Crimes Against Humanity

In the last weeks of June in the year 2022 the Supreme Court of the Unites States (SCOTUS) rescinded federal protection of common sense gun laws and a woman's reproductive rights. In the act of doing so they also weakened the separation of church and state and endangered constitutional guarantees to such basic constitutional precepts as life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. 

And I'm all for it.

This is a simple case, and a common case, of fundamentalism taking over the judiciary. It happens. But it may be a blessing in disguise. 

First, let's look at the premise of these two cases:

1. New York's concealed carry gun laws (in effect for nearly 100 years). This law stated, among other things, that a person that wants to carry a firearm outside their home had to show cause as to why they needed to. 

SCOTUS interpreted the 2nd amendment of the constitution to mean, literally, a persons right to carry arms will not be infringed. Period. In other words, the onus is on the State to determine why a citizen cannot carry arms - it's not the citizens responsibility to show why they can. The Constitution says they can. Score one for SCOTUS.

2. The Roe vs. Wade (Row) decision that was interpreted to allow a woman's right to abortion was overturned. The Row so called "abortion rights" decision was actually based on a right to personal privacy - not on reproductive rights.

Again SCOTUS rightfully established that reproductive rights are not guaranteed protection in the Constitution, per se. They asserted the association of personal privacy to a reproductive decision in Roe was far and away too separate to be joined in a legal context.

Ramifications of overturning Row:

If reproductive rights are not associated with personal freedoms or privacy in the Constitution, then there may be a complete set of religious social "anti-choice" targets (atheism, adultery, same sex marriage, LGTBQ rights, transexual medical procedures, sex education,...) that States can now legally impose laws against. 

Likewise, other states and private parties, individuals and corporations that defy another State's anti-choice laws could be liable, under said laws, to be sued - and individuals that aid and abed those seeking rights elsewhere could be fined and/or imprisoned in the subject state.

The Blessing:

With a clear majority of American's supporting the right to personal choice - from reproduction to firearms, the time may be right for the progressive left in this country to move our congressional makeup back to the center - where the rest of the western world has been for some time.

With enough votes, we can update the Constitution with reproductive rights and place restrictions - if not replace entirely - the 2nd amendment. But the 2nd amendment is really the harder one to address.

2nd Amendment Details:

The actual wording of the second amendment has always been ambiguous:

“...a well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

It's that darn comma between "State" and "the right". It's almost as if it denotes a parenthetical clarification as to what allows an effective Militia - not a singular pronouncement for all citizens. If the word "and" was used in place of the comma, there would be no question as to the intent of the amendment. The author HAD to know that this was going to be scrutinized endlessly for centuries. So why the ambiguity?

The answer may be in the document that inspired the U.S. Bill of Rights in the first place. The English "Bill of Rights" of 1688. It declared: 

"Protestants may have arms for their defence [sic] suitable to their conditions and as allowed by law." 

If this truly was the inspiration for the 2nd amendment, it is clear that the Right was indeed meant to subject to some laws. The author of the 2nd amendment may have simply assumed the "allowed by law" clause was as unnecessary as the reference to "Protestants".

In any case, the amendment has made the U.S. into a sick Wild West show with innocent civilians and children paying the price.

Citizen militias (not controlled by the State as suggested in the amendment) are arming thousands, carrying guns to protests, and mounting insurrection at the bidding of mentally ill leaders. It's time to clean it up and make it relevant to the modern world. Or the amendment that was supposed to prevent an armed overthrow of democratic government may very well be the cause of it.

JB

Ivan the Terrible

Most school children have heard of Ivan the Terrible. Ivan IV Vasilyevich was famous for two things: First, establishing the Russian Tzar as a dangerous, powerful, and formidable autocrat; and second, the transformation of the city-state Moscow into the first Russian Empire.

Born Grand Prince of Moscow in 1531, Ivan the IV ruled from the age of three. He was made ruler as a dying whish of his father, Ivan III.  His father’s death spawned a series of plots and intrigue by powerful "advisors" to the ruler - including the poisoning of his mother when he was eight - and finally culminated in his ascension in 1547, at the age of 16, to Tsar.

