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Priorities (Issue #2 of COVID 19 LAWYER) – by GARY SMOLKER
WE NEED TO THINK AND TO RETHINK
Many of us are living in completely different information eco-systems.
My position is:
- CAPITALISM is the best economic system the world knows.
- Democracy is the best system of government the world knows.
- America is always improving – that is what makes America great.
- The only constant is change.
CAPITALISM IS THE BEST ECONOMIC SYSTEM THE WORLD KNOWS
This was the longest week in American history.
We saw the collapse of civil society as we knew it and the birth of a better one.
I was so busy keeping up with current events I couldn’t finish writing Issue #2 of COVID LAWYER 19 during the week.
CHANGE
We are witnessing capitalism making changes in response to needs.
Capitalism and democracy are changing.
They are undergoing creative destruction – positive change – making everything better for every one.
STATUS QUO
Americans are never satisfied with the status quo.
They always strive to improve things, and they do.
EFFICIENTLY DRIVEN CHANGE IN CIRCUMSTANCES CALLING OUT FOR CHANGE
Capitalism is an effective instrument for responding to needs.
The Republican National Committee was planning for a gathering of 50,000 at its convention August 24 – 27 in North Carolina.
In North Carolina, currently, gatherings are limited to 10 people indoors and 25 people out doors.
Other states are asking the Republican National Committee to hold its convention in their state.
DURING THE PANDEMIC CAPITALISM IS FLOURISHING IN AMERICA BECAUSE AMERICANS LIVE IN AN ATMOSPHERE PERMEATED WITH AND EXUDING FREEDOM AND LIBERTY
Capitalism flourishes in an atmosphere of freedom and liberty.
Capitalism is a mechanism that facilitates exchange.
People keep on thinking up new things and keep on creating NEW things to exchange and new ways to exchange.
Capitalism is like the discovery in astronomy that we are living in an expanding universe.
Nothing stays the same.
DEMOCRACY IS THE BEST SYSTEM OF GOVERNMENT THE WORLD HAS EVER KNOWN
Democracy works.
George Floyd’s horrible brutal racially motivated killing united all decent Americans.
All decent Americans are taking peaceful action to make equal justice for all to happen.
This is a moment in history where we all bare witness to the American people (living in their American democracy) peacefully non-violently make righteous things happen.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP
On Monday, President Trump mobilized federal forces, including a Black Hawk helicopter, to scatter swatches of peaceful protesters in Lafayette Park next to the White House.
We saw orderly demonstrators routed by flash grenades and tear gas so that President Trump could hold up a Bible as a prop.
President Trump was immediately condemned by religious leaders, by civil activists, by ordinary citizens, and by retired military personnel.
Former Secretary of Defense General James Mattis said:
“When I joined the military some 50 years ago, I swore an oath to support and defend the Constitution. Never did I dream that troops taking that same oath would be ordered under any circumstances to violate the constitutional rights of their fellow citizens – much less to provide a bizarre photo op for the elected commander in chief, with military leadership standing alongside.
“Donald Trump is the first president who does not try to unite the American people – does not even pretend to. Instead he tries to divide us. We are witnessing the consequences of three years of this deliberate effort.”
Retired Navy Admiral Michael Mullin, a former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman, said:
“The military should never be called to fight our own people as enemies of the state. We have a military to fight our enemies, not our own people.”
On Sunday, June 7, 2020, President Trump ordered National Guard troops to begin withdrawing from Washington, D.C. saying, “Everything is under perfect control.” as anti-racism demonstrations continue worldwide.
That incident created a deep rift between the White House and the Pentagon.
The Pentagon ordered the National Guard deployed in Washington, D.C., to not use firearms or ammunition.
POLICE REFORM ACTIONS ARE TAKING FORM
On Capital Hill, Democrats powered by the Black Caucus are drafting sweeping packages of police reforms to overhaul the way law enforcement works.
Los Angeles City Mayor Eric Garcetti has submitted a new city budget proposal which defunds the City of Los Angeles’s police department.
Mayor Garcetti said he will direct $250 million to youth jobs, health initiatives and “peace centers” to heal trauma and will allow those who have suffered discrimination to collect damages.
The money would have to be cut from other city operations.
As much as $150 million would come from the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD).
DEFUNDING LAPD
That is a striking reversal from the budget Garcetti put forth in April, which proposed a 7% spending increase for LAPD, including a previously agreed upon package of raises and bonuses for rank-and-file officers.
In the budget he released in April the LAPD got 53.8% of money not designated for other specific uses.
