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Encouraging Illegal Aliens To Remain In The US Is A Crime, Supreme Court Rules

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(DCNF) The Supreme Court unanimously upheld a federal statute that forbids encouraging illegal aliens to remain in the U.S. unlawfully in a decision Thursday.

The Supreme Court justices voided an earlier decision by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which had ruled that a federal anti-harboring statute was unconstitutional on the grounds that it violated the First Amendment by restricting free speech. The ruling by the nation’s highest court Thursday upholds the law.

The Supreme Court not only vacated the appeals court’s decision, but also criticized the judges for “drastically” straying from judicial norms.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a liberal stalwart of the bench, wrote the high court’s opinion.

“[T]he appeals panel departed so drastically from the principle of party presentation as to constitute an abuse of discretion,” Ginsburg wrote, and later stated that “a court is not hidebound by the precise arguments of counsel, but the Ninth Circuit’s radical transformation of this case goes well beyond the pale.”

The decision brings to a close a court battle that lasted roughly 10 years.

A grand jury indicted California immigration consultant Evelyn Sineneng-Smith in 2010 for multiple violations of anti-harboring laws, which make it a felony to “encourag[e] or induc[e] an alien to come to, enter, or reside in the United States, knowing or in reckless disregard of the fact that such coming to, entry, or residence is or will be in violation of law.”

Sineneng-Smith encouraged illegal alien clients to apply for a certification that would allow them to remain legally in the country, despite them not qualifying for the certification, according to the indictment. She would charge her clients a fee for this service, and allegedly made millions off of the scheme.

Sineneng-Smith earned more than $3.3 million off of her clients, legal affairs outlet Jurist reported.

In a challenge to the decision, Sineneng-Smith argued that the law violated her right to free speech. The Ninth Circuit reversed her conviction, finding that the entire law was invalid as an over broad restriction of speech.

The Ninth Circuit’s reversal however, was not based on arguments presented by her defense, but by third party arguments submitted to the panel of judges.

The Supreme Court ruled that the Ninth Circuit overstepped its authority by injecting an argument not made by the defendant herself. The decision ultimately reaffirms that parties — not the courts — shape issues in a court case.

The case is now to be sent back to the Ninth Circuit “for reconsideration … bearing a fair resemblance to the case shaped by parties.”

The decision was hailed by immigration hawks.

“We applaud the Court’s well-reasoned decision,” Dale L. Wilcox, executive director and general counsel of Immigration Reform Law Institute, said in a statement.

“Unfortunately, the Court did not have to reach the issue of whether this important statute is constitutional, but it did keep the law in place. When and if the overbreadth issue is brought up properly by a defendant in the future, we will be there,” Wilcox said.

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Wall Street Journal: Economic Lockdown Is the ‘Catastrophe’

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Visitors to the Department of Labor are turned away at the door by personnel due to closures over coronavirus concerns, Wednesday, March 18, 2020, in New York. Applications for jobless benefits are surging in some states as coronavirus concerns shake the U.S. economy. The sharp increase comes as governments have ordered millions of workers, students and shoppers to stay home as a precaution against spreading the virus that causes the COVID-19 disease. (AP Photo/John Minchillo)

By Eric Mack (NEWSMAX)

Those saying we had to sacrifice the economy to save lives have succeeded in only the former, according to The Wall Street Journal ;opinion piece in a scathing rebuke of lockdowns at all costs amid the global coronavirus pandemic.

“The tradeoff isn’t between lives and livelihoods,” the Journal editorial board concluded. “The policy goal has to be to protect both as much as possible.

“Deploy more personal protective equipment, greatly increase testing, build surge capability to handle flare-ups, and isolate society’s most vulnerable to keep hospitals from getting overwhelmed.

“But for heaven’s sake reopen the economy so we don’t consign millions to years of poverty.”

The op-ed was in response to those denouncing a past call back on March 19, “Rethinking the Coronavirus Shutdown,” when the shutdowns were only beginning.

“Well, after Friday’s horrific jobs report, how do you like the shutdown now?” the Journal wrote. “The people who said we have to sacrifice the economy to crush the virus have succeeded in the former even as the virus will be with us for many more months or longer.”

April’s unemployment rate showed 14.7% of Americans out of work, the highest rate in record U.S. history, until 6.4 million workers were added to the unemployment line.

“Much of the media continue to treat the economic destruction as a sideshow and present a false choice between saving lives and jobs,” the board wrote. “But this is the fastest jobs collapse in modern history. The Great Depression drove millions of Americans into poverty and caused many suicides, and there’s a substantial risk this could happen again.”

And, most notably, even hospitals are cutting essential frontline workers, as elective surgeries have put healthcare facilities on life support.

“Congress has appropriated $175 billion to shore up hospitals, but this won’t help small physician practices much,” the board wrote. “Many healthcare providers warn they may not survive if their privately insured patients lose jobs and sign up for Medicaid, which doesn’t cover their costs.”

The board even rebuked Democrats’ plan to keep paying Americans’ unemployment indefinitely, until a vaccine that may or may not come.

“The crowd that demands the economy remain locked-down until there’s a vaccine, miracle therapy or daily testing of everyone in the country seem to think the government can replace the private economy,” the board wrote. “That’s a fantasy, and they are betraying the very low- and middle-income workers they claim to represent. Average wages in April rose sharply because so many low-income workers were laid off.”

The Journal went as far as sharing President Donald Trump’s mantra, “Americans need to work to make a living, and they want to work,” even amid the desire to “blame President Trump for the economic pain.”

“It is important to stress that the strict lockdowns were a government policy choice,” the board wrote. “But the damage is done, and our focus isn’t on recriminations. The issue is what to do now, and the public is wise enough to know that public health can’t be sustained without a healthy economy.

“Americans can see the destruction all around them. They know the virus will be with us for a long time unless there’s a vaccine, so we have to learn to live with it and have a functioning economy.”

No Israeli Corona Deaths in 24 hours for First Time in 6 Weeks

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By Ebin Sandler, World Israel News

On Saturday morning, Israel announced that the nation recorded no new coronavirus-related deaths over the past 24 hours.

This was the first full day since March 28 that Israel reported no new deaths from COVID-19, which has infected over 16,400 Israelis and killed 247 as of Saturday evening.

The announcement arrived just days after malls and open-air markets reopened for business, with national parks permitting visitors on Saturday for the first time since the coronavirus pandemic brought the nation and much of the world to a grinding halt.