In early life he did many very progressive and popular things, like revising the Rule of Law, establishing the first Russian parliament, expanding Christianity, standardizing orthodoxy, and introducing the printing press – to name only a few.

In older life, he personified the axiom: “Absolute power corrupts absolutely”.  Whether it was dementia or power mad brutality, we may never know. But in time he helped characterize the position of Tsar as one accountable to no earthly authority - but only to God.

His wars in Crimea, Siberia, Poland & Turkey, among others, were brutal attacks on citizens and rulers alike. His military exploits crippled the Russian economy, and at his death, Russia entered what was called the “Time of Troubles” where people starved, and the oligarchs took divided control of a devastated country.  

Today a modern Ivan the Terrible is at the helm of Russia. Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin has stolen the playbook of Ivan Vasilyevich. In his autocratic position of absolute power, he yearns to rebuild the communist Soviet Union by any means necessary.

Vladimir the Terrible is writing his legacy in real time – as we watch.  Unlike the Tsars of the past, today’s power mad dystopian ruler can put his evil on display for the world to see. As he laughs and threatens nuclear war if he is opposed – the 5 o’clock news details the brutality and suffering of a nation that posed no threat.  No threat in any way. Their only fault: Serving as a reminder of the power that was once the façade of the USSR.

Held together by force, fear and propaganda, the old USSR could not endure in the face of increasing challenges to its antiquated economic and technical shortcomings. Many of the western regions of the failed USSR sought independence once again – and that, to Putin’s way of thinking – was a wrong that needed correcting.

Ukraine is a nation of the proud and the imperfect. It’s only been independent from the USSR for thirty years. Many of the old communist influencers are still there. It still struggles to balance a thirst for democracy with a history of communist political and economic corruption. But they were making progress. Real progress. Progress the entire world was monitoring – from the European Union to NATO – and yes – to Putin.

Putin and his oligarchs once felt that Ukraine would slowly dissolve back into Russia. The eastern provinces were already break-away areas that Russian military "advisors" propped up. Russia took the Crimea by force in 2014 as a display of their resolve. Putin clearly expected the rest of Ukraine would simply fall in line in time. Once it became obvious that his wishes were not being honored by the Ukrainian politic, he resorted to the only tactic absolute corruption has left.

Russian armed forces are capable. While they still may lack the organization and control of a democratic force, they are more than Ukraine can reasonably hope to defend against. Over time, the shear force of destruction and death will make it impossible to resist.

Many politicians and pundits in the U.S. have tried to figure out Putin’s “End Game”.  What is he trying to achieve? Nothing. What has Ukraine done to deserve this? Nothing. What does Ukraine have that Russa desperately needs? Nothing.  What will Putin do with Ukraine once he is victorious? Nothing.

He simply wants to rule it. Period. He does not care if it is a pile of rubble and blood stained streets. It will be his.

I can see why Trump thinks so highly of him.

JB

Anti-truth Vaccine Politics

I have done a couple posts on my take on Anti-Vaxx politics.  In my prior post, Death to the Heroes, I opined that first responders were the most important group that MUST vaccinate against Covid – for the protection of the population in general, and their patients in particular. In my Anti-Vaxx II post, I warned against generalizing the reasons for not vaccinating.  There are people who feel it’s an abundance of caution – or fear of negative reactions – or fear of needles – that keeps them from getting vaccinations.

But the data is clear. Ninety-five percent of those refusing vaccines are not cautious. They are politically aligned with a ‘personal right of refusal’.  It’s their constitutional right to refuse. It’s as simple as that.

These people are predominately Republican, white, and biased. They are over 80% Trump supporters and avid followers of Fox News and similar biased right wing news sources. They hold a palpable hate for liberals and progressives – and the scientific institutions or policies they support.

