So Many Things They Know That Aren’t So

image found here

That Reagan quote is our theme today. We're applying it to Friday's oral arguments at the Supreme Court and Thursday's anniversary of the January 6, 2021, difference of opinions.

 

SCOTUS on Mandates

This past Friday the Supreme Court heard oral arguments on the vaccine mandate cases, both for OSHA and for healthcare workers at facilities receiving federal funding. The first took two hours; the second, more tailored case, was an hour and a half. You’re welcome to listen to all of it. But I’ll go over some of the highlights, and the commentary on those highlights.

Notable is the way the nine justices appear. Three do not wear masks; six do. Note that all are triple-vaxxed (two vaccine doses plus booster). Everyone had to have a clear COVID test to enter. Therefore, theoretically, there was no reason to wear a mask in a sparsely populated, well-ventilated room—unless you assume the vaccines and tests do not work and a person with no symptoms can spread the disease.

The three who don’t wear masks—Alito, Thomas, and Gorsuch—ask questions about constitutional authority. Where does the government have power to do what it’s doing?

The three Democrat appointees all wear masks—and Sotomayor was additionally tuned in remotely. I couldn’t see this; I’m using a description from Robert Barnes from the Viva & Barnes Sunday night livestream. So I’m further confounded that someone might think she could get the disease over the internet. Is this an old person misunderstanding about computer viruses?

Crankshaft comic of January 8, 2022, found in the Houston Chronicle

Anyway, these three do not seem interested in the law, or the Constitution, or authority. They simply put forward the notion that the government can do whatever it deems necessary, because—crisis! Extraordinary times; extraordinary measures.

The remaining three middling justices, with masks, asked questions that made it seem, according to Barnes, they were all focused on, “Isn’t this a little too much?”

So mask wearing—or at least lack of it—might be an indicator of constitutional understanding, just as it seems to be out in the general population.

The description of mask wearing, by the way, was different, according to Amy Howe on SCOTUS Blog, where she says all of the eight present wore masks except Gorsuch. And she noted that two of the lawyers also participated remotely. So I don’t know whether the mask is the true indicator. But the division of three segments of justices seems apt.

Politifact tweet, January 7, 2022
image found here

Sotomayor was the most embarrassing to the Court. Even Politifact rated her exaggerations as “very false.” She tried claiming:

We have hospitals that are almost at full capacity with people severely ill on ventilators. We have over 100,000 children, which we’ve never had before, in serious condition, and many on ventilators!!!!!

Exclamations points are my addition. The fact is, there have only been 83,000 children hospitalized with COVID since the pandemic began. And Fauci last week noted that we still do not differentiate between hospitalized for COVID and hospitalized with COVID. Everyone admitted to a hospital for any reason these days is given a COVID test. If they test positive (and false positives are still common), then they are listed as a COVID case, even when asymptomatic. So a child with a broken leg could be considered a COVID case. Many children, particularly during the Delta and Omicron phases, have had COVID, but most are mild and may not even be tested. So, yes, there are cases. But an illness that is milder for children that the flu ought not to cause a justice of the Supreme Court to clutch her pearls in a panic.

According to federal data, under 5,000 children with a positive COVID test were in hospitals in this country. Again, that’s “with,” not necessarily hospitalized “because of” COVID. The CDC said Friday that 4 in 100,000 children admitted to hospitals are infected with COVID—maybe that’s the factoid she twisted. The CDC’s Dr. Rochelle Walensky added, “We have not yet seen a signal that there is any increased severity in this age demographic.” She also noted that similar worries about the Delta variant had proved to be unfounded.

There was more need of fact-checking. Sotomayor also claimed, “Omicron is as deadly as Delta." Not so. South Africa got through their entire wave with possibly zero deaths from the variant, as of mid-December. Cases skyrocketed and then dropped.

Southern Africa has been improving for weeks, meaning
its peak has passed. Data from here, January 9, 2022.

Other countries are now going through the precipitous rise in cases. In our area, so many people have been coming down with it that we closed church on Sunday. I’ve known many who have had it lately—many more lately than I’ve known during the rest of the whole pandemic. But I know no one needing hospitalization. During earlier variants I did know of several hospitalized cases. So I think we’re in the Omicron wave now. But death from COVID tends to appear late—after weeks of treatment. So current deaths could still be from the Delta variant. That data is extrapolated from spot testing; not everyone knows what variant they have. But the milder symptoms and quick spread right now mean it’s probably Omicron.

Omicron is at least as easy to deal with through early treatment as earlier variants. And that information doesn’t even appear in the SCOTUS hearings.

There’s another detail I’m wondering about: if the wave lasted about four weeks in South Africa, and is already well underway here, then getting vaccinated now would still leave you vulnerable during the coming few weeks. Getting a shot might even make you more vulnerable. So why the continued push for vaccination?

