Please Support Jamie Harrison for Senate in South Carolina.

 Jamie Harrison for US Senate (click here) 

South Carolina deserves a Senator that sincerely cares about them and that is Jamie Harrison.

I think the plexiglass booth was very smart. Up to now, Senator Graham has tested negative, but, he was in contact with Mike Lee who tested positive. The CDC has stated;"

You should stay home for 14 days after your last contact with a person who has COVID-19. For all of the following scenarios, even if you test negative for COVID-19 or feel healthy, you should stay home (quarantine) since symptoms may appear 2 to 14 days after exposure to the virus." (click here)

Rather than putting safety first and postponing the debate, Graham attended a debate where he could be spreading the virus. Jamie Harrison had every right to be safe and the booth was a perfect solution. There was danger in the air and Lindsay Graham didn't care.

October 3, 2020
By Lillia Callum-Penso

...Sen. Lindsey Graham (click here) said he was tested Friday and found to be negative — though a negative test means only that the person was not infected at the time of testing and the coronavirus' incubation period can be up to 14 days.

According to the Associated Press, Graham said he had been tested for COVID-19 following his interaction with fellow Senate Judiciary Committee member Sen. Mike Lee, who's among a number of Republican officials in Washington, D.C., to have tested positive for the virus this week.

"After being informed of his positive test, and out of an abundance of caution, I was tested for COVID-19 in South Carolina. I was informed I was negative," Graham wrote in a message posted on Twitter....

White House Tours

 If there are still White House Tours they need to be suspended to prevent the spread of SARS-CoV-2 to the public.

There are absolutely no health precautions about COVID-19 on the White House Tour Website.

Pediatric testing

There are no pediatric tests for SARS-CoV-2. 

One of the reasons children are first discovered to have COVID-19 is when they are in dire distress with MIS-C (Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome - Child) because the viral load is high. 

The tests for children to discover COVID-19 at first onset don’t exist. Children need far more intense  investigation and investment in funding for early diagnosis and treatment.

Children develop at different rates at different ages, that is why pediatrics is a specialty. That difference needs to be respected by the research being conducted in testing and treatment. That specialized research needs funding now.

My, my, my a political play by the religiously bigoted.

Bigotry of any kind is not permitted in the court, it is unconstitutional. The First Amendment provides for the room in the USA for RELIGIOUS FREEDOM, NOT RELIGIOUS PREFERENCE, ie: King of England. The first European citizens that came to the "New World" left because of religious persecution. No religious bigot is going to do the same thing here in the name of any deity!

October 5, 2020

By Ariane de Vogue and Chandelis Duster

Justice Clarence Thomas, (click here) joined by Justice Samuel Alito, lashed out on Monday at the religious liberty implications of the Supreme Court's 2015 decision that cleared the way for same-sex marriage nationwide.

Thomas wrote that the decision, Obergefell v. Hodges, "enables courts and governments to brand religious adherents who believe that marriage is between one man and one woman as bigots, making their religious liberty concerns that much easier to dismiss."

Thomas' strong opinion came down on the first day of the court's new term, and reflects the fact that critics of the landmark opinion from five years ago that was penned by now retired Justice Anthony Kennedy, are still infuriated by its reasoning. They believe the court should have left the decision to the political arena and have long said that it will infringe upon the rights of those who have religious objections to same-sex marriage....

The doctors at Walter Reed are qualifying Trump’s discharge.

They are stating he may not be out of the woods with this virus. Any media outlet exploiting his premature discharge should be held partly responsible for the danger he carries for his health and life.

If he is not completely recovered he can still spread the virus. Trump needs to be legally quarantined to protect his own life and others. NOW!

A corpse can spread the disease.

He is leaving for political reasons. He wants media coverage as if Superman. No one should be contributing to the impetus of his demise.

Uncharted territory.

Where did the doctor get permission to give Trump medications out of sequence? CDC? This is the president of this country. Experiments are not allowed without proper review unless, of course, he was failing into death.

See, the problem I have with this is that protocols are protocols. When they are diverted to a different course that raises all sorts of questions. Questions like, “Why didn’t my loved one get these treatments early if it adds to the success in overcoming COVID-19?”

