Dr. X's Free Associations

The Wannabe Dictator

The Hill:

The president has recently complained about schools being driven by what he describes as a radical left-wing ideology. He spent a decent portion of Independence Day remarks at Mount Rushmore warning of a “far-left fascism” controlling American schools, newsrooms and other institutions.

“Therefore, I am telling the Treasury Department to re-examine their Tax-Exempt Status and/or Funding, which will be taken away if this Propaganda or Act Against Public Policy continues,” Trump tweeted. “Our children must be Educated, not Indoctrinated!”

The IRS is prohibited from using any of its appropriations to target any tax-exempt organization for "scrutiny based on ideological beliefs (Sec 108)." What is prohibited is the endorsement or opposition to specific candidates for public office under the rarely enforced Johnson Amendment, which funnily enough, Trump opposes. Trump has even falsely claimed that "we got rid of" the Johnson Amendment.

None of this is surprising to hear from a civically-illiterate, authoritarian hypocrite who has repeatedly revealed a wish to use the levers of government to illegally silence critics, whether it's his proposal to punish Amazon CEO and WaPo owner Jeff Bezos by raising shipping rates charged by the USPS or his wish to revoke broadcast licenses from networks that air programming critical of him or his policies.

Incidentally, Trump, himself, got into hot water for raising money for his private foundation and illegally using tax-exempt contributions as a personal checkbook to settle personal debts, make art purchases for his for-profit businesses, and for political purposes. His foundation was dissolved in an agreement with the State of NY that included an admission that the foundation was guilty of self-dealing.

Typhoid Mary Visits The Dentist

COVID Stuff: Negative and Negative

Last Thursday, I took a drive-up COVID-19 test at a Walgreen's. Results: negative

On Monday, I had an antibodies test through LabCorp: Results: no detectable antibodies to the virus.

Since my last family COVID-19 update, my aunt was taken off a respirator but died 2 weeks later and an in-law contracted the virus and died three days after exhibiting symptoms. She worked in a long-term care facility and presumably contracted the virus there. All 7 family members who contracted the virus live in NYC and the surrounding area.

Locally, no one I know personally is known to have contracted the virus, though one patient who got sick in March was never tested.

I still think we should be working toward massive, universal testing, a huge undertaking but perhaps an important element of any plan to contain the virus until the release of a reasonably effective vaccine or vaccines. In the meantime, please grow the F up and wear a mask. This isn't simply about freedom. Freedom is not without limits (See positive and negative externalities). Even if mask-wearing isn't imposed by law, basic decency should encourage one to wear a mask in public to protect others.

It might look like Trump isn't working, but he is

This week Trump was wouldn't or couldn't articulate any legislation or policy ambitions for his next term if he's reelected. He has also been unwilling or unable to come up with a response after learning that the Russians offered a bounty on the lives of American soldiers. Fortunately, he hasn't fallen down on the most important job of a president: Coming up with a new derogatory nickname for his opponent.

Trump has been asking advisers if he should stick with his current nickname for Biden — “Sleepy Joe” — or try to coin another moniker, such as “Swampy Joe” or “Creepy Joe.” The president is not convinced that “Sleepy Joe” is particularly damaging... https://t.co/0RSN5vIIPJ

— Robert Costa (@costareports) June 28, 2020

Headline News

WASHINGTON — American intelligence officials have concluded that a Russian military intelligence unit secretly offered bounties to Taliban-linked militants for killing coalition forces in Afghanistan — including targeting American troops — amid the peace talks to end the long-running war there, according to officials briefed on the matter.

The United States concluded months ago that the Russian unit, which has been linked to assassination attempts and other covert operations in Europe intended to destabilize the West or take revenge on turncoats, had covertly offered rewards for successful attacks last year.

The intelligence finding was briefed to President Trump, and the White House’s National Security Council discussed the problem at an interagency meeting in late March, the officials said.

The president has not authorized any response yet, but since learning of Putin's bounties on the lives of American troops, Trump invited Putin to the G7 Summit, and he decided to withdraw US troops from Germany.

In other news, Joe Biden said millions instead of thousands, corrected himself and apologized.

Queda Leader killed by missile modified to reduce collateral damage

NYTimes:

The modified Hellfire missile carried an inert warhead. Instead of exploding, it hurled about 100 pounds of metal through the top of Mr. al-Aruri’s car. If the high-velocity projectile did not kill him, the missile’s other feature almost certainly did: six long blades tucked inside, which deployed seconds before impact to slice up anything in its path.

The Hellfire variant, known as the R9X, was initially developed nearly a decade ago under pressure from President Barack Obama to reduce civilian casualties and property damage in America’s long-running wars on terrorism in far-flung hot spots such as Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, Somalia and Yemen.

 

A Florida attorney had his license suspended after admitting to a host of legal and ethical violations including filing frivolous ADA lawsuits. Law.com:

Dinin’s plea admits that he split fees with Alexander Johnson, a Broward man with a hearing impairment, who’s filed dozens of lawsuits against companies in Miami and Broward. Among them: 26 federal lawsuits against South Florida gas stations over their lack of closed captioning on the television screens next to gas pumps.

Even people who can hear well have no interest in those screens.

In the midst of a global pandemic with the presidential election just months away, the Justice Department asked the Supreme Court on Thursday to invalidate the Affordable Care Act, the landmark health care law that enabled millions of Americans to get insurance coverage and that remains in effect despite the pending legal challenge.

