A continuation of events surrounding the drug war and related social issues of Baja California and Mexico. Keeping an eye on Seig Heil Trump. We are still trying to restore all blogs from 2006 which were hacked by Linton Robinson and his team, famous for supporting the Baja Trump Towers on one of his real estate sites. Highlights of Paris-Simone's favorite music !!
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Showing posts with label Stephen Collinson. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Stephen Collinson. Show all posts
"CNN)Donald Trump on Monday launched a three-week quest to save his presidency, behaving as though the pandemic that has killed 215,000 Americans was already a memory in front of a packed-in crowd -- even amid chilling new warnings about the resurgent virus.
In
his first rally since his own bout with Covid-19, Trump painted a
deeply dishonest picture of the nation's battle with the disease, mocked
Biden over social distancing and vowed victory on November 3 as he
began a frantic push to Election Day, marked by multiple rallies a day
that could act as superspreader events.
"I
feel so powerful, I'll walk into that audience. I'll walk in there,
I'll kiss everyone in that audience," Trump said in Sanford, Florida,
showing his illness did not teach him to respect his own government's
pandemic guidelines. "I'll kiss the guys and the beautiful women and the
-- everybody. I'll just give everybody a big, fat kiss."
At
his Florida rally, Trump fed off the large crowd's energy during his
hour-long performance and ran through his demagogic list of favored
political attacks, from law and order to his false claims of voting
irregularities. He took the stage hours after the White House physician
said he posted negative Covid-19 tests in consecutive days.
"(Biden)
may be the worst presidential candidate in history and I got him,"
Trump said, despite a flurry of recent polls showing him down by double
digits to the former vice president and trailing in most swing states.
Biden
campaigned Monday in Ohio, a state once seen as a sure fire bet for
Trump that Democrats think is now in play, and synchronized his message
with Capitol Hill colleagues using the Barrett nomination to supercharge
claims that she would be a vessel to finally kill off Obamacare, which
faces its next date with destiny in the court a week after the election.
"In
the middle of this pandemic, why do Republicans have time to hold a
hearing on the Supreme Court instead of providing the significant
economic need for localities?" Biden asked. "I'll tell you why. It's
about finally getting his wish to wipe out the Affordable Care Act."
Biden
also rebuked Trump for his "reckless" conduct since his diagnosis,
saying: "The longer Donald Trump is president the more reckless he seems
to get."
Taken
in isolation, Trump's rally looked like any other big campaign event
three weeks before an Election Day. While some supporters wore masks
behind him in the camera shot, many people in the big, outdoor crowd did
not.
And despite presiding over a
botched pandemic response, Trump claimed he had saved millions of lives.
After turning his White House into a superspreader that caused multiple
infections, the President also criticized Biden for holding socially
distanced events in which attendees sit in designated circles.
"They
only have the circles because that's the only way they can fill up the
room," the President said, before gazing out at his own large and
raucous crowd that contravenes every government recommendation on
combating the virus and saying: "These are the real polls."
But
medical experts expressed despair at Trump's decision to gather huge
crowds during a worsening pandemic, ahead of a swing that Trump aides
said Monday would involve multiple rallies each day in the coming weeks.
"I
promise you, the virus is there, whether it is an indoor event or an
outdoor event in these large gatherings," said Dr. William Schaffner,
professor of health policy and preventive medicine at Vanderbilt
University on CNN's Erin Burnett "OutFront," who added that the images
of Trump's rally made him "weep."
"Some
of those people will become sick, they will spread it to others when
they get home and they will become sick. These are accelerator events
that promote the distribution of the virus," Schaffner said.
Trump's
mockery of his own government's recommendations -- his rallies are
almost the only mass participation events taking place in the world
right now -- came amid fast darkening warnings about the months ahead.
The
government's top infectious disease specialist, Dr. Anthony Fauci,
warned that rallies like the one Trump held on Monday night are "asking
for trouble."
"Because when you look at what is going on in the United States, it is really very troublesome," Fauci told CNN's Jake Tapper.
Later,
Fauci delivered an even more dire warning about a pandemic that is
seeing rising cases in 31 one states as a fall spike -- that is
effectively being ignored by a negligent White House -- begins to gather
pace.
"I think we're facing a
whole lot of trouble," Fauci, the director of the National Institute of
Allergy and Infectious Diseases, referring to coronavirus infections
which have recently climbed back above 50,000 a day.
"That's
a bad place to be when you're going into the cooler weather of the fall
and the colder weather of the winter," Fauci said.
Trump's
claim to have saved millions of lives is based on the presumption that
there would have been many more deaths had no counter-measures been
taken against the disease -- a scenario no one was seriously advocating.
New
research on Monday exposed the President's misinformation and showed in
staggering clarity how the US has done far worse than many other
industrialized nations in saving lives during the pandemic. After May
10, the US had more deaths per 100,000 people than other high mortality
countries featured in a study published in the medical journal JAMA.
Countries
including South Korea, Japan and Australia recorded fewer than five
deaths per 100,000 people. If the US had comparable death rates to
Australia since the beginning of the pandemic, it would have had 187,661
fewer deaths, according to the study conducted by Alyssa Bilinski, a
PhD candidate at Harvard University, and Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, vice
provost of global initiatives and professor at the University of
Pennsylvania.
If the US had
comparable death rates to Canada it would have had 117,622 fewer deaths.
And it would have recorded 96,763 fewer deaths if it had comparable
death rates to France.
In the CNN Poll of Polls on Monday, Biden led Trump by 11 points. Fresh New York Times/Siena surveys in battlegrounds Michigan and Wisconsin released Monday showed the Democrat up 6 points and 10 points, respectively.
Trump
is hoping to use his return to the campaign trail to portray himself as
triumphing over Covid-19 and to solidify his assurances to Americans
there is nothing to fear from the disease, despite its rising nationwide
threat.
