Using absurd claims that Tucker Carlson is a racist, white supremacist, bigot, etc., etc., etc., the Left has furiously attempted to have his prime-time Fox News show taken off the air. The opening segment of the September 17 edition of Tucker Carlson Tonight is a perfect example of why the left hates his guts.
Citing a breaking report by a local TV station, Carlson revealed that, acting in concert with other high level members of his administration, Nashville’s Democrat mayor intentionally withheld from the public encouraging Covid-19 data that showed an unexpectedly low infection rate at the city’s bars and restaurants. By concealing that information, Mayor John Cooper was able to justify keeping Nashville’s restaurant industry under a virtual lockdown, thus suppressing the city’s economic recovery until after the election. Please watch Tucker’s explosive report, and consider sharing it with your friends. (See Below)
From coast to coast and border to border, Democrat governors and Democrat mayors are making coronavirus decisions that have next to nothing to do with public health, and everything to do with using their official powers to rig the election against President Trump.
When the June jobs report showed the economy was undergoing a brisk recovery, with 4.8 million new jobs added, Democrats panicked. Since then, Democrat mayors and governors have surreptitiously done what Nashville’s mayor did: cook the coronavirus books in ways that retard local economic recovery between now and the election. Much to the delight of Democrats, by August the number of new jobs had fallen from 4.8 million in June to 1.4 million, a drop of 64%. Mission accomplished.
The same kind of disgraceful tactics are being used to delay school openings. Acting in concert with Democrat-controlled school boards, blue city health officials are blocking pre-election school openings to tamp down rising employment numbers by making it difficult for parents with school-aged children to go back to work. No better example of that can be found than in California, where Los Angeles County Health Director, Dr. Barbara Ferrer recently told the press that it’s “not realistic” to open the county’s schools “until after the election.”
Of things that matter to Democrats, public health and economic recovery take a distant back seat to their insatiable desire for ironclad political power.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00John Eidsonhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngJohn Eidson2020-09-22 12:18:422020-09-22 12:18:42Why the Left loathes Tucker Carlson
I am very worried about the November 2020 presidential election.
I have been writing about the unparalleled and sinister anti-American attempts to remove President Donald Trump from office for three years. In April 2020 I wrote, The Book of Humanitarian Hoaxes: Killing America with ‘Kindness’, to raise public awareness in advance of the 2020 election. The Book describes fifty of the most sinister leftist, Islamist, globalist attacks on America.
It is now 48 days until the election. The enemies of America are desperate and are behaving like cornered animals poised for attack. Their survival is at stake because if POTUS is reelected, he will take down the Deep State and expose them all. They know it and Trump knows it.
Even more than election fraud, I believe there is going to be an assault on objective reality using artificial intelligence technology called deepfakes. Wikipedia defines deepfakes as, “synthetic media in which a person in an existing image or video is replaced with someone else’s likeness. While the act of faking content is not new, deepfakes leverage powerful techniques from machine learning and artificial intelligence to manipulate or generate visual and audio content with a high potential to deceive.”
A sane society of ordered liberty requires agreement on what is real. We believe what we see with our own eyes. I believe the desperate Internet behemoths will try to manipulate what is perceived as real using deepfakes, to win their battle to oust POTUS and control society. It is the epitome of social engineering. Let me explain.
In 1995 I wrote the manuscript for my philosophy of behavior book, Dear America: Who’s Driving the Bus? I was trying to help people understand why they do what they do, so that they could change their behavior. I never considered the book to be political. When I published the book in 2011, my editor remarked that the book is very political. I was stunned because I had never considered the political applications of the book. Now I do.
Dear America explains how our minds develop, and how thought precedes behavior. When we are in our most rational adult state of mind we behave like rational adults. If we are mobilized and regress back to childish thinking, we behave like children even though we are chronological adults. Of course the book is political – we vote the way we think!
Ordered liberty requires a society of rational adults. Rational adults question information and use their critical thinking skills to formulate appropriate responses. Rational adults live in objective reality, the world of facts. They are unavoidably in conflict with chronological adults regressed back to childish thinking, who live in subjective reality, the world of feelings. Children believe what they are told unquestioningly, and behave accordingly. So do regressed adults.
A large segment of the U.S. population has been deliberately regressed back to childish thinking – they live in subjective reality where feelings matter and facts are ignored. Regressed adults are easily manipulated and have very little impulse control – they are basically emotional children disguised as adults.
Online freedom is not just a matter of censorship and freedom of speech – it is now a matter of reality! In Hoax 23: The Humanitarian Hoax of Multiple Realities, I discuss the catastrophic consequences of a society that no longer agrees on what is real. A sane society of ordered liberty requires agreement on what is real. We believe what we see with our own eyes. In my opinion, the ends-justify-the-means Internet behemoths are poised to manipulate what we see using deepfakes to win their battle to oust POTUS and control society. It is ultimate election malfeasance, and the epitome of social engineering. Manipulating reality is the nuclear weapon in the globalist war on America-first President Donald Trump.
A chilling article written by science writer, Rob Toews, appeared in Forbes May 25, 2020. “Deepfakes Are Going To Wreak Havoc On Society: We Are Not Prepared.” Toews explains the menace of deepfake technology and the artificial intelligence involved. Under the heading, When seeing is not believing, he writes:
“It does not require much imagination to grasp the harm that could be done if entire populations can be shown fabricated videos that they believe are real. Imagine deepfake footage of a politician engaging in bribery or sexual assault right before an election; or of U.S. soldiers committing atrocities against civilians overseas; or of President Trump declaring the launch of nuclear weapons against North Korea. In a world where even some uncertainty exists as to whether such clips are authentic, the consequences could be catastrophic.”
Deepfakes are the latest technological assault on reality. Toews quotes U.S. Senator Marco Rubio (FL), “In the old days, if you wanted to threaten the United States, you needed 10 aircraft carriers, and nuclear weapons, and long-range missiles. Today….all you need is the ability to produce a very realistic fake video that could undermine our elections, that could throw our country into tremendous crisis internally and weaken us deeply.”
Toews writes that according to USC professor Hao Li, the existence of deepfakes is also being used to discredit what is real. “People are already using the fact that deepfakes exist to discredit genuine video evidence. Even though there’s footage of you doing or saying something, you can say it was a deepfake and it’s very hard to prove otherwise.”
Brad Parscale’s USA Today article, “Trump is right: More than Facebook & Twitter, Google threatens Democracy, online Freedom“, was written two years ago and we are more vulnerable to Google, Twitter, and Facebook than ever before. The globalist tech giants need Beijing Biden in the White House and America-first Trump out. They will do anything and everything to remove him. According to Parscale, “Google, YouTube, and other tech giants already filter, suppress, and even directly attack conservatives.” These sins of omission and sins of commission are designed to change people’s perception of reality.
