Category: Current Events

NY State Runs Out of Old People

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Today was a sort of macabre milestone.  For the first time in weeks New York did not have one of the highest totals in COVID-19 deaths in the country.

Rather than high hundreds or even more than a thousand deaths only 41 New Yorkers perished from the COVID-19 virus.

And this had a profound effect on the total deaths for the country.

The 750 nationwide deaths was the least since March 29th.  And just like that we can see that New York was sort of the COVID-19 epidemic all by itself.  And if you realize that the numbers for New Jersey and Connecticut are essentially just the suburbs for New York City it becomes even more apparent that the rest of the country just isn’t in the same category of emergency as New York City is.

So what has happened to slow the onslaught of the disease?  Well, apparently New York has finally killed off all their vulnerable elderly.  And the horrible part about that is the fact that it was mandated by the state.  As spelled out on the attached document whenever a nursing home patient was sent to a hospital with COVID-19 disease the nursing home was required to re-admit that patient as soon as the hospital had stabilized the patient.  Which of course means that nursing homes would have to accept infected patients back into their population along with their uninfected patients.  Knowing that patients over eighty are the most vulnerable to this disease the state basically played Russian roulette with all the nursing home patients.  And over time an enormous number of them died because of it.

When this fact was brought to the attention of Governor Cuomo he was unaware of it but his Health Commissioner confirmed it to him at a news conference.  Too bad he didn’t pay more attention to his actual epidemic strategy and less time worrying about his brother Fredo play acting victim on a part time basis in his basement.  If instead of locking down the working age population and destroying the economy he had quarantined the healthy nursing home patients and treated the sick ones in hospitals he might have spared tens of thousands of lives and still had an economy to work with.  Mario Cuomo didn’t seem to hit the IQ lottery with his two boys.

What’s the Lesson from General Flynn’s Case?

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The information that has been released from the FBI files on the Flynn case and the House Investigation of the Russia probe is surprisingly clear.  When subjected to the light of day there is no way to disguise the fact that federal law enforcement personnel at the highest levels deliberately conspired to railroad President Trump’s National Security Advisor out of office and into a criminal conviction.

There was no legal justification for this but they figured out a way to blackmail Flynn into it.  And they did it because they figured once they had stripped Flynn away from the new President, they could use the Russia hoax to get a special prosecutor appointed and use that office to attack the new administration in concert with the press and the deep state.  If that isn’t treason, I don’t know what is.

Contemplating that the Justice Department of the United States felt no hesitation to commit these acts during the commencement of a new Presidential Administration surely should give any American pause when considering whether his own constitutional rights are secure in the United States.  Other than unimportance what makes me think that the FBI would hesitate for a millisecond before dragging me down to one of their interrogation rooms and providing me with an even less favorable choice than the one they gave General Flynn.  Imagine that an unaccountable government goon tells you that either you will plead guilty to a crime you didn’t commit, that could earn you ten years in prison or your son will be prosecuted and imprisoned for an even longer period.

In the last twenty years we have grown accustomed to the diminution of our freedoms in the name of greater security.  In an alleged effort to keep Islamic terrorists from blowing up our planes every old grandmother in a wheelchair is subjected to indignities and all of us have to submit to complete surveillance of our every financial transaction and personal communication of all kinds.  Of course, that hasn’t stopped obvious foreign terrorists from striking at every level of American life.  And when it happens, we have to listen to harangues explaining how it’s our bigotry that inspired the violence.  But we acceded to the indignities and accepted the surveillance.

But now we find that the security apparatus is our new master.  All pretense that we are free men has been ended.  The FBI has the means to incriminate us using these new extra-constitutional powers.  And worse, they have the will to do it too.  Well, I’m sorry.  I no longer care whether the FBI is protecting me from Islamic terrorists or roving bands of cannibals.  I want them gone.  I want the President’s highest priority to be firing every last idiot with the letters FBI emblazoned across his stupid windbreaker.  I don’t even care if the Russians, the Chinese and the North Koreans steal the gasoline out of my gas tank and the chimney off my house.  At least they won’t be able to haul me off to the gulag for failing to genuflect to Comrade Obama and his dictatorial thugs.