The police department now stands at 9,985 officers.
Leaders of the union that represents LAPD officers said they found the shift abrupt and disingenuous.
They said to place the blame of Los Angeles’s social problems on our officers is hypocritical and political doublespeak of the highest order.
Jerretta Sandoz, vice president of the police union, in a statement said: “It was one of the most craven, disingenuous political sleights of hand we have seen in some time.”
BLACK LIVES MATTER LOS ANGELES
Black Lives Matter Los Angeles leaders said they would like to see the share of L.A.’s general fund devoted to police reduced from about 50% to 5.7%.
NEVER HAVE SO MANY THINGS WORTH COMMENTING ON HAPPENED SO RAPIDLY IN SUCH A SHORT SPAN OF TIME
RAPIDITY OF CHANGE
Things have gone from business “as usual” to “business unusual” in the blink of an eye.
PANDEMIC COVID 19 CHAOS IN A TIME OF COMPLEXITY
Complexity is an extension of the world in which we already live.
Chaos brought about by the coronavirus and COVID 19 is frightening.
For the past eight plus weeks: we have lived in a world which seemed to be completely unpredictable.
Things went totally out of control.
Businesses were not allowed to operate.
People were ordered to stay home; people were ordered to maintain at least six feet of physical distancing; people were ordered to not gather in large groups; non-essential business were ordered to close and to stay closed.
THE BRUTAL MURDER OF GEORGE FLOYD
About a week ago, on May 25, a black man named George Floyd was murdered by a white police officer pressing his knee against George Floyd’s neck making it impossible for George Floyd to breath.
At the time George Floyd was handcuffed, pined to the ground, and one police officer was on top of him pressing his knee against his neck three other officers were involved.
Two other police officers helped pin George Floyd down while the fourth officer directed people away from watching one police officer pressing his knee on George Floyd’s neck while George was handcuffed and pinned down.
George Floyd cried out that he could not breathe.
The three nearby police officers, heard George Floyd’s cry for help, watched the fourth police officer continue to press his knee on George Floyd neck for over eight minutes – for almost nine minutes – and did noting to stop what was going on.
After the public saw a video of what had happened to George Floyd, mass protests erupted.
Mass protests against police brutality spontaneously occurred all over America and sympathy protests spontaneously took place in many foreign countries.
Looting, destruction of buildings, and burning of police cars took place.
In some places, policemen watched while looters ransacked buildings, destroyed stores and stole merchandise.
Videos circulated on social media showing nearby groups of police officers standing by without doing anything while looting and destruction and theft of property took place in front of their eyes. They did nothing to stop or impede the looters or to stop or prevent the destruction of property going on in front of their eyes.
Yesterday, President Trump ordered active US Military personal to fire tear gas and pepper spray into a crowd of peaceful protestors in front of the White House.
He gave that order so that he would not have to walk through a mass of assembled peaceful protestors in Lafayette Square while walking from the White House to a nearby church.
President Trump had not been invited to the church, was not invited to visit the church.
President Trump did not tell anyone connected with the church that he was coming.
When President Trump arrived at the church, his daughter handed President Trumpt a Bible.
President Trump held the Bible.
Then photographs were taken of President Trump holding the Bible.
After photographs of President Trump holding the Bible were taken, President Trump and his entourage walked back across Lafayette Square to the White House.
President Trump’s conduct was universally condemned by religious leaders, by civil rights leaders, by the public at large, and by high ranking retired military personnel and by prior presidents of the United States.
MISTAKES AND MISDIRECTION
There was a lot of misdirection given to the American public from the start with respect to the coronavirus pandemic, beginning in January, 2020.
There were many mistakes made by American leaders and by the media in January, February, March, April, May and June 2020.
This is going to be a famous year in history: 2020 is a year that will be go down in history books.
MANIPULATION, POOR LEADERSHIP, AND LOSS OF PUBLIC TRUST
Many people now think they were manipulated by the Chinese government, by the World Health Organization, by many governmental institutions, and by many leaders of governments in many countries.
People complain our economy (the US economy) has been strangled by the pandemic, by the Coronavirus, by governmental actions, by governmental leaders, by governmental institutions.
Some of those people continue to complain the economy continues being strangled by misdirected governmental actions or by actions undertaken for political gain, actions taken for political purposes.
More than 40 million Americans lost their jobs due to stay in place orders issued by governors and public health officials in the United States.
People complain that state governors needlessly devastated our freedoms by issuing way too broad and unnecessary stay in place orders which not only shut down the US economy but needlessly devastated the US economy.
