Panic Has Led to Government “Cures” That Are Worse than the Disease, History Shows

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Let’s take the novel coronavirus seriously, but let’s not throw reason, prudence, or the Constitution out the window.

Anyone who’s seen the John Hughes movie Ferris Beuller’s Day Off probably remembers the scene where Ferris’s economics teacher (Ben Stein) explains the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act to a roomful of bored, sleeping students. The scene is brilliant for many reasons, perhaps most so because it perfectly demonstrated how some of the most boring things in history are also the most important.

Smoot-Hawley was, of course, one of the great blunders in history.

Passed in 1930 over the objection of more than a thousand economists, the legislation increased tariffs (which were already high) on imports to protect US industries and farmers, sparking a trade war that deepened the Great Depression. It’s a perfect example of authorities taking decisive action to alleviate a crisis—and making things much worse.

What many forget is that Smoot-Hawley didn’t cause the Depression. It was a response to the Depression. Indeed, it may never have passed at all without the catalyst—the Stock Market Crash of 1929—that sent the nation into a frenzy. Senate Republicans had defeated the legislation the previous year, but trade restrictionists found a convenient crisis in Black Tuesday, which triggered widespread hysteria, allowing the law to squeak through.

Designed to protect Americans during the economic crisis, Smoot-Hawley proved disastrous. Imports fell from $1,334M in 1929 to just $390M in 1932. Global trade fell by roughly 66 percent, government data show. By 1933 unemployment was 25 percent, the highest in US history.

To “correct” things, Americans elected Franklin D. Roosevelt, who launched a series of federal programs—which made the crisis even worse. The rest, as they say, is history.

Smoot-Hawley and the New Deal are hardly the only examples of government actions making a panic worse.

In his book Basic Economics, the economist Thomas Sowell recounts several instances in which governments turned small problems into major ones by using blunt force—often price controls—to respond to public panic about rising costs of a given commodity.

One of the more famous examples of this is the gasoline crisis of the 1970s, which started when the federal government took a small problem (temporary high costs of gasoline) and turned it into a big one (a national shortage).

It began when OPEC (the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries), a newly formed oil cartel, cut oil production, causing fuel prices to rise. To address the rise, the Nixon administration (and later the Ford and Carter administrations) resorted to price controls to keep fuel prices low for consumers.

The result? Mass fuel shortages across the country that led to long lines and many Americans unable to buy fuel. This “energy crisis,” as it was dubbed at the time, in turn wreaked havoc on the automotive industry.

As Sowell explains, however, there was not an actual scarcity of gasoline. There was nearly as much gas sold in 1972 as the previous year (95 percent, to be precise). Similarly, Americans in 1978 consumed more gasoline than in any other previous year in history. The problem was the resources were not being allocated efficiently because of state-imposed price controls.

The energy crisis was entirely predictable, two Soviet economists (who had vast experience in the arena central planning-induced shortages) later observed.

In an economy with rigidly planned proportions, such situations are not the exception but the rule—an everyday reality, a governing law. The absolute majority of goods is either in short supply or in surplus. Quite often the same product is in both categories—there is a shortage in one region and a surplus in another.

No one likes high gas prices, but the energy crisis of the 1970s wasn’t truly a crisis until the government created it. Nor was the result unique. Similar examples kind be found throughout history, from the grain shortages in Ancient Rome brought about by Diocletian’s “Edict on Maximum Prices” to the mortgage crisis in 2007 and the financial crisis that ensued.

This might seem obvious in hindsight, yet similar mistakes are made today during crises, just on a smaller scale. To address alleged crises in housing, California and Oregon recently passed rent control laws that will surely have a devastating impact on residents in those states. Similarly, anti-price gouging laws (and social pressure) regularly lead to mass shortages during national emergencies.

As America endures the most frightening pandemic in a century, the COVID-19 outbreak, it’s important that decisions affecting the lives, liberties, and livelihoods of hundreds of millions of people are being reached through reason, not collective fear.

Pandemics are clearly different from economic depressions and fuel shortages, but some of the same lessons apply. Like an economic panic, pandemics incite mass fear, which can lead to flawed and irrational decision making.

We know that human beings by nature are prone to crowd-following, especially during periods of social unrest and panic. This instinct has resulted in some of the greatest tragedies in human history.

COVID-19 may very well prove to be every bit as dangerous as we’ve been led to believe. Epidemiologists, vaccine researchers, and other medical experts agree it’s highly contagious and deadly, especially for certain at-risk demographics (the elderly and people with compromised immune systems and lung damage, for example). Yet many of the same experts disagree on the scope of the COVID-19 threat.

One of the problems medical professionals are encountering is they simply don’t have a lot of reliable data to work with.

“The data collected so far on how many people are infected and how the epidemic is evolving are utterly unreliable,” John P.A. Ioannidis, an epidemiologist and professor of medicine at Stanford University who co-directs the university’s Meta-Research Innovation Center, recently wrote in Stat.

Let’s face it: pandemics are scary. This is probably doubly true in the age of social media, when the scariest models tend to be the ones most shared, which fuels even more panic. Because of the heightened level of fear, it’s not unreasonable to think public officials could “follow the crowd,” which is a bad idea even when the crowd isn’t totally petrified.

“Crowds do not reason….they tolerate neither discussion nor contradiction, and the suggestions brought to bear on them invade the entire field of their understanding and tend at once to transform themselves into acts,” wrote Gustave Le Bon in his seminal 1895 work The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind.

It’s no secret or coincidence that crises—foreign wars, terrorist attacks, and economic depressions—have often resulted in vast encroachments of freedom and even given rise to tyrants (from Napoleon to Lenin and beyond). In his book Crisis and Leviathan, the historian and economist Robert Higgs explains how throughout history, crises have been used to expand the administrative state, often by allowing “temporary” measures to be left in place after a crisis has abated (think federal tax withholding during World War II).

“When [crises occur] … governments almost certainly will gain new powers over economic and social affairs,” wrote Higgs. “For those who cherish individual liberty and a free society, the prospect is deeply disheartening.”

Let’s take the novel coronavirus deadly seriously, but let’s not throw reason, prudence, or the Constitution out the window while doing so.

If we do, we may find the government’s “cure” for the coronavirus cure is even worse than the disease.

COLUMN BY

Jon Miltimore

Jonathan Miltimore is the Managing Editor of FEE.org. His writing/reporting has appeared in TIME magazine, The Wall Street Journal, CNN, Forbes, and Fox News. 

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EDITORS NOTE: This FEE column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

White House Coronavirus Task Force Updates and Important Links.

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President Trump and the White House Coronavirus Task Force announced additional actions today as part of the ongoing, government-wide response to the global pandemic:

  • To help American families and businesses, the Treasury Department announced that Tax Day will be moved from April 15 to July 15. No interest or penalties will be charged for filing during this extended window, but any American expecting refunds or credits may claim now to get their money sooner.
  • To minimize impact on our nation’s students, the Department of Education is temporarily waiving all interest on federally held student loans. Secretary Betsy DeVos has also directed federal lenders to allow borrowers to suspend their student loan payments without penalty for at least the next 60 days.
  • Early, decisive travel restrictions helped slow the spread of Coronavirus to our country. Today, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced that the United States and Mexico have agreed to restrict non-essential travel across their border.
  • More help is on the way. The Trump Administration worked with Congress last week on a bipartisan deal to deliver economic relief and support for American families, which the President signed into law on Wednesday. More legislative action is expected in the coming days.
  • As a reminder, this week, President Trump issued a nationwide call to action for every American to help slow the spread of Coronavirus over the next 15 days. We encourage you all to continue to put these guidelines into practice and share them with your communities to help save lives.

