How about another dose of economic vaccine?

The first doses of the Pfizer vaccine have been administered to frontline medical personnel in New York. A good day for Michigan-based Pfizer and for the world.

But our garbage Congress refuses to act on economic relief in the America of the second lockdowns. 

You probably haven't heard of the restaurant version of the Petticoat Junction. But its closure will be a hammer blow not only to the people who worked there, but also to the people who have for decades patronized this truck stop restaurant just outside of my hometown.

My anger with both houses of our national legislature for the posturing and slow-walking of relief is nearing nuclear fusion levels. The suffering is real, and the knowing, calculated indifference to it is the kind of behavior that destroys political legitimacy across the board. 

The deliberate destruction of livelihoods and the refusal to extend a helping hand is fertile soil for unrest. The grim sequel to 2020 beckons.

We have had a couple of 1000+ case days here in Michigan over the past week.

And Macomb County has been an area of growth.

Our micro-managing governor is going to issue another decree, I can feel it.

But you can count on her to not issue an edict that will keep virus patients out of nursing homes, because she's right and everyone else is wrong.

Not so by the way, with my mother-in-law in a home that saw an early outbreak, my dislike for Whitmer is difficult to quantify. Her refusal to keep virus patients out of nursing homes--which is now unique in the United States--is, bluntly, manslaughter.  

Maybe now that she is no longer auditioning to be Mr. 25th Amendment's sidekick, she will relent. But I won't count on it. 

Nursing homes, which have been the focal point of the epidemic in this country since March, are responsible for at least 40 percent of all deaths attributed to the coronavirus. Governors in vast majority of states decided some time ago that no one infected with the virus should be sent to a nursing home and that every other imaginable precaution should be taken to ensure that the disease is not introduced to places in which it is guaranteed to spread like wildfire. Among them, after a long delay, was the Democratic governor of New York, Andrew Cuomo, who has otherwise distinguished himself during the present crisis mostly for a series of obnoxious CNN appearances with his brother, Chris.

This has not been the case in my home state of Michigan. Two weeks ago, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Cuomo's fellow Democrat, vetoed a piece of legislation that would have prevented patients with active COVID-19 infections from being placed in nursing homes. Instead, the legislation would have required these individuals to be treated in entirely separate, otherwise empty facilities reserved exclusively for those who have already contracted the disease.

It is impossible to mount a scientific justification for Whitmer's veto. It was an act of pure spite, a move that signaled nothing save her unlimited contempt for the Republican-controlled state legislature. Her feeble defense — that not placing virus patients in nursing homes where their chances of infecting their fellow occupants are all but guaranteed would have violated their medical rights and privacy rights — is risible on its face. Where were the supposed rights of the same individuals when they were moved from hospitals to nursing homes, ostensibly in accordance with guidelines from the CDC? Where were the rights of those who would be exposed to this lethal disease? Only three days after the first case of the virus was confirmed in Michigan, the head of the Healthcare Association of Michigan proposed treating coronavirus patients in vacant facilities in a widely shared letter. This idea, which would almost certainly have saved hundreds and perhaps even thousands of lives, was imperiously dismissed out of hand by Whitmer.

Yes, she remains above water in Michigan polls thanks to a fawning press corps, she's energetic, and the fact that she projects decisiveness with her flowing ink pen. 

I will finish with a quote from German general Kurt von Hammerstein-Equord, who categorized officers as follows:

I distinguish four types. There are clever, hardworking, stupid, and lazy officers. Usually two characteristics are combined.

Some are clever and hardworking; their place is the General Staff.

The next ones are stupid and lazy; they make up 90 percent of every army and are suited to routine duties.

Anyone who is both clever and lazy is qualified for the highest leadership duties, because he possesses the mental clarity and strength of nerve necessary for difficult decisions.

One must beware of anyone who is both stupid and hardworking; he must not be entrusted with any responsibility because he will always only cause damage.

"Never Again What?"

New York really is the most awful place in the United States.

All apologies to the good people who are there, among whom I count friends. 

But this fills me with a loathing I cannot quantify.

Behold your future, America: calling on the authorities to raid Jewish kids at school...and getting them to respond.

All the while loudly pretending that it's about health in a city where people have been packed armpit-to-armpit in violation of the law for weeks, whether at protests, the subways or just chilling in Central Park. Not to mention all the elderly slaughtered by State edict forcing the infected into nursing homes by their In-Case-of-Fire-Break-Glass hero.

