Quick Jots: November 2021

DOD admits to killing seven children, says "Oopsie!"
#war
When the Department of Defense outright murders seven children, even if we call it accidental, it's "an honest mistake". But if someone waltzes into the Capitol Building and takes selfies in Nancy Pelosi's chair, that person is a "domestic terrorist" and should be held in solitary confinement for months on end.  Good thing they investigated themselves and found no wrongdoing. Next time a member of the Crips unloads thirty rounds into a van killing seven children, honestly mistaking it for a van owned by the Bloods, I'm sure the government will let the Crips investigate him and clear him of any wrongdoing. Honest mistake, right?

First target of "domestic terrorists": Parents!
#education #criticalracetheory
The National School Boards Association, the FBI, and the Biden Administration colluded to crack down on parents critical of schools teaching Critical Race Theory, labeling them as "domestic terrorists". Of course, there has been little evidence of threats of physical violence directed at school boards or school staff. Seemingly always a soothsayer, Ron Paul, years ago, said that the war on terror would inevitably be turned inward. I wonder if he ever tires of being right every time.

NIH admits to gain of function funding
#covid #media
In another blow to Fauci's credibility, the NIH has admitted to funding gain of function research. Of course, we already know this from the Intercept's release of documents, and Rand Paul must have known something about it to have just destroyed Fauci again on it long ago. News sources on the right have jumped on it. Leftward-leaning news sources...not so much. No wonder we're so polarized. We consume news like if we drive with blinders, looking through binoculars fixed in one position over the dashboard.

Fifth Circuit Court blocks OSHA's vaccine mandates
#covid #regulations
Though certain employers and local jurisdictions have already moved to install vaccine mandates, the Biden Administration's vaccine mandate through OSHA has been challenged in court and the Fifth Circuit Court has issued a stay on OSHA's orders, citing serious constitutional violations. It questions whether the executive order was truly an emergency, given the months-long delay in writing the regulation and the months-long effective date the regulation gave. It also questioned whether OSHA has such broad powers to force the vast majority of employers that would force the vast majority of employees to do something that has extremely little hazard for the vast majority of this population. Tom Woods gives a more detailed breakdown of the Fifth Circuit Court's reaffirmation of its stay.

St. Paul voters enact rent control; developers stop projects
#housingcrisis
Fifty-two percent of voters in St. Paul enact rent control with no exemption for new projects, a departure from nearly all other forms of rent control. Although the exemption still slows new construction rates, causing housing shortages, the lack of exemption makes it clear as day what rent control does to housing supply. Almost instantly, developers all across the city put a halt on their housing projects and reconsidered ever doing business in the city again. Why build a project you will only lose money on? What percentage of voters in that city do you think actually understand the effects of price controls on an economic sector? Well, less than 48%, I suppose. Enjoy your shortages, you morons.

CDC director claims masks 80% effective
#covid
The CDC Director makes yet another wildly inaccurate statistical claim, likely derived from a study that does not actually conclude what she thinks it does. The likely study carried out experiments in highly controlled laboratory conditions that measured droplet expulsion through a face mask into a hole in a box after speaking a phrase. Of course, this does not measure infection spread, given the droplet size versus virus size, that the weak points in most masks are on the edges, not through the cloth as the experiment examined, and that the real world is far more complex and messy. If what she says is true, that masks are 80% effective which is more effective than vaccines, one would expect that areas with high mask compliance would have 80% lower COVID infection rates than areas that do have low mask compliance rates. But this is patently ludicrous. As covered before, mask compliance has a very weak negative correlation with COVID rates. Comments like these just further undermine the CDC's own credibility.

