Tracker

Virginia "Trump in heels" candidate says Capitol attack was justified — because of COVID rules. Amanda Chase says Capitol rioters were tired of being told "what we can and cannot do in the form of mandates" Virginia's leading Republican gubernatorial candidate, Amanda Chase, has justified the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol as a response to public health mandates in place to limit the pandemic, according to a recently surfaced video clip. Chase said the would-be insurrectionists who overran the Capitol while play-acting a ludicrous violent fantasy were actually concerned about "losing our Republic." A reporter from the British channel SkyNews approached Chase, a state senator from central Virginia who has described herself as "Trump in heels," at the Jan. 18 Lobby Day Patriot Food Drive in Richmond, asking for "a word for the rest of the world" about the Capitol riots. "They're looking in on America and wondering what on earth is going on here," the reporter wondered. Chase, who faces censure in the Virginia state legislature after referring to Capitol rioters as "patriots," said the attack was about "federal and state" mandates. "America wants freedom. They are tired of an overreaching federal government and state government telling us what we can and cannot do in the form of mandates. I don't think that's representative of our republic and people," she explained. "What we're seeing is a level of frustration like we've never seen in America, and here in Virginia, because people are concerned that we are getting away from a representative republic and are headed towards socialism and communism, in which the government makes all these decisions for us." The reporter asked Chase, who spoke at the Jan. 6 rally but left ahead of the riot, to clarify that she was referring to the attack itself: "Is that what was happening at the Capitol Building? Is that what it was all about?" "Absolutely. Absolutely," Chase replied. "I think the big concern is that we're losing our republic. It's been around for 400 years. We the people want to make sure to preserve our republic." [Fact check: The United States was founded in 1776, making it 245 years old this July.]

Wisconsin Priest Who Held Voter Fraud Exorcisms Leaves Diocese MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A priest who livestreamed exorcisms aimed at rooting out what he, former President Donald Trump and some Trump supporters have falsely claimed was widespread voting fraud in the presidential election has left a Roman Catholic diocese in Wisconsin. The Diocese of Madison said it and the Rev. John Zuhlsdorf reached a mutual decision on his departure. Zuhlsdorf will relocate from the diocese ”to pursue other opportunities,” the diocese said in a statement earlier this month. “The Bishop of Madison is grateful to the Reverend Zuhlsdorf for his faithful support of the diocese’s seminarians and priests, thanks him for his many years of steadfast ministry serving the diocese, and wishes him the best in his future endeavors,” the statement said. Zuhlsdorf did not immediately respond to a phone message and email Tuesday seeking comment. Zuhlsdorf claimed he had permission from Madison Bishop Donald Hying to conduct the exorcisms. Hying said, however, that he didn’t give Zuhlsdorf permission to conduct exorcisms related to “partisan political activity,” but rather approved an exorcism for “alleviation from the scourge of the coronavirus pandemic.”

At last! We are down to double-digits! But................... A new coronavirus strain discovered in Los Angeles may be behind the surge in cases there Newly mutated strains of the novel coronavirus spotted around the world — such as the ones ravaging the United Kingdom and South Africa — are spurring fear they could become dominant here in the U.S., too. Now, Americans have a newly homegrown strain to worry about — and public health experts suspect that it could have been the cause of southern California's most recent surge. Recently, U.S. scientists were searching for signs of the UK coronavirus variant, known as B 1.1.7, in California when they stumbled upon something different. Coronavirus strain B 1.1.7 has a transmission rate that is 50 to 70 percent greater and may be more deadly, which has prompted studies to see how much it has infected the US population. Yet while looking for B 1.1.7, scientists stumbled upon a novel strain that has peculiar mutations, which is now being dubbed CAL.20C. According to a paper published by researchers at Cedars-Sinai, that has yet to be peer-reviewed, the new SARS-CoV-2 strain appeared to account for at least 36 percent of COVID-19 cases in the Los Angeles area and 24 percent in southern California in December 2020. That correlates with a huge surge in coronavirus infections in southern California at the time. "After an analysis of all of the publicly available data and a comparison to our recent sequences, we see a dramatic growth in the relative percentage of the CAL.20C strain beginning in November of 2020," the researchers wrote in the paper. "The predominance of this strain coincides with the increased positivity rate seen in this region." A new coronavirus strain discovered in Los Angeles may be behind the surge in cases there | Salon.com