The President -- who has
rarely tried to reach beyond his political base -- is counting on a
massive turnout not just from his 2016 supporters but also from new
working class white voters who identify with him culturally but who have
rarely cast a vote in previous elections. Trump's rally on Monday was
for instance peppered with comments about the "Panhandle," the portion
of northern Florida where he performed especially strongly in 2016.
CNN White House reporter Kevin Liptak reported
Monday that Trump is pressing his advisers to organize multiple rallies
in the next few weeks as he tries to unleash a late wave of momentum to
overhaul Biden.
The President is
pining for two and three events a day -- which in the circumstances
could turn into multiple superspreader events -- to revive the spirit of
his push up to his shock victory over Hillary Clinton four years ago.
But
there are signs that the GOP hierarchy in Washington is not seeing the
similarities with 2016, with some seeing Trump's antics, including a
boorish performance at the first presidential debate, as giving
Democrats a golden opportunity to grab both the White House and Senate.
McConnell
delivered his warning about Democrats being "on fire" in a call with
lobbyists recently, according to someone familiar with the remarks.
Senate
Republicans who never expected to have a serious challenge, such as
Lindsey Graham in South Carolina and Joni Ernst in Iowa, are at serious
risk. Graham, who as Senate Judiciary Committee chairman is leading the
Barrett hearings, is facing a challenger, Jaime Harrison, who just
shattered the single quarter fundraising record for a Senate race with
$57 million.
And Trump's itinerary
for later this week also indicates a campaign playing defense as he
travels to Iowa, Pennsylvania and North Carolina -- all states he won
four years ago and where he is in danger of losing now."
~~~~~
Everyone knows we're going to lose this round to Amy Coney Barrett, but the tickle will be if Lindsay Graham loses his Senate seat and is sent back to the Plantation; that upset and a few more will put us in the position to override the arch conservative votes of the Supreme Court, right ?
So hang on to yer seats and stay calm (if you can). Vons has this great organic popcorn with white cheddar cheese, check it out, you may need it.
Lots more here, including the confirmation hearings:
So says the Turtleman; but not in the sense of burning up and burning out as Trump is doing. More like gaining momentum at a rapid and feverish pace in every possible direction.
There are so many "fire" songs...I thought this one was the best - Scorcese used it in one of his scenes as background for his frenetic anti-hero with helicopters flying overhead (hilarious) and it's very hyper. When I hear it I envision lots of energy with thousands of robust and pissed off donkeys on a stampede chasing Mitch The Turtleman out of the Senate chamber from all directions...wow, I must need sleep.
Anyway, Nilsson was a completely cool guy ..you might remember him from years ago on the Smothers Brothers. This is the longer version.
I should have added (but I thought the title was getting kind of long) he might even reveal that he thinks Joe Biden is taking drugs.
Of course, he won't be speaking about the Republicans who are blocking the Virus Aide and millions of Americans are unemployed, broke, hungry, losing their homes or rentals and scared to death. But then again he could mention he received the Bay of Pigs award.
One thing we know for certain, people will be crammed in like sardines to the inside event, most not wearing masks and not a soul practising social distancing.
This BTW was from last week, and if you listened to the Trump speech, comparing himself to FDR and Churchhill as we did, you probably were astounded-left speechless as we were to say the least. Goes to show Trump knows nothing about history, not one thing, bombastic !
So, here we are with the West ablazedue to climate change (which BTW is really not being covered here locally...nor have I heard any television weather reporter in San Diego [ with the exception of PBS] even mention "climate change" and the fires. Not a peep ! That to me is just dern-right irresponsible and stupid.
~ From Informed Comment: (with video hit the link)
"Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – It is astonishing to me that we still
have 287 million gasoline vehicles on our roads and that 20 percent of
our electricity comes from burning dirty coal. We just go on blithely
pumping over 5 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide, a powerful and
dangerous heat-trapping gas, into the atmosphere annually. It is like
setting off atomic bombs in the atmosphere. We know this. And yet as a
society we are virtually paralyzed. Our Neanderthal-in-chief actually
promotes coal burning, and the Republican Party is a Siamese twin with
Big Oil.
The presidential candidates aren’t even talking about it much, and it
was an issue largely excluded by the corporate press and the party
machines from the primary debates.
While individuals with the resources can cut down on their carbon
footprints with solar panels and electric cars (they are a good
combination), the problem can’t be tackled effectively without
government action. And there, the United States has failed. It has been
made to fail by Big Carbon and greedy politicians and ignorant
journalists and an apathetic public that apparently doesn’t care if
their children or grandchildren face a choice of being burned up or
drowning.
If you go back and look at the predictions of climate scientists
about 2020, you’ll see that they gave a range, of best- and worst-case
scenarios. In every instance, it is the worst case scenario that has
come to pass. Even the most jaded and alarmed scientists in 2000 were
not pessimistic enough.
Mother Nature is trying to tell us something but we are not listening.
Diana Leonard and Andrew Freedman at WaPo
write, “These wildfires are what is known as a compound disaster, in
which more than one extreme event takes place at the same time, across a
varied geography. While climate scientists have been warning that
compound disasters are an inevitable result of human-caused climate
change, a spate of simultaneously burning, rapidly expanding fires
spanning the entire West Coast was not expected for several more decades
if greenhouse gas emissions remain high.”
1. 3.1 million acres of California have been scorched this year by
wildfires, the largest number in recorded history, and thousands of
homes have been destroyed. Some 200,000 are going without electricity in
a bid to stop more fires. Christina Walker at CNN reports that California wildfires have increased 8x in size since 1970, and the number of acres burned is up 500%.