People complain their constitutional rights were infringed and are continuing to be infringed by restrictive coronavirus related orders made for the “ostensible” purpose of impeding the spread of the coronavirus pandemic.
Some people suspect that foul play is involved.
THIS IS A CULTURAL MOMENT
People need information to make decisions.
Information is the currency of democracy.
The same set of facts can be put together many different ways.
Social commentators, such as myself, interpret what is going on.
Social commentators tell us what the facts mean.
Social commentators tell us what is going on – contextualize stories – carry the memory of the past into the present moment.
CORONAVIRUS CHANGED THE WAY PEOPLE WORSHIP IN THE UNITED STATES
At the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, California Governor Newsom issued orders which prohibited people from attending religious services.
Over 1,000 faith leaders delivered a letter to Governor Newsom informing Governor Newsom that they were going to defy his order prohibiting worshipers to worship in their churches if his order prohibiting worship in churches was still in place on Pentecost Sunday, May 31, 2020.
Governor Newsom relented.
Governor Newsom modified his order prohibiting worship in churches.
Governor Newsom’s modified order allowed churches to operate at 25 percent of church capacity but to allow only up to a maximum of 100 congregants to attend a church service at one time.
That did not satisfy people who wanted to exercise an unfettered right to attend church services.
A lawsuit challenging Governor Newsom’s power to limit worship in churches to 25% of church capacity, coupled with a limitation on church attendance to not more than 100 people worked its way up to the United States Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court heard arguments submitted by interested parties in briefs filed with the court, and in oral arguments.
Some state health officials and the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) linked church attendance to outbreaks of COVID 19.
In one example, the CDC said 38% of those attending a rural Arkansas church in early March caught the virus resulting in four deaths.
The State of California argued that California would lift or loosen the attendance restriction when the attendance restriction proves unnecessary. “In light of tremendous uncertainty continuing to surround this new and deadly virus, however it would be rash to do so today.”
Chief Justice Roberts, who cast the deciding vote, stated his reason for upholding Governor Newsom’s power to restrict church attendance: “Choosing when to lift restrictions during a pandemic is the business of elected officials, not unelected judges.”
THE UNITED STATES IS A NATION OF LAWS, NOT A NATION OF MEN
The United States Supreme Court makes decisions based on the vote of nine Supreme Court Justices.
The United States, after President Trump’s appointments of Supreme Court Justices, has more “conservative” than “liberal justices.”
Many people thought the Supreme Court would rule against Governor Newsom’s restriction on religious worship.
United States President Trump, Vice-President Pence, and many religious leaders believe and argued publicly and to the Supreme that (a) freedom of religion is inviolate, (b) it is a violation of a constitutional right to limit the number of people who may worship together.
They argued that the First Amendment guarantees “Freedom of Religion” — they argue that any restriction on the freedom of people to worship together is a violation of that freedom.
There were other arguments against allowing a legal restriction to be put on the number of people who may legally worship together,such as:
- People questioned the expert opinion that there would be a net benefit to enforcing Governor’s restriction on the number of people who could assemble to worship, and also questioned the net benefit of having everyone ordered to stay at home.
- There were questions raised as to who is an expert on the risk to health of the pandemic? Whose expert opinion is to believed? Whose expert opinion is to be acted on?
The overall question to be answered is and was: What is an appropriate way to mitigate the risk of spread of the coronavirus?
BATTLE OF THE EXPERTS
Stanford University biophysicist Michael Levitt, who won the 2013 Nobel Prize in chemistry, has said he believed other health precautions such as enforcing the use of masks, would have been more effective in combating the pandemic.
“I think lockdown saved no lives. I think it may have costs lives.
“There is no doubt that you can stop an epidemic with a lockdown, but is a very blunt and very medieval weapon and the epidemic could have been stopped just as effectively with other sensible measures (such as masks and other forms of social distancing.)”
“It will have saved a few road accidents lives, things like that, but social damage – domestic abuse, divorces, alcoholism – has been extreme. And then you have those who were not treated for other conditions.
“We should have seen from China that a virus never grows exponentially. From the very first case you see, exponential growth actually slows down very dramatically.”
“The problem with epidemiologists is that they feel their job is to frighten people into a lockdown, social distancing.
“So you say ‘There’s going to be a million deaths’ and when their are only 25,000, you say, ‘It’s a good thing you listened to my advice.’ This happened with Ebola and with bird flu. It’s just part of the madness.”
