Face Masks and Panic Porn

Panic porn has taken over even the medical community that should know better.  Dr. Ted Noel is an anesthesiologist who has rounded up plenty of data and studies about whether these annoying face masks are doing any good.  He concludes his American Thinker piece:

Of key interest, in one CDC study, 85% of COVID victims report nearly always wearing face masks. One study claiming benefits had to be withdrawn after its conclusions were contradicted by continuing experience. Others have major confounding variables. Mask advocates ignore significant downsides such as reduced personal performance, severe psychosocial consequences, and difficulty breathing. And the Danish Mask Study, a “gold standard” randomized, controlled study, showed no benefit to mask wearing in the general population.

Difficulty breathing is something I didn’t quite appreciate during the thirty-six years I wore a mask on a daily basis in the operating room. After all, masks were a part of life. But I always dropped my mask the moment I left the OR, and almost every other OR staff member did the same. It’s really simple. Masks increase your work of breathing. If you’re wearing a properly fitted N-95, all your air has to come in and out through that filter material. That’s work. And it makes you short of breath.

Do a simple experiment. Fold a bath towel a couple of times and try to breathe through it. Make sure you aren’t breathing around it. The filtration from the fabric creates resistance to air flow. Now do it for several minutes. That’s what breathing through an effective mask feels like. You’ll get short of breath, and as soon as you can, you’ll take it off. What you felt was increased work of breathing. And that’s why the movies often show someone being strangled with a pillow.

Most Americans intuitively recognize that masks don’t reduce infections. But they go along with the virtue signaling to be good citizens. And, to make their own life a bit better, they use a single thickness gaiter over their mouth and nose like a train robber. Or they use a face shield that does nothing at all other than “covering” their mouth and nose without restricting air flow. Often you see them with a mask over their mouth but not their nose. And of course, President Biden doesn’t wear one in the Oval Office.

Returning to Einstein, since a single mask doesn’t help in the general populace, why should anyone think that double masking might help? Or quadruple, as Dr. Segal suggests. Such suggestions fall under the logical designation of “magical thinking.” Or as Albert Einstein is reputed to have said, insanity.

The full article is here.  I wear my mask around my chin as a small protest. I’ve been asked to wear it over nose and mouth only once – at a medical clinic.

# # #

How about Mike Gibbons

Rob Portman is not running for re-election in the U.S. Senate. Cleveland Tea Party's Ralph King posts:

Let the swamp games will begin! 

We need a good guy like Mike Gibbons at the top of the list to run for this seat -- not an establishment swamp retread like Slickster Jim Renacci or Ohio's Happy Hypocrite Jon Husted running for this seat.

More about Mr. Gibbons here. 

# # # 

He’s not running

 

Photo credit: CNBC

The headline at Breitbart:

Rep. Jim Jordan Declines to Run for Senate in 2022

The referenced report at cleveland.com is behind a paywall. To read the report at Breitbart, click here.

# # #

Tea Party 2.0: Look Ahead America

 

Yesterday evening, our household was watching “Tipping Point” on One America News.  Kara McKinney’s guest was Matt Braynard, who was there to introduce viewers to the organization Look Ahead America (Look Ahead America). From their website:

Our Mission

There are millions of rural and blue-collar patriotic Americans who are disaffected and disenfranchised from the nation’s corridors of power. Their fears ignored, their priorities dismissed, their values ridiculed, they’ve become cynical and pessimistic about a government that so often does not hear their voices.

Our mission is to register, educate, and enfranchise these disaffected citizens and ensure that their voices are not just heard but heeded and that the American Dream becomes their dream again.

We will also organize and guide patriotic citizens in lobbying their state legislatures and local governments on America First initiatives like fighting corporate censorship and ensuring voter integrity.

You can join our effort by donating, volunteering, and spreading the word about our daunting but necessary endeavor.

My initial take:  In a sense, this is a natural successor to the 2009 Tea Party initiative, and it is a potential partner to Cleveland Tea Party.