Anecdote for our times: I’m familiar with someone trying to bring his fiancée over from Ukraine. She had COVID a month or so ago. In Ukraine they seem to be aware that, while your natural antibodies are very high from just having had the disease, you shouldn’t get a vaccine; that’s not helpful and possibly dangerous. So she has to keep going back for tests until her antibodies go down (and, by the way, they go down in the current active state but remain in memory cells, so she’ll still have immunity), because the US won’t allow her in without being fully vaccinated.

Here’s what the Democrat-appointed justices seem to believe:

·         COVID-19 is as dangerous and likely to cause death as smallpox or Ebola.

·         It is just as dangerous to children as adults and elderly.

·         Nothing works against this dangerous pathogen except vaccines—and three shots are much better than two—or more if deemed necessary later.

·         The vaccines guarantee immunity and spreading. Except from the unvaccinated; you can still get it from them.

·         The unvaccinated spew the pathogen wherever they roam, killing off people in their wake, whether they have the disease or not.

·         If the justices are personally fearful of a pathogen, then certainly that is reason enough to favor granting any and all power to the federal government to take whatever measures the elite bureaucrats deem necessary.   

Of course COVID-19 has never been dangerous to most of the population. Most deaths have occurred in people over 80 with co-morbidities. Some deaths have occurred in younger people with serious co-morbidities, so it has been concerning. But this is the first time we’ve tried quarantining the healthy who are not at risk.

About 98% of the vulnerable population are vaccinated at this point. But there have been treatments available—and most effective are early treatments—at least since April 2020. The vaccines should never have gotten emergency use authorization status, because other effective treatments were available. The treatments were censored and derided—so that vaccines could be pushed. Whoever did this was content to have hundreds of thousands of people die unnecessarily so they could push a vaccine.

And the vaccine they pushed wasn’t a traditional vaccine that gives immunity; it was merely something that might somewhat increase a person’s antibodies for a time. It doesn’t prevent getting the virus, so they started saying the vax is necessary to have a milder case. But a vaccinated person can still get the virus and spread it. A person with natural immunity cannot get it or spread it (except, all bets are off with Omicron, which might be a step toward being a new virus, such as we have with other common cold coronaviruses). And yet people with natural immunity are as likely to be shunned for not also getting vaccinated as are those who have managed to stay well two years into this without contracting it (because their Vitamin D levels are high enough?) and do not want to be forced to take an emergency use vaccine.

Regardless of what those three justices think, vaccines have never been mandated without exemptions for religious or health reasons. Vaccines that are experimental have never been mandated—and should not be; it is a violation of the Nuremberg Code. And these vaccines neither prevent getting ill nor spreading the disease.

If it’s this easy for me to get all this information, why are these justices so ignorant?

Viva Frei is Canadian, so not fully aware of which judges were appointed by which party, etc. He put it this way:

But the questions and the hyperbole coming from the judges was what you would expect to hear from a bad lawyer, not from the highest decision-makers in the world, in the country. And it’s hyperbolic. And it’s grotesquely ignorant. And it’s the highest, allegedly, supposed to be the most informed, most educated people in the land, who are going to be making these decisions for the rest of the country.

Later in the livestream, Viva and Barnes were looking at a bit of Supreme Court history, treading carefully not to make the wild Nazi comparison, and then came back to the vaccine mandate discussion. Robert Barnes added this scathing assessment:

Frankly, this started in Britain and the US. The ideas for eugenics and social Darwinism were British and American ideas. The Nazis always cited British and American authorities. Particularly, like, I’m waiting for somebody in one of these vaccine mandate cases that gets to SCOTUS to just go after them on this issue. To say, “The last time you got high and mighty on when you thought public health authorities should be completely deferred to was when you said three generations of imbeciles was enough in order to force sterilizations that became the law of the land for 50 years, that led to forced sterilizations of poor women all across the country. So maybe you should be a little bit more careful, before you get up on your high horse about what you think medicine is, before you take off that black robe and put on that white lab coat and pretend that your professional class compadres are the ones who should dictate and direct public health policy in America. Because you have a long history of being atrocious at it. Abominable at it.” The ideas for eugenics came from America. The Nazis copied American laws and American policies and American principles—and their number one source of authority was the Supreme Court of the United States.

Here are some other sources related to the oral arguments:

·       “Left-leaning fact-checker nails Justice Sotomayor over wildly false claim about children, COVID-19” Chris Enloe for The Blaze, January 9, 2022. 

·       “’Many on Ventilators’—Justice Sotomayor Falsely Claims Over 100,000 Children in Serious Condition Because of Covid” Jeff Rizzone for The DC Weekly, January 7, 2022. 

·       “Live Q&A: Judge Refuses FDA Request, Gives 8 Months for Pfizer Data; Trump Social Network Nears” Joshua Philipp on Crossroad Highlights, January 9, 2022. 