CNN quotes Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at UCLA and the National
Center for Atmospheric Research: “climate change has not just made the
extreme heat waves that coincided with the fires worse. The bigger
effect is the more subtle, long-term warming,” he said. “That couple of
degrees of (average) warming over decades … you don’t notice it as much,
but it’s still there lurking in the background, sucking extra moisture
out of the vegetation and the soil.”
A study
has just demonstrated that the number of extreme-danger fire days has
doubled since 1980 in California because of global heating.
2. Wildfires have burned a million acres in Oregon, and Timothy Bella, Marisa Iati and Hannah Knowles at WaPo
report that state officials are worried about a “mass fatality
incident” that will overwhelm local health care facilities. Fully 10
percent of the state’s population, some 500,000 people, have been
ordered evacuated.
3. Joseph O’Sullivan reports at the Seattle Times
that Washington state has seen over 600,000 acres burned. It is also
part of the expanding Compound Disaster. This is the most acreage burnt
in recorded history except for 2015. Governor Jay Inslee, in keeping
with the spirit of Compound Disaster, is trying to provide shelter to
some of the 500,000 fleeing Oregonians.
4. Nature is not disconnected from human society or from the economy, as Trump and his ilk imagine. Jeff Dukes writes in the Chicago Tribune about the effect of global heating on the Midwest:
“In the Midwest, we regularly see crops ruined by droughts or
floods. We expect wetter springs, bigger downpours and more variable
precipitation during hotter summers to crash yields more often. The
agricultural banks that many farmers depend on for credit are typically
small and disproportionately exposed to these regional extreme weather
events.”
The Midwest is facing the opposite problem from the West, of
increased downpours and crop damage. What we seldom stop to think about
is the rolling farm bankruptcies it will produce and hence the rolling
bank failures.
5. Hurricane Laura visited devastation on Louisiana and struck up to
Arkansas. It landed as nearly a Category 4 Hurricane, and if it had hit
more populous areas it would have been an even bigger disaster. Sarah Gibbons at National Geographic
lays out the dangers of such enormous storms. They are causing coastal
erosion, literally just taking away the state’s land. As the icecaps
melt, the Gulf of Mexico is rising (and the water is heating, so it
expands). That sea level rise is exacerbating the sinking of the Delta
because levees no longer let the Mississippi lay down silt.
Hot sea water and extra moisture in the air from heat-driven
evaporation is fueling super-hurricanes in the Gulf that are more
powerful and cause more downpours than anything in recorded history.
This heating is from us driving our cars and burning our coal and other
ways we generate heat-trapping gases."
~~~~~
Local Drug War & COVID Stats:
Before I get so far behind, here are some stats:
Tijuana:
58 executions so far this month of September in Tijuana, leaving a YTD total of 1,412 dead. Check out Noticias del Dia for more reports on all of these.
"From 5 a.m. on Saturday, September 12 to noon this Sunday, in Tijuana there were ten homicides. With this, they add 58 murders so far in September, and in the accumulated of 2020, 1,412.
In
the most recent violent events, the multi-homicide of three men stands
out during the early hours of this September 13, when in the first
minutes of the day, officials of the State Investigation Agency located
the three bodies on the old highway to Tecate, on one side from number
105, in the Colonia Vivienda Magisterial 37, in the Los Pinos
delegation. The victims - who remain unidentified - have gunshot wounds.
At
noon today, in the same district of Los Pinos, a man was shot to death
while walking on the main avenue of the Puerta Plata subdivision,
located on one side of Bulevard 2000.
Municipal
police officers and Red Cross rescuers arrived at the scene and
attended to the victim, but the victim no longer had vital signs and the
man was declared dead at the scene. The area was cordoned off waiting for agents of the State Attorney General's Office to carry out the corresponding proceedings.
Regarding
the homicides reported on Saturday, September 12, at the stroke of
midnight, Valentín Reyes Rosa and Alberto Audeves Mercado were found
dead inside a house in the private San Jorge, in the Villa del Álamo
subdivision, in the delegation The pines. Both bodies show traces of strangulation.
At 11:40 p.m. yesterday, the assassination of J. Nicolás Martínez Monroy, 55, was reported. The
corpse of the man -which showed gunshots- was found inside a green and
cream public transport vehicle on Mixtla street, in front of number
14912, in the Sánchez Taboada Produtsa neighborhood, in the Sánchez
Taboada delegation .
Hours
before, at 6:30 p.m., officials of the State Investigation Agency
located a gray truck, parked on Constitución avenue, between Second and
Third streets, in front of number 616, in the Zona Centro neighborhood,
in the Centro delegation .
In the passenger seat was Geovany Zepeda, 32, whose body had gunshot wounds to the neck and chest.
Minutes
earlier, on Avenida Ferrocarril -on one side of the train tracks-, in
the Zermeño Mérida neighborhood, in the Los Pinos delegation, the body
of a man, between 20 and 25 years old, was found. The body had a head wound and 3 more to the thorax produced by a firearm projectile. So far the identity of the victim is unknown.
In
the early hours of Saturday, at 5:25 a.m., the body of a man, between
45 and 50 years old, was found on the free highway Mexicali-Tijuana, at
kilometer 159 + 100, in the Presa Rural delegation The body had two
injuries to the head and one more to the thorax, caused by a firearm."
~~~~~
UPDATE/edit 09/14:
The execution numbers according to Zeta have increased. I'm adding this because maybe you might be thinking, well, it is just more people being shot. No, this is just the tip of the iceberg as far as cruelty Is concerned...and it happens all of time, it is savage here up and down the coast:
"The violence in Tijuana continues. This
morning of Monday, September 14, the severed head of a person was found
inside a plastic bucket, a body inside a tambo, as well as a drug
message. The discovery occurred in the vicinity of the Altamira neighborhood.
