Chicago thinks it’s the nation’s murder capital. Philadelphia laughs and says, “Hold my beer!” The good people of those two fine cities are getting exactly that for which they voted.
A police officer places makers on evidence on the 3900 block of Poplar Street 18-year-old Nasir Marks was fatally shot on Tuesday, May 25, 2021. Steven M Falk, Philadelphia Inquirer Staff Photographer. Click to enlarge.
According to the Chicago Tribune, as of Sunday, December 19th, there had been 783 murders in the Windy City thus far in 2021, 34 more than on the same day last year. As of the same day, 540 homicides had occurred in Philadelphia. The 19th being the 353rd day of the year, that works out to 2.2181 homicides per day in Chicago, and ‘only’ 1.5297 per day in the City of Brotherly Love.
But, according to the 2020 census, there were 2,746,388 people living in Chicago, and 1,603,797 in Philly. Using the homicide rates, that works out to a projected 558 killings in Philly and 810 in Chicago. Murder rates are calculated based on 100,000 population, meaning that Chicago is headed for a homicide rate of 29.4933 per 100,000, while Philadelphia is looking at 34.7924. Philadelphia is far deadlier than Chicago!
We noted that Philadelphia tied its 1990 homicide record of 500 the day before Thanksgiving, and at that point, the city was actually seeing slightly fewer killings per day than it was on December 19th. And guess what: with 547 homicides as of the end of Thursday, December 23rd, the rate has crept up slightly again, to 1.5322 per day, making the projected number of killings 559!
I will admit to a sort of grim fascination with the numbers, but murder in Philadelphia has really changed things. One murder, it has been said, is a tragedy, but 547 is just a statistic, and to the leadership of the city, and the editors of The Philadelphia Inquirer, that’s all it is, a statistic, a number that they can attribute of “gun violence,” but never examine the real problem: bad people!
In Ironic Justice: Two Anti-Police Lawmakers Get Carjacked, Robert Stacy McCain noted that two Democratic politicians, one in Chicago and one in Philly, who supported the “reform” of policing — meaning: getting even softer on crime — were carjacked within 24 hours of each other.
Illinois state Sen. Kimberly Lightford (D-Maywood) was targeted in suburban Chicago on Tuesday night, while Congresswoman Mary Gay Scanlon (D-Pa.) was carjacked Wednesday afternoon after an event in South Philadelphia.
Well, it seems that, given that Representative Scanlon is a sitting congresswoman, the feds are getting involved:
“The investigation into this incident is in its very initial stages, and we are continuing to investigate and evaluate charging decisions,” said U.S. Attorney Williams. “Armed carjacking is a serious federal crime. There have been a rash of violent crimes like this recently, and while there were national security implications to this particular incident, we are always working collaboratively with our local partners to evaluate if cases should be taken federally. Working together means more resources, more tools, more intelligence. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: If you pick up a gun and use it to commit a crime, together, we will come after you. And we are very good at what we do.”
In point of fact, however, if armed carjacking is a “serious federal crime,” when was the last time the feds got involved in such a case? Just two weeks ago, Philadelphia police said the city has seen an 80% increase in carjackings this year, and what had United States Attorney Jennifer Arbittier Williams done in response? Nothing, until a Democratic congresswoman got carjacked in — sweet irony! — FDR Park.
Seriously, go look through the press release archive at the U.S. Attorney’s web site and tell me if you find a case where they previously prosecuted a carjacking. I went back as far as April and didn’t find one, so if the Biden DOJ was making it a priority to “come after” carjackers before this week, they weren’t very successful at it. But then again, success really hasn’t been a hallmark of the Biden administration, has it?
Mr McCain was employing sarcasm, but there’s a not-so-veiled slam at Philadelphia’s District Attorney, Larry Krasner, a George Soros-financed stooge whose main goal is getting the bad guys released, not jailed. At some point, you’d think Philadelphians would get tired of all of the crime and violence in their city’s streets, but not tired enough: Mr Krasner was re-elected last month!
The good people of those two cities are getting exactly that for which they voted.
Seen at Wawa
My thanks to William Teach of The Pirate’s Cove, who cross-posted here on the days I was away!
Driving back to Kentucky from the Keystone State on December 23rd, I stopped at the WaWa store on Pennsylvania Route 61, just north of Interstate 78, and saw something I’d never seen, in person, before: the WaWa had six — I think it was six; I didn’t actually count, and should have taken a quick picture, but didn’t — Tesla TSLA: (%) charging stations. This was at 3:45 PM EST.