Mr. Braynard was an articulate guest, and he informed viewers of the upcoming grassroots training session (more links to follow).  This organization seeks to influence positive conservative changes at the state and local levels, with election integrity being a major focus. One particular strategy will be to affect change in those states with conservative legislators or leadership.  (Ohio has nominally Republican leadership, so there’s a lot of work to be done.) 

Please visit their website; there are quite a few videos of Mr. Braynard’s appearances describing the organization’s upcoming activities

# # #

 

Portman’s Senate seat: A Decepticon’s decision

 

Sundance at Conservative Treehouse has an interesting take on Sen. Rob Portman’s announcement that he will retire when his term is up in 2023:

With four GOP senators having announced they’re not running (Burr, Johnson, Toomey, Portman) there’s essentially zero chance of the GOP retaking control of the Senate in 2022.  [20 R seats up & only 14 D seats that are in solid D strongholds] it is far more likely the Democrats will gain seats, so keep this in mind…. 

…When we think about forming a third party, the “you will split the vote” crew always peddles their vote split narrative.  However, the GOP doesn’t have a chance in hell to win 2022 given what the base of the Republicans think about these senate DeceptiCons now.

There has never been a better time for a New Party to launch and capture three or four seats from the retiring GOPe crew.  It would be great to see true MAGA representatives that can caucus with Republicans but hold ground on America First principles.

Sundance’s full report with links and commentary is here.

UPDATE:  Don Surber thinks a third party is still a bad idea.  See here.

# # #

 

The Post-Inauguration World

 

Over the past couple of months, several contributors to the American Thinker blog reported on probable election fraud, including fraud allegedly related to the Dominion voting machines.  Apparently, Dominion threatened to sue the blog out of existence, and as a consequence, the proprietor, Thomas Lifson, published an abject apology for publishing such outright misinformation.  His “apology” was so out-of-character, so craven, that I for one did not believe one word.  However, some comments turned up at other blogs that linked to the apology, indicating that some readers took Mr. Lifson’s “apology” at face value.  (Mr. Lifson also discontinued publishing reader comments.  The heavy hand of censorship is silencing so many conservative voices.) 

I don’t think Mr. Lifson had a choice.  As I read it, had he not issued his “apology,” his blog – which is a labor of love – would have been crushed. So I continue to visit the American Thinker blog and frequently share content with Cleveland Tea Party readers.  Today, I’m sharing some extracts from an article by E.M. Cadwaladr:

I don't think any of us will be going back to normal anytime soon.  Recent events have broken not buildings and a few thousand lives, but the last weak remnants of the institutions that our founders left us.  We have passed, in the course of a couple months, from a world in which some grudging impulse toward fairness usually prevailed into a world in which raw power is being wielded without the slightest principle.  From a world in which legalities were worth the hope of pursuing into a world in which they are merely the formal decoration on the underlying blunt trauma of the ruling class's cudgel.  From a fragile but functional republic into a grotesque parody of one.

. . .

Unless you are willfully blind or constitutionally numb, there is a pretty good chance you are quietly, or not so quietly, afraid.  You have good cause.  If you love the country that you have rightfully inherited, you now have a target on your back.  Our institutions have completely failed us.  We alone, you and I and the insulted tens of millions, are now the only obstacle between our descendents and totalitarianism.

In the sobering and dangerous days to come, let us lose neither our principles nor our humanity.  If we must journey through the darkness, let us walk proudly as freeborn men and women and not as lawless animals or broken slaves. . . .

Read the rest here. 

# # #

 

After the "mock inauguration"

 

Paul Gottfried at American Greatness traces the history of liberal progress through our bureaucratic and cultural institutions.  He goes back decades.  And he has a plan for conservatives who are reeling from the stolen election and the "mock inauguration" two days ago.  He starts off:

The conservative Catholic columnist John Zmirak ends his inauguration day column for The Stream with this expression of profound disgust:

So by all means enjoy the mock-inauguration of a corrupt, senile hack as the fruit of ballot-box stuffing and fake COVID panic. But remember that now we all live in a tinpot Bananas Republic. And a disciplined, fanatically nationalist, resurgent Red China is smiling. The virus it shipped worldwide succeeded beyond its leaders’ wildest expectations.

