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

Nkb

Boys who cry get stuff- just sayin'

wonder how many anti-vaxxers will line up for a vaccine nasal spray? lots of needle phobia part of this

Why does Germany have so many anti-vaxxers?

IllinoisLady

Can we recognize our oneness, though? And what will happen if we

not only start to see that we are connected to the other human beings

in our lives, but also start to live as if that were true? Would we

become more compassionate if we were to recognize the same hopes

and dreams that we have, there in someone else? Would we be able

to help someone else feel more hope in their lives? Would we feel

more at home and at peace in our own places in this world if we were

to keep in mind that we are an important part of the human race, and

that we have many chances every day to improve the lot of humanity

by improving the life of a fellow human being, even in tiny ways?

tom walsh

IllinoisLady

Well, it does seem at the moment to be going al right for Rittenhouse. Why so many people look at him and see boy scout I will never know. Guess for the same reason so many watched the Loon ( long before the WH ) and didn't do a thing to stop all the wrong that he was doing. Why do we see hero's and people to seemingly admire in law breakers ??? Of course the lawyers on the Rittenhouse side are helping him portray himself as someone who came to help. Fine and good, except I don't think anyone specifically ASKED for his help. He had to have his mother taken him across state lines, with a gun he was not qualified to purchase, and he himself admitted he wanted to look cool.

All these people including Mr. Biased to the Max judge, are bent apparently on forgetting there were definite VICTIMS. Maybe they too shouldn't have been where they were, but the fact remains that Rittenhouse took away any ability they might have had to make it home that night as he became their judge, jury and executioner. How many times do we have to experience people who shouldn't be armed with ANY gun due to age or ability to qualify for purchase, and they become killers.

I am totally disgusted and sick of the NRA and the scores of people who get to take other's lives with abandon.

IllinoisLady

Just looked at this and nearly went into overwhelm on all the parts of our democracy and Constitution that so need repair. The four yrs. of wanton indecency and con ang ignoring of laws and norms have been difficult. I so hope that improvements to these and many other things can at least get a good start and foothold in fixing so much that needs it.

IllinoisLady

True:

Beaverntx

At least Bannon has been indicted; we'll see where that goes!

IllinoisLady

I sort of doubt he will get too hard of a time, but I do think this needed to happen. We need to get to a place where hopefully a lot less threats ( including follow-thru ) need to be made in order to get back to the norm of almost no one avoiding subpoena's and other reasons to cooperate with commissions and government inquiries. We are a nation of laws and too many R's have decided it is fine for them to choose only the laws they like.

IllinoisLady

IllinoisLady

You and me both:

ruthbru

I wonder what ordinary people were thinking of what was happening in the country during the period leading up to the Civil War?

AliceBastable

IllinoisLady

A Year Later, Timeline Shows Trump Always Knew His Fraud Claim Was A 'Big Lie'

Darrell Lucus

@darrelllucus

November 13 | 2021

Former president Donald Trump

Over the past year, we have had to deal with Donald Trump shouting baseless claims that Joe Biden only denied him a second term because of massive fraud. He continues to promote the "Big Lies" despite his claims being debunked many times over in court, in Congress, in the press – and even by a three-month "audit" that his fervent supporters sponsored and conducted.

Believe it or not, Trump's attack on democracy is even worse than it seems. What's worse than repeatedly making "Four-Pinocchio" and "Pants on Fire" claims? Worse is repeating those allegations when you knew all along that they were false. And there is ample evidence in the published record that shows Trump was bleating and screeching about fraud when he knew full well that he had lost fairly and honestly.

This fundamental fact is important for several reasons. If you can put a firm date on the moment that Trump was well aware that he had lost, then every action taken to further those claims was in furtherance of an insurrection—one that began long before January 6. It means that we're no longer merely talking about the fine line between protected and unprotected speech. We're talking about seditious action.

If Trump always knew he had lost, then every one of those hair-on-fire emails urging people to donate to the effort to keep him in office was fraudulent. And if he knew he had lost when, for example, he tried to shake down Georgia secretary of state Brad Raffensperger, then it should be easier for Fulton County (Atlanta) District Attorney Fami Ellis to prove that effort was a racketeering offense. And if it can be proved that Trump's lawyers knew their arguments in court were false, it will be far easier to sanction them for doing so.

