RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.wsj.com/articles/another-general-at-defense-11607470114?mod=opinion_lead_pos2

Joe Biden has picked retired Gen. Lloyd Austin to be his Defense Secretary, and anyone skimming the coverage might believe the most important recommendation is his race. But Senators interested more in substance than identity politics have plenty to think about.

Gen. Austin, 67, served the country well during his four-decade career in the Army. As commander of U.S. forces in Iraq from 2010-11, he oversaw America’s retreat from the country. The general wanted to keep tens of thousands of American forces, which is to his credit. Less defensible is his failure to anticipate the full withdrawal that Barack Obama ordered and prepare adequately, which led to a hasty exit. Mr. Biden, who worked with Gen. Austin during the Obama Administration, might be most attracted to him as a loyal lieutenant.

Gen. Austin was promoted to Commander of U.S. Central Command (Centcom) in 2013 and held the job for three years as Islamic State rampaged across Iraq and Syria. His role in the failed program to train Syrian rebels deserves attention, as does the military’s apparent surprise at the fall of Mosul and swift rise of ISIS in 2014. His spokesman denied it, but Gen. Austin reportedly told the White House that ISIS was only “a flash in the pan.”

https://thefederalist.com/2020/12/08/thats-so-fauci-failing-up-while-botching-science-and-undermining-u-s-allies/

Fauci reversed himself on the safety of the COVID vaccines, apologizing for making false statements about U.S. allies’ work with the Trump administration to save countless lives through cutting-edge medical research.

Joe Biden likes Dr. Anthony Fauci’s lockdown advice so much, he has tapped him for chief medical advisor. Biden also plans to keep Fauci on his COVID advisory board despite Democrats spending 2020 insisting President Trump’s COVID guidance, although clearly influenced by Fauci, contradicted science and hurt the nation.

That same day, Fauci reversed himself on the safety of the COVID vaccines being developed, apologizing for making false statements about U.S. allies’ work in partnership with the Trump administration to save countless lives through cutting-edge medical research.

Axios reported: “‘I have a great deal of confidence in what the U.K. does both scientifically and from a regulator standpoint,’ Dr Fauci told the BBC on Thursday after saying earlier in the day that U.K. regulators ‘rushed’ their approval of the vaccine” for COVID from Pfizer-BioNTech. The day before, the United Kingdom had become the first nation to grant emergency approval to one of three reportedly highly effective vaccines that have been developed in conjunction with massive U.S. taxpayer spending and government effort.

“In the United States, there is such a considerable amount of tension of pushing back on the credibility, on the safety and on the efficacy that if we in the United States had done it as quickly as the U.K. did — and that’s no judgement on the way the U.K. did it — …there likely would have been pushback,” Fauci word-saladed in his apology over the “misunderstanding” he created by criticizing the United Kingdom’s efforts to end the pandemic faster.

“If you go quickly and you do it superficially, people are not going to want to get vaccinated,” Fauci told Fox News. “We have the gold standard of a regulatory approach with the FDA.”

https://amgreatness.com/2020/12/07/no-science-justifies-bans-on-indoor-or-outdoor-dining/

In a video that is simultaneously gut-wrenching and infuriating, a Los Angeles restaurant owner exposed the hypocrisy of Mayor Eric Garcetti’s order to ban outdoor dining in his city.

Angela Mardsen, the owner of Pineapple Hill Grill and Saloon, showed a large outdoor dining area erected for a movie studio about 50 feet from the now-shuttered outdoor section of her restaurant. “I’m losing everything,” an emotional Marden said. “Everything I own is being taken away from me and they set up a movie company right next to my outdoor patio. We cannot survive, my staff cannot survive.”

Her video went viral with millions of views; it earned a retweet by the president’s son. “It’s like these politicians are trying to destroy all small businesses,” Donald Trump, Jr. tweeted Friday. “Ridiculous!!!”

But government decrees to close bars and restaurants—especially service outside—are more than ridiculous. They are cruel, unconstitutional, and devastating to the hospitality sector, the nation’s second-largest private employer. 

In a December 7 letter to congressional leaders, the National Restaurant Association detailed the “stark” condition of the industry. More than 110,000 restaurants have permanently closed their doors this year; 10,000 establishments have shut down in just the past three months, according to the trade group. November’s unemployment rate for the leisure and hospitality sector is 15 percent, more than double the national jobless rate. Restaurants and bars account for one-fifth of the total job losses in the United States since February 2020.