Sure--you're all about health.

The reality is, they can safely stick it to Orthodox Jews, that's what really drives this and gives them that warm, happy feeling.

These shiny jack boots/

Are longing to stomp/
Right through the very heart of it/
New York, New York

I wanna to wake up/

In a city that welds Jews out/

And find I'm king of the parks/

Top of the rats

Those little school Jews/

Are going to pay/

We'll make a brand new Kristallnacht/

In old New York/

If we can make it there/

We'll make it ev'rywhere/
It's up to you, New York, New Yooooork!

I don't know about you.

But my tolerance level for subliterate fanatics who don't know their asses from any particular hole in the ground has gone far past the red-line.

The statues damaged were those honoring American Revolutionary War heroes John Barry and Casimir Pulaski, as well as Civil War military figures David Farragut, James McPherson and George Thomas, all of whom fought for the Union forces.

Statues of U.S. statesman Daniel Webster and Anglo-Irish statesman/philosopher Edmund Burke were also defaced. The repairs to the Gandhi statue are being handled by the Embassy of India.

The only people I have less patience for are those who make excuses for or ignore this behavior outright.

Mother of the Year.

That would be Danielle Lee Priebe, 31, of Brighton, Michigan:

Police said Priebe left her children home alone June 8 and that a neighbor saw the children outside crying and screaming at the intersection of their road for their mother for 40 minutes before she took them into her home and fed them. Police said Priebe indicated that she had returned merchandise to Meijer.

Police alleged Priebe again left her children home alone on July 1.

Almost as awful are those who watched the poor kids wailing for 40 minutes.

Hey, guys--according to a commenter on the story...she's single! 

But apparently a bit self-absorbed.

It turns out we have capital punishment in Michigan after all.

Macomb County just executed a guy for unpaid traffic tickets.

It was a very, very slow execution at that--it took seventeen days for David Stojcevski to die.

And the "authorities" watched him the whole time:


Stojcevski was a drug addict, and was taking Methadone, Xanax, and Klonopin to treat his addiction. But without access to these prescriptions, he quickly went into withdrawal while in jail, according to WDIV's expert. Withdrawal caused him to behave irrationally, but jail officials ignored these obvious symptoms and instead placed him in a cell for the mentally unstable. 

He was stripped naked—so that he couldn’t hurt himself—and forced to languish under the unceasing bright lights (the jail doesn’t turn them off, even at night).

At one point, Stojcevski began fighting with another (naked) inmate, who was then moved out of the cell. Sometime later, completely alone, Stojcevski could be seen reenacting the fight—a clear sign of hallucination.

On his last day of life, the man refused to touch his food and was too weak to get up from the floor.

At the first, obvious sign of drug withdrawal, Stojcevski should have been given adequate medical treatment. He was not a violent criminal, or a danger to the public. He was a man who hadn’t paid a traffic ticket.

Stojcevski’s family is suing Macomb County. A lawyer for the county told WDIV that the suit “lacks legal merit,” and expects the family to lose when the case goes to trial. Macomb County has no plans to settle, according to the lawyer.

We live in Macomb County, and all I have to say to the Stojcevski family is: 

I hope you win millions.

Your Loathsome, Despicable and Utterly Unprincipled "Free" Press at Work.

What's the difference between American media coverage of abortion and David Irving's Holocaust "scholarship"?

The former have better production values and megatons more hypocrisy. 

Good on Carly Fiorina for hitting back.

[Warning: you cannot unsee the horrific parts of the video, which shows a baby boy dying on a table.]

Some people have a problem with Hell as a concept. Me? 

Not today.

From the Moral Relativism Files.

Our nation's leaders have deemed that those who intervene to prevent or punish the rape of boys in Afghanistan must themselves be punished:

“'The reason we were here is because we heard the terrible things the Taliban were doing to people, how they were taking away human rights,' said Dan Quinn, a former Special Forces captain who beat up an American-backed militia commander for keeping a boy chained to his bed as a sex slave. 'But we were putting people into power who would do things that were worse than the Taliban did — that was something village elders voiced to me.'

The policy of instructing soldiers to ignore child sexual abuse by their Afghan allies is coming under new scrutiny, particularly as it emerges that service members like Captain Quinn have faced discipline, even career ruin, for disobeying it.

After the beating, the Army relieved Captain Quinn of his command and pulled him from Afghanistan. He has since left the military.