November 7, 2020: According to Axios, within hours of most major media outlets declaring Biden president-elect, Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien and deputy campaign manager Justin Clark tell Trump that his chances of staying in office are slim at best. He needs to win the outstanding absentee ballots in Arizona and Georgia by landslide margins, and also needs to win a legal challenge to Wisconsin's vote count. Clark tells Trump that even then, his chances were no better than five to ten percent. The Washington Post reports that Trump "signaled that he understood" the import of what Stepien and Clark were telling him.

November 10-13, 2020: Trump campaign lawyer Steffan Passantino tells The New York Times that the Trump legal team knew "within a week" of the election that there was no evidence Dominion Voting Systems-manufactured voting machines were switching votes in Georgia. Passantino tells the Times that his team conducted "a literal physical hand count" of all five million ballots cast in Georgia, and the votes "matched almost identically." Without Georgia, there was virtually no realistic path for Trump to stay in office.

November 12, 2020: Axios reports that when all remaining media outlets called Arizona for Biden, Trump's core campaign team told him that "his pathway is dead," since there was no politically viable path for Trump to win without Arizona. The Times reports that Trump's legal team was making plans to withdraw a legal challenge to Arizona's count because the 191 ballots they'd red flagged weren't even a fraction of Biden's 10,000-vote lead in the state. However, Trump was very receptive to Rudy Giuliani's claims that Dominion software was switching votes.

November 13, 2020: According to Axios, the Post and the Times, Giuliani suggests filing a lawsuit in Georgia alleging that the use of Dominion software allowed Biden to flip the state. Justin Clark replies that such a suit would be thrown out on procedural grounds, since Georgia hadn't certified its results yet. Giuliani calls Clark a liar, prompting Clark to call Giuliani "a fucking asshole." Trump sides with Giuliani, beginning what the Times calls "an extralegal campaign to subvert the election." On that same day, the Times reports that deputy campaign communications chief Sam Parkinson asked his legal team to "substantiate or debunk" claims percolating about Dominion in conservative circles.

November 14, 2020: On the same day Giuliani, Sidney Powell, and Jenna Ellis assume leadership of Trump's legal campaign to overturn the election results, Parkinson's team compiles a memo that thoroughly debunks the most outlandish claims about Dominion. Among other things, the memo states that there is no evidence Dominion and another voting systems maker, Smartmatic, presently have a relationship. Nor is there any evidence that Dominion has ties with George Soros, Venezuela, or antifa.

November 19, 2020: Giuliani, Powell, and Ellis hold a press conference alleging Dominion is at the center of a wide-ranging conspiracy to steal victory from Trump — repeating the same claims that were debunked by Trump's own communications team five days earlier. Later that night, Fox News' Tucker Carlson tears Powell to shreds for not offering any actual evidence of fraud. According to the Post, Trump is equally disappointed in Powell, and Carlson's takedown of Powell plays a major role in Trump's decision to cut formal ties with her.

Late November 2020: Axios reports that Trump is losing patience with Powell by this time. Before picking up a call from Powell in the Oval Office, Trump tells staffers that he thinks Powell is "crazy," and muses that "no one believes this stuff."

November 20,2020: Michigan state house speaker Lee Chatfield and state senate majority leader Mike Shirkey meet with Trump at the White House. According to Reuters, they tell Trump that they know of no information that would overturn Biden's 154,000-vote lead in Michigan. Chatfield and Shirkey tell the Post that they traveled to Washington in order to give Trump information that "he wasn't hearing in his own echo chamber," and they left believing that "his blinders had fallen off." In other words, it appeared to Chatfield and Shirkey that Trump knew he'd lost Michigan — and with it, any politically realistic path to reelection.

December 1, 2020: Attorney General Bill Barr, with the support of White House Counsel Pat Cipollone, meets with Trump and dismisses Trump's claims of fraud as "bullshit" (per Axios) and "ridiculously false" (per the Times). When Barr pans the Trump legal team's performance, Trump concedes that "maybe" their arguments don't add up. According to the Times, before Barr even leaves the room, Trump tweets out a claim that a truck driver delivered thousands of pre-filled ballots to Pennsylvania—even though federal investigators had already concluded the driver had serious credibility problems.

