Posted at Townhall:
Monthly Archives: June 2021
The Recovery Was Going Well Until We Started Paying People Not To Work
Yesterday Forbes posted an article about the May Jobs Report. The article notes that payroll jobs rose by 559,000 in May, better than April, but much slower than March.
The chart below shows the changes in the Workforce Participation Rate during the last year (according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics):
As you can see, the coronavirus impacted the Workforce Participation Rate. The Workforce Participation Rate had been hovering at about 63 percent before the virus hit and the lockdowns occurred. Because of the additional money being paid in unemployment benefits, it may be a while before it goes back up to 63 percent.
The article at Forbes reports:
Perhaps the most important number in the jobs report was another notable increase in hourly wages: they rose by 6% on an annual basis, after also rising by 8% last month.
The combination of sluggish employment growth but rising wages tell a clear story: anecdotes about employers having difficulty hiring are true, and they are raising worker wages to attract or retain more of them. So labor demand (jobs) is rising faster than labor supply (workers).
What is holding workers back? The evidence here is less clear, but it is likely a range of factors: the $300 weekly bump-up in Unemployment Insurance payment likely plays a small role; it should matter most in leisure/hospitality where job growth was strongest, though perhaps slower than employers wanted. Recent news stories of workers refusing to go back to their old restaurant jobs suggests that workers there are tired of low wages, unstable hours and possible exposure to Covid.
Policies matter. I believe that if the Biden administration had just left the Trump economic policies alone, we would be in a much better place.
It Pays To Stick To Your Guns
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is on the short list for the Republican presidential (or vice-presidential) ticket for 2024. He has done an amazing job in Florida dealing with the coronavirus pandemic. We can expect the press to try very hard to destroy him in the very near future.
Today The Conservative Treehouse posted an article about Governor DeSantis’ latest accomplishment.
The article reports:
The battle over COVID vaccination passports in Florida came down to a reversal by Caribbean Cruise Lines yesterday. After Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed legislation that fined companies $5,000 per incident for requiring COVID vaccination identification Royal Caribbean backed down from the fight.
The Miami Herald reported the following yesterday:
Royal Caribbean International will no longer require any of its cruise passengers to be vaccinated for COVID-19 as it had previously planned to.
In a press release Friday announcing cruises for sale on eight of its ships from U.S. ports this summer, starting with Freedom of the Seas from PortMiami on July 2, the company said it will recommend passengers get the COVID-19 vaccine, but not require it. The announcement is a reversal from previous statements and vaccine protocols the company submitted to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last month that said it would require all passengers at least 18 years old and older to be vaccinated.
“Guests are strongly recommended to set sail fully vaccinated, if they are eligible,” the company said in a statement. “Those who are unvaccinated or unable to verify vaccination will be required to undergo testing and follow other protocols, which will be announced at a later date.”
…The recently passed Florida law crafted by the Republican-controlled state Legislature and promoted by Gov. Ron DeSantis bars businesses, schools and government entities across Florida from asking anyone to provide proof of a COVID-19 vaccination. Under the law, which takes effect on July 1, businesses can be fined up to $5,000 per violation.
It is unclear if cruise companies will be allowed to ask passengers if they have been vaccinated as part of the boarding process, even if they don’t require vaccination to board.
The summer cruises announced by Royal Caribbean International Friday are still pending approval from the CDC after each ship successfully completes a test cruise with volunteer passengers.
Please follow the link to The Miami Herald to read the entire article. We need to make sure that we get our freedoms back and our privacy protected. Fighting vaccine passports is one way to do that.
When Politics Interferes With Science
Yesterday The U.K. Daily Mail posted an article about the search for the origins of the coronavirus. It seems as if not everyone wanted to uncover the truth.
The article reports:
Career staffers at the State Department ‘warned’ officials not to investigate the possibility that COVID-19 leaked from a Wuhan lab, fearing it would expose U.S. funding for gain-of-function research there, according to a new report.
Thomas DiNanno, former acting assistant secretary of the State Department’s Bureau of Arms Control, Verification, and Compliance raised the concern in a memo reported by Vanity Fair on Thursday.