On Thursday, Jerusalem’s iconic Mahane Yehuda market reopened, a national landmark where locals and tourists alike crowd in six days a week to buy fresh fruits and vegetables and dine at trendy gastro pubs and eateries.

Tel Aviv also reopened its Carmel and Hatikva markets on Thursday.

All businesses in Israel must comply with a detailed set of rules that requires social distancing of customers, maximum numbers of patrons per square meter, and health and hygiene protocols for employees and facilities.

At open-air markets in Tel Aviv, for instance, authorities fenced off entrances, placed markings on the ground to insure social distancing, and hung posters with the Ministry of Health’s guidelines visible to customers and merchants alike.

As Israel sees coronavirus infections and fatalities plummet, it prepares to face its next big test with arrival of the Lab B’Omer holiday on Monday evening and Tuesday. The day is usually marked with massive bonfires across the country that attract huge crowds, with the nation’s largest holiday gathering taking place at Mount Meron. Hundreds of thousands of thousands of religious pilgrims and casual revelers descend on the holy site in northern Israel to celebrate the legacy of the Jewish sage Rabbi Simeon bar Yochai, who died on this day during the second century and is buried there.

While mass celebrations have been cancelled at Meron this year, Israelis may be tempted to gather in other locations in light of loosened restrictions on gatherings and movement.

Last Monday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that starting on Lag B’Omer, Israelis may hold weddings and funerals with 50 people in attendance. Netanyahu also announced that Israel plans to abolish all restrictions on June 14, provided that no red flags indicate heightened risks of infection.

As a precaution, Netanyahu announced that Israel will use three criteria to determine if Israel needs to reimpose restrictions. Specifically, Israel will monitor whether: (1) 100 new cases arise in one day, (2) cases double within 10 days, and (3) hospitals report 250 severe cases of the virus.

Netanyahu also stressed that Israelis for the time being must continue to observe social distancing, wash hands frequently, and wear face masks in public.

Tucker Carlson Calls For ‘Sociopath’ Adam Schiff To Resign For Knowingly Lying To Americans For Years

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House Intelligence Committee Chairman, Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., speaks before Acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire testifies before the House Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2019. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)

Fox News host Tucker Carlson called on Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) to resign after 57 closed-door Congressional transcripts were finally released, showing once and for all that no evidence of collusion or conspiracy between Russia and Donald Trump exists.

Tucker pointed out on Friday that not only did Schiff claim evidence existed of a conspiracy between Russia and Trump, but that he had seen it firsthand.

“Adam Schiff is a sociopath. He will do or say anything to achieve power. He is unfit to hold office. He should resign,” Carlson said. “And not just Adam Schiff. The entire apparatus of official Washington has been exposed by these transcripts, as well as by the documents just released in the Michael Flynn case”, Newswars reported.

“It was all lies, literally all of it, even the core claims about hacking that formed the basis of the entire story and the investigation that followed.”

Legal group Probes de Blasio, NYPD over Alleged Targeting of Jews in Brooklyn

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(JNS) The Lawfare Project, a Jewish legal and civil-rights group, has filed a Freedom of Information Act request as part of an investigation into the alleged targeting of New York City’s Jewish community.

The investigation comes as after New York Mayor Bill de Blasio upset many with a series of tweets about the Jewish community after hundreds gathered in the Williamsburg neighborhood in Brooklyn for the funeral of Rabbi Chaim Mertz. The synagogue that held the gathering later apologized for the crowd.

“The Lawfare Project is concerned that, at a time when anti-Semitic hate crimes are skyrocketing in New York City, Mayor de Blasio has added fuel to the fire by singling out the entire Jewish community for the spread of the coronavirus, even threatening its members with arrest,” Gerard Filitti, senior council at the Lawfare Project, said in a statement. “In light of the mayor’s outrageous statement, we have filed FOIL requests to investigate whether the mayor and the NYPD have taken actions that have disproportionately, and unlawfully, targeted the Jewish community.”

In documentation provided to JNS by the Lawfare Project, several high-profile instances did not result in the NYPD issuing summonses or arrests for social-distancing violations.

This includes a March 26 incident where dozens of people were gathered in Astoria Park in Queens; an April 3 event where hundreds of motorcyclists ignored social-distancing guidelines and participated in a funeral procession; and during a flyover of the Blue Angels on April 28, when a number of media reports suggested social-distancing was ignored. No arrests or summonses were reported from these event.

Following de Blasio’s apology, the NYPD also broke up a second overcrowded Jewish funeral later that week.

As part of the request, the Lawfare Project is seeking communications related to the Mertz funeral, the NYPD’s response, the Blue Angels event and other documentation concerning any individuals who violated mandatory social-distancing orders.

In addition to targeting the Jewish community, African-Americans and Latinos have been issued more than 80 percent of summonses for social-distancing violations in the city, reported CNN. Local officials have spoken out regarding the unfair targeting of these communities.

“We will always fight to protect and preserve the civil and human rights of the Jewish community,” said Brooke Goldstein, executive director of the Lawfare Project, in a statement. “It is outrageous for the mayor, charged with protecting the rights of all New Yorkers, to seemingly selectively enforce the law only against the Jewish community. That is the essence of anti-Semitism, and it must stop.”

Williamsburg synagogue receives ‘cease and desist’ order from city health department

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(INN)  Congregation Kahal Tolaas Yaakov in Williamsburg, New York, on Friday was served by the city’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene with a cease and desist order.

The order came after the synagogue continuously violated New York State’s executive order regarding gatherings and religious services.

Last week, the congregation held a large funeral for Rabbi Chaim Mertz, prompting Mayor Bill de Blasio to “name and shame” the city’s entire Jewish community.

This week, a second event, this one with at least 100 participants, was held, leading the city to issue the order.

Olivia Lapeyrolerie, a spokesperson for the de Blasio’s office, told the Jewish Insider: “While we know how important faith is during this time of crisis, this behavior is unacceptable, dangerous and reckless. If this house of worship continues to defy the City and State’s executive order, the building will be shut down.”

Tara Reade: Biden Should Drop Out, ‘Gross’ to See Him ‘Running on Character’

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Photo Caption - In this April 4, 2019, photo Tara Reade poses for a photo during an interview with The Associated Press in Nevada City, Calif. (AP Photo/Donald Thompson)

By By Eric Mack (NEWSMAX)

Amid attacks on her potential political motives for coming forward with public allegations of sexual assault by Joe Biden in 1993, accuser Tara Reade said it began only when other allegations against Biden noted no other employees have come forward with similar incidents.