December 14, 2020: Trump policy adviser Stephen Miller announces that the Trump campaign has organized alternate slates of electors in every battleground state won by Biden, ostensibly to keep Trump's legal options open. This includes Arizona, Georgia and Michigan—states that the Trump campaign likely knew for a month or more that it had lost.

December 18, 2020: According to Axios, Powell barrels into the White House along with Overstock.com founder Patrick Byrne to meet with Trump and peddle more claims that the election was stolen -- even though White House advisers who tried to vet these allegations found they didn't withstand serious analysis. At this meeting, Powell is grilled by White House senior adviser Eric Herschmann and staff secretary Derek Lyons, who note that Powell has repeatedly failed to deliver on promises to back up her arguments. Trump himself expresses doubt about Powell and Byrne's claims, but notes that unlike Herschmann and Lyons, they were at least offering him a shot at winning. As we now know, h

January 2, 2020: Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger's general counsel tells Trump during the now-infamous shakedown attempt that both the FBI and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation have been unable to find any evidence to back up Trump's claims of fraud. However, Trump keeps pressing Raffensperger to "do me a favor."

In short:

• Trump knew as early as November 7 that he was shooting his last legal bolt to stay in office, and likely knew as early as November 12 that bolt had missed.
• Trump knew at various points in November that he had lost at least three states that he needed to hold if he had any hope of winning a second term.
• Giuliani, Powell, and Ellis' press conference aired arguments that the Trump campaign had known were baseless for at least five days.
• Trump promoted baseless claims even after being told categorically by his own aides that they were false.
• Trump himself expressed doubt about Sidney Powell's conspiratorial assertions, but had no qualms about using them to support his claims about fraud.

IllinoisLady

This article is from The National Memo which I read daily. I guess tomorrow may offer more insight but what I've read here sure sounds ominous.

Rittenhouse's Preordained Acquittal Will Inflame More Right-Wing Violence

David Neiwert

November 13 | 2021

Kyle Rittenhouse, center, with two of his supporters

Reprinted with permission from DailyKos

We may have an answer for the right-wing "civil war" devotee who asked Charlie Kirk the other week: "When do we get to start using the guns?" Judging from the way the trial in Kenosha, Wisconsin, is proceeding—and from the way right-wing pundits and politicians are responding—this week, the answer is: The day teenager Kyle Rittenhouse is inevitably acquitted for murdering two men at a Black Lives Matter protest last summer.

Rittenhouse's acquittal is largely a foregone conclusion. And not because the evidence points to his innocence—Rittenhouse did, after all, kill a mentally ill man whose only acts of aggression included shouting at him, flinging a plastic bag with his personal effects in them, and reaching for his gun. On the other hand, the prosecution's case has been a mixed bag at best—but more because the judge in the case, Bruce Schroeder, has placed his thumb so heavily on the scales of justice here, often in plain view. More broadly, however, right-wing political figures and extremists discussing the matter on social media are not merely defending Rittenhouse but valorizing him, holding up his murderous acts as heroic vigilantism, and demanding that other like-minded "patriots" follow in his footsteps.

It's a recipe for an outbreak of eliminationist violence directed at "the left"—who these right-wing ideologues define broadly as "antifa," Black Lives Matter, socialists, anti-police protesters, and for that matter merely liberal Democrats who support President Joe Biden. The day when the jury declares Rittenhouse innocent will become a beacon for the radical right, a giant flashing green light signaling permission to begin "using their guns," telling them their long-awaited day to "begin killing these people" without consequence or compunction has finally arrived.

We know this because that is not only what they have been telling themselves in the runup to the trial, but it's what they and their Republican enablers are now shouting from the rooftops. Leading the parade on Twitter was Republican Senate candidate J.D. Vance of Ohio, who posted a video ranting about the trial and denouncing the prosecutor for even filing charges against Rittenhouse:

"Ladies and gentlemen, it is time for us as patriots to stand up. Because if you don't fight back against the lawlessness, if we don't defend this young boy who defended his community when no one else was doing it, it may very well be your baby boy that they come for. It'll be your children whose life they try to destroy when no one else is defending their communities."

