A WordPress Blog-THE CHURCH MILITANT Ephesians 5:11-"And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them". This Christian News Blog maintains a one stop resource of current news and reports of its own related to church, moral, spiritual, and related political issues, plus articles, and postings from other online discernment ministries, and media which share the aims to obey the biblical commands to shed light on and refute error, heresy, apostasy, cults, and spiritual abuse. ALL CONTENT FROM HTTPS://RATHEREXPOSETHEM.BLOGSPOT.COM MOVED TO THIS NEW BLOG, MAY 2020
Have you noticed that the time in between embarrassing moments for Joe Biden seems to be getting shorter and shorter? On Wednesday, Biden nearly knocked over the Brazilian flag while walking on stage before giving a speech launching the “Partnership for Workers’ Rights” program. Later, he gave an awkward salute to the audience while appearing somewhat lost before exiting the stage.
During a speech at a campaign event at the home of billionaire Amy Goldman Fowler later in the day, Biden told the story he’s been telling for years about why he decided to run for president in 2020.
Biden started by claiming that after leaving the office of vice president, he had no intention of running for office again.
But then along came, in August of 2017, Charlottesville, Virginia. You remember those folks walking out of the fields literally carrying torches, with Nazi swastikas, holding them forward, singing the same vicious, anti-Semitic bile — the same exact bile — bile that was sung in — in Germany in the early ‘30s. And a young woman was killed. A young woman was killed.
And this was — and I re- — you may remember it. There was a consequential piece of business going on. And the former guy was asked, “What do you think would happen?” He was the sitting president. And he said, “I thought there were some very fine people on both sides.”
And I mean this sincerely, from the bottom of my heart, that’s when I decided I — I was going to run again.
Of course, the claim that Trump called neo-Nazis and white nationalists “very fine people” has long been debunked. But Biden is totally committed to this lie, telling it over and over and over again. In fact, he’s gotten so used to telling this bogus story that he ended up telling it again moments later.
“You know, you may remember that, you know, those folks from Charlottesville, as they came out of the fields and carrying those swastikas, and remember the ones with the torches and the Ku — accompanied by the Ku Klux Klan,” Biden said. “And in addition to that, they had — there were white supremacists. Anyway, they were making the big case about how terrible this was. And a young woman was killed in the process. And my predecessor, as I said, was asked what he thought. He said, ‘There are some very fine people on both sides.’ Well, that kept ringing in my head. And so, I couldn’t, quite frankly, remain silent any longer.”
Why is this important? Well, there’s been a concerted effort by the mainstream media to suggest that it’s unfair that voters are concerned about Joe Biden’s age but not Donald Trump’s. Chronologically, the two men may be only three years apart, but can anyone say that telling the same story in the same speech is normal? Whatever’s going on with Biden is getting worse.
Fauci Has $11.5 MILLION Net Worth After Leaving Government Position
Director of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Anthony Fauci testifies during a hearing before the Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies of House Appropriations Committee at Rayburn House Office Building on Capitol Hill May 11, 2022 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)
OAN’s James Meyers 3:07 PM – Tuesday, September 19, 2023
Republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, & research purposes.
A new report revealed that Dr. Anthony Fauci and his wife, Christine Grady, have a net worth of at least $11 million after he recently stepped down as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID).
According to a National Institutes of Health (NIH) termination report obtained by Fox News, it showed that the married couple are now holding $11.5 million in assets.
The wealth comes from “awards, federal compensation increases, royalties, and mutual fund investments,” he claims.
However, Fauci previously asserted that he donates all of his royalties to charity.
During his tenure as chief medical adviser to President Joe Biden and as a member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force under 45th President Donald Trump, Fauci made more money than both presidents.
He was also the highest-paid federal employee during the COVID-19 pandemic and retired with a salary of almost $481,000 a year, according to Fox.
Additionally, an investigation by the taxpayer watchdog OpenTheBooks.com found that the married couple received a net worth increase of $5 million between January 2019 and December 2021, which was up from $7.5 million.
In 2021, Fauci was handed $1 million from at least one nonprofit, the Dan David Foundation, for “speaking truth to power” and “defending science” under Trump.
“Despite being viewed as a lifelong public servant, Dr. Fauci and his wife Christine Grady — who still remains among NIH leadership today — managed to become decamillionaires,” OpenTheBooks CEO Adam Andrzejewski told The New York Post.
“It came through a mix of decades-long tenure and special assignments that added to Fauci’s salary, as well as awards, payments, and perks from private entities,” he said. “Even though Fauci left his federal position, taxpayers funded and guaranteed a lifetime pension payout that we estimate rivals the president’s salary.”
Recently, Fauci joined the staff at Georgetown University, taking on a professor position at the Infectious Diseases Division in its School of Medicine.
“This is a natural extension of my scientific, clinical, and public health career, which was initially grounded from my high school and college days where I was exposed to intellectual rigor, integrity, and service-mindedness of Jesuit institutions,” Fauci said in a June press release.
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There’s an election coming up next year, so naturally, we’re all being conditioned for a return of COVID-19. For weeks, there’s been talk of a new COVID variant, which prompted Joe Biden to request more funding for Big Pharma a new, updated vaccine. Conveniently enough, at the same time, the media started reporting on the alleged increase in COVID-19 hospitalizations, and some high-profile people suddenly caught COVID, including Jill Biden.
The message was clear: be afraid of the return of COVID. Be very afraid.
But is that really what you should be afraid of? As you may recall, during the pandemic, we learned that the vaccines didn’t necessarily protect people from COVID-19, prompting widespread skepticism. Heck, the CDC even changed the definition of vaccine to remove references to immunity. Even though you may have decided that you weren’t going to get this updated vaccine, Biden floated the idea of a new vaccine mandate.
It seems likely that the Biden administration will do whatever it can to ensure demand for this updated vaccine, which has already been approved by the FDA for all Americans six months and older. According to Johns Hopkins professor Dr. Marty Makary, this new vaccine was approved by the FDA despite any human trial data.
“They are telling every American six months of age and older to get this new COVID vaccine, but they approved it based on almost no data,” Makary told Guy Benson on his radio show. “There’s no human clinical trial data. Pfizer submitted data on ten mice, and Moderna, which also got a new vaccine approved [sic]. This is not an additional booster. This is an entirely newly designed COVID-19 vaccine they want everyone to get, even if you had COVID a few months ago. They don’t care. They’re pushing it hard.”
Even worse, the Biden administration appears ready to push this untested vaccine on children, who, we’ve pointed out many times, aren’t really at risk from COVID.
“And the White House bought four times as many doses for children this round as they did last fall when they had that new Bivalent vaccine. So this is a big push now of the Moderna trial. It turns out if you actually look at the data returned, they [Moderna] did give it to 50 people back four months ago. One of them had an adverse event requiring medical attention.”
