I say YES. YOU say NO....Numero Tre! Enjoy!

IllinoisLady

DivineMrsM

IllinoisLady

,Divine.

DivineMrsM

Elderberry

IllinoisLady: I don't know what I would do if you ever stopped posting those great memes. Thank you. Thank you.

On a happier note, British Columbia has put in a Macron style mandate. I wish the start date was sooner but I guess they are letting the anti-vaxxers get the message. Proof of vaccine will be mandatory for indoor and patio dining, gyms, movies, theatrical performances, stadium events etc Pretty much everything except essential services like grocery stores. The carrot wasn't working so they are bringing out the stick. I heard that Quebec was considering something similar. Write now out proof is on our vaccinations cards under the various Provincial Health Authorities but it is all in the whole province database so a provincial "passport" is in the works - as is a Health Canada for the whole country.

ChiSandy

Saw a CNN reporter interviewing a bunch of moronic Trumpkins attending his Alabama rally. They all said that they wouldn't take the vaccine ("it hasn't been researched enough," "it's my body, my choice," "I don't need it, I have hydrochlorine (sic) at home"). The reporter asked the most idiotic one of them (no, not the one in the black T-shirt giving Biden the finger, but the stiffly-styled-teased-and-sprayed-coiffed one in an "I Told You So" T-shirt), "the FDA is going to approve the Pfizer this week." She shot back, "I don't trust the FDA, the CDC, they're all government and I don't trust government. I trust Sherri Tenpenny." He asked her if she trusted her doctor. "No," she replied, "he told me to get the vaccine and I told him to go watch Tenpenny." He asked, "so you don't believe your actual doctor but you believe Sherri Tenpenny?" "That's right," she replied. (He didn't press her as to why, but I'd bet the farm that she'd reply 'because she agrees with me' "). He tried one more time. "Donald Trump says to take the vaccine, and that he took it and he's fine." She replied, "I don't believe you." Aghast, the reporter asked, "you don't believe Trump took the vaccine?" "Nope, it's all fake news," she insisted. Mind you, she had just heard Trump himself say he took the vaccine!

He changed the subject. "Who do you believe?" She replied "God. I listen to whatever God tells me. God separates the sheep from the goats." He couldn't resist asking, "which one are you?" She hesitated, then replied, "I'm not a sheep, because I won't be led. So that makes me a goat. Yeah, I'm a goat," she declared.

Has she read her Bible? Matthew, in particular, declares that on Judgment Day the sheep ("my flock") will be saved and goats will be damned,

There's even a song by the rock band Cake: "Sheep Go to Heaven, Goats Go to Hell."

DivineMrsM

Sandy, one time my husband grilled slices of zucchini too long turning them into a big, hot pile of mushy mush mush. Which also describes the “I told you so” coiffed hair woman’s brain.

IllinoisLady

Listening is the oldest and perhaps the most powerful tool of healing. It is often through the quality of our listening and not the wisdom of our words that we are able to effect the most profound changes in the people around us. When we listen, we offer with our attention an opportunity for wholeness. Our listening creates sanctuary for the homeless parts within the other person. That which has been denied, unloved, devalued by themselves and others. That which is hidden.

In this culture the soul and the heart too often go homeless.

Listening creates a holy silence. When you listen generously to people, they can hear the truth in themselves, often for the first time. And in the silence of listening, you can know yourself in everyone. Eventually you may be able to hear, in everyone and beyond everyone, the unseen singing softly to itself and to you. -RachelNaomi Remen

IllinoisLady

Not much of a surprise on many of those people who already had their NO reasons resting in their no arsenal. Stupid just doesn't cut it. I am probably wrong but in my mind I feel like a lot of those people who go to the ever more stupid rallies with the orange loony likely have more time than a lot of us to do research. I have to admit ( although their is something of a 'ring' on it ) I've never even heard of this Tenpenny person that comes to mind at the moment. I find it remarkable. Isn't listening to God the ultimate excuse. He is not here to argue with for starters --- so that automatically giver people the OUT they are seeking. If one could ask God I'm sure he'd say that all were given the opportunity to discover and use THEIR own wisdom and no need for him to keep telling them what to do -- all has been put out for their consumption which they are hell-bent to ignore just as much as the life-saving vaccines they ignore. Many will survive, but I also have this notion that those who don't will get wherever they think they are going --- and wonder what the hell they were thinking.

