From the article: “CDC monitors and analyzes key flu activity indicators every week. After sustained elevated activity is observed across key indicators for a number of weeks, flu season is said to have started. Flu activity met those criteria for the week ending December 15 (Week 50).
Influenza-like-illness (ILI) activity, which had hovered at or slightly above the national baseline of 2.2% for the previous three weeks, jumped to 2.7% nationally, with 8 out of 10 regions of the country at or above their regional ILI baselines. [Over the past 5 seasons, the peak of ILI has ranged from 3.6% (2015-2016) to 7.5% (2017-2018)].
New York City and 11 states are experiencing high or moderate ILI activity.
24 states and Guam are reporting regional or widespread activity.
The percent of respiratory specimens testing positive for flu at clinical laboratories increased from 6.5% during week 49 to 11.0% during week 50.
To date, influenza A(H1N1)pdm09 viruses have predominated nationally; however, over the last three weeks influenza A(H3N2) viruses have been most common in the southeastern United States (HHS Region 4: Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee).”
The remainder of the report is at the link above. If you didn’t get your flu shot, you should. They are free at VA clinics and FHCCs. Even so, the Corpsman who gave me mine told me that this time, the flu shot is effective against only 26% of the flu viruses available.
And of course, now, I have a cold that comes and goes and I spilled hot tea on my keyboard last night and had to get out an old one, so between coughing and sneezing and feeling like someone stomped on my head, my life is just crap right now. And it’s all YOUR fault.
Planned Parenthood: biggest hypocrites on the planet; they do not care about their employees at all. As described in the article at the link, their employees seem to have no real rights under labor laws at all.
There used to be rules about work-day breaks for non-exempt employees, but that has changed. But then, the PPs probably don’t bother to follow state regulations about it, and things have changed since I retired. Breaks are not required by the FLSA regulations. Glad I don’t have to work any more unless I want to.
However, this form of abuse seems to be a pattern with the PPs, if it is accurately reported in the article They don’t really care at all about women, no matter what their self-labeling is. They only care about getting cash in the cash drawer.
The woman who wrote the article was a part-time employee, which she says did not qualify her for the FMLA protection, which is outlined at the link below.
The Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 (FMLA) is a United States labor law requiring covered employers to provide employees with job-protected and unpaid leave for qualified medical and family reasons.
Pregnancy was covered by that at the time if the firm had 50+ employees. And the PPs have far more than 50+ employees, nationwide.
FMLA rules state that private-sector employers are not required to provide federal FMLA benefits if they have fewer than 50 employees. An employee who would otherwise qualify for FMLA can be denied if the company itself is not required to offer the benefits. This is something that employers should consider when making staffing decisions.
However, Planned Parenthood is a nationwide organization with a LOT of employees – many more than 50. And as a nationwide employer with a large number of employees, you’d think that the PPs would at least accommodate their female employees. The author of the NYT article indicates that no such consideration was given to her. Just the opposite, in fact.
While I find PP’s treatment of this employee abusive as reported, current federal labor law says that employers are no longer required to even give employees lunch breaks any more. There was a poster on the wall in the break room where I worked that informed us of the minimum hourly wage, and what we could expect in the way of work breaks: two 15-minute breaks plus a ½ hour lunch break, which could be combined into a 1-hour lunch period. But that was when things made sense. Now it seems that changes have been made and they are not for the better, and are exacerbated by companies that only have what is termed part-time employees, even if those employees actually work full time and sometimes overtime.
Essentially, what this woman has described is the equivalent of a sweatshop work environment.
I’m glad I’m out of the work world now, if that’s the case. On the other hand, why am I not surprised by the way this woman was treated?
Oh, gee whiz! Whoosie Whatsis Obviously-Confused is now going after her rivals, and she hasn’t even been sworn in just yet. She’s dead set on taking down Hakeem Jeffries because he doesn’t lean far enough to the left to suit Her Highnessness! The horror!
Some of that comes from Breitbart and some from Politico, from an unidentified source who spoke to Occasional-Cortex’s “people”. (She has people? Who knew?)
Kid’s on a roll here. I think it would be a good idea to let her get a full head of steam, just to see how much she can annoy people who have been in Congress for a substantial time, and watch her crash into whatever wall she aims at. The more seasoned Democrats will likely watch her tumble and then get back to business. But – dare I say it? – she’s got BERNIE BEHIND HER!!!
I think there is far more to come here and we need to keep a weather eye on this chica, just to make sure that her headlong barreling rush to grab this-and-that is not forgotten.