So Pfizer has no human trial data for its new vaccine, and Moderna is being mum about the adverse effects of its new vaccine. How can they get away with this? Well, as Makary pointed out, they’ve gamed the system before.
“They know that the regulatory process to get this approved is totally greased,” Makary pointed out. “President Biden was out there saying that this thing works and everyone needs to get it before the FDA even, you know, approved it. So this thing was greased.”
Imagine a vaccine where 1 in 50 doses resulted in an adverse effect. That’s the kind of result that, in the past, would guarantee rejection from the FDA. Heck, the Biden administration put a pause on the Johnson & Johnson COVID vaccine over a one-in-a-million risk of blood clots. Consider the evidence, and ask yourself why the Biden administration is pushing you to get an updated vaccine that hasn’t been thoroughly tested to protect yourself from a virus that isn’t nearly as severe as it was two years ago.
At least 50 percent of middle school students and 75 percent of high school students in the United States are not getting enough hours of sleep on a daily basis, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).1
Commenting on children not getting enough sleep, Oleg Tarkovsky, director of Behavioral Health Services at CareFirst Blue Cross & Blue Shield, said:
It affects everything we do, including the functioning of kids, the ability to learn, their mental health, emotional social health and physical health. It affects everything.2
Tarkovsky added that for children under the age of six, inadequate sleep has a negative effect on growth and development, and, for adolescents, inadequate sleep interferes with learning by affecting memory and reducing attention spans.3
Rafael Pelayo, MD, a sleep researcher at the Stanford Sleep Medicine Center in California, said that lack of sleep in adolescents affects their executive functioning, making them more susceptible to taking drugs, committing crimes, or taking risks sexually.4
Strong Link Between Lack of Sleep and Impulsive Behaviors in Children
A 2023 study from the Youth Development Institute at the University of Georgia published in Sleep Health found that children, who had less than nine hours of sleep per day or took over 30 minutes to fall asleep, exhibited more impulsive behaviors.5
The lead researcher of the study, Linhao Zhang, stated:
Stressful environments are shown to make adolescents seek immediate rewards rather than delayed rewards, but there are also adolescents who are in stressful environments who are not impulsive. We looked at what explains that link and what makes some people differ from others. One mechanism we found is sleep.6
The study used data from the Data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study, a multi-year brain development study funded by the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH). Data from 11,858 children aged between nine and 10 years old found that lack of sleep and long sleep latency (how long it takes to fall asleep) had a strong link to impulsive behaviors.7
The researchers’ data highlighted the important role that sleep plays in children’s cognitive and behavioral development and that this information can be used to create cost-effective interventions to help in the psychological development of children experiencing stressors at home.
Zhang added:
If you want to develop interventions for people in stressful environments, it’s very costly, and sometimes it needs generational work to change. Sleep is a modifiable behavior, and these changes can be cost-efficient.8
Sleep Deprivation Can Impact Development and Performance Even in Stress-Free Environments
The study’s researchers noted that sleep deprivation can also be a problem in stress-free environments. Zhang provided an example of how teenagers have a circadian rhythm that is adapted to staying up late at night and sleeping more in the morning; however, early start times at many schools and late nights completing homework can create an imbalance. She stated:
A lot of adolescents don’t have enough time to sleep, and they are sleep deprived. This study shows why it is important to promote longer sleep duration by delaying school start times or establishing routines so that adolescents know, ‘OK, after this event, I’m going to bed.9
Parents Can Play a Role in Correcting Children’s Sleep Behaviors
Dr. Pelayo notes that although sleep is a biological necessity, sleep habits are learned, which means that parents can play an important role in modeling good sleep habits to their children. He emphasizes that being a good role model is more effective than nagging or punishment, stating:
You can’t be smoking a cigarette and telling your kids not to smoke, right? Parents have to model healthy behavior themselves. If they’re sleep-deprived, their kids will likely be, too. … The first thing you want to do is to make sleep a priority in the family, so that sleep is not negotiable.10
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The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans has given new life to a lawsuit brought by three doctors claiming the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) overstepped its authority and acted as a medical doctor rather than as a regulating authority in the agency’s campaign promoting a ban on the use of the drug Ivermectin in the treatment of COVID-19.1
The court’s decision overturned U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Vincent Brown’s lower court’s order dismissing the doctors’ lawsuit. Judge Brown agreed with the government that it was protected from the lawsuit due to sovereign immunity.2 Sovereign immunity provides that the government may not be sued without its consent. The purpose behind the legal doctrine of sovereign immunity is to protect the government from being forced to change policies should someone disagree with them and bring legal action.3
The medical doctors, Mary Bowden, Paul Marik, and Robert Apter, argue that the FDA’s actions of interfering with their prescribing of Ivermectin harmed their reputation caused punitive action to be taken against them, and interfered with the practice of medicine, which included pharmacies failing to fill their prescription orders for Ivermectin.
Jared Kalson, the lawyer for the plaintiffs argued:
If the government is going to label Ivermectin a horse medicine or a horse dewormer and promulgate the idea that it is only for animals, then the natural correlation is that doctors who prescribe it are horse doctors or quack doctors, which has played out. The government engaged in a singularly effective campaign here to malign a common drug that has been used for a very long time and has been dispensed in billions of doses. It’s one of the most famously safe drugs in the history of human medicine. And when people did exactly what the FDA said to ‘Stop it. Stop it with the Ivermectin,’ I don’t understand how that would not be traceable back to the FDA.4
Court Rules “FDA Not a Physician”
The plaintiffs appealed the lower court order to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. The panel of three appellate judges, including Judge Don Willet, Judge Jennifer Walker Elrod, and Judge Edith Brown Clement agreed with the plaintiffs that the FDA committed government agency overreach and allowed the doctors to proceed with their lawsuit.5
The Order read,:
FDA is not a physician. It has authority to inform, announce, and apprise—but not to endorse, denounce, or advise. The doctors have plausibly alleged that FDA’s posts fell on the wrong side of the line between telling about and telling to. As such, the doctors can use the APA to assert their ultra vires claims against the agencies and the officials.6
Judge Willet took issue with the FDA’s Aug. 21, 2021 Twitter post stating, “You are not a horse. You are not a cow. Seriously, y’all. Stop it.” The judge wrote, “Even tweet-sized doses of personalized medical advice are beyond FDA’s statutory authority.”7
How a Licensed Inexpensive Antiparasitic Drug Helped Treat COVID
Merck originally marketed Ivermectin, which was licensed in 1981, as a veterinary antiparasitic drug. By the late 1980s, Ivermectin became the most widely used antiparasitic drug in both animals and humans and has been especially useful in Africa to effectively and safely control malaria.89 A Nobel prize-winning drug, doctors have been prescribing Ivermectin to patients for decades.10
So how did a cheap, accessible antiparasitic become such a popular drug used to treat SARS-CoV-2 infections during the COVID pandemic?