Capitol Police chief apologizes to Congress — admits department's failure amid deadly riot The acting U.S. Capitol Police chief is addressing the deadly riot that took place on Jan. 6, admitting the law enforcement agency does bear responsibility for failing to contain the angry mob of Trump supporters that breached Capitol security. On Tuesday, Jan. 26, acting Capitol Police chief Yogananda Pittman delivered his testimony before lawmakers during the House Appropriations Committee, according to The Hill. "On Jan. 6, in the face of a terrorist attack by tens of thousands of insurrectionists determined to stop the certification of Electoral College votes, the department failed to meet its own high standards as well as yours," Pittman said. Pittman's remarks come nearly three weeks after the civil unrest which led to the deaths of five people. In the days leading up to the U.S. Capitol riot, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) released an intelligence warning of violence on the day of the Electoral College certification. However, based on how violence erupted at the Capitol, the warnings were not taken as seriously as they should have been. In the statement, Pittman went on to admit that the law enforcement agency could have done more to combat the violence that ensued. "We knew that there was a strong potential for violence and that Congress was the target," Pittman said. "The department prepared in order to meet these challenges, but we did not do enough."

There are witnesses who can testify that Trump enjoyed watching MAGA riots: NYT's Haberman Former President Donald Trump's impeachment trial is scheduled to begin in the United States Senate next month, and New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman believes that there are witnesses who could make things significantly more uncomfortable for Republicans. Appearing on CNN Tuesday, Haberman reiterated that her own sources have said they personally saw Trump enjoying watching his supporters riot at the United States Capitol building on January 6th. "He was watching, enjoying what he was seeing in part because he was enjoying just people defending him and in part because... it stopped the certification [of Biden's election]," she said. "That was what he wanted to see." Haberman would not reveal any of her sources, but she speculated that Democrats could track some of them down and call them as witnesses at the president's Senate trial if they wanted to do so. "I think if witnesses are called for this trial, I don't know that they will be, but if witnesses are called for this trial, I suspect they can find some people who they might be able to try to get to talk about this," she said.

I think it is critical for our elected leaders to call out racism and intolerance whenever and wherever it appears, and as quickly and forcefully as possible. In matters like this, silence is complicity. Soft racism will lead to the hard type given silence.

But did you see the thousands and thousands of people at the NFL playoff games? With few masks in evidence.

Ooooh....Burnham....a Bomber......my nipples are hard......

So the title "No time To die" is sort of appropriate.

Sagan said that any technology, sufficiently advanced, would seem like magic to us. There is a certain amount of dishonesty in every field of endeavour, including physics research.

There is always that risk. Neither Pons, Fleishmann nor Rossi have tried to solicit "investments", and all have had credible academic careers, and Rossi still does. He has submitted his working devices to two separate universities in Europe and they apparently confirmed his work. What has impressed me about Rossi is that over the past 6-7 years that I have followed his work, is that he posted the results of his work- good, bad, and indifferent. While the concept of getting more energy out of a process or device than you put in is anathema in physics (as currently understood), this would not necessarily be terminal. Until the past 10 years, it was a pillar of physics that the speed of light is an absolute constant, and that nothing but nothing could move faster than that. Both have been proven to be false assumptions. In quantum physics, an object can be proven to be in two places at once and traverse distances instantly without moving (AKA teleportation). Before you snort too loudly, quantum physics made transistors, cellphones and such possible. The same science that allows for "spooky action at a distance" has made much of our everyday technology possible.