“It wasn’t until 2019, when I saw Lucy Flores come forward and the way the media treated her,” Reade told Megan Kelly in an exclusive interview, fully released Friday. “I felt I had wanted to come forward, so I talked to my friend Karen, and Karen had said, ‘have you noticed they said no employees have come forward?’

And I said, ‘I know,’ and I thought about it.”

In a 42-minute interview, Reade told Kelly the smear campaign against her is Exhibit A for why it has taken her so long to bring the long suppressed assault allegations forward.

“I’m a posterchild for why women wouldn’t come forward, aren’t I?” she added later. “If you’re watching social media and the news on how I’m being attacked on everything about me – if you did have a story to come forward on Joe Biden – it would be pretty daunting, wouldn’t it?

“My end game is basically telling my story in a dignified way, not be torn apart. And it’s being able to move on with my life and heal.”

She did admit the political nature of the timing of her revelations, but it was brought on by Biden’s “running on character,” which Reade feels compelled to respond to.

“Everything’s political, right?” Reade admitted. “This is deeper than that.

“He is running on a platform of character, and I found that’s gross. I know what he’s like. I experienced what he was like, and I wanted people to know.”

Reade, who is a domestic violence survivor and now public advocate for victims, told Kelly she is a progressive who supported Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. She also voted for Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., in her district, but she was frustrated by being rebuffed to tell her story on Biden’s character to a number of women being considered as Biden’s running mate

“I wanted to reach out to them, yes,” Reade said, adding Harris was first. “So, I tried to reach out to her, in particular, for help. I wanted to get a safe place to tell what happened, and I didn’t get a response, and I kept trying to get it out there.

“Many things can be true at once. He is presented as a champion of women’s rights, and I know personally, and I know several other women that did not experience him that way.”

Reade admitted to have posted social media support for Biden in the past, and also voting for former President Barack Obama and Biden in both 2008 and 2012.

“I feel politically homeless,” Reade says now, removing herself from the Democratic Party over this and refusing to vote Republican because of her progressive beliefs.

“I am not here to influence a national election, and I don’t want to be,” she told Kelly. “I don’t want to help Donald Trump win. I do not want to help Joe Biden win, obviously, he’s the person that hurt me.”

But, in a direct message to Biden, who she hoped would “drop out” of the race: “You should not be running on character for the president of the United States.”

“You don’t have to discredit me, or not believe me, to vote for Joe Biden,” she said. “I even have friends and family that are still voting for Joe Biden.

“I don’t really care, deep down, if they believe me or not. I know what happened to me, and I’ll move forward. But I want other survivors to know that they can come forward, and when they see this onslaught of this sort of partisanship, it’s very discouraging.

“So, we can come forward unless it’s a Democrat? Is that the message we’re sending?”

Reade lamented the media and his supporters in being “complicit” in not holding Biden accountable.

“They’re saying the media has to investigate it: To me, that was appalling,” Reade told Kelly. “It’s like calling upon the mob to tear apart somebody. And they did.”

Instead, Reade pointed to the Senate personnel complaint she filed, which she said Biden is actively withholding from being released from the University of Delaware to obfuscate the truth.

“I think that says it all,” Reade said. “Once we get the document, we’ll see what it says.

“I think that his reluctance is speaking volumes.”

Finally, on the issue of taking a polygraph, Reade is wary of doing it as a precedent it would set for women weighing whether to come forward. Polygraphs are for “a criminal,” like Biden, she added.

“I’m not a criminal,” Reade said. “Joe Biden should take the polygraph.

“Does that mean we’re presumed guilty and we’re all going to have to take polygraphs? I would take one if Joe Biden takes one, but I’m not a criminal.”

 

Obama Lashes Out at Trump: ‘Absolute Chaotic Disaster’

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By Solange Reyner  (NEWSMAX)

Former President Barack Obama on Friday during a private phone call with allies criticized the Trump administration’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic as “chaotic” and warned that the “rule of law” was endangered by the Justice Department’s decision to drop charges against former national security adviser Michael Flynn.

The searing comments from Obama came during a 30-minute web talk with members of the Obama Alumni Association where the former president pushed for Democrats to rally behind Joe Biden to win the 2020 presidential election.

“This election that’s coming up on every level is so important because what we’re going to be battling is not just a particular individual or a political party,” Obama said according to audio of the call obtained by Yahoo News.

Obama was critical of Trump’s response on the coronavirus pandemic:

“What we’re fighting against is these long-term trends in which being selfish, being tribal, being divided, and seeing others as an enemy — that has become a stronger impulse in American life. And by the way, we’re seeing that internationally as well. It’s part of the reason why the response to this global crisis has been so anemic and spotty. It would have been bad even with the best of governments. It has been an absolute chaotic disaster when that mindset — of ‘what’s in it for me’ and ‘to heck with everybody else’ — when that mindset is operationalized in our government.”

Trump earlier this week again blamed the Obama administration for a bare cupboard of medical supplies in the Strategic National Stockpile, telling ABC News the U.S. didn’t have ventilators, medical equipment and testing.

“And we’ve taken it and we have built an incredible stockpile — a stockpile like we’ve never had before,” Trump told David Muir.

The Obama administration faced repeated crises over the span of eight years, including the H1N1 influenza pandemic of 2009, but failed to take significant steps to replenish the supply of specific personal protective equipment, specifically N95 masks.

Trump has received significant blowback for his handling of the pandemic, mostly from Democrats, though his top health policy advisor on the White House coronavirus task force is Obama holdover Dr. Anthony Fauci, the head of the National Institutes of Health.

Obama, who formally endorsed Joe Biden in April, also weighed in on the Flynn case following the news of Attorney William Barr’s decision to drop the criminal case against Flynn, who pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI.

“The fact that there is no precedent that anybody can find for someone who has been charged with perjury just getting off scot-free. That’s the kind of stuff where you begin to get worried that basic — not just institutional norms — but our basic understanding of rule of law is at risk,” said Obama. “And when you start moving in those directions, it can accelerate pretty quickly as we’ve seen in other places.

Before taking office, Obama warned Trump about Flynn and his contacts with Russia.

“So I am hoping that all of you feel the same sense of urgency that I do,” he said referring to the 2020 election.

NY Pandemic Update : Saturday May 9th

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Mr. Cuomo also announced 226 more deaths due to the coronavirus, 10 more than the number reported a day earlier.