Vance repeatedly described Rittenhouse as someone who was "defending his community," even though he did not live in Kenosha, but in Illinois. He also repeatedly described the prosecutor as a "lawless thug" who was "trying to destroy his life."

The trial itself, Vance contended, represented a societal sickness: "We leave our boys without fathers. We let the wolves set fire to their communities. And when human nature tells them to go and defend what no one else is defending, we bring the full weight of the state and the global monopolists against them."

Tucker Carlson, who had adamantly defended Rittenhouse immediately after the shootings, continued in the same vein, blaming the violence on the "radicals" who were "burning down cities" and extolling the virtues of vigilantism as a natural consequence. He also claimed the Rittenhouse has "already won his case," then observed that "if you take a step back from the Rittenhouse story, you see something else entirely, you see violent insanity completely out of control in the middle of an American city. And the question is how did that happen in our country and why did nobody stop it?"

"The question, then, is how exactly are we surprised when a 17-year-old lifeguard from Illinois decides to step in?" Carlson concluded, sounding ominously like Charlie Kirk's interlocutor. "They hate it when you say that, but it's an entirely fair question. When legitimate authority refuses to do its duty, its sworn duty, others will fill the vacuum. That is always true. It's a physics principle."

And it has been from the outset. At far-right Proud Boys rallies rallies that followed the Kenosha shootings, participants began showing up wearing T-shirts declaring "Kyle Rittenhouse Did Nothing Wrong," and extolling his murders: "The Tree of Liberty Must Be Refreshed From Time to Time With the Blood of Commies," read the back of one.

Far-right Twitter maven and Gateway Pundit writer Cassandra Fairbanks retweeted an admirer's post after Rittenhouse's arrest: "I don't give a fuck anymore. I gone full Cassandra. Kill all the idiots violently terrorizing our towns. If the white suprematist [cq] do it then they're more useful than elected officials."

"Yeah," responded Fairbanks, "I'm literally just sitting here like … maybe some people will think twice about rioting tomorrow."

The primary source of their permission for violence is the eliminationist narrative the right has concocted about antifa and Black Lives Matter, concocted out of ideological and racial hysteria and conspiracy theories, depicting them as a demonic threat to the American republic. This narrative has become extraordinarily widespread, as well as deeply imbedded into the nation's political discourse, thanks largely to its constant repetition both by leading Republicans—notably Donald Trump—as well as "mainstream" right-wing media like Fox News.

We saw during jury selection for the federal civil lawsuit trial against the lethal 2017 "Unite the Right" rally organizers in Charlottesville that this wildly distorted view of "the left" has spread deeply enough to affect jury pools as well as court proceedings. In the Rittenhouse trial, it's become clear that not only the jury may be affected, but so is the judge overseeing the proceedings, Bruce Schroeder.

Schroeder, as Will Bunch explored on Twitter and at the Philadelphia Inquirer, has a troubling history of pushing "law and order" politics in his courtroom, as well as indulging in dubious courtroom behavior and head-scratching rulings. He already had informed attorneys in the case that they could not describe the three men as "victims," but would permit defense attorneys to describe them as "looters," "rioters," or "arsonists," even though none of the three were ever accused of those crimes.

This week, Schroeder also:

