Claims And Issues

THEY DO SO MUCH, BUT WONDER IF IT IS ENOUGH.

They do so much, these selfless volunteers of Hong Kong.  They feed, house, and comfort young people who protest the Communists of China, but whose parents have thrown them out into the streets because the young people protest.

These kind, courageous volunteers buy protestors gear for protection against the billy clubs of the police, arrange for financial support to carry the protestors through the day, and organize carpools to carry the protestors to their homes at night,.  They stand between protestors and police to try to prevent violence, and they run alongside protestors who are being hauled away in handcuffs to get their names so that pro bono lawyers can later try to get them out of jail.

They do so much, and yet so many wonder if it is enough.  One pastor, who has courageously chosen to face policemen in the act of arresting protestors so that he can request the police officers to go easy making the arrest, says of his work, "The impact is definitely small."

Another volunteer, the leader of a group of volunteers who call themselves Protect the Children, "pulled on his respirator and ran directly into the fog of tear gas in central Hong Kong. He was trailed by a homemaker, a retired accountant and a middle-school teacher.  Undaunted by the pandemonium of gasping protesters, they pointed people to safety and poured saline into the eyes of those overcome by the fumes."  And yet he, too, wondered how much good it all does:  "I sometimes wonder whether we are doing anything of value, but we can't just sit at home."

The inspirational stories of these volunteers is told by Andrew Jacobs, Behind the Protestors:  Pastors, Medics, Artists and Hug Dispensers, NEW YORK TIMES, Tuesday, November 12, 2019, p. A6 (The New York Times may charge for online access). 

Do not wonder what good they do.  Their goodness is known across the face of the earth.  Like the protestors they help, these people who volunteer their time, talent, and treasure in Hong Kong are an inspiration for the world.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved. 

"MEDICAL EVACUEES ARE NOW THE NEW REFUGEES OF CLIMATE CHANGE."

Dr. Stephen Parodi wrote that.  Dr. Parodi is currently an Associate Executive Director at the Permanente Medical Group at Kaiser Permanente.  He wrote this piece that The New York Times published on November 2, 2019:  Stephen Parodi, Can Hospitals Survive the Flames?, NEW YORK TIMES, in print on Saturday, November 2, 2019, p. A27 (posted online November 1, 2019, but The New York Times may charge for online access).

Dr. Parodi has first-hand knowledge on the subject.  In 2017, he was in charge of teams of doctors, nurses, orderlies, and others who evacuated 122 patients away from a California hospital that was about to be engulfed by fire.  A "makeshift firebreak" apparently bought time to evacuate the people.  The next day, the hospital was intact but everything on the other side of the firebreak was burned up.

Doctors, nurses, and other medical personnel are trained to deal with illness, infection, and broken bones.  They are not trained to fight fires, as Dr. Parodi points out.

The new healthcare model is shifting in the face of climate change whether anyone likes it or not.  That includes being prepared to evacuate if you are a patient -- or a physician or a nurse -- in a hospital in  what are now war zones complete with refugees.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved.

Download CI 11.11.19.

 

BURY THE WIRES, STOP THE FIRES.

PG&E, the California utility company, is swiftly imposing third-world status on what was previously one of the world's leading economies.  See Douglas MacMillan and Faiz Siddiqui, PG&E's Role in Sonoma Fire Questioned as Power Outage Frustrations Grow, WASHINGTON POST posted online on Tuesday, October 29, 2019.  PG&E's policy of what we in Florida would call "rolling blackouts," meaning cut off the electricity for hours every so often, has apparently resulted in billions of dollars in damages to people and businesses in California.  It has disrupted lives in ways that people living there could not previously imagine.  They live without air conditioning in the heat, unable to close up their buildings to stop the smoke from getting in and choking their breathing and endangering their lives if God help them they have conditions like asthma.  They have no telephone service and no cell phones and all the batteries run out of power during these blackouts.  When they have no telephone service, they obviously cannot contact anyone else by telephone.   They cannot even telephone for emergency assistance when they have no telephone service.  So far.  More to come.

Some third-world countries could do better.

PG&E says that it is doing this because it is afraid that its overhead wires may cause more fires if they come down especially if the wires cannot stand up to the fierce California winds at this time of year.

So bury the wires and stop the fires.  PG&E's conduct in this affair is the greatest single advertisement for working on the infrastructure of this country.   Start by burying the wires that cause the fires.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved.

Download CI 10.30.19.

 

THEN? HESBURGH, JFK. BARR? NONE.