Four years later, the Army is also trying to forcibly retire Sgt. First Class Charles Martland, a Special Forces member who joined Captain Quinn in beating up the commander.

'The Army contends that Martland and others should have looked the other way (a contention that I believe is nonsense),' Representative Duncan Hunter, a California Republican who hopes to save Sergeant Martland’s career, wrote last week to the Pentagon’s inspector general."

The "Lion of the Senate" and the Dike Road Bridge.

All that praise he had in life--and at his simulated canonization a/k/a funeral mass?

He has his reward.

He didn't answer for Chappaquiddick...in this life, at least.

I realized I was about to say this incorrectly.

I was going to say "You're a sack of shit, Egan."

But that would be improper.

The correct statement is "You're a sack of shit, Your Eminence."

I genuinely hope for the sake of his soul that he's going senile, because Mr. Dougherty is right--this is monstrous.

Gutless wonders, petty tyrants and chancery dwellers.

But I repeat myself. Yes, I know there are good folks laboring in the bureaucratic halls of the Church--this isn't directed at you. As for the rest of you...

The rector of the Cincinnati seminary managed to successfully retaliate against Rich Leonardi, long-time Catholic blogger extraordinaire and pointed, but usually civil, critic of the manifold problems of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati.

Rich was booted off the Son Rise Morning Show in retaliation for his criticism.

Here's the message he sent me in response to a query on Facebook:

To net it out, the seminary rector reached out to the head of the Son Rise Morning Show to have me thrown off the program. I called him out on it, and a pissing contest ensued. I shut down my site and intend to withdraw from public Catholic life.

In the meantime, Ken Overberg will continue to deny the Atonement from the pulpit, and Paul Knitter will air his doubts about the salvific significance of Christ and the historicity of the Resurrection, both undisturbed in the sanctuary of Xavier University. Because doing something about *them* would take a set of clockweights, the willingness to endure media hostility and the turning of a deaf ear to the squalling of local progressives.

Squashing a layman who criticizes the local leadership? You can do that in a snap and still have plenty of time to enjoy a glass of Cabernet Sauvignon with lunch. To applause from "the right people," to boot.

What few non-Catholics understand is that we remain Catholic in spite of--sometimes literally in spite of--those to whom God, in his inscrutable Providence, has temporarily given custody of part of His Church.

I hope you reconsider, Rich. The Seditious Catechist is needed now more than ever.

One hell of a week.

My mother-in-law has been in the hospital since Monday with a bad infection--basically, an untreated ear infection gone septic. She's had it for, oh, I don't know--4 weeks now. Heather told her to get it treated when they met at Mass on Sunday, and Mom agreed--but ended up calling the ambulance because she couldn't walk.

The first kicker--we didn't find out until yesterday. The good news is that she was the one calling to inform us. She seemed better, if weak, yesterday. She was eating and able to hold it down.

The other kicker is that she is going to have to be in for another week to ten days for continued IV antibiotics and physical rehab--she's too weak to walk now. After she is discharged, she will need another 3-5 weeks of IV antibiotic as well.

Prayers and good thoughts welcome--this was a scary one. Kicker 3--yesterday was Heather's birthday. "Happy Freakin' Birthday!" as our good friend Shelly put it.

Finally, you Michiganders may have heard about the plane that went down in Lake Michigan as it was taking a patient to the Mayo Clinic. It took off from my hometown's airport, and our family knew everyone on the plane. I worked for co-pilot Earl Davidson's construction company one summer back in college, and Dr. Hall was the father of one of my friends in high school and my sister-in-law's physician. They were both fine, community-minded men, and my Mom and Dad speak well of the Pavliks and Jerry Freed, the only survivor. It's torn a hole in the heart of my birthplace, so prayers and good thoughts are welcome there, too.

Fan. Tastic.

Oops.

I forgot the "Effin" in the middle.

The five men facing trial in the Sept. 11 attacks will plead not guilty so that they can air their criticisms of U.S. foreign policy, the lawyer for one of the defendants said Sunday.
Scott Fenstermaker, the lawyer for accused terrorist Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali, said the men would not deny their role in the 2001 attacks but "would explain what happened and why they did it."

A great moment for our nation, the opportunity to listen to mass murderers lecture us from the stand.

A shameful decision.

According to Hollywood, Paul Shanley's real sin was that he didn't make "Chinatown" or "The Pianist."

How else am I to understand the ferocious defense of noted rapist Roman "Everyone wants to f--- young girls" Polanski?