It’s not important that they can never cite any progressive program, decision, law, or regulation that has affected them personally. It’s not about actual facts, experiences or outcomes. It’s about politics.

I saw this graphic (scientifically developed and peer reviewed) from the CDC. Digest it.

Source: https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/71/wr/mm7105e1.htm

The CDC is a civilian body. It is NOT a government agency and cannot be controlled by the President or Congress (Trump had many frustrations with the CDC but was powerless to control it).  The right-wing media – and even some left-leaning media – get this wrong. They think the CDC and the FDA are controlled in the same way. Nothing could be further from the truth. The CDC was intentionality made to be independent from governmental and political pressure. It’s pure science. Pure medicine. Pure research.

The illustrations show – beyond any doubt – that the Omicron strain of Covid was an unvaccinated pandemic. It took a highly contagious variant to illustrate the truth. The first illustration above is based on positive tests; and the second on hospitalizations.

What these illustrations DO NOT show is how many of the vaccinated or vulnerable were infected by the unvaccinated. The contagion level of an unvaccinated person is many times that of a vaccinated person. Enough to break-through the fragile immune barrier older, or immunocompromised, individuals have - even with a vaccine. Nor does it show how many hospital beds were occupied by the unvaccinated that were desperately needed by the ill or injured.

How many deaths, I wonder, due to these people’s need to practice a political ‘right of refusal’ account for?

We will never know.

JB

A Glimmer of Hope

I’m a bit of a news junkie. As if that were not apparent to anyone following my posts. But my news gathering regimen has taken quite a few turns over the last few decades.

Back in the day – before cable TV – the news was mainly what I read in the Sunday paper and saw on the nightly TV broadcasts (ABC, NBC, CBS,.. that was about it).  As new media was added in the age of the internet and satellites - along came cable channels like CNN.  A news junkies panacea of “Nothing but news 7x24”… I loved it.  Never had to wait for a news broadcast to catch up on the latest events.  CNN was followed by other similar formats, but CNN pretty much set the standard in the early days of cable. They were followed in short order by other topic driven channels like ESPN: Sports 7x24; Bloomberg: Business 7x24; etc.

The age of genre specialization was off and running and internet content was not far behind.  From YouTube to FaceBook the new social media platforms offered content so granular that individual genre in the form of ‘influencers’ has made what was once a source of information, now a source of uneducated opinion, speculation, conspiracy, and largely unrestrained hyperbole.

Faced with sensory overload and few bona fide fact-based sources I went into a sort of sensory shutdown. I deleted my Facebook account altogether; removed CNN and like networks (all were slowly becoming pits of opinion rather than news) from my favorites on my ‘Smart TV’; and basically, returned to where I started. I bought digital subscriptions to the Washington Post; LA Times, yada,… Started recording the news broadcasts of CNBC’s Shepard Smith and the weekly CBS 60 minutes series. Still needed a good conservative source though. CNBC was just not enough. FOX & Newsmax were jokes. Then, last weekend, CBS 60 Minutes had an interview with someone I had never heard of:  Andrew Sullivan (sincere apologies sir).  Apparently, I had been living under a conservative rock for decades.

As I listened to Mr. Sullivan’s story and philosophy, I could feel the cool breeze of fresh conservative air being brought back into my lungs. I subscribed immediately to ‘The Weekly Dish’: Mr. Sullivan’s blog. Then I read his latest (November 19, 2021) blog post and realized I had found my source of conservative integrity.  

He is the first bona fide conservative I have read that understands that the American form of Democracy is liberal by design. That true conservatism is a rudder not a sail. That the Constitution of the United States was – and should continue to be - one of the most progressive experiments in governance ever developed.

I never expected to be caught up in a modern day social influencer’s take on current events and political discourse.  But this man’s thought leadership is exactly what the American Right needs right now. I hope that, in some small way, I can help him be heard. 

JWB

 

 

The Next Crusade

I’m an atheist. Let’s get that out of the way up front. Those that are offended by others’ religious views can stop reading right now. Saves us both time and frustration.