Share with us:

  • Know of an inspirational story? We know that Americans have gone above and beyond to serve their communities during this time. If you would like to share with us any inspirational stories in your communities, let us know and send them our way.
  • Who else needs this information? Please send us any names with organizations and e-mails for other faith leaders that would benefit from receiving these updates.

Important Links:

© All rights reserved.

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School Closures—and Accidental Homeschooling—Continue. Here Are More Resources for Families

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As of today, 91,000 public and private schools in 39 states with more than 41 million students collectively, have closed because of the coronavirus, according to Education Week. 

As parents continue to navigate their new role as homeschool instructors, resources are being made available online to meet the needs of families.

Some schools have begun live-streaming PE classes. Others are delivering virtual content to students, and at some—such as Success Academy in New York—teachers begin the day with phone calls to each of their students and hold virtual office hours later in the day. Families, schools, and free markets are rising to the challenge of schooling during a worldwide pandemic.

Here are 10 resources to check out for your own family:

In these trying times, we must turn to the greatest document in the history of the world to promise freedom and opportunity to its citizens for guidance. Find out more now >>

  1. Project Gutenberg is an online library of more than 60,000 free eBooks of the world’s great literature. These great works are available in full online for free because they are older works for which U.S. copyright has expired.
  2. The Ashbrook Center’s Teaching American History Project is a treasure trove of history resources that “explore themes in American history and self-government through the study of original historical documents.”
  3. Mike McShane of EdChoice recommends Brain Pop, which offers online resources, interactive activities, quizzes, and lessons in everything from science and social studies to art and engineering.  He also recommends the Cincinnati Zoo’s page, which offers a Facebook Live safari every day at 3 p.m. Eastern.
  4. The entire Core Knowledge Foundation curriculum is now online for free.
  5. Get a crash course in homeschooling through the Home School Legal Defense Association’s homeschooling through high school page.
  6. The Space Foundation partnered with Peanuts to create 10 free lesson plans, in its “ongoing quest to catalyze the next generation of space explorers, innovators, and entrepreneurs.”
  7. Beginning next Wednesday, Code Break will offer a live, weekly webcast to teach students computer science at home, even offering learning options for students without computers.
  8. The Bill of Rights Institute has a wealth of history curriculum resources.
  9. More advanced students can check-out the University of Dallas’ Arts in Liberty courses in Logic, Rhetoric, Geometry and Arithmetic, and Astronomy.
  10. Open Culture provides access to free online courses from universities worldwide as well as audiobooks and documentaries, and EdX offers free online courses from universities on topics such as language, business management, and engineering.

COMMENTARY BY

Lindsey Burke

Lindsey M. Burke researches and writes on federal and state education issues as the Will Skillman fellow in education policy at The Heritage Foundation. Read her research. Twitter: .

A Note for our Readers:

This is a critical year in the history of our country. With the country polarized and divided on a number of issues and with roughly half of the country clamoring for increased government control—over health care, socialism, increased regulations, and open borders—we must turn to America’s founding for the answers on how best to proceed into the future.

The Heritage Foundation has compiled input from more than 100 constitutional scholars and legal experts into the country’s most thorough and compelling review of the freedoms promised to us within the United States Constitution into a free digital guide called Heritage’s Guide to the Constitution.

They’re making this guide available to all readers of The Daily Signal for free today!

GET ACCESS NOW! >>

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Signal column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

Coronavirus Is the Chinese Government’s Curse Upon the World

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The World Health Organization and other sensitive souls have instructed us to stop referring to the new strain of the coronavirus as the “Wuhan” or “Chinese” flu because of the racist connotations.

I’m disinclined to curb my speech to placate Chinese propagandists, and it seems to me the aversion to those terms is less about racism than about averting blame. But in the spirit of comity, and avoiding disparaging an entire nation, I’m happy to call it the ChiCom Flu moving forward.

There are many traditional naming conventions that don’t really make that much sense. Somewhat weirdly, for example, we often name diseases after the people who “discover” them—Hodgkin’s disease after Thomas Hodgkin, Parkinson’s disease after James Parkinson, and so on.

But naming viral diseases after places—Guinea worm, West Nile virus, Ebola, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, etc.—is probably just intuitive. Viruses “come” from someplace, after all, and thus people gravitate to those names. I doubt we came up with “Lyme disease” because of some deep enmity toward Connecticut.

In these trying times, we must turn to the greatest document in the history of the world to promise freedom and opportunity to its citizens for guidance. Find out more now >>

Anyway, “COVID-19” or “H1N1” don’t exactly roll off the tongue.

The latter was, until very recently, widely referred to as the “Spanish flu,” a virus that killed around 675,000 Americans and tens of millions of others around the world in the early 1900s.

“Spanish flu” has now retroactively fallen into disfavor as well. And to be fair, there is some historical evidence that the virus may actually have originated in China or France, so if we must call it the French flu moving forward, so be it.

But while the Spanish have a good case to be annoyed, the Chinese government does not.

As Jim Geraghty notes, the communist Chinese have been far more effective in stopping the spread of information about the coronavirus than in stopping the spread of the coronavirus itself. Today, for example, China expelled most American journalists from the country.

Early on, the communists destroyed samples and suppressed vital information that could have helped mitigate the damage of this new strain of the coronavirus.

The government also silenced doctors who warned about the disease. Some were censured for “spreading rumors” or sharing test results with colleagues, and some were forced to write self-critical public letters—a Marxist mainstay—admitting that the warning “had a negative impact.”

The Chinese communists probably let 5 million people leave Wuhan without screening, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The Chinese communists, like all communists, hide societal problems. There is no crime, disease, or addiction in the collectivist state. This kind of secrecy and dishonesty can be disastrous, especially in a highly interconnected world.

Though millions of Chinese have been lifted out of extreme poverty through free trade, with modernity comes some basic responsibilities—for instance, not killing everyone in the world with preventable zoonotic diseases.

The Chinese regime is perfectly capable of administering an array of authoritarian policies to suppress the rights of its own people. But it’s apparently unable to exert even mild cultural pressure warning them that their eating habits can be extraordinarily dangerous and hold the potential of creating massive socioeconomic problems.

If reports are correct, it was in Wuhan’s popular “wet markets” that vendors were selling the bats—and possibly snakes—that may have caused the COVID-19 outbreak. “Wet” because the meat sold in its unsanitary stalls was only recently slaughtered.

This kind of thing happens quite often. And not always in China, of course. But the avian influenza was likely transmitted to humans from chickens in a “wet” market.

Scientists have been warning for years that the eating of exotic animals in southern China “is a time bomb.” Acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) also originated in China, and probably jumped to humans through bats. Other coronavirus strains are also likely connected to bats.