 

Then?  Hesburgh, JFK:

 

        President John F. Kennedy receives Notre Dame's Laetare Medal at the White House from

        University President Theodore M. Hesburgh.

 

Since then?

Barr?  None.

See the related articles previously posted here on October 23 and on October 27, 2019.  Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved.

Download CI 10.28.19.

"THIS IS NOT DECAY. THIS IS ORGANIZED DESTRUCTION."

Attorney General William Barr speaking at Notre Dame Law School on Friday, October 11, 2019.  Quoted by Pema Levy, Attorney General Barr Rages Against Secularist "Assault" on Religion, MOTHER JONES MAGAZINE, posted online Saturday, October 12, 2019.  Mr. Barr addressed what he apparently thought was a real problem, the way religion is treated in this country.  He blames the problem on what he called "secularists" and "so-called progressives."

There have been a few other problems that are actually real, which could have been addressed but which were not addressed, yet ought to be addressed.

                                        (Kim Kyung Hoon/Reuters)

Yes, wait a second.  This is not decay.  This is organized destruction.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved.

 

Download CI 10.27.19.

THE CONTINUING ADVENTURES OF FLORIDA HOSPITAL: NOW AdventHealth.

Florida Hospital is known now as AdventHealth, but a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.

It is reported that FloridaHospital/AdventHealth made a contract with a lawyer who used to frequently be appointed as a Guardian.  A Guardian makes some important decisions for some patients on the theory that the patients cannot make those decisions for themselves.  The decisions include life and death.  A Guardian can make end-of-life decisions in Florida, as in many States. 

The contract that FloridaHospital/AdventHealth made with this particular Guardian apparently involved referring patients to the Guardian who became the Guardian's clients.  In at least one case, the Guardian superseded the client-patient's own choice of Health-Care Surrogate -- the patient's daughter.  In return, the hospital got the patient "out the door."  See Monivette Cordeiro, Experts:  Hospital, Guardian Pact Odd / AdventHealth's $4M Deal Unheard of by Some in Health Care, ORLANDO SENTINEL, Sunday, October 20, 2019, p. A1, posted online on Wednesday, October 16, 2019.

FloridaHospital/AdventHealth paid this particular Guardian $4 Million over the past decade for her services.  Id.

Here is how things can work with a Guardian, and how they worked with this particular arrangement featured in the newspaper report.  It was an attorney for the hospital that convinced a judge to appoint the Guardian in the first place.  Once appointed, the Guardian moved the patient out of the hospital.  Once the patient was moved out of the hospital, the hospital no longer had to care for him and had a bed available.  Once a bed was available, a potentially paying patient could be admitted for hospital care.

And the original client-patient in the story?  He died.  This particular Guardian's story does not end there.  Her story began there, as it turns out.  The death of this particular client-patient led to "allegations that [this particular Guardian] routinely abused 'do not resuscitate' orders, sparking a scandal that has embroiled the state's guardianship system."  Id.

Who knows where fault lies and who acted rightly in this story, if anyone?  But this much is clear:  Be careful who you make deals with, and what deals you make.

Please Read The Disclaimer.  ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved.

Download CI 10.21.19.

IF YOU LIE DOWN WITH DOGS, YOU GET UP WITH ....

FLEAS.  Sometimes the costs of doing business are well, costly.

Many large U.S. corporations have struck up business deals in Communist China.  Not surprisingly, the Chinese Communist Party, which controls the Chinese Government, insists on a few things from these businesses in exchange for access to the lucrative Chinese market.

From Apple the Chinese Government reportedly wanted an app deleted that helped protestors in Hong Kong protest against rule by Chinese Communists.  Apple deleted the app.

From the National Basketball Association the Chinese Government wanted a message deleted from Twitter, for starters.  For starters, the NBA deleted the offending tweet, which called for freedom in Hong Kong essentially.  Later reports are murky about how far the NBA is going to pacify the Chinese about this.

These are just a few of their favorite things, as the song goes.  The broad outlines of the whole story are outlined in the New York Times by Jack Nicas in After China Objects, Apple Removes App Hong Kong Protestors Use to Track Police, NEW YORK TIMES, Friday, October 11, 2019, p. B1 (online here; the New York Times often charges for online access).  See also Javier Hernandez, Police-Tracking App Spurs China Media to Denounce Apple, NEW YORK TIMES, Thursday, October 10, 2019, p. B3 (posted online with the headline and subheadline, Chinese Media’s Attacks on Apple and N.B.A. Help Inflame Nationalism / Outlets are trying to intimidate multinational companies into toeing the party line while Beijing tries to rein in the Hong Kong protests; don't forget:  the New York Times may charge you for online access);  

If you lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas.  