In 2020, Australian researchers from the Biomedicine Discovery Institute (BDI) at Monash University made the discovery that Ivermectin could neutralize the novel SARS-CoV-2 virus within 48 hours. The study, a joint effort between Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute, Monash University in Clayton, Australia, and the Peter Doherty Institute of Infection and Immunity—a joint venture between the University of Melbourne and the Royal Melbourne Hospital, both in Melbourne, Australia—found that, in vitro, the drug proved effective against a number of viruses, including HIV, dengue, influenza, and Zika. The findings suggested that just a single dose of Ivermectin could remove or significantly reduce viral RNA within 24 to 48 hours of SARS-CoV-2 .
Dr. Kylie Wagstaff, Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute scientist and leader of the study said: “We found that even a single dose could essentially remove all viral RNA by 48 hours and that even at 24 hours there was a really significant reduction in it.”
A study was published in 2021 in the American Journal of Therapeutics providing evidence that the use of Ivermectin reduces morbidity and mortality from SARS-CoV-2 infections, including time to recovery and viral clearance.11 In addition, Ivermectin is being investigated as an option for treating certain other human viral infections like latent Epstein Barr, which can be reactivated in some individuals when they are infected with SARS-CoV-2 and lead to long COVID.121314
Ivermectin Showed Antiviral Effects Against Omicron and Other Variants
Off-label use of Ivermectin has been the source of much scrutiny among many public health officials throughout and even following the pandemic. And while historically prescribed as an antiparasitic for humans and animals, the drug did show and other variants in 2022 during joint nonclinical research conducted by Japanese pharmaceutical company, Kowa Co. Ltd.15
Additionally, another study published in The Lancet in 2021 found Ivermectin to incite “antiviral activity against SARS-CoV-2 and provides insights into the type of evaluations to be considered in the assessment of antiviral drugs for the control of COVID.”16
Popular podcast host and health and wellness influencer Joe Rogan posted a video only days after the FDA urged people to stop taking the drug to prevent or treat COVID-19 to share he was taking Ivermectin after contracting the virus. He said that taking Ivermectin in conjunction with monoclonal antibodies, prednisone, azithromycin, a NAD drip, and a vitamin drip, a protocol he shared with his followers, helped him feel “great” only three days later.
FDA’s Condemnation of Ivermectin-Blocked Doctor Prescriptions for COVID Patients
Judge Willet further pointed out that Ivermectin is available in both animal and human form and that doctors have been prescribing the drug to patients for decades. However, after the FDA’s condemnation of Ivermectin as an ineffective and potentially dangerous treatment for COVID-19, pharmacies across the country began refusing to fill doctors’ prescriptions for patients.
A Department of Justice attorney, Ashley Cheumg Honold, clarified the FDA’s position to the court stating…
FDA explicitly recognizes that doctors do have the authority to prescribe ivermectin to treat COVID.17
Despite the FDA’s statement that doctors have the authority to prescribe Ivermectin to treat COVID, pharmacies continue to refuse to fill prescriptions for the drug, leaving patients scrambling. Dr Bowden told The Epoch Times:
This needs to come to an end. In telling my patients what medicines they can and cannot have access to, we effectively have a large group of pharmacists practicing medicine without a license. They have no accountability for this yet they are allowed to dictate patient care. … I see it every single day. Enough is enough.18
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Gay Trump Official Roasted for Condemning Texas GOP’s Ban on Gay Republican Group
Former Trump administration official Richard Grenell faced backlash when he publicly condemned the Republican Party’s announcement to host the 2028 GOP convention in Houston, Texas. He pointed out that Texas is the only state where the gay Republican group “Log Cabin Republicans” is banned from their state convention. Predictably, many of his conservative followers did not respond kindly to his denunciation of the Texas Republican Party’s homophobia. Read More About This Story Here: https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2023/08/g...
I have to admit, I was shocked when I first saw this clip.
There’s been a lot of talk about Trump’s recent interview on SiriusXM’s “The Megyn Kelly Show,” but his answer to what may have been one of the most important questions was so horrifying awful, I can’t even wrap my head around it.
During the interview, Megyn Kelly asked Trump a very simple question: “Can a man become a woman?”
Easy, right? The answer is “No, absolutely not.” It’s not complex or complicated. There’s no room for nuance, different points of view, or interpretation. A man cannot become a woman. A woman cannot become a man. There’s no gender spectrum, nor are there more than two genders.
Yet, in response to the easy question, Trump first replied with an “Ummmmmm,” then a chuckle, before saying, “In my opinion, you have a man, you have a woman. I think part of it is birth. Can the man give birth? No, although they’ll come up with some answer to that also someday. I heard just the other day they have a way that now the man can give birth. No, I would say I’ll continue my stance on that.”
What kind of an answer is that? Look, the sad reality is that there is no middle ground on this issue. Trump may be strongly against the mutilation of children by the transgender cult, but it feels like Trump is trying to have it both ways on this transgender nonsense, and you just can’t.
Sure, he banned transgender people in the military and is against giving children puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones and such, but at the root of this issue isn’t merely whether or not a kid has the mental capacity to consent to transitioning, whether biological men should be able to play in women’s sports, or whether someone on hormones should be in the military. The root of this issue is the fundamental and basic question of whether a man can become a woman or vice versa. And if you even give the slightest hint that maybe “someday” it might be possible, then you legitimatize the transgender movement and the entire industry behind it. To make matters worse, Trump also referred to Bruce “Caitlyn” Jenner by feminine pronouns.
Republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, & research purposes.
The traitor class that has captured the U.S. government despises the U.S. military rank-and-file. They control the brass, but they are aware that the ranks are still filled with patriots, and they’re doing their best to remedy that.
“Marines were ordered to pick up human feces before they were allowed to leave Kabul: ‘Degrading and ridiculous,’” by Miranda Devine, New York Post, September 10, 2023:
Before they were allowed to leave Kabul in August 2021, having just lost 13 comrades to a suicide bomber, US Marines were ordered to pick up human feces and other disgusting trash at the airport so as to leave it pristine for the Taliban.
The Kabul airport passenger terminal was filthy on Aug. 28, 2021, after the botched Afghanistan withdrawal.
More than 120,000 Afghans had camped there for a week, “defecating and leaving trash, bags, clothes, and other unspeakable things.”…
The order to clean “came with a threat that we would not leave at all if it was not completed,” one junior Marine told authors Jerry Dunleavy and James Hasson.
Washington Gun Law President, William Kirk, answers one of the most common questions we've received here in the last couple of days as we have covered the grotesque incursion into individual liberties as Governor Michelle Lujan Griffin has suspended the Constitutional Rights of hundreds of thousands of her citizens because she believes she knows how to keep her communities safe. Can she be impeached? How is it done in New Mexico? Well, we actually just read the New Mexico state constitution so that we talk about all of that and much, much more so that we can arm ourselves with education.
Republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, & research purposes.
WARNING: Liberal Logic Ahead, iStock
The unilateral action by New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham declaring a ban on civilian possession of a firearm, whether open or concealed, in public “to remain in effect for the duration of the public health emergencies. . .” is unconstitutional, unconscionable, and illegal.
But, apart from the illegality of Grisham’s Public Health Order on Second Amendment grounds and U.S. Supreme Court’s Bruen rulings,,,
…the Order runs afoul of New Mexico’s own state Statutes!
This latter matter has not yet been discussed. We do so here.
We begin with the phrase “Gun Violence,” which appears in the Governor’s Public Health Order. For the longest time, the Anti-Second Amendment establishment has raged over this thing, “Gun Violence.” The idea implicit in ‘Gun Violence,’ if one insists on the expression, is that of ‘Criminal Violence’, where a criminal uses “a gun” in the commission of a crime. In that commonsensical view the phrase ‘Gun Violence’ simply denotes criminal use of guns, nothing more.
So why not eschew talk of Gun Violence for the appropriate expression, ‘Criminal Violence’?
Doing so would drive public policy where it belongs, on crime and criminals and away from the mechanism criminals sometimes employ, although not invariably, to do their horrible misdeeds.
But Democrats and Progressives don’t want to talk about crime and criminals. They don’t even want to talk about criminal use of guns. They only want to talk about guns and reducing the number of them, and that creates a real problem.
For, who is it that owns and possesses most of those “guns?” The answer is tens of millions of innocent, rational, responsible, law-abiding citizens.
And why do tens of millions of Americans wish to keep and bear guns?
Well, they do so for many reasons, all lawful, and one of which stands out as predominant: self-defense.
But little mention of this finds its way into the public square because Democrats and a sympathetic Press won’t allow it. They don’t want it. Anti-Second Amendment elements in Government, in the Press, and in the greater society have their own uses for ‘Gun Violence.’ It is they, after all, who have coined the expression.
And that phrase is the driving force behind the Governor’s Public “Health” Order.
Boiled down to its essence, the tacit message conveyed is this:
“Guns are a virus, a virulent contagion, and like all virulent contagions, must be rooted out, quarantined, and eradicated, and I, New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, intend to do just that!”
The idea of Guns as a virulent contagion is not a novel idea. It goes back decades.
In 1995, in an Academic Article, Don Kates and others wrote (Guns And Public Health: Epidemic Of Violence Or Pandemic Of Propaganda?) about the strategy to deny one’s exercise of the natural law right of armed self-defense by viewing guns as a health menace. The article’s writers referred to this strategy as “The Public Health Agenda.”
“In 1979 the American public health community adopted the ‘objective to reduce the number of handguns in private ownership,’ the initial target being a 25% reduction by the year 2000. Based on studies, and propelled by leadership from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the objective has broadened so that it now includes banning and confiscation of all handguns, restrictive licensing of owners of other firearms, and eventual elimination of firearms from American life, . . . .
This follows the health advocate sages’ avowed intention to promote the idea that firearm ownership is an evil and that its elimination is a desirable and efficacious means of reducing violence.” From “Guns And Public Health: Epidemic Of Violence Or Pandemic Of Propaganda?”, 62 Tenn. L. Rev. 513, Spring, 1995, by Don B. Kates, et. al.
Viewing “Gun Violence” as a medical matter is inane. It involves tortuous use of a literary device, metaphor, as a mechanism upon which to design and implement public policy.
The metaphor is that guns are like a virulent plague and must be stamped out. And Governor Grisham’s Order is based on the metaphor of “Guns As Virulent Virus.” She attempts to apply the metaphor to law. That is absurd.
Our free Constitutional Republic is grounded on law, not metaphor.
Nonetheless, Grisham trusts that she can skate around the Second Amendment issue and the constraints of State law by focusing on guns as a public health menace. She hopes that no one will bother to notice the card trick and the use of metaphor she employs to do this.
Unfortunately, pervasive and undeniable lunacy doesn’t prevent ideological fanatics who wield immense power from thrusting their lunacy on everyone else, embroiling us all in their nightmarish reality.
So, why isn’t anyone attacking the Governor’s lunacy head-on? That is where attention should first be directed.
Grisham cites several New Mexico State Statutes. Do they offer her support? Let’s see.
“A. A state of public health emergency may be declared by the governor upon the occurrence of a public health emergency. Prior to a declaration of a state of public health emergency, the governor shall consult with the secretary of health. The governor shall authorize the secretary of health, the secretary of public safety and the director to coordinate a response to the public health emergency.”
But the pertinent question here is whether the mere possession of guns in public equates with “Gun Violence” such that this “Gun Possession” qua “Gun Violence” falls within the legal definition of a ‘Public Health Emergency’ under New Mexico law.
“As used in the Public Health Act [Chapter 24, Article 1 NMSA 1978]:
A. ‘condition of public health importance’ means an infection, a disease, a syndrome, a symptom, an injury or other threat that is identifiable on an individual or community level and can reasonably be expected to lead to adverse health effects in the community; . . . .”
So, then, Does “a condition of public health importance” include “Gun Violence” qua “Possessing Guns in Public” under New Mexico law?
No, it does not. This kind of thing does not fall within the purview of New Mexico’s “Public Health Act” and, therefore, cannot be construed as a “Public Health Emergency” under New Mexico law, as shown below.
N.M. Stat. Ann. § 12-10A-3 is the applicable “Definitions,” and Section. N.M. Stat. Ann. § 12-10A-3 (G) defines the phrase, ‘public health emergency.’
“‘Public health emergency’ means the occurrence or imminent threat of exposure to an extremely dangerous condition or a highly infectious or toxic agent, including a threatening communicable disease, that poses an imminent threat of substantial harm to the population of New Mexico or any portion thereof.”
Does the phrase “exposure to an extremely dangerous condition” that appears in the afore-cited statutory section embrace “Gun Violence” qua “Possessing Guns in Public” under New Mexico Law?
Such an idea would be a stretch—an impossible stretch. N.M. Stat. Ann. § 12-10A-2 explains why.
N.M. Stat. Ann. § 12-10A-2 (Purposes of the Act) says,
“The purposes of the Public Health Emergency Response Act [12-10A-1 NMSA 1978] are to:
A. provide the state of New Mexico with the ability to manage public health emergencies in a manner that protects civil rights and the liberties of individual persons; [emphasis added]
B. prepare for a public health emergency; and
C. provide access to appropriate care, if needed, for an indefinite number of infected, exposed or endangered people in the event of a public health emergency.”
Paragraph “C” implies the presence of an ongoing and serious chemical, biological, or epidemiological hazard, causing illness to many people. Such a health emergency is objective and the harm caused to many is measurable and extensive.