What is that proverb? Something about ‘pride goeth before a crash and burn?’ Something like that?
And now comes the news that Bernie is the preferred choice of Democratic Progressives. And he’s only 77 right now, so he can still stick his oar into the political pond.
It’s good to know that they have finally changed their preferred political nominative so that they don’t align themselves with regular Democrats. That would be embarrassing – to be lumped in with that political hoi-polloi, wouldn’t it? Aren’t regular Democrats just underlings to the Democratic Progressives? Has anyone discussed this with DiFi or Nancy or Chuck?
Hey, what if we teamed up Her Highnessness Princess Googly-eyes with The Beto? Wouldn’t that bring in Da Votes? Or would they be at each other’s throats? Who would come out on top?
Stock up on popcorn. And buckle your seatbelts. It’s gonna be a bumpy ride. (Thanks, Bette D!).
I vehemently object to the existence of PERVs, people eating raw vegetables. This abomination and utter cruelty in the form of peeling, slicing, dicing, shredding and in some cases, puréeing raw vegetables without their knowledge or consent must stop! Their smugness when they declare their vegetariansim and genuflect to carrots and cucumbers in the produce aisles is an affront to all that is good and tasty and makes a nice salade verte with Roquefort cheese crumbles.
Chomping on a helpless radish, tail and all, after dipping it in salt or ranch dressing, is an obscenity, never mind what happens to celery! Think of the poor celery stalk, unable to release itself from its roots, forced to wait until the Kitchen Aid slicer/dicer thingy has a go at it, and all for the sake of a pathetically selfish dish called Waldorf salad. Pity the poor raisins and nuts stuck in that mess with celery, grapes and diced apples, too, awash in mayonnaise, unable to even take a faint breath! These raw fruits and vegetables are condemned to wait for the final solution – mastication at the dinner table by uncaring, self-involved PERVs.
The horror!
A little sympathy is due the humble potato, too. Forced to await its doom in a bag with other potatoes, all sizes and all colors, with no sympathy or understanding for those root shoots starting to grow through the airholes in the bags! Skinned, quartered and dumped into boiling salted water, only to be turned into mashed potatoes, and drowned in thick, creamy gravy that accompanies a beef or pork roast, the humble potato awaits it fate at the hands of PERVs. But not to worry: potatoes are frequently thrust into a hot oven, removed, sliced open and squeezed while cheese, chives, and bacon crumbles are dumped on them! They are also subjected to being sliced, diced, shredded, and turned into long sticks, plunged into a vat of boiling fat from which they can only escape when the fry basket is pulled. Then the fried potatoes must endure being inspected for doneness, and if done to a turn and as crisp as an October morning, turfed out onto a cold plate to accompany a double cheeseburger with everything, extra pickles, onions, and ketchup on the side. And this grisly, greasy abomination is all for the sake of filling the stomachs of PERVs!
Did no one ever think to ask the potato “What would you like to do today”? A little sympathy is in order, isn’t it?
Be aware that the humble tomato, ripped untimely from its leafy vine, sent directly to a cold shower on a conveyor belt, with no choice in its destination, faces an even more uncertain fate. The tomato, being the flexible vegetable that it is, may be stewed and canned, cooked down into pasta sauce with basil, garlic, olive oil and salt, sliced into layers to fill the void in a bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwich with even more mayonnaise, or simply sliced or diced for a green salad with cucumbers, baby zucchini, green onions, radishes, and bell peppers, all of which are likewise given no choice in the matter of dressing, whether it is a stylish ranch dressing or a lemon juice and olive oil dressing, and must await their fate on a salad plate.
Even the humble rutabaga may fear the stew pot, after it is peeled, chopped and plunged into the gravy of the stew. The PERVs show no mercy in this regard.
And this is all for the sake of filling the fancies and stomachs of PERVs.
“The Anne Arundel County police chief defended Maryland’s new “red flag” protective law Monday, just hours after a 61-year-old man was shot and killed while officers were trying to serve a court order requiring him to surrender his guns.
Chief Timothy Altomare said the fatal shooting in Ferndale was a sign that the law, which went into effect Oct. 1, is needed. There have been 19 protective orders sought in the county since then, tying Harford County for the most in Maryland, according to a report on the first month. Statewide, about half of the 114 orders sought have been granted.
“If you look at this morning’s outcome, it’s tough for us to say ‘Well, what did we prevent?’ ” he said. “Because we don’t know what we prevented or could’ve prevented. What would’ve happened if we didn’t go there at 5 a.m.?”