I quote Zmirak’s peroration because of the openness of his loathing for the administration that began its reign on Wednesday. Pat Buchanan, Roger Simon, Newt Gingrich, Roger Kimball, and Michael Walsh have all recently produced informative and eloquent columns underscoring the lies, deceit, and intimidation that they associate with the woke Left. These columnists have also documented the extent of leftist control and underlined the need to resist their odious domination.

Here’s Mr. Gottfried’s plan:

Although there are lots of properly indignant Americans on our side, we should not exaggerate the value of our hand. The best course for us to pursue given our relative weakness would be to try to isolate our opposition. Do nothing to cooperate and concede no ground. There should be no plan for “bipartisanship” or for reaching out. I can’t see the benefit of either, and as I watched Matt Continetti, Geraldo Rivera, and then Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) going after Trump for “inciting a riot” during his last weeks in office, I was struck by the futility of this groveling to the Left. 

Conservatives in Congress should treat the Biden-Harris Administration exactly the way the Democrats treated Trump’s presidency, by totally dissociating themselves from any of its actions. This resistance could have started (and for many did) by ignoring the “mock inauguration” that John Zmirak so pungently described.

And, oh yes, avoid the word “president” in designating the implausible new occupant of the White House.

Or put the word “president” in scare quotes.  Mr. Gottfried’s full column is here. 

Bonus link:  Katie Hopkins was in DC for the "inauguration."  Her report is here.

# # #

Re-education camp for Trump supporters

 A.F. Branco cartoon at Legal Insurrection:

# # #

 

President Biden’s Words of Division

 

Heather Mac Donald watched President Biden’s inaugural speech so you didn’t have to.  Her commentary at City Journal begins:

It’s an odd way to seek national unity: call a significant portion of the American public white supremacists, racists, and nativists. Welcome to the Biden presidency.

Joe Biden’s inaugural speech as 46th president is predictably being hailed for its “unifying” message. And just as predictably, his invocations of the divisive bromides of the identitarian Left are being swept under the rug.

According to Biden, we are a “great nation” and a “good people.” But we also oppress minorities with an ever-rising fervor. “Growing inequity” is among the greatest challenges facing the country, according to Biden, along with the “sting of systemic racism” and encroaching “white supremacy.” Only now are we confronting “a cry for racial justice, some four hundred years in the making.”

One might have thought that more than 50 years of civil rights legislation; the banishing of Jim Crow segregation; the ubiquity of racial preferences throughout corporate America, higher education, and government; trillions of dollars of tax dollars attempting to close the academic achievement gap; and the election of black politicians by white voting districts would have reduced inequity, not increased it. But to Biden’s speechwriters, steeped in academic victimology, racial inequity is always with us, requiring constant remediation from government.

Ms. Mac Donald’s full commentary is here. 

Note:  When this blog makes reference to President Biden’s speech, or decision, or agenda, or whatever, I assume he is delivering whatever his masters require.

# # #

Thoughts for January 20

 

For conservative Americans, the past couple of months have been devastating. George Parry blogs at Knowledgeisgood, and his posting from January 1 struck a chord.  He begins:

Beware of the Thing That Is Coming

A number of you have kindly inquired as to why I have recently been absent from these pages. The reason is that, since early November, the only matter worth discussing has been the outright theft of the 2020 presidential election, and, as will be explained below, I have been emotionally and intellectually  unable to rationally address the topic.

President Trump won re-election by an historic landslide. He has been denied his rightful victory by means of corrupted voting machines and the massive use of unverified and unverifiable mail in ballots. I won’t go into the details since I would just be repeating all the depressing and alarming facts with which I am sure you are already familiar. But, watching events unfold, it has become apparent that there was nothing subtle about the theft. It has been the electoral equivalent of an in-your-face smash and grab robbery – as in, yeah, we stole the election and there’s nothing you can do about it.