The Fake News media also threatens reality, but the greatest threat is that the tech giants will misrepresent President Trump using deepfake technology to steal the election. I have written extensively about the conflict between objective reality and subjective reality. The menace of technological virtual reality is here.
Deepfakers can manipulate reality using their deepfake technology to trick you into believing their falsified Trump messaging. If the public believes that what they see is real – that will form the basis for their voting behavior and for their responses to the election outcome. The Internet is now the public square. The Internet behemoths and technocrats who own AI technology now control the public square. Google, Twitter, Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft, Alibaba are likely to unleash a mass of deepfake unreality bombs in their ends-justify-the-means desperation to defeat Trump in November.
The final battle for America is the battle for reality. The technocrats are trying to force us into a post-truth world where shared standards for objective reality no longer exist. They are trying to convince us that snow is black. Don’t let them.
In 2010 the sculpture “Unconditional Surrender” was purchased by Jack Curran, a WW II Navy veteran, and with support from numerous Sarasota veterans and patriotic organizations. Mr. Curran was able to gift the sculpture to the City of Sarasota at a personal cost of $500,000. The full intent of Mr. Curran was that the statue remain on Sarasota’s bay front.
One gentleman named Daniel O’Rourke even produced buttons with the slogan “Unconditional Surrender” – On The Bay It Must Stay, used as the title of this column.
Jim Haberman in an email to the citizens of Sarasota, Florida wrote:
The upcoming roundabout construction at U.S. 41 and Gulfstream Ave. will necessitate relocating the Unconditional Surrender sculpture to a nearby site on the Sarasota Bayfront, its home for the past 15 years, and some are attempting to take advantage of that situation in order to have it permanently removed from the Bayfront. Contrary to recent news reports, only the Sarasota City Commission can make the final decision, and no decision has yet been made. The Commission will probably do so at its October 5 meeting.
Unconditional Surrender serves as a tribute to America’s victory in World War II, and the military veterans – the Greatest Generation – which made that victory possible. Various Sarasota county veterans organizations – and others – are passionately advocating for the sculpture to remain in a prominent Bayfront location.
In addition, Unconditional Surrender draws huge numbers of visitors to the downtown area. According to Virginia Haley, President of Visit Sarasota, Sarasota county’s official tourism marketing entity, 25% of all visitors to Sarasota County visit Unconditional Surrender. Given the unprecedented economic impact of COVID-19 on Sarasota’s downtown business district, removing one of the principal attractions drawing visitors to the downtown area would not be a wise choice.
2.) Send an e-mail to each of the Sarasota City Commissioners, respectfully requesting that Unconditional Surrender remain on the Sarasota Bayfront. If you are a City resident, please state so in your e-mail:
3.) Offer public comment of up to three minutes at the Sarasota City Commission meeting (probably October 5) at which the commissioners will vote on Unconditional Surrender’s final disposition. Can be done at City Hall or remotely from home. If you are a City resident, please say so during your comments. The public comment protocols are at https://www.sarasotafl.gov/home/showdocument?id=6498.
4.) Forward this e-mail to others who support keeping Unconditional Surrender on the Sarasota Bayfront, and post the information to social media.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Dr. Rich Swierhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngDr. Rich Swier2020-09-22 06:23:112020-09-22 15:33:35SARASOTA, FLORIDA: Unconditional Surrender — On the Bay it Must Stay!
Congressman Bob Barr represented Georgia’s 7th District in the House of Representatives from 1995-2003. He now practices law in Atlanta, Georgia and is Chairman of Liberty Guard a non-profit, pro-liberty organization. He also heads the Law Enforcement Education Foundation and a consulting firm, Liberty Strategies.
TOPIC: Democrat Hysteria!
DR. GERARD LAMEIRO
Dr. Gerard Lameiro is an author, philosopher, economist, and engineer. He is the author of 6 books and is a popular TV and Talk Radio show guest. Dr. Lameiro was a member of the 1980 Presidential Electoral College and personally cast one electoral vote for Ronald Reagan for President of the United States of America. Dr. Lameiro accurately predicted a Trump victory long before most pollsters and pundits gave Trump even a small chance of winning the presidential election. Dr. Lameiro correctly predicted every State that candidate Trump actually carried in the 2016 election. HIS LATEST BOOK.. “Real World Socialism..” Available from Amazon.com and other retail outlets. Available on Kindle and other devices.
TOPIC: Death of Ginsberg and the Supreme Court!
FRANK SALVATO
Frank Salvato is the host of “The Underground” A podcast heard on iHeart Radio, Pandora, Spotify, Amazon Podcasts, and anywhere podcasts are heard. His writing has been recognized by the US House International Relations Committee and the Japan Center for Conflict Prevention. His analysis has been published by The American Enterprise Institute, The Washington Times, and Accuracy in Media, and is nationally syndicated. Mr. Salvato appeared on The O’Reilly Factor on FOX News Channel and is the author of six books examining internal and external threats facing our country. He can be heard twice weekly on “The Captain’s America: Third Watch” radio program syndicated nationally on the Salem Broadcasting Network and Genesis Communications affiliate stations.
The recent death of Justice Ginsburg will intensify the battles between America’s Socialist/Fascist (Democrat) Party and Republicans. Our national security is at stake as in fact you are witnessing Putin’s war against the Republicans and all patriotic Americans… It is more than an Anti-Trump war, it is Putin’s war against the American Constitutional Republic to transform Capitalism to Socialism, a war against the unique political system designed by our Founding Fathers. Knowledge is Power! Knowledge of Russia and her Security Services apparatus is a MUST to expose the traitors in our midst–the leadership of America’s Socialist/Fascist Party.
The History of the Socialist War Against America
It had happened at the end of 1940s or in the beginning of the 50s when Comrade Stalin gave a secret order to his military and Security Services forces to involve the U.S.A. in Middle East wars. He explained his order: “the Sectarian Wars in the Middle East will never end…” Both the Soviet Military and Security Services forces executed that order. Writing about the Soviet/Russian Security Services I use the term KGB. So, the KGB contacted its agents in the Muslim Brotherhood and gave them the assignment to find a reliable Muslim leader. They had found the man and Yasser Arafat was recruited by the KGB in 1957—Russia thus entered the wars of the Mideast.
For decades the Middle East bloody war was a primary concern of the world and humanity’s desire to create peace there. To grasp the unique and historic magnitude of Israel-UAE-Bahrain Abraham Peace Accord, you have to be informed of the war waged by the Socialist/Fascist regimes against Western civilization for many decades. The Abraham Accord is the first dove of peace in that bloody neighborhood. This is a remarkable twist of history—President Donald J. Trump has reversed Stalin’s war to initiate peace in the Middle East. Isn’t it something astonishing! Yet, Stalin’s war has intensified in the rest of the world, especially in America…
Writing about Stalin’s war, I called it WWIII and identified as WWIII: Recruitment and Infiltration, Drugs and Assassinations. You can see all of it in the 2020 America. I deliberately called those regimes Socialist/Fascist. As a matter of fact I was writing about Soviet Socialism for the last thirty-five years and renamed it to Soviet Fascism after the attack on 9/11. I felt that the 14 Saudi Arabian students were recruited by the KGB and the attack was engineered and executed under the supervision of the KGB. At the time I had only my feeling, but later I found evidence in the writing of a Russian defector Konstantin Preobrazhensky. Both Socialism and Fascism are totalitarian ideologies and the terminology depends of the one’s knowledge. Read What is Happening to America? The Hidden Truth of Global Destruction, XLIBRIS, 2012.