It’s a wretched situation on both an economic and personal level—particularly since not one executive order is backed by science. 

In fact, closing dining venues is a wholly unscientific mitigation strategy that has no proven impact on halting the spread of COVID-19. One would think that nearly a year into the pandemic, such a drastic measure would be backed by reams of data and real-life examples. Surely hundreds of case studies now are available to justify permanently destroying tens of thousands of small businesses and millions of jobs, right?

Wrong. 

https://www.city-journal.org/blue-state-regulation-driving-out-california-businesses

A Sacramento Bee headline from late October, “How liberal politics, COVID-19 and a high cost of living are fueling a new California exodus,” could have been written, without the virus reference, a year ago. Or ten years ago. The flight from California kicked off long before this year’s pandemic.

Eight years ago, an Investor’s Business Daily editorial laid out the reasons Californians were moving “To Texas (And Arizona And Nevada),” all of them fueled by progressive public policy. That same year, a Manhattan Institute report detailed “the great ongoing California exodus . . . reversing the storied passages of the Dust Bowl era.” The authors attributed the mass departure to policy decisions making the state a less desirable place to live. Two years earlier, in 2010, New Geography asked: “If California Is Doing So Great, Why Are So Many Leaving?” and noted that the state’s “domestic migration has been negative every year since at least 1990.”

Nor is the California exodus limited to desperate residents. Joe Vranich, a relocation specialist once headquartered in Irvine, California, but now settled in Pennsylvania, has been tracking business departures since 2008. Vranich says that he became “irritated by repeated comments from California politicians, including governor Jerry Brown, that business departures . . . were not a big deal.” As he analyzed the companies, jobs, and capital fleeing the state, he realized the drain was significant. The state’s toxic business environment, Vranich estimates, caused as many as 13,000 “disinvestment events” from 2008 to 2016.

Data-analytics software company Palantir is among the firms to announce more recently that it is leaving California. CNBC characterized its decision to relocate from Palo Alto to Denver as “one of the first signals that a long-anticipated exodus from Silicon Valley is on the horizon.” Hewlett-Packard, a garage-band Silicon Valley original, recently announced that it would move its global headquarters to Texas, seeking “opportunities for cost savings,” while accommodating “team members’ preferences about the future of work.”

https://www.city-journal.org/covid-hypocrisy-by-elected-officials-fuels-mistrust

Political atheism is spreading across California, and cynicism is taking hold. Reviling policymakers is not new, of course, but the current disdain is particularly intense. As elected officials’ disregard for constituents and the law becomes ever more evident, all but the most stalwart loyalists are turning against them.

Mistrust is worsened by Covid restrictions “for thee, but not for me.” In September, the unmasked Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, visited a San Francisco hair salon closed under strict emergency pandemic orders. Business owners had been forced to cease operations and the public was restricted from getting haircuts, but Pelosi made herself an exception. Her claims of a “setup,” and a demand that the salon owner apologize to her, did little to restore trust.

More recently, Governor Gavin Newsom instructed citizens to stay home for Thanksgiving and Christmas and avoid all contact with friends and family members from outside their households. Flaunting the rules, he dined at the luxurious French Laundry restaurant with a large group of associates. The result, reported Carla Marinucci in politico.com, was a blow to his approval ratings and inspiration for newfound vigor for his recall. County Supervisor Sheila Kuehl voted to ban all outdoor dining, which she described as “a most dangerous situation”; news soon emerged that she had dined outdoors, at Il Forno Trattoria in Santa Monica. San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo spent Thanksgiving at his parents’ home, apparently skirting health guidelines that urge the public to avoid such gatherings.

In San Francisco, trust in local government has reached a nadir. Mayor London Breed maintains some support, but it’s primarily due to her perceived success in keeping Covid cases down. It’s certainly not for increased quality of life, since the city grows filthier and more dangerous every day. Companies, small and large, are leaving. The decline of San Francisco is particularly distressing to those who stay.

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/bronsonstocking/2020/12/05/doctor-has-medical-license-yanked-after-nonhysterical-n2581116?