On the emotional side, I have been too angry to write coherently about the theft and what it will mean for the future of this country. The consequences of the theft extend far beyond the fate of President Trump. Those who conspired to steal the election now have in place the tools to oppress the majority. Think of the massive demonstrations in Venezuela by the majority who oppose the Maduro dictatorship. The masses may demonstrate and protest, but so what?  Maduro and his thugs remain in control and will continue to “win” elections into perpetuity using the same voting machines and software now being used (in conjunction with fake mail in ballots) to deprive Trump of victory.

Will the majority in America suffer the same fate as its counterpart in Venezuela? If Trump, who won a huge landslide, can be cheated out of victory, what chance will lesser candidates have in the future?

Read the rest here.

# # #

Today is the “inauguration”

 In observance of today’s “Inauguration,” here’s Tom Stiglich’s cartoon via Townhall:

# # #

The Cruelest Hoax Of All: COVID-19

Mark Wauck at MeaningInHistory nominates COVID-19 as:

The Cruelest Hoax Of All

Which hoax? We live in an age of hoaxes, so there's a lot of competition for the honor of being the cruelest hoax of all. My vote still goes to the Covid hoax. I base that on the sheer unprecedented amount of damage done by this hoax: business failures, unemployment, lockdowns, depression and its attendant ills, education stoppages that hurt the poorest students most, mass fear bordering on--and not infrequently exceeding--hysteria, widespread paranoia and the breakdown of social solidarity. And last but not least--perversely mistaken withholding of effective treatments (the HCQ regime and Ivermectin) in favor of dangerous and often fatal "treatments", such as mechanical ventilation, leading to far too many unnecessary deaths. Most of this damage was inflicted in knowing violation of all scientific and medical norms regarding viruses in general and coronaviruses in particular. Now we're witnessing the rush to lift many of the absurd measures that were taken--simply because Trump has been ousted by our ruling oligarchy. Which leads to the very reasonable supposition that this was an essentially political hoax that took advantage of unscientific hysteria that was propagated with a purpose.

. . .

there has been an appalling lack of transparency throughout this whole hoax, which has facilitated its political weaponization.

Read the rest here (includes links to reports and videos).

RELATED:  Steven W. Mosher: The doctor who denied COVID-19 was leaked from a lab had this major bias at the NY Post here.

# # #

 

Accomplishments of President Trump

 

This past weekend was filled with relentlessly discouraging headlines.  But Toni Williams at VictoryGirlsblog had an upbeat column about “The Greatest Accomplishment of Donald Trump.” She begins:

President Donald J. Trump will leave the White House early on the morning of January 20, 2021. He is not sticking around to watch the Cheater-in-Chief be inaugurated. Quite frankly, I am glad. If Trump attended the Inauguration, it would give a legitimacy to Joe Biden that was never afforded to Trump. As we say goodbye to his Presidency, it is right that we should look at his accomplishments and ask which one was the greatest?

. . .

Trump was unabashed in his love of this Country. “Make America Great Again”, “Keep America Great” and “America First” all have one thing in common: America. Every Trump rally, every truck rally, every boat rally and every motorcycle rally was filled with happy patriots waving the American flag. Admit it, it felt so good to be proud of your country in public again.

Those are just the morale accomplishments. The actual accomplishments listed by the White House are breathtaking. Read them here.

Other columnists have suggested that President Trump’s greatest accomplishment was pulling the masks off the corrupt Deep State and swamp-dwellers.  Anyway, the rest of Ms. Williams’s column is here.