The media ( some, not all ) are still trying to stir the Afghanistan pot. Hopefully Burns will be able to work something out to get a bit of an extension on the end of the month date to have everyone out of there. Until then I guess we will be treated to the impeach Biden or whatever else they can come up with. Ding-Dong. Ratings, ratings, ratings.

IllinoisLady

IllinoisLady

IllinoisLady

DivineMrsM

Heather Cox Richardson

Sunday, August 22, 2021

A week after the Taliban took control of Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, as the U.S. was withdrawing the forces that have been in the country since 2001, the initial chaos created by the Taliban's rapid sweep across the country has simmered down into what is at least a temporary pattern.

We knew there was a good chance that the Taliban would regain control of the country when we left, although that was not a foregone conclusion. The former president, Donald Trump, recognized that the American people were tired of the ongoing war in Afghanistan, which was approaching its 20th year, and in February 2020, his administration negotiated with the Taliban to enable the U.S. to withdraw. In exchange for the release of 5000 Taliban fighters and the promise that the U.S. would withdraw within the next 14 months, the Taliban agreed not to attack U.S. soldiers.

Trump's dislike of the war in Afghanistan reflected the unpopularity of the long engagement, which by 2020 was ill defined. The war had begun in 2001, after terrorists affiliated with al-Qaeda attacked the United States on September 11 of that year. Taliban leaders in control of Afghanistan sheltered al-Qaeda, and after the attacks, the U.S. president, George W. Bush, demanded that Afghanistan hand over the terrorist leader believed to be behind the terrorist attack on the U.S: Osama bin Laden. In October, after Taliban leaders refused, the U.S. launched a bombing campaign.

That campaign was successful enough that in December 2001 the Taliban offered to surrender. But the U.S. rejected that surrender, determined by then to eradicate the extremist group and fill the vacuum of its collapse with a new, pro-American government. Al-Qaeda leader bin Laden escaped from Afghanistan to Pakistan, and the U.S. project in Afghanistan turned from an anti-terrorism mission into an effort to rebuild the Afghan government into a modern democracy.

By 2002 the Bush administration was articulating a new doctrine in foreign policy, arguing that the U.S. had a right to strike preemptively against countries that harbor terrorists. In 2003, under this doctrine, the U.S. launched a war on Iraq, which diverted money, troops, and attention from Afghanistan. The Taliban regrouped and began to regain the territory it had lost after the U.S. first began its bombing campaign in 2001.

By 2005, Bush administration officials privately worried the war in Afghanistan could not be won on its current terms, especially with the U.S. focused on Iraq. Then, when he took office in 2009, President Barack Obama turned his attention back to Afghanistan. He threw more troops into that country, bringing their numbers close to 100,000. In 2011, the U.S. military located bin Laden in Abbottabad, Pakistan, and launched a raid on the compound where he was hiding, killing him. By 2014, Obama had drawn troops in Afghanistan down to about 11,000, and in December of that year, he announced that the mission of the war—weakening the Taliban and capturing bin Laden—had been accomplished, and thus the war was over. The troops would come home.

But, of course, they didn't, leaving Trump to develop his own policy. But his administration's approach to the chaos in that country was different than his predecessor's. By negotiating with the Taliban and excluding the Afghan government the U.S. had been supporting, the Trump team essentially accepted that the Taliban were the most important party in Afghanistan. The agreement itself reflected the oddity of the negotiations. Each clause referring to the Taliban began: "The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan which is not recognized by the United States as a state and is known as the Taliban will…."

It was immediately clear that the Taliban was not living up to its side of the bargain. Although it did stop attacking U.S. troops, It began to escalate violence in Afghanistan itself, assassinated political opponents, and maintained ties to al-Qaeda. Nonetheless, the Trump administration put pressure on the leaders of the Afghan government to release the 5000 Taliban prisoners, and they eventually did. Before Biden took office, Trump dropped the U.S. troop engagement in Afghanistan from about 13,000 to about 2500.

