People of the future will look back at these 11 months and be very confused. How could virtually the entire world have thrown out settled practices of civil, economic, and cultural liberties for a virus that resisted every attempt to control it?
This virus is not Ebola and it has come nowhere near approaching the death rates associated with H1N1 of 1918. By some measures, it’s not been as deadly as 1957-58, a virus that came and went without much public attention at all. New pathogens are part of life, and there was and is nothing particularly unusual about this one.
The enduring question now and for many years to come will be: why? We all asked the question a thousand times, and it has been asked of us the same number of times. It is too early to say, and the answer will likely be similar to other epic events in history such as the Great War or the Fall of Rome.
The answer to the question why is: multiple causes. I’m not prepared to weigh them yet.
And yet, it seems reasonable to observe that many groups and sectors had a kind of hankering for a pandemic. They turned a widespread and mostly manageable pathogen – doctor/patient relationships and reasonable cautions on the part of the vulnerable – and converted it into the basis for a global panic that overthrew centuries of progress in law and liberty.
Among which:
The tech companies who became so enraptured with the digital world – and we can include online retailers in this – that they forgot all the people who cannot and do not want to live entirely outside the physical world.
The pharmaceutical companies with hundreds of billions of investment in labs and distribution circles who wanted to ply their wares in the midst of emergencies, in addition to the PCR testing industry.
Public health intellectuals who for at least a decade and a half had fallen for the romance of computer modelling and were itching to try out a new method for disease mitigation.
The mega-billionaire Bill Gates who found himself vexed by computer viruses that were wrecking his Windows operating system and thereby developed a passion for blocking viruses in general, while failing to understand the difference between biology and computer hardware.
Government officials who like to try out new uses of power.
Media companies who live on clicks and know with certainty that public panic is the best way to guarantee consumer attention, especially if they are locked at home with nothing else to do.
The Chinese government which was supremely annoyed at the Trump administration’s trade policies and successfully trolled the West into believing that China nixed the virus through totalitarian controls.
Rabid opponents of the Trump administration, who had failed to wreck it through accusations of Russian collusion and then impeachment over a phone call to Ukraine, finally turned to creating tremendous social, economic, and political chaos by massively overblowing the severity of a widespread viral pathogen, which itself became a metaphor for the political infection they believed afflicted the country.
School teachers unions who have been wanting to strike for years in order to extract pay and benefits from the taxpayer but worried that doing so would turn their public against them; for them, lockdowns were the perfect excuse to find another way.
A ruling class population that has lost touch with people who cannot live on their computers, increasingly detached from the flow of life as it exists in the physical world and thereby failed to empathize with the suffering of others under lockdown.
No one interest group could have achieved this on its own. It required a perfect storm. It doesn’t have to be a conspiracy much less a specific plot. It only requires that the right confluence of events present themselves in a way that prompts action and cooperation.
I might add one more push for pandemic that touches on a general philosophy of life. The world is overflowing these days with people who are consumed by ideology. They have a perception that something is fundamentally wrong with the world and are consumed with a burning passion to fix it. They long for big change, mighty drama, epic shifts in history. For them, the marginally improving world of bourgeois existence seems dull and uneventful. The pandemic was for them something exciting and momentous: it presented a chance for big change.
That we will look back with astonishment at what has happened to the world is a near certainty. The folly! And people of the future will never stop asking that great question of why. The answer is finally unsatisfying. It was a massive screw up by people and groups who wanted to try something completely new, none of whom were willing to bear responsibility for the results. It will be up to the rest of us to pick up the pieces and get life on the right track again.
Google-owned YouTube has banned LifeSite News, one of the leading sources of pro-life news and commentary on the web.
Gualberto Garcia Jones, VP of LifeSite News, told Breitbart News that the site had anticipated censorship from Big Tech companies, and has already established a presence on alternative platforms including Gab, Rumble, MeWe, and Telegram, and encouraged readers to follow them there.
“The truth is, we’ve been anticipating this for some time,” said Garcia Jones. “YouTube, along with other Big Tech corporations, are simply not interested in allowing anyone to dissent from their state-approved, liberal ideology.”
“Fortunately, we’ve already taken preemptive measures to ensure the truth will continue to reach the ears of those most in need of it in these dictatorial times.”
In a comment to Breitbart News, a YouTube spokeswoman, said that LifeSite was banned from the platform due to violations of its “COVID-19 misinformation” policy.
“In accordance with our long standing strikes system, we terminated the channel LifeSite News Media for repeatedly violating our COVID-19 misinformation policy, which prohibits content that promotes prevention methods that contradict local health authorities or WHO,” said the spokeswoman.
“Any channel that violates our COVID-19 misinformation policy will receive a strike, which temporarily restricts uploading or live-streaming. Channels that receive three strikes in the same 90-day period will be permanently removed from YouTube.”
