Current damage to children from lockdown and expected further damage to higher education.

What is happening to kids who don’t have a parent looking over their shoulder all day, or don’t have decent internet connection, or don’t have a newer computer? Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

Studies are emerging showing the damage to children who are trying to learn remotely. I am hearing anecdotal reports that remote learning is not working, but that is only anecdotal. News reports are starting to lend credence to the intuitively obvious.

Multiple articles are indicating higher education is going to have a worse time in fall 2021 then they have now.

Check out the following:

  • Remote learning is hurting children.
  • Colleges have let go 10% of their staff during the pandemic.
  • Admissions season is looking grim.
  • Drastic drop in number of students completing the financial aid form used to access essentially all forms of financial assistance for college.

11/12/20 – American Enterprise Institute – The damage because when we close down schools – it’s worse than you think – Article says that if remote learning actually worked there should be a great result in the Netherlands are conditions are quite favorable to remote classes. However, the analysis says overall students made little progress during the brief shutdown and students from homes where there was less education for the parents suffered far more than their peers.

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Good news for California churches from the Supreme Court ruling regarding New York State.

Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

Okay, this will take a bit of explaining. Short version is there will be a hearing on whether the California restrictions on church worship services are constitutional or not.

Longer version is Harvest Rock Church sued the state of California over restrictions on worship services. The District Court for the Center District of California ruled against the church. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals refused to issue an injunction upon the church’s appeal.

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When, oh when, will we see an end to rule makers blatantly ignoring the rules they demand we lowly peasants follow?

image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

If our ruling overlords continue on their current path, I’ll have to order an extra terabyte of pixels to keep covering them.

I’m about to exhaust my quarterly budget of pixels covering the flaming hypocrites who don’t bother to follow the rules to which you and I must bend the knee.

(Bending the knee is a medieval practice of getting down on your knee in front of the monarch to show you are meekly submissive to his unquestionable, divine, royal authority.)

 

If my ridicule is dripping off your screen and you can hear through your speakers what vaguely sounds like my laughter, you know the rest of this post will discuss the foolishness of those high and mighty leaders who have taken it upon themselves to decide how we must live our life.

Please join me in laughing at the following:

  • Another French Laundry party.
  • Mayor chastises citizens for leaving the house…while he is vacationing in Cabo. He also can’t quite recall whether he got a Covid test upon his return and he “generally quarantined” when he got back.
  • Judge signs order to extend pandemic restrictions then immediately goes to his grandson’s birthday party because he misses the little guy. Earns a Class C misdemeanor conviction for ignoring his own court order.

I will dial back the ridicule for the rest of this post.  Of course, since the above mayor is my role model for today, the pointing-and-laughing will be “generally” dialed back only those times I “recall” making said plan.

 

Rich hypocrite, French Laundry edition:

12/1/20 – San Francisco Chronicle – S.F. Mayor London Breed had her own French Laundry party – the night after Gavin Newsom’s – The “rules for thee but not for me” stories keep surfacing.

This time it is San Francisco Mayor London Breed who also attended a private dinner party at the ultra-elite French Laundry, with eight people attending in total. Presumably that is four households.

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Supreme Court finds dust covered Constitution in storage closet. You won’t believe what happened next…

Text of First Amendment quoted in a textbook. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

A majority of the Justices actually read the Constitution and realized the First Amendment was still there, including something about free expression of religion.

After re-reading those odd comments, they realized it was an attack on the U.S. Constitution when the New York governor picked a spot on the map and said within that area indoor worship services must be limited to 10 people. Thus they issued an injunction against the state pending a full trial on the merits of the case.

The limit of 10 is a particular burden for the Orthodox Jewish congregations who filed the litigation. For a routine worship service, Orthodox Jews require 10 adult males be present. See Minyan explanation at Wikipedia.

This means that under the arbitrary rules issued by the state, an orthodox congregation could meet but no women, no children, and no men beyond the quorum of 10 could participate in the worship.