Then there are the professionals that are peers that are now staring at each other wondering why they weren’t doing that earlier if it added to the success in treatment.

There are now questions within the medical community as to where their authority lies as opposed to the patient’s demands.

Unless the physicians at Walter Reed are carrying out new protocols they will probably be reviewed by peers over their departure from standard protocols.

I want to see proof of the positive tests for Trump. I doubt these medications were given early.  All the positive tests, not just the ones that plays into his political timeline. My understanding is that he is tested at least daily.

Did the Trump medical doctor from the health care center say...

 "...we just added a few drops of dexamethasone to his oxygen...."

Dexamethasone 3.3 mg/ml Solution (click here) for Injection may be administered by intramuscular, intraarticular or direct intravenous injection, intravenous infusion or soft tissue infiltration. Intravenous and Intramuscular Administration: IM or IV dosage of dexamethasone is variable, depending on the condition being treated.

I think he ran some sentences together. He is probably talking about drops in oxygen that brought Dexamethasone into use as a therapeutic.

There is no inhalation therapy for dexamethasone. I am sure they aren't flying by the seat of their pants.

I think I misheard him. He was talking quickly.

Donald John Trump has no right to tell anyone how to think about SARS-CoV-2 and the impact on their lives.

This is the isolation room (click here) that Americans are trading to when they treat SARS-CoV-2 as if "just the flu."

The virus is a killer. Donald Trump was provided the absolute best medicine and care this country provides. Not all Americans have that level of care or medication available to them.

Besides that, we know the impact of SARS-CoV-2 is very much territorial. Cities, where demographics are a higher number of people per square mile, has higher numbers falling ill to this virus.

Americans must take recommendations of their doctors seriously, including masks, social distancing, and hand hygiene. This is not an amateur sport whereby the participants make their own decisions. This is not about government oppression of American liberties. This is a very dangerous virus that kills people. Every American contributes to this democracy and everyone is important. They need to take care of themselves and participate.

Most Americans don't realize that when there are decisions to make about opening up the economy it is not based on the safety from contracting the virus, it is about the ability of a region to react to citizen's needs for care, medications, and hospitalization. When a governor states the society is open to a meeting of 10 people in a group, it means that if a group of people is exposed to SARS-CoV-2 the hospitals available to them are able to handle their illnesses. Put in different words, it means there are sufficient medical beds.

Not all these recommendations are limited to hospital availability, it also includes the density an area has of COVID-19 cases. If there is an increase in COVID-19 cases that continues to increase there must be a limit to the exposure by the people to the virus to stop the spread.

Finally, Donald John Trump has been lying about everything. There is no reason for any American to believe him about dismissing COVID-19 as a minor illness.

Everyone is facing potential danger with this virus. We have seen young people succumb to this virus. That is not a minor issue. Everyone needs to think through the protections they take in their lives to prevent infection of this virus. Everyone should be respected for the decisions they make without pressure to make decisions differently.

Donald John Trump has broken the law in New Jersey when it comes to the gathering of people. The maximum number of people in an indoor room is 25. Trump had 200 people at a gathering in Bedminister, New Jersey. In realizing the limit on gatherings is 25, he clearly put all 200 people in danger because if they all become ill, which they might, it exceeds the capacity of the local health care system. THAT IS JUST PLAIN DANGEROUS AND COMPLETELY IRRESPONSIBLE TO THE PEOPLE ATTENDING THAT FUNDRAISER.

A fundraiser that is political is allowed 150 people or 25% of the capacity of a room WHICHEVER IS LOWER. There is no excuse for this level of recklessness except arrogance. Arrogance did not protect Trump from SARS-CoV-2. The attendees should have asked what the limit is in attendance and whether it legally meets those limits of people in attendance. Money, power, and privilege is not a barrier to this virus. Obviously.

Indoor Gatherings (click here)

• General indoor gatherings must be limited to 25 people or 25% of a room's capacity -- whichever number is lower. All attendees at indoor gatherings must wear face coverings and stay six feet apart.
• Indoor gatherings for weddings, funerals, or memorial services must be limited to 150 people or 25% of a room's capacity -- whichever number is lower.
• Indoor gatherings for religious and political activities protected under the First Amendment must be limited to 150 people or 25% of a room's capacity -- whichever number is lower.
• Indoor gatherings for entertainment centers where performances are viewed or given, including movie theaters, performing arts centers, and other concert venues, must be limited to 150 people or 25% of a room's capacity -- whichever number is lower.