·       “30 States Oppose Biden Vaccine Mandate, Via SCOTUS Brief of Family Councils” by Joseph Menslage for Katy Christian Magazine, January 4, 2022. 

·     

 

January 6^th Anniversary

That was enough for a full post. But the other example of ridiculous beliefs from last week was the January 6^th anniversary, which deserves a mention. Alas, my resolution to write shorter posts fails already. Anyway, first enjoy this celebration from The Babylon Bee:

·         “10 Fun Ways to Celebrate January 6 This Year” The Babylon Bee, January 5 2022. 

The most unlikable politician in history, VP Kamala Harris, gave the speech of lies: 

Certain dates echo throughout history, including dates that instantly remind all who have lived through them—where they were and what they were doing when our democracy came under assault. Dates that occupy not only a place on our calendars, but a place in our collective memory. December 7th, 1941. September 11th, 2001. And January 6th, 2021.

Let’s do a chart:

Event	Deaths	Those Who Caused Deaths
Pearl Harbor bombing	2,335 military personnel killed 1,143 wounded	Japanese declaring war against us
9/11/2001 attacks at World Trade Center and Pentagon	2,977 people were killed 6,000+ injured	Islamist terrorists continuing a war they declared against us
1/6/2021	1 protestor killed, 4 rally participants died of natural causes*	Capitol Police

 

Here’s what they seem to believe, or want us to believe:

·       All Trump supporters are insurrectionists, trying to overthrow the country.

·       Anyone who attended the Trump rally on January 6th participated in insurrection.

·       The reason people were at the capitol was to stop the official proceedings being carried out by Congress

·       They wanted to overturn a free and fair election of the people by staging a coup.

·       Trump instigated the insurrection and signaled people to attack the capitol.

·       Lawmakers barely escaped with their lives.

Except, of course, that’s not true. Any of it.

The hundreds of thousands of rally goers went to express their support for Trump and to express their dismay at the rampant voter fraud; it was called the Stop the Steal Rally. They were encouraging lawmakers to accept alternate slates of electors from several states. This is a constitutionally provided procedure—which Democrats often avail themselves of for no rational reason beyond partisanship.

Only a small percentage of people entered the capitol. Most of those who entered did so at the invitation of Capitol Police, where they were allowed to walk around and take photos.

A much smaller percentage caused violence. None of those causing violence was armed. No one at the Capitol that day was armed except the police. No lawmakers’ lives were threatened; they were all evacuated at the first sign of a breach of the building.

There was indeed some violence. Instigators have not been charged, oddly. As more evidence comes out, it appears this was an FBI-instigated entrapment operation. They were hoping to goad Trump supporters into violence, so they could blame Trump and his supporters. The people who were charged are being held on trespass charges and a few for vandalism. There are no insurrection charges, because there is no evidence of insurrection happening that day. None.

Recently information has come out about two of the “natural causes” deaths. One is a woman said to have overdosed on a prescription medication. There is surveillance footage of her being beaten by Capitol Police and dragged back into the building. This calls the coroner’s report into question as part of a political coverup. Story here:

·       “Videos Shed Light on Death of Rosanne Boyland at US Capitol on Jan. 6” by Joseph M. Hanneman for The Epoch Times, January 7 (updated January 8), 2022. 

·       “Live Q&A: Judge Refuses FDA Request, Gives 8 Months for Pfizer Data; Trump Social Network Nears” Joshua Philipp for Crossroads Highlights, January 9, 2022.  This is the same video as above; here it is linked to come up at the place of this story.

Another “natural causes” death that may also have been caused or contributed to by Capitol Police is believed to be Kevin Greeson, 55, of Alabama. He had a history of high blood pressure and reportedly died of a heart attack. But there is an eyewitness account and video showing that there was a sudden attack on a peaceful crowd by Capitol Police, with less-than-lethal tear gas, concussion grenades, rubber bullets and pepperballs. The eyewitness report is from comedian Tyler Baggins of Wisconsin, who was recording the crowd that day. His video shows the crowd singing the Lee Greenwood song “I’m Proud to Be an American” and then cuts to footage of CPR being done on Greeson.

Lauren Witzke was a reporter on scene that day for National File, reporting this:

By the time I got to the Capitol, people had already made their way up to the steps. Trump supporters were waving flags and trying to talk to the Capitol Police. Every rally-goer at that point was extremely peaceful. I then saw Capitol Police Officers with rifles appear on the balcony looking down on us. Almost immediately, the Capitol Police on the ground started throwing flash grenades into the crowds, teargassing us all.

I moved about 40 feet away from the steps, and just stood there, yet the tear gas and flash grenades continued. After being flash bombed and tear-gassed for the third time, I looked down beside me to see that a middle-aged man—Kevin Greeson—on the ground, blue in the face.

