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  • An Electoral College dialogue continued

    George Rebane

    Mr Dick Sciaroni wrote 'Electoral College reform – it's up to us' in the 13mar20 Union, a measured and civil response to my 7mar20 Union column, ‘Democracy Destroys the Electoral College’ (and here), wherein he concludes with, “Is it time to reform the Electoral College system? Perhaps. It’s up to all of us, the citizens, to decide. That means dialogue, not diatribe.”  However, a more careful read of what I wrote would reveal that nowhere did I oppose a national dialogue on the continued utility of the Electoral College in the governance of our republic.  What I do oppose is the current approach to its subrosa and de facto elimination through the little known National Popular Vote Interstate Compact.

    Mr Sciaroni writes, “The Founders’ decision how they should choose a president should have no overriding claim on 21st century America such that we cannot change it. After all, we are talking about our government. It’s ours. Why can’t we change it?”  In this he implies that I oppose any such change.  I don’t, but I do oppose what’s going on now.  The NPVIC is intended to surreptitiously sidestep a national dialogue, and most certainly subvert a constitutional process, through the leftwing mainstream media’s daily diatribes that call for a precipitous elimination of the Electoral College.  I highly doubt that more than one in a hundred Americans are aware of the NPVIC’s existence, its role in eliminating our EC, and current progress toward that goal – all happening without the national dialogue which Mr Sciaroni and I would welcome. 

    In his piece, nowhere did Mr Sciaroni acknowledge that my arguments were directed against imposing governance by direct democracy on large diverse populations, in accord with our Framers.  Instead he did repeat the Left’s talking points that the configuration of the EC by our Framers was a devious stratagem to keep wealthy white men in power, and therefore is now a dated construct of our government that needs major overhaul, and perhaps removal altogether.

    And his main point about the pervasive role of money in our elections ignores recent evidence that undermines his arguments.  In 2016 Hillary outspent Trump by far, in the current election Steyer, Bloomberg, and Bernie have all outspent our former VP Biden, and most certainly President Trump.  Yes, modern campaigns demand more funding to get out the message, but the evidence at hand is that it still continues to be the message, not the money that shapes the voters’ preferences.  In sum, such evidence should weigh heavily to counter Mr Sciaroni’s “final analysis” wherein he maintains that “the downside of the Electoral College is that it works hand-in-glove with moneyed interests to give a small number of people – not surprisingly, white males – access to the presidency of a country in which they are the decided minority.”  By all means, let us all talk about this.

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  • COVID Testing – Unclear on the Concept (updated 15mar20)

    George Rebane

    Our dispensers of perennial hate have now fastened on to the shortage of Covid test kits in the land, and claim that the President had two months warning and did nothing.  The fact of the matter, as even reported in the NYT (here), is that no one around the world knew of the actual epidemiological parameters of Covid.  And no one did anything about it, starting with China’s Communist Party which initially tried to hide and play down what was happening in Wuhan.

    Another fact of the matter is that there are perhaps tens of infectious disease outbreaks around the globe each year, most in inaccessible places that stay and abate there.  But some do get out into the more traveled parts of the world.  While we may know about each of such outbreaks, gearing up the nation’s medical machinery to combat a full-blown epidemic on our shores for each of these has never been either a reasonable or feasible response.  Last December Covid-19 started out just like one of these outbreaks.

    In any case, the problem we have with starting up any mass production of medicines and medical supplies is – drum roll please – big government.  The litigious regulatory state has grown to such an extent that everyone who could, moved their manufacturing offshore.  We make less that 10% of the medicines we consume – most are made in Chinese pharma factories.  No one gets extra credit for answering, ‘which of America’s political factions promote high cost of labor, draconian and unfathomable regulations, litigation at the drop of the hat, high taxes and fees on businesses, and overwhelming government bureaucracies to oversee and enforce the whole mess?’  And after that, they scream about high prices for the consumer.

    CoronaTestKitBut let’s get back to testing.  The anti-Trump lamestream continues to convince the public that Covid testing is somehow a prophylactic against the virus.  And things would have been much better had we been able to test all Americans from the gitgo.  That, it turns out, is unabashed bull crap.  Princeton’s liberal professor of economics and public policy, Alan Blinder, advises President Trump that ‘The Best Stimulus Is Coronavirus Testing Kits’.  Why? Because testing negative will give comfort to the consumer to go out there and keep shopping, since consumer spending makes up 70% of our GDP.