Andropov’s Legacy in America
Stalin also gave guidance to the war against America: “America is like a healthy body and its resistance is threefold: its patriotism, its morality, and its spiritual Life. If you can undermine these three areas, America will collapse from within.” — Joseph Stalin. To grasp the menace of that war, let me show you how Stalin’s devoted disciples continued his war for decades. The Chairman of the KGB, Yuri Andropov, was Stalin’s devoted disciple. I knew him well. My work within the legal community coincided with his tenure as the KGB Chairman. If you have any doubts in my identification of Soviet Fascism and WWIII, the first person to confirm the identity of both will be the Chairman of the KGB, 1967-1982, Yuri Andropov. It is an irony and a paradox of the time, but a fact—his words exposed his Socialist/Fascist ideology and behavior …
Here is a conversation of Lt. General Ion Mihai Pacepa, the highest-ranking KGB officer ever to defect to the U.S, with Yuri Andropov:
“In 1972 the Kremlin decided to turn the whole Islamic world against Israel and the U.S. As KGB Chairman, Yuri Andropov told me a billion adversaries could inflict far greater damage on America that could a few millions. We needed to instill a Nazi-style hatred for Jews throughout the Islamic world, and to turn this weapon of the emotions into a terrorist bloodbath against Israel and its main supporter the United States. No one within the American/Zionist sphere of influence should any longer feel safe.”(“RussianFootprints,” by Ion Mihai Pacepa, National Review Online, August 24, 2008.)
In the same article General Pacepa wrote: “According to Andropov… the Muslims had a taste for nationalism, jingoism, and victimology. Their illiterate, oppressed mobs could be whipped up to a fever pitch. Terrorism and violence against Israel and her master, American Zionism, would flow naturally from the Muslims’ religious fervor”, Andropov sermonized. What can better confirm both of my terms Soviet Fascism and WWIII than those words? I remind you that under Andropov the indoctrination and infiltration into Western civilization had tripled. Andropov had designed Operation Barbarossa to infiltrate simultaneously American Intel and media. Under his leadership there occurred the bloodiest terrorists’ attacks in the world, from the Munich murder of Israelis in the Olympic Village to the Johnstown tragedy.
Vladimir Putin’s War on America
Vladimir Putin is a devoted disciple of the KGB Chairman Yuri Andropov, his student. It is Vladimir Putin who brought Stalin’s war to the 21st Century, and he is not alone. The ideology united him with Chinese Communists as they have the same agenda, strategy, and methods in fighting humanity. Technology developments have widened their criminal activities in the 21st Century and they use it to quadruple their crimes. The Chinese Wuhan-virus is a warfare missile of the Communist ideology against humanity. Don’t you smell fascism in attacking citizens of the world, even their own citizens, with a deadly disease without gas chambers? If you want to know the details of infiltration and indoctrination by this ideology, please read my books and read here my column: Putin’s Old Soviet Fraud in America! September 10, 2020.
Knowing the history, tactics and methods of the Russian Socialist Revolution, I predicted events in America. Look at my definition of Soviet fascism made in 2012 and compare it with the current predicament in America:
“Now, many years later, I can see the overall dynamics of the events in the world—the Stalinist ideology is moving from one country to another like a plague. It contaminates the land and the human psyche. I saw it with my own eyes. I felt it. And with time a more complete idea and identification of Soviet Fascism had been growing and ripening in my head. Soviet Fascism[i] has become the ideology of various political groups, an amalgamation of Marxists, Communists, Socialists, Anarchists, radical Islamists, and other left-wing groups around the globe, united under the Kremlin’s umbrella to fight Western civilization. Be prepared—different types of violent extremism even a revolution will become an instrument of official policies of the countries adhered to Soviet Fascism… WWIII is marching across the globe…” What is Happening to America? p. 159, XLIBRIS, 2012.
Don’t you see the carbon copy of the quandary described above in 2020 America? This mess was created by two Democrat American Manchurian Presidents. They, in concert with the KGB transformed the Democrat Party to the Socialist Party and Socialist mafia we are dealing today. The actual example of the Socialist mafia in action is the Biden campaign, run by Socialist Charlatans. Besides, a demented Biden speaking and acting according to a prescribed script, the entire campaign is operating by the Socialist methods and tactics and Stalin’s major postulate: Never admit crime committed, instead accuse opposition in that exact crime. … Listen to Biden and his Charlatans, it will be lies, deceit, disinformation and fraud—the essence of any Socialist/Fascist regime. Read here The Origin of Washington Spy Ring and the Swamp, March 30, 2018.
Warning to the 2020 Election
Do you feel the rising political temperature in the country? We are super divided! Socialist/Fascist Party of America has “achieved” a great deal to create this division during the last couple of decades. Two American Manchurian Presidents executed that division from within then and today. Abraham Lincoln was right, we are committing suicide. Here are the doers of the division the Clinton mafia: George Stephanopoulos, John Podesta, Tony Podesta, Terry McAuliffe, and Sidney Blumenthal. Those people have been a totalitarian force of Socialism/Fascism, undermining the American Republic for decades with impunity, and continuing it today. The recent Trump interview by Stephanopoulos was a set up in the best traditions of the Stalin’s KGB. Read here my column Revelation, April 26, 2019
The racial division created by Obama is unprecedented, yet the country bought into his cult of personality and nobody dared to criticize him. His holdovers doubled undermining America. Don’t blame Millenniums they were purposely deprived of knowledge. I’d like to talk about Obama’s long-range policy, keeping America ill-informed, deaf, mute, and naked…. I am an Alumni of the Kennan Institute. The Kennan Institute was the premier U.S. center for advanced research on Russia and Eurasia and the oldest and largest regional program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. My colleagues were really knowledgeable people in their subjects. I knew George F. Kennan and he loved listening me and the Russian poetry I was reciting.
I was shocked hearing that “Resigning from Congress in February 2011, Jane Harman became President and CEO of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.” Her knowledge of Russia was equal to zero during this time of Putin’s war against America. Her appointment stopped real information about Putin’s Russia for several years, making America ill-informed, deaf, mute, and naked…. Obama had achieved his goal, in addition to that he depleted our military. This and other analogous actions of TREASON has mobilized the Democrat Party to save their future and fight Trump to divert the people’s attention from the TREASON the Democrat’s leadership has committed for several decades.