A health emergency does not include criminological problems, sociological concerns, or matters deriving from political biases or animosities.
Moreover, Paragraph “A” makes abundantly clear that any declaration of a public health emergency must be conducted in a manner that “protects civil rights and the liberties of individuals.”
The right of the people to keep and bear arms is one such fundamental civil right that requires protection when the New Mexico Governor declares, as here, a “Public Health Emergency.”
But how can the exercise of a fundamental civil right, the right of the people to keep and bear arms—that the governor implies is a public health emergency (for that is what the New Mexico Public Health Order targets), and one that must be harshly dealt with—truly be considered a health emergency under New Mexico law when that health emergency is the very fundamental civil right that must, as New Mexico law makes clear, be protected during an emergency?
The answer is: It cannot! That is the crux of the problem for Grisham and her “Public Health Order.”
Governor Grisham’s Order is legally incoherent, incompatible with State Statute, logically inconsistent, and, on analysis, overtly nonsensical.
We hope someone challenging Governor Grisham’s “Public Health Order” in Federal or State Court will make that argument.
About The Arbalest Quarrel:
Arbalest Group created `The Arbalest Quarrel’ website for a special purpose. That purpose is to educate the American public about recent Federal and State firearms control legislation. No other website, to our knowledge, provides as deep an analysis or as thorough an analysis. Arbalest Group offers this information free.
New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham issued a public health order suspending open and concealed carry of firearms in Bernalillo County public places for the next 30 days. Bernalillo County is the home of Albuquerque.
The Governor announced in a press conference Friday that she was taking the extraordinary step after the death of an 11-year-old due to a gunshot and several other shootings. She made the announcement alongside other New Mexico officials, all of whom had taken solemn oaths to support and defend the Constitution.
The Governor claims she has the power because “gun violence” is a “public health crisis.”
The order will almost certainly be challenged on Constitutional grounds. The move seems to run afoul of the Bruen Decision, which said individuals have the right to carry firearms outside the home. The Supreme Court did not make any exceptions for “public health.” In fact, the decision knocked down interest balancing. The Governor stated she expects legal challenges to the order.
AmmoLand News has reached out to several gun rights organizations to get comments. Gun Owners of America (GOA) responded, and the organization is aware of the Governor’s actions and is looking at options to challenge it.
One Cuban American who works for GOA compared the order to the country his family fled.
“New Mexico’ Governor has violated the rights of New Mexico’s law-abiding citizens in a manner I would only expect to see 90 miles off the coast of Florida,” said Luis Valdes, Florida Director, GOA. “In the Communist Hellscape that is Cuba. Criminals will continue to break the law, and the law-abiding will suffer because of it.”
Besides the restriction on carrying firearms outside of one’s residence, there were several other stipulations introduced. Including one measure that will place increased pressure on the locally owned and operated gun shops, implementing monthly inspections of federal firearms licensees (FFL) by the state.
• The Regulation and Licensing Division will conduct monthly inspections of licensed firearm dealers to ensure compliance with all sales and storage laws. • The Department of Health, along with the Environment Department, will begin wastewater testing for illegal substances such as fentanyl at schools. • The Department of Health will compile and issue a comprehensive report on gunshot victims presenting at hospitals in New Mexico, which shall include (if available): demographic data of gunshot victims, including age, gender, race, and ethnicity; data on gunshot victims’ healthcare outcomes; the brand and caliber of the firearm used; the general circumstances leading to the injury; the impact of gunshot victims on New Mexico’s healthcare system; and any other pertinent information. • No firearms are allowed on state property, including state buildings and schools. This also includes other places of education where children gather, such as parks. • New Mexico State Police will add officers in Albuquerque with funding for overtime provided. • The Children, Youth, and Families Department will immediately suspend the Juvenile Detention Alternative Initiative and evaluate juvenile probation protocols.
No lawsuits have been announced, but it is not a question of if. It is only a question of how many and when the cases will be filed.
UPDATE 9/9/2023 Local Law Enforcement have begun to weigh in:
Statement from Bernalillo County Sheriff John Allen:
“…However, as the elected Sheriff, I have reservations regarding this order. While I understand and appreciate the urgency, the temporary ban challenges the foundation of our Constitution, which I swore an oath to uphold. I am wary of placing my deputies in positions that could lead to civil liability conflicts, as well as the potential risks posed by prohibiting law-abiding citizens from their constitutional right to self-defense.
I was elected to represent and safeguard all constituents and to ensure the balance between our rights and public safety is maintained. That means we must critically evaluate any proposed solution to the deeply rooted issue of gun violence, ensuring we both protect our community and uphold the values that define us as a nation.” ~ Bernalillo County Sheriff John Allen.
Albuquerque Police Department Chief Medina sent the following message to APD officers about the governor’s state order on gun possession.
UPDATE 9/10/2023
Late Saturday, September 9th, 2023, Gun Owners of America filed a Temporary Restraining Order against the NM Governor’s unconstitutional order.
RANDY DONK, GUN OWNERS OF AMERICA, INC. and GUN OWNERS FOUNDATION, Plaintiffs, v. Civil Action No. 1:23-cv-…
New Mexico Suspends Concealed Carry Public Health Order
About John Crump
John is an NRA instructor and a constitutional activist. John has written about firearms, interviewed people from all walks of life, and on the Constitution. John lives in Northern Virginia with his wife and sons and can be followed on Twitter at @crumpyss, or at www.crumpy.com.
The Attending Physician of the United States Congress and the United States Supreme Court, Navy Rear Admiral Dr. Brian Monahan, wants you to calm down and stop telling Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Octogenarian) to go home. On Tuesday, the good Dr. Monahan publicly assured the world that when Mitch has suffered his recent spells of sudden speechlessness and confusion, he isn’t in the throes of a stroke or a seizure. Hey, that’s terrific, Dr. Monahan! But what exactly is McConnell suffering from, then? On that, Monahan was as silent as McConnell himself during one of his freeze-ups.Slay News noted Tuesday that “in a one-paragraph letter to 81-year-old Sen. McConnell, Monahan said he reached his conclusion after a comprehensive neurological assessment.” This comprehensive assessment included a brain MRI, an EEG, and “consultations with several neurologists.” All this neurological testing was necessary because the savvy establishment Republican mainstay froze up again in the middle of a press conference on Aug. 30, just over a month after he went bizarrely silent in similar circumstances for the first time on July 26.
Monahan wrote happily to the aged controlled opposition leader: “There is no evidence that you have a seizure disorder or that you experienced a stroke, [transient ischemic attack] or movement disorder, such as Parkinson’s disease.” The respected physician reminded the superannuated solon, who after all that he has been through may have forgotten that he had “examined McConnell’s health extensively after he suffered a fall in July.” Monahan added that had used “brain [magnetic resonance] imaging, [electroencephalogram] study, and consultations with several neurologists for a comprehensive neurology assessment.”