Also see: William Teach: Climate Cult: Forget The Electric Vehicles You Can’t Afford. People Need To Drive Less
Meanwhile, the store’s twelve or so gasoline pump queues, two pumps per queue, were fully occupied, with additional cars lined up to get fuel, and a fuel tanker was unloading gasoline or diesel into the underground storage tanks, because those vehicles are thirsty! I really should have taken pictures, on my phone, or as Sheriff Buford T Justice told his son, “Put the evidence in the car!”
I did pick up two boxes of WaWa coffee in Kuerig-cups for my wife and older daughter for Christmas.
Climate Cult: Forget The Electric Vehicles You Can’t Afford. People Need To Drive Less
Or, the climate cultists could simply mind their own business and stop trying to force everyone to Comply. Maybe stop using fossil fueled vehicles in their own lives
Letters to the Editor: Electric cars aren’t a climate change panacea. We need to drive less
To the editor: Electric cars shouldn’t be regarded as the silver-bullet solution to lowering automobile emissions. While they don’t run on gas, their batteries create their own set of environmental problems. (“California isn’t on pace to meet its climate targets. Here are 3 ways to cut pollution faster,” editorial, Dec. 19)
What we need is to use our cars less. We have to stop looking at cars as the only viable option to get from Point A to Point B. We can start by carpooling to work, taking the bus to run an errand and riding a bike for short trips.
A few tweaks in our driving habits can go a long way toward reducing our carbon footprint, electric or not.
What’s this “we”, Sparky? I do not see many Warmists doing this in their own lives. I haven’t met many EV owners who are doing it due to ‘climate change’. I mean, good grief, they have barely rolled out pushing for everyone to be forced to drive an EV (which most cannot afford) and now we have to get rid of them.
To the editor: There seems to be a delusion among those who formulate climate policy that if they set a pollution reduction mandate, it will surely happen.
The mandates and targets never have the supporting, well-conceived, detailed plan for how to reach the goals. Broad guidelines like “increasing the percentage of zero-emission vehicles sold” are made, but they rarely have the how-to specifics.
The populace gives lip service to climate goals while legislators avoid the draconian measures that would be required.
Let’s face it: There is no way that California will meet its legal mandate to cut emissions 40% below 1990 levels by 2030.
Where are the concrete, specific goals from Warmists in their own lives to cut their own emissions? But, really, this person’s point is correct: most in government do not have real plans, probably because even the most hardcore realize they can’t make them happen.
Meanwhile, here are 22 of the “most anticipated” EVs (you have to look at the Canoo Lifestyle vehicle. Very silly looking). For those with pricing, the least is $34470. Most are way, way more. That’s affordable, right? And, while stocks soared in 2021, they’re expected to go way down in 2022. Because anticipation is not the same as people actually buying them. They’re toys for the upper middle class and rich.
Surprise: NPR Says Cloth Masks Don’t Protect People From Chinese Coronavirus
The media has been telling us for over a year and a half that masks are awesome, just wear a mask. Any mask. Once in a while they’ll do a study that shows the effectiveness of most masks is barely better than not wearing a mask at all, but, those are minimized. And now NPR is really letting the cat out of the bag
If you're still using a cloth mask, it's time to up your game. Experts say to block omicron, you should upgrade to an N95 or similar high-filtration mask.
Here's how to find a good one — and when to wear it.https://t.co/UpfUTTdcRG
— NPR (@NPR) December 23, 2021
From the screed
With another coronavirus variant racing across the U.S., once again health authorities are urging people to mask up indoors. Yes, you’ve heard it all before. But given how contagious omicron is, experts say, it’s seriously time to upgrade to an N95 or similar high-filtration respirator when you’re in public indoor spaces.
“Cloth masks are not going to cut it with omicron,” says Linsey Marr, a researcher at Virginia Tech who studies how viruses transmit in the air.
Omicron is so much more transmissible than coronavirus variants that have come before it. It spreads at least three times faster than delta. One person is infecting at least three others at a time on average, based on data from other countries. (snip)
True, a cloth mask can be a “marginally OK to maybe a decent filter,” Marr says. But with something as highly transmissible as omicron, just “OK” isn’t good enough. (snip)
Given all this, you want a mask that means business when it comes to blocking viral particles. Unlike cloth masks, N95, KN95 and KF94 respirators are all made out of material with an electrostatic charge, which “actually pulls these particles in as they’re floating around and prevents you from inhaling those particles,” Karan notes. “And that really is key” — because if you don’t inhale virus particles, they can’t multiply in your respiratory tract.