PROTESTS AGAINST POLICE BRUTALITY AND RACIAL INJUSTICE
After George Floyd was murdered by a police officer who crushed George Floyd’s neck making it impossible for George Floyd to breathe (while Floyd was hand cuffed and pined to the ground in police custody) … all Hell broke loose.
If equal justice under the law had applied to George Floyd – justice equal to that applied to the four cops now charged with his murder have received – he never would have been arrested in the first place.
On Memorial Day, Monday, May 25, 2020, a store clerk in Minneapolis called the police because he thought Floyd had paid for a pack of cigarettes with a counterfeit $20 bill. The call should have started an investigation; that’s not what happened to Floyd.
Instead within minutes of the arrival of four police officers, Floyd was face down on the street, hands tied behind his back with Derek Chauvin pressing his knee into his neck for nearly nine minutes, while two other police officers restrained Floyd by pressing down on his back and legs, and the fourth police officer kept distressed passersby from intervening. Floyd pleaded for his life, telling them he couldn’t breathe.
Chauvin was caught killing a black man on video by a passerby, while several eye witnesses pleaded with him to stop.
On the video, Chauvin seems completely calm, bored even, with one hand nonchalantly in his pocket even as Floyd died beneath his knee.
No police cars swarmed the area to arrest the four officers. Chauvin went home that night a free man, and stayed a free man for the next three nights as well. The other three police officers were not arrested until Monday (June 1, 2020).
At first, Hennepin County District Attorney Mike Freeman said there was not enough evidence to arrest anyone, adding, “there is other evidence taht does not support a criminal charge.”
It took for days after the killing for the D.A. to arrest Chauvin – and only after protests over George Floyd’s murder began in nearly every major American city.
It was not until Wednesday (June 1), after Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison took over the case, that felony aiding and abetting the murder were filed against the other three other officers.
At the moment, we now are facing all things ripple effects brought about both by the coronavirus pandemic, fear of the coronavirus pandemic and fear of COVID 19, and the ripple effects brought about by the injustice that began at the moment George Floyd was arrested and continued as he was murdered which was amplified by the complete indifference of the police department and local district attorney to the murder.
PEACEFUL PROTEST RALLIES TURN VIOLENT
Peaceful protest rallies in many cities in the United States followed the showing of a video of the injustice of what happened to George Floyd.
Several of those rallies turned violent.
- Police cars were burned.
- Buildings were burned.
- Rocks and bottles and bricks were thrown at police officers.
- Buildings were set on fire by rioters.Businesses were broken into and looted by rioters.
Chaos rained in several major cities in the United States.
Curfews were imposed.
CURFEWS
Curfews were imposed in cities and counties throughout the United States
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA
I live in Los Angeles.
Peaceful demonstrations in the City of Los Angeles began on Friday.
They turned into riots Friday night (May 29), which continued all day Saturday and Saturday night (May 30).
Friday night and Saturday night a citywide and countywide curfew was imposed.
On Saturday night, California Governor Newsom deployed 1,000 National Guardsmen to Los Angeles to assist local law enforcement.
A citywide and countywide curfew stayed in place until Sunday night (June 7).
REALITY OF LIFE IN CONFINEMENT
A woman’s nails are important to her. They are a part of her identity.
Getting her nails done is very important to many, if not, all women.
Nail salons are essential businesses, essential for everyone’s well being.
Can you imagine having to be locked up in a house with a woman who is used to having her nails done once a week, when she can’t get her nails done, has not been able to get her nails done for over two months?
Some ladies are doing their nails themselves.
Some ladies are going to another woman’s home to have their nails done.
Thus stay at home (shelter-in-place) don’t go to nail salon orders are turning many of our women into criminals.
By the way, in San Francisco, California, it is currently against the law for women to get their nails done at a nail salon until August.
Nail salons will not legally be open in San Francisco until August, 2020.
LESSONS LEARNED
We have learned lessons during the coronavirus pandemic and the George Floyd mass protest rallies.
It is best to:
- Observe, listen, and get input from multiple and diverse perspectives.
- When laws are imposed there will be unintended consequences.
- Stay vigilant – almost everything will evolve and change.
- Change happens all the time.
- Ask yourself: What might be missing that’s outside my own frame of reference?
WHAT IS REALLY GOING ON
Below are four opinions of what is really going on with respect to the motivations of people in charge and the consequences of their actions.
- The first opinion is the opinion of a Beverly Hills entrepreneur about the impact of the coronavirus on business and business people. I have known this entrepreneur for approximately forty years.
- A member of the international farming community heartedly agrees with the Beverly Hills entrepreneur’s opinion.