The Grand-Conspiracy Operates Undercover
The Anti-Trump prolonged coup was manufactured and executed by three Presidents: Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, and Vladimir Putin to cover-up the crimes they committed. You are witnessing a global war-room aggressively attacking the government system of the American Constitutional Republic!!! Read here my column Watergate 2.0: The KGB’s Global Spy Ring, November 8, 2020.
My fellow Americans!
America’s Socialist/Fascist Party is ready to implement in America a totalitarian regime similar to the Soviet Union and China. Expect an enormous voter-fraud by the Socialist/Fascist Party to take over POWER. Be ready for hate, intimidation, threat and violence… Defend your country, your freedom and personal liberty! Vote Republican!
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Simona Pipkohttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngSimona Pipko2020-09-22 05:44:262020-09-26 08:27:26America’s Socialist/Fascist Party = No Peace!
The magnitude of recent headlines pertaining to the new vacancy on the United States Supreme Court and the subsequent political maneuvering has understandably overshadowed the news cycle. However, another significant story that Americans (and especially conservative Christians) should care about is how various state and local governments continue to violate the First Amendment rights of churches.
In short, antagonism towards churches and houses of worship persists in certain areas throughout the country. Unfortunately, even as the coronavirus abates and America reopens, several states and cities have demonstrated a startling level of bias against churches. In fact, as of today, religious worship is still prohibited or subjected to unequal treatment (compared to secular activities) in six states — California, Nevada, Maine, Connecticut, New Jersey, and Virginia. In California, the state where some of the most egregious bias has surfaced, 30 of the state’s 58 counties continue to prohibit churches from holding indoor worship services. In counties where churches can meet indoors, singing and chanting activities are forbidden, and churches are subject to strict attendance limits.
However, despite the draconian measures still in place throughout the Golden State, there was good news out of Illinois last week when the city of Niles announced they had dropped charges against Pastor Daniel Chiu. The pastor of the Romanic church Logos Baptist Ministries had been issued a $800 fine for holding worship services. Mat Staver, who represents the church, announced that he will ask the Supreme Court to review the case.
Of course, it should be inconceivable that government officials would threaten churches for holding worship services. As I have noted previously, the overwhelming majority of churches complied with government mandates to suspend in-person worship in March. In fact, most churches suspended public meetings before being instructed to. However, as the summer wore on, and it became clear that initial predictions about the virus were inaccurate, churches began to meet again while implementing CDC-informed health and safety precautions to protect their parishioners and visitors.
But despite taking appropriate safety measures, churches were instructed not to open in some states. Although liquor stores and abortion facilities could resume operations in many of these states, churches — which were not deemed “essential” — were held to restrictive standards that made it virtually impossible to meet. When some pastors defied the unfair orders, many were threatened with arrest and jail time. Predictably, one of the worst perpetrators of bias against churches is Governor Newsom and local authorities in California.
For example, Harvest Rock Church in Pasadena incurred the wrath of local officials when they decided to reopen for worship a few weeks ago. After a judge denied an injunction from Harvest Rock, the church received a letter on August 13 from a city attorney demanding the cessation of all in-person worship services. The letter explained that if the church continued holding indoor gatherings, church owners, staff, and parishioners would be “subject to criminal penalties [i.e., fines], as well as the closure of the church.”
Senior Pastor Ché Ahn and other church leaders could face additional charges including fines for each violation and a potential one-year jail sentence. Worth noting is that Harvest Rock asks attendees to follow guidelines including social distancing, wearing a mask “when entering and exiting the auditorium,” and staying home if you are at risk or are feeling flu-like symptoms.
Earlier today, attorneys representing the church presented oral arguments before a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, and requested the church be allowed to meet indoors while appealing state and local orders against indoor worship services.
Another California church facing pressure from officials is Godspeak Calvary Chapel. On August 21, Pastor McCoy appeared before the Superior Court of Ventura County and was held in contempt of the court for defying the local ban on indoor worship services. Additionally, Calvary Chapel was fined $3,000 for holding six church services in defiance of local lockdown orders. Despite the fines, the church continues to gather for indoor worship. According to Pastor McCoy, gathering for worship is a matter of religious liberty and it is unfair for some businesses to be allowed to reopen while churches are forced to hold meetings outside.
Finally, Pastor Jack Trieber and North Valley Baptist Church have also been in the news recently for holding services. North Valley was fined $5,000 for every service they held with additional fines being issued for singing, leading to an eventual $112,000 in fines. A cease and desist letter posted on the front door of the church demanded that the church immediately stop holding services and acknowledged that agents had been sent into the church to observe the congregation. After a weeks-long legal battle, Pastor Trieber decided to move worship services to the church parking lot. Although Trieber has asked that the county remove all fines, the county has said that it will not forgive the fines they imposed on North Valley Baptist Church.
While the recent news from Illinois was a welcome development, the foregoing examples from California reveal that the First Amendment is under assault. Under the guise of enforcing emergency public safety guidelines, too many officials have overstepped their authority and unfairly targeted churches. It is time for Americans of all faiths and religious backgrounds to stand up for their constitutionally protected freedoms and remind officials that church is essential.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Family Research Councilhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngFamily Research Council2020-09-22 05:28:362020-09-22 05:29:46The Battle Against Big Brother: Churches Refuse to Yield
WASHINGTON, D.C. /PRNewswire/ — The Biden-Harris campaign has issued a detailed plan for how they would carry out immigration policy if elected in November. The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) has analyzed the Biden-Harris policy proposals in order to project the real-world consequences they impose on Americans. The report investigates how these policies might translate into real numbers of new immigrants who could be admitted to the United States and the costs associated with what would likely be an unprecedented surge of new migration.
The lax approach to illegal immigration offered under the Biden-Harris plan – halting construction of border security fencing, eliminating detention for most illegal border crossers, scaling back worksite enforcement, and limiting deportation to only violent criminals – would also carry some large numbers with dollar signs in front of them. The likely increase in illegal immigration would run up the costs of services and benefits to illegal aliens and their U.S.-born children to more than $200 billion annually. That increase would represent a 50 percent jump in the already onerous annual costs to American taxpayers.
“Campaigns are an opportunity for candidates to present to the voters their vision on important policy matters. To their credit, the Biden-Harris campaign has done just that on immigration policy,” noted Dan Stein, president of FAIR. “But policy proposals are not just words on paper. If implemented, they will have quantifiable results. They can mean more legal and illegal immigration or less; greater costs to taxpayers, or less.
“It is important to get beyond rhetoric and look at the real-world implication of policy proposals if they become law, so that voters can understand the choices they are making,” said Stein.
Among the potential consequences of FAIR’s analysis of the Biden-Harris immigration plan:
52 million total new legal and illegal immigrants eventually entering the country due to these policies.
43 million people made eligible for family-chain migration under an extensive amnesty program.
At least 2.4 million new immigrants under various non-family-based migration categories.