I hate to thrust my Western cultural values on anyone, but maybe it’s time to stop eating bats.

It’s important to stress that it’s not the Chinese people who are the problem. Just look at their success in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, and the United States. The ChiComs are the problem.

If the Chinese government spent as much time working on educating its people and regulating dangerous markets as it does on secrecy and propaganda efforts, maybe it wouldn’t have to worry as much about diseases being named after it—or about the catastrophic death and economic pain their negligence helps cause.

COPYRIGHT 2020 CREATORS.COM

COMMENTARY BY

David Harsanyi

David Harsanyi is a senior writer at National Review and the author of “First Freedom: A Ride through America’s Enduring History With the Gun, From the Revolution to Today.” Twitter: .

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A Note for our Readers:

This is a critical year in the history of our country. With the country polarized and divided on a number of issues and with roughly half of the country clamoring for increased government control—over health care, socialism, increased regulations, and open borders—we must turn to America’s founding for the answers on how best to proceed into the future.

The Heritage Foundation has compiled input from more than 100 constitutional scholars and legal experts into the country’s most thorough and compelling review of the freedoms promised to us within the United States Constitution into a free digital guide called Heritage’s Guide to the Constitution.

They’re making this guide available to all readers of The Daily Signal for free today!

GET ACCESS NOW! >>

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Signal column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

How Long Will Americans Tolerate Corona-Madness

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A usually level-headed Christian conservative lashed out on Facebook scolding everyone they thought was not taking the Corona virus seriously enough. Fake news media has successfully infected many with irrational fear.

Hearing Gov Larry Hogan on my car radio announcing his executive order to close bars, restaurants, gyms and theaters sounded like the script of a 1950s horror movie. “We will stop the spread of this deadly disease!”, dramatically proclaimed Hogan. Little more than 100 have died in the U.S. and under 9,000 worldwide. According to the CDC, during the 2018-2019 flu season, an estimated 16.5 million people got sick and 34,000 died in the U.S.

When Hogan mentioned plans to restrict church gatherings, a chill went up my spine. In the United States of America, government is mandating that people not attend church. Wow!

CDC data confirms that the martial-law-light mandates steamrolling across America are disproportionate to the threat of the virus. Some governors and most corporations are responding to media-mob pressure to halt life in America. Others see an opportunity to land a death-blow to the Trump Administration.

Insidiously ignoring the CDC’s no-need-to-panic-data, fake news media created and is gleefully fueling Corona-madness. Using their huge bully pulpit, fake news media says anyone who dares to contradict their you’re-all-gonna-die narrative will be dragged into the high tech public square, stripped naked, branded an irresponsible idiot with a hot iron and their career will be canceled.

It is disturbing that there is practically zero push back against governors instantaneously overruling our constitutional freedoms. Sadly, many youths are clueless regarding their constitutional freedoms. They grew up in public schools where progressive teachers taught them that the Constitution is an out-dated piece of paper written by racist, sexist, homophobic and Christian dead straight white men.

We have far too many Bernie Bro youths who say, “If the government is going to give me free stuff, I am down with whatever controls government deem necessary.”

A gentleman said this about Democrats/fake news media in an email, “…they are willing to destroy hard working people’s jobs to accomplish their power play.” This guy is spot on correct. This is why I regard Democrats’/fake news medias’ gleeful spread of Corona-madness so loathsome and evil.

Democrats and fake news media are 100% committed to destroying Trump, their greatest Nemesis. Collapsing the U.S. economy and even the loss of American lives is acceptable collateral damage in their quest for power to control every aspect of our lives. They believe Corona is their highly sought after kryptonite to kill We-the-Peoples’ superman president.

A wise woman emailed me, “I think a lot of people are willing to do social distancing, etc., but they’re unwilling to live in perpetual fear.”I say, “Amen sister.”

How long can fake news media/Democrats successfully keep Americans at a fever pitch level of irrational panic and fear? How long will U.S. businesses allow media to bully them into losing billions of dollars simply because they hate Trump. How long will it take Americans to say screw this nonsense, “I’m going out for a burger and a beer.” I believe there will be a tipping point when Americans say enough is enough, I’m going to resume my life.

My baby boomer generation is still the largest demographic. We know our constitutional rights and will fight for them. We will not go gentle into Democrats’ snap-of-their-fingers repeal of our constitutional freedoms intended to collapse our economy.

The simple truth is the Corona virus has had very little affect, causing less than 125 deaths nationwide. What has caused the unprecedented closing down of America is media-hype about the Corona virus. We are suffering the consequences of deranged Democrats and fake news media willing to sacrifice everything to stop a president from implementing his America-first agenda.

Democrats and fake news media view the Corona virus as blood in the water to create a feeding frenzy of criticism of Trump.

Remarkably, every crazy, illegal and evil scheme to remove Trump from the White House has failed. So will Corona-madness. Why? Because God put Trump into the White House and only God will take him out.

Two buddies of mine said the hysteria is causing seniors in nursing homes to be isolated from visits from their loved ones. But Democrats/fake news media do not care. All they ever care about is furthering their socialist, communist and progressive agendas and damaging Trump. Thank God Trump caught and denied Democrat Nancy Pelosi’s sneaky attempt to hide abortion funding in Trump’s Corona relief spending.

In response to a 50 degree temperature day after people who have been cooped up in their homes because of a brutally cold winter, people rush outside wearing t-shirts and flip-flops. I believe Americans will eventually respond the same way, becoming emotionally-burnt out over Corona-madness. This will spark a huge economic boom.

Folks, the light I see at the end of the Corona-madness tunnel is the strong will, spirit and instincts of the American people. Without analyzing their feelings through a lens of political ideology, Americans will begin demanding to have their lives back; working, weddings, kid’s birthday parties, restaurants and so on. We are Americans!

Trump is the perfect man in office when that day comes. He will gladly say, “I am with you folks. Let’s get back to keeping America great!”

Trump Clears Way to Use Malaria Drug Against COVID-19

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VIDEO: Tucker Carlson discusses Chloroquine with Dr. Greg Rigano.

In what he called a “game-changer or maybe not,” President Donald Trump on Thursday directed the Food and Drug Administration to clear regulatory hurdles and move toward expanding use of a malaria drug to battle the coronavirus.

The drug chloroquine has shown “very, very encouraging early results,” Trump said during the daily press conference on the coronavirus disease, which health officials call COVID-19. The drug has been used to treat malaria since 1944.

“If treatments … in Europe, Japan, or other nations are known to be safe against the virus, we’ll use that information to protect the health and safety of the American people,” Trump said, later adding:

This is a common malaria drug. It’s also a drug used for strong arthritis. If somebody has pretty serious arthritis, [he] also uses this in a somewhat different form. But it is known as a malaria drug. It has been around for a long time, and it’s very powerful.

The nice part is it has been around for a long time. So we know if things don’t go as planned, it’s not going to kill anybody. When you go with a brand new drug, you don’t know. You have to see and you have to get a long test. But this has been used in different forms, a very powerful drug, and it has shown very encouraging, very, very encouraging, early results. And we’re going to be able to make that drug available almost immediately.