- He is a friend of mine, who lives in the State of Washington. His business is deeply enmeshed in the international farming-agricultural industry. As a result of the coronavirus pandemic our food supply chain in the US was disrupted.
- The second opinion is the opinion of my office-mate, Daniel Cheren, Esq. Daniel is an East Coaster and a worldly man. Dan currently practices law in the United States and in Israel.
- Dan was born in France, has degrees from Harvard University, Columbia University and Boston University, and practiced law while living in Israel.
- Dan and I work in the same law office suite on Ventura Blvd., in Encino, California. Dan practice involves people, cases, and clients from all over the world.
- The third opinion is the opinion of a friend of mine who is a mathematician. He lives and works in Boston. He is a health-expert who has expertise consisting of specialized knowledge on how to conduct clinical trials of new medicines in order to obtain FDA approval.
- He has a PhD degree from MIT in nuclear physics, a MD degree from the University of Pennsylvania, He has lectured at the Harvard University School of Public Health and is totally plugged in to the business world, the academic world, the political world and the regulatory world.
- The supplemental information provided about how life in China is controlled was provided by a businessperson who does business in Mainland China, with Chinese nationals, who visits Mainland China on business trips many times each year.
- The fourth opinion is my opinion of how the impact of the coronavirus pandemic and the murder of George Floyd have changed our lives and will change the lives of future generations.
- It is my opinion that what is now happening as a result of the pandemic and as a result of the killing of George Floyd will have more impact on the American people than did President Lyndon Johnson, President Richard Nixon, the Vietnam War, General William Westmoreland (US Army officer who commanded U.S. forces in the Vietnam War from 1964 to 1968), Watergate, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Mohamed Ali.
CAPITALISM EFFICIENTLY FILLS NEEDS
I agree with American Billionaire Entrepreneur Mark Cuban (net worth $4.311 B according to forbes.com):
We need to create permanent jobs, jobs that are needed to make our economy function, jobs that will give people security and a state of mind necessary for them to be willing to spend money.
We need coronavirus contact tracers. The federal government should provide funds to train contact tracers and to pay them.
Any funds given to big companies should come with restrictions — Any funds used to pay top executives should be paid in the same percentage to all workers in the company. Any stock options or warrants given to top executives should be given in the same percentage to all workers, and should be given in the exact same amount to the US Government.
US Government leaders should negotiate with big companies who are loaned money by US government, or given money by US government, or given grants by US government on behalf of US Taxpayers.
Rebuilding American economy should and will come from the bottom up, not from the top down.
The government should provide for and/or pay for day care centers available to working parents to leave their children when they go to work.
The government should pay for and provide after school programs for school children to be able to attend after school and to be able to attend on the weekend.
I agree with other American Billionaire Entrepreneurs that the US Government should invest additional funds in social programs – at a minimum an additional amount of money – equal to any loss to the US Treasury of tax revenue from tax breaks given to big corporations and to affluent individuals.
[ASIDE: I have been told that the entire US Tax Code could be written in three pages. The only reason it is longer than three pages is that all the additional pages represent tax breaks lobbied for and given to special interests.
The minimum wage should be raised so that a working person will make enough money working at one job to support himself or herself, and have health insurance, sick leave, and a time off to have a vacation.
Attendance at community colleges and at state universities should be free, at no charge to students.
Everyone should have access to basic health insurance which will provide payment for basic medical care.
FIRST OPINION
On May 26, 2020, I posted a cartoon on Instagram of an old man accompanied by the caption, “I wonder – out loud – if the spread and misinformation about COVID 19 and government action to prevent the spread of COVID 19 is a plot to rid the world of old people residing in rest homes.
The Beverly Hills Entrepreneur replied:
“Yes it is.
“First they want to bankrupt all the businesses and the rich.
“Then they want to kill all the old.
“I wonder why they don’t kill the homeless as well.
“Maybe they wait for their votes, then kill them as well.
“Not many people die because of COVID 19.
“Any patient that dies they put a COVID tag because that way the hospitals make a ton of money from the government.”
A friend resided in the State of Washington, replied:
“Here is Washington State we add gunshot victims to the COVID list. Any questions.
“All science is now politics used to reinforce Progressive Ideology.
“Any science that that does not do that doesn’t see the light of day.
“Refresh my memory.
“I’m a little slow.
“Has anybody ever heard of a computer model that has been even a little accurate?”
The Beverly Hills Entrepreneur replied, “I bet they do.”
Someone who follows me on Instagram @garyspassion replied, “It lowers the Social Security burden to kill old people, it gets them off the social security rolls.”