Google is becoming increasingly aggressive in its censorship policies. As Breitbart News recently reported, the market-dominating tech giant recently rolled out a new censorship regime for its main search engine, along with a list of new policy violations that could see websites suppressed in search results:
The list, published in full on Google’s support website, includes the following:
Discover policy violation: Adult-themed content
News and Discover policy violation: Dangerous content
News and Discover policy violation: Harassing content
News and Discover policy violation: Hateful content
News and Discover policy violation: Manipulated media
News and Discover policy violation: Medical content
Discover policy violation: Misleading content
News and Discover policy violation: Sexually explicit content
News and Discover policy violation: Terrorist content
News policy violation: Transparency
News and Discover policy violation: Violence and gore content
News and Discover policy violation: Vulgar language and profanity
Publishers who have been hit with a manual action by Google will be able to appeal the decision by “fixing” whatever issue violated the policy and then submitting their website to Google for a review. Google states that it could take “several days or a week” for the tech giant to reach a final decision.
Garcia Jones said that LifeSite will not be demoralized by Big Tech’s crackdown, and will rise to the occasion.
“Like Christ, we will never tire nor waver in bringing His teachings to a world in need,” said Garcia Jones. “If that means getting banned completely from social media, so be it. We rejoice at being persecuted for His sake.”
A former CIA officer wrote that he left the Democratic Party due to the second impeachment of former President Donald Trump, saying that it only serves to exacerbate the political divide.
“For years, Democrats like me have watched with increasing alarm as our own political leaders and activists … have used an endless stream of hateful, violent and ultimately un-American rhetoric that has resulted in billions of dollars in economic damage and given birth to a violent national movement,” wrote Bryan Dean Wright, the former intelligence officer, for the Daily Caller.
Wright said the “modern Left” is infused with “systemic hatred” that has “inflamed profound political divisions and the predictable outcomes that come with them, most especially violence and destruction.”
“The most egregious example came in the summer of 2020, with Leftist race riots that cost upwards of $2 billion in damages,” he said, adding that Democratic leaders didn’t offer condemnations when “fires raged,” property was vandalized, and lives were destroyed.
Wright pointed out that democratically elected officials incited violence in 2020.
“A woman in New York City threw a Molotov cocktail at four police officers sitting in their vehicle during a riot” and “were unharmed only because the gas bomb failed to ignite,” he said.
“Next, a group of rioters in Seattle tried to seal up the doors of a police precinct and ignite the building on fire, burning cops alive.
“In all, over 700 federal, state, and local law enforcement officers sustained injuries in violence perpetrated by Leftist rioters. That includes retired St. Louis police Captain David Dorn, who died defending the city he loved from those encouraged by the Democrat Party’s incitement.”
Wright went on to cite rhetoric from mainstream media pundits such as CNN’s Chris Cuomo, who told viewers last year, “Show me where it says protesters are supposed to be polite and peaceful,” and NPR’s statement that “looting is a powerful tool to bring about real, lasting change in society.”
Such statements, he argued, served to gaslight people into committing acts of violence. At the same time, he suggested that it’s hypocritical to impeach Trump for allegedly inciting an insurrection when Democratic leaders and left-leaning media outlets emboldened rioters and anarchists last year.
House Democrats have argued that Trump’s speech incited supporters on Jan. 6 to carry out the Capitol breach, which left several people—including an officer—dead.
“For Democrats like me, we have no choice: we have to leave. But where do we go, politically, now that our party can no longer be salvaged? The answer is to be found in the exit data from the 2020 election: We’re already leaving, it turns out, and joining the new, populist Republican Party,” he said.
(TJVNEWS)The Dallas Mavericks have not played the national anthem all season long, but they’ll start playing it again right away.
Despite an order from Mavs Owner Mark Cuban to not play the anthem reportedly because “many feel it does not represent them,” the league has stepped-in and mandated that “all teams” will play the anthem before games, Breitbart reported.
“With NBA teams now in the process of welcoming fans back into their arenas, all teams will play the national anthem in keeping with longstanding league policy,” the league’s Chief Communications Officer Mike Bass said in a statement.
The Mavericks have not played the anthem in any of their 13 home preseason and regular-season games. Cuban had not publicly given a reason why the anthem was being nixed until Tuesday night when he confirmed to ESPN that the team was not playing the Star-Spangled Banner and had no plans to resume playing it.
A report from The Athletic’s Shams Charania cited a source claiming that Cuban’s decision to not play the song stemmed from a belief that “many feel the anthem doesn’t represent them.
The decision went unnoticed for 13 games, according to The Athletic, as it was not publicized or explained internally and fans had not been allowed to attend games due to coronavirus restrictions.Monday’s game against the Minnesota Timberwolves was the first time a limited number of fans had been allowed into the American Airlines Center.
Cuban was faced with fierce criticism on social media for temporarily eliminating the anthem.
MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell said Tuesday that sales of the company’s signature product remain strong after several retailers recently stopped stocking the pillows.
“We’ve actually increased in sales. We’re actually up in sales. Our shipping’s behind,” he told The Epoch Times.
Wayfair and Bed Bath & Beyond, among other retailers, stopped selling MyPillow last month. The companies faced pressure from activists who dislike Lindell’s involvement in pursuing election fraud claims.