For those still with me, I want to offer a serious challenge to each of you and our country as a whole.  I have no skin in the Religion game. I find all religions lacking truth, facts, and relevance. But I do have a home, family, and a country I love. And that's where our paths cross.

After the January 6^th uprising in Washington DC, there was talk from the far right of a civil war brewing. A Zogby poll taken shortly after, found that 46% of likely voters believed the country could experience civil war.  And not just republicans; both parties and independents held the same view.

On November 13^th, 2021 while on a ‘ReAwaken America’ tour with other like minded haters, Michael Flynn, a former Trump administration official, said, and I quote: “If we are going to have one nation under God, which we must, we have to have one religion. One nation under God, and one religion under God,…”. Of course, he was talking about the One true God. You know, the one attributed to Judaism.

While I’m sure Christian revisionist history is well preserved in this ‘tour’ of the self-righteous; the one religion all in attendance assumed he meant was, of course, Christianity.

Much of the recent talk of civil war in America centers, as it did 150 years ago, on bigotry. And it’s nothing really all that new. During Barack Obama’s presidency, racist GOP leaders in eight southern states wanted to secede from the union rather than live in a country with a black president.  

Not to be outdone by the racists, after the 2016 election of Trump, there was a secessionist movement by liberal elites in California.

Racism in and of itself is not going to spark a war. Civil unrest, maybe, but no one thinks basing a war solely on political divide or racial bigotry will ever succeed. However, religious bigotry has a long history of success in starting and fueling conflicts. Big ones.

Add to all this a recent ‘woke’ movement to remove or destroy all civil war relics and memorials; defund police departments; etc… and you have a heat building in the conservative heartland.

So, there’s a lot of civil tinder and accelerant lying around right now. All it needs is a spark.

Giving a platform and pulpit to the likes of ReAwaken America is as dangerous as it is traitorous. Our Constitution recognizes that only religious freedom will ensure civil freedom. It espouses the rule of law and equality for all. With CNN, Qanon, Facebook, Fox News, Newsmax,… yada, yada at their disposal, the perpetrators of civil conflict – on both sides - can get the upper hand in spite of the Constitution. We must stop giving these haters a voice.

All the media that these haters need to be heard and become powerful rely on advertising to keep them solvent. If enough people say ‘enough’ - and we stop buying from their advertisers (and we let the advertisers know Why we stopped) - the platform on which these traitors stand will soon collapse.

The religious Crusades of the eleventh and twelfth centuries were brutal conflicts that killed and maimed millions of men, women, and children. Fueled by the church, religious brainwashing, lies, bigotry and power mongering; this formula will still work today.

I challenge America to stop it while it can.

JB

 

 

 

 

Anti-Vaxx II

In my last post, Death to the Heroes, I opined that first responders were the most important group to take advantage of the FDA emergency use approval of Covid19 vaccinations. And I truly believe that.  When those in the public trust cannot be trusted to put the well being of others ahead of their political bias, they should not be serving the public. It's sad that some of these 'heroes' will undoubtedly die for their political beliefs.

But the issues for the rest of the public is not as cut and dried.  

Take for instance the real fact that none of the Covid19 vaccines were out of the FDA ‘emergency use authorization’ (EUA) phase, until November 2021, and you have a problem. At this writing (Nov 13, 2021) only one Covid19 vaccine is Fully FDA Approved: The Pfizer mRNA vaccine. However, it is only fully approved for adults.  It’s still in EUA status for children of all ages and booster applications.

Government regulation is almost always a double edged sword. And key governing agencies are always in a damned if you do; damned if you don’t paradox. The FDA, NIH, and independent organizations such as the CDC, are always walking a tightrope when it comes to medical evolution, drugs, treatments, approvals, and recommendations.

As I mention in my post Death to the Heroes – vaccines, inoculations, and treatments for various diseases in early years was anything but ‘scientific’ or safe.