When he took office, Biden had to decide whether to follow Trump's path or to push back on the Taliban on the grounds they were not honoring the agreement Trump's people had hammered out. Biden himself wanted to get out of the war. At the same time, he recognized that fighting the Taliban again would mean throwing more troops back into Afghanistan, and that the U.S. would again begin to take casualties. He opted to get the troops out, but extended the deadline to September 11, 2021, the twentieth anniversary of the initial attack. (Former president Trump complained that the troops should come out faster.)What Biden did not foresee was the speed with which the Taliban would retake control of the country. It swept over the regional capitals and then Kabul in about nine days in mid-August with barely a shot fired, and the head of the Afghan government fled the country, leaving it in chaos.

That speed left the U.S. flatfooted. Afghans who had been part of the government or who had helped the U.S. and its allies rushed to the airport to try to escape. In the pandemonium of that first day, up to seven people were killed; two people appear to have clung to a U.S. military plane as it took off, falling to their deaths.

And yet, the Taliban, so far, has promised amnesty for its former opponents and limited rights for women. It has its own problems, as the Afghan government has been supported for the previous 20 years by foreign money, including a large percentage from the U.S. Not only has that money dried up as foreign countries refuse to back the Taliban, but also Biden has put sanctions on Afghanistan and also on some Pakistanis suspected of funding the Taliban. At the same time it appears that no other major sponsor, like Russia or China, has stepped in to fill the vacuum left by U.S. money, leaving the Taliban fishing for whatever goodwill it can find.

Yesterday, Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo flagged tweets showing that members of the Afghan government, including the brother of the president who fled, are in what appear from the photos posted on Twitter to be relaxed talks about forming a new government. Other factions in Afghanistan would like to stop this from happening, and today Biden's national security adviser Jake Sullivan warned that ISIS-K, another extremist group, is threatening to attack the airport to destabilize the Taliban.

Meanwhile, there are 10,000 people crowded into that airport, and U.S. evacuations continue. The Kabul airport is secure—for now—and the U.S. military has created a larger perimeter around it for protection. The U.S. government has asked Americans in Afghanistan to shelter in place until they can be moved out safely; the Qatari ambassador to Afghanistan has been escorting groups of them to the airport. Evacuations have been slower than hoped because of backlogs at the next stage of the journey, but the government has enlisted the help of 18 commercial airlines to move those passengers forward, leaving room for new evacuees.

Yesterday, about 7800 evacuees left the Kabul airport. About 28,000 have been evacuated since August 14.

Interestingly, much of the U.S. media is describing this scenario as a disaster for President Biden. Yet, on CNN this morning, Matthew Dowd, who was the chief strategist for the Bush-Cheney ticket in 2004, noted that more than 20,000 people have been evacuated from Afghanistan without a single loss of an American life, while in the same period of time, 5000 Americans have died from Covid-19 and 500 have died from gunshots.

IllinoisLady

Great piece, Divine.

Miriandra

This is a good start.

Nine Afghan girl robotics team members safe in Qatar

DivineMrsM

IllinoisLady

The journey between what you once were

and who you are now becoming

is where the dance of Life really takes place.

- Barbara De Angelis

IllinoisLady

Divine, the memes are great but I particularly love the last one. I read about a fellow on the way here who was I think about 56. He was dead-set against masks as well as the vaccine. Now, he is deceased. He said he was pretty much a Libertarian and didn't want anyone telling him what to do. Made me wonder ( and yes I know it sounds a mite cruel ) how he lasted this long. You know, we are all told many, many things we must do -- by others. We have to stop at lights, wait at crossings for trains, be at work on time, be dressed in public. I just see it as a strange way to cop-out. I do feel sorry for the family he has who may not in fact, be in agreement with how he saw things. If they are in agreement then I wish good luck to you or better luck then your family member had.