“Those were bots and trolls they were afraid of,” Lindell said, asserting what transpired was an example of so-called cancel culture.
But he also said that the companies are facing negative impacts.
“They’re just as bad as the people that are doing it because they did it out of fear. I’ve been with them for years, and they’re the ones that suffer because now those customers are buying directly from Mike Lindell, from MyPillow. So our business is up,” he said.
“The box stores that stayed with us are way busier because they’re not going to those other places because they don’t have MyPillow products now,” he added.
Walmart-owned Sam’s Club and other stores have continued stocking MyPillow items.
Lindell told NTD last month that Americans need to step up against cancel culture, or the growing trend of trying to shut down people and companies that are out of step with certain groups, primarily the modern leftist orthodoxy.
“This is the time we all have to stand up against this,” he said.
Lindell has become known for talking about election fraud claims and recently debuted a documentary, “Absolute Proof,” that he alleges shows the November 2020 election involved high levels of fraud. It aired on One America News last week and is set to air again this week.
Lindell has faced personal repercussions for his remarks about the election. Twitter recently suspended him, citing alleged violations of the company’s civic integrity policy, before permanently banning the account. YouTube and Vimeo, meanwhile, took down “Absolute Proof.”
Lindell told The Epoch Times that “they’re trying to cancel me everywhere.” In another example, he said, Google has prevented him from buying ads for the film.
“We’re gonna get it out in spite of all them and then our whole country… everybody needs to see this. This isn’t a political thing,” he said. “Everybody should be concerned, that’s just terrible.”
Lindell was a mainstay at rallies for former President Donald Trump but clarified that he rarely spoke to him. Lindell said he has not seen Trump since he visited the White House just before Trump left office.
Former presidential candidate and tech entrepreneur Andrew Yang (D) is leading the field of Democrat primary candidates in the 2021 New York City mayor’s race, a Fontas/CODA Pulse of the Primary Poll released this week found.
The survey, taken January 20-25 among 842 likely voters, showed Yang appearing to have the most recognizable name in the field of candidates. He led the race with 28 percent support. Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams followed with 17 percent. New York City Comptroller Scott Stringer earned 13 percent support.
Former Obama administration official Shaun Donovan and lawyer and civil rights activist Maya Wiley tied with eight percent each. The remaining candidates garnered two percent or less. Nearly one-fifth of respondents, or 19 percent, were undecided.
The Chinese coronavirus appears to be a major factor for New York City voters. The survey found:
57% of likely voters said “the pandemic caused a significant negative impact on my household finances.” (26% strongly agree + 31% somewhat agree)
47% indicated that “If I had the ability, I would consider moving out of NYC permanently.” (19% strongly agree + 28% somewhat agree)
When presented with a list of nine major topics frequently discussed on the campaign trail, nearly half of voters (49%) said the “most important” issue to them when considering the candidates relates to COVID [coronavirus]: health aspects (30% “preventing the spread of COVID / vaccine distribution”), as well as economic aspects (19% “reopening the economy / job creation”).
The survey’s margin of error is +/-3.38 percent.
Yang, who rose to the national spotlight during the presidential Democrat primary race with his distinct happy-go-lucky attitude and pitch for Universal Basic Income (UBI), filed paperwork to run for mayor in December but took a brief break from the campaign trail after testing positive for the Wuhan virus earlier this month.
“Wow — let’s keep the momentum going and growing and get New York back on its feet!” Yang said Wednesday in reaction to the poll:
Wow – let’s keep the momentum going and growing and get New York back on its feet! ?? https://t.co/IPSd5uIfAN
“The city could help restaurants buy heat lamps, dividers and air filtration systems in bulk — bring the costs down for the small businesses trying to stay open,” he pitched on Wednesday. “We need to be a partner to firms trying to make it work”
The New York City mayoral primaries will be held June 22, 2021. Mayor Bill de Blasio (D) is ineligible to run due to term limits.
(TJVNEWS) Western diplomats are deeply alarmed after a classified briefing given at the UN by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on Wednesday, The Wall Street Journal reports, after some of the contents of IAEA findings which said the Iranians were intent on pursuing a major step toward nuclear weapons production had been leaked earlier last month. The new IAEA findings say Iran has now acted on its prior “threat” to produce uranium metal.
“In contravention of the 2015 nuclear accords, Iran has started producing uranium metal, a material that can be used to form the core of nuclear weapons, the United Nations atomic agency told members in a confidential report Wednesday evening,” WSJ reports.
The IAEA is alleging the small amount of uranium metal was produced by the first time on February 8 at the Isfahan nuclear facility.
Former President Donald Trump is not pleased with the initial performance of his impeachment lawyers on Tuesday, according to reports.
The New York Timesreports Trump was “furious” as he watched his lawyer Bruce Castor Jr. deliver his opening argument after the gripping visual and emotional performance put on by Democrats, citing “people briefed on his reaction” and on a scale of one to 10, Trump was an eight.
Politico reports Trump “grew increasingly frustrated” as the trial continued, citing “people familiar with his thinking.”