The FBI from its beginnings has spied on the American people.  It has spied on our leaders and it has used this spying to blackmail and coerce the government into doing its bidding.  That is too dangerous a tool for our country to possess.  It seems to me that the Justice Department already has plenty of employees.  It needs to be dismantled.  It needs its fangs pulled.

That is a tall order.  It’s doubly so because the Attorney General, Bill Barr wouldn’t dream of extracting the jewel in the crown of his department.  I’m not even sure he’ll clean out the viper’s nest that is responsible for the outrage they perpetrated against this country.  If Barr and Durham had any sense of proportion, they would know that their precious FBI is a worse curse than the COVID-19 epidemic or the September 11th Attack.  What he should do is have a press conference where he apologizes to the American people for the organized crime cartel that he’s perpetrating on the rest of us.  He should fire everyone in the bureau from the top down until he finds someone who’s willing to expose the plot that we’ve lived through for the last four years.  That’s what he should do.  And then the President should demand Congress draft legislation to revoke the Patriot Act.  And if they won’t he should have his Solicitor General petition the Supreme Court to find it unconstitutional.  If the Congress squawks about that tell them to work on a constitutional amendment.  That should keep them busy for about twenty years.

Anyway, this rant is to say that it’s clear we now live in a police state.  It’s run by the FBI with additional surveillance provided by the tech companies.  In 1984 Orwell named the security agency in his dystopia “The Ministry of Love.”  If we know what’s good for us, we’ll make eliminating the Ministry of Love our highest priority.  At the very least, prosecuting all the Obama apparatchiks should be a survival reflex for the Trump Administration.  These people are hell bent on destroying a free society.  With them having a strangle hold on our government this truly is an Orwellian nightmare.  I think I’d prefer to live under a simple dictatorship.  At least it would be easier to figure out the rules.

10MAY2020 – OCF Update – Happy Mother’s Day

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Greetings everybody out there.  Hope all the moms out are somewhat enjoying Mother’s Day.  Although the whole cowering-in-place has rendered Camera Girl’s Mother’s Day sort of an academic exercise.  None of her kids can come to see her.  In recognition of this injustice I have spent the weekend as her company.  Unfortunately I’m a poor stand in for her children.  But I did what I could.  She is a Scrabble fanatic so I volunteered to play several games of this bizarre pastime.  It confirmed my belief that she has somewhat unorthodox ideas about what constitutes as legitimate English word.  She used “droid” without any embarrassment.  In addition we watched some movies together.  Interestingly we watched the movies I wanted to see but I attribute that to coincidence.  But I have been incredibly attentive.  I have been talking about all kinds of stuff and asking her all kinds of questions and talking about all the good things we can do together alone.  I’ll have to say, in my opinion, her enthusiasm was somewhat lacking.  Several times she seemed to wander away in the middle of one of these displays of attentiveness.  Apparently laundry and floor sweeping are time critical in her mind.  I’ve always thought men are much more sociable creatures.  Not to mention our pleasant and even-tempered personalities.  Well what can you do?

So anyway, I’ve been unavailable for output on OCF this weekend but that interregnum is now over.  I’ve got a post cued up for tonight on the Flynn fiasco.  I think that should be a major point of discussion for folks on our side of the aisle.  The fact that the information has been transmitted to the public is in itself encouraging.  More to follow.

We had a little more snow here yesterday but it wasn’t much to talk about.  But it really makes you wonder how much later into the year it would have to snow before we could question the reality of global warming.  Would a foot of snow at the Fourth of July qualify?  I’ll have to ask one of my Green friends (if I had any).

So enjoy the holiday to the extent that circumstances will allow but I’m back on the job and content will follow.

Christmas Cooking, Sony A7 III, Sony 90mm f\2.8 macro lens

Tucker Lays Out the Flynn Decision and the Reaction on the Left

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This guy is so much fun to listen to.  Tucker gets down to the nub of why the Left is so incensed by the vacating of charges against General Flynn.  I think you’ll enjoy listening to this.  There’s nothing new in it.  He just puts the pieces together so well and points out the dangerous hypocrisy and dishonesty on the Left.