With this fact, the number of intentional homicides rises to 63 victims in September, and 1,416 so far in 2020.
Information
obtained by ZETA, refers that around 06:29 hours it was reported that
in Lucrecia Toriz Street and Second Street at the height of the stairs
that lead to a private university there was a black and white plastic
drum, which was he managed to appreciate the lower extremities, which
were tied with a piece of black cloth, wrapped in a brown and beige
blanket.
In addition, 20 meters from the first site, a white plastic bucket was found, and inside a human head. On one side was a piece of canvas with a legend that read: “ALINIENSE BALL OF DOGS FROM INDEPE TO VAN A RODAR CHOMPAS. YOU FOLLOW YOUR LUIZ GÁMEZ OR THE (LUISILLO) ATORALE BY DAY CRISTALON IN ONE. ATT EL KINDER NG ”.
In other violent events, four murders were recorded on Sunday, September 13.
The
first occurred at 6:10 a.m. at an address at number 96 Lázaro Cárdenas
street, Alfonso Garzón neighborhood, where a 20-year-old male who went
by the name of Yamil Ramos Ramírez was murdered.
Later,
another young man identified, Gerardo García Mora, 24, was found dead
on Titanio Street in the Puerta de Plata neighborhood. The victim had reddish-brown spots.
Also
on Sunday on Abedul Street in front of the address of Lot 11, Block 27,
Valle Imperial neighborhood, a male was found dead with visible traces
of violence, until now unidentified. Two casings were found at the site.
Finally,
at 9:40 p.m., a young man between the ages of 25 and 30 was shot to
death when he was on Hacienda las Arboledas Street, in the Terrazas del
Valle II section.
In none of the cases are detained persons reported."
end edit.
~~~~~
Ensenada:
You wouldn't know Ensenada is more or less a battleground, not only in the drug war related deaths but the COVID debacle by reading the reports of tourists flocking to the Municipality. Marco Flores writes that a YTD tally would exceed 265 deaths in Ensenada by execution. Here is the link to Ensenada from Zeta; you can scroll through - don't miss the two gringos down in San Quintin at El Socorro. Back in the early 80's Socorro used to be one of our favorite places to camp & surf.
"The
State Attorney General's Office (FGE) suspects that the North American
couple who is missing in Baja California are inside a grave in the town
of El Socorrito in San Quintín, south of Ensenada.
They
are a retired couple identified by the media from San Diego,
California, as Ian Hirschsohn, 78, of Solana Beach and Kathy Harvey, 73,
of Tierrasanta.
Both
traveled frequently to the area where they rented a home, although they
intended to return to the United States on August 31. Relatives of the couple had no further news of them so they notified the police corporations.
The
San Diego Police Department confirmed on Friday that the bodies were
found, however, according to Ensenada officials working on the case,
they reported that they are not sure because they have three days trying
to extract the remains from a grave, or well, six meters deep.
Since
the discovery last Thursday, September 3, a delegation was formed
between agents and rescue elements from the Civil Protection
Directorate, as well as volunteers.
On
Saturday night the rescuers deserted the operation due to the risk, on
Saturday morning they began the work but so far they have not been able
to extract the remains.
El
Socorrito is located about four kilometers from the Transpeninsular
highway, and the closest to the place of the discovery is a
rehabilitation center for addicts."
"The
number of deaths caused by the SARS CoV-2 virus (COVID-19) amounted to
3,330 in Baja California, with which the entity remains in fifth place
nationally. More than half
of the deaths (58.8%) from March to September 12, 2020 were registered
with the Mexican Institute of Social Security.
While
37.4% in the hospitals of the Ministry of Health and 3.75% in the rest
of institutions, said the Secretary of Health, Alonso Pérez Rico, this
Sunday during the message of Governor Jaime Bonilla Valdez, on Facebook.
In
the last report (of September 12) the entity reported 20 new deaths: 12
in Tijuana, 3 in Ensenada, 3 in Mexicali, and 2 in Tecate.
Regarding
the number of accumulated cases of coronavirus, in Baja California
there are 18 thousand 324. Of which, the Ministry of Health registered 7
thousand 108; IMSS, 9,753; IMSS Wellbeing 209; ISSSTE, 440; ISSSTECALI, 662; Sedena, 37; Semar, 47 and private hospitals, 68.
According to the official, 24 new cases were reported on September 12. Fifteen in Ensenada, to add 2 thousand 905. Eight in Mexicali, bringing the total to 8 thousand 778 accumulated. Five in Tijuana, to reach 5,841 accumulated cases of coronavirus. Rosarito one, with a total of 323. While Tecate had no new cases, although it registers 477 accumulated cases.
As
of yesterday's cut, active cases in the entity decreased from 675 to
601. Tijuana went from having 317 cases to 278, which left the top 20
municipalities with the most active cases, ranking 25th.
Mexicali
also decreased the number of active cases, from 144 to 125. Ensenada,
went from 162 to 157. Tecate dropped 10 active cases, from 26 to 16.
Rosarito also reduced one active case, bringing it to 25.
Pérez Rico added that hospital occupancy is 28.16% in the SSA; 73.68% in Social Security; 87% in the ISSSTE; 63.82% in the ISSSTECALI; and 21.36% in Sedena."
"The
city of Tijuana in Baja California reported 229 active cases of
COVID-19, on the morning of Monday, September 14, the highest figure in
the five municipalities, which together accumulate 501 patients with the
active SARS-CoV-2 virus . Of
the accumulated cases since the beginning of the pandemic, there are 18
thousand 341 and three thousand 319 deaths, reported the head of the
Ministry of Health (SS), Alonso Pérez Rico.
Although
active cases decreased by 100 cases compared to the previous day, the
state remains above 500 patients with the active virus. Tijuana
reports 229, Mexicali 103, Ensenada 100, Playas de Rosarito 24, Tecate
11 and the towns of San Quintín and San Felipe have 32 and two cases
respectively.
