State Governments and Socialism

Posted on 31 March 2020 by eehines

A current government move to control the means of production—classic socialism when the controls are widespread—is this, involving what’s left of our nation’s insurance industry, at the State level.

In at least three states, lawmakers have proposed legislation to force insurers to pay billions of dollars for business losses tied to government-ordered shutdowns.

Never mind what already agreed policies say. To Hell with signed contracts. Government men Know Better, and being above petty commitments themselves, can’t conceive the idea that commitments actually matter in a free society, in a free market economy.

Some regulators have declared moratoriums on cancellations and nonrenewals of policies.

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Progressive-Democrats and the Law

Posted on 31 March 2020 by eehines

And contracts. Since the SARS epidemic of some years ago, insurers have declined to cover losses related to virus or bacteria damage, and they wrote their policies to that effect. State regulators—who controlled and still control the structure of insurance policies and the premiums allowed to be charged for those policies outside Obamacare—agreed.

However.

New Jersey Assemblyman Roy Freiman, a Democrat, introduced a bill that would retroactively rewrite interruption coverage contracts and force insurers to foot some losses for any policyholder with fewer than 100 full-time employees.

Contracts be damned. They don’t fit the Progressive-Democrat agenda, so by Progressive-Democrat-run Government fiat, they must be tossed.

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In Defense of an Election Defeat

Posted on 30 March 2020 by eehines

Ex-Congressman Dan Lipinski (D, IL) lost his State’s primary election largely—almost entirely—because of his pro-life position on abortion. He wrote an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal explaining how that loss came about:

I faced it [the question of whether he should have changed his abortion stance to win the primary] head-on in my statement. I defended my pro-life position, which is rooted in both my Catholic faith and science. “I could never give up protecting the most vulnerable human beings in the world, simply to win an election,” I said. “My faith teaches, and the Democratic Party preaches, that we should serve everyone, especially the most vulnerable. …”

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FDA’s Drug Approvals

Posted on 30 March 2020 by eehines

Charles Hooper and David Henderson are on the right track.

The Federal government requires pharmaceutical companies to prove that their drugs are both safe and effective before putting them on the market. Before 1962, companies needed to prove only safety. While there is some appeal to this two-hurdle approach, evidence suggests that there is only a slight benefit and a tremendous cost. With the COVID-19 pandemic sweeping the world, there has never been a better time to revoke the Food and Drug Administration’s efficacy requirement.

This is a preview of FDA’s Drug Approvals. Read the full post (306 words, estimated 1:13 mins reading time)

Holding Some Back

Posted on 24 March 2020 by eehines

Forty-three million students are doing homework at home due to the current Wuhan virus situation.

Here’s the shocker about that:

Some public schools are calling online work “enrichment,” not part of the curriculum, because they can’t guarantee that all students will have access to it.

The work, which was part of the curriculum when school was in session, won’t be graded, won’t count. This is another example of the Left’s view of equality: hold back the successful because the less successful don’t, or can’t, keep up. Don’t take steps to help the less successful do better. No, that’s too hard.

This is a preview of Holding Some Back. Read the full post (141 words, estimated 34 secs reading time)

Scapegoating

Posted on 23 March 2020 by eehines

…and fake apologies.

Recall that Doctor Li Wenliang, a resident of Wuhan, Hubei Province, People’s Republic of China and an ophthalmologist at Wuhan Central Hospital, gave early warnings about the dangers and contagious nature of the Wuhan virus. Recall further that subsequent to his warnings, the police were sicced on him and that they threatened him if he didn’t shut the hell up. Li subsequently died of that same Wuhan virus.

Now the Communist Party of China is pretending to apologize to his family for that behavior.

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A Start

Posted on 21 March 2020 by eehines

But we need to go further. Recall that an official of the Communist Party of China threatened to cut off US access to life-savings medicines that are manufactured in the People’s Republic of China [Bing Translate translation from the Xinhua publication].

If China retaliates against the United States at this time, in addition to announcing the travel ban on the United States, it also announced the strategic control of medical products and the ban on exports to the United States, then the United States will fall into the ocean of new crown [corona] viruses.

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“Novel Ways to Apply Homicide Liability”

Posted on 20 March 2020 by eehines

That’s what an ex-federal prosecutor in DC and current “legal” analyst for a broadcast network’s cable outlet says he was always on the lookout for in those unfortunate days of his prosecutor-ness.

Rule by law, instead of rule of law—this ex-federal prosecutor is an example of that.

Show me the man, and I’ll find you the crime—this ex-federal prosecutor is the modern example of Lavrentiy Beria.

We have ‘way too many Federal criminal laws, laws, too, that usurp the individual States’ legitimate police powers—this ex-federal prosecutor demonstrates the failure of that and illustrates the need to “quinquagintate” those Federal criminal laws and then target pare from there..

This is a preview of “Novel Ways to Apply Homicide Liability”. Read the full post (141 words, estimated 34 secs reading time)

Reusable Grocery Bags

Posted on 19 March 2020 by eehines

…and reusable shopping bags, generally. These are supposedly better for our environment than nominally single-use plastic or paper bags (though both, until they wear out, can serve other purposes than holding food or other goods—usually two or three reuses until they’re truly ready for the trash or the recycling bin).

The serious questions, though, and ones that have been missed until the current COVID-19 situation has exposed them empirically, are:

For whose environment, exactly, are reusable shopping bags better?

Who, exactly, are the ones doing the reusing?

The answer to the first is…germs.

This is a preview of Reusable Grocery Bags. Read the full post (308 words, estimated 1:14 mins reading time)

A Lesson Learned?

Posted on 19 March 2020 by eehines

Our pharmaceutical companies have decided to bring back to the US some critical drug production capabilities in view of the People’s Republic of China’s current role in that manufacturing supply chain, the interference the Wuhan virus has caused in the PRC’s ability to produce those critical intermediates, and the separate threat of some ranking PRC officials to cut us off from those intermediates.

This is a preview of A Lesson Learned?. Read the full post (640 words, estimated 2:34 mins reading time)

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