Persecute - OR - Prosecute

1) Covid-19 has been found to be a zoonotic virus, with origins in animal populations in Asia, probably primates. It was almost certainly not artificially created, so the evil heathen Chinee lab theory is bullshit. The disease vector that attacked the US was from EUROPE, so Trump aimed his wrath in precisely the wrong direction in instituting travel bans on China but not Europe. None of all this is seriously disputed at this point.

2) The only way to determine vaccines' efficiacy is to compare two otherwise similar populations, one vaccinated, the other not, and determine infection, hospitalization, and death rates. The data from the US clearly show that vaccination rates were inversely correlated with the above three factors, and that correlation is statistically significant.

3) The Hunter laptop farce was generated by Republicans, and yes, it is total bullshit.

I don't see how you can blame Democrats for any of the above. The federal response to Covid, or lack thereof, was under a Republican administration. The efficacy of vaccines was proved, and the gang that was bleating against them for so long--well, they weren't Democrats. And the mystical magical tale about Hunter's radioactive laptop wasn't cooked up by Democrats.

I don't see how the Democratic party has become "authoritarian," unless you misapply that term to mean "unwilling to allow discrimination and bigotry." Surely you're not so obtuse as to think that free speech protections apply to speech that hurts and endangers others? Surely you're npt so dense as to think that prohibiting such speech is "authoritarian"? It's no more "authoritarian" than, say, traffic laws.

     I base my decisions on what people do, not on what they (or others) say.  Being stonewalled by the DemocRats during his time in office kept him from fulfilling many of the things he wanted to and said he would do. Can you name any really successful people who are not narcissists to some degree? Here, peruse this list (it is quite lengthly) and see how many people, judged by your stated standard, that you should hate or be hating -- https://thenarcissisticlife.com/famous-people-with-narcissism/

LOL. Nothng gives away like passive voice. For example, "Covid 19 has been found" to be zoonotic and all that. First of all, I'm sure 200 million people "have found" Covid 19 to be zoonotic and "not artificially created," which is another red herring phrase.

Passive voice demonstrates nothing, as fairies "have been found" to live in forests, Dracula has been found to live in castles, and The Wolfman also in forests. The term zoonotic is a parse attempt. It's also an attempt to create a false bifurcation -- Covid 19 is EITHER zoonotic or "artificially created," which as a phrase, by the way, has no precise meaning. 

The consensus, right now, is that COVID-19 was more likely a lab leak than not. US intelligence agencies have gone on record as such, including the FBI. It's not the U.S. being wrong early regarding origins that is worrisome. It's the blatant attempts to stamp out competing narratives and to bullshit the public, over and over. And here we are, two years later, and the FBI announces its opinion.

Again, passive voice - "the efficacy of vaccines was proved." Which efficacy -- the alleged ability to prevent transmission as voiced by Pfizer in tweets? or the effectiveness against the first two variations of the virus? Two different things. And "the efficacy of vaccines was proved" is true enough -- even if that efficacy has been, from a cost/benefit perspective, not very good after the first two virus versions and not very good for people under 50.

And this is why I hate the Democratic Party unending bullshit. Kevin had to be aware of the flaws in what he was writing while he wrote it, but he soldiered on to make a case. It's hard to design parsed passive voice sentences without being aware of why you're framing facts so torturously and carefully. Kevin's post above is pure partisanship in service of nothing related to reality.

Ask the FBI.

He is concern trolling.

I'm 66. I was a little young to appreciate the "we're winning in Vietnam" lies, but I would move them into third if they count. Hard to quantify the laptop lies as it's hard to quantify if they did indeed determine the election. Hard to quantify what a second Trump term versus Biden would have involved. Maybe it would have been similar.  

That origins lie could be devastating if these labs continue to operate because there isn't sufficient public revolt against them. And the US public continues to fund them.

I get a kick out of the comments, by the way. Non-factual. 

Passive voice, in many contexts, including scientific literature, is used when the ACTION is more important than the ACTOR. For instance: "Little Priscilla was killed by a drunk driver." We don't really care about the driver. "Indiana Jones was chased down the passage by a big stone ball." The movie is about the adventures of Indiana Jones, not the adventures of a big stone ball. Get it? Some people teach that passive voice is inherently bad, which means that they know just enough to be dangerous.

So I used the passive voice to refer to Covid mortality data because I didn't wish to discuss, nor does it matter, the exact names of the thousands of people who collaborated to collect and interpret that data. The data are more important than the individuals who collected it.

I'm figuratively if not literally ROFLing at your characterization of Democratic narratives, as if the last seveeral years of Trumpy shit coming from the RepubliQ were models of truth, clarity, and objectivity. I mean, Jesus, dude. Have you not only drunk the Kool-aid but also filled your swimming pool with it and paddled around in it?

Educate yourself--learn what "zoonotic" means, take a few English classes, learn about Covid data and the conclusions reached from it, and get back to us.

Who's lying about the magical laptop, if anyone is? Hint: only one side is claiming that it even exists or that it contains evidence of a vast conspiracy as well as reams of Vogon poetry.

A second Trump term would have resulted in tens or maybe hundreds of thousands of additional Covid deaths; a much slower economic recovery, as government funds would have been ladled to big corporations and GOP donors, not the public; and a continuation of the disgrace that the US suffered in the eyes of the world.

Let me check this heathen Chinee silliness. You seriously believe that this was a manufactured Bond-villain virus that only kills about 1% of its victims--and mostly the old folks, at that? If this was an eeeevil Chinee murder weapon, it's like a gun that misfires 99% of the time. PLUS, evil Chinee or any other kind of bacteriological/viral warfare is pointless in a world where no country can successfully isolate itself.

But it's possible, even likely, that I'm talking to a brick wall. Maybe not a Millerscum-style brick wall, but equally impenetrable.

Solid post. Spot on. 

Of course it leaked from a lab.  

  Once again, President Trump was right.

I can name one narcissist who isn't successful - Trump.  

And yes, I hate a lot of those people actually.