 

Download CI 10.14.19.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved.

 

 

PROPAGANDA IN AMERICA TODAY.

American media outlets, particularly the large corporate media outlets, are microphones for niche sites broadcasting propaganda.  Small-time propaganda sites are enabled to reach a much larger audience than they commanded with their original bit of propaganda, by being re-published or re-broadcast in the mainstream media.

The propaganda sites know this very well, and they care about it very much.  The corporate media knows this very well also, but they don't care about it at all if it sells advertising.

We have the latest tiresome example of propaganda-rebroadcast-by-media in a story about a candidate for the Democratic nomination for president.  That fact alone tells you from the beginning who is responsible for this propaganda.  It's not the Democratic candidate for president, that's the first clue.

The candidate is Senator Elizabeth Warren.  She has told an anecdote on the campaign trail about how she lost a teaching job.  She lost it when she became visibly pregnant and could no longer hide her pregnancy.  When that happened, her principal told her to go.

Recall from the beginning of this story that being fired for being pregnant was and still is a common thing for employed women.

In response, someone wrote a piece on a website claiming to have accessed the school board's records that the school board actually renewed Ms. Warren's teaching contract.

The corporate media ate it up.  Apparently without spending any money on reporters' salaries or on emails or telephone calls to the school board to check it out, the corporate media effectively spread this propaganda "as is," in print and online.  They reprinted and republished this propaganda so much that Warren eventually had no choice but to respond to it.

Here's what happened.  The school board did in fact renew Warren's teaching contract.  That was before the school found out that she was pregnant.  When they found out that she was pregnant, that was when they told her that she had to go, she no longer had a job.  Which is what Warren said in the first place.

Being fired for being pregnant comes as no surprise to employed women in this country.  Remember what I said at the beginning?  The propaganda machine remembers it.  Denying truth is essential to propaganda especially when you don't look too closely at it.

It is not really a wonder that things are as they are.  But things like propaganda-rebroadcast-by-corporate-media are just beginning to change now, and for the better.

It's about time.

For the whole story of the latest smear, see Thomas Kaplan, Warren Details Account of Losing Teaching Job Because of a Pregnancy, NEW YORK TIMES, Wednesday, October 9, 2019, p. A20 (online here; the New York Times may charge you for online access -- they've got to get their revenue you know, but we won't charge you anything for our own article that you have just read).

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved.

ALL THE BEST PEOPLE.

When you use your power to snatch babies away from their mothers and fathers, it is not a long way for you to use power for other things.

So long as you have the power and they do not. One of these best people allegedly forced another of these best people to have intercourse, or "committed sexual assault," behind closed doors in a motel room. They both used to work for the Border Patrol.

Oh, wait, I said "allegedly." Add that a grand jury indicted the perp on criminal charges.

Oh, and that he resigned from the Border Patrol.  Parenthetically, his wife of 20 years -- not the victim of this indicted "sexual assault" -- is a Senior Agent there.

And his Criminal Court hearing is next.

All the best people. And this is not unusual for them. See Senior Border Patrol Agent Faces Charges of Sexually Assaulting Colleague / The assault accusation is at the center of a #MeToo moment for the nation’s border-security force, by Manny Fernandez and Mitchell Ferman, published in The New York Times, posted online Saturday, October 5, 2019 (the New York Times may charge for online access).

Power corrupts. Not an original idea. But a true one.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall. All Rights Reserved.

'But They ARE SO Your Children Too, Mr. Potter.'

Is the movie "It's A Wonderful LIfe" turning into a documentary?

Do you know where the children are?  If not, why not?

See Girl's Disappearance Grips Migrant Town, by Christina Goldbaum, THE NEW YORK TIMES, Tuesday, October 1, 2019, p. A20.  (Try online here; The New York Times may charge for online access.  The "Migrant Town" of the headline here is Bridgeton, New Jersey.)

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved.

 

Download CI 10.02.19.

 

 

IS IT TIME FOR "WAG THE DOG" NOW?

The conditions seem to be coming together now for a distracting kind of war.

First, "Qaeda Branch in Syria Poses Threat, U.S. Says," reported by Eric Schmitt in The New York Times, Monday, September 30, 2019, p. A7 (the New York Times may charge for online access).  This information reportedly comes from the current State Department run by Mr. Mike Pompeo.  That would be the same State Department in the same federal government that claims that ISIS was totally defeated in Syria.  Apparently, even though ISIS has been "defeated," Al Qaeda is now a threat, they say.