Gee, that’s swell, but then what did account for Mitch suddenly falling silent, as well as having “reportedly ‘face-planted’ at an airport shortly before the first freezing episode”? What did lead to the fact that ol’ Mitch “also fell while walking on March 8, which led to a fractured ribcage”? Why does he “use a wheelchair at airports”? On all that, Monahan had absolutely nothing to say. The Attending Physician of the United States Congress is content to leave the American people, and presumably the illustrious senator himself, in the dark about the reason or reasons why his health is so rapidly deteriorating before the eyes of the world.
And when you think about it, it is altogether fitting and proper that Monahan should do this. The members of the United States Senate, after all, are not like you and me. They don’t have the same kind of accountability and responsibility that ordinary citizens have. They must be allowed to feed at the public trough in an absolutely unhindered fashion. The public wants to know why Mitch keeps freezing up like an old Buick on a cold winter’s day. Why, what effrontery! What insolence! What right do we peasants have to know what is going on with those who rule over us and who live so lavishly at our expense?
Mitch McConnell has been “serving,” as it is still put so quaintly, in the Senate since the waning days of Ronald Reagan’s first term. The world has changed slightly since the day Mitch took his seat in the esteemed chamber. When he entered the senate, the learned talking heads were confidently assuring the nation and the world that the Soviet Union was here to stay and that Reagan was disastrously wrong not to continue the previous policy of appeasement known as “détente.”
And long before that, on the day Mitch was born, FDR signed Executive Order 9066, which led to the internment of over 120,000 Japanese Americans in the United States during World War II. That same day, the Japanese defeated Allied forces in the Battle of Badung Strait, off Bali. Today, for a variety of reasons, we aren’t as worried as we once were about the Soviet Union or the Japanese empire, but Mitch is still around.
The clearest indication of just how very old Mitch McConnell really is today is the fact that he is nine months older to the day than Old Joe Biden, who gives us indications of his diminished cognitive abilities on a daily basis (and whose doctors are no more forthcoming about what is going on than is Brian Monahan). It is long past time for McConnell to step aside and allow others to revitalize the political opposition that McConnell, as its putative leader, has done so much to hamstring. But Brian Monahan, and McConnell himself, continue to do all they can to push Mitch’s longed-for day of retirement off into the future.
Happy Friday, dear Kruiser Morning Briefing friends. Swanya felt vindicated when the women of Paint Nite admitted that they loved her chickpea/Negroni marmalade.
People trying to make points about their personal views on part of the United States Constitution will often say, “The Founding Fathers never intended,” or something similar. The presumption that some Twitter/X rando in 2023 could even begin to grasp what the likes of Benjamin Franklin or Alexander Hamilton were thinking is beyond ludicrous, but the Founding Fathers were fans of free speech, so people are allowed to babble nonsensically.
One thing I am fairly confident in assuming, however, is that the Founding Fathers couldn’t have known that people would live as long as they do now and that they would serve in elective office long past their “Best If Used By” dates. Depending on the source, the average life expectancy of a male in 1776 was between 38 and 43 years.
Yes, two of the Founding Fathers — Thomas Jefferson and John Adams — famously lived long lives, especially for the time. They each died on July 4, 1826, aged 83 and 90, respectively.
But they were sane people who had been retired from public office for a very long time.
Now we’ve got Mitch McConnell and Dianne Feinstein hanging around the Senate when they’re obviously not in good shape. Worse yet, the octogenarian president of the United States provides more evidence with each public appearance that he has mentally and physically checked out. Beyond the obvious decline, another thing that they have in common is that licensed physicians keep clearing them to work.
After McConnell’s second thoroughly disturbing “freezing up” event, the Capitol Hill physician issued a report that basically said, “Nah, he’s fine.” Now Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky — another licensed physician — is calling malarkey on that, which Matt wrote about:
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) has done something surprising. He’s disputing the Capitol Hill physician’s report on Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) that blames his recent freezing episodes on dehydration. Paul isn’t just blowing smoke here. He’s an ophthalmologist who practiced medicine for nearly thirty years. So when he speaks about the diagnosis, there’s reason to listen.
“I’ve practiced medicine for 25 years, and it doesn’t look like dehydration to me,” Paul told the media on Wednesday. “It looks like a focal neurologic event. That doesn’t mean it’s incapacitating, doesn’t mean he can’t serve. But it means that somebody ought to wake up and say, ‘Wow, this looks like a seizure.’”
I’m a native of a desert. I know what dehydration looks like. I may not be a doctor, but I know that McConnell isn’t glitching simply because he needs some Gatorade.
The physician enablers — we can throw John Fetterman’s doctor into the mix, too — are doing the country a disservice by giving their patients a green light to hang around at work until they drop. The White House physician who insists that President LOLEightyonemillion is functional is an active participant in the rapid destruction of the Republic.
The arrogance of these physicians is irritating. Those of us who haven’t been to medical school are supposed to disregard what’s in plain sight because, “Trust me, I’m a doctor.” I’ve known a lot of people who have suffered from shingles, which was what supposedly kept Dianne Feinstein out on sick leave for so long. None of the people I know who had shingles looked like they had a stroke afterward.
The bigger question — which we’ve asked here about Biden a lot — is, don’t these people have anyone who loves them enough to tell them it’s time to call it a day? Are they all in agreement that clinging to power is worth the repeated public embarrassment and potential further damage to the health of the one in the spotlight? I don’t personally know any of the people I’m writing about here, and I’m really uncomfortable watching them struggle and fall apart before our eyes.
The eyes that their doctors tell us we shouldn’t trust.
There is an unfortunate history of famous people getting their doctors to do and say whatever they wanted them to. Elvis and Prince would be the two most notable examples of that.
The media is in fearmongering mode; in recent weeks, we’ve been told about a new COVID-19 variant, a new vaccine in the works, and a potential new mandate. Dr. Anthony Fauci has been resurrected, telling the public that studies that dispute the effectiveness of masks are wrong and that if the CDC recommends masking again, they are right.
Many have observed that it appears the public is being conditioned for the return of the pandemic and all the terrible memories from those dark days: masking, social distancing, vaccine mandates, shutdowns, and, for good measure, illegal changes to election laws for your safety.
So when the news dropped that Jill Biden, the wife of and personal handler for Joe Biden, tested positive for COVID-19, my first thought was, “Of course she did; why didn’t I see that coming?” It was inevitable.
Her Communications Director Elizabeth Alexander released a statement Monday evening.
“This evening, the First Lady tested positive for COVID-19,” the statement read. “She is currently experiencing only mild symptoms. She will remain at their home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware.”
According to reports, she’s double-vaccinated and double-boosted and previously caught COVID a year ago. So far, Joe Biden remains in the clear.
