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People are morons. They are abusing health care workers who are trying to save their ignorant, stupid lives. Can you imagine the audacity of some of these donkey-donuts cursing out medical staff while proclaiming Covid isn’t real? It’s happening here in Texas-North, and i am fucking embarrassed to live in this clownshow of a province.
“While we’re on this unit, the doctors (and nurses) are just being horrifically, horrifically abused,” she said.
“(Health-care workers are) being sworn at, they’re being told that COVID isn’t real and (patients) don’t want to be intubated,” Christensen said.
“There are no words at this point. I’m just completely baffled. I’ve walked the halls of this ICU. I’ve seen that it’s real.”
Un
Fraking
Believable.
Dr. Paul Parks, the head of emergency medicine for the Alberta Medical Association, said the situation in Alberta hospitals will only become worse without an increase in restrictions.
“I am advocating so strongly for increased public health measures at this point in time and our government to take leadership and to put in some meaningful restrictions,” Parks said.
He said he believes the province is just days away from implementing critical care triage, with increasing COVID-19 patients and no workers to care for them.
“We’re for sure close,” he said. “We cannot continue to keep adding (patients).
This public health crisis was easily predictable and entirely avoidable, but our conservative UCP government led by Jason Kenny proclaimed the province was “Open for Summer!” and lifted all public health safety restrictions.
321 Albertans died for the “Open for Summer” debacle – and more are dying everyday – expect a big jump in the death toll once the medical triage starts.
What a tragedy, made worse with the knowledge that it was entirely preventable.
This post will have been queued up, so here is what I think will happen.
The deck chairs on the good ship Canada might rearrange a bit, but the overall layout will remain the same. We shall emerge from this election with a Liberal minority government.
The Liberal stratagists that suggested that they call an election during the 4th wave of a pandemic will have their asses fired *even though* the polls at the time put the Liberals far into majority. This is a case in which common sense was overlooked for political expediency. The voting during pandemic backlash has taken all the gild off of the hopes for a Liberal Majority government.
The bottom three parties – the Greens, NDP, and PPC, – will continue to toil in obscurity while the separatists in Quebec will make small gains because the stupid spectre of Quebec nationalism still needs to periodically stir and reprove its unworthiness to the rest of Canada.
The Maritimes will stay Liberal, Ontario will split the pie slightly differently, and the west will once again stick mouth over the Conservative tailpipe and inhale deeply – voting conservative blue because fuck thinking about politics seriously – we still have a grudge against the decades ago National Energy Policy – so any progressive thought must GO.
So, in conclusion, roughly more of the same. Oh Canada…
Political practice in the US often seems to centre around everything but the facts of any given issue. The pandemic being one of the most obvious examples.
So, we ignore the real-world material evidence of what Denmark is doing with their Corona Pass and continue to prevaricate in our approved left/right ideological ways.
Can we just be pragmatic for once with a touch of utilitarian goodness on the side? Wouldn’t that be nice?
David Rovics writing for Counterpunch describes the pandemic angle of the left/right folly that is occurring in the US and to a certain extent, Canada.
“So when it comes to public health measures necessary to get a pandemic under control, much of the public is skeptical. They may be described as skeptical about vaccines, but I’d say it’s a skepticism, if that’s the right word, that far transcends any particular thing like that. It’s more a generalized skepticism of anything the government — any government, or particular ones, depending — might propose.
The far right is horrified by the idea of what in Denmark is known as a Corona Pass — a form of ID that verifies you have been vaccinated and have tested negative, in order to be allowed to do things like fly in a plane with other people, sit down in a cafe, attend a festival, etc. Through widespread vaccination and the use of the Corona Pass system, Denmark has thus far avoided the fourth wave of the pandemic that is killing so many people, especially in countries like the US, India, and Brazil.
But we can’t do that kind of thing, we hear from voices on the right, because maybe the virus doesn’t exist, or maybe the vaccine causes more sickness than the virus does, or even if the virus does exist and vaccines are good generally, these vaccines haven’t been tested enough, and if they have, people shouldn’t be required to take them, because that’s an infringement on their God-given individual rights. Their freedom to live free means they might have to die free, which is better than obeying a government mandate. And then add to the mix the fact that the only government mandates in the US that exist with regards to this pandemic so far are completely piecemeal, local, and therefore ineffective.
And then from the corners of the left we hear that having information like our vaccination status publicly available to the relevant authorities is the next step towards total control of everything by Big Brother, and as soon as we all have submitted to the magnetic strips on our ID cards, the next step are those FEMA concentration camps that the Spectrum always agree are waiting for all of the dissidents. Which dissidents will end up in those camps would be the main point of contention on the Spectrum.”
Noam Chomsky is 92 years old, yet his grasp of world and US politics remains a force to be reckoned with.