At least 20 million illegal aliens residing in the country due to reduced border enforcement and detention, and highly constrained interior enforcement.
Founded in 1979, Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) is the country’s largest immigration reform group. With over 2 million members and supporters nationwide, FAIR fights for immigration policies that serve national interests, not special interests. FAIR believes that immigration reform must enhance national security, improve the economy, protect jobs, preserve our environment, and establish a rule of law that is recognized and enforced.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Federation for American Immigration Reformhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngFederation for American Immigration Reform2020-09-22 05:17:162020-09-22 05:19:43Analysis of the Biden-Harris Immigration Plan Reveals Very BIG Numbers
Three different white liberals in authority roles within universities and activist movements have apologized this month for pretending to be black—and they aren’t the only ones to get caught lying about their racial identities.
Satchuel Cole, an Indianapolis racial justice activist, apologized on Wednesday for misrepresenting her racial identity.
“Friends, I need to take accountability for my actions and the harm that I have done. My deception and lies have hurt those I care most about. I have taken up space as a Black person while knowing I am white,” Cole wrote on Facebook.
“I have used Blackness when it was not mine to use. I have asked for support and energy as a Black person. I have caused harm to the city, friends and the work that I held so dear.”
Cole is just the latest white liberal woman to apologize for pretending to be black.
University of Wisconsin-Madison graduate student CV Vitolo-Haddad apologized and announced her resignation from her teaching position on Sept. 8, admitting that she is actually of Italian heritage, despite repeatedly claiming to be black.
George Washington University history professor Jessica Krug, who specialized in “Africa and the African Diaspora,” apologized on Sept. 3 for presenting herself as black for years.
“To an escalating degree over my adult life, I have eschewed my lived experience as a white Jewish child in suburban Kansas City under various assumed identities within a Blackness that I had no right to claim: first North African Blackness, then US rooted Blackness, then Caribbean rooted Bronx Blackness,” Krug wrote in a Medium post.
Former Spokane, Washington, NAACP President Rachel Dolezal admitted in 2015 that she’s white, despite publicly claiming to be black for years. “I acknowledge that I was biologically born white to white parents, but I identify as black,” she said in a November 2015 interview.
Dolezal had taught Africana Studies at Eastern Washington University before she was exposed as white.
Left-wing activist Shaun King faced accusations in 2015 that he misrepresented himself as black, though King has adamantly denied those accusations.
Both parents listed on King’s birth certificate are white, The New York Times noted in August 2015.
CNN anchor Don Lemon reported that King’s parents are white, citing one of King’s family members. “A family member tells CNN that both of King’s parents are white,” Lemon said.
Unlike Cole, Dolezal, Krug, and Vitolo-Haddad, King has denied falsely claiming to be black, insisting that the man listed on his birth certificate isn’t his real father, leaving the question of whether he lied about his race without a definitive answer.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00The Daily Callerhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngThe Daily Caller2020-09-22 05:02:172020-09-22 05:06:14Here’s a List of White Liberals Caught Pretending to Be Black
“We cannot allow federal tax dollars to be wasted when the safety of the citizenry hangs in the balance. It is my hope that the cities identified by the Department of Justice today will reverse course and become serious about performing the basic function of government and start protecting their own citizens,” Attorney General William Barr said in a statement.
Department of Justice says New York City, Seattle, and Portland permit anarchy and violence
The Justice Department designated New York City, Seattle and Portland as “jurisdictions permitting violence and destruction of property” on Monday.
President Donald Trump released a memo earlier this month instructing the department to find ways to slash federal funding after determining which US cities are “anarchist jurisdictions.”
“We cannot allow federal tax dollars to be wasted when the safety of the citizenry hangs in the balance,” Attorney General William Barr said.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said on Monday: “You can’t bully New Yorkers.”
The Department of Justice escalated its threats to cut federal funding to major US cities by designating New York City, Seattle, and Portland as jurisdictions that permit anarchy and violence on Monday.
The department said the cities have “permitted violence and destruction of property to persist and have refused to undertake reasonable measures to counteract criminal activities,” according to a statement Monday.
The move is in response to a memo from President Donald Trump earlier this month instructing Attorney General William Barr and Department of Homeland Security acting secretary Chad Wolf to find ways to slash billions of federal dollars directed to the three cities.
“When state and local leaders impede their own law enforcement officers and agencies from doing their jobs, it endangers innocent citizens who deserve to be protected, including those who are trying to peacefully assemble and protest,” Barr said in the statement Monday. “We cannot allow federal tax dollars to be wasted when the safety of the citizenry hangs in the balance.”
Gardner supports moving forward on Ginsburg seat, striking blow to Dem chances of halting nomination
By: Christal Hayes, USA TODAY, September 20, 2020:
WASHINGTON – Sen. Cory Gardner, a Republican in a tough reelection race in a swing state, said Monday he supports moving forward on a Supreme Court nomination to fill the vacancy left by Ruth Bader Ginsburg, significantly lowering Democrats’ chances of stopping the process until after the November election.
Gardner, who is facing a re-election challenge from former Gov. John Hickenlooper in Colorado, was viewed as one of the last potential holdouts that could halt the Senate from voting to approve President Donald Trump’s nominee to the high court. But a statement Monday evening made clear he will support moving forward in the process, likely leaving Republicans the votes to clear a nominee even if such a process comes before the November election.
“When a President exercises constitutional authority to nominate a judge for the Supreme Court vacancy, the Senate must decide how to best fulfill its constitutional duty of advice and consent,” Gardner said in a Monday evening statement. “I have and will continue to support judicial nominees who will protect our Constitution, not legislate from the bench, and uphold the law. Should a qualified nominee who meets this criteria be put forward, I will vote to confirm.”
I know, I know, it isn’t kosher to speak ill of the dead, but really, can we now stop gushing over Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg?
I began paying a little attention to her while writing many posts at Refugee Resettlement Watchabout the hellhole that South Africa has become since Nelson Mandela and his ilk took over the country and turned it into a supposed Nirvana, claiming it is now the “rainbow nation” where love and peace reign and fairness for all is written in their constitution.
(If you haven’t seen my archive on the “rainbow nation” click here.)
Have alook at that constitution (it says everyone has a right to everything!) and you will see why Africans from across that continent flooded there only to experience xenophobia on a level greater than any country in the world.
Ginsburg reportedly praised that commie constitution over the US Constitution, although her fan base claimed her comments were taken out of context. See Foreign Policy for one version of the 2012 controversy.
One writer who isn’t sending air kisses to Ginsburg is Frank Miele opining at Heartland Diary(hat tip: Paul):
RBG has a remarkable legacy — but so do Lenin and Mao. Please stop praising her if you are a conservative!
Democrats are accusing Republicans of being hypocritical, and they are, but not because they want to vote to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg during an election year.