New hospitalizations for Covid-19 patients remained relatively flat, with 572 new patients being treated at city hospitals for the coronavirus. On Friday, 604 people were hospitalized, and that number hovered in the 600s this week.

“That number has been infuriatingly constant,” he said. “We would like to see that number dropping at a faster rate that it is currently dropping.”

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Three young children have died in New York of a mysterious, toxic-shock inflammation syndrome with links to the coronavirus, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo said on Saturday.

As of Saturday, more than 73 children in New York have been sickened by the rare illness, which has some similarities to Kawasaki disease and was publicly identified for the first time earlier this week, NY Times reported.

The state will be working with the New York Genome Center and Rockefeller University to determine what is causing the illness, which Governor Cuomo described on Saturday as “truly disturbing.”

*****************************************************************************************************’

Amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, Governor Andrew M. Cuomo today announced the launch of a new initiative to expand access to testing in low-income communities and communities of color. The state is partnering with Northwell Health to establish an initial 24 temporary testing sites at churches in predominately minority communities in downstate New York to build on the state’s network of downstate testing sites.

The results of the state’s diagnostic testing and antibody testing surveys show that low-income and minority communities are suffering the most from COVID-19. The largest statewide antibody testing survey of 15,000 New Yorkers found a greater infection rate in communities of color. Additionally, the state’s comprehensive survey of all newly admitted patients hospitalized for COVID-19 found communities of color are most impacted and of the 21 zip codes with the most new COVID-19 hospitalizations, 20 have greater than average black and/or Latino populations. A deeper look into two of the most impacted communities in the survey, in Brooklyn and the Bronx, found communities of color are also lower-income and have a greater percentage of COVID-19 hospitalizations and infections than New York City overall.

Today’s testing expansion initiative builds on previous state actions to address inequalities and deliver for those most impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. In recent weeks, the state has partnered with Ready Responders to bring healthcare services, including COVID-19 diagnostic testing, to residents of public housing in New York City and delivered one million cloth masks and 10,000 gallons of hand sanitizer to public housing.

The Governor also announced the preliminary results of the state’s antibody testing survey of more than 1,300 transit workers in the New York City region show 14.2 percent have COVID-19 antibodies, compared to 19.9 percent of the general population in New York City.

Facebook’s “Oversight Board” just an Excuse for Technofascism

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By Jeffrey Wernick, legendary Investor and Strategic Advisor to Parler,

Facebook’s Content Oversight Board has generated a lot of discussions. Some cite it as another example of power over speech. Others have discussed the number of people on the Committee. Still, others focus on the names mentioned and their alleged biases and preferences. I cogitate all this is a distraction and diversion from the real issues. Facebook is a private company and is allowed to set its own Terms of Service. As Facebook has scaled, its bargaining power has strengthened since its users do not want to lose the audiences or the monetary value they have built, and prefer to preserve the status quo. Facebook, like any other business, tries to maximize the value of its bargaining power for their maximum financial benefit.

Facebook has said under oath that they are a publisher. We should not necessarily believe that statement because they admittedly lied under oath before, repeatedly lied to their users, and to just about everyone else. But the biggest Facebook lie is that they are a social network and public forum. The Social Network is merely the title of a movie that present Zuckerberg as an unscrupulous backstabber. Facebook and Zuckerberg’s noble intentions are fiction. Facebook has faced a lot of attacks regarding its decision to become a moderator of content and their digital inquisition against certain individuals. They want to continue to perform that role, but they do not want the accountability, so they are trying to legitimize the concept of aggressive content moderation by giving it more gravitas.

How many are on the Board? Irrelevant. Composition of the Board. Irrelevant. Do they have market power? Debatable. Have they abused the Section 230 waiver and exemption? Debatable.

The description of any Board or Committee as “pro-social” whose job is to judge the statements of others is an embrace of an elitism that is anti-social and anti-American. Anyone who would even serve on a Board or Committee like that has already indicated they believe the concept is legitimate. They are arrogant elitists and technofascists independent of whatever ideology they claim. They have chosen Facebook’s Terms of Service over the Constitution and Bill of Rights.

Shame on Facebook. Shame on anyone who embraces this concept. And shame on anyone who would agree to serve on this Committee. They are free speech frauds who want to control language and thought. Trust no one who wants that power or authority. My proposed solution is for people to simply get off Facebook.

Facebook is an acknowledged data rapist who promotes digital assassinations of individuals and groups. And is now recruiting more people to further legitimize those practices. Do not be distracted by the window dressing. Shame everyone and anyone who is willing to serve on it and practice technofascism.

Omar Attacked as Insufficiently Anti-Israel

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  ( Free Beacon)

Rep. Ilhan Omar (D., Minn.) is under fire from an unlikely group—the anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian activists who once hailed her as their movement’s biggest star.

Omar, who has championed anti-Israel causes from her perch in Congress, recently signed on to a congressional letter urging the Trump administration to ensure that an international embargo on Iran’s purchase of advanced military equipment is not lifted later this year. In a rare display of agreement with her Republican colleagues, Omar lent her name to the letter, which was spearheaded by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the nation’s most prominent pro-Israel group.

The letter, which was signed by nearly every member of Congress from both parties, expressed support for Trump administration efforts at the United Nations to ensure the Iran arms embargo remains in place. If the embargo were lifted, Iran would be capable of purchasing advanced missiles that could strike into the heart of Israel.

Omar’s willingness to partner with AIPAC in its efforts to crack down on Iranian terrorism sent shockwaves through the anti-Israel community, eliciting a range of criticism from activists who heaped praise on Omar when she expressed anti-Semitic views and advocated for economic boycotts of the Jewish state.

“It’s official, [Omar] got her own taste of the Benjamin’s baby! She’s now under the spell of [AIPAC],” tweeted Palestinian activist Abbas Hamideh, referring to Omar’s past claim that AIPAC wields power by lining the pockets of members of Congress. “It was too hard for her to resist signing a letter stating Iran was a threat to ‘Israel’ and the Gulf States effectively voting for sanctions on Iran.”

“[Omar] has updated her bio: Mom, Refugee, Intersectional Feminist, and SELLOUT,” Hamideh later tweeted, one of several enraged missives he sent on the subject.

“When you sell yourself cheap you get outed by the entire Pro-Palestinian Movement. [Omar] has become the latest example of why identity politics can be deceiving,” he stated in another. “She sold out during the Holy Month of Ramadan. Keep that in mind next time when voting.”

These same activists rushed to praise Omar when she promoted anti-Semitic conspiracy theories about Israel’s control over U.S. foreign policy and called for Jewish goods to be blocked from the international marketplace.