My friend Kimberley immediately began CPR and continued until her lips were bleeding. But she couldn’t get him breathing again. Men were yelling “Help we need an EMT, get this man an ambulance,” etc. We begged the Capitol police officers for help. But they ignored us, and continued macing old men who got anywhere near them.

Trump supporters were able to make a makeshift gurney out of the fencing and carry him out of there. Capitol Police continued to flash bomb and tear gas us, macing in the face anyone who came near them.

She reported that there had been absolutely no violence in the crowd prior to the assault from Capitol Police. Emergency personnel did not rush to help, as previously reported. People in the crowd carried the man to get medical help, which took about half an hour, at which time he was pronounced dead. There is some speculation that any eventual violence that happened was in response to his death and the unwarranted and unwarned assault by Capitol Police.

This information comes from a source I am not familiar with, so use your discernment. However, in other places it coincides with news I’ve heard elsewhere, such as the Ricochet report, which I wrote about and linked to here. Here's the story:

·       “VIDEOS: Jan 6 Violence Sparked by Innocent Man's Death, Police Grenade Assault on Peaceful Crowd” by A. J. Cooke for National File, January 6, 2022. 

Robert Barnes also tied these two issues together, which kind of summarizes today’s post:

Well, it’s kind of parallel to the vaccine mandate hearings at the Supreme Court. You have the reality of the way things are actually shaping up, if you look at the facts on the ground, versus the narrative, the myth, that’s being propagated by the press. And just as Sotomayor had this myth of everybody’s dying, and the kids are dying, and all the rest, the mythical narrative of January 6th is still the insurrection that almost happened, that has to be remedied. We should look at it like the second coming of the Civil War and 9/11.

And the reality is, it’s none of those things. Nobody’s been charged with insurrection. There’s more people filing frivolous lawsuits against everybody. More evidence that, in fact, capitol police—some of the other people that died that day may not have been from natural causes; it may have been the capitol police killed them. And they covered it up. And thanks to the good work of Tom Fitton at Judicial Watch, they’ve used the Freedom of Information Act to uncover more evidence. Because there’s 14,000 hours of video evidence the government’s trying to hide from the world, including from the defendants themselves.

And it appears the reason for that is not only a lot of informants being part of the process, but the Capitol Police behaved in a very illicit manner, and was just violently bringing people in and beating the daylights out of them for kicks and giggles. Including women, older women, like that.

Now we’re starting to find out why they hid and covered a lot of this up. That the only really violent people that day were actually the capitol police, not the people who are accused of being the insurrectionists.

This is not the America we know and love. God help us. Here’s a New Year’s wish: May all their crimes be shouted from the rooftops; may all the corruption be rooted out of our government; may we return to the thriving civilization that happens when a free and good people are allowed to live their lives without tyranny.

In That Case

Today were the closing arguments in the Rittenhouse case, where a 17-year-old boy shot three people in self-defense in late summer 2020 during riots in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

Defense Attorney Mark Richards during closing arguments, November 15, 2021
(Defense Attorney Binger seated in the background)
screenshot from the Rekieta Law livestream

There are so many people who can talk about guns with more authority than I can. But I understand enough to know that this case has broader implications, because it puts self-defense on trial.

In the closing argument rebuttal today, the prosecution said some truly crazy things. Like, we all know what it’s like to get beat up sometimes. You should expect that. It’s not something you should kill somebody over. So, getting hit in the head with a rock and a skateboard and being attacked by somebody with a Glock in hand (a “small” gun, not a big scary one like an AR-15) is not enough; any reasonable person would wait until bodily harm was inflicted before using a firearm that could actually kill someone.

There’s plenty to say about the couple of weeks that have been shown to the jury. But it’s in their hands now, and we’re likely to hear a result by tomorrow.

If the result is a guilty verdict (unlikely), we could expect an appeal based on a mistrial, because there were enough causes for that before it went to jury.

This may be the most clear-cut case of self-defense in history. It should not have been brought to trial. But this case isn’t about law or justice; it is about political posturing.

I’ve been mostly following daily reports from Robert Gruler and Viva & Barnes. Today I watched large portions of the closing arguments—on Nick Rekieta’s livestream. He has been doing those daily. Today there were over 700,000 people watching his livestream when I tuned in, which shared the PBS livestream (because some other stream was more technologically unreliable) while he and a panel of law vloggers commented as they watched. When I checked that video again tonight, over 900,000 had watched. That in itself is kind of a phenomenon. Here are the 9+ hours of video from today.