The real reason they are hypocritical is because they don’t have the cojones to call Ginsburg what she was — a hard-left Democrat extremist who was only interested in using her position on the Supreme Court to fundamentally transform the United States into a politically correct, disarmed socialist republic. Her support for a woman’s right to choose to kill her unborn child is partly responsible for the deaths of millions of babies.
How do Republican senators square that with their effusive praise of her? Simple. As I already said — hypocrisy. Can you imagine Democrats praising Donald Trump as the most significant president of the last 75 years (or more) when he dies? Hell no, because the Democrats know he was their sworn enemy. Republicans are too cowardly to tell the truth about Ginsburg.
A random sampling of the Republican praise for Ginsburg should prove the point:
Thank God we have Trump in the White House! Almost every other Republican you can think of (if he/she was President at this auspicious moment in history) would be tucking tail and running and attempting to show that they are good people by not pushing forward with a nominee for Ha! Ha! “Ginsburg’s seat!”
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Ann Corcoranhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngAnn Corcoran2020-09-21 08:54:132020-09-21 08:55:18Is the Fawning Coverage of RBG Making You Sick?
Church Militant (a 501(c)4 corporation) is responsible for the content of this commentary.
The old expression “the enemy only fires back when you are directly over the target” would mean that the Marxists in the Church — especially in the hierarchy — are getting bombed right now. These crooks have decided to give fake-Catholic Biden a pass on his evil and the wickedness of the entire Democratic establishment, and the real Catholics are ticked off and letting them know.
In truth, there’s no doubt some of the bishops are actually scared — terrified — of ticking off the Harris-Biden ticket, and yes, we all know: That is the actual order of the ticket. Even Biden says it. And so did Harris. The bishops are scared because the ground is shifting considerably as Catholics begin to wake up. Within the ranks of bishops, the word is going out that the rebellion against their tyranny must be put down.
This explains the massing of forces of Marxist Catholics to throw down for Biden. The so-called Catholics for Biden initiative is a rogues’ gallery of phony Catholics like Carolyn Woo. Woo used to head up the leftist-posing-as-Catholic “Catholic Relief Services” (CRS).
We caught up with her a few years ago after she gave a brainwashing session at an Ohio parish, duping ignorant laity. For some reason, she didn’t want to answer our questions, and her handlers tried (unsuccessfully) to sneak her out a side door.
CRS, a favorite of the U.S. hierarchy, takes gobs of your tax dollars and spends them on projects around the world, partnering with abortion providers and contraceptive providers in Third World countries, pretending it’s all about poverty.
Well, it sort of is. Their philosophy is to eliminate poverty by eliminating the poor. So it really is altogether fitting that such a woman would sit on the board of Catholics for Biden. But she’s just one of many in the Marxist Catholic establishment throwing their weight around, lying about Biden being acceptable to Catholics. He’s not.
A couple evenings ago, Newark cardinal Joesph Tobin came out swinging for Biden. And just a recap as some of His Eminence’s highlights, he got caught tweeting out the now famous, “Nighty nite baby. I love you” tweet to his general account by accident, later claiming it referred to his sister.
Remember, Tobin owes his appointment to Newark to homosexual molester Theodore McCarrick, as testified to by Abp. Viganò. And then there was the revolting case of a known gay Italian model who was living in his residence — paid for by collection-plate money — who bolted back to Italy as soon as Church Militant and others exposed it.
When questioned about why he was living with Cdl. Tobin, the official response was he was a foreign student studying English at Seton Hall. When questioned about why he couldn’t live with the thousands of other students on campus, no response.
This man came out with his thinly veiled support for Biden — another supporter of sodomy-as-marriage — on a Zoom conference hosted by Boston College. Birds of a feather really do flock together, don’t they?
Trump really is remarkable. In less than four years, he has managed to get every one of these snakes to slither out from under their rocks and completely reveal themselves. It’s very important to know who the enemy is. Thank you, Mr. President.
The forming of all these phony Catholic groups, the actions of Marxist bishops trying to suppress good priests — all of this is attributable directly to Trump. Although mischaracterized, even the student paper at homosexuality loving Jesuit Fordham University in New York admits this in a recent op-ed entitled, “Trump Creates a Schism in the Catholic Church.”
That’s a real knee-slapper. Trump did not create the schism in the Church (which is very real) any more than Church Militant caused the division in the Church that bishops love to accuse us of. Both Trump and Church Militant have only brought to light the existing formerly-in-the-shadows reality. Good working with you, Mr. President. Thanks for the help. Let us know if we can help you.
Still, the media cannot keep their paws out of this story. A headline from just the day before last from a Minnesota outlet reads, “Two Renegade Priests: One Calls COVID Sham, One Says Dems Face Hell.” Notice how they can’t resist labeling them “renegade” for calling out the truth?
Imagine how life would be under that Harris-Biden administration for actual Catholics. We were all sitting around talking here in the studios a short while ago, and I was saying, “I’ve been doing this kind of work all my life, and I have never seen this level of engagement by the Catholic apostate, heretic, Marxist, dissident crowd.”
They are losing control of the narrative. And what’s more, they know it. However, their narrative has always been built on lies. And truth — that pesky little thing — it always finds a way of coming out. And, moreover, once it gets out, look out. It changes everything.
The Tobins, Martins and Woos of the world, along with all their other evil allies, have brought about the almost-complete destruction of the Church through a series of lies and lies built on lies. And now, truth is coming out, and they have become desperate. And it is looking more and more like the truth is busting out everywhere and being reflected all over the political world.
Trump rallies are, once again, the hottest ticket in town with thousands showing up. The Marxist media continues to lie, almost to the point of hysterical. In a Twitter side-by-side posting, you see on the right a picture from Latino voters at a Trump event. The other side shows that CBS grabbed the picture and captioned it as Biden appealing to Latino voters while campaigning in Florida.
The actual picture — before CBS cropped it — showed loads of Trump people in the crowd. Who knew so many MAGA people showed up at Biden rallies? If it weren’t so evil, you’d be rolling in the aisles. But when evil is pushing back this hard — and the Marxists in the Church are linked arm in arm with them — you just know that you are right over the target.
A month ago, the Marxist polls were showing a virtual blowout for Harris-Biden. Then, right after the conventions, their lies had to start being rolled back because Judgment Day, Nov. 3, will expose all. So after being told for months that Biden was going to crush Trump — after racism, COVID, injustice, climate, impeachment, economy, you name it — all of a sudden, the Marxist media had to start saying the polls were tightening (especially in battleground states).
Amazing how Trump came storming back out of nowhere to draw to a tie all over the map. That, of course, is if he really was ever that far behind. And then came the bombshell (and what has created ulcers at Marxist headquarters at the Democratic People’s Party).
A new poll came out from the outfit that has proved the most reliable (and the one that really can’t be ignored), Rasmussen. For the first time ever, Trump pulled into the lead over Biden after trailing Biden by five two weeks earlier.
Yes, this is a gigantic clash of the ages. Every last weapon is being pulled out by both sides, but the biggest weapon, truth, is only held by one side.