 

 

The DOJ Drops Criminal Case Against General Flynn

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Finally!  Let’s hope the idiot judge has brains enough to know the jig is up and drops the case. In the article they mention Flynn is over $4 million dollars in debt from legal bills and had to sell his house.  His lawyer is going to have a field day.  Hey maybe Peter Strzok is a good target for a law suit.  How about Comey and McCabe?  Man, do I hate those creeps.

The Compound Attacked by One of the Great Old Ones

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Last night abysmal horror stalked the home base.  A Lovecraftian abomination was on the move unleashing its mind shattering power on my corner of New England.  It was Cthulhu or maybe one of the Deep Ones.  The horror, the horror.

Just see the damage caused by its irresistible strength and titanic weight.  Behold!

 

UPDATE!!!!

We cowered in fear during the night time attack.  Finally this morning I gathered my shattered sanity and my courage and I ventured out to assess the damage.

I found this massive print

And finally I found this titanic creature lurking in the near by swamp.

Do not be fooled.  Those green growths are actually massive pine trees that the monster crushed with it’s cyclopean bulk.  What you are seeing is Ralsa Whateley, the hybrid spawn of a human woman and one of the batrachian Deep Ones.  Grown tremendously large from ingesting all of Camera Girl’s bird seed he now rests before once again attacking humanity with the ferocity only capable by one of the Great Old Ones.

 

Who is the Next Donald Trump?

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President Trump has been a seismic event in American politics.  For the first time in generations a man dared to speak the truth about like illegal immigration, off-shoring of American jobs and even whole industries to China and malign neglect of the working class in this country.  You have to go all the way back to Ronald Reagan to find someone who challenged the status quo and rallied the country behind a Pro-American platform.  And even though he’s been attacked relentlessly by every aspect of the Elite centers of power he managed to revive the economy and give conservative voters hope that things could be fixed.  And despite the apocalyptic appearance of the COVID-19 epidemic I fully expect him to be re-elected in November and do even more to turn this country around on the social and economic aspects of life here.

But in 2025 there will be a new president.  Maybe Mike Pence will be Vice President in 2024 and that may provide him with presumptive front runner status in the Republican primary race.  But what I’m interested in is who is out there right now that possesses the instincts and talents that could rival the kind of success that President Trump has demonstrated when squaring off against our enemies?

One guess might be another businessman.  In fact, let’s look at the essence of Donald Trump’s background.  He was born into wealth accrued by his father as a real estate developer in New York City.  So, you have a wealthy businessman who isn’t part of the Wall Street crowd.  Later he took some of his business interests public like the casinos, with decidedly disastrous results for his stockholders.  What that tells me is that he is an outsider of the corporate establishment.  His business is based on his family ownership of real estate assets in New York City and the connections with government and local business communities that he has built up over the course of his life.  In my mind that may be the kind of man we might expect to possess the skills we need.

Another possibility is someone like Tucker Carlson.  He apparently has decided that he wants to take on the elites on behalf of the working class, Christians, straight white men and other despised groups who fall into the category of deplorables.  Having grown up as one of the elites, he has quite a lot of information about them and he seems to have a convert’s zeal to repair the damage done by his former comrades.  Does he have the grit it takes to stand up to the kind of dirt they would throw at him?  It’s hard to say.  Having been part of the media for many years he may have all kinds of dirt they can expose against him.  Could he endure something akin to what Billy Bush did to Donald Trump during the campaign?  I think that’s hard to say.  But we may find out.  I have a feeling that Carlson has an interest in politics.

What about conventional politicians?  Ted Cruz?  Rand Paul?  Ron DeSantis? Mike Pence?  I think someone like DeSantis might be a possibility.  I favor a governor over a senator.  And DeSantis is showing determination in the way he’s running Florida.  That’s a tough place for a conservative to flourish.

Mike Pence?  If you had asked me back in 2016, I’d have said definitely no.  Seeing him fold like a cheap suit when that weasel George Stephanopoulos grilled him about the pro-religion law that he passed in Indiana was disgusting.  After eight years of working for President Trump he’ll certainly have learned a lot.  But can you learn instinct?  Can you learn grit?  I think Mike Pence would have to prove himself to me and many others before we’d believe he has the right stuff.