An Oregon doctor has reportedly lost his medical license after attending a “Stop the Steal” rally and delivering comments about the coronavirus and face masks. 

In a video of Dr. Steven LaTulippe’s remarks at the Nov. 7 “Stop the Steal Rally,” the physician described himself as a retired Air Force officer, an ordained minister, and a practicing physician in The Dalles, Oregon area. 

“I want you to know that I never shut down during the entire COVID season, from the time it was declared till now,” LaTulippe told the crowd. “I hate to tell you this — it might scare you — but I and my staff, none of us once wore a mask in my clinic. And how many problems did we have in our clinic from that? Zero. Absolutely none.” 

The doctor called the lockdowns a threat to the American people, freedom, and the Constitution, and petitioned those in the crowd to remove their “mask of shame.” 

While the physician acknowledged the virus was real, LaTulippe said it is “a common cold virus that has been with us forever.” 

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16830/durham-special-counsel

Should Biden finally, officially, be declared the next president, you can rest assured that he will dismiss Durham during the opening flurry of activity from his administration.

Of course, this is all wildly frustrating for those of us hoping for some semblance of accountability and justice. Something. Anything.

When the Russia! Hoax fell apart it was reinvestigated by Mueller – and when that collapsed, they manufactured “Ukraine!” This bit of theater got the president impeached in two months flat. That was just last year. Do you remember? For many eager to bring down the current administration, prosecutions and justice move with lightening speed. Barr and Durham appear to still be looking for the keys to their offices.

This should all be deeply disturbing to the American public. Apparently, it is not. That, dear reader, is even more disturbing. The American public do not want to be deceived – yet again.

A couple of days ago, Attorney General William Barr announced the appointment of a special counsel for the criminally fraudulent “Russia!” Hoax. The special counsel is none other than the current US Attorney investigating the case – John Durham.

The appointment is troubling on three fronts: 1. Durham has produced only one indictment of a lowly Justice Department staff attorney; 2. Durham’s appointment may not be legal; and, 3. Barr did not make the appointment (back on October 19) public until now because he was concerned it was too political during an election season. Of course, one can also argue that NOT making the announcement was too political. The inactivity is strikingly similar to the pharmaceutical companies waiting until about three days after the election to announce their 95% effective COVID vaccines. Seems President Trump must not be credited with anything that might be conveniently deferred to his opponent’s advantage.

Barr wrote that “in light of extraordinary circumstances relating to these matters, the public interest warrants Mr. Durham continuing this investigation pursuant to the powers and independence afforded by the Special Counsel regulations.”

I have discussed the anemic legal performance of Durham’s team, and the mountain of publicly available information that can be crafted to indict approximately three dozen government officials. You are reminded that forty indictments arose from Watergate. The Russia! Hoax is exponentially more serious and criminally Byzantine than Watergate.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/12/lockdowns-and-other-madness-bruce-thornton/

Historians of the future will look back on the pandemic of 2020 as the occasion for one of this country’s worst unforced errors ever. The policies that the blue state mayors and governors of our most populous cities and states enacted were equal parts hysteria and politics, all the while they were touted as “following the science.” The lives of millions have been damaged, the economy willfully stalled, and a presidential campaign tainted with electoral fraud.

No enemy could have dreamed up a more insidious and devastating attack than those policies and their consequences, the ramifications of which will last for years––businesses lost, children harmed by isolation and their educations being interrupted, and the “deaths of despair” from depression, drug and alcohol abuse, unemployment, and domestic violence that typically follow economic depressions and natural disasters.

This disaster happened not just because the virus was new and its nature unknown. It soon became apparent that politics was driving the response. The progressive Democrats and Republican NeverTrumpers have for four years stewed in their bitter, irrational anger over losing the presidential election to an outsider like Donald Trump, who sneered at their technocratic pretensions, hypocritical “democratic norms,” and long record of policy failures both at home and abroad. He smashed the cognitive elites’ received wisdom and hypocritical “principles,” challenging the foundations of their power and influence.

So they set out to destroy him. They corrupted our federal investigative apparatus, jumped Constitutional guardrails, and fed anonymous mendacious leaks to a compliant media. When the “Russia collusion” canard collapsed, they turned to preposterous articles of impeachment that quickly imploded in the Senate. But nothing worked.