St. Francis has signed an encyclical regarding the problems we have today.

This encyclical takes on the death sentence and capitalism. He opposes both.

Catholic News World (click here)

October 5, 2020
By Charles P. Pierce

Papa Francesco (click here) has had a nice month for himself. First, he tells Mike Pompeo to pound sand. And, over the weekend, he issued an encyclical entitled Fratelli Tutti (All Brothers), a title drawn from the "admonitions" of St. Francis of Assisi, from whom the pope took his papal name. Among its other elements, the encyclical pretty much aligns the Church against the death penalty more firmly and finally than it ever has before. But its overarching theme is to confront our present moment and to do so directly and in the language of our time.

“The marketplace, by itself, cannot resolve every problem, however much we are asked to believe this dogma of neoliberal faith. Whatever the challenge, this impoverished and repetitive school of thought always offers the same recipes … the magic theories of ‘spillover’ or ‘trickle’ — without using the name.”

That's not Bernie Sanders. That's the pope.

“Anyone who thinks that the only lesson to be learned was the need to improve what we were already doing, or to refine existing systems and regulations, is denying reality. God willing, after all this, we will think no longer in terms of ‘them’ and ‘those’, but only ‘us’. … If only we might keep in mind all those elderly persons who died for lack of respirators, partly as a result of the dismantling, year after year, of healthcare systems.”

That's not AOC. That's the pope.

As is customary, the encyclical is broken into numbered parts. This is a particularly relevant passage, at least to me.

Things that until a few years ago could not be said by anyone without risking the loss of universal respect can now be said with impunity, and in the crudest of terms, even by some political figures. Nor should we forget that “there are huge economic interests operating in the digital world, capable of exercising forms of control as subtle as they are invasive, creating mechanisms for the manipulation of consciences and of the democratic process. The way many platforms work often ends up favouring encounter between persons who think alike, shielding them from debate. These closed circuits facilitate the spread of fake news and false information, fomenting prejudice and hate.”

The most interesting thing about this section of the encyclical is its number.

It's 45.

October 1, 2020

By Christopher Brito

A high-ranking Vatican official (click here) said Wednesday that Pope Francis would not meet with U.S. Secretary of state Mike Pompeo during his visit to Rome, citing the proximity of the U.S. general election in November....

The fall and rise of the financial markets is due more to Pelosi than any other decision. It is called "Bubble Up" as opposed to "Trickle Down."

Morning Papers

The Rooster? (click here)

Okeydoke

October 5, 2020
By Steve Goldstein

European stocks rose on Monday (click here) on hopes for one last economic stimulus boost to the economy before the U.S. election, as well as a clear result on Election Day....

...Futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average YM00, 0.74% rose 215 points.

Politico reported that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi as well as Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin consulted Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell about their stimulus plan talks. It’s unclear what, if any, role the Fed will play. The central bank did have a role in the first stimulus plan. Pelosi separately said in an interview with CBS that airlines should not fire workers, and that aid will be retroactive....

Oxygen levels

I will put it this way, normal is considered greater than 95 percent blood saturation measured by a pulse oximeter. There are Americans that have chronic lung disease like COPD (chronic obstructive lung disease) from smoking cigarettes that live on continuous oxygen flow from an oxygen condenser. Their oxygen saturation can be as low as 89 percent on a pulse oximeter, however, they are considered permanently disabled and are not making executive decisions.

Transient oxygenation problems as experienced with SARS-CoV-2 are very serious. Any patient, including the president of this country, needs to recognize the severity of that COMPROMISED state of wellness and rest while responsibly allowing decision making to other competent and trustworthy people.

Receiving serious drug treatment to successfully conquer COVID-19 is alone an indication to reassign responsibility to the Vice President. Anything short of that by the Cabinet is a compromise to the national security of this country. That does not mean that a fully recovered president cannot return to his duties to this country.