Finally, how about going back to President Trump for a successor.  How about Donald Jr.?  This one is intriguing.  A father is always a bad judge of the talents of his children.  I think we’ll have to wait to see if Don Jr. begins acting like a presidential candidate.

One thing I’m quite sure of is that we’ll be best served by having a long series of debates in which the candidates attack each other mercilessly.  I believe 2016 has shown that a gentlemanly discussion is useless for picking a leader.  We need plain talk and hard questions to find out who is strong enough to knock off the Democrat nominee.  I’m very much looking forward over the next few years to see who emerges on the Right as a successor to President Trump.  I only hope whoever it is that he has half the brains and guts of the current occupant of the Oval Office.

Who’s on My Side?

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Nowadays there are a thousand labels and each group will tell you that they are the real Americans.  There are the groups on the Left like the Progressives, the Socialists, the Bernie Bros and all the various identity groups that inhabit their alliance, the feminists, the LGBTQ crazies and the racial minorities.  On the Right are a similar mixed group of ideologies, the libertarians, the neo-conservatives, the fiscal conservatives, the establishment conservatives and moving farther right we have the social conservatives, the religious right, the so-called alt-right and the dissident right.  For the last forty years and more I’ve been following politics in this country and I’ve always been two steps behind the real story.  But the last five years have been extremely clarifying.  The unmasking of the establishment conservatives as the controlled opposition has made it much easier to understand why things always got worse.  But at the same time, I’ve never been sold on the whole racialist destiny where everyone will be voting their skin color and ethnicity thing either.  In my experience ethnicity, race and identity group memberships are a pretty poor way of running a society.  In fact, it’s the whole notion of basing policy on racial and sexual victim status that has gotten us into the sorry state we’re in now.  Rather than join into that mess I want it ended.  No more special rules based on race and sex.

Instead what I’ve always used as a gauge for in-group status with me is whether someone had the same goals for his children.  First of all, if somebody doesn’t think marrying a pretty girl and having a family with her is high on his priorities then he won’t be very supportive of the kind of world that I’m interested in inhabiting.  And after that if he isn’t interested in his kids following in the same pattern then he’s not in my camp.  Now granted there are people who are happier single and I’ll allow that they have the right to live their lives the way they want.  But if they don’t at least see the value of having society revolve around the family then they’re definitely not on my side.

Now once you’ve passed those hurdles what comes next is the Bill of Rights.  Your ancestors and mine could have come from the same peasant town in Campania but if you don’t think freedom of speech and the rest of our freedoms are more important than being in good with the local big shot then you’re not on my team.  After that, all I ask is that you don’t expect me to pay your bills.

So that’s how I see the political landscape.  I can probably get along with a spectrum of people who respect the merits of a traditional society.  And to use a word that has been bandied about on a few too many bumper stickers, I can “coexist” with lots of people who don’t believe in the same things I do.  I neither need nor want to convince liberals, libertarians or even establishment conservatives to think the way I do.  What I do need is for them to get out of the way while we dismantle the program, we have been subjected to for the last fifty years that systematically attacks all the things that I see as normal, necessary and fundamental for living a healthy life.  What I can’t coexist with is the radical elements of the left who are leading that attack on normal, wholesome life.  These people are indeed a cancer attacking the good things in America that have up until now given this country it’s strength and character.

So hopefully that helps define where I stand on the political spectrum and who I see as my allies, as neutral parties and my enemies.

Tell me what you think.  Have I identified the situation we live in or have I got it wrong?  I’m honestly interested in your opinions.  Do you think we can put Humpty Dumpty back together again or are we already too far gone?  Leave a comment.