I'll never totally get over this reaction from people because it has no good basis. I do not sorrow for them -- they are not fitting in the world too well and have been freed by the former guy and his minions to let foolishness and stupid behaviors be their flag. They don't stop and consider where so many of their kind are at present -- starting with their loony leader holed up in New Jersey/Fla.

IllinoisLady

IllinoisLady

DivineMrsM

Here’s hoping the FDA approval of the Pfizer vaccine makes a difference. I’m seeing numerous stories of employers requiring the vaccination now that I guess the approval gives them legal standing to do so. And they will use other tactics hitting the bottom line of individuals. WVU Medicine, West Virginia’s largest employer now requires it. Delta Airlines will charge unvaccinated employees an additional $200 per month on health insurance premiums. The Pentagon issued a statement saying U.S. troops must get their vaccine immediately.

Other employers with vaccine requirement: CNN, WaPo, Google, Disney, Facebook, AT&T, Amtrack and numerous others.

Side story: horse dewormer medicine is sold out in Oklahoma despite FDA warnings not to use it to treat Covid. Those Oklahoma turd balls have shit for brains.

ChiSandy

Horse shit for brains, Divine! (I find it hard to believe everyone in OK has a horse). Our cat’s vet sent out an e-mail to “pet parents” warning them not to take ivermectin

DivineMrsM

There’s an apathy about Covid among some people that is both frustrating and infuriating. I attended an outdoor covered-dish lunch with some ladies from the pool. I struck up a conversation with a woman from the area that I’d never met and enjoyed talking with her on many neutral topics. Inevitably, tho, Covid and the vaccine came up and she shrugged her shoulders and said, “It’s a virus. I just think it’s like the flu and it’s just always going to be around.” She indicated she wasn’t concerned about it and repeated, “It’s a virus.”

Aurrrrgh! Since when is Covid seasonal like the flu? How many hundreds of thousands more people have died of Covid than from the flu? How often does the flu disrupt medical procedures being done, stop visitors from being allowed in hospitals, entire businesses to shut down due to an outbreak? When has the flu ever disrupted our economy?

I did not give this kind of reply to the woman because she already made up her mind. I am sure many others have her mindset. They choose not to see the difficulty those in the health field continue experiencing because of Covid cases. I guess when you are not directly affected, it means little to you.

ChiSandy

All these COVIDiots, regardless of whatever excuse they give for being anti-vax, anti-mask, and even contending the disease is a "hoax." have one thing in common: an extreme resentment of any authority (other than, perhaps, their pastors). They were told what to do--sometimes compelled to do it--all their lives by those with higher income, education, and social status. This explains why they will reject the advice of not only scientists but even their own physicians--because internet crackpots confirm that their desire to do whatever the hell they want to do (and only what they want to do) is justified.

But they will obey their pastors because they were raised to believe, even fear, God (mostly Jesus, except for Haredi Jews) as the one authority who has the final say and power to punish or reward them not just in this world but the next. The most ignorant of them haven't even read the whole Bible, relying on their clergy to tell them the Word of God.

Sort of analogous to all those Bible story paintings & mosaics on the walls & ceilings of medieval churches--the laity were usually illiterate, so the priests told them what was in the Bible and the images--usually sequential--illustrated and reinforced it. (In Haredi Judaism, women are not permitted to publicly read from nor even touch a pointer to the Torah--the first 5 books of the Old Testament, and are forbidden to study Talmud, which consists of the early rabbinical interpretations and further rules expanding those in the Torah). They pick and choose those sayings and parables their clergy & communities are fond of citing--hence that woman at the AL Drumpf rally who cluelessly & hilariously misinterpreted Matthew's parable of the sheep & goats.

IllinoisLady

Sandy and Divine -- all true. I guess my harsh feelings are for the fact that those who have not "bothered" to be vaccinated have visited upon the rest of us having to now go back into mask mode, maybe some lock-down, and worry much more about breakthrough infection. These people have John Brown syndrome, better known as 'you can't tell me what to do' so don't even try.

I still think ( especially for those pastor loving individuals ) how when you do arrive at the pearly gates are you going to explain having ignored all the help that was bestowed on Earth for you. I'm one of those who believe we are given many forms of help -- but nothing works if you don't choose to use it. If you choose to view it as being told what to do.