“The U.S. always portrays itself as the greatest force on the planet for peace, justice, human rights, racial equality, etc. Polls tell us that most other nations actually regard the U.S. as the greatest threat to stability. What in your view is the truth here?
Even during the Obama years, international polls showed that world opinion regarded the US as the greatest threat to world peace, no other country even close. Americans were protected from the news, though one could learn about it from foreign media and dissident sources. Sometimes illustrations are reported. Thus there has been some mention of the recent UN vote condemning the savage Cuba sanctions, virtually a blockade: 180-2 (US-Israel). The NY Times dismissed it as a chance for critics of the US to blow off steam. That’s quite normal. When there are reports of how the world is out of step, the usual framework is curiosity about the psychic maladies that lead to such pathological failure to recognize our nobility.
There’s nothing new about that stance. It’s typical of imperial cultures. Even such an outstanding figure as John Stuart Mill wondered about the world’s failure to comprehend that Britain was an angelic power, sacrificing itself for the benefit of the world – at a moment when Britain was carrying out some of its most horrifying crimes, as he knew very well.”
William Astore, former American Military, dares the public and the American industry of defense to think outside the box. He reimagines the role of the US military as primarily for the defense of the American republic. It is a bold and necessary move as the role of ‘policeman of the world’\imperial power is simply to costly for a nation to fund and take care of its citizens in a reasonable matter. Some inside the the military would be unhappy, yet I think the operational clarity that is concomitant with defending the physical territory of the United States and not spending blood and treasure on imperial ventures would eventually win the day.
Elite opinion might be a more negative however as they current system does much to support their unsustainable way of life.
“Here, then, are just 10 ways America’s military could change under a vision that would put the defense of America first and free up some genuine funds for domestic needs as well:
- No more new nuclear weapons. It’s time to stop “modernizing” that arsenal to the tune of possibly $1.7 trillion over the next three decades. Land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles like the Ground Based Strategic Deterrent, expected to cost more than $264 billion during its lifetime, and “strategic” (nuclear) bombers like the Air Force’s proposed B-21 Raider should be eliminated. The Trident submarine force should also be made smaller, with limited modernization to improve its survivability.
- All Army divisions should be reduced to cadres (smaller units capable of expansion in times of war), except the 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions and the 10th Mountain Division.
- The Navy should largely be redeployed to our hemisphere, while aircraft carriers and related major surface ships are significantly reduced in number.
- The Air Force should be redesigned around the defense of America’s air space, rather than attacking others across the planet at any time. Meanwhile, costly offensive fighter-bombers like the F-35, itself a potential $1.7 trillion boondoggle, should simply be eliminated and the habit of committing drone assassinations across the planet ended. Similarly, the separate space force created by President Trump should be folded back into a much-reduced Air Force.
- The training of foreign militaries and police forces in places like Iraq and Afghanistan should be stopped. The utter collapse of the U.S.-trained forces in Iraq in the face of the Islamic State in 2014 and the ongoing collapse of the U.S.-trained Afghan military today have made a mockery of this whole process.
- Military missions launched by intelligence agencies like the CIA, including those drone assassination programs overseas, should be halted and the urge to intervene secretly in the political and military lives of so many other countries finally brought under some kind of control.
- The “industrial” part of the military-industrial complex should also be brought under control, so that taxpayer dollars don’t go to fabulously expensive, largely useless weaponry. At the same time, the U.S. government should stop promoting the products of our major weapons makers around the planet.
- Above all, in a democracy like ours, a future defensive military should only fight in a war when Congress, as the Constitution demands, formally declares one.
- The military draft should be restored. With a far smaller force, such a draft should have a limited impact, but it would ensure that the working classes of America, which have historically shouldered a heavy burden in military service, will no longer do so alone. In the future America of my military dreams, a draft would take the eligible sons and daughters of our politicians first, followed by all eligible students enrolled in elite prep schools and private colleges and universities, beginning with the Ivy League. After all, America’s best and brightest will surely want to serve in a military devoted to defending their way of life.
- Finally, there should be only one four-star general or admiral in each of the three services. Currently, believe it or not, there are an astonishing 44 four-star generals and admirals in America’s imperial forces. There are also hundreds of one-star, two-star, and three-star officers. This top-heavy structure inhibits reform even as the highest-ranking officers never take responsibility for America’s lost wars.
Pivoting to America
Perhaps you’ve heard of the “pivot to Asia” under the Obama administration — the idea of redeploying U.S. military forces from the Greater Middle East and elsewhere in response to perceived threats from China. As it happened, it took the new Biden administration to begin to pull off that particular pivot, but America’s imperial military regularly seems to be pivoting somewhere or other. It’s time to pivot to this country instead.