Pretending the president is not compromised is further imperiling his life and the country’s security. In the USA, anyone can legally refuse treatment and doctor’s orders. Refusing to accept doctors' orders and recommendations, as a president of the USA, is a dereliction of duty.

It is my opinion that in order to carry out his tour of citizens at the gate of the hospital complex Trump checked out of the hospital and then voluntarily returned to the doctor's care. I don't know any hospital or professional staff that would willingly compromise the public safety or the patient's well being by allowing such a stunt.

Trump wants to return to the White House while continuing his treatment. That is not fully recovered. The American people deserve better treatment than the president gives himself.

"Good Night, Moon"

The waning gibbous

17.7  days old

90.7 percent lit

This is an article from mid-September. It is fairly level headed compared to some of the forecasts I have been hearing about winter.

September 17, 2020

By Hillary Gavan

Fall temperatures (click here) will warm up in the coming weeks under a reddish moon, and there will be an average-to-cool winter following the unique phenomenon of a “blue moon” in October.

Paul Collar, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service Milwaukee/Sullivan, said it may feel cool now, but fall will be warming up.

“We are not heading into permanent cool. We will return to nice warmth next week,” he said....

We live in very difficult times.

Earth is warming rapidly because oil profits and the availability of liquidity for financial markets was convenient. The electric car technology has been around since Henry Ford yet when approached it is treated as if it is a failed method of transportation. That's nonsense. 

Earth is at a tipping point. A dangerous tipping point and we need to set our sights firmly on the future without looking back. Transportation and electricity production has to be benign to the balance of the planet. 

There are nearly 7.6 billion people alive on Earth. They are all consumers. Consumption means the use of energy and plenty of refuse and waste. Now, is the time to make Earth a priority. There is no looking back. 

The loss of ice fields and ice caps is extremely dangerous as they are climate mitigators. That mitigation is gone when the ice is gone. What is going to take it's place? Now, is the time we take this all very seriously and realize Earth's ice is precious and important and not simply a spectator sport when huge chunks break off to melt and raise sea levels.

Besides the climate, there are a lot of challenges to the USA Constitution as we know it. I have to continue this dialogue next week. This is simply a concept of understanding at this point. I want Americans thinking about their country and the importance of it's sovereign laws and the concept of their personal freedoms. It is time to vote and put the future first on all fronts.

One of those fronts must also be ending the plutocracy in the USA that endangers our freedoms. 

I appreciate your interest in this blog. Until later...

29 September 2020
By Tulane University

...“Barrett is an ‘originalist’ judge. (click here) The judicial philosophy of originalism has gradually become a very narrow approach to constitutional interpretation, which stresses looking for the ‘original meaning’ of the document. That meaning has to be constructed on the basis of a highly selective approach to history. The constructed nature of originalism, in effect, gives judges like Barrett permission to imagine that their preferred policy positions are ratified by the framers of the Constitution. That makes it a dangerous philosophy, one that could do real damage to the structure of American constitutional law.”

“Over the past few decades, Republicans have cared more about judicial appointments, including appointments to the Supreme Court, than Democrats. The nomination of Amy Coney Barrett is the culmination of that effort. But going ahead with the nomination so close to a closely contested presidential election poses real risks. There are no clear parallels in American history to the current situation. The Supreme Court itself as an institution could easily become the victim of a Democratic backlash if Barrett is confirmed.”

Protected lands portrays a false understanding. Protected Areas is what USGS uses and it is correct.

September 10, 2020
By Nathan Rott

Protected Lands (click here)

That map came from USGS (click here), but, the website above is easier to use.

Human activities (click here) have caused the world's wildlife populations to plummet by more than two-thirds in the last 50 years, according to a new report from the World Wildlife Fund.

The decline is happening at an unprecedented rate, the report warns, and it threatens human life as well.

"The findings are clear," the report states. "Our relationship with nature is broken."

The Living Planet Report 2020 report drew on wildlife monitoring of more than 4,300 different vertebrate species - mammals, fish, birds and amphibians - from around the world. It found that population sizes for those monitored species declined by an average of 68 percent from 1970 to 2016.

In the American tropics, including the Caribbean and Latin America, population sizes decreased by a staggering 94 percent.