 

Other Omar allies, such as Palestinian journalist Ramzy Baroud, accused the lawmaker of selling out her values to the pro-Israel community.

“No explanation by Omar’s office could possibly suffice, or morally justify this shameful decision,” Baroud wrote in a Palestinian Chronicle article headlined, “Extremely Disappointing.”

At the Electronic Intifada—which often posts anti-Semitic rhetoric—veteran activist Ali Abunimah accused Omar of siding with Israel over Iran.

“Omar has signed on to a letter whose goal is to preserve and protect American empire and shore up its reactionary and undemocratic client states in the region,” Abunimah wrote in an article that went on to defend recently killed Iranian general Qassem Soleimani as an agent of “peaceful rapprochement.”

The American Conservative, a publication aligned with the anti-Israel isolationist movement that seeks to reduce the economic pressure on Iran, also expressed disappointment in Omar.

“The fact AIPAC was able to get these signatures is a testament to its influence and the hurt that it can bring down on politicians when [it] comes to re-election,” the publication wrote, echoing tropes about AIPAC’s supposed stranglehold on Congress.

“Omar’s recent signature on a letter that would have garnered hundreds of her colleagues’ support and made a splash with or without her, is a signal to AIPAC that she knows her seat is at risk, and that she would rather neutralize the feud with the pro-Israel powerhouse than send it flocking to the aid of her opponents,” according to the American Conservative.

Omar’s decision to back AIPAC’s letter elicited a vastly different response in the mainstream pro-Israel orbit.

One veteran Republican pro-Israel activist who works with AIPAC told the Free Beacon that Omar may be waking up to the threat posed by Tehran.

“People can have profound differences about foreign policy while still recognizing the existential threat that the Islamic Republic of Iran poses to American interests throughout the Middle East,” said the source, who was not authorized to speak on the record about the letter. “These sanctions help prevent the regime from spreading terrorism and further destabilizing the region. At the end of the day, I’m pleased Rep. Omar realizes that it’s all about the ballistic missiles.”

FDA Grants Approval for First At-Home Saliva Coronavirus Test

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By Tauren Dyson (NEWSMAX)The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Friday authorized emergency use for an at-home, saliva coronavirus test, according to the agency’s website.

The RUCDR Infinite Biologics lab at Rutgers University got an amended emergency authorization on Thursday for the test, which lets people send saliva samples to a lab.

The same lab was also granted emergency authorization in April for its saliva collection method, which New Jersey health care workers used to begin testing patients, according to The New York Times.

The FDA made note that this would be the only saliva-based coronavirus testing kit on the market. The only other coronavirus tests require people to gather nasal or throat samples and send them to a lab.

What’s new and next is expanding access to testing for people,” chief operating officer and director of technology development at the RUCDR Infinite Biologics lab Andrew Brooks told CNN.

According to Brooks, users will have to spit into a tube and fasten it with a cap. When the entire preservation agent turns blue, the tube is placed into a biohazard bag and sent off to the lab.

“If people are committed to do self-collection and can facilitate that collection at home, certainly with a prescription under medical care, we can get to those that are quarantined, don’t have the means for transportation or are too scared to go outside,” Brooks said. “So they get the test in the mail or from a distribution center.”

FDA Commissioner Dr. Stephen M. Hahn wrote in the agency’s press release: “The FDA has authorized more than 80 COVID-19 tests and adding more options for at-home sample collection is an important advancement in diagnostic testing during this public health emergency.”

NY’s Cuomo criticized over Highest Nursing Home Death Toll

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By JIM MUSTIAN, JENNIFER PELTZ and BERNARD CONDON (AP)

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who has won bipartisan praise for rallying supplies for his ravaged hospitals and helping slow the coronavirus, is coming under increasing criticism for not bringing that same level of commitment to a problem that has so far stymied him: nursing homes.

In part-lecture, part-cheerleading briefings that have made him a Democratic counter to President Donald Trump, Cuomo has often seemed dismissive and resigned to defeat when asked about his state leading the nation in nursing home deaths.

“We’ve tried everything to keep it out of a nursing home, but it’s virtually impossible,” Cuomo told reporters. “Now is not the best time to put your mother in a nursing home. That is a fact.”

Residents’ relatives, health care watchdogs and lawmakers from both parties cite problems with testing and transparency that have prevented officials — and the public — from grasping the full scale of the catastrophe.

And they are second-guessing a state directive that requires nursing homes take on new patients infected with COVID-19 — an order they say accelerated outbreaks in facilities that are prime breeding grounds for infectious diseases.

“The way this has been handled by the state is totally irresponsible, negligent and stupid,” said Elaine Mazzotta, a nurse whose mother died last month of suspected COVID-19 at a Long Island nursing home. “They knew better. They shouldn’t have sent these people into nursing homes.”

Of the nation’s more than 25,000 coronavirus deaths in nursing homes and long-term care facilities, more than a fifth of them — about 5,300 — are in New York, according to a count by The Associated Press, and the toll has been increasing by an average of 20 to 25 deaths a day for the past few weeks.

“The numbers, the deaths keep ticking up,” said MaryDel Wypych, an advocate for older adults in the Rochester area. “It’s just very frustrating.”

Cuomo faced criticism at a recent briefing for saying that providing masks and gowns to nursing homes is “not our job” because the homes are privately owned.

“It was such an insensitive thing to say,” said state Assemblyman Ron Kim, a Queens Democrat who noted that it wasn’t until just this past week that New York and neighboring states announced a plan to combine forces to buy protective gear and medical supplies for nursing homes.

“If we had focused on that early on,” he said, “we could have saved a lot of lives.”

Cuomo’s administration defended its response to the crisis, saying it has provided more than 10 million pieces of protective equipment to nursing homes and created a database of 95,000 workers who have helped out in hundreds of New York homes.

“This was an overwhelming situation for everyone,” said Jim Malatras, who serves on the governor’s COVID-19 task force. “There were deaths and it’s unfortunate. But it doesn’t mean we weren’t aggressive.”

One key criticism is that New York took weeks after the first known care home outbreaks to begin publicly reporting the number of deaths in individual homes — and still doesn’t report the number of cases. By the time New York began disclosing the deaths in the middle of last month, the state had several major outbreaks with at least 40 deaths each, most of which were a surprise to the surrounding communities and even some family members.