Altomare said the two investigating officers, who he did not identify Monday, “did the best they could with the situation they had.” One of them fatally shot Gary J. Willis at his Linwood Avenue home. – Article.
According to the article, Mr. Willis did put the gun down on the floor. If so then, why was it necessary to shoot him, and why did those cops go there at 5AM and wake him up? Per the article, Linwood became agitated and picked up the gun and a struggle ensued. So why was it necessary for either cop to pull out a gun and shoot him, instead of calling for back up and putting him on the floor? Is Anne Arundel County turning into Chicago?
And who called the cops on him, anyway? Was it family or a disgruntled neighbor? Apparently, it was a family member, but why aren’t these people responsible enough to get him to counseling if he’s agitated about something?
Regarding this incident in Marylnad, which is now a “red flag law” state, there are many questions left unanswered. I’m hoping they will be answered, because this is bizarre, from my point of view.
As you may or may not know, red flag laws allow someone to make a call to the police and say you’re some kind of threat, even if you are not. If this by itself does not smack of Stalin’s era, then what is it? Someone likened it to “Minority Report”, a “gag me with a spoon” movie with that midget actor TCruise. (N.B: if Scientology has so much influence, why isn’t he more famous and more taller?)
There are states that already have those laws in place. I think in Florida, there is also the Baker Act. Here’s the list:
In Illinois, jumping through all those hoops to comply with state legislation has been tested several times now. As you may recall, the Mayor of Deerfield, IL, was slapped by the court for violating the “unlawful search and seizure”, “due process” and all those other cautionary measures, in addition to violating the 2nd Amendment of the US Constitution. That sparked the Sanctuary County movement which is ongoing and becoming wider spread in the state of Illinois. (Hey, how about some Sanctuary States?)
I’d like to point out the obvious here. In the Florida Parkland school shooting, there were calls reporting the shooter and the police did absolutely nothing. He didn’t have a “collection”, which is something that is kept in order and looked after. He just had a big pile of guns. He did make threats because he didn’t fit in at school and was bullied. The school did nothing about it. The people he lived with did nothing about him. And, finally, the police did nothing about his threats, even with the backup of the Baker Act, so there was nothing that stopped him from his rampage.
We must remember, too, that nothing stops cops from being jackasses either, which has a lot to do with what happened to Mr. Linwood. The Chicago cop who shot LaQuan MacDonald shot him in the back 16 times, instead of in the leg to disable him. The Chicago cop who beat up a female bartender half his size because she wouldn’t serve him any more liquor is another example. When the police do these things, they make the rest of us doubt their sanity.
And remember: we were subjected to Piglet and His Friend Pooh in Parkland, making their grandstanding appearances during their attention-whoring day or two.
So when someone goes in to a panic attack over “red flag laws”, my response would be that he file a public complaint that a law like that does not comply with the US Constitution, does not allow due process or follow that part about ‘unreasonable search and seizure’. You have to sometimes stand up for your rights if you want to keep them.
That it is Nazism and Stalinist KGB/NKVD stuff at its worst, that it specifically follows those practices that led to concentration camps and gulags – those are all true, but has any of that come to pass? Use whatever legalities you can come up with, but keep it calm and assertive. Go through the courts and get that crap overturned. At my age, if I’m not allowed to have a gun on me when I’m on the trails with a camera, in the odd but possible event that I may or might run into a rabid coyote (they never get their shots), I want to know why.
You can file a complaint pro per or get the help of law students, and all of them need a shake-up now and then to rattle their complacency. They also need the real-world experience of dealing with something that they may not agree with, but which is still legally and constitutionally valid and/or invalid, and they are required to do some real legal work in some states. Good practice for them.
Seriously, if someone really wants to be Gestapo, shouldn’t they at least wear the armbands and the insignia so we know who they are?
Unless we take the old bullshit by the horns, the bullshit can and will bury us deep. We must always pay attention to our AO.
The Bad Guys are out there in the darkness…. And they want Your Guns. (Snerrkkkk!)
When someone from Generation X, or the older generations, talks about getting paddled when they were younger, it’s usually by someone that was older. If we committed a serious enough action that dictated a butt whoppen, we increased the chances for a butt beating.
Well, a 45-year-old man exercised such error in judgment, and ended up getting paddled in the rear by members of a younger generation.
I was in a social fraternity during my first attempt at collage, going through the pledge phase, then initiation into the fraternity. No paddles were involved, but we had a wading pool outside the fraternity house that we constantly got tossed into… Regardless of what part of the year it was.