·       “Kyle Rittenhouse Trial Monday LIVE - CLOSING ARGUMENTS” Rekieta Law livestream, November 15, 2021. 

screenshot of the panel of law vloggers following the closing arguments
on Nick Rekieta's livestream, November 15, 2021

Something to keep in mind is that the mainstream story has very little resemblance to what actually happened that night, or probably to what the prosecution claimed happened. Video and testimony, even of prosecution witnesses, shows that Kyle Rittenhouse retreated, avoided firing until the final moments, with more composure and bravery than many older people with much more experience. He did not provoke. He was attacked. He had reason to fear for his life. And a reasonable person would see that he is innocent. One of those he shot, who sustained a serious arm injury, testified that Rittenhouse didn’t shoot him until he drew his gun on Rittenhouse. The trial should have ended right there.

One of the many observers of the trial, billionaire Bill Ackman, a lifelong Democrat, watched the trial and realized the media story had been false. He said so in a series of tweets, and the response he got was, “Did someone hack your account?” In a fair world, the natural response would be, “Hmm. Maybe I should watch for myself.” Here’s that story:

·       “Billionaire Bill Ackman shows that 'the truth shall make you free'” by Andrea Widburg for American Thinker, November 15, 2021. 

You can watch (or rewatch) the daily coverage from Nick Rekieta at Rekieta Law on YouTube. But for the daily briefings, I recommend Robert Gruler and Viva Frei or Viva & Barnes—all of whom popped in on Rekieta’s panel today. Robert Barnes had been volunteering to help with the defense. He was set to help with jury selectionas were the guys from the Behavior Panel, world-renowned body-language experts. But the defense team at the last minute rejected all help. Not good. And there were times during the trial it looked like they should have paid better attention. But the closing argument today was quite good. Anyway, here are a few highlights from the past week or so:

·       Robert Gruler “Rittenhouse Trial Day 11 Recap: Closing Arguments Review” November 15, 2021. 

·       Viva & Barnes “Rittenhouse Closing Arguments RECAP” November 15, 2021. 

·       Viva & Barnes “Ep. 87: Rittenhouse; Arbery; Bannon; O'Keefe; Baldwin; Astroworld & MORE!” November 14, 2021. 

·       Viva Frei Vlawg “Rittenhouse Trial Final Day —, Rejection & Projection” November 12, 2021. 

·       Robert Gruler “Rittenhouse Trial Day 9 Recap: Defense Rests, Use of Force Dr. Black, Drew H Live, Video Evidence” November 11, 2021. 

·       Robert Gruler “Rittenhouse Trial Day 8 Recap: KYLE TESTIFIES!” November 10, 2021. 

·       Robert Gruler “Rittenhouse Trial Day 6 Recap: Gaige Grosskreutz Direct & Cross Exam, Crime Lab, Kenosha PD” November 8, 2021. 

Viva Frei (left) and Robert Barnes during their recap
after closing arguments, November 15, 2021
screenshot from here

The most interesting testimonies, to me, were Gaige Grosskreutz, with the mic-drop moment when he admitted under oath that Rittenhouse didn’t shoot until Grosskreutz aimed his gun at him; and Kyle’s testimony. He didn’t have to testify. The evidence was all in his favor. It was risky. But he handled it pretty well. He did break down near the beginning—evidence of PTSD, which Barnes later verified he is being treated for. After recomposing, he held up very well. Not flawlessly, but good enough.

There were times during closing arguments when the prosecution was creating the story of what Kyle was thinking—at each of which the defense should have said, “Objection: mind-reading”—but that Kyle’s own testimony had explained. His testimony always coincided with video and other witnesses. So, for those of us watching, and maybe for the jury, it was somewhat satisfying to hear from him. But it shouldn’t have been necessary.

We’ll have more answers on the Rittenhouse case tomorrow. It has been a painful trial for everyone who believes we have a God-given right to self-defense. The panel today, after the end of closing arguments, was guessing what would happen tomorrow. About half guessed it would be a hung jury—not because the evidence didn’t show that Rittenhouse clearly acted in self-defense, but because the jury will be afraid of reprisal if their identity becomes known. Or they don't want to be blamed for the outbreak of more riots. Or possibly because there will be a holdout jury member who already had prejudice against Rittenhouse and is disregarding all the evidence.

If that happens, I think it will not be retried; it will be dismissed, maybe on some Friday afternoon news dump. I don’t know. Maybe the judge could call it a mistrial, which he could have done, based on prosecutorial misbehavior. I can’t see it proceeding forward with us all going through this again. But maybe I’m naïve.

I’m encouraged that there were so many people paying attention. It is a certain kind of person who listens to Rekieta and the other law vloggers: people interested in law and order. Other sorts might tune in directly to the PBS livestream or other sources. But it was nearly a quarter of a million people today. Viva Frei has been commenting frequently on how the number of watchers has been growing daily during the trial. It’s a phenomenon. And it is a metric that means something good for our country.

I hope things go well for Rittenhouse tomorrow, because that is something good for him personally, and also good for justice. Eventually I believe things will be made right for him, whatever happens. And enough of us care about law and order that we won’t lose our rights to apathy.