“They should have announced to the public: ‘We have a problem in nursing homes. We’re going to help them, but you need to know where it is,’” said former New York Lt. Gov. Betsy McCaughey, a Republican who now heads the nonprofit Committee to Reduce Infection Deaths. “Instead, they took the opposite tack: They hid it.”

urther, there has been a lack of testing in several recent New York outbreaks, including one that killed 98 residents, many of whom died with COVID-19 symptoms without ever being tested.

Unlike West Virginia, New York has not mandated testing in its more than 1,150 nursing homes and long-term care facilities. Nor has Cuomo followed the lead of such states as Maryland, Florida, Tennessee and Wisconsin in dispatching National Guard teams to homes to conduct testing, triage and some care.

To be sure, it’s difficult to gauge the impact of such actions. While those states reported fewer nursing home deaths than New York, several have a larger share of nursing home deaths out of their state’s totals than New York’s 25 percent.

“No state is doing even close to an adequate job,” said Elaine Ryan, AARP’s vice president for state advocacy.

New York has faced particular scrutiny for a March 25 state health department directive requiring nursing homes to take recovering coronavirus patients.

“A number of nursing homes have felt constrained by the order and admitted hospital discharged patients without knowing what their COVID status was,” said Chris Laxton, executive director of the Society for Post-Acute and Long-Term Care Medicine. “This order made an already difficult situation almost impossible.”

The order, similar to one in neighboring New Jersey, was intended to help free up hospital beds for the sickest patients as cases surged. But critics have suggested nursing homes were already overwhelmed and a better solution might have been sending them to the virtually empty Jacob K. Javits Convention Center, which was retrofitted to treat COVID-19 patients, or an even less utilized Navy hospital ship that has since left Manhattan.

As the virus was racing through his nursing home, the head of Brooklyn’s Cobble Hill Health Center frantically emailed state health officials April 9 asking just that.

“Is there a way for us to send our suspected covid cases to the Javitz center or the ship?” Donny Tuchman wrote.

Tuchman said he was denied permission. Eventually, more than 50 residents at his home would die.

Added the lawmaker Kim: “We could have figured out how to isolate these folks. We failed to do that.”

Rich Azzopardi, a senior advisor to Cuomo, said controversy over use of the convention center and the hospital ship is a “red herring” because patients discharged to nursing homes were “outside of what the feds would accept” at those facilities.

A state Health Department spokeswoman added the state is not tracking how many COVID-infected patients were admitted to nursing homes under the directive but homes should not take on new patients if they are “not medically prepared” to meet their needs.

“Throwing in new residents who may or may not have been stable at that point could not possibly have been to the benefit of any facility,” said Dr. Roy Goldberg, medical director of the Kings Harbor Multicare Center, a nursing home in the Bronx that has seen 56 deaths.

US Postal Service Warns it Could Be Next Victim of Coronavirus

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By Marisa Herman (NEWSMAX)

The U.S. Postal Service issued a warning that it may not survive due to the coronavirus pandemic.

On Friday, the mail service said the virus began harming business in late March and the decline has continued.

“It is estimated that the COVID-19 pandemic will substantially increase the Postal Service’s net operating loss over the next eighteen months, threatening the Postal Service’s ability to operate,” a press release states.

Postmaster General Megan Brennan is asking Congress and the Trump administration to send financial aid.

“We anticipate that our business will suffer potentially dire consequences for the remainder of the year,” Postmaster General and CEO Megan Brennan said in Friday’s statement. “At a time when America needs the Postal Service more than ever, the pandemic is starting to have a significant effect on our business with mail volumes plummeting as a result of the pandemic.”

More than 60,000 mail carriers and postal workers have worked through the virus outbreak.

The postal service released its second quarter numbers Friday, which are artificially elevated by mailings tied to the US Census.

“Compared to the same quarter last year, First-Class Mail revenue increased by $89 million, or 1.4%, despite a volume decline of 29 million pieces, or 0.2%. This growth was due to one-time mailings associated with the 2020 U.S. Census, otherwise First-Class Mail revenue and volume would have each declined,” the postal service said.

Last month, Brennan warned Congress the agency would run out of cash by the end of September if lawmakers don’t step in with financial assistance. USPS requested $75 billion in funding from Congress.

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin said that a $10 billion dollar loan for USPS was authorized in the CARES Act stimulus package late last month. The terms of the loan are still being discussed, USPS spokesperson David Partenheimer told CNN on Friday.

President Donald Trump said he wouldn’t approve a loan unless the USPS raises its prices for Amazon and other big shippers to four to five times current rates.

Brennan pleaded to Congress and the Trump administration for more help.

“As Congress and the Administration take steps to support businesses and industries around the country, it is imperative that they also take action to shore up the finances of the Postal Service, and enable us to continue to fulfill our indispensable role during the pandemic, and to play an effective role in the nation’s economic recovery,” she said Friday.

When Governments Switched Their Story from “Flatten the Curve” to “Lockdown until Vaccine”

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(Mises Institute)

In the early days of the COVID-19 panic—back in mid-March—articles began to appear pushing the idea of “flattening the curve” (the Washington Post ran an article called “Flatten the Curve” on March 14). This idea was premised on spreading out the total number of COVID-19 infections over time, so as to not overburden the healthcare infrastructure. A March 11 article for Statnews, summed it up:

“I think the whole notion of flattening the curve is to slow things down so that this doesn’t hit us like a brick wall,” said Michael Mina, associate medical director of clinical microbiology at Boston’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital. “It’s really all borne out of the risk of our health care infrastructure pulling apart at the seams if the virus spreads too quickly and too many people start showing up at the emergency room at any given time.”

In those days, it was still considered madness to suggest outlawing jobs for millions of Americans or “shutting down” entire national economies in an effort to flatten the curve. Thus, the article lists far more moderate mitigation strategies:

By taking certain steps—canceling large public gatherings, for instance, and encouraging some people to restrict their contact with others—governments have a shot at stamping out new chains of transmission, while also trying to mitigate the damage of the spread that isn’t under control.

What we got, of course, was something much more far reaching, radical, and disastrous for both the economy and for long-term health problems.

For the next two weeks or so, governments mostly sold the idea of forced social distancing as a measure to flatten the curve and the phrase began appearing everywhere in social media, media publications and government announcements.

Many people found this message reasonable enough, especially when coupled with claims that hospitals and governments would seek to buy up large numbers of ventilators and expand capacity with temporary hospitals. This flatten-the-curve narrative persisted for two weeks or so, but at some point in late March and early April, the narrative switched to something new.