    A little thought reveals that 1) a negative Covid test does not prevent subsequent infection, and 2) since a negative test is only a snapshot in time, we can’t make and distribute enough test kits to give continuous comfort to the consumer.  (We don’t even know the sensitivity of the tests; at what level of pre-symptomatic Covid presence will the test register positive.)  Testing negative on Monday does not guarantee that you will not be infected on Tuesday, nor that you will not be infecting others by Friday.  The only benefit a one-time comprehensive testing provides is to identify potential pockets of infection which might be contained by a timely regional quarantine, a quarantine which no one really knows how to enforce (as our Italian friends have discovered).  And to provide such information for making public policy on an ongoing basis requires testing entire populations also on an ongoing basis.  For that we have neither the funds, the manufacturing capacity, the distribution and administration organization, nor the capable personnel to administer tests and interpret the results – in short, it’s not in the cards.

    Given all that, the only ‘benefit’ that the spread of Covid in America provides is ammo for the Democrats to continue lambasting President Trump and his administration, while hoping that their absurd accusations get some traction with the country’s lightly read, and therefore divert attention from the obviously diminished-capacity senior citizen who they’re putting up for President this fall.

    [12mar20 update]  The Democrats’ program of Big Lies continues with their and their lamestream lackeys’ assertions that the Trump administration continues to mismanage the country’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic.  This is now asserted as a given on the leftwing broadcast media.  However, the medical professionals who the President has working on the problem is made up of people like the NIH immunologist Dr Anthony Fauci (who has also advised six Presidents on HIV/AIDS and many other domestic and global health issues) .  None of their careers are dependent on their current jobs, but all of their professional credentials are.  And to date none have criticized the federal response as being somehow inadequate in the sense that something else or more could be done today which isn’t being done.  In short, all these health pros agree that what the administration did and continues to do with the information and resources available at the time was aggressively proper.  And compared to what other governments have done, America under Trump is way in the lead in executing its pandemic mitigation policies.  According to my lights, the perniciously partisan public propaganda that the Democrats are trumpeting today puts them squarely in the sleazebag evil category.

    Apropos to this politicizing, in 2009-10 we had the H1N1 (swine flu) epidemic under Obama, who could do no wrong.  Around 60,000,000 Americans were infected, and about 12,000 died (its death rate was a bit higher than the annual flu’s).  But the pandemic was not politicized, and it finally abated as people took normal precautions with social distancing and the usual care for flu cases.

    Covid19deaths_9mar20

    (H/T to reader for the above graphic.)

    Another hot flash from the NC school district nurse who informed the attendees at a service club meeting that keeping hydrated is good, and staying hydrated with hot drinks like tea is better.  It also doesn’t like Vitamin C.  The virus does not like wet, and hot wet is especially toxic to it.  Also take a look (here) at how long the virus survives in various non-human environments.

    [13mar20 update]  Worthy of note is America’s unique process for most medical tests as outlined by Dr Fauci in his congressional testimony.  It turns out that to get tested for Covid-19 you need to go to your physician who then will decide whether to prescribe that you be tested.  Most EU countries apparently allow the patient to get the test kit on his own recognizance, perform the test, and submit the ‘kit’ for interpretation by medical authorities.  They do this to reduce costs of their national healthcare programs which are already unsustainable and forever seeking to eliminate services in a manner that will evade public attention and response.  We should follow their cost saving example and also allow self-testing, at least during this pandemic.  Longer term consideration of this policy is warranted – e.g. case in point, we allow self-testing for pregnancy with OTC test kits.

    [15mar20 update]  The commentary and discussion on Covid-19 and testing for it is continued here.

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  • Scattershots – 9mar20 (updated 12mar20)

    George Rebane

    Those whose policies cannot create wealth must champion policies that redistribute existing wealth.

    So you think that if you get some flu-like symptoms, just go in and get tested for COVID-19, and then they’ll do the rest and take care of you.  Hah!  My east coast spy sent me the link (here) to a an unfolding saga of what is probably more prevalent than not across the country.  Remember, if there’s a problem ANYWHERE, your first look-see should be the government, on which you can make book on being at fault or the cause.  So enjoy, and don't touch anyone or anything or …;  I think levitation is the best bet if you can do it.