At one point during the trial, Castor praised the presentation of the Democrats and admitted the team changed his own argument to respond. At another point, he argued voters were “smart” enough to vote Trump out of office and did not need Congress to impeach the former president.
Senate Republicans were not impressed with the performance either.
Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana joined five other Senate Republicans in voting that the trial itself was Constitutional, even though he voted against the trial in a vote triggered by Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) in January.
“If you listen to it, it speaks for itself,” Cassidy told reporters. “It was disorganized, random … they talked about many things but did not talk about the issue at hand.”
Cassidy said if he was an “impartial juror” he had to admit the Democrat House impeachment managers did a “much better job.”
“I don’t think the lawyers did the most effective job,” he said while praising the Democrat argument as “impressive.”
Perhaps more alarming was a Bloomberg report that McConnell would not press his colleagues to back the president, again floating the notion of supporting the articles of impeachment even though he voted Tuesday that the trial itself was unconstitutional.
Trump’s legal team experienced a tumultuous preparation for the trial after Trump’s initial lead lawyer Butch Bowers and lawyer Deborah Barbier left the team due to disputes over legal fees and strategy, according to reports.
President Trump announced Castor as his lead impeachment lawyer just ten days before the trial.
Two professional football teams left New York for another state – but the New York Stock Exchange? That is a possibility if the Empire State imposes a transfer tax on stock sales, according to the exchange’s president.
In a Tuesday op-ed in The Wall Street Journal, NYSE President Stacey Cunningham said she and 25 other representatives of New York’s securities industry sent a letter to state legislative leaders warning against the unintended consequences of imposing such a tax.
“The New York Stock Exchange belongs in New York,” Cunningham said. “If Albany lawmakers get their way, however, the center of the global financial industry may need to find a new home.”
New York state lawmakers introduced a bill that would tax certain financial transactions. Although state revenue has suffered due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the proposed new transaction tax seemed to have little support from Gov. Andrew Cuomo or his officials.
In January, state budget director Robert Mujica said a lot of ideas around such financial taxes “haven’t been fleshed out,” according to a transcript provided to Reuters by an official in the New York State Division of the Budget, per the New York Post.
A financial tax was proposed last year in New Jersey, where many exchanges host their servers. Mujica said exchanges quickly mobilized to temporarily move their employees and activity outside of the state.
“If we increase the tax like that, you mobilize people, potentially just move your transactions and your servers to another part of the country where those taxes don’t exist,” said Mujica, who noted the pandemic had shown people can do business anywhere.
A NYSE representative declined to comment further on Cunningham’s article.
The New York Jets and Giants of the NFL left the state years ago and now play their home games at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J.
House Democrats opened Donald Trump’s historic second impeachment trial Tuesday showing the former president whipping up a rally crowd to march to the Capitol and “fight like hell” against his reelection defeat, followed by graphic video of the deadly attack on Congress that came soon after, according to an AP report.
In an early test of the former president’s defense, Trump’s team lost a crucial bid to halt the trial on constitutional grounds. Senators confirmed, 56-44, their jurisdiction over the trial, the first of a president no longer in office. While six Republican senators joined the Democrats in proceeding, the tally showed how far prosecutors have to go to win conviction, which requires a two-thirds threshold of 67 senators, according to the AP report.
Tuesday’s vote was on whether a former president could be tried after leaving office.
The lead prosecutor told senators the case would present “cold, hard facts” against Trump, who is charged with inciting the mob siege of the Capitol to overturn the election he lost to Democrat Joe Biden. Senators sitting as jurors, many who themselves fled for safety that day, watched the jarring video of Trump supporters battling past police to storm the halls, Trump flags waving, as was reported by AP.
“That’s a high crime and misdemeanor,” said Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., in opening remarks. “If that’s not an impeachable offense, then there’s no such thing.”
AP reported that Trump is the first president to face impeachment charges after leaving office and the first to be twice impeached. The Capitol siege stunned the world as hundreds of rioters ransacked the building to try to stop the certification of Biden’s victory, a domestic attack on the nation’s seat of government unlike any in its history. Five people died.
Acquittal is likely, but the trial will test the nation’s attitude toward his brand of presidential power, the Democrats’ resolve in pursuing him, and the loyalty of Trump’s Republican allies defending him.
According to the AP report, Trump’s lawyers are insisting that he is not guilty of the sole charge of “incitement of insurrection,” his fiery words just a figure of speech as he encouraged a rally crowd to “fight like hell” for his presidency. But prosecutors say he “has no good defense” and they promise new evidence.
Security remained extremely tight at the Capitol on Tuesday, a changed place after the attack, fenced off with razor wire with armed National Guard troops on patrol, as was reported by the AP. The nine House managers walked across the shuttered building to prosecute the case before the Senate.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Biden would not be watching the trial of his predecessor.
“Joe Biden is the president, he’s not a pundit, he’s not going to opine on back and forth arguments,” she said, according to the AP report.