“Following the First Lady’s positive test for COVID-19, President Biden was administered a COVID test this evening,” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement released to the media. “The President tested negative. The President will test at a regular cadence this week and monitor for symptoms.”
Even before this latest development, many suspected that a psyop was afoot, and Jill Biden testing positive has affirmed that suspicion. Naturally, the liberal media was quick to poopoo such “conspiracy theories” and insisted that COVID is a growing problem again.
However, the announcement of the First Lady’s infection comes amid a spike in infections in the U.S. spurred on by the emergence of two new variants of the virus, prompting speculation that fresh COVID restrictions could be on the horizon.
In the week to August 19, there were more than 15,000 hospitalizations due to COVID-19 infections across the U.S., the most recent monitoring figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) show—a rise of nearly 19 percent on the week prior.
Admissions have been steadily rising since July, but are far below the highest peaks of the pandemic and appear to be localized into hotspots. A CDC spokesperson told Newsweek on Thursday it currently has no intention to call for a return of mandated mask-wearing, but didn’t deny that this might change if cases of the new variants were to rise significantly.
Newsweek then went on to dismiss the “conspiracy theories” of various right-leaning voices arguing that we’re being primed to go back to pandemic mode soon because of the new COVID variant. But we all know what has happened to “conspiracy theories” in the recent past, don’t we?
Just three months after the Biden administration announced that U.S. taxpayers would fund a $5 billion initiative called Project NextGen to develop “next generation” COVID-19 vaccines and therapeutics, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) awarded $1.4 billion in contracts under the program on Aug. 22, 2023. The total includes “$1 billion for COVID vaccine clinical trials, $326 million to create a new COVID monoclonal antibody drug, and $100 million to develop novel COVID vaccines and therapeutic technologies.”123
The HHS awards come on the heels of Pfizer implementing cost-cutting measures after sales for its Comirnaty messenger RNA (mRNA) COVID biologic and Paxlovid, a protease inhibitor drug, saw sharp declines this year. After Pfizer’s COVID products underperformed in 2023, the company predicted a rise in infection rates this fall that will inform its future sale strategy in the COVID market as it transitions from a government-dominated sales market to a commercial one.
However, reported cases of new SARS-CoV-2 infections in the U.S. have been rising sooner than expected, with public health officials tracking three new SARS-CoV-2 variants, including EG.5, FL.1.5.1, and BA.2.86. Coinciding with Project NextGen, the latest surge in COVID cases has led some universities and companies to reinstate the mask mandates in yet another repeat effort to “slow the spread” of the new SARS-CoV-2 variants. 3
Mask Wearing Reduced the Risk of Coronavirus Infection and Death by Only Five Percent
Throughout the pandemic, health officials in countries have been divided over whether face coverings effectively prevent the transmission of SARS-CoV-2 infections. Research conducted by Cochrane of London, England has provided substantial evidence to resolve this uncertainty. The Cochrane analysis of 78 global studies involving over one million people published on Jan. 30, 2023, found that masks only reduced the risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection and death by a mere five percent, and authors asserted that the benefits of mask-wearing and mask mandates did not outweigh the risks, such as impeding children’s academic and cognitive development in their early years.4
Considered the “gold standard” in assessing evidence-based medicine and public health policies, Cochrane reviews follow a rigorous methodology, are generally less vulnerable to bias, and only consider high-quality evidence in their systematic reviews that investigate the effects of interventions for disease prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation.5
In response to Cochrane’s new findings, Francois Balloux, PhD, director of the UCL Genetics Institute and professor of computational biology at University College London, wrote:
Irrespective of the limitations of the study, its results indicate that the true impact of medical/surgical masks and N95/P2 respirators on the transmission of respiratory viruses is at best small. 6
Other key findings by Cochrane included: there were no clear differences between the use of medical/surgical masks compared with N95/P2 respirators in healthcare workers when used in routine care to reduce respiratory viral infection; and community mask-wearing makes little to no difference in lab-confirmed infections, compared to not masking. However, the authors concluded that immunocompromised or vulnerable individuals may benefit from mask-wearing, since interventions that are not effective at a population level may still provide a personal benefit to at-risk individuals.
Vaccine Failure Persists as CDC Suggests New Variants May Evade Natural and Vaccine-Acquired Immunity
Health authorities warn that the highly mutated BA.2.86 lineage of coronavirus may be more capable than its predecessors to cause infection in people who have been vaccinated for COVID or have been previously infected with SARS-CoV-2. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said that, due to the high number of mutations detected in this new SARS-CoV-2 strain, it may be more efficient at evading immunity from vaccines and previous infections.7
The federal health agency abruptly stopped tracking breakthrough infections, or instances of vaccine failure in 2021, choosing to only include data on breakthrough infections that result in hospitalizations and deaths.8Newer COVID booster shots, which COVID vaccine manufacturers and health officials claim will prevent serious complications from infection with an Omicron subvariant known as XBB.1.5, are expected to be available by the end of this month.910
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Federal Appeals Court Revives FDA Lawsuit Regarding Anti-Ivermectin Campaign
A sign for the Food And Drug Administration is seen outside of the headquarters on July 20, 2020 in White Oak, Maryland. (Photo by Sarah Silbiger/Getty Images
OAN’s Brooke Mallory 11:48 AM – Monday, September 4, 2023
Republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, & research purposes.
A federal appeals court overturned a prior judgment on Friday, enabling a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) lawsuit involving its campaign against the use of ivermectin to treat COVID-19 to proceed.
In a lawsuit filed against the FDA last year, three different doctors asserted that the agency had overstepped its boundaries in its anti-ivermectin campaign, “acting more like a medical body than a regulator.”
A district judge had originally ruled that the lawsuit could not proceed, but in a Friday decision, the 5th Circuit Appeals judge gave the physicians new hope by remanding the matter to a lower court for reconsideration.
“FDA is not a physician. It has authority to inform, announce, and apprise — but not to endorse, denounce, or advise,” said Judge Don Willett. “The Doctors have plausibly alleged that FDA’s Posts fell on the wrong side of the line between telling about and telling to.”
Ivermectin is an anti-parasite drug that is frequently prescribed to horses but also occasionally prescribed to people as well. The FDA’s campaign, which featured viral posters stating “You are not a horse,” underscored the agency’s warnings that it should not be used to treat the COVID-19 virus.
“Although [the] FDA has approved ivermectin for certain uses in humans and animals, it has not authorized or approved ivermectin for use in preventing or treating COVID-19, nor has the agency stated that it is safe or effective for that use,” the agency’s recommendations stated.
While a handful of people were reportedly hospitalized and some even died from the drug, which occurs if one takes ivermectin in addition to certain other medications, many groups still welcomed it as a miracle cure and claimed to receive beneficial results for their health.