    [10mar20 update]  Trump can’t bluff or bully the epidemic, so correctly argues Walter Russell Mead in the 10mar20 WSJ (here). And the hits Trump will take won’t really depend on how the fed responds to COVID-19.  This is a complex nationwide problem affecting multiple fronts, it's a bona fide black swan.  The feds have never responded to such things without big goof-ups here and there, and this time it will be the same, no matter who is in the White House.  But today the TDS crowd, now fervently praying for death and destruction in this election year, has some well-oiled, built-in ammo with its lamestream to fire against the administration.  As WRM says, “the media multitudes who loathe Mr. Trump will do everything they can to turn the epidemic into a Hurricane Katrina event. That would be easy to do even if the government’s response is near-flawless; epidemics are messy. There will almost certainly be heartbreaking tragedies that can plausibly be blamed on administration policies. There will be shortages of medical supplies. Some hospitals will be stretched past the breaking point. The bureaucracy and its leadership will inevitably fall short in many ways. In an election year when health care is a major political issue, every failure and problem in the coronavirus response will be politicized and publicized, putting the administration on the defensive as the economy falters and the virus spreads.”  The coronavirus will indeed be President Trump’s greatest foe, one against which the best policies, let alone his standard repertoire of responses, will be inadequate in many (most?) eyes.

    Democracy or Winner-take-all.  The Dems are playing both sides of the street on this for their presidential candidates.  In the primaries they want proportional allocation of delegates to the their July convention.  However, in the November election for president, they want to do winner takes all the Electoral College votes, which disenfranchises the minorities in each state.  Another case of ‘Do as I say, and not …’.

    [12mar20 update]  Bernie Sanders claims to have won the ideological battle because he convinced the young that capitalism is bad and socialism is good.  And the young are the future.  But what he and other collectivists have missed in the past is that the young age, gain realworld experience, and change their minds about socialism.  Perhaps this time it will be different.  But Bernie is headed for his political sunset, and he must hope that Bumblebrain Biden will pick up the gauntlet and carry it past goal line.  Bernie’s departing line continues to be that his “democratic socialism” is not what the USSR had which was “autocratic communism”.  According to Bernie and his guileless followers, the slogan to remember is “Real socialism hasn’t been tried!”  David Harsanyi writes (here), “ leftists like Bernie like to act as if socialist ideology is incompatible with totalitarianism, when the opposite is true. The nationalization of industry and dispensing with property rights — necessary for any genuine socialism to occur — can’t be instituted without coercion and a centralized authoritarian effort. And even if the effort to redistribute property is first supported by the majority, as soon the state comes for your stuff — and it always does — the “democratic” part of the equation starts to dissipate.”

    Today’s men beware of the women activists who claim to have been victims of sexual harassment and predation.  It is apparently legal for people, especially employers, to ask whether someone is or has been involved in law suits of various kinds before entering into a relationship.  Therefore it might be prudent for a man contemplating a relationship with a woman to find out whether he might be stepping into a snare.  Given the number of websites that offer access to publicly available personal information databases, wouldn’t it be useful to have accessible a database on women who have publicly accused or sued men for sexual issues?  Online dating services could even include that in their clients’ data sheets.  In light of today’s greatly expanded definitions of sexual misconduct, what man would want to get involved with a woman who has a record publicly accusing men of such misconduct?  Making such information readily available would both reduce future issues (real and imagined), and temper such gratuitous allegations in the future.

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  • The Democracy Debate Revisited

    George Rebane

    On 19 February last, I broadcast on KVMR and posted here a commentary titled ‘Democracy Destroys the Electoral College’.  Subsequently I submitted an edited version of the piece to The Union which published it in its 6mar20 print and online editions (here).  The commentary was of a piece and amplified my longstanding agreement with our Framers who warned us against the dangers of democracy in governance, especially at the federal level where overarching matters of national import are decided. 

    The Union’s online version of my commentary has elicited a long comment stream of pros and cons.  By number, most of the comments were con in the sense that they are in support of electing at least the president by popular national vote.  The Left has been a longtime proponent of having us abandon our constitutional republic in favor of maximizing the use of the plebiscite (or referendum if we want to split hairs) to decide matters of governance.  Unfortunately, a number of prominent Republicans have also weighed in on the side of electing the president by popular vote – i.e. bypassing the Electoral College.

    The Left’s motivation, in America and elsewhere, has been consistent in their correct assessment that large populations, especially those lightly read and tightly led, are predictably malleable.  This guarantee redoubles when a political ideology gains control of public education for a generation or more – ours since around 1970.  Our history gives pause to many like me as we consider the views of some otherwise more reliable politicians.