Although fraternity life was fun when I did it, I wouldn’t do it now, at my age… I’m older than the guy featured in this article.
Of course, at 45, he should’ve known better even if he never had fraternity experience. He has a couple of teenage sons, and he had to remember his mindset when he was a teenager, and when he was a young adult.
He was doing the equivalent of being a senior NCO that decides to “go native with the privates”.
From the New York Post:
A middle-aged Brooklyn man told cops he paid a painful price for pledging a fraternity at the ripe old age of 45 — by getting whacked on the backside hundreds of times with a wooden paddle, police sources said Friday.
Well, let’s see. He decided that he wanted to join a fraternity. He goes through the process, and ends up with young whipper snappers whacking his backsides with a paddle. The bruising was serious enough that he went to the hospital to get treatment. Then, this led to him talking to the police.
Didn’t he see Animal House?
That’s when they went more medieval than Greek on his heinie, whacking it up to 200 times with the paddle and their open hands, according to the sources.
Well, in certain sectors of society, “going Greek” means a back-door entry via the pooper. So, this guy would’ve been f’ed either way.
On a side note, Pew Research has decided they will use 1996 as the last year that Millennials were born. This means that the youngest millennial will turn 22 before the ball drops this coming New Year’s Day.
So, chances are that there were those among the paddlers who are members of Generation Z.
Because of the nature of what happened, I’m entertaining the possibility that this could be satire. if not, we’re familiar with “Teh Stoopid”.
Daydreams are nice, aren’t they? But they don’t pay the bills or put food on the table, or make sure that your home is clean and free of unwanted other species.
There’s a huge push from many sides to transfer everyone to what is commonly referred to as “green energy” resources. This includes solar and wind energies as resources, with a large portion of it being politically motivated with no thought to the consequences.
In Australia, because they’ve shut down coal-fired plants and have only wind and solar facilities for generating electricity, with gas-fired plants as backup, electricity charges for residents are apparently spectacular and in some cases, enough to make it unaffordable, period. Angela Merkel has been harping on wind energy during her reign as the EU’s head, with disastrous results including the deaths of thousands of ordinary citizens from cold exposure in the winter, when those people could not pay their utility bills. Some had resorted to trying to stay warm by candlelight. It is a disgraceful thing to do to put your personal daydreams ahead of the welfare of people who voted you in, and Merkel is losing her job because of her insistence on using “green power” instead of reliable gas and/or coal. Germany is now, in fact, building new coal-fired power plants because Angela screwed up so badly. France has nuclear-powered plants, so all those protests have been partly over Macron’s plan to raise fuel taxes and partly over his reducing taxes on wealthy people.
China only gave a crap about coal-fired pollution when the air in Beijing got so smog-ridden, it made both Los Angeles and New York City in the 1960s look like pikers by comparison. Coal-fired plants in the USA have scrubbers to remove particulates from their exhausts, and gas-fired plants are replacing coal in some areas because natural gas is cheaper than coal.
In the daydream world of the greenbeans, solar and wind energy are freebies. There are no consequences involved. In the real world, however, you have $500 million in government subsidies given to companies like Solyndra who start the business and then go belly-up, leaving behind the detritus of their scam in the form of empty facilities and unemployed people whose livelihoods disappeared while they were watching.
There’s also the cost to the environment, in the matter of solar farms like the Ivanpah solar facility in the Mojave Desert, which has a record of incinerating migrating birds because the mirrors that focus sunlight toward the three towers embrace the routes of migrating birds.
“As many as 28,000 birds are killed each year — that’s one every two minutes — by the Ivanpah solar plant in the Mojave Desert, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service . Ivanpah focuses more than 300,000 mirrors on three 459-foot towers, generating heat of up to 800 degrees — enough to fry birds that happen to fly by. “ – from the article That’s just that solar furnace in particular. There are other solar facilities that endanger wildlife as well.
But this isn’t just about birds, in case you’re wondering. These winged migrants are part of the control species that eat pests like bugs that destroy crops. It’s the food on your plate that’s at stake, not some abstract concept. Birds and bats are natural pest control. Migrating birds feed on the local pests while they are on their way north or south.