So, long live the rule of law!

Big Week for News

In preparation for what I would write about today, I started collecting some of the big stories. I don’t know when there has been so much big news happening day after day. So I had a good start. And then, early this morning, I got a similar list passed along to me, including all I had, plus a few. Some I can’t verify yet. I and people like me just want to know, Do we get to keep our country and our freedoms? We’re interested, so we keep searching for true news, wherever we can find it. And right now the news is coming at us like a firehose.

 

The Texas Lawsuit

meme found on Facebook

The biggest story, especially living here in Texas, is about the Texas lawsuit against Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan, and Wisconsin, filed late near midnight Monday.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s Office put out this statement: 

“Trust in the integrity of our election processes is sacrosanct and binds our citizenry and the States in this Union together. Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin destroyed that trust and compromised the security and integrity of the 2020 election. The states violated statutes enacted by their duly elected legislatures, thereby violating the Constitution. By ignoring both state and federal law, these states have not only tainted the integrity of their own citizens’ vote, but of Texas and every other state that held lawful elections,” said Attorney General Paxton. “Their failure to abide by the rule of law casts a dark shadow of doubt over the outcome of the entire election. We now ask that the Supreme Court step in to correct this egregious error.”  

Back in September we had a series on the Constitution. When we covered Article 3, the Judicial Branch, we noted that in Section 2, the Supreme Court is not just the ultimate appeals court. In certain circumstances it is the court of original jurisdiction. One such situation is when one or more of the states is a party in the suit.

So this Texas case goes directly to the Supreme Court. No stops along the way for a lower court to hear it or reject it. This case is “outcome determinative,” meaning that this one case could determine effect on the outcome of the election, since enough electors are involved. Whereas cases involving individual states would not, by themselves, determine outcome, because their electors alone would not make enough difference.

However, the Supreme Court is not being asked to determine the winner of the election. If it determines that the states indeed broke the law in ways that affected Texas and other states, the Constitution outlines possible alternatives. The first is for those state legislatures to meet and select a slate of electors. They would be free to select either candidate, although all of the states in question (plus AZ and NV, who are also swing states with voter fraud issues) have Republican-majority state legislatures.

If states fail to send electors and neither candidate thus gets 270 electoral votes, then the alternative approach is for the US House to vote—with a single vote from each state, based on its majority delegation. Timing changes the exact numbers, because Republicans have gained in the November election. If such a vote happens after seating the new Congress, then Republicans have 27 to Democrats’ 22, or something similar. If done with the existing Congress, Republicans still lead by a couple.

As of yesterday, 17 states had signed on to the Texas case. Today I have heard the numbers 18, 19, and 25, but I haven't been able to verify more than 17. Also, President Trump is joining in this lawsuit as a direct interested party. There are various ways to join the suit—to become additional equal plaintiffs, or to offer amicus briefs, and probably other ways. I don’t know which states have done what. Arizona has also offered an amicus brief stating that they believe the Supreme Court must take the case, since there is no lower court to remand it to. Justices Alito and Thomas seem to agree, based on what they've said previously.

The rather beautifully written first couple of pages
of the Bill of Complaint section of the Texas lawsuit

SCOTUS has asked for responses by this afternoon (Thursday), so we should know what those contain by Friday.

Here is the lawsuit for you to read. 

There’s plenty more for you to read or view. Let's start with this one:

·         “Texas is Suing 4 States for VOTER IRREGULARITIES and the Suit is AWESOME!”  Viva Frei Vlawg, Dec. 8, 2020.   

Frei starts with this:

And let me tell you something: This is a well-drafted lawsuit. It is an election lawsuit, and the next time someone tells you that there were no voter irregularities anywhere in this election, tell them to read this lawsuit or watch this vlog, because they simply don’t know what they’re talking about or they work for CNN.

He adds that it is “challenging the Supreme Court to take action on the issue.” And he points out that the lawsuit focuses on these states’ breaking the law—both their own state laws and the US Constitution. Then it lists the damage done to faith in the outcome, using the most provable of claims that require only known data, not speculation.

One main point is that each of these states changed voting laws without the legislature; election law is required by the US Constitution to be set by state legislatures. I think in one case a state had a legislative change, but the change went directly against that state’s own constitution.

 The ACLJ podcast has updated info on the case at least daily. Here are those since Tuesday:

·         “Breaking: Texas Sues PA, GA, MI, & WI at Supreme Court” Official ACLJ, Dec. 8, 2020. 

·         “Breaking: SCOTUS Orders Response to Texas Lawsuit” Official ACLJ, Dec. 9, 2020. 

·         “These Are the Legal Arguments - PA, WI, MI, & GA Ordered to Respond at the Supreme Court” Official ACLJ, Dec. 9, 2020. 

·         “BREAKING: President Trump and 18 States File at Supreme Court” Official ACLJ, Dec. 10, 2020. 