# # #

 

For all you Browns fans

 Seen on social media:

# # #

Business as Usual

From PowerLine’s “The Week in Pictures” [and memes]:

# # #

Another blogger bans Facebook

Bookworm Room, a/k/a Andrea Widburg, is one of our favorite bloggers.  And she is dropping her Facebook page:

Aside from Facebook’s anti-American censorship practices — which, by censoring the truth about Biden and Hunter, almost certainly affected the election — I was appalled to learn that most of the planning for the violence that occurred on January 6 was planned in advance on Facebook. This information not only proves that Facebook is a home for anti-American political violence, it also proves that President Trump’s speech asking people to walk peacefully to Congress had nothing to do with what eventually happened.

Indeed, the FBI has conceded that the violence was planned well in advance of the President’s speech.

. . .

So let me be clear: President Trump’s speech did not incite violence. The violence was pre-planned and Facebook was part of the planning. I can no longer in good conscience allow this platform to serve as a forum for my blog. 

. . .

If you’re wondering why it matters that I leave it, rather than just keep it but don’t visit, it’s because I’m the product as are all of you. The more products Facebook has, the more revenue it can demand from advertisers. I want companies that come to Facebook looking for eyes for their advertisements to discover that the store is empty.

Read the rest here. Ms. Widburg continues to blog also at American Thinker.

# # #

 

Ignore the Inauguration

 

January 20:  Save the Date!!  Andrea Widburg at American Thinker passes along a good suggestion:

Indeed, when it comes to the inauguration in Washington, D.C., Roger L. Simon has a great idea, which is to boycott it into oblivion:

There is a much better way to protest the inauguration.

Don't show up!

When I say don't show up, I mean really don't show up.

Don't protest the inauguration in any way, not in Washington, not at your state house, nowhere. Ignore the whole thing.

Don't even watch the event on television or stream it on any of your devices.

Let Bret Baier blather away all by himself, with or without Martha McCallum. That means no Newsmax or OAN too.

And especially do not watch their "Virtual Inaugural Parade." Turn it into a ratings disaster.

I know you will be tempted, but don't do it. Not even a glimpse. Ignore, ignore, ignore.

Sounds like a plan.

# # #

Canceling Big Tech

 

You've seen the ongoing headlines; conservative voices  -- including President Trump's -- are being censored or canceled by Big Tech.   Our household has:

• uninstalled Mozilla Firefox
• cancelled Amazon Prime
• begun the process of canceling Facebook and Gmail (a Google product)

And no more Apple products for us. A reader at RedState via Lucianne posted the following comment:

You don’t need [Facebook] to keep up with anyone - use email, text messages or actually call people and interact with them in person. You don’t need Amazon - you can go on their site, find what you need and then order it directly from the company, manufacturer or distributor bypassing Amazon completely. And you don’t need Google [for] anything. DuckDuckGo is a perfectly good alternative. Google tracks absolutely everything you do and can follow you as you move around even if you have your phone or tablet turned off.

Our household uses Bing for searches.

# # #

 

Things I'm worried about

 Seen on social media:

# # #

Our Potemkin Congress

 

image from Blazing Saddles via blogspot.com

If you thought our Congress-critters couldn't sink any lower . . .  Mark Steyn loathes the U.S. Congress even more than you do ("Potemkin Parliament, Pseudo-Legislature"):

I despise the United States Congress, and not merely for the weeks I had to spend there during the Clinton impeachment trial: My contempt pre-dates that circus. It dates to the moment I first realized, as a recent arrival to this land, that when Dick Durbin or some such is giving some overwrought speech on a burning issue he is speaking to an entirely empty chamber - because there are no debates, because most of these over-entouraged Emirs of Incumbistan are entirely incapable of debate: See, inter alia, Ed Markey.

But the fact that they might as well be orating in front of the bathroom mirror isn't why I despise it. It's that the American media go along with the racket, and there's only the one pool camera with the fixed tight shot so that you can't see the joint is deserted and the guy is talking to himself. The wanker press is so protective of its politicians that it's happy to give the impression that a boob like Markey is Cromwell in the Long Parliament.

I have never seen such rubbish in the House of Commons at Ottawa or Westminster or their equivalents around the Commonwealth - and it's a charade in which the media are all-in.