    In 1913 we took a major step away from what our Founders bequeathed us when we ratified the 17th Amendment to the Constitution to permit election of federal senators by popular vote.  Since then, the several states have each implemented more pure democracy into their elections, both to politically shield and secure timid politicians and to assure outcomes desired by the party in power.  California again is the posterchild of such ‘progress’ in governance.

    But the problem with democracy is the same as with socialism, since they always start their journey hand-in-hand.  Of course, as many of us know, socialism will always at some point along the way begin to dispense with democracy as its governing elites gain power and restructure the state into a derivative form of dismal and stultifying autocracy.  But, like a frog being slowly parboiled, by the time the population realizes this after having been increasingly succored on socialism, it will be too late.  At that point, outside forces notwithstanding, the remaining choices are acceptance of a moribund future, or violent revolution.  With socialism, as with pregnancy, it’s very difficult to remain with just a ‘little bit of it’

    Perhaps there is a better way of electing our president.  But today, turning the decision over to an incipient ochlocracy that knows little of the history and operations of governance, and less about how our existing system works, seems to me like a bad idea.  We should make haste slowly to change what we have.

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  • Bernie’s Big Lie – Socialist Sweden

    George Rebane

    Sen Bernie Sanders’ lies are too many to count, but one that he keeps repeating successfully to the nation’s light thinkers involves the myth of Scandinavian socialism.  This is the kind of socialism that Bernie wants to incorporate in the United States, and he continues to use Sweden as the posterchild of how socialism can be made to work successfully.  Either he is butt stupid or evil as he spreads the lies about Swedish socialism.  Let’s be kind and put Bernie with the butt stupid crowd, that includes the Dem candidates clown car and Team AOC, as they were characterized by Will Rogers’ “It ain’t what you know that worries me, it’s what you know that ain’t so.’

    Sweden was a model and wealthy capitalist democracy before 1960, having gone through two world wars as a neutral selling their wares to the highest bidders.  Along with the other Nordics, Sweden then tried socialism to redistribute its remarkable wealth and earn votes for its leftwing politicians, and that failed miserably over the next two decades.  As a result, each pulled back toward marked capitalism after enjoying the tender mercies of socialism.  Sweden led the way after having doubled public spending from 31% to 60% in the 1960-80 interval.  And then the real problems started piling on which ended with unemployment surging and budget deficits of 11% of GDP in the late 80s (that’s like almost $3T annually in the US).  The country literally went broke as the wealthy, the producers and entrepreneurs jumped ship.  The pullback to sanity started in 1991 and has been going on ever since.  And that has been the best kept secret of our progressives and their lamestream lackeys (witness its effect on our local liberal commenters).

    Ramirez_200220

    Swedish historian and author, Johan Norberg (also senior fellow at the Cato Institute) lays out the history of this wise retrenchment to sanity in his ‘Sweden’s Lessons for America’.  Norberg reports that –

    Sooner or later, American socialists always return to Sweden and other Nordic countries. There’s a good reason for that. For some reason, the countries that socialists originally tout always end up with bread lines and labor camps. But there’s always Sweden: decent, well‐​functioning, nonthreatening, and with impeccable democratic credentials. … There is just one problem: Sweden is not socialist. … If Sanders and Ocasio‐​Cortez really want to turn America into Sweden, what would that look like? For the United States, it would mean, for example, more free trade and a more deregulated product market, no Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and the abolition of occupational licensing and minimum wage laws. The United States would also have to abolish taxes on property, gifts, and inheritance. And even after the recent tax cut, America would still have to slightly reduce its corporate tax. Americans would need to reform Social Security from defined benefits to defined contributions and introduce private accounts. They would also need to adopt a comprehensive school voucher system where private schools get the same per‐​pupil funding as public ones.

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  • Sandbox – 7mar20

    [Just happened to visit Nevada County Voices, an info website run by our favorite climate catastrophe czarina, Dr Anna Haynes.  It appears that since the passing of Russ Steele, RR remains as the sole active 'rightwing' website in these parts.  On her resourceful site we are properly relegated to the extreme right column that is off-page, so it will not surprise and offend the more sensitive eyes of her polite company visitors (a trigger warning pointer is provided).  I continue to note over the years that Dr Haynes' political spectrum remains one-winged.  Nowhere are her voluminous lists of left-leaning sites so identified.  I suppose all of those are like our self-proclaimed centrists Bob Crabb and George Boardman – politically vanilla, untinged and untrammeled by any shade of partisanship.  We are properly put in our place.  gjr]

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  • Dropout Derby – 5mar20

    George Rebane

    Now which one will Pocahontas bless as she rides into the sunset after being rejected by her friends and neighbors, who knew her too well?  And Tulsi, give us a break, please!