• Called on the court to applaud a defense witness, who was there to testify that Rittenhouse was justified in taking two lives, for being a veteran. Schroeder, noting that it was Veterans Day, asked if anyone in the court was a veteran; when witness John Black said he was, Schroeder called for the court to applaud him. Jurors joined in on the applause.
• Rejected video of Rittenhouse shooting one of his victims, claiming the using Apple's zoom functions might distort the image. "iPads, which are made by Apple, have artificial intelligence in them that allow things to be viewed through three-dimensions and logarithms," defense attorneys insisted. "It uses artificial intelligence, or their logarithms, to create what they believe is happening. So this isn't actually enhanced video, this is Apple's iPad programming creating what it thinks is there, not what necessarily is there." Schroeder agreed.
• Kept forgetting to silence his phone, whose ringtone is the Lee Greenwood song "God Bless the USA." The song is the anthem of the tea party/"Patriot" right, and is used at Trump rallies as his entrance theme.
• Refused to permit prosecutors to ask defense witness Drew Hernandez, a pseudo-journalist who specializes in filming and posting misleadingly edited videos about antifascists and anti-police protesters, about his work for former Trump adviser Steve Bannon's Real America's Voice network. Hernandez also was present at the January 6 insurrection inside the Capitol, before which he had spoken at the "Stop the Steal" rally, telling the crowd: "We punch back, we fight back. Because we will not go down without a fight. We will not go down without bloodshed. If they want a second civil war, then they got one. I will fight to the very last breath." Schroeder ruled that the jury could not learn about his background because "this is not a political trial."
• Tried to make a joke to the court, after the jury had filed out, about the lunch that had been ordered that day: "I hope the Asian food isn't coming … isn't on one of those boats from Long Beach Harbor." (The joke went over the heads of everyone who wasn't a regular viewer of Fox News, which has repeatedly run stories about supply chain issues for Asian goods coming in to Long Beach—issues that in fact are primarily the result of Donald Trump's trade wars with China and other nations.)

Most legal observers have observed that the trial's outcome is a foregone conclusion, and many believe the primary blame lies with Schroeder and his handling of the proceedings—particularly how he has intervened at every juncture when the prosecutor has trapped Rittenhouse in a lie. Some observers describe this style as "pro-defense"—which is consistent with the judge's record—but family members of the victims surrounding the Kenosha unrest are outraged.

"It seems like he's aiming to let this man out of this courthouse scot-free and we're not going to let that happen," Justin Blake, the uncle of Jacob Blake, whose shooting by a police officer sparked the Kenosha protests, told The Washington Post. "If it happens, we're not going to be quiet about it."

Right-wing extremists are already stepping up their threatening behavior, and doing so with apparent confidence that they will face no consequences for doing so. A militia group called the Kenosha Strong Patriots posted the name, photo, and home address of Rittenhouse's chief prosecutor on Telegram. A participant disingenuously claimed: "This is absolutely not an encouragement to violence. Just would be nice to see a peaceful protest outside his home like the left does every time they don't like something."

Greg Sargent of The Washington Post observes that the embrace of Rittenhouse's vigilantism is occurring in the context of a general absorption of a violent ethos into the fabric of the Republican Party, which includes their ongoing valorization of the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection and Congressman Paul Gosar's recent anime video portraying a fantasy in which he kills his Democratic colleague.

Carlson's Fox News colleague, Greg Gutfeld, similarly chimed in that "all Rittenhouse did was to fill the void that the government left open."

"Those two people should never ever should have been out on the streets and it forced citizens to become the police," Gutfeld said.

Other right-wing pundits valorized Rittenhouse as a youth role model. As Kristen Doerer reports at Flux, one of these is Ed Martin, president of Phyllis Schlafly Eagles, who devoted an extended rant on his podcast to defending the teenager.

"And my point here in setting that up is Kyle Rittenhouse was a completely—his conduct was completely consistent with what Americans should do," Martin wrote. "Stand up for the property, stand up for their towns, stand up for what's happening. He is a hero—that's true. Kyle Rittenhouse is a hero. Kyle Rittenhouse should be regarded as someone who did the right things."

Moreover, his example is worthy of emulation, Martin opined: "He stepped up in a way that was, frankly, it was much more, it was much more worthy of praise than the tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of Americans that sat home and watched cities burn."

These themes have been the right's primary argument in support of Rittenhouse's murders since he was arrested. Moreover, the undercurrent in all of these arguments is to create permission for right-wing "patriots" ginned up on right-wing propaganda to act out their shared violent fantasies.

IllinoisLady

This and Bridgegate should have clued Christie in that he is going nowhere in '24. With or without the Loon.

Christie Mocked Hilariously As He Bids For Anti-Trump Redemption

Meaghan Ellis

November 13 | 2021

Chris Christie

Reprinted with permission from AlterNet

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) may have an anti-Trump stance in the public eye now but Bulwark writer Tim Miller is explaining why his pushback is a decade too late.