With senators gathered as the court of impeachment, sworn to deliver “impartial justice,” the trial was starting with debate and a vote over whether it’s constitutionally permissible to prosecute Trump after he is no longer in the White House.
Trump’s defense team has focused on the question of constitutionality, which could resonate with Republicans eager to acquit Trump without being seen as condoning his behavior, as was reported by AP.
AP reported that lead lawyer Bruce Castor said that no member of the former president’s defense team would do anything but condemn the violence of the “repugnant” attack, and “in the strongest possible way denounce the rioters.”
Yet Trump’s attorney appealed to the senators as “patriots first,” and encouraged them to be “cool headed” as they assess the arguments.
At one pivotal point, AP reported that Raskin told the personal story of bringing his family to the Capitol the day of the riot, to witness the certification of the Electoral College vote, only to have his daughter and son-in-law hiding in an office, fearing for their lives.
“Senators, this cannot be our future,” Raskin said through tears. “This cannot be the future of America.”
Trump attorney David Schoen turned the trial toward starkly partisan tones, the defense showing its own video of Democrats calling for the former president’s impeachment.
Schoen said Democrats are fueled by a “base hatred” of the former president and “seeking to eliminate Donald Trump from the American political scene.”
It appears unlikely that the House prosecutors will call witnesses, in part because the senators were witnesses themselves. At his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida, Trump has declined a request to testify.
AP reported that presidential impeachment trials have been conducted only three times before, leading to acquittals for Andrew Johnson, Bill Clinton and then Trump last year.
Timothy Naftali, a clinical associate professor at New York University and an expert on impeachment, said in an interview, “This trial is one way of having that difficult national conversation about the difference between dissent and insurrection,” as was reported by AP.
AP reported that a similar question was posed late last month, when Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky forced a vote to set aside the trial because Trump was no longer in office. At that time, 45 Republicans voted in favor of Paul’s measure. Just five Republicans joined with Democrats to pursue the trial: Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania.
The House prosecutors argued there is no “January exception” for a president on his way out the door. Rep. Joe Neguse, D-Colo., referred to the corruption case of William Belknap, a war secretary in the Grant administration, who was impeached, tried and ultimately acquitted by the Senate after leaving office, as was reported by AP.
Trump’s case is hardly a run of the mill corruption charge, he said, but incitement of insurrection. If Congress stands by, “it would invite future presidents to use their power without any fear of accountability.”
AP reported that in filings, lawyers for the former president lobbed a wide-ranging attack against the House case, suggesting Trump was simply exercising his First Amendment rights and dismissing the trial as “political theater” on the same Senate floor invaded by the mob.
Because of the COVID-19 crisis, senators were allowed to spread out, including in the “marble room” just off the Senate floor, where proceedings are shown on TV, or even in the public galleries above the chamber. Most were at their desks on the opening day, however.
Presiding was not the chief justice of the United States, as in previous presidential impeachment trials, but the chamber’s senior-most member of the majority party, Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, according to the AP report.
Under an agreement between Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Republican leader Mitch McConnell, the substantive opening arguments will begin at noon Wednesday, with up to 16 hours per side for presentations. The trial is expected to continue into the weekend.
Trump’s second impeachment trial is expected to diverge from the lengthy, complicated affair of a year ago. In that case, Trump was charged with having privately pressured Ukraine to dig up dirt on Biden, then a Democratic rival for the presidency.
This time, Trump’s “stop the steal” rally rhetoric and the storming of the Capitol played out for the world to see.
The Democratic-led House impeached the president swiftly, one week after the attack. Five people died, including a woman shot by police inside the building and a police officer who died the next day of his injuries.
David Schoen, a lawyer representing Donald Trump said Tuesday that Democrats are fueled by a “hatred” of Trump and fear that they will lose power. He says if the trial moves forward, it will make “everyone” look bad and other countries that wish the U.S. harm will watch with “glee.”
The NY Post reported that Schoen also argued that Democrats will “tear this country apart” and “open up new and bigger wounds” with the impeachment trial of the former president.
Schoen urged the Senate to dismiss as unconstitutional an article of impeachment against Trump for allegedly provoking the rampage the US Capitol rampage.
“This trial will tear this country apart, perhaps like we have only seen once before in our history,” Schoen said on the Senate floor, according to the NY Post report.
Trump’s team is arguing that the trial is not constitutional because Trump is out of office. Democrats, citing legal scholars and precedent from a secretary of war’s 1876 impeachment, have detailed both the historical precedent and the violence of the rioting to argue that it is constitutional.
The Post reported that Schoen additionally argued that a thorough investigation — such as one underway by retired Lt. Gen. Russell Honore — could exonerate Trump and show that the violence resulted from “preplanning” by people with an “agenda bearing no relationship to the claims made here.”
Schoen said that the trial was being waged by Democrats who don’t want a redux of Trump’s 2016 upset victory, according to the Post report.
“The House surely seeks to strip Donald Trump of his most highly cherished constitutional rights, including the right to be eligible to hold public office again should you so choose,” Schoen said, as was reported by the New York Post.