Joshua Philipp of Crossroads has been covering the Texas case in his daily Q&A livestreams. Here’s the one from Tuesday, when the story was breaking, and then several print stories:

·         “Live Q&A: Could Texas Break Election Deadlock?” Crossroads with Joshua Philipp, Dec. 8, 2020. 

·         “Supreme Court Puts Texas Election Lawsuit on the Docket” by Jacob Palmieri for The Palmieri Report, Dec. 8, 2020. 

·         “Texas Case Challenges Election Directly at Supreme Court” by Kris W. Kobach for Breitbart, Dec. 7, 2020. 

·         “Multiple States Throw Support Behind Texas’ Election Lawsuit Against GA, WI, MI, PA” by Ryan Saavedra for The Daily Wire, Dec. 9, 2020. 

·         “Sen. Cruz, Colleagues Submit Amicus Brief To Supreme Court in Brnovich v. DNC” Senator Ted Cruz press release, Dec. 7, 2020. 

 

YouTube Censorship

The next big story, coincidentally, is that YouTube announced a new censorship policy.

·         “YouTube to Delete Content Alleging Presidential Election Fraud” by Jack Phillips for The Epoch Times, Dec. 9, 2020. 

As of yesterday, any video that makes the claim that the election is not settled will be taken down for being false. They claim that, because December 8^th was the “safe harbor” day, a week before the scheduled Electoral College vote, when electors are appointed and given time to be prepared for their vote, that all is settled. Note that nothing in law mentions a “safe harbor” date. The date of the Electoral College vote is in statute but goes unmentioned in the Constitution. Only the January 20 inauguration date is mentioned (and that isn’t original either; it has been as late as April).

YouTube ignores all the cases that are making the electors in as many as six swing states unsettled. But if you argue with them, you will be silenced.

In essence, because their censorship policy coincides with the very substantial Texas case, they may be silencing news about an active, pressing, even historic Supreme Court case. 

There is quibbling, however. Joshua Philipp described it in his December 9 Q&A. He says, by his reading, it looks like you can say that Trump won the election. And you can say that there were voting irregularities. But if you tie those ideas together to say that voting irregularities mean that Trump really won the election, you will be censored.

On the R&R Law Group vlog  Wednesday, Robert F. Gruler tried to describe YouTube’s EDSA rules (educational, documentary, scientific, or artistic). YouTube’s example was that of a documentary that included speech by Nazi Germans; taken in context, that could be allowed, because it is used to show history, not to promote Nazism. Gruler, in applying that to the current election f-word (fraud), believes he can present information from original sources and offer some analysis of that, but would not be allowed to offer conclusions based on that analysis that go against YouTube’s assertion that the election outcome is settled.

That means you can still find videos on YouTube, ones where content producers are being very careful. But just in case, they’ll probably all tell you they’re pursuing other platforms, such as Rumble, Twitch, Facebook, Twitter, and probably others. I’ve been trying to navigate YouTube alternatives, but not yet successfully. I think that is going to be inevitable, though. I’ve been trying to learn to navigate MeWe and Parler as well, as alternatives to Facebook (see the story below), but I find them difficult and unsatisfying so far. Maybe it’s an age thing. I’m also aware that Blogger is a Google app, and that means I may eventually face scrutiny even here.

 

Facebook Monopoly

Meanwhile, Facebook is being forced to divest some of the companies it has acquired. By buying up any small competitor, it has essentially made itself a monopoly. The FTC lawsuit is asking that Facebook sell off Instagram and WhatsApp, and possibly others. The pressure for this case has been building for a decade, but only recently has scrutiny been paid to the control social media is exerting on the information people can get and share.

·         “Federal Trade Commission Calls for Breakup of Facebook” by David Ingram for NBC News, Dec. 9, 2020. 

·         “Facebook Looking at Fresh Antitrust Lawsuit from 40 States” by M. Corey Goldman for TheStreet, Dec. 3, 2020. 

 

Some Surprising News Stories

tweet image found on Facebook

Hunter Biden—Taxes and China Ties

·         “Hunter Biden tax probe examining Chinese business dealings” by Eric Tucker, Michael Balsamo, and Jonathan Lemire for Yahoo News, Dec. 9, 2020. 

·         “CNN Reporting About Confirmation of Investigation of Hunter Biden Is Laughable in Many Respects” The Spectator commentary, Dec. 10, 2020. 

·         Tweet by Kyle Becker (see right) Dec. 9, 2020

Eric Swalwell—China Ties

·         “House Intel Republicans Not Told about Eric Swalwell’s Relationship with Chinese Spy” by Steven Nelson and Ebony Bowden for The New York Post, Dec. 9, 2020. 

·         “FBI: Communist China Spy Infiltrated California Politicians, Including Russia Hoaxer Eric Swalwell” by Jordan Davidson for The Federalist, Dec. 8, 2020. 