That’s where the FDA is so great. They’ve gone through the approval process. It has been approved, and they took it down [in availability] from many, many months to immediate. So, we are going to be able to make that drug available.

In these trying times, we must turn to the greatest document in the history of the world to promise freedom and opportunity to its citizens for guidance. Find out more now >>

As of noon Thursday, there were 10,442 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the United States and 150 deaths, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That’s up from 97 deaths reported on the site the day before.

FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn said his agency is providing American innovators “regulatory flexibility with scientific oversight” to expedite development of other safe drugs that could be a bridge until a vaccine for COVID-19 is fully developed.

Hahn, a physician, noted that phase one of vaccine trials are happening.

“We expect that to take 12 months to get to completion, to get to a time when we can actually approve a vaccine. These are all things to bridge to the prevention part of this with the vaccine,” Hahn said of medicines. “It’s exciting work, and the president is right. This is record-breaking time for the development of a vaccine and impressive public-private partnership.”

Hahn said the FDA will continue to explore whether “experimental or an off-the-shelf drug that is used for something else can safely and effectively treat patients” infected with the coronavirus.

COLUMN BY

Fred Lucas

Fred Lucas is the White House correspondent for The Daily Signal and co-host of “The Right Side of History” podcast. Lucas is also the author of “Tainted by Suspicion: The Secret Deals and Electoral Chaos of Disputed Presidential Elections.” Send an email to Fred. Twitter: @FredLucasWH.

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A Note for our Readers:

This is a critical year in the history of our country. With the country polarized and divided on a number of issues and with roughly half of the country clamoring for increased government control—over health care, socialism, increased regulations, and open borders—we must turn to America’s founding for the answers on how best to proceed into the future.

The Heritage Foundation has compiled input from more than 100 constitutional scholars and legal experts into the country’s most thorough and compelling review of the freedoms promised to us within the United States Constitution into a free digital guide called Heritage’s Guide to the Constitution.

They’re making this guide available to all readers of The Daily Signal for free today!

GET ACCESS NOW! >>

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Signal column is republished with permission. All rights reserved.

VIDEO: The Vortex — The Last Chance

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TRANSCRIPT

No one in America who really, deeply cares about the future of the United States misses the point that what people on both sides are actually voting on is the makeup of the U.S. Supreme Court.

For decades, and largely while political conservatives — including a hefty number of Catholics — were asleep at the switch, the Marxist Left was implementing a takeover of the country through judicial fiat. The Left resorted to the courts because they could not get done what they wanted through state legislatures. So, in an effort to usurp the will of the people, they populated the nation’s elite law schools with social radicals, some of whom, after decades, were able to rise high in positions within the federal judiciary.

By the time political conservatives caught on to the plan, it was too late. The Left sufficiently controlled the courts, including the Supreme Court, to force its will on the people. Once something becomes legal, in people’s minds, it tends to be more readily viewed as acceptable, even moral. Even formerly controversial issues take on an air of respectability, and opposition to them now becomes seen as narrow-mindedness.

But the composition of the High Court — the ages of various justices — brought the issue to a head in the 2016 presidential election. It was almost a certainty that the court could shift to the right, even marginally, if Trump was elected. So while the Left was alarmed, the Right was ecstatic at the possibility. After decades and decades of hard, grinding, thankless work, the possibility was coming into focus that Donald Trump in the White House might finally hand the brass ring to the cause of political conservatism.

And the issue was abortion. If Hillary were to win, it would be game over, potentially forever. And recall, during the 2016 race, there was already one vacancy on the court — the seat of Antonin Scalia — a conservative seat. Securing that seat with a liberal, as Obama had nominated in the person of Merrick Garland, would have been the death-knell.

Fast forward to 2020 and a rapidly aging, in-poor-health Ruth Bader Ginsburg, with one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel. As one expert told Church Militant, “The old gal will last one year. She isn’t going to last five.” If Trump wins re-election it is virtually guaranteed that he will replace Ginsburg, one of the most Marxist-minded, pro-abortion, anti-God justices ever to sit on the bench.

But here’s a question — something to consider: If the court tips from its current 5–4 to 6–3 conservative bent — or even possibly 7–2 — before Trump’s second term is over, and then would overturn Roe v. Wade, what would happen?

Pondering that possibility, and even planning for it to some degree, the Left is arming itself and speaking openly of rebellion. It seems not that far-fetched that the same crowd that starts fires on college campuses when conservative speakers arrive and violently riots in the streets under the banner of Antifa would have little compunction about making blood run in those same streets if the Court toppled abortion. Current whispers of civil war might become louder than just whispers.

If that happens, if something like that — even on a somewhat limited scale — were to occur, it would, by definition, become a noble cause: the defense of innocent life.

There is not an honest man or woman walking who does not know that the Left supports child-murder. That is the central motivating issue around which all of American politics have evolved since the days of Ronald Reagan. That has been the central issue of the attempt to unseat Donald Trump for going on three years now, even up to the relative Marxist-media hype surrounding the coronavirus scare.

This is relative to what, you may ask? It’s relative to the swine flu epidemic that went on for more than a year under Obama and killed thousands of Americans. Nothing was done by the media giants in that case like is being done now. They have seized on a serious issue and are perfectly happy to use it to try and destabilize Trump — they’ll try anything to destabilize him — and it’s all because abortion is always playing in the background.

Abortion is and has been the topic that has been responsible for shaping the national debate for more than 40 years. It caused the bedlam surrounding the Brett Kavanaugh hearings — even the pounding on the doors of the High Court once he was confirmed. It was the admitted issue when New York Sen. Chuck Schumer hurled his invective and threats against both Justices Kavanaugh and Gorsuch — actually threatening them —for which he never apologized. The case he was talking about? Abortion.

But this is what pro-lifers need to note, and note hard: Given the rapidly changing demographics of the country — an essentially morally rudderless young population, opposed to religion and unfamiliar with natural law, this election is the last chance to secure and lock down a pro-life court. Pro-life voters will simply be overwhelmed by sheer numbers of the socialist-loving lefties by 2024.

In the midst of all this — with everything on the table — do not look to the U.S. bishops to make this point. Too many of them are registered Democrats themselves and do not possess supernatural faith. They are enamored with the Party of Death — even child-killers who are baptized Catholics they love schmoozing with.

The marriage between political conservatives and theologically orthodox Catholics has brought this moment to reality. It has been a gigantic, uphill struggle — a fight for the ages — and is now the last great clash over the future direction of the nation we will see in our lifetime. The Right has arrived at a point of equal footing, or at least as equal as it’s ever going to get. The victory must be secured and it must be secured now, because the moment will never arrive again as long as any of us are breathing.

In 233 days, we will know our future.

Pray, fast and act like you’ve never done before.

It is your solemn duty before the Lord of Life.

EDITORS NOTE: This Church Militant video is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

VIDEO: H1N1 Response VS COVID-19 Response, Why So Different? We Asked Rep. Roger Marshall, M.D.

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Dr. Roger Marshall, who representing Kansas’ first district spoke with the Daily Caller’s Stephanie Hamill about the the latest regarding the coronavirus pandemic.

He also discussed the differences between the 2009 H1N1 pandemic response and coronavirus response.