Forest clearing for agricultural space was the predominant cause of the decline, the report says, noting that one-third of the planet's land is currently being used for food production. Human-caused climate change is another growing driver....

USGS uses the idea of Protected Areas, because, there are many different departments of the federal government that uses those lands, including the military. I might add, most of that land is unusable. It isn't as though there is some great private enterprise that can spring from them. The land while precious in its use, isn't conducive to real estate development.

The wildlife that live in the USA, are occupying land that is suited for that purpose and not much else.

Paradox. Know the word?

Straight out of Merriam-Webster:

A statement that is seemingly contradictory or opposed to common sense and yet is perhaps true.

The USA Consitution has a paradox. It states:

"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

The preamble (click here) sets the stage for the Constitution (Archives.gov). It clearly communicates the intentions of the framers and the purpose of the document. The preamble is an introduction to the highest law of the land; it is not the law. It does not define government powers or individual rights.

We the people in order to form a more perfect union. Those words are a marriage of ideas. It marries the idea of individual people coming together and forming governance. That is the rule of the majority. But, the US Constitution goes on from there.

The people want to establish justice, domestic tranquility, a common defense, general welfare for all the people, and SECURE THE BLESSINGS OF LIBERTY.

Hm. How does all this happen? How do individuals live under governance designed to control the social fabric of their lives? 

Liberty. What an odd idea in the massive writing of the USA Constitution. Isn't liberty about individual rights?

Liberty is the state of being free within society from oppressive restrictions imposed by authority on one's way of life, behavior, or political views.

The paradox. The USA Consitution provides for governance to protect a sovereign country while people live their lives without an oppressive regime or single dictator or king. The USA Constitution created within a paradox creates the concept of "majority" and "minority." Minority is not about race, it is a way to state that individuals have rights that may be different from the majority rule. 

Got it?

The USA Constitution is a paradox. Complicated, but, true.

The USA military has been preparing for the climate crisis for some time now. Not sure what is transpiring under this administration though.

September 14, 2020
By Nafeez Ahmed

When we don’t plan (click here) and prepare from a whole-systems perspective, our societies tend to respond to escalating crises by becoming more militarized to maintain order and control in an environment of escalating chaos. The irony is that this only tends to make our institutions even more brittle, weak and rigid—unable to meaningfully address the root causes of rapidly changing conditions.

That’s why we should be concerned to discover that the British government is planning for the inevitability of a catastrophic rise in global temperatures of nearly 4 degrees Celsius due to business-as-usual carbon emissions. The revelation comes from new research commissioned by the Ministry of Defence (MOD) in November 2019 to inform the MOD’S climate change strategy....

I am a little surprised that NATO hasn't been leaning into this.

October 4, 2020

London - Prince William (click here) has expressed his concerns about rising sea levels and other impacts of climate change in a television documentary to be aired in Britain on Monday, the ITV channel reported.

William, grandson of Queen Elizabeth and second-in-line to the British throne, was interviewed on the royal Sandringham Estate, which is located in East Anglia, a low-lying part of eastern England.

ITV said part of William's message in the film was that climate change posed threats to everyone, including in Britain.

"You'll lose the wildlife habitats here, you'd lose the farming, you'd lose the communities," William said, according to a report on the ITV website.

"It's in everyone's interest that we protect these sorts of areas. We have to get on top of the climate change issue."

William said the rising incidence of extreme weather events was a threat, including on his own doorstep at Sandringham.

"You suddenly realise those extreme events are going to happen more and more in the future. And also how low-lying, particularly this part of East Anglia all is."...

I have to introduce a concept. Let's start with the idea of a majority.

All Americans understand what a majority it because there is how government representatives are elected, by a majority of the voters. That majority is not about limiting voters by race or gender, UNLESS, all the amendments to the USA Constitution are erased.

Unconscionable.

Anti-American.

Unconstitutional.

All, those words describe the USA's people and how they relate to their government. The USA Constitution protects Americans from destroying freedom and democracy and liberty. That is the "state of play." But, what if other Americans think that "originalists" are better at governance than those that see every person in the USA as having rights and responsibilities.