However, In 2021, a review of 14 studies on the use of ivermectin concluded that there was insufficient evidence to justify its usage, adding that “few [of the studies] are considered high quality.”
Yet, “It must be acknowledged that some of these studies were possibly intentionally designed to yield predetermined findings,” researchers maintained.
Besides COVID-19, there have also been reports from those suffering from autoimmune disorders who claim that ivermectin helped combat their negative symptoms and that they have been taking the anti-parasite drug for years.
The National Institutes of Health and the World Health Organization are two organizations that have consistently advised against using ivermectin to treat COVID-19.
The anti-ivermectin FDA campaign, according to the three doctors, damaged their doctoral reputations since they had previously encouraged the use of the drug. One doctor was expelled from medical school, and another was even suspended from working at a hospital.
“This case has broad implications for protecting the practice of medicine from unlawful interference by the FDA,” the doctors’ attorney, Jared Kelson, said in a statement. “It’s about ensuring that federal agencies act only within their statutory authority. The FDA crossed a bright line here.”
One of the pro-liberty plaintiffs in the case, Mary Talley Bowen, praised the decision on Friday.
“A small win, or at least a step forward, in a monumental battle to protect the doctor-patient relationship from government tyranny… ONWARD!” Bowen said.
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Biden To Request Funds From Congress For New COVID Vaccine
US President Joe Biden speaks to the press after attending a pilates class in South Tahoe, California, on August 25, 2023. (Photo by MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images)
OAN’s Roy Francis 9:56 AM – Saturday, August 26, 2023
“I signed off this morning on a proposal we have to present to the Congress a request for additional funding for a new vaccine that is necessary, that works,” Biden told reporters while vacationing in Lake Tahoe. “It will likely be recommended that everybody get it no matter whether they’ve gotten it before or not.”
The announcement comes after reports of a recent rise in COVID-19 cases in some regions of the country. Due to the recent reports of a rise in hospitalizations, mask mandates are also slowly being reintroduced by some organizations, such as LionsGate studios.
Updated versions of the vaccine which contain the newer version of the virus are already being developed by Pfizer, Novavx, and Moderna. Officials claim that due to the mutating nature of the virus, the vaccine needs to constantly be updated.
The supplemental funding that the Biden administration recently presented to Congress did not include any funding for COVID-19 vaccines. Instead, the request asked for around $40 billion for short-term “key priorities” such as more aid for Ukraine, federal disaster funds, climate change, and a minimal amount for border security.
In the fall of 2022, Biden had also asked for around $9 billion from Congress for funding for the virus, but the request was denied by Congress at the time.
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The people of Maui have been through a disaster of biblical proportions as wildfires swept the area earlier this month, leaving a path of destruction so vast that it left hundreds of people dead, thousands missing, and even more without homes. To make matters worse, it appears that an incompetent government may have actually added to the misery they have experienced. Somehow, that always seems to be the case, doesn’t it?
Both PJ Media’s Lincoln Brown and The Blaze reported that left-wing politics may have played a part in setting Maui up to burn to ashes, along with the delayed distribution of water the area needed badly. Guys, this is going to make you absolutely livid, so, if you have high blood pressure, you might want to do a little deep breathing and meditation before continuing on because this is horrendous.
The reports state that Herman Andaya, the administrator of the Maui Emergency Management Agency — who has since stepped down from his post — did not trust the public to react in a civilized, orderly manner, so he opted to not sound the alarm as the wildfires began to decimate the city of Lahaina. It doesn’t matter how you might think people will react; sound the alarm. That was literally his main job. His failure to execute his job duties is responsible for some of the loss of life that occurred during this tragedy.
It actually gets worse from here. Other officials for the city had been warned for years now that Lahaina is a high risk for wildfires, but they did nothing to work on implementing some sort of system that would help prevent such a disaster, including a lack of practiced escape plans and no early evacuations.
The Blaze goes on to point out that a large portion of the survivors were individuals who ignored orders issued by the government and state authorities. One mother who put her trust in those authorities to help the citizens of Lahaina has learned the hard way that her belief in the rightness of the government’s orders was misplaced.
Luz Vargas ran a cleaning service in Lahaina and was working the day her town was reduced to ash and ruin. Her adopted son, Keyiro Fuentes, who would have turned 15 on Sunday, was five miles away at home, enjoying the last day of his summer vacation.
CBS News reported that when Vargas and her husband, Andres, learned about the threat of the fires, they jumped in the car and desperately tried to race home to their son.
Vargas told the media that she was told not to go and responded by only uttering two words: “My son.” She was in a race against time to reach her boy but encountered severe gridlock. They decided to leave the vehicle and try to get there on foot. Unfortunately, they were stopped by yet another obstacle in the form of a police barricade.
National Public Radio reported that local law enforcement officers were preventing people from going back toward where the fires were raging.
“I told them my son is still in our house. I said he’s at this house on this street,” Vargas recounted in the conversation she had with CBS News, pointing out there was a language barrier making things even more difficult.
Vargas then revealed she managed to get by police, her flip-flops melting from the intensity of the heat, where a man on a motorcycle took her toward the fires where her son was located. However, when she attempted to enter the fire zone, she was stopped by first responders who told her they had already cleared the area and there was no one left, encouraging her to “have faith” that her son had escaped the blaze.
She and her husband, having been assured that the boy had escaped from the area, waited for him to show up at Honokowai Beach, regularly checking with authorities to see if he had arrived while also calling around the area. Two days later, Vargas made her way home, where she found out the area had, in fact, not been cleared, and one person remained.
Vargas found her son’s body in his bedroom, his arms wrapped around his dog. It just does not get more tragic than this. What’s to blame for her loss? Government ineptness. It’s infuriating.
“He was not as I expected, in ashes. God maintained him like this. So we knew it was him,” Vargas stated, revealing she prayed over her dead son’s body, “Please God, hold him for me.”
The child’s body was wrapped up in a blanket and carried half a mile to a police station. The victim’s brother, Josue, who also spoke with CBS News, said, “He was too young. If we still had time, I know he would have been a very, very, very good man.”
A report by the Associated Press revealed that the same barricades that slowed down Vargas also caused other residents of the area to actually lose their lives in the fires that tore their community apart.
West Maui residents attempting to flee the fires attempted to exit via the only paved road out of town, but authorities had reportedly set up a barricade, barring access to Highway 30. As a result, numerous cars were sent back into the flames, resulting in a number of people perishing in their vehicles.
Those who disregarded the barricade managed to survive, including one family who ignored the barricade and drove around it. Having ignored the instruction of authorities, the family ended up safe and secure in a nearby town 48 minutes later, reported the Associated Press.
Much of the loss of life could have been prevented had the alarm been sounded and proper precautions taken long before the wildfires broke out. Authorities knew it was a big risk for their town, yet they did nothing to ensure the safety of residents. There needs to be consequences for this level of incompetence.