“First of all it has been sensationalized, so from day one the press has, they really have, the left socialist media has blown it out of proportion, they’ve used this as an attack tool on the president, but unfortunately it is a real virus and it has a higher mortality rate on our senior citizens especially those people with underlying medical problems” said Marshall.  

Marshall went on to discuss what Congress can do to help Americans suffering from COVID-19’s economic impact.

VIDEO BY

Stephanie Hamill

Video Columnist

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Brit Hume Describes A Coronavirus Scenario That Could Be ‘Quite Good News’ For President Trump

How China Corrupted The World Health Organization

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller video is republished with permission. © All rights reserved. The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of The Daily Caller.

Churches on the Front Lines of Responding to Coronavirus [+Podcast]

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A Time of Testing at the Church:

“Hunger doesn’t take a break at times like this.” And neither does Second Harvest Heartland.

For food bank workers like Allison O’Toole, coronavirus is only part of the country’s crisis. The other? Feeding struggling families and older people who don’t want to leave their homes.

But as the need intensifies, so are a lot of churches’ efforts. And that’s good news for everyone in these anxious times.

Despite the challenges, people like Cathy Maes of Minneapolis’ Loaves & Fishes are determined. All day Thursday, she says, she was in “intense conversations” with 33 churches and community centers about how they can keep the ministry running.

In these trying times, we must turn to the greatest document in the history of the world to promise freedom and opportunity to its citizens for guidance. Find out more now >>

Finally, after several back-and-forths, they agreed: the public dining service would continue. They’d just be extra careful.

“How bad would my heart feel if we stopped serving the people,” Maes said, on the verge of tears. “We have to feed them, because people need nourishment to be stronger in case they get the virus.”

Like the other 300 food banks in Minnesota, Maes’ working overtime to make sure they have the food and volunteers they need. It hasn’t been easy in a country where grocery shelves are bare and more restaurants are shutting down.

“This is an extreme situation,” agreed Dave Rudolph, “but we absolutely have to continue to be a lifeline.”

In Alabama, that lifeline is taking on a different look. Birmingham’s Church of the Highlands is opening up as an official state testing site, with help from the Jefferson County Public Department of Health.

Even though the church itself was forced to stream Sunday services, Pastor Chris Hodges is still committed to supporting and caring for the community. “We’re continuing to pray and believe God for health, healing, protection, and peace that passes all understanding.”

Just because the dynamic has changed, Michelle Lantz said in Michigan, doesn’t mean their mission has. Volunteers at Delta Presbyterian Church and other congregations are teaming up to store and distribute food now that school districts can’t.

Using a new drive-thru model, they’ve been able to bypass some of the issues and get pallets of food to families. Other teams are filling backpacks with food for students who don’t have access to the public school meals. And now that classes are postponed, they hope they could have more people in line to volunteer.

As for the church itself, a lot of pastors are seizing the moment to let their lights shine. “We need to hear God’s word and worship with His people more than ever,” Harvest Christian Fellowship’s Greg Laurie said.

And if there were ever a chance for the church to step up, Miles McPherson insisted, this is it.

While people are frantic and looking for answers, the church is in the unique position of providing them. As God’s people, we also have the opportunity to help and minister in ways that no one else can.

Maybe your state has advised that the church stop meeting in large numbers. That’s understandable. But there are other ways for congregations to have an impact. Just because pastors can’t preach to full pews in some places doesn’t mean that they can’t open the building for prayer or gather in smaller groups.

It’s time to think creatively about how we, as the church, can lean into this crisis and be the place of stability and calm that Americans desperately need. There are always ways for Christians to engage the community if we refuse to hunker down and shrink back.

For those who aren’t working, this can be a time to serve those in high-risk categories who cannot or should not leave their homes. Churches should begin within their own congregations and then expand to the greater community in areas like assisting the elderly with grocery shopping or prescription pick-up. Prayerfully consider how you and your church family move forward.

This should go without saying, but please continue to support your local church with your tithes and offerings. If you don’t have electronic banking, most church offices remain open, so please drop your contribution off with your church so that ministry can continue.

Above all, we need to be a source of strength and encouragement, as I discuss in my message below.

Tony Perkins’s Washington Update is written with the aid of FRC senior writers.

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EDITORS NOTE: This FRC-Action column with video is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

The Media’s Appalling Fixation on Trump’s Use of ‘Chinese Virus’ [Video]

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America is in a state of lockdown, the stock market is plummeting, and countless people around the world could get sick and die as the result of a deadly pandemic, but still many in the American press will use their time to give cover to the People’s Republic of China.

At a press conference Wednesday, President Donald Trump was asked why he used the phrase “Chinese virus” to describe the new coronavirus disease, known as COVID-19.

Cecilia Vega of ABC News asked: “Why do you keep calling this the Chinese virus, there are reports of dozens of incidents of bias against Chinese Americans in this country. Your own aide, [HHS] Secretary [Alex] Azar, says he does not use this term. He says ethnicity does not cause the virus. Why do you keep using this? A lot of people think it’s racist.”

Other reporters asked essentially the same question.

In these trying times, we must turn to the greatest document in the history of the world to promise freedom and opportunity to its citizens for guidance. Find out more now >>

“Because it comes from China,” Trump responded to Vega. “It’s not racist at all. No, not at all. It comes from China, that’s why. It comes from China. I want to be accurate.”

Trump doubled down, explaining that he chose to use the “Chinese virus” phrase to push back on the idea, spread by Chinese officials, that the virus was started by the U.S. military.

Again, in this time of crisis, our esteemed press is asking the questions most on the minds of the American people, right?

Just unbelievable. What’s worse than the knee-jerk speech-policing in such a serious time is how it’s clearly being used for the purposes of China’s propaganda.

Trump is right about his rhetoric. The virus originated in Wuhan, China, and it’s appropriate to label it by where it came from, as we do with many other viruses.

Just a few months ago, most American media outlets had no problem identifying COVID-19 with China, unless they think they were peddling racism and xenophobia as many now claim.

What changed?

As Trump noted, Chinese officials and various state-backed media outlets have stepped up their campaign to lay this disaster at the feet of the United States.

They are using the idea that calling COVID-19 the “Chinese virus,” “China coronavirus,” “Wuhan virus,” or anything else that may direct attention toward their government’s misbehavior is racist and must be silenced.

It’s a message that’s well-tailored to suck in the social justice warrior journalists and left-wing commentariat to carry out the goals of the communist Chinese regime.

It’s important to keep a focus on the origin of the pandemic in light of the fact that the actions of the Chinese communist government to suppress information in the early stages of the outbreak have deeply exacerbated this catastrophe.

It’s incredible that in the face of the Chinese government’s expulsion of American journalists and refusal to provide reliable information about the outbreak in China, our own press is most troubled by the president’s attempt to draw attention to this with a simple phrase of identification.

And if American journalists are so concerned about racism and government mistreatment of minorities, why not get more worked up about China’s current treatment of Muslim Uighurs who’ve been detained in concentration camps and, according to reports, are being used as essentially slave laborers to make up for labor shortages.

The biggest threat we will face in coming months isn’t racism, it’s the potential for a massive pandemic worse than any we’ve seen in a century.