April 2: Fauci Says Nation Can only “Relax” Social Distancing Measures After There are Zero New Cases.

The new narrative was this: the death toll will simply be too gruesome and unbearable to allow people to continue on with some semblance of an ordinary life. So, we must keep society locked down indefinitely until a vaccine is found or until there can be enough testing and tracking of infections among the entire population. Until then, only minimal “essential” activities will be allowed. This could last eighteen months, or two years, or more. And even then, there will need to be “COVID passports” and official freedom-to-work documents issued by governments. The future is one in which every move must be controlled and monitored to prevent the spread of this disease.

Thus, on April 2, Anthony Fauci, one of the lead bureaucrats on the White House’s COVID-19 advisory commission insisted that mandatory social distancing could not be eased until further notice:

“If we get to the part of the curve where it goes down to essentially no new cases, no deaths for a period of time, I think it makes sense that you have to relax social distancing,” [Fauci] added. “The one thing we hope to have in place, and I believe we will have in place, is a much more robust system to be able to identify someone who is infected, isolate them, and then do contact tracing.” [emphasis added.]

Similarly, former presidential advisor and physician Ezekiel Emmanuel flatly stated that there is “no choice” but to stay locked down indefinitely:

Realistically, COVID-19 will be here for the next 18 months or more. We will not be able to return to normalcy until we find a vaccine or effective medications. I know that’s dreadful news to hear. How are people supposed to find work if this goes on in some form for a year and a half? Is all that economic pain worth trying to stop COVID-19? The truth is we have no choice. [emphasis added.]

This messaging was used at the state level as well. On April 9, the Hawaii Department of Education, echoing Fauci, announced that all “public schools are expected to stay shut until COVID-19 is no longer spreading in the community, defined as four weeks with no new cases.”

Needless to say, such a situation is unlikely to happen any time that’s soon enough to save Hawaii from an economic implosion.

Similarly, in Colorado, during an April 1 briefing, Governor Jared Polis stated that when it comes to COVID-19 his policy is “stamping this out,” and claimed that mandatory social distancing could not be eased until total cases were falling.

This switcheroo on the reason for the lockdowns was a great victory for the World Health Organization (WHO) and advocates for widespread state controls on the economy and daily life. Already by early March, some WHO officials had come out in favor of the Chinese approach of draconian lockdowns imposed by the Chinese police state and surveillance state. As noted by Statnews, Mike Ryan, the head of the WHO’s health emergencies program, embraced the Chinese “containment” strategy and denounced flatten-the-curve style “mitigation” strategies as “counterproductive.”

Perhaps not surprisingly, by early April we had leading national figures in the US insisting that China-style lockdowns were the only way to deal with the disease. “Flatten the curve” was still used as a slogan, but its meaning had changed.

Another Switch in Early May:  Back to the Old Idea of “Flatten the Curve”

By early May, it was clear that the “containment” strategy was failing, since, in the United States at least, few elected officials were prepared to stomach the idea of keeping their economies locked down until a vaccine appeared or until new cases disappeared completely. After all, as unemployment numbers skyrocketed and state and local government budgets cratered, “lockdown until vaccine” didn’t seem like such a viable strategy anymore.

Indeed, two weeks earlier, the Hawaii Department of Education had already abandoned its declaration about the need for no new cases, with the department director backpedaling furiously and stating:

“We would expect to be living with COVID-19 for a long time, and to have to wait for the last case to have occurred and another 28 days probably is not going to happen, so I believe that was really a placeholder.”

By late April, numerous states’ governors and municipal officials were discussing ways to scale back their lockdowns. Many governors and mayors nonetheless continued to claim that they would not allow any easing of the lockdowns until cases began to decline, or until testing became widespread. Neither of those things has happened, yet governments have already begun to significantly loosen lockdowns. In many states, total deaths have plateaued but show no sign of disappearing.

The Sweden Model Is the Future

“Flatten the curve” remains a popular goal among policymakers, but now we’re back to the old definition: fear remains that hospitals and healthcare personnel will be overwhelmed. The preferred political solution lies in both continuing to encourage social distancing and in prohibiting larger gatherings. But the idea that everyone will sit at home until a vaccine is found has at the moment fallen out of favor except in the most dogmatically leftist areas.1 Hard-left activist Matthew Yglesias, for example, complained this week that flattening the curve “isn’t good enough.”

Indeed, the Chinese-style containment strategy has failed so completely that even the WHO has abandoned it. The WHO now endorses the Swedish model, which is based on increasing healthcare capacity while relying primarily on voluntary social distancing. The Financial Times reported on April 29:

The World Health Organization has defended Sweden’s approach to tackling Covid-19, saying it has implemented “strong measures” to tackle the virus….

The director of the WHO’s health emergencies programme said on Wednesday there was a perception that Sweden had not done enough to contain coronavirus, but “nothing could be further from the truth”. Sweden has put in place a “very strong public health policy”, Mike Ryan said, but unlike many other countries has chosen to rely on its “relationship with its citizenry” and trust them to self-regulate.

Its healthcare system has not been overwhelmed, he said, adding that its approach could be a “model” for other countries when lockdowns begin to relax.

In other words, the containment strategy favored by Fauci and Emanuel is dead (for now).  Although it has not happened by design, the US is moving toward a Sweden model.

Nonetheless, one is still likely to encounter rabid “COVID warriors” on social media, who think that interminable lockdowns will (somehow) significantly reduce the overall total deaths from COVID-19. But it increasingly seems that such a scenario is wishful thinking.

In a new article posted at The Lancet on Tuesday, Swedish infectious disease clinician Johan Giesecke writes on how lockdowns don’t really reduce overall total deaths, and says that when it’s all over, nonlockdown jurisdictions are likely to have similar death rates to lockdown areas:

It has become clear that a hard lockdown does not protect old and frail people living in care homes—a population the lockdown was designed to protect.

Neither does it decrease mortality from COVID-19, which is evident when comparing the UK’s experience with that of other European countries.

PCR testing and some straightforward assumptions indicate that, as of April 29, 2020, more than half a million people in Stockholm county, Sweden, which is about 20–25% of the population, have been infected (Hansson D, Swedish Public Health Agency, personal communication). 98–99% of these people are probably unaware or uncertain of having had the infection; they either had symptoms that were severe, but not severe enough for them to go to a hospital and get tested, or no symptoms at all. Serology testing is now supporting these assumptions.