In contrast to the more than 100 new cases to COVID-19 registered in recent days, this Monday there were only 17 new cases. Tijuana (5,851 confirmed) accumulated 10 cases; Ensenada (2 thousand 364) added three cases; Mexicali (8 thousand 484) accumulated two cases; Tecate (478) had a new case as well as the town of San Quintín (545). Only Playas de Rosarito (323) and the town of San Felipe (296) remained without incident.
Of
the confirmed accumulated, 387 are people ranging from 0 to 20 years
old, but the group with the most cases is that of people 30 to 34 years
old who report 2,274 COVID patients. Of the patients that are still alive, 14,848 have been outpatients and 173 have been hospitalized, 3,319 have lost their lives.
Pérez Rico reported that of the 15 recent deaths, Tijuana had the highest number, with 7 deaths reaching 1,352 deaths; Mexicali accumulated 1,498 with five deceased persons; Tecate with two reached 103 deaths and Ensenada with one case rose to 327 deaths. The
localities without increases are Playas de Rosarito, which maintains 18
deaths, the town of San Quintín has 19 and San Felipe has two.
By age groups, the highest number of deaths has occurred in people aged 64 to 69, 427 to date; It is followed by the groups of 60 to 64 years that register 414 deaths and that of 55 to 59 years has 413 deaths. Those recovered are 10,380 in the entire state.
In the SS, hospital occupancy is 28 percent with 110 beds occupied and 60 ventilators in use. The General Hospital of Mexicali is at 29 percent occupancy; the General de Tijuana at 32 percent and the General Hospital of Ensenada at 24 percent occupancy.
The
Mexican Institute of Social Security (IMSS) is 74 percent occupied in
the state with 149 hospitalized patients and 29 connected to a
ventilator. Mexicali has an occupation of 78 percent in the General Hospital of Zone 30; Tijuana is 73 percent in the Regional Hospital 1 and Ensenada works at 73 percent occupancy in the General Hospital of Zone 8."
end edit.
~~~~
I saw this report a few days back and thought it might work on the blog...but I was torn, especially after viewing the Ensenada report from Zeta (above) and of course the drug violence which surrounds us in Tijuana.
However , I am a Jimmy Carter fan... and I needed a tune for the blog.
Here then,
~ From the Hill via MSN:
"Jimmy Carter Says His Son Smoked Pot With Willie Nelson On White House Roof"
By, John Bowden - https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/jimmy-carter-says-his-son-smoked-pot-with-willie-nelson-on-white-house-roof/ar-BB18ZURH
"Former President Jimmy Carter reveals in a new documentary that his
son James Earl "Chip" Carter sat on the roof of the White House and
smoked marijuana with country music legend Willie Nelson.
People magazine
reports that Carter made the admission in a new documentary, "Jimmy
Carter: Rock & Roll President." Carter confirmed the anecdote
described in Nelson's autobiography, though Nelson had hid the identity
of Carter's son in the book in which he referred to his companion as a
"servant" in the White House.
"When Willie Nelson wrote his
autobiography, he confessed that he smoked pot in the White House one
night when he was spending the night with me," Carter says, according to
People. "And he says that his companion that shared the pot with him
was one of the servants in the White House. That is not exactly true -
it actually was one of my sons, which he didn't want to categorize as a
pot-smoker like him."
Carter famously made political alliances with many well-known
musicians during his White House tenure, including Nelson and the Allman
Brothers. In the documentary, he reportedly also dismissed criticism of
his meetings with musical groups, pointing to the influence such groups
had over their fans.
"I was doing what I really believed, and the
response I think from the followers of those musicians was much more
influential than the people who thought [of] that being inappropriate
for a president," Carter says, according to People.
Nelson is an outspoken advocate for left-leaning causes and in 2018 supported former Texas Rep. Beto O'Rourke (D) in his Senate bid against Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas)."
~~~~~
Rolling Stone covered this same material back in 2019:
"Sixty-five years after
he smoked his first joint, Willie Nelson is America’s most legendary
stoner and a walking testament to the power of weed. It may have even
saved his life"
Actually Trump is so stupid whilst he is whistling he doesn't even realize that the song he is whistling was written by James Bland, a black composer.
Meanwhile, it's pretty touchy right now between the Pentagon and the White House; the question is, will Trump fire General Milley? Then what? And, will he attempt to move the Confederate statues to the Rose Garden?
~~~~~
~ From Slate:
The Generals Are Turning on Trump
Mark Milley’s apology for the church photo-op is a major escalation.
President Donald Trump’s fraught relations with senior military officers ratcheted up another notch on Thursday as Gen. Mark Milley, the top U.S. general, formally apologized for appearing in Trump’s June 1 photo-op
at St. John’s Episcopal Church after police and National Guard officers
fired rubber bullets and tear gas to clear protesters from nearby
Lafayette Square, across from the White House.
“I should not have been there,” Milley, the chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff, said in a prerecorded commencement address to National
Defense University. “My presence in that moment and in that environment
created a perception of the military involved in domestic politics.”
Last week, Secretary of Defense Mark Esper,
who also appeared in the photo-op, told reporters that he too shouldn’t
have been there, further claiming that he didn’t know where he was
going when Trump led him to the church. Esper also said that he opposed
invoking the Insurrection Act to bring active-duty soldiers to quell
disorder in D.C., as Trump had threatened to do. Esper’s remarks earned
him a chewing-out in the Oval Office. Whether the same will happen to
Milley—who has reportedly been agonizing over his role in Trump’s
politicization of the military—is a matter of some suspense.