“A great many Americans see this process for exactly what it is: A chance by a group of partisan politicians seeking to eliminate Donald Trump from the American political scene and seeking to disenfranchise 74 million plus American voters and those who dare to share their political beliefs and vision of America. They hated the results of the 2016 election and want to use this impeachment process to further their political agenda,” he argued, according to the NY Post report.
“These elitists have mock them for four years. They’ve called their fellow Americans who believe in their country and their Constitution ‘deplorables’ and the latest talk is that they need to ‘deprogram’ those who supported Donald Trump and the Grand Old Party.”
Schoen, an Orthodox Jew last week had petitioned the Senate for a break in the trial on Friday afternoon in order to keep his weekly observance of the Jewish Sabbath which begins at sundown and lasts 25 hours. During that period, observant Jews are commanded to do no manner of work as the day is set apart for worship, rest and Torah study. At the trial on Tuesday, Schoen could be seen taking several sips of water throughout his opening arguments and each time he did so, he lifted his hand and placed it on his head while drinking. This was done in lieu of the fact that he chose not to wear a yarmulke (traditional head covering that Orthodox Jewish men wear).
Tuesday afternoon on Twitter, JTA’s Ron Kampeas posted in reference to Schoen putting his hand on his head, “People, don’t mock David Schoen for covering his head while he drank water. He was likely saying a blessing.”
CNN reported that Schoen subsequently withdrew his request to not hold the impeachment trial on the Jewish Sabbath, according to a person familiar with trial planning, which had altered the likely schedule for the proceedings.
CNN reported that in a letter written to Sens. Pat Leahy, Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell, Schoen wrote, “Based on adjustments that have been made on the President’s defense team, I am writing today to withdraw my request so that the proceedings can go forward as originally contemplated before I made my request. I will not participate during the Sabbath; but the role I would have played will be fully covered to the satisfaction of the defense team.”
He also wrote, “I am advised that your response to my letter was to graciously accommodate my Sabbath observance and to set a schedule for the upcoming impeachment trial that meant suspending the trial for the Jewish Sabbath. This meant causing you to lose Friday evening and all day Saturday that you previously intended to have for the trial. I very much appreciated your decision; but I remained concerned about the delay in the proceedings.”
Schumer’s office had said over the weekend the Senate would accommodate the request from Schoen.
(AP, New York Post & CNN)
(Additional reporting by JV staff writer, Fern Sidman)
A new analysis from a fiscal watchdog group claims City Hall is obscuring the scope of NYC’s budget crisis.
As reported by the NY Post, Mayor Bill de Blasio’s budget is counting on $1 billion in recurring savings from the Big Apple’s labor unions — but these concessions have not yet been agreed to. The Citizens Budget Commission (CBC) said that the city hasn’t even publicly presented a plan with which to reach this goal. “I look at this as a fake part of the budget. This $1 billion in labor savings is a fiction until they come up with a plan,” said Andrew Rein, head of the budget watchdog group. “Fictional savings in the budget is masking the depth of the problem.”
Mayor Bill de Blasio has listed the $1 billion in savings, which is not yet a reality, to keep the city’s explosive budget deficits in check, not just this year but for the next four years. For 2022, the labor savings keeps the $92.3 billion budget from dipping into the red, says the CBC. If the labor cuts don’t materialize, in 2023, City Hall’s deficit will expand to $5.3 billion, instead of the $4.3 billion currently projected. Without the $1 Billion gimmick, the budget for 2024 and 2025 similarly jump, and those budget gaps may surpass $5 billion, as per CBC’s analysis.
Amid the pandemic, which obliterated NYC’s revenue stemming from property taxes, Mayor Bill de Blasio has come under pressure to cut costs and payrolls to balance the budget. For months the mayor has been pining for Federal aid, which has been stalled. So, his administration’s simple solution was to defer $722 million in labor costs from the 2021 budget to 2022, which municipal unions agreed to in exchange for short-term promises from the mayor to stop laying off city employees.
The city’s fiscal woes are far from over, with heavy declines in property tax revenues to continue, and receipts slated to plunge by roughly $2.5 billion in 2022 alone. Critics have said that the plan is just a way to hold over the city’s fiscal problems for the year, until the mayor’s term ends.
“In the face of declining tax revenues and billions in unplanned spending to fight the pandemic, we balanced the budget, remained focused on saving taxpayer dollars, and reduced the City’s payroll without laying off a single employee,” said City Hall spokesman Mitch Schwartz, in a statement. “All the while, we’re expanding our vaccination efforts and proving that we’re going to rebuild this city with a recovery for all of us.”
New York Mayor Bill de Blasio on Sunday ordered an independent audit of the city’s nonprofit shelter providers after a published report described multiple sexual abuse accusations against the top executive of one of the largest providers.
De Blasio also ordered the Bronx Parent Housing Network to hire an independent investigator to examine multiple sexual misconduct allegations against chief executive Victor Rivera.
The New York Times reported Sunday that 10 women, some of them employees, accused him of sexual assault or harassment and that two alleged he coerced them into performing oral sex. The report alleged Rivera also used his power to hire family members and steer contracts to close associates.