 

Looking for Good Ideas

A couple of weeks ago I wrote an article called, “How Do We Live Our Lives in an Upside-Down World?”  What I said there was that we have to look at the big picture and the little picture at the same time.  So, supporting President Trump and any other leaders who show that they can get the job done is very important.  But just as important is improving your life, your family’s existence and extending out into your circle of friends and acquaintances.  And that’s how this gets to OCF.  You folks out there, the ones who like the content here, are my friends.  I put up content that I think will be entertaining, interesting and maybe even useful to people on our side of the fence.  By the same token I want anyone who comes to the site who has insights and information that I don’t have but could help me do a better job, to pass it along.  I’ll have to figure out a way to keep a wanted list of information I’m looking for.  As a for instance, I have a quote of the day that I’ve been doing for a couple of years.  You’d be surprised how hard it is to find good quotes after you’ve been digging through them for that long.  So, for readers who have favorite authors of quotes, and especially if you’ve been following the quotes for a good long time, I’m looking for more authors to search through.  If you have authors, I haven’t checked please pass them along in a comment.  And in the same way, I’m always looking for movies and books to review both old and new.  If it’s something you’ve always enjoyed or something good you recently discovered pass it along.

Finally, Some of the States Are Waking Up and Even Here in the Gulag, Signs of Life

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Fifteen US states are beginning the process of getting back to normal.  States like Georgia and Arkansas are shedding most of the restrictions while Florida and Texas are selectively and incrementally opening up.  And with the two-week increments proposed to step through the process there may be big chunks of the country completely back to normal by June.  And that will be an important outcome.  Lots of economic opportunities are associated with the summer vacation schedule, so this could allow many small businesses to salvage something from the wreckage of this year.

The next milestone I’m waiting for is when the medical community admits that we’re on the downward side of the daily-new-death curve.  From my reading of it we’re already over the hump.  Even with the Blue States, for the last two weeks, calling every death a COVID-19 death, it looks like we’re about to break through.  The last five days have been steadily lower and lower totals.  So, we may hear them admit it soon.

And in addition to the progress in other parts of the country the folks in the blue states are starting to get tired of this too.  You’ve heard about protests in Michigan, Virginia and California.  Well even in the very heart of cower-in-place New England, folks are starting to ignore some of the rules.  They’re going outside for no reason!  They’re walking around without masks!  And, horror of horrors they’re going to visit relatives without a car window or a wall between them.  I was overjoyed on Sunday when my daughter and her family came over and hung around with us in the yard for a couple of hours.  And I swear I could see how much my grandsons have grown since I saw them last!  It was great.  They came to install some raised beds for Camera Girl’s gardens and they did us both a world of good just seeing and talking to them face to face.  It didn’t hurt that it broke seventy degrees yesterday for the first time this spring.  And right on cue, the road past my house was full of motorcycle riders thundering by in droves.

So, all at once we’re waking up and I can sense that nothing will slow it down.  Not even a spike in deaths.  I think even in blue states people are starting to realize this was a bad idea.  The shutdown didn’t stop the deaths.  It probably didn’t even slow it down.  It was already too late to stop the infections in the larger cities from reaching the elderly in those high-density areas.

The next fight will be over the blue states trying to get the federal government to bail them out from their civil service retirement entitlements.  I’m hoping that President Trump won’t want to do that and instead will concentrate on helping small businesses and restarting the economy.  With the election season upon us he’ll do everything he can to cheerlead the economy and eliminate problems for the people trying to get their lives back on track.  At this point Joe Biden seems to be almost a non-issue in the election.  It’s up to the President to call the shots and give us back our hope in the future.  And I think he can.

Well to paraphrase the Bard, “Now is the winter of our discontent turned glorious summer by this Son of New York.”

03MAY2020 – American Greatness – Post of the Day – Bound and Gagged by the Bugmen

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Someone pseudo-named L0m3z has a post about SJW double talk or as he references it bug speak.  He makes his point but what really makes this worth reading is his quote from the “Zaphorian Cossack’s Letter to Sultan Mehmed IV.”  That scurrilous obscene screed to the Ottoman sultan is downright hilarious.  And Lom3z is using it as an example of non-bug speak such as he highlights in President Trump’s straightforward way of speaking and writing.  You owe it to yourself to read the details of the Cossacks’ history with the sultan.  It makes you proud to be a free man to know that such courage and creative obscenity has been passed down to us through history.  Take a look at the famous painting celebrating the momentous writing of the letter.  It does my heart good.

I’ll conclude with the conclusion of the Letter, “Now we’ll conclude, for we don’t know the date and don’t own a calendar; the moon’s in the sky, the year with the Lord, the day’s the same over here as it is over there; for this kiss our arse!”