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 !!
And it's a good thing except I'm having a rough time logging in - hopefully I can get the reports to link here.So let's give it a whirl. This news will supersede Joe Biden's Town Hall. In case the report won't come up on a link, I'll paste it and save myself a trip back here to edit it.
"Cd. de México (18 septiembre 2020).- Pese
al discurso oficial, las masacres en México no han cesado. En lo que va
del año se han registrado al menos 45 casos en donde, en un mismo
hecho, han asesinado a sangre fría a cinco o más personas en 20 estados.
[Oscar Uscanga
Mexico City (September 18, 2020) .- Despite the
official discourse, the massacres in Mexico have not stopped. So far
this year there have been at least 45 cases in which, in the same act,
five or more people have been murdered in cold blood in 20 states.]
En total, las masacres en México le han quitado la vida este año a 320
personas en los estados de Guanajuato, Michoacán, Guerrero, Puebla,
Durango, Zacatecas, Veracruz, Tamaulipas, Jalisco, Baja California,
Chihuahua, Morelos, Colima, Nuevo León, Sonora, Oaxaca, Estado de
México, Chiapas, Tabasco y San Luis Potosí.
[In total, the massacres in Mexico have killed 320 people this year in
the states of Guanajuato, Michoacán, Guerrero, Puebla, Durango,
Zacatecas, Veracruz, Tamaulipas, Jalisco, Baja California, Chihuahua,
Morelos, Colima, Nuevo León , Sonora, Oaxaca, State of Mexico, Chiapas,
Tabasco and San Luis Potosí.]
Para el especialista en seguridad de World Justice Project en México,
Juan Salgado, estos crímenes son posibles principalmente porque la
impunidad impera en las entidades.
[For the security specialist of the World Justice Project in Mexico, Juan
Salgado, these crimes are possible mainly because impunity reigns in
the entities.]
"Creo que tiene que darse un apoyo muchísimo más fuerte al modelo
nacional de Policías, que consiste en fortalecer a las corporaciones de
los municipios porque se está dando la mayor parte de recursos a la
Guardia Nacional, pero se tiene que hacer una reforma que vaya de abajo
para arriba", consideró.
["I believe that much stronger support must be given to the national
police model, which consists of strengthening the municipal corporations
because most of the resources are being given to the National Guard,
but a reform has to be carried out that will from the bottom up, "he
considered.]
Un recuento similar de masacres fue realizado por la organización Causa
en Común, que entre enero y agosto contabilizó 479 casos, en los que
tomó en cuenta hechos donde asesinaron a tres personas o más.
[A similar count of massacres was carried out by the Causa en Común
organization, which between January and August counted 479 cases, in
which it took into account events where three or more people were
murdered.]
El primero de septiembre, en su mensaje por el Segundo Informe de
Gobierno, el Presidente Andrés Manuel López Obrador manifestó que en
México ya no había desapariciones ni masacres.
[ On September 1, in his message for the Second Government Report,
President Andrés Manuel López Obrador stated that in Mexico there were
no longer disappearances or massacres.]
"Ya no hay torturas, desapariciones ni masacres; se respetan los
derechos humanos y se castiga al culpable sea quien sea", afirmó en
Palacio Nacional."
["There is no longer torture, disappearances or massacres; human rights
are respected and the guilty is punished whoever he is," he said in the
National Palace.]
~~~~
Aha...and then he laughed..link includes the video:
""Let's see, put the first of the Reformation, in one of those we found it. There it is, look. There are the massacres! Heh, heh, heh. They are predictable, very obvious ”, said this Friday, September 18, while laughing, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
The
newspaper Reforma published this same day, in its main article, that
“despite the official discourse, the massacres in Mexico have not
stopped. So far this year
there have been at least 45 cases in which, in the same act, five or
more people have been murdered in cold blood in 20 states ”.
According
to the same newspaper, in total, the massacres in Mexico have
registered 320 deaths, in the states of Guanajuato, Michoacán, Guerrero,
Puebla, Durango, Zacatecas, Veracruz, Tamaulipas, Jalisco, Baja
California, Chihuahua, Morelos, Colima, Nuevo León, Sonora, Oaxaca,
State of Mexico, Chiapas, Tabasco and San Luis Potosí.
The
newspaper recalled that on September 1, in his message for the Second
Government Report, López Obrador stated that in Mexico “there is no
longer torture, disappearance or massacres; human rights are respected and the guilty is punished whoever he is ”.
We could not watch the entire ABC Trump Town Hall because of our reception here, but picked up bits and pieces watching Don Lemon; plus I was cooking and in fact I now have a billion things to do including making a new recipe for broccoli salad for tonight. I stayed up way too late last night watching clips of the Town Hall from You Tube which drove me crazy. I came away rattled - wondering how is it that we are all still here - how is it that the impulsive extrovert mentally unstable Trump hasn't pushed the red buttons yet? Well, he still might especially if he is deposed, or can finally accept the reality that he will be. Am I being too generous? Because this report from today gave me the heeby jeebies.
UPDATE/edit: Wow. Here's the latest on Redfield, wearing masks and the elusive vaccine. Trump is pissed off - he says Redfield was mistaken, but I don't think so. Maybe Redfield finally was fed up from being pushed around ...we'll find out tomorrow. You have to scroll down to see the coverage, included is Collinson's knock em dead report.
Have to run, this recipe calls for Balsamic vinegar, I'll let you know how it goes. Heck let's unravel our little minds and do another Willie Nelson...seems to help. Stay Safe Y'all !
P.S. The salad was great ,the balsamic vinegar was not overpowering. Have to go up to the states and get a flu shot, be back in a few days. Stay Safe Everyone.
We could not watch the entire ABC Trump Town Hall because of our reception here, but picked up bits and pieces watching Don Lemon; plus I was cooking and in fact I now have a billion things to do including making a new recipe for broccoli salad for tonight. I stayed up way too late last night watching clips of the Town Hall from You Tube which drove me crazy. I came away rattled - wondering how is it that we are all still here - how is it that the impulsive extrovert mentally unstable Trump hasn't pushed the red buttons yet? Well, he still might especially if he is deposed, or can finally accept the reality that he will be. Am I being too generous? Because this report from today gave me the heeby jeebies.
UPDATE/edit: Wow. Here's the latest on Redfield, wearing masks and the elusive vaccine. Trump is pissed off - he says Redfield was mistaken, but I don't think so. Maybe Redfield finally was fed up from being pushed around ...we'll find out tomorrow. You have to scroll down to see the coverage, included is Collinson's knock em dead report.
Have to run, this recipe calls for Balsamic vinegar, I'll let you know how it goes. Heck let's unravel our little minds and do another Willie Nelson...seems to help. Stay Safe Y'all !
P.S. The salad was great ,the balsamic vinegar was not overpowering. Have to go up to the states and get a flu shot, be back in a few days. Stay Safe Everyone.
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"
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"