Miller pointed to a tweet highlighting a quote from Christie that read, "I've never walked away from an argument, no matter who stood on the other side," Christie told me during a wide-ranging interview in New Jersey.

He went on to note the main problem with Christie's remarks: The former governor talks a good game but fails miserably at backing it up.

"Like every other pathetic, podgy, scared, insecure bully who has ever disgraced a schoolyard, Chris Christie talks a big game," Miller wrote. "But when he was called upon to meet the biggest threat of his life—a doughy, soft-handed trust-fund baby with authoritarian aspirations—Christie didn't just walk away from an argument. He waddled as fast as he could go in his urine-soaked pull-ups."

Referencing an incident that occurred back in February of 2016, Miller explained how Christie blunder on the campaign trail. At the time, the former governor had launched his presidential bid, running alongside the likes of former President Donald Trump and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL). He needed a campaign boost in New Hampshire but instead of taking aim at the candidate he should have challenged, Christie went after Rubio.

"Christie surveyed the stage and decided to try and butch himself up by taking on the runt of the pack: He ignored Trump and whaled on Lil' Marco, to the delight of many," Miller wrote. "To the delight, in fact, of Trump."

In his book, Christie also recounted what transpired between him and Trump after the debate as he alluded to why he targeted Rubio instead.

"I felt a tap on my shoulder. It was Donald Trump," Christie wrote in his book. "Donald put his arm around me and said, 'God, you destroyed him. . . . You're the only one who could have done that. Just remember: I haven't said anything bad about you. Don't go after me.'"

Miller went on to explain how Christie's wrong move not only impacted Rubio but also tanked his own campaign in New Hampshire.

"Christie succeeded in blunting Marco's momentum, but did nothing to boost himself. Three days later Trump went on to win New Hampshire in a rout, Marco fell to fifth, and Christie bottomed out in sixth," he wrote. "After which he walked away from the race without ever having even thrown an unkind glance in Trump's general direction."

However, Christie's behavior didn't stop there. It only grew worse in the months that followed as the 2016 presidential election approached.

"Right at the moment when the Republican party needed to unite against Trump, Christie gassed the fellow up," Miller noted.

Highlighting a number of Christie's other embarrassing blunders, Miller explained why he has made it to the point of no return.

He wrote:

• Christie stood next to Trump pliantly as he ranted and raved.
• It was leaked, maybe apocryphally, that he was assigned the job of fetching Trump's hamburgers.
• He stood by as Trump told him to stop eating Oreos.
• After an event in Arkansas, he obediently walked up to Trump looking for a pat on the head but instead he was shooed off and instructed to "go home."
• He weirdly referred to him throughout the campaign as "Mr. Trump," despite the fact that he was a sitting governor and Trump was a former game-show host.

Despite Christie's latest attempt at redemption, Miller concluded, "Christie is six years late and one insurrection short and I will not be respecting his authorit-aye."

IllinoisLady

"A great attitude does much more than turn on the lights in our worlds; it seems to magically connect us to all sorts of serendipitous opportunities that were somehow absent before the change."
– – Earl Nightingale

IllinoisLady

Alice, your meme was on the money perfectly. Hard to look at the Reps. party of today. My dad would be so sad/distressed to see what has become of the party he loved. The Loon is just the highlight as I've felt for several yrs. that the party was off the rails. It has taken some time, but the orange one finally let them, through his ability to thumb his nose at all of it, be turned loose from themselves.

So hope that we are able to hold the line long enough to get some serious changing going on. That does mean staying successful through the elections coming up while Pres. Biden is in charge. I just hope we don't fall heir to listening to the pundits and others who will hand out crazy information and maybe worse deeds. Strength, purpose and perseverance.

IllinoisLady

They do show up I do believe at the hospital for their heart attacks, diabetic blackouts, and car accidents. Seems to me that is basically believing in science and medical assistance. Why I bet a lot of them even have medical insurance. Starts to spell hypocrite pretty easily.

IllinoisLady

IllinoisLady

IllinoisLady

IllinoisLady

IllinoisLady

IllinoisLady

magiclight

Neither democrat or republican: This is what a racially biased health care system does:

A widely used algorithm that predicts which patients will benefit from extra medical care dramatically underestimates the health needs of the sickest black patients, amplifying long-standing racial disparities in medicine, researchers have found.