“The city is hiring an outside auditing firm to review non-profit shelter providers to ensure true compliance,” de Blasio tweeted Sunday. “And we can’t stop at just shelter providers. I have directed that any complaint to any City agency alleging sexual misconduct from any non-profit contractor must be referred to an independent investigatory agency, NOT the non-profit’s own board.”
In a statement, Rivera denied the allegations, according to the Times, calling them “unfair, baseless and without merit.” A phone message was left Sunday evening on his office voicemail. The organization put Rivera on leave last week, according to the Times.
Rivera was one of the founders of the network 20 years ago and “knows first-hand what it is like to be surviving the streets of the Bronx,” according to the Bronx Parent Housing Network website. The city has paid the organization more than $274 million to run homeless shelters and provide services since 2017, according to the report.
Rivera was one of the founders of the network in 2000. The city has paid the organization more than $274 million to run homeless shelters and provide services since 2017, according to the report.
De Blasio told NY1 Nws he did not know about these allegations or that there wasn’t an independent investigation and said the city will not tolerate such misconduct.
NY1 reported: although the mayor contested that in recent years, nonprofits in the city have engaged in less wrongdoing, and said he’s been told Bronx Parent Housing Network has done good work for homeless New Yorkers, he called the allegations against Rivera a wake-up call.
De Blasio said any such allegation must be investigated by the Department of Investigation or an outside independent auditor to vet nonprofits and the people they employ, something he says he is mandating for all homeless services providers.
On Thursday, Gov. Andrew Cuomo finally released the complete list of New York State COVID-19 nursing home deaths. Following months of prodding, a Supreme Court judge ordered New York State’s Department of Health to comply with a Freedom of Information request. As reported by the Daily Mail, in compliance, the Governor’s updated list reveals 4,000 more deaths than the original released figure of 8,711.
The new COVID-19 death toll for NYS nursing home and assisted living residents is officially 12,743, which is 50 percent higher than the state had admitted till now. The new figure also includes those who died after being transferred from a nursing home to a hospital due to the novel Coronavirus. The new detailed list, with numbers for each nursing facility in the state, highlights that the highest number of deaths occurred in Suffolk County, which had 655 confirmed deaths and 267 presumed. The second highest number of COVID-19 nursing home casualties occurred in Erie County in Western New York, with 621 confirmed deaths and nine presumed.
The single nursing home that fared worse was Harris Hill Nursing Facility in Erie County, outside of Buffalo. As per the state’s figures, 117 residents from Harris Hill Nursing Facility were confirmed to have died of COVID-19, and 19 more died after being transferred to a hospital, and two more died presumably from COVID-19. Other homes with tragic results include the Father Baker Manor in Buffalo, the Absolut Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation in East Aurora. In Queens, the Parker Jewish Institute for Health Care and Rehab had 83 residents who died of COVID-19, plus 32 who died in the hospital after transfer.
Thursday’s new tally puts the state of New York in 13th place, for the highest COVID-19 nursing home mortality rate in the U.S., as per an Empire Center analysis. With the previous numbers, NYS was at 35th place. The calculation is made by evaluating the number of deaths relative to the percentage of the nursing home population for 2019.
For six months, law makers have been trying to pry the number out of the state’s Health Commissioner Howard Zucker. In January, Attorney General Letitia James released a report blasting the state and finding that the Cuomo administration misled the public about the actual number of COVID fatalities in nursing facilities, and that the state figure was undercounting deaths by some 50 percent. The Daily Mail reported that days after the AG’s report, Albany Supreme Court Justice Kimberly O’Connor ruled, in a 16-page decision, that the DOH must submit the full records to the Empire Center within five business days and pay their legal costs.
Thousands of New Yorkers who were previously Republicans or independents have recently re-enrolled as Democrats, so as to be able to vote for the Democratic mayoral primary which will be held in June. As reported by the NY Post, some 15,000 New Yorkers switched or re-enrolled as Democrats recently, anticipating the party’s all-important primary, which may determine who the next New York City mayor will be.
In the city where the blue wave dominates, a group named Be Counted NYC has spent millions of dollars to persuade independents and Republicans to re-enroll as Democrats so that they can have more a say in the mayoral election. The group holds that a Republican candidate won’t stand a chance of winning the general election, so in essence, the Dem’s primary will decide the winner. By adding more moderates and conservatives into that pool of registered voters, the group hopes to affect the outcome of a close primary race, and prevent a candidate way to the left from being elected.
The city Board of Elections, related that 7,156 New York City voters switched to the Democratic Party between Jan. 2 and Feb. 4, 2021. Of those who switched, 2,426 were formerly registered as Republicans and 4,730 were formerly registered as “blank” or unaffiliated. The ‘Be Counted NYC’ group, however, maintains that the total tally will be much higher and that roughly 15,000 have switched over or enrolled as Democrats. “We are seeing a tremendous amount of momentum behind our effort to get people registered to vote in the Democratic primary, including a surge last week in a single day when thousands of voters returned their voter registration by mail,” said Be Counted NYC founder, founder, Lisa Blau, who is a wellness brand financier. Her husband is Jeff Blau, the CEO of Related Companies, a major real estate developer in NYC.
