Quick Jots: July 2022

Julian Assange extradition approved
#media
I totally whiffed on posting about this last month. The UK approved the extradition of Julian Assange to the United States. Wikileaks will appeal the ruling. He is sure to get a show trial in the country where the CIA plotted to assassinate Assange since he published truthful information about the spying and military apparatus of the United States. Snowden was smart in having a bug out plan. The whole freedom of the press thing is only for journalists who are obedient and neutered members of The Cathedral. Ain't that right, Jim Acosta?

CDC: COVID top five killer of children
#covid19
The CDC, in the midst of trying to "figure out" if they should recommend vaccines for children under 5, released a statistic that said COVID-19 is the top four or five killer of children. Anyone that has paid any attention to the pandemic should have an instant double-take at this statistic. The virus that is notorious for killing old people and sparing children, is a top-5 cause of death for children under five? All of the public policy health experts that saw this CDC statistic and thought "yeah, okay, I guess that makes sense." Or they at least were too scared (or too invested in NYSE:PFE) to speak up and say this doesn't make any sense. Kelly Krohnert saw through it immediately and after digging around a bit, found that the statistic scrunched 26 months of COVID deaths into one year. On top of that, they failed to differentiate died of COVID and died due to COVID. What is this, April of 2020? They still haven't figured out the difference between correlation and causation?

Shinzo Abe shot in Japan
#obituary #gunrights
I don't know much about the guy except that he cranked up the money printer in Japan, continuing the stall of the Japanese economy. Nevertheless, people used this incident as proof that gun restrictions work. Yeah, you read that right. They pounced on this to illustrate the rarity of gun violence in Japan. Yeah, well, violence is low in Japan, regardless of the weapon type, and he was still shot. The ability of people to relax their eyes and see what they want to see is pretty amazing. I don't know where to find these numbers, but I'd wager that if you look at gun violence committed by Japanese in the United States, it would be similarly low as Japan. It's the culture, stupid.

Court declines to hear AB5
#legislation
Looks like there will be a major shakeup in California's trucking industry. SCOTUS has declined to review AB5 in California, that regulates independent contractors in certain industries, which includes trucking. Many independent truckers will likely move their operations to other states and decline to work in California. This will likely exacerbate supply chain issues, and increase the cost of shipping. Unfortunately for the rest of the country, California contains major shipping docks so this will increase the cost of shipping for everyone else, as well. Shipping routes may start moving to other states. Independent truckers will be hurt since their preferred method of work will be denied to them by the state, but trucking companies may be forced to raise salaried positions in order to entice more people to work for them, causing shipping costs to go up further. I guess on the plus side, we'll get less congested highways and fewer broken windshields. Unsurprisingly, truckers shut down ports in protest.

New York brings back illegal gun restrictions
#gunrights
New York reimposes gun restrictions in an obvious and dubious attempt to circumvent the recent SCOTUS rulings, still blatantly violating the ruling the Supreme Court just handed out. This illustrates, somewhat, the bizarreness of the system we're supposed to marvel at. A state can violate the Constitution, get a finger-wagging by the Supreme Court, and just keep on doing what they're doing. Nobody goes to jail, pays a fine, is forced to resign, or even take administrative leave. Supposedly, the executive branch can step in and force the state to stop, but come on. Joe Biden is not likely to enforce this ruling. Which makes this Constitutional system merely theatrics.

Devon Allen robbed
#offtopic
I am so pissed. In the World Athletics Championships in Eugene, the hometown hero, Devon Allen, was disqualified from the final 110m hurdles because he had a reaction time from the electronic blocks of 99ms (same with two women in the 100m sprint heats). Anything under 100ms was deemed impossible by the IAAF, for some stupid reason. I'm not using the word "stupid" as an epithet. It is a literally stupid threshold. A study by Pain and Hibbs concluded that reaction times by athletes under 100ms are possible, down to 85ms. His start that appeared to be the exact same as everyone else on the field in slow-motion frame-by-frame replays, sparked a Twitter mob while Devon Allen, a class act, just tweeted his congratulations to his colleagues. The world was robbed of a phenomenal race from someone who ran the event in the third fastest time in world history just a few months ago. It may have resulted in another USA sweep. Some people talked about how technology (electronic blocks) is ruining the sport. No, the blocks don't make the stupid rule of 100ms requirement, the rule makers do. Just like how it wasn't the pandemic that short-circuited the economy and mental health. The lawmakers did.

Citizen with gun saves untold number of lives
#gunrights
A shooter in an Illinois mall opened fire, striking five, killing three. A good Samaritan with a gun, Elisjsha Dicken, returned fire and killed the shooter, reportedly from 40 yards out! Although the mall policy was to forbid firearms, it was this person who disobeyed a bad rule that saved lives. The mall operator issued a statement praising the response of the citizen with a gun. The police also issued a statement calling Elisjsha a hero, which is comforting to know since it makes it unlikely he will be charged for murder, like he may have in New York. Fifteen seconds and it was all over. Or we can wait for the police to show up, then wait 70-odd minutes for the police to do something other than impede parents from taking action, like in Uvalde. One good guy with gun > 400 cops in Uvalde.

American Rescue Plan cost 800k per job
#economics
That American Rescue Plan that Joe Biden was touting early in his presidency, apparently cost $855,000 per job-year, that paid on average less than $100,000 per job per year. Much of the plan fed money to financial losers like government-run golf courses. We would have been better off if they had just directly paid $100,000 to 7 times more people to sit at home and watch Everybody Loves Raymond reruns. 

Antonia Okafor testifies to Congress
#gunrights

Antonia Okafor, of Gun Owners of America, in a testimony to Congress completely dismantled the gun control argument that has been pushed recently. It was refreshing to hear someone in the chambers speaking that actually has knowledge of firearms. She stated that the Buffalo shooter stated he was comforted that he would face little resistance due to New York's restrictive firearms laws, the first time I heard this.