GOP operatives send clear signals about the next attack on democracy Hours after President Biden declared that "democracy has prevailed" during his inaugural address, longtime Republican strategist Karl Rove urged Republicans to pressure GOP election officials and legislators to create "a model election code" to reconsider the laws surrounding 2020's two voting options that lead to the presidential election's record turnout. "Republicans should also encourage GOP secretaries of state and state lawmakers to develop a model election code," Rove wrote in a January 20 commentary for the Wall Street Journal entitled, "The Republican Future Starts Now." "The job of proposing electoral reforms shouldn't be based on the unsupported claims of widespread fraud peddled by Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell," Rove continued. "Instead, the goal should be to suggest measures that restore public confidence in our democracy. How do states with extensive mail-in and early voting like Florida and Texas get it right?" Rove's commentary comes as Republican-majority legislatures in battleground states such as Georgia, Pennsylvania and Arizona have proposed bills or convened hearings to review the laws that allowed people to vote with mailed-out ballots or early in-person in 2020. "Whenever Karl Rove writes a piece in the Wall Street Journal, the history of it suggests that Democrats should pay careful attention," said David Daley, author of Unrigged: How Americans are Battling Back to Save Democracy. "Because the Wall Street Journal is where Republicans can signal to their donor class their key projects." In March 2010, Rove penned a Wall Street Journal commentary openly discussing the GOP's REDMAP project, which targeted 107 state legislative seats that "would give them control of drawing district lines for nearly 190 congressional seats." REDMAP succeeded, creating GOP majority legislatures and congressional delegations in the otherwise purple states of Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, North Carolina and Alabama. GOP operatives send clear signals about the next attack on democracy - Alternet.org

There are multiple reports coming out of the US from credible sources that Trump's inner circle and possibly Trump himself were directly involved in planning the riot on January 6th. This was a serious attempt to overthrow a legitimately elected government and should warrant the direst of charges against the rioters and those within the GOP and Trump's camp. Apparently there is no remorse whatsoever on the part of these, only regret that it did not pan out. And it did not succeed patially because of the stupidity of Trump and his advisors in choosing incompetent lawyers (ie: Giuliani). The prime reason it did not succeed was that there was a loose coalition of Democrat and progressive leadership who accurately foresaw what Trump would try to do and how he would try to do it. The bottom line is that the coup came a lot closer to succeeding than most people and media are admitting.

The GOP Is Beginning To Fracture Polling shows that a large majority of Republicans are still in thrall to Trump to be sure, but somewhere between one-fifth and one-fourth of the party has fallen away. A Pew poll taken after the insurrection found that more than 30% of Republicans disapprove of Trump. That may not seem like much but it is enough to make it impossible for Republicans to win nationally if those people fall away from the GOP permanently. As the Atlantic's Ron Brownstein put it, "if Biden could lastingly attract even a significant fraction of the Republican voters dismayed over the riot, it would constitute a seismic change in the political balance of power."

Here are the damning Rudy Giuliani admissions that will help Dominion take him to the cleaners Dominion Voting Systems filed a massive $1.3 billion defamation lawsuit against Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani on Monday over his false claims that the company rigged the 2020 election on behalf of President Joe Biden. One challenge for Dominion will be not only showing that Giuliani's claims about the company are false, but that they were made with malicious intent, as proving malice is an essential component of any successful defamation lawsuit. Writing on Twitter, attorney Akiva Cohen flags a section from Dominion's lawsuit that he says will give the company real proof that Giuliani maliciously lied about them as part of an effort to justify charging hefty legal fees to the Trump campaign. Specifically, Dominion noted that Giuliani only talked about Dominion during public appearances, but went completely silent about the company when actually arguing before courts in his efforts to overturn the 2020 election. During a court hearing about the results of the 2020 election in Pennsylvania, for instance, Giuliani admitted that the Trump campaign "doesn't plead fraud" and said that "this is not a fraud case." Here are the damning Rudy Giuliani admissions that will help Dominion take him to the cleaners - Alternet.org

Sad, Five days in a row of increases- a small increase reported today, but still and increase. The light at the end of the tunnel is receding. Unfortunate but inevitable. You do not want to know the percentage of patients in hospitals who receive incorrect dosages. Turns out that the staff there are human.

As has been reported, this was not a beer-hall putsch. This was a deliberate, planned and funded attempt by some of the GOP and Trump loyalists to subvert the American democracy and overthrow a legally elected government. If the Democrats and an independent Department of Justice do not act on this act of sedition, America will pay for it.

And it wasn't me. Again. Maybe I should buy a ticket next time.

Damndamndamndamn. That makes four consecutive days of increased positive tests. Yes, they are mostly outside of Winnipeg, but still increasing.