Second, "Trump's Next Top General Is Combat Tested and Skilled in Banter," reported by Helene Cooper in The New York Times, Monday, September 30, 2019, p. A 14 (again, the New York Times may charge for online access).  The incoming Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is an Army General, Mr. Mark Milley.  He will replace a Marine appointed by President Obama and he is the current regime's favored choice over an Air Force General recommended by former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis.  Many people say that Mr. Milley got the head military job "because he cozied up to President Trump," the New York Times reported in the linked article, which ends with this quote:

For military leaders, operating in a political environment will push you to the limit, and you've got to be prepared to say, "I'm not going there."

Quoting Admiral Mike Mullen, Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama.

 

The conditions seem to be coming together now.   "We'll see."

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved.

RADIO SILENCE: INSURANCE AGAINST ACCOUNTABILITY.

Kenneth T. "Cooch" Cuccinelli II, or junior, is the latest Acting head of U.S. Customs and Immigration Services.  A couple of months ago, USCIS sent letters to people in the United States who had been given permission to be here to receive medical treatment that will save their lives.  The program that kept them alive is called the medically necessary deferred action program.

The letter which was issued by the USCIS on Mr. Cuccinelli's watch  -- without his signature on it -- told the patients to leave the United States or they would be deported.  The previously unannounced change was met with a firestorm of justified criticism.  Supposedly the USCIS is against the change now and will keep the medically necessary deferred action program alive.  See Miriam Jordan, Deferred Action For Immigrants Set to Resume, NEW YORK TIMES, Friday, September 20, 2019, p. A20.  (The online link is here; be warned that the New York Times may charge for online access.)

Mr. Cuccinelli did not put his name to the announcements that supposedly reversed the USCIS's position to terminate the program.

As noted, Mr. Cuccinelli did not sign the earlier letter to the patients who would die without the medical treatment that is only offered in the United States.  That is the letter that reversed the medically necessary deferred action program in the first place.  As well as terminating the chances of the patients to live.  See "CALL THEM BY THEIR TRUE NAMES."  Rebecca Solnit, posted here on September 8, 2019.

You may recall this guy.  He is the one who has never had any problem speaking in public.  For example, he publicly re-interpreted the poem inscribed at the base of the Statute of Liberty. He is used to speaking in public, in fact, he seeks out opportunities to speak in public.  He did a lot of public speaking when he recently ran for Governor of Virginia, and lost.   He is nowhere to be found on this issue.

Yet his fingerprints are all over it.

Moreover, he is the head of the USCIS that did all these things.  Maybe he is only the Acting head, but at the moment he is the only head.  These things all happened on his watch, not on somebody else's watch.  He owns this issue whether he likes it or not.

Radio Silence:  Insurance Against Accountability?

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved.

 

 

 

DEMOCRATS, WE GAVE YOU THE HOUSE MAJORITY FOR A REASON!

AND THIS ISN'T IT.

Calls surface this week for impeachment of Brett Kavanaugh.

Okay, maybe you are not in favor of impeachment yourself, but how about an investigation at least? In case you don't remember, we haven't had one of those yet.

There were calls earlier for impeachment of other people. Including Bill Barr. Nothing happening with that, either. Not even an investigation. To say again, we haven't had one of those yet.

You know, you can't keep saying you want to impeach people and then do absolutely nothing about it.

House Judiciary Committee Chair Jerrold Nadler says that he's too busy to even think about Brett Kavanaugh this year, in particular. He was for it before he was against it, though. A year ago he vowed to conduct a full-scale investigation of Brett Kavanaugh if the voters elected a House Majority of Democrats. This year, he's changed his mind. He's not the only House Democrat who does not act or want to act. See Sheryl Gay Stolberg, Allegation Reopens the Debate Over Kavanaugh / New Questions Emerge About F.B.I. Review, NEW YORK TIMES, Tuesday, September 17, 2019, p. A1 (the Nadler interview appears in the last four paragraphs at the end of the story, buried on page A18 of the print edition). Online here (the New York Times may charge for online access).

We gave you a House Majority, Democrats, so that you could check these people. What you are not doing is not why we elected you. We could have voted for the other party and gotten the result we're getting now. You might as well not be there.   Actually anything would be better than the job you're not doing.

Some other people could do a better job.   Wait, there's an idea.

Download CI 09.18.19.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall. All Rights Reserved.

DEMOCRACY DIED TUESDAY OF A GERRYMANDER.

The pundits are out in force over the results of the special election in a Congressional district in North Carolina. The Republican won by 2 percentage points on Tuesday over a Democrat who, last time he ran, lost by only 0.4 percentage points.