The Canadian woman charged for sending ricin to President Trump & law enforcement agencies in Texas was previously deported. Pascale Ferrier tried to cross back into the US on Sunday & was found carrying a gun. She recently tweeted about killing Trump. https://t.co/nvACsTHsTPpic.twitter.com/EnuKaViQwY
WASHINGTON (AP) — A woman suspected of sending an envelope containing the poison ricin, which was addressed to White House, has been arrested at the New York-Canada border, three law enforcement officials told The Associated Press on Sunday.
The letter had been intercepted earlier this week before it reached the White House. The woman was taken into custody by U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers at the Peace Bridge border crossing near Buffalo and is expected to face federal charges, the officials said. Her name was not immediately released.
The letter addressed to the White House appeared to have originated in Canada, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police have said. It was intercepted at a government facility that screens mail addressed to the White House and President Donald Trump and a preliminary investigation indicated it tested positive for ricin, according to the officials.
The officials were not authorized to discuss the ongoing investigation publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
There have been several prior instances in which U.S. officials have been targeted with ricin sent through the mail.
A Navy veteran was arrested in 2018 and confessed to sending envelopes to Trump and members of his administration that contained the substance from which ricin is derived. The letters were intercepted, and no one was hurt.
In 2014, a Mississippi man was sentenced to 25 years in prison after sending letters dusted with ricin to President Barack Obama and other officials.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Dr. Rich Swierhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngDr. Rich Swier2020-09-21 08:01:372020-09-22 14:45:54ASSOCIATED PRESS: Woman Arrested! Accused of Sending Ricin Letter to President Trump
States across the country are experimenting with a mass switch to mail-in elections in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
But is it wise for states to make such a big change, especially in light of messy voter rolls around the country?
What I was sent earlier this month by election officials in Alameda County, California, makes me worried that ballots going to the wrong locations will be a significant concern this year.
The Alameda County Registrar of Voters notified me by mail at my parents’ address in Oakland that I would receive a ballot when the state sends them out Oct. 5. This is following Gov. Gavin Newsom’s executive order that all California voters receive a mail-in ballot before the Nov. 3 election.
The problem is, I should not be considered a California voter.
Since I left California in 2011, I have registered to vote in two other places. I’ve officially changed my address. And my parents notified election workers at their local voting location after I left the state, but to no avail.
The only reason I was even aware of the situation is that my parents still live at the same address.
I posted this information on Twitter, noting that it’s particularly concerning given that there will be a massive uptick in mail-in voting this year.
So people are saying that this is incorrect because ballots won't officially be sent out in CA until Oct 5. My parents just received this in the mail telling me that they are sending the ballot. Havent voted there in 10 years. Parents told them I left years ago. https://t.co/Lz21nJlbavpic.twitter.com/oZHkjT7uSW
Although the official mail my parents received isn’t the actual ballot, it informed me that I would receive one along with every other California voter. Unless something changes, a ballot will be sent to me in a town where I haven’t lived or voted for a decade.
What if I or my parents had been dishonest, and I voted twice? What if somebody else living at that address tried to submit my vote?
It’s not hard to see how this system could be abused by those who care to do so.
Again, this is an even bigger problem right now. Much of the country is experimenting with mass voting by mail even while many states have done a poor job of cleaning up their voter rolls and taking extra precautions to ensure election integrity.
Among the problems were mismatched signatures on ballots and hundreds of ballots that were bundled improperly. Several people were charged with voter fraud.
That election in New Jersey simply may be an ugly outlier, but it’s also a good reason to be concerned about an election system being transformed on a widespread scale, as we are seeing for the 2020 presidential election.
State officials should treat election integrity as the serious issue that it is.
The bottom line is that voter rolls around the country are bloated and filled with inaccuracies. Countless voters are registered in multiple states, many of which have resisted cleaning up their rolls.
The 2020 election also presents unique problems. Most states are moving toward a mail-in system as a response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
My Heritage Foundation colleague Hans von Spakovsky has written extensively about election integrity issues and warned about the implications of mass mail-in voting.
“Going entirely to by-mail elections would unwisely endanger the security and integrity of the election process, particularly if officials automatically mail absentee ballots to all registered voters without a signed, authenticated request from each voter,” von Spakovsky wrote in April.
Von Spakovsky noted in the article that having “thousands of ballots” arrive in places where voters no longer reside “risks those ballots being stolen and voted.”
As far as my own ongoing problem with California sending me ballots, von Spakovsky says:
Voter registration forms usually have a place on the bottom of the form where you can write in where you were previously registered. But states are notoriously lax about forwarding that information to the former jurisdictions or doing anything about information when they get it from other states. Their voter rolls, particularly California’s, are also in notoriously bad condition because they don’t take off people who have moved or died.
Mark Hemingway, who has written extensively about related issues, wrote in 2019 that a sharp divide now exists between those who prioritize “ballot access” and those who focus on “ballot security.”
These sometimes competing concerns are prevalent in the 1993 National Voter Registration Act, often called the “Motor Voter Act.” Officials streamlined the process for voter registration, but opened the possibility of more inaccurate rolls, especially given how many people move from state to state.
“People are far more likely to register to vote in their new homes than to alert their old communities that they have moved,” Hemingway wrote.
It’s up to the states to do regular maintenance on their voter rolls, and they are supposed to follow up with a notice to voters who have been inactive for a long time.
However, Hemingway wrote that since passage of the National Voter Registration Act, “many states have simply ignored the maintenance requirements while others have sought legal workarounds.”
For those who say they’re concerned with protecting “democracy,” ballot security should be a priority. Messy voter rolls open up the possibility of fraud as well as innocent errors that could gravely threaten our electoral process.
BREAKING: The unfortunate death of RBG has ended the Covid-19 pandemic. Also, we can officially vote in person. Praise God. 🙏🏾 pic.twitter.com/RokbAsTuPI
Democratic Socialists say, “America should be more like socialist countries such as Sweden and Denmark.” And millions of young people believe them…
For years, “Democratic Socialists” have been growing a crop of followers that include students and young professionals. America’s future will be in their hands.
How are socialists deluding a whole generation? One of their most effective arguments is that “democratic socialism” is working in Scandinavian countries like Sweden and Norway. They claim these countries are “proof” that socialism will work for America. But they’re wrong. And it’s easy to explain why.
Our friends at The Heritage Foundation just published a new guide that provides three irrefutable facts that debunks these myths. For a limited time, they’re offering it to readers of The Daily Signal for free.
Get your free copy of “Why Democratic Socialists Can’t Legitimately Claim Sweden and Denmark as Success Stories” today and equip yourself with the facts you need to debunk these myths once and for all.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00The Daily Signalhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngThe Daily Signal2020-09-21 06:44:032020-09-21 06:49:37California Wants Me to Vote, Even Though I Haven’t Lived There for Over 8 Years
Eight months into this pandemic, we sometimes seem to be no nearer to knowing what’s going on than we were at the beginning.
