Continuing Peril

Perilous Times:  The more things change, the more they stay the same so Congressional Democrats are still grappling with how to keep the government funded and raise the debt limit while also passing their build back better infrastructure bills.  Republicans are still refusing to help raise the debt limit, a largely pointless and arcane provision but one that is needed to fund the tax cuts and expenditures they voted for when the FG was in office.  And of course that FG continues to be nefarious.  He spent the weekend claiming that the Arizona Cyber Ninja faux audit proved he won Arizona even though it actually did just the opposite while also finding a few more Biden votes; he campaigned in Georgia alongside his preferred Senate candidate, alleged wife beater/former football star Herschel Walker; and he accidentally, or intentionally, endorsed Democrat Stacey Abrams by trashing Georgia’s Governor Brian Kemp for failing to respond to his request to overturn the state’s election results, an admission against his own interest given that he’s being investigated for trying to tamper with Georgia’s election.  His behavior would be laughable if it wasn’t so effective with his base and if the Republican party, including those who ought to know better, like South Carolina’s Lindsey Graham weren’t out there saying that he should run again in 2024, something the FG says he’ll do unless his doctors tell him otherwise, and others like Texas’s embattled Governor Abbott wasn’t so quick to accede to his demand for an audit of their 2020 election results.  Of course that Texas audit will focus on the large urban Democratic counties, not the rest of the state.  Not to be outdone, Pennsylvania Republicans are trying to conduct a “forensic” audit of their state’s results too, demanding access to personal voter data that they shouldn’t be allowed access to.  The bottom line is that the FG was and is dangerous.  Ignore him at your own peril.

Viral Musings:  Over the weekend Pfizer CEO Bourla said that his company would be submitting its data for the vaccine for 5 to 11 year old set to the FDA in a matter of days making shots by Halloween a real possibility.  Like the adult shot, the children’s protocol will, at least initially, entail two jabs but their dose will be about one third of that given to the rest of us.  Yesterday, once again setting an example for the rest of us, President Biden got his Pfizer booster in front of the cameras, while assuring us that there are plenty of shots to go around, for both boosters and those finally stepping up to get their first shots.  Though the media is full of stories about workers quitting their jobs to protest vaccine mandates the reality is that where mandates are imposed, vaccine rates rise.  NYC’s mandate for teachers and other education staff to get jabbed was temporarily halted but then reinstated yesterday after a US Circuit Court three judge panel said it could move forward.  That decision is likely to be appealed but in the meantime, school employees have until Friday to get their first jab.  Given how many of their colleagues have suffered and or died from COVID, you’d think they’d be running to get their shots, but sadly though many have been vaccinated, too many remain resistant.  It’s not just education staff, NYS Governor Hochul is preparing to call up the National Guard to fill in for those health care workers who refuse to get their jabs.  Doesn’t everyone want to be cared for by someone unvaccinated when seeking care??   On the booster front, there’s more data out of early booster country Israel. Two weeks after receiving their third dose, Israel’s over 60’s, the first group to receive the extra jab, were 11.3 times less likely to become infected with the contagious/predominant Delta variant that’s been causing so much trouble.  Worth mentioning, the entire Brazil UN delegation is now in quarantine as a fourth member of their squad has tested COVID positive.  The quarantined included President Bolsonaro who has already had a bout of COVID and was never vaccinated.  In case you missed it, check out the NY Times article on COVID vaccination and COVID incidence by political affiliation, no surprise but still stunning how people in “red” counties are shunning vaccines and getting sick.  Apparently getting sick and dying is preferable to trying to stay healthy and alive.  Who knew?  Though COVID cases do appear to be dropping a bit, with more than 2000 deaths per day, and 691K dead, we will probably cross above 700k deaths within the week.  

Other News: Though Pensacola Congressman Matt Gaetz remains out and about, he may know something that we don’t about his future as he has retained a high priced team of sex crime lawyers. On the legal front FG loyalist Sydney Powell said that the point of the January 6 insurrection was to get the election into the hands of the Supreme Court Justice Alito so that he could stop the certification of the electoral college votes.  She says that no one ever expected Speaker Pelosi to reconvene the House later that night.  She’s crazy, and there’s no indication that Alito knew he was part of the coup plan but still there are probably others, like the FG, who bought into that strategy. As to some of the crazies, Mike Lindell is back to advertising on Fox but don’t expect to see Rudy Giuliani there anytime soon as Fox higher ups have banned him over concerns that his presence and his wackadoodle assertions are upping their legal exposure.  That from the company that allows fish stick heir Tucker Carlson to push vaccine lies.