I see that the Congressional district is apparently still gerrymandered. Wait, it is more than apparently still gerrymandered. It is gerrymandered.

I thought I would mention this.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall. All Rights Reserved.

IT'S 911. DO YOU KNOW WHERE YOUR CHILDREN ARE?

Where are the children taken from their families by the current regime at the southern border? They say they cannot find the children that they took.

    U.S. Customs and Border Protection via AP.

The current regime and the truth have not begun a beautiful friendship, to put it mildly. So, check the foster homes, the orphanages, and every other place where the children may face forced adoption.

Stranger things have happened.

Heck, stranger things happen every day now.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall. All Rights Reserved.

SECRETARY OF DEFERENCE: CHILDREN AND THE 101st AIRBORNE LOSE BIG.

You may know that Mark T. Esper is the name of the latest U.S. Secretary of Defense. What you may not know is that back in the day, before he became a lobbyist for a defense contractor that does a lot of business with the Defense Department, Mr. Esper was a soldier in the 101st Airborne Division.

The 101st Airborne Division is stationed at Fort Campbell, Kentucky. Mahaffey Middle School is at Fort Campbell. It was built even before the time that Mr. Esper would have been in the 101st Airborne Division. So it was there when he was there, in all probability.

Mr. Esper did not go to Mahaffey Middle School, though, and so far as we know, none of his children if he has any went there either. That may be Mahaffey Middle School's loss. But it is not their only loss.

Mahaffey Middle has needed renovations since the George W. Bush presidency. In 2007, a teacher at that school testified:

Garbage cans catch water from a leaking room while a broken heating and air-conditioning system produces sauna-like conditions in some classrooms, while other classes have no heat.

"The problems persist today," soldiers serving at Fort Campbell have disclosed. Aging School Loses Funding to Border Wall, by Helene Cooper, NEW YORK TIMES, Friday, September 6, 2019, p. A1 (the New York Times may charge for any online access), posted online with the headline, No New School at Fort Campbell:  The Money Went to Trump's Border Wall.

Nonetheless Mark T. Esper approved taking all $62,600,000.00 of its construction budget away, to help pay for an unauthorized border wall with monies dedicated by Congress -- and previously, dedicated by the Defense Department that Mr. Esper now heads -- to projects like the Middle School attended by children of the 101st Airborne Division.

Duty. Deference. Money.

Disbelief.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall. All Rights Reserved.

"CALL THEM BY THEIR TRUE NAMES." Rebecca Solnit

The New York Times has declared Kenneth Cuccinelli "a devout Catholic," The Public Face of Homeland Security Also Ruffles Its Feathers. A Lot, by Zolan Kanno-Youngs and Maggie Haberman, NEW YORK TIMES, Friday, September 6, 2019, p. A12 (be forewarned: the New York Times often charges for any online access to its reports).  Mr. Cuccinelli is the latest acting director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services or "USCIS."

This is insulting. We will have to discuss what being "a devout Catholic" means. That long discussion is for later, not for now.

A devout Catholic does not announce new rules designed to change the meaning of "public charge" so as to designate disabled people a "public charge" and label them unfit for this country, but Mr. Cuccinelli did.

A devout Catholic does not sponge away the message of the Statute of Liberty to ask only for people who can stand on their own two feet, but Mr. Cuccinelli did that too. Some people cannot stand on their own two feet, but they are still people. And in the United States, they can still live free.

And a devout Catholic does not send sick children to their deaths, many of whom were actually invited into this country on medically necessary deferred relief.

It is not my place to judge Kenneth Cuccinelli as a person and I am asking you not to judge him either. I am not saying that he is a bad person. I am saying that he should not be called "a devout Catholic." His actions are not devout and they are not Catholic. Many will say "Lord, Lord," but you shall know them by how they act and not by what they say about how devout they are.

To paraphrase the Irish-American poet John Boyle O'Reilly, Kenneth T. Cuccinelli II may have a right to rule if we let him. But he has no right to call his reign Catholic.

Or to call it the United States of America.

 

Download CI 09.08.19.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall. All Rights Reserved.

LAWYERS, TEACHERS, MEDICAL WORKERS ... AND CPAs MARCH FOR FREEDOM.

Thousands of accountants marched for freedom in Hong Kong recently.  They marched from a city square to the headquarters of Hong Kong government.  "They were the latest profession to back the movement publicly following rallies by lawyers, teachers and medical workers."  Associated Press Copyrighted Report, Hong Kong Protestors Form Human Chain to Call For Democracy, Los Angeles Times online Thursday, August 23, 2019.