In 1901, diphtheria patients were routinely treated with antitoxin derived from the blood serum of infected horses. After 13 children died of tetanus because of contaminated antitoxin, Congress passed the 1902 Biologics Control Act, giving the government its first regulation of vaccine and antitoxin production. That power moved to the FDA when it was formed in 1906.

The caution with which the FDA moves to fully approve a vaccine or treatment outside of EUA has been, historically, set in stone. It takes years. Many people think the FDA is moving too slowly to fully approve all available vaccines. But in reality – the recent approval of the Pfizer vaccine is one of the fastest since the FDA was formed.

FDA policy requires the long term effects of a drug, vaccine, or treatment to be reasonably understood before being fully approved. Included in ‘long term’ effects are the effects on children born to the patients, complications, or interactions with other drugs, or treatments later in life.

The mRNA vaccines offer a couple mitigating factors. 1) mRNA vaccines are not developed using a weakened strain of the virus or a serum derived from an infected person/animal; 2) mRNA vaccines use your own body’s immune process to create antibodies to Covid; 3) Numbers mean a lot. The total number of people vaccinated using mRNA under the EUA exceeds 150 million in the U.S. alone. Millions more worldwide. This includes all adult age groups, male & female, pregnant women, every race & culture, and those with major heath conditions. This enormous sample size is rare – and it clears a lot of doubt.

Being anti-vaccination is like being anti-health. It makes no sense. But being vaccine-cautious is another thing altogether.  I especially relate to those with young children. Even at reduced dosage, taking a wait and see approach is not, in my view, being anti-vaxx.

I wish the left wing media and the self-righteous influencers in this country would stop judging, name calling and cancelling others for using caution.  

I do not think, however, those that use political ‘personal liberty’ concerns as rationale for refusing a vaccine are not being honest. They are just being self-important, entitled, ignorant attention getters. They deserve whatever they get. Hopefully not a fatal case of Covid.

JB

Death to the Heroes

Born shortly after WWII, I am a ‘boomer’. A product of the post war baby boom when thousands of men returned home and thousands more women left the workforce to make room for the returning veterans - and return to a more ‘normal’ family life.  

It was a different time, with women being raised and educated in a way that supported the popular culture of the day. Then, being called a ‘housewife’ was a declaration of success wherein the breadwinner was able to afford supporting a home, a wife, and several children in a manner to which society approved.

It was the beginning of an era fueled by an economic boom like nothing before - and treating Black, Hispanic, and Gay populations with ignorance and segregation – even distain.

Thankfully times are changing.

Those days also gave rise to great innovations in medical care, and it was to be the spark that made the boomer era even more formidable.

One of the key contributors to the raise of global life expectancy over the last 250 years was the development of vaccinations. 

As seen in the table to the right, Oceana (Australia) and Europe were the first to experience a systemic increase in life expectancy. 

Life expectancy in Europe and the Americas started their increase in the mid 1800s - 80 years before underdeveloped areas. I believe it's not a coincidence that, in 1815, Sweden was the first nation to introduce compulsory Smallpox vaccinations to Europe. In 1853 this mandate spread to England and their colonel empire (Oceania & the Americas).

Only tuberculosis (TB) was a greater killer than smallpox in the 18^th & 19^th century. It was estimated that TB killed ¼ of the population of Europe in the 1800s. While an effective treatment (streptomycin) and a suitable vaccine (BCG) were developed, the biggest impact on TB was improved hygiene and the waring of masks in hospitals. But I digress. This post is not about TB.

Over the course of time in the 19^th and 20^th centuries many diseases were all but eradicated by vaccine. From polio to diphtheria and measles, vaccines – back in my day – were a no-brainer. Parents eagerly sought to get their children vaccinated as soon as their doctor would permit. Childhood deaths from many of these horrific diseases were all but eradicated. When I was born, children could be expected to live until age 55 - maybe 60. Today I’m expected to live to nearly 80. Likely longer.

I’m not proposing that vaccinations, in and of themselves, are the primary cause of increased life span. But they do mark milestones in the improvements in medical care and disease prevention. 