In a late-night filing, Solicitor General Noel Francisco said that once the law's individual coverage mandate and two key provisions are invalidated, "the remainder of the ACA should not be allowed to remain in effect." -More

If the court strikes down the rest of ACA, the change probably can't go into effect until next year, after the election, but the Democratic candidate ads will be a brutal, relentless and effective replay of 2018.

I reject mindless, wholesale destruction of statues, but:

What if the intent and effect of a statue is to erase, rewrite, or even repeat history? What if 50 years after WWII, neo-Nazis in Germany had had a major political resurgence and were reasserting control over Jews and erecting statues of Hitler? Could these statues suggest to people that Hitler is worthy of admiration? Could they mitigate the realities of Nazi defeat? Could they encourage Lost Causers to hang on to ambitions for a return to the past "glory" of Hitler's Nazi Germany?  Could the statues intimidate Jews, as if to say" 'we're back or we're still here right here in your town square, so we are far from defeated?" Would it be wrong for Jews and other decency-minded people to declare that the Hitler statues need to go? Could you blame Jews for tearing down these statues if government officials ignore their complaints for decades? Would anyone argue that we need the Hitler statues to remember the Holocaust and WWII, or would books, movies, TV, museums, classes and lectures provide sufficient memory of the evils of Hitler and WWII?

With regard to our present situation, I would note that Northerners learned about the Civil War without having a statue of Robert E. Lee in their village square. Some northern communities have statues of Union military figures, but if the Confederate statues are about remembrance of history, shouldn't statues of Union (American) generals and leaders be plentiful in the Southern states, to remember who won the war? Wouldn't Union statues help remember which side was worthy of admiration?

Bonus Questions: If the Kim family dynasty ever falls and North Korea joins South Korea as a single, democratic  Korean nation, should the statues and poster images of the Kim family stay up all over the North to remember history? Should North Koreans be entitled to an environment that doesn't offer ubiquitous reminders of the monsters who tyrannized their nation?

Three NC Police Officers Fired For Racist Rant

Wilmington NC: A routine internal audit of an accidentally activated police video revealed racist comments by 3 Wilmington NC police officers:

At the 46-minute mark of the video, Piner and Gilmore began talking from their respective cars, at which time Piner criticized the department, saying its only concern was “kneeling down with the black folks.” About 30 minutes later, Piner received a phone call from Moore, according to the investigation, a segment in which Moore referred to a Black female as a “negro.” He also referred to the woman by using a racial slur. He repeated the use of the slur in describing a Black magistrate, and Moore used a gay slur to describe the magistrate as well. Later, according to the investigation, Piner told Moore that he feels a civil war is coming and that he is ready. Piner said he was going to buy a new assault rifle, and soon “we are just going to go out and start slaughtering them (expletive)” Blacks. “I can’t wait. God, I can’t wait.” Moore responded that he wouldn’t do that. Piner then told Moore that he felt a civil war was needed to “wipe them off the (expletive) map. That’ll put them back about four or five generations.” Moore told Piner he was “crazy,” and the recording stopped a short time later.

Got to wonder what's going on in the Wilmington Police department that three officers would feel free to speak to other officers in this manner unless such conversations occur often enough for these officers to feel they're safe engaging in such a conversation when they think they're speaking privately. On the other hand, kudos to the sergeant who reported it and leadership that took decisive action against police officers who spoke this way.

This angry Florida woman argued today against the mask mandate, while bringing up the devil, 5G, Bill Gates, Hillary Clinton, "the pedophiles" and the deep state.

Enjoy... pic.twitter.com/yqKUZNQYLQ

— Rex Chapman🏇🏼 (@RexChapman) June 24, 2020

That description doesn't do her QAnon rant justice. Not even close.

Viewing Recommendation

I've been watching medieval scholar Dorsey Armstrong's 24-part lecture series "The Black Death: The World's Most Devastating Plague (2016). She really does a great job of describing the medical, political, economic, religious, social and cultural impacts of the bubonic plague--an epidemic that killed as much as 40-60% of Europe's population. It was a different time and a far more deadly disease than Covid-19, but there is much relevant food for thought here. It certainly leaves me wondering more about the possible long-term effects of our current situation.

Update: Link fixed.

.@KamalaHarris just snatched John Cornyn’s entire soul in front of the nation. That pause and look, chile...💀 pic.twitter.com/mEK2NQ2HHC

— chris evans (@notcapnamerica) June 23, 2020

I don't know if she got his soul, but I spotted his spleen sitting on her lectern.

Dear Apple

An email trumpeting your "biggest updates ever" is not something I greet with immediate enthusiasm. Trepidation is my first reaction.

Conservation Experts Call For Regulation Of Art Restorers

Original painting on the right. Two botched restoration attempts on the left.

Conservation experts in Spain have called for a tightening of the laws covering restoration work after a copy of a famous painting by the baroque artist Bartolomé Esteban Murillo became the latest in a long line of artworks to suffer a damaging and disfiguring repair.

A private art collector in Valencia was reportedly charged €1,200 by a furniture restorer to have the picture of the Immaculate Conception cleaned. However, the job did not go as planned and the face of the Virgin Mary was left unrecognisable despite two attempts to restore it to its original state.  -- more