Think of it.  It's hard enough to get lawyers to agree to anything, let alone to march for freedom together.  (Remember the old joke?  If you put two lawyers in a room, you get three opinions.)

Teachers and medical workers I can understand.  They practice professions in which their whole professional life involves helping people.

And now accountants.  Perhaps the Communist Party which runs China does not find these events note-worthy.  But you and I and the rest of the world know better.

Download CI 09.06.19.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved.

This article was written before Hurricane Dorian could inflict damage including to the power supply. It has been previously posted for today.

PRIVATE PROFITS, PUBLIC EXPENSES: THE STORY BEHIND EL PASO SHOOTINGS.

"There were no armed security guards on duty at the time of the massacre in El Paso."  Michael Corkery, Shooting Renews Scrutiny of Walmart Stores for Frequency of Crime, NEW YORK TIMES, Tuesday, August 6, 2019, p. A11 (the New York Times may charge for online access).

It could have been any store in Texas.  But it wasn't just any store as it turned out.

There were no armed security guards on duty despite the fact that Texas has open-carry gun laws.  That means that people can go into a store in Texas openly carrying a gun. That is what happened before the killings began at a store in El Paso recently.  To say again, that store had no armed security guards on duty at the time despite the fact that Texas has laws that authorize a person to go to stores carrying guns.

Last but not least, the company which owns the store where the recent El Paso shootings took place "remains the largest gun seller in the nation."  Michael Corkery at New York Times, supra.

Private Profits.  Public Expenses.

Download CI 09.04.19.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved.

This article was written before Hurricane Dorian could inflict damage including to the power supply.  It has been previously posted for today.

 

HONG KONG, THE DARKNESS AND THE LIGHT REVEALED.

For very good journalism, accurately reported and written, see Shibani Mahtani and Timothy McLaughlin, Protestors Focus on Hong Kong's Airport, Snarling Transport Links After Day of Violence, WASHINGTON POST online Sunday, September 1, 2019.  In easily understandable, solid reporting, this article informs about:

• the reasons for the protests,
• the violent reactions of Communist China and their thugs,
• the decline in professionalism among those who now wear the uniforms of the once-respected Hong Kong Police Force, and
• the hardships reluctantly cast upon the tourists using Hong Kong's face upon the world, its airport, such as the words of this man from the Philippines who walked an hour-and-a-half to the airport from the last train station that the government left open, so that he could catch his flight back to Manila:

"I understand what they [the protestors in Hong Kong] are fighting for.

They are young people fighting for their future."

The reporters carefully report the fact that this person made his flight.

Download CI 09.02.19.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved.

 

TRACK THE CHILDREN! WATCH MOSCOW MITCH!

Keep on tracking the children. This current regime might just try to put a price tag on anything that moves -- no matter how small or innocent. Download CI 08.18.19.

And while we are at it, keep an eye on Moscow Mitch! Come on, now, keep the song going ... Download CI 08.19.19.

♫Moscow, Moscow Mitch!

Mitch Wants to be a Moscow Man!♫

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall. All Rights Reserved.

Download CI 08.28.19.

"PROTEST LEADER?" REALLY? HE'S BEEN IN JAIL OVER A YEAR.

The 2019 protests in Hong Kong are famous for having no leaders.  Leading protests in Hong Kong can land a person in jail in China.  The people of Hong Kong are acting for themselves.  This drives Communist China up the Great Wall.

Apparently, it drives corporate media up a wall in this country too.  The New York Times has actually published a story pinning the leadership of the 2019 Hong Kong protests on a guy who was put in jail months before the protests started.

The Times is pushing the story that the guy in jail, Edward Leung, is the mastermind of the Hong Kong protests.   The problem with that story is that Mr. Leung was jailed for his role in the 2016 Hong Kong protests.  Months before this year's protests started in June.  Mr. Leung's jailers are not in the habit of allowing prisoners time off for bad behavior.  His contacts with Hong Kong outside his prison walls are not the kind of thing that leads violent protests against China.  

To the contrary, other reports have Edward Leung in 2019 releasing a letter that counsels against violence in the face of contrary provocations including from the government.  See Edward Leung's Letter to Hongkongers, published July 30 and apparently written July 26, 2019. 

But two large organizations want you to believe them and not your lyin' eyes on this.  One of the organizations is the Chinese Communist Party.  The other organization that wants you to swallow this is equally desperate to put a name on the 2019 protests.  That other desperate organization is The New York Times apparently, in a piece published over two weeks after Edward Leung's Letter to Hongkongers.  See Andrew Higgins, 'Che Guevara' of Hong Kong Inflames a Fight Over Identity, New York Times, Thursday, August 15, 2019, p. A1, published online with a very different headline, ‘Retake Hong Kong’: A Movement, a Slogan and an Identity Crisis (New York Times may charge for online access). 