DiNanno wrote that staff from two bureaus, his own and the Bureau of International Security and Nonproliferation, ‘warned’ leaders ‘not to pursue an investigation into the origin of COVID-19’ because it would ‘open a can of worms’ if it continued.
In one State Department meeting, officials say colleagues explicitly told them not to explore the Wuhan Institute of Virology’s (WIV) gain-of-function research, because it would bring unwelcome attention to the U.S. taxpayer funds that were supporting the work.
The article continues:
It’s unclear exactly much U.S. government funding was going to the WIV, but at least some of it was being routed through a nonprofit called EcoHealth Alliance.
By 2018, EcoHealth Alliance was pulling in up to $15 million a year in grant money from an array of federal agencies, including the Defense Department, Homeland Security, and the U.S. Agency for International Development, according to tax filings.
EcoHealth Alliance and its founder Peter Daszak have been working with Shi Zhengli, the WIV virologist known as the ‘bat lady’, for more than 15 years.
British-born Daszak, 55, is the president of EcoHealth Alliance — and in the early days of the pandemic, he was key in establishing the veneer of a ‘scientific consensus’ that the lab-leak origin was impossible.
Daszak not only signed but spearheaded a letter signed by 27 scientists rejecting the lab leak hypothesis, which was published on February 19, 2020 in the medical journal The Lancet.
Leaked emails later revealed that he encouraged colleagues who do gain-of-function research on coronaviruses not to sign the letter, in order to obscure the connection.
The letter declared that the scientists had ‘no competing interests’ — but it seems clear that Daszak did, as a lab leak origin would likely derail his entire field, but an animal origin would justify his life’s work.
I don’t know whether or not knowing the origin of the coronavirus would have been helpful in finding a cure or a vaccine, but it bothers me that we have people in our government working against the interests of American citizens.
Great News!
On Wednesday The Daily Wire posted an article a discovery by scientists in Scotland.
The article reports:
Scientists in Scotland have successfully tested a new drug that can kill cancer cells while leaving nearby healthy tissue untouched, according to new reports.
The researchers at the University of Edinburgh combined a tiny cancer-killing molecule, called SeNBD, with a chemical food compound, which tricked cancer cells into ingesting it. The combination has been dubbed a “Trojan Horse,” according to The Herald.
The study, which has been peer reviewed, used zebrafish and human cells. The scientists say more research needs to be conducted to see if it is a safe to treat early-stage cancer and even drug-resistant bacteria.
“Cancerous cells are ‘greedy’ and need to consume high amounts of food for energy and they typically ingest more than healthy cells, said the University of Edinburgh. By coupling SeNBD with a chemical food compound it becomes the ‘ideal prey for harmful cells’ which ingest it ‘without being alerted to its toxic nature,’” the Herald reported.
The article concludes:
“This research represents an important advance in the design of new therapies that can be simply activated by light irradiation, which is generally very safe,” said lead researcher Professor Marc Vendrell, chairman of translational chemistry and Biomedical Imaging at the university.
“SeNBD is one of the smallest photosensitizers ever made and its use as a ‘Trojan horse’ opens many new opportunities in interventional medicine for killing harmful cells without affecting surrounding healthy tissue,” he said.
Another researcher, Dr. Sam Benson, said the way the drug works is that it is delivered through the “front door of the cell.”
“With SeNBD, we can combine a light activated drug with the food that cancerous and bacterial cells normally eat. This means we can deliver our ‘Trojan horse’ directly through the front door of the cell rather than trying to find a way to batter through the cells defenses,” Benson said.
This is amazing. Hopefully the drug can be fast-tracked around the world to save lives.
What An Amazing Coincidence
The New York Post is reporting the following today:
A Chinese Communist Party military scientist who got funding from the National Institutes of Health filed a patent for a COVID-19 vaccine in February last year — raising fears the shot was being studied even before the pandemic became public, according to a new report.
Zhou Yusen, a decorated military scientist for the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) who worked alongside the Wuhan Institute of Virology as well as US scientists, filed a patent on Feb. 24 2020, according to documents obtained by The Australian.
The patent — lodged by the “Institute of Military Medicine, Academy of Military Sciences of the PLA” — was filed just five weeks after China admitted there was human-to-human transmission of the virus, and months before Zhou died under mysterious circumstances, the report noted.