Lockdowns vs. no lockdowns; masks vs. no masks; hydroxychloroquine vs. remdesivir; opening schools vs. closing schools, etc., etc. Every day, top-level experts express significantly divergent viewpoints on each of these questions. One study published one day concludes one thing; another study published the next concludes the opposite, and critics attack both. One newspaper analyzes the latest data and claims that things are getting better; another newspaper, looking at the same data, laments they have never been worse. Meanwhile, fundamental and simple questions, such as how this virus is transmitted, or where it originated, are still the subject of ongoing research and intense debate.
All of which is to say, science is operating exactly as it always has.
Preaching Orthodoxies Prematurely
If the history of science proves anything, it’s that attaining certainty even on relatively narrow questions is an arduous process. It requires huge investments of time and is often preceded by false starts, dead ends, and premature claims of success. Science is often muddied by haste, ineptness, researcher bias, and conflicting personal, financial, political, and ideological interests.
Given the additional, staggering complexity of a global pandemic, the surprising thing about our present uncertainty is not the uncertainty itself, but how distraught or even scandalized many people are by it. An excessive desire for certainty is leading to counter-productive responses — and to a breakdown of communication and trust, precisely when we most need both.
Over the past eight months, people of every political stripe have prematurely seized on scientific claims and preached them as though they were orthodoxies, with a zeal out of proportion to our actual knowledge. Rather than explore and attempt diverse approaches, or carve out space for conversation, creativity, and experimentation, we too often assume “the other side” is malicious. We call even mild nonconformism or risk-taking a moral failing rather than a necessary prerequisite for advancing our knowledge. Often, the public “debate” has been little more productive than a pie fight
Not long ago, as Allan Bloom pointed out in The Closing of the American Mind, some form of skepticism or relativism was the default epistemological position of the overwhelming majority of people. Every day college freshmen repeated some version of the claim that “truth is relative” as though it were a platitude. But today we expect and demand absolute certainty on extraordinarily complex matters, at the snap of our fingers.
Scientism, Superstition, and Dogmatism
Most people seem to agree that the pandemic is a scientific problem that needs a scientific solution. This is true, but only partially. To view the plague as purely a scientific problem is reductive. As Andrew Sullivan noted in a recent essay, a plague is not just a medical event. It is also a “social and cultural and political” event. Plagues “insinuate themselves into every nook and cranny of our lives and psyches — from sex to shopping, from work to religion, from politics to journalism — and thereby alter them.”
After all, even if our scientific understanding of the virus were complete, we still wouldn’t all agree on the right response, and for good reason. Many medical experts presume that our goal should be to save as many lives as possible from the virus — but there are limits to that goal. Saving more lives in the short term at the expense of fundamental rights and freedoms, or of social order, or of the long-term viability of the economy, may be too high a price to pay. How to balance these concerns cannot be answered by science alone.
Talking heads on TV exhort the public to “trust the science” as if “the science” were some monolith, unaffected by human fallibility and constraints, that could answer all the political, ethical, and social questions that the pandemic raises. Many seem to believe that, if scientists just work harder, at some point “the science” will tell us what to do, down to the minutest detail.
This is scientism, and it is a form of superstition. Like all superstitions, it stems from a desire to escape the discomfort of uncertainty; the painful duties of investigation, debate, and decision-making; and the risk of being wrong.
Rather than stretch our minds to fit the problem, superstition reduces the problem to fit the limitations of our minds. It replaces reason with dogma, and thanks to the spread of scientism today, dogmatism is ubiquitous. Even those who criticize the dogmatism of others who demand fealty to “the science” often adhere to their own scientific dogmatism — only they find their dogmas in far-flung and seedy corners of science and the media. Moreover, both sides often insist that their favored scientist, or group of scientists, or publication, or journalist, is the only one who has “figured it out.” If we would just listen to them, everything would be all right.
The dogmatist is scandalized by the difficulty of how humans come to know — bit by bit, at the expenditure of enormous energy, and in many matters reaching only probable conclusions. He prefers to seize on a simplistic explanation and call it a solution. One can see why such people often become conspiracy theorists. Perplexed by a vast confusion of data points, the conspiracy theorist does not patiently investigate the data to discover their objective connection (which is hard). Rather, he presumes an explanation, investigates how to fit the various data points to it, and simply discards the data that will not fit (which is easy).
How to Debate About a Plague
But maybe there is no one correct solution to this pandemic — no one strategy that we know with certainty (based on irrefutable scientific data) will save more lives than the alternatives; or that won’t come with its own unacceptable, long-term costs. Or if there is any such answer, perhaps we cannot possibly know what it is until well after this pandemic is over, when there are no more decisions to make. There are simply too many factors at play and too many unknowns; and we have no idea how the coming days, months, and years will unfold.
Should we throw up our hands in despair? Are there no solutions that are clearly better, or supported by better evidence, than others? Is the science so hopelessly complex that we can’t possibly look to it for any guidance? Should we not advocate our favored solutions, based on the best available evidence, or not oppose the solutions we believe to be harmful or misguided?
Of course not. Doing nothing is not an option. We may not know everything we would like to know about this virus, but we do know much more than we did before, and certainly more than the human race has ever known when facing a similar crisis. We have to move, and in order to move, we must select a starting point. We must make decisions based on the limited information we have, and then execute those decisions with conviction, hoping that they turn out as planned.
On the other hand, we should be aware of the sorts of errors that may cloud our judgment.
Dogmatism closes questions that ought to remain open and blinds us to any truths that go against our own prejudices and political loyalties. It precludes fruitful conversation and compromise by treating as moral those questions that are merely practical and therefore debatable. We should be rigid only on moral absolutes and be flexible in everything else. We need to bear courageously the burden of uncertainty in matters that are uncertain. We ought not cast aspersions on the motives of others, when a plausible case can be made that they are simply reading the data differently.
Another common error is the “sunk cost” fallacy: when we continue down a path — even in the face of evidence that it is the wrong way — merely because we have already gone so far down it, or because we staked so much of our reputations on it. Then there is confirmation bias, the error by which we ask how new data support our preferred conclusion, rather than whether they do so in fact.
Wisdom lies not in having a great deal of knowledge, but in honestly identifying the limits of our knowledge. Socrates was the wisest man in Athens precisely because he believed himself to be ignorant. We ought to be suspicious of politicians, media talking heads, conspiracy theorists, and social media warriors who profess to be wise. Their alluring reductions and ideologies are leading us astray and tearing us apart.
Above all, let us have the humility to admit when we are wrong. If anything is certain in a global pandemic, it is that every one of us will be wrong some of the time.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00MercatorNet - Navigating Modern Complexitieshttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngMercatorNet - Navigating Modern Complexities2020-09-21 06:24:532020-09-21 06:24:53In a Pandemic, Dogmatism is the Real Enemy
