Texas held a similar rally in late July....the organizer, 30 year old Caleb Wallace, showed signs of covid by July 30 but refused testing or treatment, opting for vitamins and ivermectin, a horse dewormer conspiracy theorists have decided is some kind of covid medicine (it's not), and was hospitalized shortly thereafter and has been in icu since Aug 8 near death. His family, pregnant wife and three young kids, is begging online for funds to pay home and medical bills. The hospital has asked his family to sign a do not resuscitate order because they have no treatment options and are running out of oxygen thanks to so many anti vaxers filling the hospitals.
So far they have refused to sign, forcing the hospital to continue to treat him, meaning someone else with a chance to survive can't get a hospital bed and they will die too.

This guy spouted some of the most dangerous, anti science, anti medicine conspiracy theories and lies for a year, and worked hard to stop any actual medical advice from being followed.

No one deserves this outcome more. If only he had to live with it...death seems like he's getting off easy, leaving his family and the rest of us to live with the consequences of his choices.

My two cents, the old axiom, your right to swing your first ends at my nose, seems to apply.

I think people should pay for their choices, so eating poorly, pay more for insurance....Lots more. Ignore doctors advice, lose all benefits of insurance and pay for your own care, and from the back of the line too. When that choice has a good chance of costing someone else's life or health, that's the line imo. You cannot ever repay that kind of debt, so you shouldn't be allowed to take it on, nor should people be allowed to gamble with other people's health and lives.

Hey there. Devil's advocate here.

Should we tell people who eat poorly to fuck off, too? What about any people who go off of their doctor's advice?

Don't get me wrong, I'm heavily in your corner. I would say the pandemic is a special case, not because it takes up hospital beds unnecessarily (which most of them do since heart disease, the #1 killer, is a disease of lifestyle), but because it immediately puts others in danger, outside the hospital.

The question of freedom vs. public health is easy in this case, but when does it become overreach? On the other (very far) end of the spectrum is eugenics.

Being against the vaccine?

At ░5░9░ you should remember the AIDS epidemic?

Think about how people were worried about it? How they had to learn about it? That it was, for a while, a real fear amongst the unknowing? But after a while, most people understood the risk. After all that, shouldn't you've learned?

When those nurses came back from Africa, caring for Ebola victims, then they got treatment also - which group was most vocal? The changes of them contracting it were even more remote than AIDS!

Being ░5░9░ , should remember living under the threats of Herpes, Hepatitis, AIDS, West Nile, Lyme, Ebola, Hunta...all those viruses...having to learn the what it is, what it does, how it's caught, and the risks of ignoring sound medical advice - why has it changed?

Remember seat belts and helmet laws? Child seats? Live with it and had no choice about it. Those help keep people alive.

Why is having a SAFE - EFFECTIVE - and F R E E vaccine such a misery?

Why make the actual advice gray and tiny? (2:55)

Repeated non partisan recounts, above board by republican chosen organizations with bipartisan witnesses and uninterrupted video despite the lies OAN told you, with no Italian satellites wirelessly changing Trump votes (you delusional morons forgot there is a paper record of all votes that's been verified as matching the electronic counts). It's been proven twice over.
The fake audit dragging on now is none of those things, it's purely partisan, there aren't bipartisan witnesses, it's not all recorded, it has no rules, no plan, and no professionals involved, just Trumpsters trying to find any nonsense they can use to fool morons into believing they found fraud, Trump won, you really aren't all loser crybabies butt hurt over losing and throwing tantrums....but the thing is, you are.

Prove it was above board? How about give one scintilla of proof it wasn't, not crack heads spouting bullshit, not babies whining that they won, proof. So far every single bit of proof has shown every single case of demonstrable fraud was perpetrated by Trump voters for Trump. From double voters to voter suppression to hundreds of thousands of "lost" mail in ballots Dejoy refused court orders to even look for, Texas, all cases are Trump frauds....but you don't care a whit about that massive, multi spiked wheel of fraud because it ALL benefited Trump.

Prove it was above board? Ask any Republican in office if THEIR election was through fraud. Every single one will tell you no. If the ballots that elected them are not fraudulent, neither was the presidential election on the same ballots. Try it, see what happens.

Prove it was above board? No amount of incontrovertible proof would ever satisfy you, because you are incapable of examining it and understanding so you defer to whatever rambling mumbling nonsense Trump and Q feed you, never grasping that they lie to you at every turn but instead insisting it's reality that has it all wrong, Trump won two elections, climate change both isn't real and is a good thing, trickle down works, insane debt is both the most important thing we should focus on and a nothing burger, poorly built fences that fall in the wind are huge immovable concrete walls....I could go on all day.