An entrepreneur on the East Coast added: “Yes it is a plot to get rid of old people. They want to get rid of old people because old people are Republicans.”
Another friend replied: “The end game is to take down capitalism.”
SIDE COMMENT
Various people have expressed the opinion that the coronavirus pandemic was either purposefully caused by the Communist Chinese government in Mainland China or was originally negligently caused by the Communist Chinese government in Mainland China and then knowingly and purposefully allowed to spread by the Mainland Chinese government.
But, nobody has proposed to me that the evil reason for the coronavirus pandemic “justified” shut down of all businesses in the United States was and is to purposefully create over 40 million unemployed people in the United States not only for the purpose of ruining the US economy but to also to create a mass of unemployed people available to protest an act of racial injustice.
Or that as part of this diabolical Chinese Communist plot/plan George Floyd was murdered for the sole purpose of creating social disorder and loss of face to the United States.
According to this, as yet unstated theory, the Chinese Communist Party leadership not only wants to destroy the United States and its economy, Chinese Communists want to make sure President Trump is not reelected President of the United States.
The Chinese Communist Party leadership does not want President Trump reelected president of the United States because President Trump has taken affirmative action to put an end to Communist China’s unbounded predatory trade practices.
SECOND OPINION
Gary – I do not think there is a serious argument that Covid is a plot against old people.
I think the proper historical reference is WWII and the emergence of the US as a superpower. Prior to WWII – Western Europe, primarily England and France, ruled the world militarily, economically and politically. The U.S. was still an emerging power, struggling in the Depression and very much isolationist. After WWII – the French and British Empires crumbled, their power and influence waned – and the U.S. quickly assumed dominance of western culture throughout the world.
How did this happen? I would posit that it was less the brilliance of American minds and industry and far more the simple fact that Europe and east Asia destroyed itself in the war. There, a whole generation of young men was decimated. Their cities and industries were bombed and destroyed. On the other hand, the U.S. was never bombed – and the number of American soldiers that died (75,000) while tragic – did not change the demography of the U.S. So after the war, the U.S. was able to dominate the world economy simply because there was no competition.
The Chinese are very conscious of history in general and no doubt are fully aware of the secret behind America’s success.
As the Western countries shut down their economies in the wake of the Wuhan virus – damage, perhaps irreparable damage, is being done. Millions of businesses are going bankrupt, millions of people are unemployed, the economy is slowing down, demand is drying up, and trillions of dollars are being borrowed in order to prop up our failing economy. China is taking advantage of this — economically, militarily and politically. Lending money, buying up strategic assets, expanding its power in east Asia, and making in-roads into the Middle East, Africa and South America.
While Americans have been focused on the specter of Russia Russia Russia – like a magician’s sleight of hand distraction – China has engineered an economic coup that may precipitate the collapse of the West as the dominant superpower to its advantage. In other words, a plot far more sinister than ridding the world of the elderly.
THIRD OPINION
My third friend immediately responded to Dan’s opinion, stating
- American deaths in Word War II were far greater than 75,000. In World Word II over 405,000 Americans gave their lives.
- A pro-Hong Kong resolution at a British university expressing support for Hong Kong pro-democracy movement was recently voted down at the University of Warwick in England, after opposition from mainland Chinese students.
He sent an article to me which describes the purposeful actions taking place by the the Communist Party Government of Mainland China to influence world events. According to that article.
Chinese state media in the mainland have portrayed the protestors as the “violent pawns of hostile foreign forces.
The University of Warwick has about 27,000 students. Of those, about 3200 are Chinese International Students.
Chinese students compromise the largest group of international students in Britain, with around 120,000 Chinese international students currently studying there.
Chinese embassies and consulates maintain close relationship with Chinese student groups, providing funding, occasional political directives, and paying them to attend pro-China demonstrations.
On February 3, 2020, the University of Warwick student union met to discuss a motion that would condemn the “abhorrent human rights abuses of the Hong Kong Police Force and the Hong Kong SAR Government.
During the 2019-2000 academic year, there were a total of 11 resolutions. Each of these resolutions with the exception of the Hong Kong resolution was voted on by around 1,000 students; most passed by a wide margin.
The Hong Kong resolution failed: 2,041 votes against, and 977 votes for.
CONTROL OF CONSCIOUSNESS IN THE DIGITAL WORLD
A business person who goes to China frequently.
According to that person.
Every time a person goes to China it is necessary to get a new Chinese phone because their regulations on phones (e.g. how to set them up, get a phone number, etc.) change regularly.