Some early vaccines were anything but safe and effective however. If they had 50% efficiency, they were considered good enough. Historically, vaccines were designed using a weakened form of the disease it was meant to combat. Some of the first cases of ‘inoculation’ were seen in ancient China where smallpox scabs from an infected person were scrapped off and pulverized to a powder. The powder was then inhaled by a healthy person to build immunity. It ‘appeared’ to work about half the time. You can imagine what happened to the other half.

Later in Europe, another practice used the blood of a person that survived the disease to create a serum for injecting into a healthy individual. It was also used as a treatment for the infected as well. This practice proved to have some of most effective outcomes. But it was a ‘hit-and-miss’ method that required many trial runs and often years of measurements to prove what dosage was going to prevent disease as opposed to causing it.  

Then, to reduce the hit & miss outcomes, laboratories began growing the virus or pathogen in the lab. There they could manage the strength of the disease strain and test on animals before moving to humans. But the process to bring a vaccine to market was still measured in years.

By the mid 20th century vaccines were the norm. Then in 1987 a grad student at the Salk Institute named Robert Malone mixed strands of messenger RNA (aka mRNA - a genetic element like DNA found in all humans) with droplets of fat. The reaction saw human cells creating proteins based on the mRNA / fat mixture. And customized proteins are the holy grail of human immune response.

The issues, however, were many. At the time mRNA was not easy to extract. At least not in any quantity. It was the early days of medical DNA/RNA research, and it was painstakingly slow and expensive. I’m not going to go over all the technicalities and gymnastics involved. But if you are intrigued by the genetics research behind the mRNA vaccines, please read The Tangled History of mRNA Vaccines published in Nature magazine.

From my perspective the BIG difference with the mRNA approach is that they are not ‘infecting’ the recipient with the virus that causes the disease. They are imitating the ‘protein’ the virus produces to create a ‘package’ of immune information that is delivered to your cells using mRNA. There, it is replicated using your natural immune response to create protein anti-bodies to the virus.

When Covid19 hit, the mRNA research spanned nearly 40 years of study and refinement. The anti-vaxers often suggest these vaccines ‘popped up’ on the spur of the moment and can’t be trusted as a result. Nothing could be further from the truth. If anything, we were just lucky that the maturity of the science and the onset of Covid19 occurred at the same time. 

The speed at which the mRNA vaccines were brought to market are a testament to the scientists, their long struggle and the U.S. Government’s focus on a solution. These vaccines effectiveness, now demonstrated with hundreds of millions of doses administered - and precipitous drops in fatalities among the vaccinated - make it one of the miracles of modern medicine and science.

Today – in step with the erosion of integrity in politics – there is an erosion in the integrity of people. Now, vaccination is more a political football than an obvious course of action. As I write this over 25% of Americans are refusing to get vaccinated due to ‘personal liberty’ objections. 

And for those that claim mandatory vaccination is illegal - it is not. As a matter of fact, compulsory vaccination laws were upheld in the 1905 landmark case Jacobson v. Massachusetts by the Supreme Court of the United States. The Supreme Court ruled that laws could require vaccination to protect the public from dangerous communicable diseases.

More surprising to me is that those individuals charged with the public trust are some of the most adamant objectors. Those that are sworn to serve, protect and do no harm, are doing anything but.

From police to hospital staff and EMTs, not being vaccinated is a clear and present danger to themselves and others. Sworn to protect and heal, you would think these people, of all people, would know that this decision is not about THEM. They will contract and spread this virus to anyone and everyone in the name of personal liberty?  Really?

Well, I say MY personal liberty is more important than theirs. I have a RIGHT to be safe – they do not have a RIGHT to endanger me, my family or loved ones. When your personal liberty endangers me & mine – it’s personal all right. Very personal.

Many of those I once regarded as heroes are now the spawn of zombie-like Trumpism. It’s like you are dead inside. America needs you to WAKE UP!

JB