In between the June 1 incident and now, several senior officers,
retired and still serving, have spoken out against the idea of using
active-duty troops against the American citizens who have been
demonstrating since the Minneapolis police killing of George Floyd.
Retired Marine Gen. Jim Mattis,
who had resigned in protest as secretary of defense in December 2018,
used the occasion to criticize Trump himself, lambasting his presidency
as “three years without mature leadership.”
Trump is scheduled to give a commencement address this Saturday to the graduating cadets at West Point.
Rather than delivering it remotely, as various leaders have done for
other military academies, Trump—against the wishes of West Point’s
leaders—demanded that the Army cadets return to campus, isolate
themselves for two weeks, and then, during the ceremony itself, sit in
tight formation, ignoring CDC guidelines on social distancing. Of the
1,100 graduating cadets, 17 have tested positive for the coronavirus.
The whole business, which seems designed to provide footage of Trump
speaking before the newest flock of military officers for his reelection
campaign, has sparked quiet resentment from many in the Army.
Meanwhile, in another brewing conflict between Trump and a military
culture that’s suddenly, swiftly modernizing, the Republican-chaired Senate Armed Services Committee
late Wednesday approved a motion giving the Defense Department three
years to change the names of all military bases, installations, and
street signs named after Confederate officers. Sen. Elizabeth Warren
offered the amendment to the defense authorization bill; the motion was
approved in a voice vote, signaling that it will almost certainly be
adopted by the full Senate.
Then, on Thursday, Rep. Yvette Clarke, a Democrat from New York,
introduced a bill giving the Defense Department just one year to change
the names. She sponsored a similar bill in 2017 that garnered so little
support it didn’t even come up for a vote on the House floor.
The world has since changed. Just in recent days, several prominent Army officers—notably
retired Gen. David Petraeus, former commander of U.S. forces in Iraq
and Afghanistan—have said it’s time to remove the names of the
treasonous secessionists who fought against the United States
in the Civil War from U.S. military facilities, including 10 large Army
bases in former Confederate Southern states. In response, acting Army
Secretary Ryan McCarthy said that he would be open to a “bipartisan
conversation” on the matter.
But Trump reacted with fury to the whole idea, tweeting
on Wednesday that he “will not even consider the renaming of these
Magnificent and Fabled Military Installations.” He finished off his
tweet, laden with more capitalized letters than usual: “Respect our
Military!”—although he clearly has no notion of what real military
officers, who have deployed for real combat from these bases, really
think.
All of this is taking place as Trump’s ratings have slid by as much as 10 percentage points
just in the past week, owing in part to his hostile and aggressive
response to the protests and to his political exploitation of church
property, a move that has damaged his standing with many evangelicals. Now, he’s picking a high-profile fight with the military as well.
The awkward thing about Milley is that Trump appointed him Joint
Chiefs of Staff chairman in 2019. The post has a term of four years, so
he is nowhere near retiring—though, in accordance with his powers as
commander in chief, Trump could fire him. In a recent article in the
Atlantic, Eliot Cohen,
dean of Johns Hopkins University’s School for Advanced International
Studies, wrote about the Trump era’s growing crisis in civil-military
relations, concluding, “The real demonstration of military courage by a
general in such a position is … the willingness to be fired.” Milley may
soon face that test."
The deeper the change sweeping America, the more President Donald Trump digs into positions that even some of his natural allies have recently forsaken.
Defending the memory of Confederate generals, proudly crisscrossing the country without wearing a mask and threatening to send troops to tackle demonstrators in Seattle, Trump on Thursday solidified his reelection pitch as a bulwark against a cultural transformation.
In
essence, he's arguing that there is something fundamentally un-American
and liberal about finally shedding the symbols and imagery of the Civil
War, believing systemic racism stains the police force or covering up
to prevent the spread of a deadly virus he is trying to wish away.
The
President's conduct is consistent with a lifetime of going against the
crowd and his impulse to use racial and cultural flashpoints for his own
advantage. At a time when much of the country, even many instinctively
conservative individuals and institutions, is engaging in a racial
reckoning, he is apparently betting that his stands will ignite and
expand his political base and carry him to a backlash victory in
November.
As
he did with his "Make America Great Again" campaign slogan, Trump is
implicitly invoking an idealized past vision of a nation untarnished by
political correctness, where white conservative values were dominant,
that seems incompatible with an increasingly diverse country. At the
same time, he is propagating an alternative reality that the pandemic is
over -- despite rising cases in many states -- to convince voters that
the strong economy he was using as his main reelection pitch is on the
way back.
Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel announced on Thursday that Trump will accept the nomination at a 15,000-person arena in Jacksonville, Florida
-- not in Charlotte, North Carolina, as planned -- after the President
took issue with social distancing guidelines from the Tar Heel State's
Democratic governor that would have curtailed the festivities he wanted.
The
President's resumption of campaign rallies -- he will be back onstage
in Tulsa, Oklahoma, next week -- is crucial to driving home this
two-pronged strategy. But reality is intruding; attendees will have to agree to a disclaimer
that stipulates they won't sue Trump's campaign if they get coronavirus
in a packed crowd. In itself, the event will be a massive symbolic
repudiation of the idea that there is any reason for Americans to change
their behaviors and attitudes in the face of two massive national
crises.
But as the President
fortifies his culture war positions, he is alienating his own generals,
some Republican senators, executives who run sports leagues and
Americans who tell pollsters that they are uneasy with his handling of
the pandemic and the aftermath of the death of George Floyd.
Military
leaders were shocked by Trump's refusal to rename bases named for
Confederate generals, who took up arms against the United States in a
civil war fought to preserve slavery. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs
of Staff, Gen. Mark Milley, now says
he was wrong to allow himself to be dragged into Trump's notorious
photo op following the forceful dispersal of peaceful protesters outside
the White House last week.