The article notes:
Despite being an award-winning military scientist, there were no reports or tributes, with him just listed as “deceased” in a Chinese media report in July and a December scientific paper.
The joys of living in a communist country. Evidently President Biden has ordered an international investigation of Zhou’s death. I just hope he doesn’t let the World Health Organization do the investigation.
The article concludes:
Zhou worked closely with the Wuhan lab at the heart of increasing international focus over its possible links to the pandemic, as well as its now-notorious “bat woman” lead scientist, Shi Zhengli, the report said.
The close working relationship between the pair supports declassified US intelligence released in January that said the Wuhan lab was conducting “secret military activity,” The Australian said.
“Despite the WIV presenting itself as a civilian institution, the United States has determined that the WIV has collaborated on publications and secret projects with China’s military,” the intelligence stated.
“The United States and other donors who funded or collaborated on civilian research at the WIV have a right and obligation to determine whether any of our research funding was diverted to secret Chinese military projects at the WIV.”
They researched genetically manipulating coronaviruses soon before the pandemic hit, funded in part by the NIH, where Fauci runs the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, the report said, citing a research paper submitted to the Journal of Virology in November 2019.
It was funded with three grants from the National Institutes of Health, via US universities. Zhou also worked alongside the University of Minnesota as well as the New York Blood Center, the report said.
The revelation appeared in a report by the paper’s award-winning investigations writer Sharri Markson as part of her research for an upcoming book, “What Really Happened In Wuhan.”
And finally:
Fauci declined to be interviewed for the report, the paper said.
Wow. Just wow.
This Is What Our Children Are Being Taught
First of all, our children need to learn that people are different and that not everyone has the same family. However, that is something they will figure out on their own as they grow up. It does not need to be pushed on them when they are toddlers. Keeping that in mind, please watch the following video from an episode of “Blues Clues.” “Blues Clues” is a really cute television show aimed at preschool children. It is generally a good show that deals with finding things and problem solving. The video below, featured on “Blues Clues,” crosses a line for me. I just don’t think it is necessary to involve young children in “Pride Month.” Watch at your own risk.
Posted at YouTube:
We Don’t Need More Taxes–We Need Less Spending
Yesterday Power Line Blog posted the following graph:
Increasing taxes is not the answer (see the Laffer Curve). What we need to do is find a way to stop the runaway spending that is a way of life in Washington, D.C. It is our money Congress is spending. Do you think they would be a little more careful if it were their money?
We Need To Add The Concept Of Ethics Back Into Our Scientific Work
Hot Air posted an article today related to the origins of the coronavirus. However, there is some very troubling information about some other research carried out by the Chinese in the article. It is quite possible that the coronavirus pandemic was the result of a laboratory leak at the Wuhan Laboratory, but the question remains as to exactly what was being studied during the time of the leak.
The article reports:
Ed (Morrissey) grabbed the big takeaway from the splashy new Vanity Fair piece this morning, that federal efforts to investigate the lab-leak theory were hamstrung by numerous conflicts of interest within the public-health bureaucracy.
But here’s a provocative bit of news buried deeper in the story that’s worth some attention.
There’s no smoking gun of wrongdoing, just an … interesting coincidence.
As the NSC tracked these disparate clues, U.S. government virologists advising them flagged one study first submitted in April 2020. Eleven of its 23 coauthors worked for the Academy of Military Medical Sciences, the Chinese army’s medical research institute. Using the gene-editing technology known as CRISPR, the researchers had engineered mice with humanized lungs, then studied their susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2. As the NSC officials worked backward from the date of publication to establish a timeline for the study, it became clear that the mice had been engineered sometime in the summer of 2019, before the pandemic even started. The NSC officials were left wondering: Had the Chinese military been running viruses through humanized mouse models, to see which might be infectious to humans?
Believing they had uncovered important evidence in favor of the lab-leak hypothesis, the NSC investigators began reaching out to other agencies. That’s when the hammer came down. “We were dismissed,” said Anthony Ruggiero, the NSC’s senior director for counterproliferation and biodefense. “The response was very negative.”
Please follow the link above to read the entire article and the related article. There seems to be a lot more to Chinese gain-of-function research than previously noted. Hopefully the truth of what was going on will be uncovered in the near future.