The problem was caught in an algorithm sold by a leading health services company, called Optum, to guide care decision-making for millions of people. But the same issue almost certainly exists in other tools used by other private companies, nonprofit health systems and government agencies to manage the health care of about 200 million people in the United States each year, the scientists reported in the journal Science.

The software used to predict patients' need for more intensive medical support was an outgrowth of the Affordable Care Act, which created financial incentives for health systems to keep people well instead of waiting to treat them when they got sick. The idea was that it would be possible to simultaneously contain costs and keep people healthier by identifying those patients at greatest risk for becoming very sick and providing more resources to them. But because wealthy, white people tend to utilize more health care, such tools could also lead health systems to focus on them, missing an opportunity to help some of the sickest people.

racial biased medical algorithm

IllinoisLady

ruthbru

IllinoisLady

Ruth+++

DivineMrsM

I'm posting a letter to the editor of my local newspaper written by a (rare) Democrat who lives in my town; who I’ll call "V. Smith". He's a bit eccentric but recently saw his star rising after successfully getting city council to implement alternative solutions for increasing much-needed water department revenues rather than burdening residents with higher rates yet again.

That's just a bit of context as you read the letter. By the third paragraph, you'll see where "V. Smith" is going with his train of thought. I got a chuckle out of the clever way he makes his point. (For purposes of anonymity in the letter, I changed the names of two people, the town and newspaper).

*****

To the editor:

I thought I'd write a letter to share my favorite potato soup recipe. But before that, a comment to resident T. Jones, a staunch detractor of Biden and unwavering supporter of Trump, who wrote in the Nov. 6 edition of City Newspaper, "V. Smith (whose previous letters reveal a staunch detractor of Trump and unwavering supporter of Biden,) does not say one word about how great Biden and his policies are. I find the silence telling."

My most recent letter was Oct. 17, and City Newspaper noted it was entitled "Questions about rates in Smalltown," because it was about, well, questions I had concerning water rates in the city of Smalltown. My comment is this: Not all my letters are going to be about national politics. For example, this one is about a soup recipe.

Start with three pounds of potatoes. Luckily, potatoes have not yet been heavily impacted by supply issues and are still reasonably priced. As is milk, which is another ingredient in this recipe. Other items are being impacted by supply chain issues, none of which are under the immediate control of any president. For example, gasoline is at a national average of about $3.86 a gallon, which is 20 cents cheaper than it was in 2018 before COVID when Trump was president, but that's not what this letter is about.

Slice half the potatoes with skins on, and peel and chunk the other half. Place each half in separate pots, lightly salt and cover in water. Bring to a boil. Meanwhile thinly slice a pound of beef snack sticks. Beef, incidentally, is a commodity on the stock market, which is currently breaking records, and has risen 18.69% so far this year, which is more than 6 points higher than the 12.26% it rose on average each of the four preceding years. But this letter is about soup, not how great the market is now compared to Trump's pathetic yo-yo-ing Dow.

Chop one large onion, and crush three cloves of garlic. Speaking of crushing it, the unemployment rate has dropped 1.8 points since Biden took office. It actually went up 1.7 points between the time Trump took office and when he left, and his best year (2017) only saw a drop of .7 points. But, again, this letter is about my delicious potato soup, not Trump's miserable failure of a presidency nor Biden's successes.

When the potatoes are "fork soft," drain and mash the cubed potatoes and add to the other pot along with the meat, onion and garlic. Add a tablespoon of olive oil, a cup of milk, Italian herbs, pepper flake and black pepper to taste. Finally, add in a bundle of chopped greens and serve once wilted. Enjoy with a glass of Republican tears and savor along with the knowledge that Biden got us the infrastructure we desperately need, and which Trump failed to deliver on for four years.

By the way, I was a Warren supporter.

V. Smith

JKL2017

Love it, Divine! He’s a very clever writer.

pingpong1953

I want to know this man!

Seriously, I'd love to spend time with him, enjoying a bowl of his potato soup and talking about the future of the US of A.