NASCAR, the stock car racing circuit that is seen as a bastion of Southern values, has banned the
Confederate flag from its tracks in the latest stunning move to address
a national outpouring triggered by Floyd's death. The NFL has apologized to its own black players -- whom Trump blasted for taking a knee during the National Anthem to protest police brutality.
Even some Republican senators, on whose support Trump can normally depend without even asking, broke with the President in
the controversy over Confederate symbols. Some local politicians in
several Southern, conservative bastions are moving on the issue of
Confederate monuments. And unlike Trump, most Republican senators walk
around Capitol Hill wearing masks to help cut transmission of the novel
coronavirus -- obeying government advice from the experts the President
has made a political choice to undercut.
Trump
is also insisting that there is no systemic racism in the police -- as
he stakes out a "law and order" platform that he believes is attractive
to a wider group than just his political base. He said during a trip to
Texas on Thursday that National Guard troops cut through protesters in
Washington "like a knife through butter" and renewed his vow to
"dominate" the streets.
"We
have to work together to confront bigotry and prejudice wherever they
appear, but will make no progress and heal no wounds by falsely labeling
tens of millions of decent Americans as racist or bigots," Trump said.
Trump seeks to ignite a political backlash
Trump's
instincts are that the "forgotten Americans" who make up his base, and
plenty more besides, are angry at and alienated by the current pace of
change and the restrictions that have been imposed by governments on
their activities during the pandemic. He is deliberately pitting white,
conservative older Americans who subscribe to what they might call
"traditional values" against the more diverse, more liberal younger
sector of the country, which he shocked to the core by beating Hillary
Clinton in the 2016 election.
It's
not the first time the President has come out in favor of preserving
Confederate imagery -- he did so after the controversy over his racially
charged comments on the Charlottesville protests several years ago,
speaking up for supporters in the South who believe that such monuments
are quintessential icons of Southern heritage.
But
three years on, Trump appears to be outpaced by the change erupting all
around him, and the stakes of his strategy are becoming increasingly
high. As polls show that he's badly trailing Democratic candidate Joe
Biden ahead of November's election, the chances appear to be growing
that the President is navigating toward political terrain that cannot
provide a foundation for his reelection. His decision to purely serve
his base in more than three years in power is facing its most acute test
-- it's possible his failure to broaden his support will make a second
term impossible.
But the President
is sticking to his task, in the apparent belief that his rhetoric is
seen very differently outside the elite bubbles on the East Coast. And
he's zeroing in on Democratic vulnerabilities, for instance calls for
defunding the police, which he is using to portray Democrats as radicals
out of the American mainstream.
Trump puts Republican senators in a tough spot
All
day on Thursday, the President's actions reflected a politician who is
convinced he's tapped into the pulse of the nation, which he says media
elites have ignored, even though current polling suggests he may have
made a losing bet and is actually narrowing his support.
"My
administration will not even consider the renaming of these Magnificent
and Fabled Military Installations," Trump wrote on Twitter on Thursday,
characteristically igniting a culture war skirmish that raged all day.
The President's argument that shedding the names of Civil War generals
would be disrespectful to troops who trained at such bases and then went
off to fight and die in foreign wars makes little logical sense.
But
it allows him to pose as the guardian of Southern, conservative values,
waging political feuds with establishment elite institutions and
opinion formers -- a dynamic that he always seeks to create and that has
been successful for him in the past.
The
President's latest uproar is an unwelcome one for many Republican
senators -- especially those who are already facing tough reelection
fights and fear being dragged down by an increasingly unpopular
President, who dropped to a 38% approval rating in a CNN poll this week.
A Republican-led Senate committee voted against Trump's wishes
on Thursday to support an amendment written by Democratic Sen.
Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts to remove Confederate leaders' names
from military bases -- drawing a threat of a White House veto.
"There
is always a history that we don't want to forget," said Sen. Mike
Rounds, a South Dakota Republican who sits on the Senate Armed Services
Committee and supports the plan. "With regard to that, I agree with the
President that we don't want to forget our history. ... But at the same
time that doesn't mean that we should continue with those bases with the
names of individuals who fought against our country."
The
next few months -- in light of the extraordinary reckoning many white
Americans are having about race, perhaps for the first time -- will show
whether Trump's strategies will be as successful as they were four
years ago. And that leads to one more question, a moral one, over
whether a President -- the titular head of the nation -- should work to
reconcile national aspirations of equality rather than standing in the
way for his own political reasons."
Memorial Day came and went...but wait for the aftermath. Zeta reported there were problemas with mask wearing and social distancing in our neck of the woods., however I can tell you that Rosarito gets an "A+". Mike picked up Luis to look at the old volvo, both wore masks and gloves. The tow truck driver also wore a mask and gloves, town was clean with people adhering to the rules. We even stopped at the Home Depot to look at more wash machines, everyone was compliant. We're going to cancel the wash machine up in the States because it won't be here until the 6th and I cannot wait that long. Found a GE with great warranty coverage down here and I can have it in three days.
"On
Saturday, May 23, it was two months since the social distancing program
began and preventive measures were applied to avoid raising the
contagion curve in Mexico. However, the “stay at home” phrase repeated
by federal and local authorities has not been effective, at least not in
Tijuana, where people continue on the streets without taking preventive
measures, despite being the second city in Baja California in number of
infections by COVID-19 and first municipality in deaths at the state
level.
Two
months after the closure of beaches, shopping malls, parks, stores and
non-essential companies, Tijuana is home to 1,822 COVID-19 infected
patients and 451 deaths, in addition, the hospitals have 50 percent
capacity, according to official information, but it is known that the
lack of beds is a constant problem, so it has been necessary to open a
space in a basketball stadium to attend to non-serious patients.