When Your Power Grab Gets Slowed
Yesterday National Review posted an article about a recent ruling by the Senate parliamentarian that will put a crimp in the plans of Democrats to use the reconciliation process to pass their radical agenda without Republican support.
The article reports:
The Senate parliamentarian issued a new ruling that would effectively allow Democrats to use automatic budget reconciliation just one more time this year to bypass Republicans to advance President Biden’s progressive agenda.
Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough ruled that a revision to the 2021 budget resolution cannot be automatically discharged from the Senate Budget Committee, according to The Hill. This means that Democrats would need at least one Republican on the 11-11 panel to vote with them if they want to use reconciliation on more than one occasion before the legislative session ends in October.
The bi-partisan talk during the presidential campaign was simply talk. There never was any plan to work with Republicans unless the Republicans agreed to everything the Democrats wanted. To Democrats the definition of unity is “when everyone agrees with me.”
The article notes:
The ruling makes it more likely that Democrats will pursue a fresh fiscal 2022 budget to bypass Republicans if infrastructure negotiations fail, according to Bloomberg.
The news comes as Biden said on Tuesday that June “should be a month of action on Capitol Hill” and that while pundits on TV may ask why he has not done more to pass his legislative priorities that it is because he “only has a majority of effectively four votes in the house and a tie in the Senate with two members of the Senate who vote more with my Republican friends,” likely referring to Senators Joe Manchin (D., W. Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (D., Ariz.).
During a press briefing on Wednesday, White House press secretary Jen Psaki attempted to rewrite Biden’s remarks, claiming that the president was only commenting on TV punditry.
“I can tell you that sometimes these conversations can be oversimplified. TV isn’t always made for complex conversations about policymaking,” she said. “What the president was simply conveying was that his threshold, his litmus test is not to see eye-to-eye on every single detail of every issue and he doesn’t with Senator Sinema and Senator Manchin.”
“He believes there’s an opportunity to work together to make progress to find areas of common ground even if you have areas of disagreement,” Psaki said.
However, Republicans have criticized Biden and his party for doing little to work with the GOP to find common ground. Democrats used budget reconciliation earlier this year to pass the president’s COVID-19 response package with a simple majority and without Republican support.
“He knows well having served 36 years in the Senate that sometimes it’s not a straight line to victory or success, sometimes it takes more time and he’s open to many paths forward,” she said. “I don’t think he was intending to convey anything more than a little bit of commentary on TV punditry.”
Keep your eye on the filibuster. If the filibuster survives, we may get through the Biden administration without bankrupting the country.
Good Idea
The cancel culture often hurts the people it claims to want to help. Well, some of the people recently cancelled have decided to fight back.
Just the News posted an article on Monday about a lawsuit brought against Major League Baseball by a group of Atlanta business owners.
The article reports:
A small business group on Monday evening sued Major League Baseball, its commissioner Rob Manfred and the head of professional baseball players union Tony Clark alleging their efforts to move this summer’s All-Star game from Atlanta to protest Georgia’s new election integrity law unlawfully inflicted “staggering” damages on businesses in the region.
The suit filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan by the Job Creators Network alleges MLB violated the Klu Klux Klan Act of 1871 and committed “tortious interference” in business by canceling the game over a political matter.
It seeks damages of at least $100 million for the businesses of Atlanta as well as an order to restore the game this summer to the Atlanta Braves home stadium, Truist Park.
“MLB Defendants intended to punish Georgians because their state enacted a reasonable ballot-integrity statute and to coerce Georgia and its duly elected government to surrender Georgia’s sovereignty in our federal system,” the lawsuit charged.
It said the true victims were small businesses who spent money and made plans for two years to host the All-Star Game based on MLB’s promise, only to see it canceled.
Please follow the link above to read the entire article which includes a link to the complaint. The decision by Major League Baseball was based on faulty information and should be met with a lawsuit.
We Need To Get On Board
Yesterday The Gateway Pundit posted an article about voter identification. Contrary to what the media would have you believe, America is one of the few nations that does not require some form of government-issued identification to vote.