It’s especially important that as we first manage the very serious health crisis, we also remember how a ruthless authoritarian regime turned a limited catastrophe into a global one.

Hopefully this message will get through to the press. Maybe now is the time to restore some of their lost credibility rather than further damaging it.

COMMENTARY BY

Jarrett Stepman

Jarrett Stepman is a contributor to The Daily Signal and co-host of The Right Side of History podcast. Send an email to Jarrett. He is also the author of the new book, “The War on History: The Conspiracy to Rewrite America’s Past.”Twitter: .

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A Note for our Readers:

This is a critical year in the history of our country. With the country polarized and divided on a number of issues and with roughly half of the country clamoring for increased government control—over health care, socialism, increased regulations, and open borders—we must turn to America’s founding for the answers on how best to proceed into the future.

The Heritage Foundation has compiled input from more than 100 constitutional scholars and legal experts into the country’s most thorough and compelling review of the freedoms promised to us within the United States Constitution into a free digital guide called Heritage’s Guide to the Constitution.

They’re making this guide available to all readers of The Daily Signal for free today!

GET ACCESS NOW! >>

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Signal column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

Keeping Your Head During the Coronavirus Crisis

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Some wag once changed the opening line of Rudyard Kipling’s classic poem, “If,” this way: “If you can keep your head while all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you…you haven’t understood the gravity of the situation.”

And so it seems to be with the coronavirus crisis.

I can’t remember the last time church was canceled. (I think it was during one of the hurricanes we frequently experience in Florida.) We as a family ended up having a mini-service in our own home.

On the other hand, one can’t help but feel that fears surrounding the virus are being exaggerated.  We are taking all due precautions because of the coronavirus.

Every morning when I arise, coronavirus or not, I try and repeat a number of Scriptural truths to put me in the right frame of mind. It keeps me positive and focused. I go through them in the night as well.

I recommend this practice because this is such a negative world. I cannot imagine what life would be like if all you did was watch cable news. To watch that news all the time, one could easily lose perspective on life.

Here are several Biblical truths I try to bathe my mind with. My goal is the renewal of my mind:

  1. All things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purposes.
  2. I give thanks in all circumstances.
  3. If God is for us, who can be against us?
  4. He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how will He not also, along with Him, freely give us all things?
  5. Because of Jesus, I am righteous in God’s sight.
  6. God is pleased with me.
  7. God approves of me.
  8. I have been forgiven. I forgive those who have sinned against me. I walk in forgiveness. I don’t hold any grudges.
  9. I am a son of God.
  10. I am a friend of God.
  11. I was chosen before the foundation of the earth.
  12. My past is forgiven.
  13. My present is abundant life in Christ.
  14. My future is eternal life with Christ.
  15. I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.
  16. And my God shall supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus.
  17. The Lord will fulfill His purpose for me.
  18. By His grace I will fulfill my God-given destiny.
  19. God promises to give us wisdom when we ask for it, believing.
  20. I am more than a conqueror through Him who loves us.
  21. God is leading me, and I follow His lead.
  22. Greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world. (This means: God is greater than Satan.)
  23. Look to others, and be distressed. Look to self, and be depressed. Look to Jesus, and be blessed.
  24. By God’s grace, I am generous, and I look out for the interests of others.
  25. He who began a good work in you will complete it until the day of Christ Jesus.
  26. Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart.
  27. In all your ways, acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.
  28. God says, “No good thing will I withhold from those who walk uprightly.”
  29. With God, all things are possible.
  30. To live is Christ. To die is gain.

While taking all common-sense precautions—including getting plenty of sleep and exercise and, of course, washing, washing, washing—focus on God to stay positive in a negative world.

This piece is being written around the time of St. Patrick’s Day. I’m reminded how the great saint, who brought Christianity to Ireland, used to pray regularly for God’s safety in very dangerous times. He developed (or perhaps it was developed later, based on his teachings) a prayer called, “The Breastplate of St. Patrick.”

Tradition tells us St. Patrick prayed: “I arise today / Through God’s strength to pilot me: / God’s might to uphold me, / God’s wisdom to guide me, / God’s eye to look before me, / God’s ear to hear me, / God’s word to speak for me, / God’s hand to guard me, / God’s way to lie before me, / God’s shield to protect me…/ Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me, / Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me, / Christ on my right, Christ on my left, / Christ when I lie down, Christ when I sit down, Christ when I arise.” Amen.

May God help us to keep our head during the coronavirus. Try to stay safe. This too shall pass.

© All rights reserved.

We’re All Homeschoolers Now

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In the fight against coronavirus, 33 states have closed some 64,000 schools, affecting more than 32.5 million students, Education Week reports.

Texas is waiving state testing requirements for school districts, New York is relaxing state requirements for how many days a year schools have to be open, and, in California, the Los Angeles Unified School District announced a partnership with PBS to put school lessons on television for students at home.

The District of Columbia and Puerto Rico also have closed schools to help curb the spread of the new coronavirus disease, which health experts call COVID-19.

Like other institutions, schools should implement social-distancing policies. Keeping that policy in mind while trying to help needy students, some schools—including those in Ohio, Michigan, and New York—have begun providing pick-up breakfasts and lunches at designated places for eligible students.

In these trying times, we must turn to the greatest document in the history of the world to promise freedom and opportunity to its citizens for guidance. Find out more now >>

A rapidly flourishing market of online resources is beginning to meet the content needs of millions of students across the country.

Numerous companies such as Zearn and STMath are providing their materials online for free during the coronavirus outbreak. Existing options such as Khan Academy offer a wealth of educational resources for families navigating homeschooling for perhaps the first time. Prenda microschool is offering its coursework to families for just $100 for the remainder of the year.

Here is a fantastic list of online learning resources that every family should bookmark on their computers during this pandemic.

National School Choice Week has online resources categorized by content area. You can find online tools such as communications platforms, math, social studies, English language arts, and foreign language education.

Be sure to check out “Daddy School” while you’re at it.

Also available are virtual visits to museums, including the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., the Guggenheim Museum in New York City, and 2,500 other museums that have partnered with Google to make their art and virtual tours available online.

The Met will offer opera performances online for free beginning at 7:30 every evening through March 22. When you have a chance, check out some 450 online courses available for free from Ivy League universities.

Many of these online learning providers have been doing this for a long time, and traditional school districts should look to either imitate them or work with them—so that districts don’t try to create something from scratch and then realize it doesn’t work.

The list of online resources for families and teachers is growing as social distancing becomes the necessary, new normal. But policy actions by officials in school districts and state governments, as well as at the federal level, can maximize health and safety and provide learning opportunities for students.

District and State Level Policies

  • States and school districts should put online learning resources on their websites. They could include links such as those above to existing private resources and tools, along with links to virtual platforms (such as Blackboard) enabling families to contact teachers directly, access lessons, and stay in touch virtually with classmates.
  • State restrictions on teacher certification should be lifted temporarily to free up the supply of online tutors, allowing anyone with a bachelor’s degree to provide instruction online.
  • States should restructure per-pupil K-12 education funding in the form of emergency or temporary education savings accounts for families of children with special needs, so that they may continue to receive the therapy they need. Five states currently have ESA options in place. (Parents receive a portion of their child’s per-pupil public school funding in a restricted-use account that they then can use to pay for any education-related service, product, or provider of choice.)