The material in surgical masks also has an electrostatic charge. But surgical masks tend to fit loosely, and a snug fit — with no gaps around nose, cheeks or chin — “really makes a big difference,” says Marr, who has studied mask efficacy.
Omicron may be more transmittable, but, it is also way less dangerous, way less deadly, than previous variants, especially Delta. But, we already knew that cloth masks had around a 10% effectiveness rate at stopping any version last year. Now they want everyone to wear higher end masks, which are not in abundance. All while few areas and states are requiring masks. It is very weird being in NJ and there is no mask mandate, most people are walking around without one in stores.
Wachter says he’s also covering up indoors with small groups of friends and family unless everyone is vaccinated and boosted. If they’re not boosted, he says, “I consider them to be somewhere between vaccinated and unvaccinated, and I act appropriately if I’m going to be around them.” That means he either has everyone mask up, or he has everyone take a rapid test to make sure no one is infectious at that moment. “One or the other.” This is especially important if anyone attending is high-risk.
And then it’ll be “if you haven’t had a second booster, you’re somewhere between vaccinated and unvaccinated.
Marr says that with omicron surging, she’d have kids wear respirators if possible when they’re indoors in public spaces. Parents searching for good respirator options for their children can check out the work of Aaron Collins, aka “Mask Nerd,” a mechanical engineer with a background in aerosol science. He’s been testing the filtration efficiencies of hundreds of masks and respirators on the market. You can find his reviews on his YouTube channel. (This spreadsheet on kids’ masks may also be helpful.)
And they want to drag kids into their mask hysteria.
Brandon Makes Holders Of Student Loan Debt Mad
Biden is just working hard to make everyone mad
President Joe Biden on Wednesday extended a pause on student loan payments that was set to expire on February 1, a decision praised by Democratic lawmakers who pressured him to make the move as the coronavirus pandemic continues to disrupt American lives.
But at the same time, Biden signaled that he wants borrowers to resume paying off their loans once the new moratorium ends on May 1, placing him at odds with Democrats who have demanded that debt be wiped out.
“[We] know that millions of student loan borrowers are still coping with the impacts of the pandemic and need some more time before resuming payments,” Biden said in a statement. “Given these considerations, today my Administration is extending the pause on federal student loan repayments for an additional 90 days — through May 1, 2022 — as we manage the ongoing pandemic and further strengthen our economic recovery.”
No one is pausing you and I having to pay our mortgages, car loans, and other stuff. Loans we took out voluntarily. Same with student loans. They knew they had to pay them, yet, they often took them and either got a degree not worth the paper or obtained too much debt to repay properly. That’s their problem. Of course, you can’t simply repossess the degree. Provided they even obtained it. Why should they be given relief? Get a job? Work two. There should be no extension. Biden is correct that they should start paying. He shouldn’t extend this. Because you know the loan recipients will next get him to further extend it.
Under what statutory authority is there to extend the pause on repaying legal debt to creditors? Perhaps if the loans are from the federal government, not just the ones backed by Los Federales but owned by private companies.
“Meanwhile, the Department of Education will continue working with borrowers to ensure they have the support they need to transition smoothly back into repayment and advance economic stability for their own households and for our nation,” the president continued. “As we are taking this action, I’m asking all student loan borrowers to do their part as well: take full advantage of the Department of Education’s resources to help you prepare for payments to resume; look at options to lower your payments through income-based repayment plans; explore public service loan forgiveness; and make sure you are vaccinated and boosted when eligible.”
Wait, what was that last part? Did that need to be there?
Biden’s comments put him on a collision course with progressive lawmakers vowing to increase pressure on the administration to cancel student-loan debt for millions of borrowers. Americans owe an estimated $1.7 trillion in student loans, a record-breaking total, according to Federal Reserve data.
“Thank you! Next step: cancellation,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York tweeted along with a video of Biden’s announcement.
“I applaud President Biden for once again pausing federal student loan payments for 45 million Americans. Now let’s cancel it. All of it,” Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont tweeted.
AOC, NY Dems Unhappy Over “Peaker” Power Plants
See, these types of plants are rather necessary for peak power loads, especially as efficient, effective, low cost, reliable power plants are shuttered
Three House Democrats ask watchdog to probe ‘peaker’ power plant pollution
Three House Democrats from New York on Tuesday called on a federal watchdog to investigate pollution generated by “peaker” power plants, or those that only generate electricity during periods of high demand.