IllinoisLady

DivineMrsM

I did not edit out or add anything to the following article:

What the ivermectin debacle reveals about the hypocrisy of the anti-vaxxer crowd

(CNN) — Stores in Oklahoma are struggling to keep ivermectin, a drug used to de-worm large animals, in stock. In Mississippi, 70% of the recent calls to the state's poison control center are about ingestion of ivermectin formulations meant for animals and purchased at livestock supply centers. Calls to Alabama's poison control center regarding ivermectin have more than doubled of late.

Why, you ask, are people taking a medicine meant for horses and cows? Because some irresponsible Republican elected officials and conservative media have spent months touting ivermectin as an effective treatment for Covid-19.

Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, who appears to have never met a conspiracy theory he was unwilling to embrace, has been at the leading edge of pushing ivermectin as an effective treatment for the virus.

In late 2020, he held a hearing -- as chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee -- that featured not one but two doctors who advocated for the use of ivermectin to treat Covid-19.

And Johnson has continued to push the drug in the intervening months. In June, he was suspended from YouTube for a week after posting remarks made at the Milwaukee Press Club where he touted ivermectin as well as hydroxychloroquine. (In response, Johnson said that "YouTube's ongoing Covid censorship proves they have accumulated too much unaccountable power.")

As recently as last week, Johnson was touting ivermectin via his official Senate Twitter account, praising a doctor who supports the medicine's usage for his "courage and compassion."

Fox News' Laura Ingraham has worked to amplify Johnson's claims about ivermectin.

(Sidebar: Neither Johnson nor Ingraham are medical doctors or trained scientists. I know this shocks you.)

As The Washington Post's Aaron Blake deftly documented, Ingraham has been banging the drum on the efficacy of ivermectin since at least late 2020, when she had a doctor on her air praising hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin as "very successful and very safely used in most of the world."

By February, Ingraham was saying things like "you have hydroxychloroquine, which of course got political and totally maligned, ivermectin, vitamin D, zinc -- all of it's good to take." By March she was insisting that ivermectin was being "used around the world to reduce Covid hospitalizations and deaths."

Now, there are formulations of ivermectin approved for human use in the United States, but it's intended for intestinal parasites and conditions such as head lice and rosacea.

The problem with all of this? The study on which Johnson, Ingraham and the rest of the ivermectin supporters base their conclusions that it has efficacy against Covid-19 has been retracted. As Nature noted earlier this month:

"Throughout the pandemic, the anti-parasite drug ivermectin has attracted much attention, particularly in Latin America, as a potential way to treat COVID-19. But scientists say that recent, shocking revelations of widespread flaws in the data of a preprint study reporting that the medication greatly reduces COVID-19 deaths dampens ivermectin's promise -- and highlights the challenges of investigating drug efficacy during a pandemic...

"...The paper summarized the results of a clinical trial seeming to show that ivermectin can reduce COVID-19 death rates by more than 90% — among the largest studies of the drug's ability to treat COVID-19 to date. But on 14 July, after internet sleuths raised concerns about plagiarism and data manipulation, the preprint server Research Square withdrew the paper because of 'ethical concerns'."

So, yeah.

Another significant problem is that many of the people who are getting their hands on ivermectin currently aren't even getting the version made for humans. Animal versions can be highly concentrated and dangerous for humans.

Then, on Saturday, the US Food and Drug Administration -- seeing the reports on ivermectin use -- felt the need to tweet this: "You are not a horse. You are not a cow. Seriously, y'all. Stop it."

The tweet linked to an article on the FDA website headlined: "Why You Should Not Use Ivermectin to Treat or Prevent COVID-19."

(Johnson, for his part, tried to clarify Tuesday that he had never advocated people taking ivermectin meant for animals. "I have advocated for early treatment of Covid, never a veterinarian grade drug," he tweeted Tuesday night. "Any suggestion otherwise is a grotesque lie.")