The article reports:
Of 47 nations surveyed in Europe — a place where, on other matters, American progressives often look to with envy — all but one country requires a government-issued photo voter ID to vote. The exception is the U.K., and even there voter IDs are mandatory in Northern Ireland for all elections and in parts of England for local elections. Moreover, Boris Johnson’s government recently introduced legislation to have the rest of the country follow suit.
Criticisms of the British leader’s voter ID push are similar to those heard in the U.S. The Scottish National Party claims his voter ID push targets “lower income, ethnic minority and younger people” who are less likely to vote for Johnson’s conservatives and therefore represents “Trump-like voter suppression.”
The article notes:
Seventy-four percent of European countries entirely ban absentee voting for citizens who reside domestically. Another 6% limit it to those hospitalized or in the military, and they require third-party verification and a photo voter ID. Another 15% require a photo ID for absentee voting.
Similarly, government-issued photo IDs are required to vote by 33 nations in the 37-member Organistion for Economic Co-operation and Development (which has considerable European overlap). Only the UK, Japan, New Zealand, and Australia currently do not require IDs.
The article concludes:
And as a result of that fraud, Mexico in 1991 mandated voter photo IDs with biometric information, banned absentee ballots, and required in-person voter registration. Despite making registration much more difficult and banning absentee ballots, voter participation rates rose after Mexico implemented the new rules. In the three presidential elections following the 1991 reforms, an average of 68% of the eligible citizens voted, compared with only 59% in the three elections prior to the rule changes. Seemingly, as people gained faith in the electoral process, they became more likely to vote. Ultimately, in 2006 Mexico would revert to permitting absentee voting, but limited it to those living abroad who requested a ballot at least six months in advance. Claims of voting irregularities have occasionally arisen in later years, but they focus on vote buying, not impersonating others, or having non-existent people voting.
…The case of Mexico undermines the idea that stricter voting rules lead to vote suppression, and so does some of the evidence from America. A number of states have in recent years instituted photo and non-photo ID measures, and found no statistically significant change in voter participation rates. Other evidence suggests that black and minority voter registration rates increased faster than whites after states implemented voter ID requirements for registration.
RCI (Real Clear Investigations) contacted both the Brennan Center for Justice and the ACLU, two organizations that have been at the forefront of the ballot access/voting integrity debate, to ask them what they made of the more restrictive voting rules implemented elsewhere. The ACLU did not respond, and a Brennan Center spokesman said: “As a rule, we don’t comment on other countries’ voting systems because that’s not our area of expertise.”
Sometimes the facts are simply inconvenient.
Hopefully This Will Help
The Epoch Times reported yesterday that some of the Texas counties that have been impacted by the lack of border security are going to start charging people illegally crossing the border with trespassing and child endangerment.
The article reports:
Seeing no solutions to the border crisis from the federal government, some counties are looking at all possible means to rein in the high-speed vehicle pursuits, trespassing, break-ins, vehicle thefts, and other crimes that are increasing in their communities.
“I’m going to start here, locally. If we catch them, we’re going to start prosecuting these people that are trespassing on y’all’s property,” Kinney County Sheriff Brad Coe told an appreciative crowd in Brackettville, Texas, on May 22. “And whatever other legitimate charge we can stack on there to try to deter them from coming to Kinney County. We’re going to try to hold these people accountable.”
Neighboring Edwards County is doing the same.
Coe said his county would start charging for trespassing on June 1. He provided ranchers with a form that would authorize the sheriff to file charges on their behalf if someone is caught on their property—saving the rancher from coming into town to press charges every time a trespasser is caught. For many local ranchers, it’s a daily occurrence.
The article concludes:
On April 21, Kinney County declared a local disaster due to the impact of the border surge, saying in its declaration that the “health, life, and property” of its residents are “under imminent threat of disaster from the human trafficking occurring on our border with Mexico.”
More than two dozen counties have since also made disaster declarations or are in the process of it.
Smith said Texas should act on its own to enforce its border with Mexico.
“It is my opinion that an emergency declaration by Governor [Greg] Abbott or the Texas Legislature would authorize Texas to take certain steps in the enforcement of its own borders and the protection of its citizens’ health, safety, and welfare,” he wrote in an open letter in April.