Download CI 08.21.19.

 

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved.

 

THE BALLAD OF MOSCOW MITCH.

The current Leader of the United States Senate, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, has done deeds that people want to sing about.

♫MOSCOW, MOSCOW MAN! MITCH WANTS TO BE A MOSCOW MAN!

In 2016, Mitch McConnell refused to sign a bipartisan letter that the Russians were interfering in the presidential election.  The President of the United States, the Minority Leader of the U.S. Senate, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, and the Ranking Member of the House were all reportedly on board with a joint letter calling out the Russians for their interference.  But not Mitch McConnell.  See Jennifer Rubin, McConnell Owes the Country a Fuller Explanation on Russian Meddling, Washington Post online February 20, 2018.

MITCH WANTS TO BE A MOSCOW MAN!♫

In recent years, most recently in 2019, Mitch McConnell has refused even to allow a vote in the Senate on election security legislation that enjoys overwhelming support in the Senate as well as in the House.  If you can't vote on it, it doesn't have a chance to become law.  Period.  See Nicholas Fandos, New Election Security Bills Face a One-Man Roadblock:  Mitch McConnell, New York Times online June 7, 2019 (the New York Times may charge for online access).

MOSCOW, MOSCOW MAN!♫ MITCH WANTS TO BE A MOSCOW MAN!♫

A previous article posted here called attention to Mitch McConnell's involvement in a Russian aluminum factory to be located in Kentucky.  The article raised some hard questions that to this day have not been answered.  See MITCH McCONNELL SAYS 'JUST A COINCIDENCE' AFTER RUSSIAN SANCTIONS REMOVED, posted May 17, 2019.

Other articles have recently begun to ask the same and similar questions about Mitch McConnell and Russian investment in an aluminum factory that the Russians made a deal to put in Kentucky.  See, e.g., Tom Hamburger and Rosalind S. Helderman, How a McConnell-Backed Effort to Lift Russian Sanctions Boosted a Kentucky Project, Washington Post online August 14, 2019.

So, sing along all! ♫MOSCOW, MOSCOW MITCH! MITCH WANTS TO BE A MOSCOW MAN!♫

Download CI 08.19.19.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall.  All Rights Reserved.

WHAT GOOD ARE YOU, health and human services DEPARTMENT?

Ever had a loved one in a nursing home or an assisted living facility? Or even in the hospital? Heard about how the level of care they get in all of those places increases as the number of visitors increases?

"Health and Human Services officials have failed to conduct required visits of independent living programs for thousands of people with intellectual and physical disabilities, the agency’s Office of the Inspector General found." Yasmeen Abutaleb, Agency Did Not Conduct Required Oversight of Program for Those With Disabilities, WASHINGTON POST online Wednesday, August 14, 2019.

The Administration for Community Living is the name of the branch of health and human services that has not conducted an inspection of independent living programs for people with disabilities, since Congress voted to delegate this power in 2012.

Not once in seven years. And that's the Office of Inspector General reporting that.

So: Today they say that "orange is the new black," that "50 is the new 60," and things like that. Is this another one of those sayings: "This is the new health, these are the new human services" in 2019?

Download CI 08.14.19.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall. All Rights Reserved.

MATH CHALLENGES SPEAKER PELOSI.

Over half of the House Democrats have announced in favor of impeachment. See, e.g., Time magazine here.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi previously said that would never happen, that there would never be a majority of her party in the U.S. House in favor of impeachment, no way. Watch the PBS Newshour video and listen to the audio here.

Speaker Pelosi also said that four certain Members of Congress, newly elected in 2018 all, have no following.

Every one of the Four is for impeachment. Right now.

Math challenges Speaker Pelosi.

Download CI 08.12.19.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall. All Rights Reserved.

THE KILLER IN EL PASO IS NOT AN IMMIGRANT. Postscript 08.05.19.

The death count stands at twenty as I write these words. That is how many people were killed in El Paso yesterday.

The killer is not an immigrant.

He aimed at people who he thought look like immigrants. They weren’t immigrants either. But they got a sentence of death from him because they looked like immigrants.

Who was the dangerous one in El Paso yesterday?

 

Postscript of Monday, August 5, 2019:

“This Anglo man came here to kill Hispanics. I’m outraged and you should be, too. This entire nation should be outraged. In this day and age, with all the serious issues we face, we are still confronted with people who will kill one another for the sole reason of the color of their skin.”