Federal Policies

  • At the federal level, Congress should immediately but temporarily make funding authorized under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act both student-centered and portable, allowing children with special needs to access learning services to which they’re entitled under federal law. These IDEA funds could be used to pay for in-home tutors and behavioral therapies, among numerous other allowable uses, to help children with special needs continue to have access to service providers that are so critical in their lives.
  • The Elementary and Secondary Education Act requires every state to administer reading, mathematics, and science assessments annually to all students in tested grades, the outcomes of which are used in state accountability plans. Although the U.S. Department of Education currently is providing targeted waivers to federal testing provisions under ESEA, it temporarily should provide a blanket waiver to all states, enabling them to postpone testing until this pandemic has subsided.

The coronavirus pandemic has created unprecedented health challenges, which have affected schools from the earliest grades through college. These temporary measures can provide some relief and flexibility, helping schools to better meet the needs of families during this challenging time.

And the growing body of online learning resources can help parents as they navigate this new normal.

COMMENTARY BY

Lindsey Burke

Lindsey M. Burke researches and writes on federal and state education issues as the Will Skillman fellow in education policy at The Heritage Foundation. Read her research.Twitter: .

RELATED ARTICLE: More Than 6.1 Million CA Students Might Not Be Going Back to School Before Summer

A Note for our Readers:

This is a critical year in the history of our country. With the country polarized and divided on a number of issues and with roughly half of the country clamoring for increased government control—over health care, socialism, increased regulations, and open borders—we must turn to America’s founding for the answers on how best to proceed into the future.

The Heritage Foundation has compiled input from more than 100 constitutional scholars and legal experts into the country’s most thorough and compelling review of the freedoms promised to us within the United States Constitution into a free digital guide called Heritage’s Guide to the Constitution.

They’re making this guide available to all readers of The Daily Signal for free today!

GET ACCESS NOW! >>

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Signal column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

Don’ts and Dos on Wuhan Flu Virus

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Some of the views expressed here are controversial. So, do ask your doctor. I hope you have one—not just the HMO or retail clinic “provider.”

Don’t panic. That is always good advice. If you, like the world’s economy, operate on just-in-time inventories, and did not take advice to stock up 3 weeks ago, do not join a mob at a big-box store. Somebody there is no doubt infected. Plus, there’s the risk of getting trampled or injured in a fist fight over the last roll of toilet paper. Most of the world survives without that luxury good. If you have no rice or beans or pasta in the pantry, that is more serious, but you should still avoid mobs if at all possible. Take-out and drive-through places are booming.

Don’t treat fever without a doctor’s advice. Fever is not a disease. It is an important defense mechanism. Very high fevers (say 105 degrees) can cause brain damage, and children can have seizures. But don’t pop Tylenol or ibuprofen at the first sign of fever. Many of the casualties in the 1918 pandemic might have been caused by heavy use of aspirin. Like aspirin, popular nonsteroidal anti-inflammatories (NSAIDS) such ibuprofen also have detrimental effects on blood clotting. Try lukewarm sponge baths for comfort.

Don’t rush out and get a flu shot. I know, a lot of doctors and public health authorities urge everybody to do this. Influenza can kill you, and the flu shot decreases that risk by 30% to 60%—but there is evidence that it can make COVID-19 worse, both from the earlier SARS epidemic and lab research. Like with so many things in medicine, we have to play the odds.

  • Don’t go to the emergency room or urgent care unless you are severely ill. There will be sick people there, and you might catch something. You also might end up with a big bill, say for a CT scan you didn’t really need. And if you have the flu or a cold or COVID-19, and don’t need IV fluids or oxygen, they can’t do anything for you. Telephone advice lines could help greatly.
  • Don’t go to events that are crowded, especially indoors in poorly ventilated rooms. Staying home is good.
  • Don’t demand to be tested and rely on the results. The tests are still in short supply and not very accurate. If you are at low risk, a positive test is likely to be a false positive. And if you are infected, the test may be negative at first. We need much more testing—mainly for public health monitoring.
  • Don’t waste. Expired medications are probably still good. Most drugs or essential ingredients are made in China, and supplies are running out. Masks (also mostly made in China) are meant to be disposable, but likely can’t be replaced (see below).
  • Don’t touch your face or your eyes. That is very hard—preventing that is one function of a mask and eye protection.
  • Don’t fall for internet scams, or malware. Hucksters will always be around to try to profit from panics. A new type of malicious virus is embedded malware in sites that come up on a search for information. (If you want to find the Johns Hopkins University dashboard of cases and deaths, go to the university’s website, don’t Google “coronavirus map.”)

Now for some dos:

  • Do prepare to take care of yourself and your family. Be sure you have a fever thermometer, disposable gloves, plastic garbage bags, and cleaning supplies. A pulse oximeter, available in many places for around $40, is good to have to check oxygen levels.
  • Do clean and disinfect surfaces such as doorknobs, telephones, computer keyboards, toilets, and countertops often. Virus can persist there for days.
  • Do remember that sunlight is the best disinfectant. If you don’t have a pocket ultraviolet lamp (they are or were available on amazon), try putting things like masks or paper currency out in the sun. The idea should be rigorously tested, but in times of need, you may have to guess.
  • Do wash your hands often and use hand sanitizer. With SARS-CoV-2, most disinfectants work, including 70-percent-alcohol-based sanitizers.
  • Do put a mask on sick people if you can. For protecting yourself you need a minimum of an N95 mask and eye protection.
  • Do take your vitamins. Most people may be vitamin D deficient. Your need for vitamin C escalates with infection. Some 50 tons of vitamin C was shipped to Wuhan, and studies of effectiveness are underway.
  • Do get your essential prescriptions refilled for 90 days—the supply chain depends on China. If your managed-care plan won’t pay, consider paying cash. You may be able to get a good price with a coupon from goodrx.com.
  • Do protect your immune system, with adequate sleep, exercise, fresh air, and diet, especially avoiding sugar if you feel ill.
  • Do help your neighbors, and be responsible about protecting others as well as yourself from contagion.

© All rights reserved.

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Because of the Coronavirus, Borders Suddenly Matter: New York State even establishes internal borders.

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There is a Yiddish expression that translated states, “Man makes plans and God laughs.”  In other words, for all of the hubris of the human species, things do not always go as planned.  Circumstances beyond human control can easily obliterate the best laid plans.

Scientists currently believe that the mighty dinosaurs that inhabited the earth for millions of years were suddenly rendered extinct when an asteroid slammed into what is now the Yucatan Peninsula, roughly 65 million years ago.

Literally overnight the world changed and the mighty dinosaurs were wiped off the face of the earth.  Some disappeared entirely and others, it is believed, morphed into other creatures such as birds.

The stage was thus set for the rise of the mammals and, ultimately the human species.

We can hope that today another drastic event, the sudden appearance of the coronavirus (COVID-19)  will lead to the extinction of another species- the globalists and lead to a resurgence of leaders who, not unlike President Trump, believe in the value of national sovereignty, not just for the United States but all countries.