Michigan State Rep Cynthia Johnson—Threats

·         “Michigan State Rep. Cynthia Johnson Disciplined by GOP for Facebook Video” by Emily Jacobs for The New York Post, Dec. 10, 2020. 

FBI Has Seth Rich Laptop

·         “FBI FINALLY Admits to Having Laptop of Murdered DNC Staffer Seth Rich, 1000s of Pages in Material” by Ben Sellers for Headline USA, Dec. 10, 2020. 

·         “HUGE: After 4 Years of Stonewalling Corrupt FBIFinally Admits They’re Holding Seth Rich’s Laptop” by Jim Hoft for The Gateway Pundit, Dec. 10, 2020.

China Influences Wall Street

·         “Beijing Manipulated Wall Street to Steer USPolicy, Until Trump Became President: Chinese Professor” by Cathy He and Linh Yun for The Epoch Times, Dec. 8 (updated Dec. 9), 2020.” 

·         “Revealed: How Trump Broke China's Control of America” Crossroads with Joshua Philipp, Dec. 6, 2020. 

 

Some More Election Sources

·         “Infographic: What Happened in Atlanta on Election Night” by Petr Svab for The Epoch Times, Dec. 9, 2020. 

·         “Election Supervisor Shows on Video How Dominion Software Allows Changing, Adding Votes” by Petr Svab for The Epoch Times, Dec. 10, 2020. 

·         Here Is The Evidence, a crowdsource data site for election info. 

·         “Richard Baris: Evidence of Voter Fraud Disappears from State Networks” Crossroads with Joshua Philipp, Dec. 8, 2020. 

Wars and Rumors of Wars

Some of the info in this section is certain, such as the transfer of power to Central Command.

Here’s an announcement:

·         “TRANSFER OF AUTHORITY OF MARFORNORTH FROMCOMMARFORRES TO COMMARFORCOM” Dec. 8, 2020.  

And here’s video of the ceremony

·         “U.S. Marine Corps Forces Northern Command Transfer of Authority to U.S. Marine Corps Forces Command” 

What I don’t know is whether that is significant in the ways people are hinting. The chatter added that there’s a lot of military air traffic, causing people to speculate all kinds of things. I’m guessing they think marshal law is about to break out, maybe. But you can read this and see what you think.

·         “ALERT! 82nd Airborne Division: ‘A STORM IS COMING’–That’s General Flynn’s Division” by IWB Investment Watch, Dec. 9, 2020. 

Another odd story came in a text passed along from a friend, but she could not identify the originator. Here are the main parts, copied as is:

The Kraken is SOF directed against domestic enemies who committed the election theft of 2020. This Kraken is needed because the CIA was running a rogue ELECTION THEFT!!!! operation out of our US Consulate office in Frankfurt Germany starting Tuesday, November 3rd, 2020. This is similar to the dozens of other election theft ops that the CIA has conducted in other countries around the world, very illegal then and now. Americans got a taste of what its like to be fraked by the CIA. Something many countries around the world already know. The US Army command was ordered by DoD and Trump to go in to Frankfurt and seize the CIA's own servers as evidence of the theft. The US Army did NOT raid Scytl's Frankfurt operation, that story is a ruse. The US Army seized American servers. We own them. We retrieved our own servers from a rogue CIA Election Theft Operation (similar to Hammer/Scorecard). Now President Trump has the servers….

This news will bring down the CIA, FBI, all of the major news organizations Washington Post, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, all of the television media, ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, FOX, all of the tech titans Facebook, Twitter and especially Google. Foreign governments in Canada (PM Justin Trudeau), in United Kingdom (PM Boris Johnson), in France (President Emmanual Macron), in Germany (Chancellor Angela Merkel) and even the entire European Parliament will collapse. Trump has encrypted calls of John Brennan and Chris Way [sic] commiting sedition. Trump has encrypted communications between Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Senator Chuck Schumer commiting sedition. Trump has information proving that dozens of Congress people, Senators and Governors all around America have committed election fraud and sedition. Trump has all the information and evidence needed to prove that CNN, FOX, Facebook, Twitter have all conspired to steal this election from the American people. President Trump has all of this information. How? Trump controls the NSA and the NSA has everything. Trump has everything because the NSA has everything. BOMBSHELL INDEED!

I’ve heard enough elsewhere that I believe the CIA servers were seized in Frankfurt. And quite possibly Kraken is the name of a military intelligence unit; I’m uncertain how to verify that, but I've heard it from multiple places. I don’t know about any of the rest of it. Is it wishful thinking that we could take down all the anti-America conspirators? Probably. But then, who knows? It’s the year 2020, after all.

Anyway, it has been a rather heavy news week. It’s still a challenge to wade through to find truth. But, until the censors become completely successful, at least we can still try to do that.