If the federal government will not secure the border, the states involved need to find a way to do it. This is a national security issue that is being ignored by the federal government. Aside from the possible terrorists coming across the border, how many people with the coronavirus are crossing into America illegally?
Quick Action Is Needed
President Biden has announced that he will withdraw all American military troops from Afghanistan on September 11th. Although I question his choice of that particular date, I think it is the right move. However, it is necessary in withdrawing those troops to protect those Afghani civilians and military who have helped America in its efforts. To leave those people behind is to insure their capture, torture and death.
The Federalist posted an article yesterday detailing some of the current situation.
The article reports:
During our nearly 20-year presence in Afghanistan, the U.S. military and countless government personnel have been aided by Afghan interpreters. These brave men and women bridged the gap between Americans and Afghans, often patrolling, and sometimes even fighting, alongside our forces.
Because of their selfless service to American personnel, the Taliban consider interpreters arch traitors. According to Brown University’s Costs of War Project, “at least thousands” of Afghan interpreters have been killed in retaliation by the Taliban and other criminal elements.
The United States created the Special Immigrant Visa program in 2006 to grant threatened interpreters from Iraq and Afghanistan refugee status and ultimately citizenship. The SIV program has failed to deliver the safety it promised, however, as evidenced by the host of critical gaps identified in recent reports from Brown University, the Truman Center, and the Department of State’s Office of the Inspector General.
Currently, a backlog of 18,800 applications of Afghan translators awaits processing. Rather than the nine-month processing period promised, applications have taken an average of 658 days to process, putting translators and their families at unnecessary, continued risk. The Washington Post estimates that around 1,000 Iraqi and Afghan interpreters have been killed while awaiting their visas.
Numerous interpreters whose lives are imperiled have been unable to apply for — or were rejected from — the SIV program. Many are unable to locate their employers to supply the necessary proof of employment. Others have been denied because the application makes untenable demands on Afghans who live under wartime constraints.
On Feb. 4, President Biden signed an executive order mandating a 180-day review of the SIV program. While such a review is long overdue, lawmakers believe the effort is inadequate.
The article concludes:
Maj. Thomas Schueman is among other veterans and service members making sincere appeals for their former interpreters. Schueman’s interpreter “Zack,” is unable to apply to the SIV program because his former contracting agency cannot be reached to provide proof of employment.
Zack has previously been identified by the Taliban for his work with the Marines. He says the local Taliban “are threatening [him] all the time.” Schueman considers assisting Zack a way of honoring his “lifelong contract” of “service to [his] troops.”
Miervaldis reports that No One Left Behind has recently received thousands of e-mails and Facebook messages regarding interpreters concerned about their SIV status. As the Taliban step up violent attacks on government forces, the targeting of interpreters will likely increase.
Rather than allowing our allies to stand by in peril as we address decades of failures in our SIV program, we must grant our interpreters asylum with haste. Neglecting to protect those who assisted us would be a moral failure, as well as a stinging blow to those who fought alongside our Afghan allies. It could also have resounding national security implications should we look to forge local alliances in future conflicts.
We need to make sure that all of the interpreters get out of Afghanistan before our troops leave. To leave them behind would be a stain on America forever.
Breaking Up A Monopoly In The Supply Chain
Yesterday wattsupwiththat posted an article about the worldwide chip shortage.
The article reports:
Prompted by a worldwide chip shortage already impacting automobile production, President Biden in February signed an executive order directing a 100-day broad review of supply chains for critical materials for semiconductors and large-capacity batteries, including rare-earth elements. It builds on analyses, reports and executive orders initiated several years ago by the Trump Administration.
The stark truth that this review should highlight is that the U.S. and its Western allies have been left behind at the starting gate in a race only China seems to have realized was taking place.
The Chinese began building their now-dominant supply chain decades ago. The U.S. has been 100% net import reliant on rare-earth elements, with 80 percent of those imports sourced from China.
Technology metals consultant Jack Lipton has described five steps in a total rare-earth supply chain. Mining comes first, followed by extraction of the rare-earths from mining concentrates and preparation of clean, pre-PLS (pregnant leach solution) mixed rare-earths products. (Actually, there is another step that precedes mining, at least in Western countries – gaining permission to mine – and it is often the most difficult and most time-consuming step of all.)