What's truly remarkable in the growing number of people willing to ingest a drug primarily meant for animals is that many of these same people refuse to take any of the three Covid-19 vaccines. These vaccines have been authorized for emergency use -- and now the Pfizer vaccine has full FDA approval. All three vaccines have produced minimal side effects in the 171 million Americans who are now fully vaccinated against the coronavirus. Vaccines are highly effective in preventing severe disease and death from Covid-19, even from the Delta variant. Vaccines are not meant for horses or cows.

As with the hydroxychloroquine hype -- largely fostered by then-President Donald Trump in 2020 -- it seems as though there is a segment of Americans looking for any way to avoid listening to the medical community when it comes to the best ways to avoid getting Covid-19 and to treat it if you do happen to become infected.

Owning the elites by taking a horse pill rather than getting the vaccine is really a telling commentary on just how much blind partisanship has taken over among Trump conservatives. Telling -- and terrifying.

DivineMrsM

Texas father strips down to swimsuit to take stance on school mask mandates

ABC News

"We follow certain rules for a very good reason," the man said, nearly naked.

August 25, 2021, 9:04 PM

As mask mandates have spurred heated debates at school board meetings nationwide, one Texas man took a bold approach to showing his support: He stripped down to his swim trunks.

The stunt occurred during a meeting Monday for the Dripping Springs Independent School District, near Austin.

James Akers, a 15-year resident of Dripping Springs, started the 90 seconds he was allotted during public comments by saying he had three children go through the school district and another currently in high school.

"I'm here to say that I do not like government or any other entity -- just ask my wife -- telling me what to do," he said. "But sometimes I've got to push the envelope a little bit. And I've just decided that I'm going to not just talk about it, but I'm going to walk the walk."

Akers then discussed how much he hated the jacket, shirt and tie he's required to wear for work, before proceeding to take off all three.

He alluded to mask opposition and sarcastically talked about driving through three stop signs and four red lights on his way to the meeting and parking in a handicap space. "I almost killed somebody out there, but by God, it's my roads, too, so I have every right to drive as fast as I want to," he said.

"It's simple protocol people," he continued, by now having removed his pants and standing before the school board members in a swimsuit.

"We follow certain rules for a very good reason," he said, before his time ran out.

Board President Barbara Stroud addressed the stunt, which drew a mix of gasps, laughter and cheers from the crowd.

"Mr. Akers, I understand, I believe you're a swimmer, but if you wouldn't mind putting your pants back on for a comment that would be appreciated," she said.

Akers indeed put his pants back on as two district police officers stood nearby, before walking away shirtless to minor applause.

"If we could have order, please, so we could continue with our public comment," Stroud said.

Akers further elaborated about his intent with Austin station KXAN Tuesday, saying it was "an easy message."

"There are too many voices out there that I think are digging in for political reasons, and absolutely just not thinking about the common-sense decisions we make every day to comply with everything from driving down the road and being safe and courteous to other drivers, to not parking in handicapped spots," he told the station. "All these rules that we're given every day that we follow because they make sense, and we know ourselves that it makes sense for the community."

Masks are currently optional for staff and students at the Dripping Springs Independent School District. Other Texas school districts are requiring masks, in defiance of Gov. Greg Abbott's executive order barring mask mandates in the state.

On Wednesday, a Dallas judge issued a temporary injunction against Abbott's ban, allowing mask mandates issued by local leaders and school districts to remain in place for the time being.

Spookiesmom

When my Aussie was a puppy, I was told by several people NOT to give him Heartguard, an anti heartworm medicine from Hartz. Why? It’s TOXIC to all herding breeds. A study from U Washington confirmed this. Why on earth ppl would take it is beyond me.

DivineMrsM

Spookie, the last few sentences of the CNN article puts it this way:

“…… it seems as though there is a segment of Americans looking for any way to avoid listening to the medical community when it comes to the best ways to avoid getting Covid-19 and to treat it if you do happen to become infected. Owning the elites by taking a horse pill rather than getting the vaccine is really a telling commentary on just how much *blind partisanship* has taken over among Trump conservatives. Telling -- and terrifying."

These people have horse shit for brains and are blind!