In essence, Orthodox Jewish congregations may not worship. Sure does seem like that would be an infringement on free expression.

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Ongoing reports keep showing pandemic restrictions apply only to us peasants.

Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

I am confident another dozen or two stories have surfaced in the last few days like the following items. These three are merely the ones that jumped out at me as I was scanning various news sources.

Check out the comment at the end of the last article showing that there is at least one politician in the entire country who is starting to realize this flaming hypocrisy could possibly, perhaps, maybe, eventually have an impact on the trust we serfs have in our masters, the ruling caste.

11/25/20 – WCVB 5 – Hours after asking residents to stay home, Denver Mayor flies out of state for Thanksgiving holiday – The day before Thanksgiving Denver Mayor Michael Hancock sent a tweet telling everyone the spread of the coronavirus can be reduced by avoiding travel over the Thanksgiving holiday.

Separately, the city sent a tweet urging people to celebrate with only immediate household. The embedded video also urged avoiding all travel – don’t go see any family or any friends. Don’t fly. Don’t drive.

So what did the mayor do the same day those messages went out?

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Discussion of the governors expensive, indoor dinner party.

Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

Details are leaking out every few days on the California governor’s dinner party he said was held outside when the rest of us have been told not to eat inside and not to have more than three households present for a meal and to make sure we wear our masks between bites of food.

There is a deeper issue than merely the flaming hypocrisy of leaders demanding we follow harsh rules while blatantly ignoring the rules themselves.

The real issue is the governor and his friends (including at least three lobbyists) made a self-assessment of the risks to themselves of going out to dinner with a group of at least five other couples. They concluded that was an acceptable risk to given their age and health.

Good for them. They have the ability to make decisions for themselves as to what is acceptable or what is too risky.

The serious, freedom-threatening issue is you and I should be able to do the same thing.

We should be able to decide for ourselves what is an acceptable risk and what is unacceptable.

 

Here is a listing of the coverage by your humble correspondent:

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About the governor’s dinner…it keeps getting worse.

Bar tab at party is reportedly $15,000. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

Hard to believe, but details get worse every few days about the governor’s “outside” inside dinner with more than 12 people and no masks in sight.

Looks like we need to increase the estimated cost for the meal.

A reporter for California Globe reports on 11/23/20: Gov. Gavin Newsom’s “Dinnergate” Apology Grows From Little White Lie to Whopper.

Last tidbit at the bottom of this post:  some of the people at the party are laughing at you and me.

New info on size of dinner party and bar tab

The article pulls together a variety of information from other reporters.

One reporter, who lives in the town where the French Laundry is located, did some digging. He is hearing stories that the bar tab was $15,000 for the party.

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Take the hot newsflash about the Sturgis motorcycle rally being a super-duper super spreader event with a humongous grain of salt.

Suggested amount of salt to consume when reading some research reports. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

(Dark humor alert:  Sarcasm is not a healthy form of humor. Sometimes though, a healthy dose of ridicule accompanied by pointing and laughing is necessary to emphasize the ridiculousness of something. So, check out the following research…)

 

Breathtaking reports on social media claim there is scientific proof that the Sturgis motorcycle rally was a massive super spreader event.

Solid evidence.

Incontrovertible proof I tell you.

Study is described at Wall Street Journal on 11/21/20: CDC Study Links Sturgis Motorcycle Rally to Covid-19 Spread in Minnesota. Hosts of other news sites are doing their own re-write of the story.

Guesses are somewhere around 460,000 people attended the huge motorcycle rally held every year in Sturgis, South Dakota. This year it ran from August 7-16.

The lack of mask usage, the closeness of the event, and massive number of people was dangerous I tell you.

Coverage at the time and headlines now say this was obviously a super spreader event that would obviously cause 7 or 8 gazillion infections and just over half a bazillion deaths.

CDC research shows there, uh, weren’t, um, quite that many infections.

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