We had multiple bipartisan professional forensic audits, that's where they found all that Republican fraud. You want a partial audit by fully partisan political hacks that are part of the stop the steal cult, not looking for fraud (bamboo ballots, really?!), they're looking to continue the circus long enough that you don't forget the big lie before the next election, and hoping to destroy the capabilities of any county that went to Biden to hold the next election....Maricopa needs to rebuy tens of millions in election equipment because any machine you morons touched has been permanently decertified and must be discarded (should be destroyed so republican counties don't buy them knowing they've been tampered with). Now you want to repeat that in all 50 states, only in counties that went for Biden. How about this, I think many would agree to that, but only if the auditors pay to replace all election equipment in counties they audit before they get approval, and do not get personally identifying information under any circumstances (in AZ they want names, addresses, criminal records, and social security numbers....all unsecured and gone through by unqualified unsupervised unverified certifiable morons who are guaranteed to turn around and sell it to hackers.) That means $10-50 million per audit...up front in cash.

The "audit" being done by cyberninjas isn't forensic. They have zero experience. It's like a complicated death happened and the main suspect is handed the body to make their own determination of how they weren't murdered, they fell on all 14 knives while accidentally shooting themselves in the face 6 times....case closed, the suspect now inherits the victims estate and wife. So retarded, useless, and in no way a real investigation. It's a bullshit show for morons.

Yes, republicans are blocking that nonsense too, because it's not an audit, it's an incredibly expensive exercise in destroying trust in elections....a Putin plan that undeniably hurts America but has zero chance of actually producing evidence, proof, or rational theories of fraud. There's absolutely no way it could overturn the election even if it did find massive election outcome changing fraud (hasn't found non-republican fraud yet, btw, been 7 months of searching under every rock so far)...That's not how the law works. Sadly, you get legal advice from a crackhead and Giuliani, both clinically insane.

I wonder. What do you morons think? Do you believe if they can find ANY fraud from Democrats the position is just handed to Republicans? 1) There's already been massive Republican frauds found but no Republican handed over their seats 2) there's no mechanism for decertifying a certified election and 3) if there were, it would mean a special election, not that Trump just gets installed. Trump's favorability is 1/2 Biden's, same goes for many Republican senators and representatives. If there was a new election today, it would be a shutout against Republicans. Not a blue wave, not a blue tsunami, but a biblical blue flood, and your team can't build boats or swim. Is that what you want?

Might want to rethink this anti American, undemocratic plot to steal elections after the fact, it's destroyed your party's future, reputation, and further damaged you're believability and trustworthiness that were already on life support.

Cry us more snowflake tears, Bobby....I'm making lemonade and need the sweet syrup of sadness to keep flowing.

wonder what the 'industry' thinks in this regard. also leery about how the 'Nannie state' believers would consider this: Nannie over nuthin' or nothing Nannie about unnecessary risks?

it is disturbing. just the tangle of extension cord thing shows how institutionalized this fear, or known risk, has been installed into the public. would reasonably assume this is traceable to having been taught in schools. echoed also in many ads, manuals, etc. although have difficulty understanding why putting inexpensive safeguards would be a bad thing?

but have always believed it's easier to change systems than people. am joining the Nanny crowd.

[also think BSR's advice is worth noting. maybe when the speaker starts in w/the technical jargon, a smaller window opens with a 'normal' person translating the message. i.e. "wire gets damn hot" or "could shock the crap outta yah". maybe not so perfectly clear, but succinct and truthful.]

Saturday Satan, Sunday saint
Foolin' your neighbors
That's what you think
Readin' the good book
Singin' the hymns
Come Monday morning and it's back to a life of sin

Old brother Brown
All week he steals
Tells everyone
His big business deals
The deacon walks by
A dollar hits the plate
Tryin' to buy himself a ticket to the pearly gates

Old sister Rose
On the very first row
Been a-sittin' right there
Twenty years or so
Never hears a word
When the preacher speaks
Too busy talkin' bout the bad girl down the street

Saturday Satan, Sunday saint
Foolin' your neighbors
Readin' the good book
Singin' the hymns
Come Monday mornin' and it's back to a life of sin
This little song holds good advice
Though some people may
Think it ain't too nice
Well, if you're one
Who's wearing the shoes
Well, there's somebody watchin' and he ain't nobody's fool

Saturday Satan, Sunday saint
Foolin' your neighbors
Readin' the good book
Singin' the hymns
Come Monday mornin' and it's back to a life of sin
Come Monday mornin' and it's back to a life of sin

Oh excellent - thanks! Had to look her up, and this appears to have been the first of a set of recurring bits with her.

(shamelessly ripped from wikipedia) "In her early career as a regular on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour of the late-1960s, French portrayed a somewhat spaced-out or ditzy hippie named Goldie O'Keefe. The character was originally introduced, in an ostensible studio-audience interview segment, as Goldie Keif; both "Goldie" and "Keif" were slang terms for marijuana at the time. Reportedly, the slight name change to O'Keefe when she became a semi-regular was at the television network's insistence. Her segment of the show was called "Share a Little Tea with Goldie." At the time, "sharing tea" was a popular euphemism for getting high on marijuana. Following suit, her segment consisted largely of "helpful" household advice loaded with sex and drug-related double entendres."

Filing away "goldie" and "sharing tea," those were new to me

I thought I addressed that. Travel was also open between states, and many countries with "free travel amongst nations" had no-travel/stay at home orders in place, unlike the U.S., and afaik, mandatory quarantine for all international travelers.