Echoing the words of George McGovern, a highly decorated World War II bomber pilot who unsuccessfully ran for president against Richard Nixon in 1972, “Come home, America.” Close all those foreign military bases. Redirect resources from wars and weapons to peace and prosperity. Focus on restoring the republic. That’s how Americans working together could truly defend ourselves, not only from our “enemies” overseas, almost always much exaggerated, but from ourselves, the military-industrial-congressional complex, and all our fears.”
This letter published in the Scottish newspaper The National.
It is a letter that would likely not see the light of day here in Canada where we seem to be beholden to a small subset of society that demands we disbelieve our eyes and perceptions to order to ‘be kind’ and validate their delusions of gender. I’m tired. Very ducking tired of expending energy dealing with entitled queer males who masquerade as women all the while pleading they are the most oppressed people(?) in society. It’s horseshit from stem to stern. And dangerous horseshit at that, as the lunacy extends to putting predatory males in female prisons and defunding rape crisis centres because they have the audacity to maintain a female only service. Women (adult human females) in Canada have to fight for their rights to spaces, boundaries, and services *again* against this latest queered delusional assault by men. It would be hilarious if it wasn’t so detrimental to female rights in society.
This letter highlight illustrates the disconnect from reality that is central to queer theory and identity politics. The corrosive politics of the personal (identity) can only survive in a society that has reality based rights, protections, and safeguards for its citizens. Women in Afghanistan can not identify out what is happening to them. Like all of fucking history if you are born female you are automatically second class in society and no amount of queer pandering to the identity gods will ever change that.
But enough of me, let us get to the letter, which is brilliant.
“In recent years it has become fashionable in predominantly English-speaking “progressive” circles and establishments to feign bewilderment at basic evolutionary facts related to our species. Often, this bewilderment is specifically reserved for only one half of the population. Despite millions of years of mammalian ancestry preceding us, it is only now that the female homo sapiens is apparently a convoluted, nonsensical entity.
A cherished argument to prop up this convoluted, nonsensical entity is that female people everywhere at any point in time do not share exactly the same experiences, therefore a “woman” can encompass any male who lays claim to the label.
It is true that women come from all kinds of socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds, and as a result they will have been shaped as individuals by various experiences over the course of their lives. Women differ in our beliefs, political values, personalities and ethics.
Yet, looking at events unfolding in Afghanistan in recent days, many women around the world feel a shared sense of dread and heartache for the women trapped in such intolerable circumstances. The sickening, sinking feeling is an instinctive one that bypasses all pseudo-intellectualism. Strip away the relatively superficial differences between women and that sickening, sinking feeling is an instinctive one precisely because there are some experiences that only female humans can be subjected to. For better or worse, there is a common reality that no convoluted, nonsensical definition can erase.
Looking an Afghan woman in the eyes, what connects her suffering with our struggles here in Scotland? The embodied reality of womanhood that transcends time, distance and cultures. She is me and I am her. It is a visceral bond that no male can ever identify into and no female can ever identify out of.
It is only by an accident of fate that I live in the UK. I am one of the rare winners in the grotesque lottery of life. Life for women in the UK has been shaped by its own cultural and religious heritage. Its historical trajectory enabled British women to organise and win incredible gains for their daughters in a way that women from many other countries can only dream of doing.
The plight of Afghan women is a stark reminder of the iron fist of oppression that men can wield against women on the basis of our sex. It is an uncomfortable truth that without the majority of men on our side, women truly are at the mercy of the vicious whims and savage violence of men. My heart breaks for the women of Afghanistan – so many of them had a taste of freedom, opportunity and being a person in their own right, and now it has evaporated almost overnight. I know what is happening to them could happen to me too, if circumstances enabled it. The incel attack in Plymouth reveals the deep hatred and desires of subjugation that some men harbour for women.
Far too many women in the UK take their precious freedoms for granted. Yes, there’s much that can be better, but it’s important to realise just how rare it is to live in a time and place where women have so many rights and protections within a stable, wealthy society and where most men view us as worthy of full personhood.
Some women are so intoxicated by these freedoms – freedoms they themselves did not win – that they think it’s great fun to indulge in all kinds of outlandish luxury beliefs, such as biological sex being a social construct, women are not oppressed on the basis of sex, and that being a woman is nothing but a feeling and set of sexist stereotypes. They have feasted at the table of liberty for so long that they think they can ignore reality by chanting mantras and “queering” words.
Bloated by their gluttony, they cheer the erosion of the same rights and protections that enabled their arrogance and ignorance. Their fingers and mouths greasy with the remnants of the fruits of labour of the women that came before them, they sneer at those who understand the precarious nature of our rights and personhood and seek to protect it. They might belch out insults and smears in between mouthfuls, but deep in their hearts they know they would never willingly trade places with Afghan women, because all the queer theory in the world won’t save them from the slaughterhouse.
Mel T
bleatmop
Mystro
Dead Wild Roses 
Your opinions…