So it's a Potemkin parliament.

That leads easily to the next stage of decay - for why would a Potemkin parliament not degenerate further into a pseudo-legislature? The Covid "relief" bill is 5,593 pages. There is no such thing as a 5,593-page "law" - because no legislator could read it and grasp it. 

Read the full article here.

# # #

 

Nationwide Action Alert: Horns of Jericho – Sound At NOON ET Wednesday TODAY

 

Nationwide Action Alert: Horns of Jericho – 

Sound At NOON ET Wednesday   TODAY

Sundance has the announcement:

Many people cannot attend the Washington DC rally to support President Trump.  However, several groups have organized to share an action message that all patriots can take at noon Eastern on Wednesday January 6th.  “Sound the Horns of Jericho.”

The objective is for people coast to coast, regardless of their location at Noon ET on Wednesday, to blow their car horn in support of President Trump and the rally taking place in Washington DC.    Let the sound of our patriotic message carry with the same intensity as the Horns of Jericho.

Download and share the graphic above on your social media accounts: Parler, Facebook, Twitter, TicTok, etc. and help spread the word.  Whether you are attending a rally at your state capital, or whether you are stuck in COVID compliant isolation, set your phone alarm to remind you at NOON on Wednesday and then blast your car horn.

…”We will not go gently into that bloody collectivist good night. Indeed, we will make with our defiance such a sound as ALL history from that day forward will be forced to note, even if they despise us in the writing of it.”…

~ Mike Vanderboegh

Please share !!!

# # #

Nationwide Action Alert: Horns of Jericho – Sound At NOON ET Wednesday

 

Nationwide Action Alert: Horns of Jericho – 

Sound At NOON ET Wednesday

Sundance has the announcement:

Many people cannot attend the Washington DC rally to support President Trump.  However, several groups have organized to share an action message that all patriots can take at noon Eastern on Wednesday January 6th.  “Sound the Horns of Jericho.”

The objective is for people coast to coast, regardless of their location at Noon ET on Wednesday, to blow their car horn in support of President Trump and the rally taking place in Washington DC.    Let the sound of our patriotic message carry with the same intensity as the Horns of Jericho.

Download and share the graphic above on your social media accounts: Parler, Facebook, Twitter, TicTok, etc. and help spread the word.  Whether you are attending a rally at your state capital, or whether you are stuck in COVID compliant isolation, set your phone alarm to remind you at NOON on Wednesday and then blast your car horn.

…”We will not go gently into that bloody collectivist good night. Indeed, we will make with our defiance such a sound as ALL history from that day forward will be forced to note, even if they despise us in the writing of it.”…

~ Mike Vanderboegh

Please share !!!

# # #

Patrick Henry vs COVID-19

 Via Citizen Free Press:

# # #

March on the Ohio Statehouse January 6 : Stop the Steal

 From our friends at CVR: 

Jan 6, 2021:   March on the Ohio Statehouse for President Trump

For those who cannot attend the DC rally, join in at the Ohio Statehouse:

Click to embiggen, or visit the page at CVR here.  They also have a page for a bus to DC here.

# # #

January 6 Rally in DC : Stop the Steal

 

Via Conservative Treehouse on Jan 1:

President Trump reminded everyone about the January 6th rally in Washington DC.  From what can be ascertained from social media and inbound grassroots communication to CTH, this is shaping up to be the largest DC gathering in recent history.

I’m not sure where John Spiropoulos [Let's Roll America] is at the moment, but we know he is on the road conducting interviews with people heading to the event.   John was traveling from California to DC via Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tennessee and Virginia.  CTH will resume sharing videos of John’s travels as soon as he files a report.

For more reporting and links to updates, logistics, maps, and tips, click here.

UPDATE:  Carol Brown at American Thinker has more specific details.  Click here.

UPDATE 2:  CVR has a page for a bus (Cleveland and Elyria) to DC here.

# # #