Greed-driven globalists have, for decades, demanded a borderless world insisting, “Borders, we don’t need no stinking borders” (slightly misquoting the famous line from the old film “The Treasure of the Sierra Madre.”)

The globalists, driven by greed and unbridled hunger for power concluded that in a world without borders, workers could be moved around the world, not unlike chess pieces on a huge chessboard to drive down wages.  Merchandise could be moved around the world without tariffs, without any obstructions and as a consequence, the super wealthy could become even wealthier while the middle class would be relegated to museums that display extinct species.

Proponents of this transformation claimed it would lead to “The New World Order.”

In reality it would lead to nothing short of tyranny.

Borders are our nation’s first line of defense and last line of defense, yet you would never know it if you listened to the speeches and accusation hurled with rancor by the globalists.  The Democrats who used to support immigration law enforcement and the securing of America’s borders against the illegal and un-inspected entry of cargo and people have done a total reversal and now call for the end of immigration law enforcement.

In my previous article for FrontPage Magazine, Comprehensive Immigration Reform Should be Renamed the “Overwhelm America Act” I provided a direct quote from Bernie Sanders who, in 2007 proclaimed:

I think as you’ve heard today, sanctions against employers who employ illegal immigrants is virtually nonexistent. Our border is very porous.”“And I think at a time when the middle class is shrinking, the last thing we need is to bring over in a period of years, millions of people into this country who are prepared to lower wages for American workers.

None of the “journalists” who are covering the Democratic presidential primaries, who have become the masters of ambush or “gotcha” interviews, have ever confronted Sanders about his reversal on this extremely critical issue.

Did Bernie simply accept bribes from his “campaign contributors” who want the end of border and immigration law enforcement?  Alternatively, and more likely, has he and his Communist fellow traveler Democrats decided that the destruction of America’s middle class would propel millions of desperate Americans to the Left to seek financial assistance as they lose their jobs to foreign workers or, at a minimum, face massive wage suppression or even wage reduction making ever increasing numbers of Americans dependent on government subsidies offered by the increasingly radicalized Democratic Party?

Perhaps it is a combination of both.

New York’s Governor Andrew Cuomo has come to vilify ICE (Immigration and Customs Agents), referring to them as thugs.  New York State recently enacted the “Green Light Law” that blocks federal immigration law enforcement agencies from having access to DMV (Department of Motor Vehicles) databases.

As I noted in my recent article, this lunacy is a gift to criminals and terrorists that would keep on giving while undermining public safety and national security.

The purpose for imprisoning law violators is to punish those who commit crimes, to deter others who might consider committing similar crimes and to protect potential victims of criminals.  In essence, you could say that prisons quarantine sociopaths from society.

Increasingly, however, the Left has sought to turn criminals into the victims and have enacted measures that result in violent thugs and gang members being turned loose and back onto the street where they can continue to ply their criminal “trades.”

As a consequence innocent people have been injured and killed in the name of “Social Justice.”

Deportation of criminal aliens can help to address the perennial problem of recidivism when prisons fail to live up to their lofty and optimistic goals of being “correctional institutions.”

However “Sanctuary Cities” and “Sanctuary States” refuse to cooperate with ICE and infuriatingly, innocent people have again paid the price, all too often, the ultimate price, for this lunacy.

Now, however, in the wake of the emergence of the coronavirus countries around the world are suddenly attempting to secure their borders to prevent infected people from entering.  Following President Trump’s lead countries around the world are imposing entry restrictions on aliens who seek entry but have recently been in countries where the coronavirus is present.

While it is likely that the coronavirus will move around the world whether or not such measures are imposed, the idea is to slow the spread of the virus so that hospitals and medical resources can deal with the onslaught of patients without being overwhelmed in a short period of time.

This sensible strategy can, and hopefully, will save many lives around the world.

What is truly incredible, is that because of the virus, New York’s Governor Cuomo has established a Containment Zone around hard-hit New Rochelle in an effort to prevent the virus from spreading outward from this community.  In essence, he has established a border around this town in an effort to quarantine the residents who live here.

It is also worth noting that as I wrote in an earlier article, The Coronavirus and China’s Travel Ban:

Indeed, on January 24, 2020, New Jersey Senator Bob Melendez posted a news release on his official website, “Booker, Menendez demand coronavirus screenings at Newark airport as illness spreads.”

The inspections process is conducted at ports of entry by Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to prevent the entry of aliens who pose a threat to public health, public safety, national security and the hence the lives and livelihoods of American and lawful immigrants.

A section of the Immigration and Nationality Act, 8 U.S. Code § 1182 enumerates the categories of aliens who are statutorily ineligible to enter the United States and makes it clear that our immigration laws have nothing to do with bigotry, racism and xenophobia, but everything to do with protecting America and Americans.

Yet Cuomo and other radical Democrats are determined to undermine and thwart the efforts ICE and CBP, two component agencies of the Department of Homeland Security, to protect America and Americans.

Sanctuary policies and the obstruction of immigration law enforcement must suffer the fate of the dinosaurs and be rendered extinct- the sooner the better.

CLICK HERE TO READ ALL OF OUR ARTICLES ON THE WUHAN VIRUS

RELATED ARTICLE: Due to Coronavirus, Trump to Change Mexico Border Controls

EDITORS NOTE: This FrontPage Magazine column is republished with permission. All rights reserved.

VIDEOS: President Trump Secures No-Cost Virus Testing for Americans

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The Trump Administration is leading an “all-of-America” approach, as Vice President Mike Pence calls it, to protect Americans during the global Coronavirus outbreak.

“Last week, at this table, the President met with pharmaceutical leaders, we met with nursing home leaders, leaders of commercial labs, airline industries,” Vice President Pence said. “We’re bringing all of the businesses of the country to bear to protect the health of the American people.”

Earlier today, President Trump and the Vice President met with executives from America’s largest health insurance companies, where they announced a major deal.

Please visit Coronavirus.com to learn more.

Vice President Pence: We are defending all patients against surprise billing

“I’m pleased to report, as you requested, Mr. President, that all the insurance companies here—either today or before today—have agreed to waive all copays on coronavirus testing and extend coverage for coronavirus treatment in all of their benefit plans,” the Vice President said.

Medicare and Medicaid announced recently that beneficiaries will have Coronavirus testing and treatment covered. Now, private insurers have made that commitment, as well.

Insurers also agreed to cover telemedicine services, which will allow all patients—particularly among the vulnerable senior population—to be treated without feeling the need to go to a hospital or doctor’s office.

After sitting down with insurance leaders at the White House, the President traveled to Capitol Hill this afternoon, where he and Vice President Pence met with lawmakers. “We just had a meeting on stimulus, and you’ll be hearing about it soon. But it was a great meeting,” President Trump said.

He also had one important message for Americans during this time: We’re prepared.

“Everybody has to be vigilant and has to be careful. But be calm,” the President said. Thanks to early preventative measures by the Administration, as well as the strong fundamentals in our economy and job market, America is in great shape to weather any storm.

Watch today’s Coronavirus Task Force briefing live at 5:30 p.m. ET.

President Trump: Be vigilant, careful, and calm in response to Coronavirus

MUST READ: President Trumps’s Coronavirus Guidelines for America: 15 Days to Slow the Spread.

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