Sheriff Richard Wiles of El Paso, Texas, quoted by Simon Romero, Manny Fernandez, and Michael Corkery in A Store That Connected Cultures, Until a Killer ‘Came Here For Us,’ NEW YORK TIMES, Monday, August 5, 2019, p. A1 (online here; the New York Times may charge for online access).

Download CI 08.05.19.

 

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall. All Rights Reserved.

"OH, LOOK, A SQUIRREL!"

Small children are easily distracted. Adults relearn this by hanging around them, such as coaching or umpiring Little League games.

Adults generally grow out of distractions. But not always.

“You can fool some of the people all of the time. And you can fool all of the people some of the time. But you cannot fool all of the people all of the time,” Abraham Lincoln famously said.

This is true even though adults in modern times have something in their lives that comes between them and their squirrels, their distractions. The filter for adults is the corporate media. The corporate media is so loud and so relentless, it never stops and never seems to shut off. They broadcast squirrels shamelessly (so long as they make money from it, at least).

Even so, you can still fool some people all of the time of course, and you can still fool all of the people some of the time, it’s just easier now.

But you still cannot fool all of the people all of the time.

Not now. Not ever.

Download CI 07.31.19.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall. All Rights Reserved.

THINK ABOUT WHAT you’re GOING TO DO.

On January 20, 2017 the story was that the crowds were huge. That has been said so many times since then, despite all the photographs to the contrary, that some people believe it. The next day – one day later – the first Women’s March was attended in the United States by so many more people that it is reportedly the highest attendance at a protest in American history, ever. Not to mention the many people who marched in other nations.

In the Fall of 2018, the story was that Democrats would lose big. They were big losers, supposedly, and that mantra was repeated so many times that many people either believed it or feared it, or both. The Democrats cleaned their opponents’ clocks in the Midterms of 2018. They did it by running their races with boldness, grace, and courage. Their opponents pushed fear and lost.

My daughter attended a softball camp when she was younger. The coach was Lonnie Richardson. At the time, he was a coach of a college softball team and his sister was and is Dr. Dot Richardson, a softball Olympian and a true great of the sport. Lonnie Richardson said that when his sister is at bat “she’s not thinking of what the pitcher is going to do, she’s thinking of what she’s going to do.”

The moral of the story is really simple: Think about what you’re going to do.

Download CI 07.24.19.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall. All Rights Reserved.

ANTI-CATHOLIC DISCRIMINATION AT THE BORDER?

The treatment of immigrants at the border is not completely understood but it is well-known to be bad. Many if not most of the immigrants are Catholic. Are they being discriminated against because they are Catholic?

Centuries ago this country gave shelter in some places to the “Know Nothing Party.” The Know Nothings hated immigrants and minorities, and just about anybody that was not white. They made some exceptions to their hatred of people who were not white, though.

They reserved a lot of their hatred in particular for Catholics.

It deserves asking again, then: Are the actions of the occupiers of the current federal government unjustly discriminating against immigrants because they are scared of Catholics?

The Know Nothings ride again. On the same hatreds.

Download CI 07.22.19.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall. All Rights Reserved.

IT’S ALL IN THE WRIST. MAYBE IT’S IN ATTITUDE INSTEAD.

    A woman was born with polio. Let’s call her Dianne. (That’s her name.)
    She can still walk but it’s becoming more of a chore. She uses a motorized wheel chair a lot now.

This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY

    Today Dianne went for an x-ray. Alone.
    She pulled into the parking lot by the front door. Luck or her guardian angel or both were with her. She found a space right near the front door which opened automatically.
    The x-ray office was down the hall near the back door to the building. The back door is not automatic.     Neither is the door to the x-ray office.
    Dianne waited by both doors until someone came through the back door. (It would have to be an able-bodied person, of course, since the back door does not open automatically.) Soon a woman entered the building through the back door. She had children in tow, one child holding each hand. Dianne asked her if she could ask a favor.

This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY

    The woman said “Sure.” She may have had the back door in mind since a handicapped person in a wheelchair clearly cannot open it, and that’s what she had in front of her, namely, a handicapped person in a wheelchair. Although the back door had no sign on it one way or the other.
    However the favor that Dianne asked was instead to open the nearby door to the x-ray office. The woman said “Of course,” and she did.
    Dianne said to her then: “You see, you didn’t know when you woke up this morning that you were going to be an angel. But you were.”

    The children beamed to hear this truth be told about their mom.

Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2019 Dennis J. Wall. All Rights Reserved.

Download CI 07.17.19.