Tax on unrealized gains is completely untenable
#economics
Being a fellow Oregon Duck, I should have just about every bias in favor of Ron Wyden, a senator from Oregon. He has also done tremendous work against NSA domestic spying, famously catching James Clapper in a blatant lie to Congress about the program. But his proposal to tax unrealized gains? Pure garbage. He, like many of the progressives in Congress, talk about how billionaires avoid tax because they "don't take an income". How does he think billionaires buy things? They have to sell stock and pay capital gains on realized gains. You can't exactly stroll into a Ferrari dealership and pay them in Amazon stock (which would trigger the capital gains tax anyway). Unrealized gains mean exactly what the words say. They are unrealized. So to tax something unrealized is, well, stupid. It would force them to realize their gains by selling stock to pay for the gains. Jeff Bezos, for example, gained about $78 billion in 2020 with 54.5 million shares soaring from around $1,826 per share to around $3,257 per share. A 20% capital gains tax rate on that is $15.6 billion. What does Ron Wyden think will happen to people's retirement funds when Jeff Bezos is forced to sell $15.6 billion to pay Uncle Sam? Yeah, the sell volume will tank Amazon's share value as he sells, likely forcing him to sell far more than $15.6 billion at current pricing. Meanwhile, other institutional players (read: other billionaires) will pick up the shares at a discounted rate. Wyden, stick to grilling the NSA. You suck at finance.

COVID Omicron
#covid #media
A new strain of COVID-19 was discovered around Thanksgiving, named Omicron. Huh. It was expected this variant would just go down the line to Nu, but the WHO skipped to Omicron. What comes after Nu but before Omicron? Xi. Why on earth would they want to skip Xi? What...is someone important named Xi? Is the WHO friends with someone named Xi? Anyway, I was on vacation while the news media started going berserk over this variant. Countries, including the US, started implementing travel restrictions on South Africa and its neighboring countries, where it originated, though it's unlikely these travel bans will do a whole lot to contain its spread. While the television ran nonstop coverage of the Omicron variant with scary graphics of oversized Coronavirus balls, the doctor that discovered the variant reported that the variant, while highly transmissive comes with mild symptoms, as per the typical mutation path a virus takes. Will this be a particularly bad strain? I don't know. Neither does CNN.

Women's Tennis to the rescue
#china
It was going to happen sooner or later. It sure feels like we've been in "later" territory for years now. I knew it wouldn't be the idiot LeBron James and the NBA, but I never thought it would be the Women's Tennis Association that made the first move. Following concerns over the disappearance of Peng Shuai following her allegation of a high-ranking Chinese Communist Party official of sexual assault, the WTA CEO Steve Simon suspended all games in China, citing safety concerns. The CCP provided feeble "proof" that she was doing okay and that her rights were not being violated like nobody has ever heard of them forcing captors to recant and apologize while stating publicly that they are doing fine. Hopefully, their ratings shoot up and people see that the market in China is not worth the negative publicity of kowtowing to a tyrannical government. Peng is "lucky" that there are so many eyes on her case. For every Peng, there are thousands upon thousands of other politically oppressed people in China that don't have a following to help protect them.

Chris Cuomo breach of ethics
#media
The New York attorney general released documents showing Chris Cuomo, aka Fredo, of CNN, that he used his position to involve himself with his brother Andrew's ongoing case with women accusing him of sexual assault, contradicting his earlier claims. He attempted to dig up dirt on some of the accusers in attempt to discredit them. While he was directly assisting with Andrew's efforts to respond to the allegations, he kept quiet about the affair on television and mislead his viewers about his role in it. Chris on CNN has been insufferable, doing cringey fluff piece interviews between him and his brother Andrew that made anyone watching dumber for having watched it as Andrew was the subject of a scandal involving the exacerbation of nursing home deaths by unnecessarily subjecting them to higher COVID exposure. CNN, despite defending him for years prior to this revelation, has now suspended him indefinitely. With Andrew Cuomo out as governor, what is the point of hanging on to Chris? Hopefully, we never hear of this disgraced family again.

[update 12/10/21] It looks like CNN has now fired him and is refusing to pay severance. Along with this, he ended his Sirius show though some report he was forced out, and his book deal was cancelled.