“Estimates for bird deaths by wind turbine run from 100,000 a year (the National Research Council) to 300,000 (American Bird Conservancy). Bloomberg News puts the toll at 573,000 birds in 2012. At the high end of the estimates, that’s well more than 1,000 birds chopped to death each day.” – Article
These numbers are not remotely matched by the deaths of 161 birds in a 2015 oil spill off the coast of California, or the 2,303 that died during the 2010 BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. The worst portion of this is that the majority of birds killed by wind turbines are raptors, which includes hawks, vultures and eagles. These are apex avian predators that prey on pests both large and small, and dispose of carcasses as well.
Yes, cats, feral or domestic, allowed to run around outdoors, are also responsible for preying on birds. And so are squirrels. They will rob nests and eat the young when they think the coast is clear. My cat is, therefore, an indoor kitty.
The cost of so-called green energy is considerably higher than it should be. You, the customer who decides to use that, have to pay for the construction, equipment and delivery, which you chose to use. And it is not cheap, either, especially when a company that made big promises goes belly up and unemployment lines lengthen.
So you can understand my curiosity when an offer to switch “green” and “sustainable” energy (meaning wind and solar) arrived, and I read through the offer as outlined, finding that the per KwH charge is $0.095/KwH, never mind the delivery charges and taxes. This is a 50% rise in my usual charge, which is $0.065/KwH, plus delivery and taxes. I did the simple math, based on my current month’s usage compared to last year, because the furnace is running now, which runs up the bill. Whereas my normal winter usage runs around $52.00/month, this 50% hike in the KwH rate will boost my charges to well over $80.00/month, just to have a furnace running, plus a couple of appliances, and a few lights in my little house. The offering also says that rates are variable and may rise as needed. And this source of this power is to come from wind and solar energy farms in my area. Since there are no such things within 250 miles of where I live, it means that wherever it originates, the possibility of breakdowns and outages increases with distance, never mind storm damage to the “farm” itself.
The offering for this marvel of modernity comes from some group located in Washington, DC.
It would be far more constructive to start building more nuclear power plants in this country.
News from Germany: Change in Germany’s migrant policy is being suggested by Merkel’s CDU replacement, Annegret-Kramp Karrenbauer. Remember, Merkel’s party lost votes in the recent elections, so she has to step down. Germans are fed up with being pushed around by Angela’s protegees.
In Germany, Friedrich Merz, another potential replacement for Merkel, wants to discuss whether the post-World War II asylum doctrine should stay in Germany’s constitution.
Merz is planning to run for office to replace Merkel next year. He stands for a more right-wing approach to immigration than Ms Merkel, as does another leadership contender, health minister Jens Spahn. The party is seeking to reduce the appeal of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which has capitalized on discontent over immigration.
In Poland, NATO drills proceed against unspecified Russian threats. (Dated 11/17/2018)
It not only involves Poland, but four other countries as well. The base where we will be putting our troops is at Katowice, where the recent climate conference was held. To accommodate all the people attending the climate conference, Katowice had to have annex housing built, the equivalent of a small city.
In France, the gilets jaunes (yellow vests) protests which occurred over the weekend inspired similar protests in Brussels, Belgium, and in the Netherlands. Russia-linked social media accounts are being accused of encouraging these protests. However, the Kremlin on Monday denied involvement in the “yellow vest” protests that have rocked France, after reports that Russia-linked social media accounts are waging a campaign to encourage unrest. Poor old Vlad can’t catch an even break.
And Hungary is now accusing Soros of interfering in their elections. Katalin Novak is a Hungarian minister interviewed in the video by France24. (A little eye-candy for you guys, too, but she does have a family.)
This follows the Central European University in Budapest finally closing its doors and leaving, after legal and rhetorical fights with the Hungarian government (mostly with Orban). Viktor Orban’s party won a third term in the April elections. There is more on Hungary vs the EU at this link: https://www.france24.com/en/tag/hungary/
The dissension rose from CEU’s issuing US degrees with no US university campus, prompting CEU through Soros’s foundation to set up a campus at Bard College in New York.
The Grauniad’s take on this is biased, refusing to acknowledge Hungary’s sovereignty and dissing its anti-immigration stance – which is the Grauniad’s problem, not ours. They also note in a sidebar that Soros’s Open Society Foundation is pulling out of Turkey. Looks like Soros and his cash aren’t as welcome as he expected. But the Grauniad seems to think that Hungary should just knuckle under to Merkel’s demands. This comes after all the hell Hungary and the rest of eastern Europe went through, until the Iron Curtain fell.
And now, Merkel is going to be replaced in the Spring election. And Brexit is slowly getting underway. There is even a hint of a Frexit. Looks like we’ve come full circle.