    DropoutEntries200305

    Dropouts200305

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  • Should Our Kids Learn to Code?

    George Rebane

    [This is the transcript of my regular KVMR commentary broadcast on 4 March 2020.]

    As more and more young people finish their education today with unemployable skill sets, while employers are looking for people who can think on their feet and solve problems, the question of whether and how to teach high schoolers the elements of programming comes up.  Given that our world is now almost entirely software driven, and will become even more so tomorrow, you would think that programming or learning to code should become one of an educated citizen’s basic skills such as reading, writing, and arithmetic which reached those expectations over a hundred years ago.

    But there is a curious mix of people who argue against teaching such a skill to students in our public schools.  Some see acquiring coding skills to be equivalent to vocational training, against which many have argued for decades.  It’s hard to believe that there were educators against teaching high schoolers skills with which to earn a living after graduation, especially when so few students went on to college.  Stanford professor of computer science Robert Sedgewick points out that coding “is not vocational training any more than English is vocational training for journalists or economics is vocational training for business executives.” 

    In the early part of the 20th century more than 90% of students entered the workforce without college degrees.  But our schools did teach them skills beyond literacy and arithmetic that were needed in the workplace.  Yet academics like former Stanford education professor Dr Larry Cuban continue to argue that coding is the same as teaching vocational skills such as machine shop and home economics.  Such courses for them have been a wrong-headed “imposition of those requirements (that) for years served to undermine the broader cultural goals of public schools—such as social mobility, individual development and civic engagement.”  Yet everyone today knows that all of those broader cultural goals are only possible for those who can be gainfully employed.

    In response, Dr Sedgewick points out that “teaching students to code introduces them to logical thinking, as well as fostering creativity and problem-solving skills. It encourages experimentation, develops persistence and promotes collaboration. Learning to think as a coder gives one a valuable set of strategies for understanding a variety of situations that one will encounter later in life—particularly those who are working outside of tech.” (more here and here)

    In my own teaching experience, I have confirmed that learning to code is also a painless introduction to critical thinking.  The experience provides a gender-free sense of empowerment, as the students make machines and data sing at the touch of their finger.  Coding and algorithmics – devising stepwise procedures for efficiently solving problems – are fields connected at the hip.  Immersive coding is a ‘flow experience’, almost like being in another universe that contains its own resources and rules for new and powerful tools.  Tools which you control and with which you can assemble wondrous machines.  For young people anticipating college or a job after high school, having mastered the elements of coding is tremendously empowering as they experience the opening of new worlds of possibilities and understanding.

    But today we also have an emerging dark side of coding and computer science, one more political enterprise that is seeking a foothold in secondary education.  It is called ‘culturally responsive computing’, and is devised by the politically correct mavens of identity politics.  The proposed curriculum is primarily directed at minorities, and claims to educate students through the implementation of “computing-culture connections” that inject such arcane concepts as “African mathematics”.  The entire enterprise is a massive diversion from teaching kids substantive skills valuable for work and further studies.  Fundamentally, it is one more area of ethnic-gender education that would join the other useless but feel-good subjects which already displace substantive learning in our public schools.  Look for it at a school district near you. (more here)

    In the meantime, I strongly recommend that you support the advent and expansion of STEM subjects that include computer science and coding in your local high schools.  Our young people need every bit of it that they can handle in a world where they will spend the rest of their lives.

    My name is Rebane, and I also expand on this and related themes on Rebane’s Ruminations where the transcript of this commentary is posted with relevant links, and where such issues are debated extensively.  However, my views are not necessarily shared by KVMR.  Thank you for listening.

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  • The Socialistic Socialization of Socialism (updated 6mar20)

    George Rebane

    Some thoughts on Super Tuesday 2020.  Socialism is a form of organizing society and the economy, a form unknown to our younger generations.  They have been taught in our schools all about the mythical glories of socialism, and no history of what actually happens when countries have adopted it.  Today they are saturated by reports of Europe’s socialism as examples of the ‘benefits’ which await America on its adoption here.  These propagandized stories are generated and delivered by our media that are somewhere between incompetent and corruptly partisan.