For many years now, China has blocked Google/Gmail, Twitter, and Facebook access for all people within the borders of China and replaced them with Chinese companies (essentially copies) such as Baidu, Weibo, and RenRen. This creates a controlled information loop in China. Chinese people then use VPN services to access blocked websites and apps on their phones and computers. VPN services essentially reroute a computer’s access while disguising their IP address.
In May (last month) China demonstrated it now has the cyber ability to disable VPN in personal phones and computers by doing so.
American spirit, love of free speech, is the greatest force in the world to withstand this global force to control the free flow of information, ideas, concepts, different opinions and “fact based news.”
SIDE EDITORIAL COMMENT
When people base their understanding only on the devices in their hands, when they don’t read books, when words and text can be altered digitally, when access to truth can be turned off… then we are talking about a mass control of consciousness.
The Chinese leaders are masters at this. They have been practicing for decades for now.
Perhaps they have been teaching and sharing their techniques with other global leaders.
If so, it is not too far fetched to suspect there are powers at play to either create or spread the coronavirus or to use this catastrophe to increase mass surveillance and control.
We must remain vigilant and cautious.
We must get closer together and communicate through trusted means.
We need places like churches to meet in person and discuss ideas since we cannot depend on the realities displayed to us through our phones.
We must do this together.
We must not stop communicating with people of different political backgrounds or who share varying views.
We must radically embrace different voices and allow free expression or else …. we will be come robots to whatever reality is told to us, outside of our control.
One of the many great things about America is freedom of speech, open debate of ideas an opinions.
The more pieces of the picture we see, the more clear the picture becomes.
A SUPPORTING POINT OF VIEW
Another friend, expressed in an email the following supporting point of view (addressed jointly to me and to the China expert).
Thank you for shinning the light on a truly toxic long-term problem that will outlive this current crisis – the control of access to information and the reduction of information nodes that China’s government uses in order to control its citizens and avoid accountability for its institutional crimes.
Now social media platforms like Facebook and YouTube are reflecting this extreme Chinese-style censorship with the ongoing bans of videos and statements from eminently qualified medical doctors, epidemiologists, chemists and structural biologist who are questioning Dr. Fauci’s assertions and also questioning the Beijing-style lockdown policies embraced by several US states – including lockdown policies in the State of California.
Our society is ablaze in lies.
Nowadays epidemiology is largely data science.
In late January, Dr. Fauci was repeating the lies put out by the Chinese Communist Party and their enablers in WHO – that COVID was not a threat to the world. You can Google’s Fauci’s interview with Newsmax TV to see the video where Fauci stated Americans had nothing to fear from this virus. Then four weeks later Fauci gets exposed for being way wrong and decides to atone for his failure by cosigning Neil Ferguson’s alarmist projections and throwing in with the lockdown crowd.
Neil Ferguson is an epidemiologist of Imperial College London who is known to be consistently wrong on his projections going back 20 years – with disastrous results in his home country – ruined farmers from his hoof and mouth disease alarmism, magnitude of failure on his team’s projections on mad cow, bird flu, etc. Neil Ferguson’s modeling has been revealed to be a sham many times. He has spit out failed predictions time after time.
FAUCI DEPENDED ON AN OUT OF BOUNDS EPIDEMIOLOGIST’S MODEL OF FATALITIES.
THAT EPIDEMIOLOGIST HAS A LONG HISTORY OF ALWAYS GETTING EPIDEMIC PROJECTIONS WRONG.
So do we now have any responsible news platform questioning the basis of this entire lockdown effort or putting hard questions to Dr.Fauci about his rationale for destroying people’s lives and livelihoods? Hell no.
We here now in this “Information Age” are being rendered ignorant by the messengers and their medium with data deluge. Indiscriminate, unintegrated, unintelligible noise voiced by personalities to attempt a credibility that is fake and phony.
The cable news TV viewing audience and the YouTube viewing audience are accomplices in this crime.
In that regard, there is video posted on YouTube with the title “Italian residents hug Chinese people to encourage them in coronavirus fight.”
This video was taken while Wuhan was shut down, before widespread coronavirsus infections decimated Italy.
It depicts the Mayor of Florence’s “hug a Chinese program” – which was going on full blast while Wuhan was a coronavirus hot spot.
In this video Italians (people in Florence) are shown hugging a Chinese man in an act of solidarity — the English subtitles in the video state: “I’m not a virus. I’m a human. FREE ME FROM PREJUDICE. ERADICATE THE PREJUDICE.”
Stupidity is static.