House Oversight Committee Chair Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) joined Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Rep. Yvette Clarke (D-N.Y.) in calling on the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to investigate the effects of such plants on local communities.
The lawmakers noted that the plants are both less energy-efficient than standard power plants and are frequently located in lower-income or predominantly minority neighborhoods.
“Addressing the use of peaker plants, which can emit twice the carbon and up to 20 times the nitrous oxides of a typical plant while operating significantly less efficiently, represents a high-impact opportunity to reduce climate risks and tackle a life-threatening environmental justice issue,” they wrote. “We request GAO’s assistance in reporting on key data to assess damage, uncover health burdens, calculate economic costs, and identify alternative solutions to the use of peaker power plants.”
A couple points here. First, why is this the business of the federal government in the first place? This is clearly a state issue, regardless of Los Federales wanting to make ‘climate change’ a thing. This is all about New Yorkers having the power necessary to Do Life. Second, here are 3 federal representatives wanting to make sure that their constituents, along with all the other residents of NY, are short on power. All while they spend most of their time in D.C. How about investigating peaker plants in D.C.? Or would that be inconvenient for AOC, Maloney, and Clarke?
There are 89 peaker plants in New York City alone, including 28 in or near Maloney’s district and 16 in Ocasio-Cortez’s district. An area in western Queens with a number of such plants has become known as “Asthma Alley” due to its disproportionate rates of the respiratory condition.
Wwll, hey, y’all in NYC voted for these Socialist lunatics, so, you’re willing to give up all that power generation, right?
As evidence mounts that the vaccines do not stop the spread of the virus, some people want to double down on #VaccineMandates
It seems that employers have been struggling with the vaccine mandates, but there’s an underlying, unwritten message in this. From The New York Times, not exactly an evil reich-wing source:
Whiplash on U.S. Vaccine Mandate Leaves Employers ‘Totally Confused’
Companies are struggling to figure out what to do as legal battles and rising Covid cases complicate their plans. Even up in the air: What does “fully vaccinated” mean?
By Lauren Hirsch, Emma Goldberg and Charlie Savage | Monday, December 20, 2021 | 6:50 AM EST
The marching orders from the Biden administration in November had seemed clear — large employers were to get their workers fully vaccinated by early next year, or make sure the workers were tested weekly. But a little over a month later, the Labor Department’s vaccine rule has been swept into confusion and uncertainty by legal battles, shifting deadlines and rising Covid case counts that throw the very definition of fully vaccinated into question.
The spread of the highly transmissible Omicron variant has seemingly bolstered the government’s argument, at the heart of its legal battle over the rule, that the virus remains a grave threat to workers. But the recent surge in cases has raised the issue of whether the government will take its requirements further — even as the original rule remains contentious — and ask employers to mandate booster shots, too. The country’s testing capacity has also been strained, adding to concerns that companies will be unable to meet the rule’s testing requirements.
“My clients are totally confused as, quite frankly, am I,” Erin McLaughlin, a labor and employment lawyer at Buchanan, Ingersoll & Rooney, said on Saturday. “My sense is that there are a lot of employers scrambling to try and put their mandate programs in place.”
No company has been spared the whirlwind of changes in the last week, set off by the spike in Covid cases that have, in some instances, cut into their work forces. Then on Friday, an appeals court lifted the legal block on the vaccine rule, though appeals to the ruling were immediately filed, leaving the rule’s legal status up in the air. On Saturday, hours after the appeals court ruling, the Labor Department’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration urged employers to start working to get in compliance. But OSHA also gave employers some leeway, pushing back full enforcement of the rule until February, recognizing that for all its best intentions the rollout of the rule has been muddled.
There’s a lot more at the original, but the unwritten part is simple, and obvious: most employers don’t want to impose a mandate on their workers, not because they don’t believe in the effectiveness of the vaccines — most probably do — but because they don’t want to discipline or terminate workers who refuse. Businesses are already having problems finding workers, and losing some of those they have can seriously hurt production, and the bottom line.
The truth is simple: the vaccines have been freely available to everyone for about ten months now, and virtually every medium has been telling us about the availability. Politicians and business leaders and community activists and your neighborhood Karens have all been imploring people to get vaccinated. The number of Americans who haven’t heard the messages has to be vanishingly small. Those who want to get vaccinated have already done so; those who haven’t gotten vaccinated are almost universally those who do not want to get vaccinated.