Non-essential companies have had to close under the health agreement and tourism has been reduced to a minimum; the
health sector, for its part, has denounced shortages in the supplies
received, and they were seen standing in long lines to buy the material
to protect themselves from their own pocket, a situation that was not
enough and has taken its toll on the health of doctors, nurses and
hospital staff, who have tested positive for the pathogen.
All
of the above has been evidenced both in the media and on social
networks, and in some cases confirmed in the video conferences of
Governor Jaime Bonilla in which he is accompanied by the head of the
Ministry of Health, Alonso Pérez Rico.
But
this climate of alert has not been enough to raise awareness in the
population of Tijuana, who today went out on the streets for a walk. In a
tour carried out by Semanario Zeta, in the market on wheels of the
Tomás Aquino neighborhood, a significant influx of people was
identified, some accompanied by their families, the elderly and minors.
Not everyone covered their faces with a face mask, some did wear it, but
as it has been found, most used it incorrectly.
The
issue of overcrowding in crowded markets has been constant, each week
the Inspection and Verification department has carried out operations to
prevent them. This
Saturday, its director, Adolfo García Dworak, reported that they visited
20 markets and made 29 administrative minutes to non-essential
positions, in addition to removing 230 positions with turns not allowed
at this stage of the pandemic.
At
the Otay gate the crossing to the United States was constant, with up
to 300 vehicles on the Sentri line and another 200 on the Ready Lane,
the crossing to Mexico through that gate was smooth. Through
San Ysidro, long lines were also present, in this area of the city, 8
traveling vendors were fined for not having corresponding permits.
Although
the non-essential stores were mostly closed, convenience stores,
pharmacies, restaurants, and food outlets remained open. The
points where there were more people gathered, were again the Coppel and
Elektra stores, just outside these stores there were long lines of
customers waiting to enter, not all to make payments, some came out with
shopping bags.
Stores
such as Dax and Waldos, maintained a constant visit of customers, in
some cases without distance measures, so several people were observed
inside both stores.
Although
the Directorate of Inspection reported that a car wash premises in the
Libertad neighborhood was closed because it was not an essential
activity, it was detected that in the Buena Vista neighborhood, there
are establishments of this type that continue to work regularly, without
any sanction.
In
Playas de Tijuana the situation is worsening, since the number of
people entering the beach is more and more frequent, although the
passage is prohibited; On Saturday morning, elements of the Municipal Police reported having withdrawn a group of people who were walking on the sand. This Weekly was able to verify the easy access to the boardwalk, since several areas do not have protective tape.
Whole
families roam the Pacific Avenue, few of them with a face mask, they
took advantage of the fact that the locals were open to buy snacks and
drinks, without queuing, standing close to each other, as if there were
no series of infections in the city rising. In the Parque México the
scenario was similar, parents with their children sitting on benches and
on the grass, couples walking, street vendors with customers gathered
around them, without taking the four-meter distance recommended in
public spaces.
In
the Central Zone, as every day the assistance to the Teniente Guerrero
Park does not end, it does not matter that there is yellow tape around
prohibiting the passage, it has not been a barrier to take a few hours
of rest under the trees of the emblematic park. In the Plaza Santa Cecilia all the kiosks are open, the souvenir vendors are waiting for a tourist.
In Tijuana, unlike Mexicali, the mandatory use of mouth covers has not been determined nor has social mobility been limited."
~~~~~~
I know, it is bad - but look at what's happened in the U.S.:
~ From CNN:
Full video coverage, you have to watch these and gasp:
"Ottawa, Canada (CNN)Canadian
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says his government is trying to give all
workers a minimum of 10 days paid sick leave per year as Canada starts
to prepare for a second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic.
"Nobody
should have to choose between taking a day off work due to illness or
being able to pay their bills. Just like nobody should have to choose
between staying home with Covid-19 symptoms or being able to afford rent
or groceries," Trudeau said during a news conference in Ottawa Monday.
As of Monday, Canada has reported more than 85,000 cases of coronavirus and 6,545 related deaths.
For those infected, sick leave is usually a provincial jurisdiction, which complicates the national effort.
Trudeau
said putting the necessary mechanisms in place for a national paid sick
leave program would be challenging, but his government and the
provinces are determined to try.
"When
the Fall comes and flu season starts up we don't want people who
develop a sniffle to suddenly worry that while they really shouldn't go
into work but they can't afford to not go into work and therefore the
risk of contributing to a wave significantly, could be a real problem,"
Trudeau said.
Canada's top doctor
repeated her assertion Monday that a second wave of the virus could be
worse than the first and encouraged public health officials to build up
capacity for testing, hospital beds and personal protective equipment in
order to prepare.
Canada's top doctor repeated her assertion Monday that a second wave of
the virus could be worse than the first and encouraged public health
officials to build up capacity for testing, hospital beds and personal
protective equipment in order to prepare.
"I think you can never be overly
prepared and we have to just keep going with some of these capacity
developments and that goes for lab testing as well," said Dr. Theresa
Tam, Canada's chief public health officer during a press conference
Monday.
In
hopes of managing the spread of the virus into the country, Trudeau
announced last week that the border with the United States will continue
to be closed until at least June 21. Trudeau called the border, which
has been closed since March 21, a clear point of "vulnerability" for
Canada.
The prohibition of
international travelers and quarantine of returning Canadians is the
only thing that has allowed Canada to manage its first wave of
coronavirus, Tam said."
Crapola From Numbnuts, Marvelously Penned by Stephen Collinson:
To sum it up....please don't miss this piece: (I was only finally just opening email and there this was, so I didn't have time to ask permission to republish - Pitt is fantastico !!)
Locally the numbers are steadily increasing in virus and drug war related deaths, I don't have to cook tomorrow, so I'll be back with those grim reports . And, you are welcome to request any music you want, just drop a line - how about that ?