Stupidity doesn’t follow Boyle’s Law, Kepler’s Three Laws of Planetary Motion, Einstein’s Theory of Relativity, or even String Theory.
CHINA CONTROLS CRITICAL SUPPLIES
Someone sent me an article which states China controls critical medical supplies, supplies most of the critical medicines consumed in the U.S.A. The article also states American companies couldn’t/can’t complete because the Chinese pharmaceutical companies are subsidized by the Chinese government. They drive down the price of medicines to the point where American manufactures can’t manufacture their medicines at a profit. Later, after the American manufacturers no longer manufacture a particular medicine, the Chinese company that manufactures that medicine raises the price it sells the medicine at.
Another person sent me an email in which the claim is made that Chinese companies manufacture many if not most of the smart phones and computers used in the United States.
MY OPINIONS
COVID 19 TRANSMISSION DURING PROTESTS
WE have to make sure these protests do not become super-spreader events.
Anyone attending a protest is facing a risk of contact with coronavirus.
Distancing is most important to reduce risk of spread of COVID 19.
Police and protestors should wear masks.
Use of tear gas and pepper spray by police will cause coughing, sneezing, and touching face.
Sneezing and coughing will spread virus further – get it on you and others.
People put in custody should be given masks, and transported and processed while maintaining physical distancing of at least six feet.
Large congested crowds create the perfect conditions for the virus to be transmitted.
Shouting and singing, which are common at protests, have been shown to hasten the spread of the virus via droplets.
On May 30, 2020, a 22 year old Ohio State University grad, Sarah Grossman, died shortly after being sprayed with tear gas kneeling at a Columbus, Ohio rally protesting the death of George Floyd. She stood up to protest police brutality and was tear gassed as a result.
The City of Columbus, Ohio has opened an investigation into her death.
LISTENING
Experts and Black Live Matter leaders tell us
- Policing is not a war.
- Police should have a ‘neighbor mindset’.
- The people police deal with are their neighbors. They should be treated as neighbors.
- Police should be trained to have a neighbor mindset.
- Spending money on something that doesn’t work (police) is a waste of money.
Black mothers in radio interviews and on YouTube videos tell us what it is like to be a black mother. They tell us that they tell their black son’s “the story.”
Beginning when their sons are very young Black Mothers tell their sons, “don’t wear a hoodie,” “don’t do anything that will alarm a white person,” “be passive around white people.”
Black women tell us in radio interviews and on YouTube videos that the thing they fear the most is they will get “the call,” a call in which they are told their husband or their son or their daughter has been murdered by a white person.
A day or two ago, the President of the American Psychological Association (APA) stated, in writing, “We are living in a racism pandemic.”
According to the APA, racism is associated with conditions such as depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder, and substance use disorders. It can contribute to the development of cardiovascular and other “physical diseases.”
Black people are three times more likely to be killed by police than white people.
Through black people make us 13% of the U.S. population, they account for 24% of the deaths where race is known.
Racism is a belief system that makes us all sick.
Living with diminished respect makes us more vulnerable to pathology and premature death.
Our minds and bodies are interrelated.
Our beliefs are the most important force in our life.
The belief that people have a descending order of value depending on their race (belief there is a racial hierarchy) is racism.
I agree with Colorful American Billionaire Entrepreneur Mark Cuban’s statement:
“Treating people equally means treating people with equal amounts of respect for who they are and for what they have experienced.”
UNCOMFORTABLE CONVERSATIONS
We get more accomplished when we listen then when we act.
Interacting with people who have different views than our own, allowing ourselves to understand their motivations – what motivates them – expands our perceptions, leads to empathy, develops emotional intelligence.
Knowledge changes perspective.
The more we know the more we see.
The more we see the more we understand.
Listening and talking to people in uncomfortable conversations gets people to see their humanity, to share their humanity, and as a consequence people come together with love, respect and honesty and act more intelligently.
We have to understand what is going on, because when we don’t we are a danger to ourselves and to everyone else.
Our beliefs are the most important force in our lives.
IN AMERICA DEMOCRACY WORKS
“‘Whose the greatest.’ he asked all the children, and they all shouted his name. ‘Who upset the world?’ and they all shouted his name. ‘I am the champion.’ He told them, ‘and that means all of us are champions. I showed you all what we can do..'” – Sports Illustrated March 9, 1964
On May 17, 1965, the young heavyweight champion of the world stopped for a bite to eat on the Florida-Georgia border – and was told to eat out back with his kind.
That would not happen today.
Gary Smolker
Copyright (c) 2020 by Gary Smolker, All Rights Reserved
Gary S. Smolker 