These facts have led me to the following conclusions. Everyone will be exposed to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus, and most people will become infected. COVID-19 is spreading like wildfire in all countries, but we do not see it—it almost always spreads from younger people with no or weak symptoms to other people who will also have mild symptoms. This is the real pandemic, but it goes on beneath the surface, and is probably at its peak now in many European countries. There is very little we can do to prevent this spread: a lockdown might delay severe cases for a while, but once restrictions are eased, cases will reappear. I expect that when we count the number of deaths from COVID-19 in each country in 1 year from now, the figures will be similar, regardless of measures taken.

Will Giesecke be proven correct? We’ll find out.

1.In Illinois, for example, the state’s Democratic governor J.B. Pritzker on May 7 issued a plan for “reopening,” stating that the state’s economy cannot be “fully reopened” until there is “a vaccine or highly effective treatment widely available or the elimination of any new cases over a sustained period.” This is the languge used earlier by Fauci and Emanuel. Pritzker continues to insist that he will rule by decree “until COVID-19 is defeated.” Bill Gates has made similar comments: “One of the questions I get asked the most these days is when the world will be able to go back to the way things were in December before the coronavirus pandemic. My answer is always the same: when we have an almost perfect drug to treat COVID-19, or when almost every person on the planet has been vaccinated against coronavirus.” (https://www.gatesnotes.com/Health/What-you-need-to-know-about-the-COVID-19-vaccine)

Author:

Contact Ryan McMaken

Ryan McMaken (@ryanmcmaken) is a senior editor at the Mises Institute. Send him your article submissions for the Mises Wire and The Austrian, but read article guidelines first. Ryan has degrees in economics and political science from the University of Colorado and was the economist for the Colorado Division of Housing from 2009 to 2014. He is the author of Commie Cowboys: The Bourgeoisie and the Nation-State in the Western Genre.

 

 

U.S. News Stocks Rise on Hopes that Awful Jobs Report Marks the Bottom

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By STAN CHOE and DAMIAN J. TROISE (A.P)

Wall Street brushed off a record-breaking report of job losses and pushed higher Friday as investors reckoned that the very worst of the economic pain caused by the coronavirus pandemic may be passing. The S&P 500 climbed 1.7% and posted its first weekly gain in the last three. Employers cut 20.5 million jobs last month as businesses and travel shut down, a record high but still less bad than markets had braced for. In other encouraging signs that pessimism was easing, oil prices closed the week with solid gains just weeks after hitting record lows, and bond yields rose.

Wall Street rallied again on Friday after a terrible, unprecedented report on the U.S. jobs market wasn’t quite as horrific as economists had forecast.

The S&P 500 climbed 1.4% in afternoon trading after the government said employers cut a record-busting 20.5 million jobs last month. While the number is a nightmare, it was slightly below the 21 million that economists told markets to brace for. More importantly, investors are betting they won’t see another report that bad again because the number of workers filing for unemployment benefits has been slowly declining the last five weeks.

Stocks around the world were already heading higher before the U.S. jobs report came out, in part on hopes that U.S. and China won’t restart their trade war. After the release of the report, stocks climbed even more. In another sign of receding pessimism, Treasury yields tentatively rose.

“In some aspects, investors are starting to look at it as the worst is behind us,” said. Charlie Ripley, senior investment strategist for Allianz Investment Management. “Obviously we have time to wait here and reassess as things go, as they reopen, but there’s some comfort that we’re passing through the trough.”

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 370 points, or 1.5%, at 24,245, as of 3:10 p.m. Eastern time. The Nasdaq was up 1.3%. The S&P 500 is heading toward its first winning week in the last three.

After losing a third of its value in a little more than a month on worries about a severe recession, the S&P 500 has since charged higher to recover more than half its loss. The rally started after the Federal Reserve and Capitol Hill pledged trillions of dollars to prop up the economy through the downturn.

More recently, even as horrific data confirmed the recession fears were correct, investors have pushed stocks higher as they looked ahead to growth potentially resuming later this year. Countries around the world and many U.S. states have laid out plans to relax restrictions on business, meant to slow the spread of the coronavirus outbreak. which could set the stage for many of those vanished jobs to reappear.

“Investors have chosen to look beyond the current trauma and focus on the reopening of the economy, though the trajectory of the recovery is unlikely to be a straight line,“ Mark Hackett, Nationwide’s chief of investment research, said in a report.

Many analysts are skeptical of the rally, though, saying the economy likely won’t recover nearly as vigorously and quickly as the stock market has. Friday’s jobs report showed that the unemployment rate climbed to its highest level since the Great Depression. And if reopening economies lead to a renewed surge in infections, businesses shutdowns could sweep the world quickly again.

“As we move forward, we’ll have to see what consumers are doing and how willing they are to spend,” said Ripley of Allianz.

Stocks got off to a strong start earlier on Friday after a Chinese state media report said top U.S. and Chinese trade negotiators talked on the phone and are working to implement a trade deal. That helped calm building concerns that tensions between the world’s largest economies may flare up again.

The last thing investors want is another round of punishing tit-for-tat tariffs dragging even more on an economy already sliding into a severe recession.

Companies whose profits are usually most closely tied to the strength of the economy led the market higher. Energy producers in the S&P 500 jumped 3.8% for the biggest gain of the 11 sectors that make up the S&P 500. Industrial companies and financial stocks were also stronger than the rest of the market.

The trio were the hardest-hit sectors earlier in the year on worries about the coming recession, which would cause demand for their products to vanish and saddle banks with bad loans.

Smaller stocks also rose more than the rest of the market, an indication of the market’s expectation for stronger growth ahead. Small-cap stocks have historically sunk more than their bigger rivals heading into downturns, in part because of their more limited financial strength, but rebounded harder in anticipation of recoveries. Friday’s 3.4% gain for the Russell 2000 was more than double those for big-stock indexes.

In Asia, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng added 1%, and stocks in Shanghai rose 0.8%. South Korea’s Kospi gained 0.9%. In Europe, France’s CAC 40 rose 1.1%, and Germany’s DAX returned 1.3%.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury note rose to 0.66% shortly after the job report’s release, up from 0.63% late Thursday. That yield tends to move with investors’ expectations for the economy and inflation. It then wobbled through the morning, at one point giving up its gains, before rising back to 0.67%.

Benchmark U.S. crude oil rose $1.19, or 5.1%, to settle at $24.74 a barrel, continuing its strong week and recovering some more of its record-setting losses from earlier in the year.. Brent crude oil, the international standard, rose $1.51, or 5.1% to $30.97 a barrel.