The resistance is only getting stronger: as the government pushes harder to try to force the reluctant to get vaccinated, those who do not want to take the vaccines are pushing back harder as well. As William Teach noted, Governor Kathy Hochul (D-NY) is now pushing legislation which would mandate a booster shot as well as the initial two-shot vaccine to be considered ‘fully vaccinated.’
- New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) announced during a press conference on Thursday that she is planning to introduce legislation that includes a booster shot within the definition of being “fully vaccinated.”
While the Democratic governor noted that the legislation needed to be more fleshed out and required more data to be collected, she signaled the change would happen eventually, saying that “at some point, we have to determine that fully vaccinated means boosted as well,” CNY Central reported.
Hochul’s remarks come as the country begins to see an uptick of COVID-19 cases again and as health officials grapple with the spread of the omicron variant, which President Biden’s chief medical adviser Anthony Fauci warned on Thursday would likely be the dominant strain in “a few weeks.”
- A growing body of preliminary research suggests the Covid vaccines used in most of the world offer almost no defense against becoming infected by the highly contagious Omicron variant.
All vaccines still seem to provide a significant degree of protection against serious illness from Omicron, which is the most crucial goal. But only the Pfizer and Moderna shots, when reinforced by a booster, appear to have initial success at stopping infections, and these vaccines are unavailable in most of the world.
The other shots — including those from AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson and vaccines manufactured in China and Russia — do little to nothing to stop the spread of Omicron, early research shows. And because most countries have built their inoculation programs around these vaccines, the gap could have a profound impact on the course of the pandemic.
A global surge of infections in a world where billions of people remain unvaccinated not only threatens the health of vulnerable individuals but also increases the opportunity for the emergence of yet more variants. The disparity in the ability of countries to weather the pandemic will almost certainly deepen. And the news about limited vaccine efficacy against Omicron infection could depress demand for vaccination throughout the developing world, where many people are already hesitant or preoccupied with other health problems.
But here’s the money line:
- Most evidence so far is based on laboratory experiments, which do not capture the full range of the body’s immune response, and not from tracking the effect on real-world populations. The results are striking, however.
So, there seems to be little or no effectiveness against transmission by any vaccines other than Pfizer and Moderna, and only if reinforced by the booster, and their effectiveness is based only on laboratory studies, not real-world data. Employers wanting to see more of their workforce vaccinated are having to deal with reality: reluctance on the part of some employees, a tight labor market, and data which show that getting vaccinated provides less protection from spreading the virus than we were originally told.
This is the conundrum: if the vaccines lessen the effects on those who contract the virus, but don’t seem to offer much protection from spreading the virus, the ‘logic’ for mandating vaccination vanishes. If getting vaccinated does not mean you can’t contract and spread the virus to others, choosing not to get vaccinated is a decision which only affects the person choosing not to get vaccinated!
I’ve said it before: I am vaccinated, and I took the booster shot as well. I think that’s the wiser choice, and I am perfectly willing to say that to anyone who asks. But it is none of my business, nor should it be the government’s business, nor the employer’s business, as to what other people choose to do.
36
A man’s life, reduced to four paragraphs. From the Lexington Herald-Leader:
Coroner releases name of man, 21, who died after shooting in Lexington
by Karla Ward | Saturday, December 18, 2021 | 12:44 PM EST | Updated: 1:48 PM EST
A 21-year-old man died after being shot in a neighborhood near downtown Lexington late Friday.
Lexington police said they were called to the shooting on the 800 block of Oak Hill Drive, off Loudon Avenue, at 10:56 p.m. When they arrived, police found the man inside a residence, Lexington police said in a news release Saturday.
The Fayette County coroner’s office said the man, Devon Sandusky, was pronounced dead at the scene at 11:25 p.m.
They said the investigation is ongoing. No suspect information was released.
There was a fifth paragraph, but one which simply told readers where to report information to the police. A sixth paragraph noted that this was the city’s 36th homicide of the year, a new record. The previous record was 34, set in 2020. At the current pace, Lexington is projected to see one or two more killings before 2021 is over.
To me, this was sadly reminiscent of the stories I see in The Philadelphia Inquirer, where a murder victim’s life is reduced to a few short paragraphs, often without even the victim’s name being published. But, unlike the Inquirer, the Herald-Leader will print more about the murder as more information is released. With ‘only’ 36 homicides on which to report, the newspaper’s staff can put a little bit more time into reporting on it; the Inquirer’s staff are overwhelmed, with 535 homicides through Thursday, December 16th, and the City of Brotherly Love on pace to record another 23 killings, for a total of 558.