    With today’s stifling political correctness and ongoing deconstruction of our public speech, critical thinking by the young is almost impossible and definitely rare.  It is a field day for corrupt politicians like Senators Sanders and Warren.  This gives the young no choice about their messages, but to simply believe their content, and judge them only by the cosmetics of their delivery.

    All of this explains why our millennials and genXrs are so willing and eager to vote away their national inheritance.  The one-world socialist elites know well Thomas Jefferson’s admonition – ‘A nation ignorant and free, that never was and never shall be.’

    Ramirez_191225

    [6mar20 update] Super Tuesday’s Latinos for Sanders.  We know that Bernie Sanders is an idiot and a demogauge – he has proved it daily for at least the last five years.  But what about the young Latinos whose parents escaped here from dictatorial banana republics in which Sanders’ socialism was on full display, and whose history and leaders Sanders still celebrates today?  What does that say for their socio-political awareness when they have such revealing and enlightening family histories?  Actually, it says the same thing about them as about the more indigenous Americans who make up Bernie’s Bros.  It’s the same 25-30% of unread bad news bears (more in California) who can’t or won’t, and who support every national movement that promises them a workers’ paradise where everything is free.  They will be with us forever, here and elsewhere.  And every so often they are successful in bringing communism to the fore, and dispense wholesale misery to their people for a couple of generations before the next revolution.  All of them now believe it’s finally America’s chance to dumpster dive for a dictatorship of the proletariat.  (more here)

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  • Scattershots – 2mar20 (updated 5mar20)

    George Rebane

    Gun-free zones are the secure hunting grounds for armed killers.

    Bernie’s latest Big Lie was his report on Cuba’s commendable “literacy program”.  Everyone who understands communist governance knows that Castro initiated no such program to teach Cubans to read – Cubans were already a very literate people in 1960.  What he really did set up was a re-education program with mandatory attendance to disseminate revolutionary communist propaganda.  The “teachers” were actually government agents whose job was to identify the potential recalcitrants who would then be sent to concentration camps for a more sterner curriculum or worse.  Sanders is still a communist-in-hiding, supported by organizations (e.g. Dream Defenders) that make no bones about their ideological sentiments.  Meanwhile, Bernie continues to bamboozle his lightly read constituents who number in the millions (witness members of our local chapter in these pages). (more here)

    Shortround has spent almost half a billion to get here.  I think he’s ready to spend that much again to make it a nice round number like $1,000,000,000 to get to 1600 Pennsylvania – it does have a nice ring to it.  The question now is – how many more butts does he have to lick to become the leader of his recently adopted party.  And don’t forget, he can always start a new party in a heartbeat to sink Sanders or Bumblin’ Biden.  All the reins are in Shortround’s hands, and tomorrow will tell.

    Who is Bernie Sanders?  Wikipedia has a long report on him (here) which is condensed (possibly from a conservative perch) into an email that is going around, no doubt only in conservative circles – but you never know, since he’s not a favorite of establishment Democrats.  Most interesting would be comments from our liberals that debunk what is contained in this unattributed report which is passed on as received.  Download WHO IS BERNIE SANDERS

    ‘Officials admit it: Trump saved lives and spared America from worst of coronavirus’ writes Monica Showalter of American Thinker.  The piece presents some significant facts that the Dems have been trying to cover up, misrepresent, and simply attempt to lie into oblivion.  It’s worth a read, especially if you’re a liberal. 

    [5mar20 update]  Former educator and now Union liberal columnist Terry McAteer has discovered California’s economic “doughnut hole” in its Central Valley, a region un- and under-represented in Sacramento.  Decades of Democratic diktats have left the state’s formerly rich agricultural heartland pretty much destitute.  But in his column (here), Mr McAteer can’t help taking a swipe at the Right with – “While the State of Jefferson folks profess a need for a north/south political split, the real split in our state is an economic one, clearly centered in the “doughnut hole” of California.”  Huh??  His latest losing bout with logic reminds us of Mad Magazine’s ‘The moon is 1/49th the size of the earth, even though it is further away.’  The professed SoJ political split is required to heal and prevent the economic one manufactured and maintained by California’s Democrats.  Both are real, but are also very much quadrupeds of a different hue, an idea apparently inaccessible to the liberal mind.

    Senator Chuck Schumer’s tirade to the mob confronting SCOTUS – “I want to tell you, Gorsuch. I want to tell you, Kavanaugh. You have released the whirlwind and you will pay the price. You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.”  Now a blatant threat like that would clearly be an impeachable abuse of senatorial power had it been made by a Republican congresscritter.

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