That thinking exists. See, some Americans might secretly think that the Amendments are nothing more than politics and the original document is the correct way of thinking about the US Constitution.

The Founding Fathers as they are called were mostly wealthy men that voted because they were landowners. Thirteen colonies and an economy based in farming primarily would include a lot of people as landowners and farmers. No one was renting out a skyscraper apartment building in a big city, now were they? The Found Fathers as they are called would not even conceive of a skyscraper, let alone understand how the population of this country was growing.

So, what if a political party decided they wanted to reach back in time and allow only wealthy landowners a vote and everyone else were simply vassals.

A vassal is a person regarded as having a mutual obligation to a lord or monarch, in the context of the feudal system in medieval Europe. The obligations often included military support by knights in exchange for certain privileges, usually including land held as a tenant or fief.

Straight out of the Middle Ages. The USA would be a series of fiefdoms.

There would be a real problem with that, called sovereignty. Who are the landowners exactly? Russians? There is an oligarch in Kentucky. China bought out Smithfields Farms (click here). Nothing like a Farm Bill that gives aid to foreign governments.

March 27, 2019
By Renee Wild

American soil.

Those are two words (click here) that are commonly used to stir up patriotic feelings. They are also words that can't be taken for granted, because today nearly 30 million acres of U.S. farmland are held by foreign investors. That number has doubled in the past two decades, which is raising alarm bells in farming communities.

When the stock market tanked during the past recession, foreign investors began buying up big swaths of U.S. farmland. And because there are no federal restrictions on the amount of land that can be foreign owned, it's been left up to individual states to decide on any limitations.

It's likely that even more American land will end up in foreign hands, especially in states with no restrictions on ownership. With the median age of U.S. farmers at 55, many face retirement with no prospect of family members willing to take over. The National Young Farmers Coalition anticipates that two-thirds of the nation's farmland will change hands in the next few decades.

"Texas is kind of a free-for-all, so they don't have a limit on how much land can be owned," say's Ohio Farm Bureau's Ty Higgins. "You look at Iowa and they restrict it — no land in Iowa is owned by a foreign entity."...

I strongly believe in mitigation of the climate. I can be done and must be done. There is no turning away from it.

2 October 2020

The map (click here)

As wildfires sweep across (click here) the western United States, taking lives, destroying homes and blanketing the country in smoke, Niklas Hagelberg has a sobering message: this could be America’s new normal.

The climate change expert with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) says a fast-warming planet will likely lead to more record-breaking blazes, like those that have ravaged the states of California, Oregon and Washington in recent months.

We recently sat down with Hagelberg to discuss the relationship between climate change and wildfires, and whether one-day infernos could make California unlivable.

UNEP: Some people think climate change is a problem for future generations. But are we already seeing the early effects of it?

Niklas Hagelberg: Yes. It’s here, right now. The planet is already 1.1°C warmer than it was in pre-industrial times and that is changing the world around us. I’ll give you a personal example. I’m 46 and when I was a teenager in southern Finland, you could go rally driving on ice. Now, you have to worry about walking on ice. You can ask pretty much anyone these days and I bet they’ll have a similar story to tell. Our climate is changing into something we don’t recognize. And it doesn’t match the societies we have built.

UNEP: Is climate change responsible for the blazes that have consumed parts of the western United States of America?

NH: Forest fires are natural. But in recent years, we’ve seen a rise in the average temperature, which has led to an increase in evaporation. We’re also seeing extended droughts. The landscape is so dry from multiple years of gradual change, that suddenly there has been an increase in the frequency and intensity of fires. In fact, one report from the University of California, Berkley found the fire season in the western United States is now 75 days longer than it was in the 1970s....

The USA is considered a "representative democray."

Remember those words, "We the People." I think that is the most instructive statement in the USA Consitution. 

October 4, 2020
By Robert Longley

...Republics and democracies (click here) both provide a political system in which citizens are represented by elected officials who are sworn to protect their interests.

In a pure democracy, laws are made directly by the voting majority leaving the rights of the minority largely unprotected.

In a republic, laws are made by representatives chosen the people and must comply with a constitution that specifically protects the rights of the minority from the will of the majority.

The United States, while basically a republic, is best described as a “representative democracy.”...