Since December, the group has been making phone calls, text massages, and mailing letters to Republicans and unregistered voters trying to persuade them to enroll as Democrats so as to vote in the June 22 Democratic primary. The deadline to enroll is Feb. 14.
Former Gov. George Pataki joined other Republican leaders who criticized the effort. “Don’t give in to those who say Republicans can’t win in New York,” said the former three-term GOP NYC Governor. “How did Bloomberg win? How did Rudy Giuliani win. How did I win,” he added.
NYC currently has 3,748,026 registered Democrats, and only 568,732 registered Republicans, with another 1,075,189 enrolled as “blank” or unaffiliated voters, as per the state Board of Elections.
Two recent resignations at the NY Times are being described as “forced” and are creating a lot of controversy, as one reporter resigned after allegedly using racist language and a second reporter resigned after alleged predatory behavior.
Staff members at the New York Times are reportedly clashing after its longtime reporter Donald McNeil Jr. was forced to resign last week for using “racist language” in 2019.
In posts to a private Facebook group, the Washington Free Beacon reportedly discovered Times staffers heatedly arguing about whether the ousting of McNeil, a science reporter who had been at the paper for 45 years, was justified, Breitbart pointed out
Breitbart summarized: McNeil, who had emerged over the past year as a leading reporter on coronavirus for the paper, had, according to the Times, used a “racial slur” during a work trip to Peru in 2019 while serving as a guide to high school students, and the paper’s management had subsequently “disciplined” him for it. The Daily Beast provided further context, reporting that several students complained that McNeil had used the N-word specifically and two students alleged McNeil also rejected the concept of “white privilege.”
According to Breitbart, McNeil explained last week in an apology letter that a student during the trip had asked him if a classmate of hers should have been suspended for a video in which she used the word, and McNeil had replied to the student by repeating the word as he was clarifying her question.
In other words, McNeil was not using the word to degrade an induvial with the racial slur, he was repeating a question. Evidently context no longer means anything with political correctness infecting workplaces. Even more bizarre is that a reporter is not allowed to have an opinion of a vague social justice slogan “white privilege”, which in itself is simply an opinion or sociological theory, not a grounded fact.
“We do not tolerate racist language regardless of intent … and [we] will work with urgency to create clearer guidelines and enforcement about conduct in the workplace, including red-line issues on racist language”, Executive Editor Dean Baquet and Managing Editor Joe Kahn said in a statement.
Meanwhile reporter Andy Mills stepped down after alleged “predatory” behavior. The NY Post pointed out In his resignation published online, Mills admitted to bad behavior while working as a producer for the WNYC show “Radiolab” — including giving one colleague an unwanted backrub and pouring a drink on a coworker’s head at a party seven years ago — but said he was stepping down over an “online campaign” that had painted him as a “predator.”
“I look back at those actions with extraordinary regret and embarrassment,” he wrote Friday.
New York lawmakers last September proposed the “No Citizen is Above the Law” legislation aimed at making it harder for Trump or any future president to avoid state prosecution if accused of criminal wrongdoing, and ironically during the week of Trump’s second impeachment trial, the bill is poised to pass.
Senate Deputy Leader Michael Gianaris and Assembly Member Nick Perry announced the New York No Citizen is Above the Law Act, in September of 2020 after a federal court granted President Trump another delay in his on-going legal maneuverings and stall tactics to keep hidden his subpoenaed tax returns from the Manhattan District Attorney. This bill ensures laws are equally applied to all citizens, even the President of the United States
“This President and any who follow should be held accountable for their illegal acts,” said Senate Deputy Leader Michael Gianaris at the time. “We must close the loophole that allows Presidents to exploit statutes of limitations coupled with Presidential immunity to forever escape culpability for malfeasance.”
“Clearly the privileges of the office of President were not intended to make the holder of the office above the law and was not intended to empower a President with the ability to thwart and sabotage an active, legitimate investigation as New York prosecutors have accused the president of doing,” said Assemblyman Nick Perry at the time.
“We must close the loophole that allows Presidents to exploit statutes of limitations coupled with Presidential immunity to forever escape culpability for malfeasance”, Perry demanded in September.
The bill will pass the state Senate this week and is on the calendar to be voted on in the Assembly at any time, the NY Post pointed out. Trump legal adviser Alan Dershowitz said the proposed state law is probably legal, as long as legislators do not extend the statute of limitations for criminal prosecution, typically five years.
The bill pauses statute of limitations for all crimes alleged to be committed by the President of the United States. If enacted, it would thwart all efforts by any sitting US President to impede on-going criminal investigations. Under current law the immunity enjoyed by Presidents can be used to run out the statute of limitations on criminal charges. The bill, if enacted, would take effect immediately allowing prosecutors in New York State currently pursuing investigations into the sitting President of United States to pursue charges if warranted, Senate Deputy Leader Michael Gianaris press release stated.