The article continues:
In a four-part series addressing Chinese dominance in the rare-earths industry, Jamil Hijazi and James Kennedy explained that China built its rare-earth industry as part of a carefully designed nationalistic strategy for world domination, one not motivated by the quest for private profits.
Now, with their market share dominance, “China uses opaque subsidies to eliminate any profit potential for competitors. No profit potential, no competitors, China’s metallurgical monopoly remains secure and uncontested.” Even more daunting, the lack of non-Chinese processing, refining and metallurgical capacity means the world sells China its low value ore-concentrate and China sells back much higher value end products.
Menell (TechMet Chairman and CEO Brian Menell ) points out that China’s rare-earths dominance is “the result of decades of successful central planning, to secure the minerals required to develop technologies across strategic sectors such as energy, auto and defense.”
President Biden’s executive order supporting the concept of resilient, diverse, secure supply chains is certainly admirable. However, Menell says, the United States must make the supply of critical minerals a central part of both domestic and foreign policy.
Menell notes that the Biden Administration also needs to educate the American public that the mining and processing of critical materials can be done with much lower environmental impacts by American companies than by Chinese firms, and that America’s economic well-being depends heavily on an integrated rare-earths value chain.
As the world depends more and more on various computer chips, this is going to become more of a problem. China (as usual) has played the long game while the west ignored its growing dependence on rare-earth metals. America needs to act on this problem quickly, but with an eye to a long-term solution rather than a quick fix.
I Am Still Wondering What The Big Push For Vaccinations Is About
We have never seen such a strong government push to get people to get a shot. Particularly a shot that has only be approved for emergency use by the Food and Drug Administration. Particularly a shot given to people who are not a risk of serious complications from the disease the shot is supposed to prevent. Now there is a new wrinkle in the story.
Yesterday (updated today) The Epoch Times posted an article about something the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has recently done.
The article reports:
In order to encourage American workers to get vaccinated, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has suspended the legal requirement for employers to report work-related injuries resulting from vaccinations aimed at combating the CCP virus that causes the disease COVID-19.
This suspension of the law by OSHA does not change the fact that employers may be held liable under workers’ compensation laws or under civil personal injury laws, according to the nonprofit group Liberty Counsel.
Earlier in May, the website of OSHA, an agency within the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL), stated that employers could be held liable if they required employees to receive COVID-19-related injections as a condition of employment and the employees then experience adverse reactions.
A “Frequently Asked Questions” (FAQ) section of OSHA’s website stated, “If you require your employees to be vaccinated as a condition of employment (i.e., for work-related reasons), then any adverse reaction to the COVID-19 vaccine is work-related. The adverse reaction is recordable if it is a new case under 29 CFR 1904.6 and meets one or more of the general recording criteria in 29 CFR 1904.7,” according to Liberty Counsel.
But visitors to the same website’s FAQ section now see a different message, which reads:
“DOL and OSHA, as well as other federal agencies, are working diligently to encourage COVID-19 vaccinations. OSHA does not wish to have any appearance of discouraging workers from receiving COVID-19 vaccination, and also does not wish to disincentivize employers’ vaccination efforts. As a result, OSHA will not enforce 29 CFR 1904’s recording requirements to require any employers to record worker side effects from COVID-19 vaccination through May 2022. We will reevaluate the agency’s position at that time to determine the best course of action moving forward.”
The article also notes:
“OSHA’s suspension of the recording requirement so as not to discourage experimental COVID shots reveals that the Biden administration could care less about the collateral damage being caused by the COVID shots. The people can see this biased agenda. They are not stupid.”
None of the available COVID-19 shots are approved or licensed by the U.S Food and Drug Administration, Liberty Counsel noted. They come under what’s known as an emergency use authorization (EUA), which means their use cannot be required.
The FDA acknowledges on its website that it “must ensure that recipients of the vaccine under an EUA are informed, to the extent practicable given the applicable circumstances … that they have the option to accept or refuse the vaccine, and of any available alternatives to the product.”
This seems very curious to me. Why would you end reporting on something as important as negative reactions to a vaccine? Wouldn’t it make more sense to record everything and create a study panel to see if they can find specific causes for whatever problems arise?