I'm pleased to note the French public--and a growing number of public figures--are less solicitous of rapists than Les People are.

Prayer request.

I would like to blog about our pumpkin and tomato growing successes, the birth of our cat's litter of five or the overdue book reviews, but I'm requesting your prayers instead.

My eleven year old nephew was attacked by a group of teenagers last Sunday. In addition to outnumbering him by up to 12 to 1, they thought it would be hilarious to film it on their camera phones--"Youtube!" they said. Oh, and my nephew's little sister was a witness, too.

There are many words that have come to mind over the past few days--reiver, reprisal, let them hate so long as they fear.... Those words are not models of Christianity, no. But they are certainly in the human (and definitely the Celtic) DNA.

Turns out that filming it was a bad idea, as this constitutes something called "evidence" and tends to make a lie out of your statements to the police that your victim was the attacker.

As does a history of similar violence for one of the assailants.

My nephew is out of the hospital, but returned to school yesterday, which can't have been easy, given that he's facing the thugs there. But he's keeping his head high.

Prayers for my family would be appreciated.

Resign, you scumbag.

Governor Mark Sanford admits to travelling to Argentina to knock boots with his mistress.

He also used his office to lie and conceal the affair.

But here's the best part: he's a father of four, and he spent Father's Day getting jiggy.

Unbelievable. Wretched, rotten, foul, putrid--insert your decomposing adjective here.

This married father of four recommends you STFU, leave office and spend the rest of your life in penitential obscurity. The longer you spend in office, the more you make Elliott Spitzer look like a model of puritan rectitude.

Comment of the Year.

Stop your submissions--we have a winner. After watching a week of non-explanations and carefully-planned damage control, I'm no longer inclined to give Fr. Jenkins the benefit of the doubt. Thus, I'm posting this from Doug (not my brother, but he still ain't heavy), on the ND controversy:

Regarding the optimistic assertion that Jenkins is being stupid: he's the pres of Notre Dame - he didn't get there by being naive or stupid.

Jenkins has offered a sop of excuse to provide himself with plausible deniability. Well, we're told that to get a promotion, you should perform the job you want rather than the one you have; perhaps he's angling for a mitre in his future.

And let's all put a moratorium on the pathetic bleating about charitable interpretations, when what is really meant is "don't tell the truth about a priest when it's unpleasant." Being unable to say shit when you have a mouthful is nothing like a virtue; particularly when you have that mouthful at the manipulative request of a liar in a collar.

One good thing about the Sebelius nomination for HHS.

It's this: our enemies have identified themselves quite nicely. After all, Ms. Sebelius revels in the company of infanticide practitioners and has been told by all of the bishops of her state to refrain from receiving communion. Among other problems.

Let's not mince words: the signatories of her support letter are, to a man and woman, quislings, remarkably cheap partisan whores and utter disgraces to their callings as Catholics.

It is abundantly clear that for some self-described Catholics (these in particular), there is no proabort they are unwilling to embrace if it advances a partisan agenda.

OK--charity compels me to consider the alternative: each is suffering from progressive (rimshot!) and irreversible dementia. Hopefully that explains Brownback, whom I'm now delighted I never supported.

Take your pick.

Let us stand for the Creed.

[Thanks to Opinionated Catholic for the links.]

I wonder.

Nobody in the West ever questions the number of people killed in the following:

1. The Armenian Genocide [the Turks dispute the use of the term, which indicates that it was an organized extermination, not the figures];

2. The Ukrainian Terror-Famine;

3. Cambodia;

3. Srebrenica;

4. East Timor; and

5. Rwanda,

to name but five. But when it comes to the Holocaust, well, there the noisy fringe headscratching begins. Six million Jews in less than ten years? Impossible. Followed by an evil beclowning of the self, if not outright descent into delusion, as we saw recently with Msgr. Williamson and Fred Leuchter.

My goodness, how could modern, industrialized Germany with its advanced war machine, top-notch infrastructure and instilled Jew-hating ideology pull off such a thing in ten years? Yes, a puzzler given that Rwandan Hutus killed at least half a million Tutsis in 100 days without any similar groundwork.

Peculiar, that. I can't imagine what could possibly explain the discrepancies in thought.

May God have mercy on her soul.

AIDS truther Christine Maggiore is dead at 52.

Proceeded by rivers of blood. An emblem of the decay of the Western mind.

Following the "If You Can't Say Something Nice..." adage, here are my thoughts about her:












.