Don's Tuesday Column

          THE WAY I SEE IT   by Don Polson  Red Bluff Daily News   8/10/2021

Some big news still reaches us

In spite of our self-imposed communications “dead zone,” a dozen miles from phone and wi-fi signals, a weak AM station, KAJO, from Grants Pass, Oregon, provides hourly news updates from reliable sources like “Townhall.com” and “SRN news” (preferable to ABC, CNN or even left-leaning FOX radio).

There is also a weak AM broadcast of NPR, with its “progressive” slant: COVID coverage castigated Brazil’s leader as a “denialist from the start.” He leaned more toward then-President Trump’s positions, and not Dr. Fauci’s or the W.H.O; such blasphemy earns one the dastardly moniker, “denialist,” as in “holocaust denier.”

That’s not journalism, just shorthand jingoistic propaganda. By the way, Trump was right on travel bans from China; “stay-at-home” orders, lockdowns, church shutdowns, and mask mandates being wrong; his vaccines worked when Democrats and bigmouth-media-celebrities said “Don’t trust Trump vaccines.” He’s still right opposing mask/vaccine mandates, and further lockdowns.

Other NPR biases we heard: pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel; pro-Nicaraguan Communists, anti-the Contra rebels (and America’s role fighting against Central American Communists in the 80s). Honestly, it’s no surprise NPR listeners absorb their leftist lens—they don’t deserve tax subsidies.

KAJO’s “inspirational” musical mix included an hour that ended with Perry Como’s marvelous choral- and orchestral-backed rendition of “The Lord’s Prayer.” The stirring final crescendo—“For Thine is the Kingdom, and the Power, and the Glory Forever, Amen”—was enough, together with the beauty of nature’s skies, forests and the Rogue River, to inspire any willing soul to reverence. Aside from other soft-rock and eclectic tunes, they also played 70s classics, “Jesus, is just all right, oh yeah,” and “Spirit in the sky.”

News segments included stories about (tip: we’re into 2022 and 2024 election “battlefield preparation”) the “feud” between His Fraudulency, Joe Biden, his mouthpiece, Prevaricating Psaki, and Republican Governors Abbot (TX) and DeSantis (FL). In progressive-dominated media bubbles, “me-too” Democrat-dominated CNN/MSNBC “thought-leader” panels, and the “twit-book” NYTimes-dominated news “echo chambers”—the “conventional wisdom” is this: Yay, President Biden and Jen Psaki, intimidate those recalcitrant Republicans into submission.

They think the rubes in America’s “red” states, and the rebellious objection-ists in blue states, are simply speed bumps on the way to unified, top-down controls and mandates. The current rallying cries are “mask mandates for all schools,” and vaccine mandates and “passports” for everyone, including children. It seems many big employers are dancing to the “mandate” fiddle, requiring employees to get poked. An employer can do that; employees can sue, quit or get the shot; we’ll see who does Biden’s bidding. It’s shameful to divide the military over vaccines.

Governors Abbot and DeSantis are giving better than they are getting dumped on, by responding with the simple refrain: “Personal freedom.” They seem to be saying, “Heck no, you won’t stomp on us with your despotic boots.” Don’t expect us to meekly accede to your supposedly “scientific” orders that should now be seen by anyone with open eyes, ears and brains to be “bogus science.” Only two out of 1,000 cases are “serious.” The death rate is about at its lowest.

Mask mandate have not corresponded (remember, correlation is not causation) to anything more than marginal differences in hospitalizations and deaths; the virus is 1000x smaller than the mask pores. Honestly, when we see the few folks in Gold Beach that wear masks (the library strongly urges but does not require them—I wouldn’t wear one, anyway), it’s like a “here comes stupid” sign. Maybe that’s harsh and maybe they will wear them forever as a barrier to all germs; don’t mask kids.

Practice informed and educated “personal freedom”—not just blind obedience or compliance; use calm analysis, in consultation with your doctor and common sense.

Have you had the Wuhan Flu/COVID, or symptoms? Medical sources say you are at least as immune to getting re-infected and/or spreading the virus as if you were vaccinated. Your doctor can assess your need for further protection, or advise you against the vaccine if you risk ill effects. Younger middle-aged, young adults and school-aged—those without underlying conditions—have suffered very little illness or death from the Wuhan Flu, compared to normal flu strains.

“Variants” are less lethal than the original; yet, here we go again with “fear mongering” over rising positive tests, the same tests that have given false positives for over 18 months. Ignore media hysteria over “new cases of the variant.”

Doctors not in fear of social backlash would confirm all of this. Add the tens of millions that are mostly immune through prior infection to the tens of millions now vaccinated (like us), and the above age groups that have little risk of serious illness or death—you no longer have a pandemic, an epidemic or even a medical crisis.

Vaccination is highly (but not entirely) effective against infection. Attempts to implement “100 percent” safety via “one-size-fits-all” mandates are a fool’s errand and should be seen by intelligent people as little more than substituting sheer power for individual freedom.

Finally, about upcoming elections: Democrats, media, governing and policy elites that think they can enforce upon the rest of us their whimsical orders—that think they have a winning message for getting elected to state and national office—have a rude awakening in store. Go ahead and run on a “You vill obey” vs. a “You are free to decide” message; political oblivion awaits you, with my encouragement.

Anyone castigating Donald J. Trump for repeatedly saying Biden “stole” the 2020 election needs to quantify four years of false claims that Trump “colluded with Putin” and “stole” it from Hillary Clinton. They never stopped; why should he?