Again, because he eradicated the international Global Health Security and Biodefense unit, I can legitimately ascribe every single non Chinese death and most Chinese deaths to his actions directly. A pandemic on this level WAS foreseen after SARS, Ebola, and Swine Flu, it's why we created the GHSB. It's why we had a pandemic response plan that Trump completely ignored and actually denied it existed for months and months.

I also am going by facts. My facts say that at least four things Trump did against professional advice took us from prepared to minimise any pandemic to at worst a foreign epidemic to a place where months after pandemics start our leader denied any danger and made no moves to stop it.
1) Eradication of the GHSB, missed opportunity one to have zero US cases and avoid a pandemic completely.
2) Repeated early public denial of the danger while encouraging others to do the same and go about business as usual, missed opportunity two to have zero US cases, and a missed opportunity to minimize any spread if quarantining travelers (something else he failed miserably to even consider early on) failed.
3) Encouragement of those who trust him to ignore all mitigation efforts, don't mask, don't social distance, don't shut down non essential businesses, don't close schools, don't listen to medical professionals....missed opportunity number three to minimize US infections to thousands instead of hundreds of thousands. Remember the many months he said grandma would gladly die to get people back to work, pretending many months in that only feeble octogenarians get sick?
4) Denial of a prepared response plan, never following it and claiming total ignorance, missed opportunity number four to follow prepared plans based on science from day one, missing the opportunity to keep our infection rate at S Korean levels.

That's four well researched and vetted moronic, irrational, and irresponsible mistakes he personally made that multiplied our infection rate by 100- infinity times (if we could have had zero without his multiple massive and stupid mistakes, which is not just possible but likely, he can be said to have CAUSED every single US case, multiplying our infections by infinity.). There were more, but I'm beating a dead horse.
Remember, his real plan was natural herd immunity, with an expected 3-60 million deaths depending on who you asked.

I say if intelligent decisions could have avoided all US infections, and that's undeniable IMO, you can lay the blame for as high a percentage as you like on the leader who made bad dangerous decisions out of pure narcissistic ignorance and hatred of his predecessor...up to 100%. 80-90% still seems like I'm coddling him, at least two failures could have made cases zero, and others minimized it to under 10% of what we have. All four I listed almost certainly allowed >90% giving every doubt and giving him all possible credit....so yes, I'm satisfied I'm not exaggerating.

Obama's responsible and responsive planning and execution stopped Ebola from ever spreading here despite it making it to our shores, and it was FAR more contagious and deadly. Had we had Trump then doing the same things, there would be tens of millions dead and likely still spreading disease, imo.


Edit: let me try analogy...If a mayor removes the stop signs from 4 way highway intersections, they are responsible for every wreck that happens, even though other towns with stop signs still have wrecks at intersections. Trump pulled the signs, removed the flashing red light, and cut first responder funding, and claimed there never was a highway code to follow and he takes no responsibility for the jump in highway deaths.

Surprisingly great advice and really impressive example of how to handle yourself and engage nonconfrontationally with a stranger in a high-stress moment.

unfortunately it's a mix of legitimate points, paranoid points, and a lot of pretty bad advice. a muddled and dangerous blend of fairly accurate perceptions, conspiratorial thinking, and delusions of grandeur.

geo321, your guess seems reasonable. Could be a health class video though, what with the medical advice and all.

Lol. So sad Bobby.
12000 total died vs >210000 and rising fast expected to top 400000 before Biden takes office, and Trump's new plan if he is successful with his coup is to raise that to 8 million dead or more.
Swine flu is the flu, not even a bad one by the numbers, Covid 19 is not. Covid kills 1 in 33 infected, swine flu killed 1 in 5000, and didn't put 20% in the hospital.
Obama put out science based guidelines and warnings quickly, trump continues to lie and claim Coronavirus is less deadly than the flu, nothing, go out and get it.

Trump ignored warnings, trump ignored pandemic specialists and fired them, trump cut travel from China eventually, but only of Chinese, no quarantine for the 40000+ non Chinese he let come in from China, trump ignored the pandemic response plan, and claimed for 5+ months there wasn't one, Trump stupidly blames the last administration for his total lack of preparedness, but he had been president for three+ years when he even noticed, but he takes NO responsibility, not a leader's actions. Trump let 210000+ Americans die according to him to avoid people getting worried, and continues to give horrifically wrong and deadly advice from the Whitehouse now to avoid admitting his total failure to lead.....what a plan.

It sure is looking like a landslide, with Biden ahead double digits in every poll besides a few pro Trump internet polls open only to Republicans by non pollsters. It's so bad Trump is calling on Barr to prosecute Biden now....the problem being he doesn't know for what, and worse, the Republican Senate report already cleared Biden of ANY crimes....and accused every Trump official of lying during his impeachment, including trump himself who they confirmed WAS helped by Russia...remember, that country that put bounties on American soldiers that Trump ignores to this day? Your homeland.
Moscow's Emissary Governing America...no thanks, we tried that, it cost us trillions, tripling the deficit this year, and hundreds of thousands of lives.

Red tsunami, take me away.