I also want to clear up my admittedly limited understanding of 5G. I'm not saying it is causing COVID-19, I'm saying it is contributing to the cases or outbreak -- whatever it is, that's another aspect of what is going on -- by breaking down our cell structure and leaving us vulnerable to diseases and cancers. It's one of many factors, including air pollution.
As for whether COVID-19 is real or just seasonal flu being misdiagnosed with inaccurate tests, there seems to be evidence for that. There also seems to be evidence for a US bioweapon that was unleashed in a few select places before boomeranging into a backlash; however, in pondering that more I'm starting to think that was a limited a hangout. I say that because the rapid spread does seem a bit far-fetched given the official cause of transmission, and because every national government in the world (except for Sweden) has taken advantage of the worldwide lockdown to further repress its own citizens.
Anyway, once again I will try to cut down on the colorful language and color bolding typing today. I thank Blogger for allowing me to continue, as well as the readers who are giving me their time.
"‘They will not tell us how bad it is’: Families want more disclosure on nursing home coronavirus outbreaks" by Laura Krantz, Shelley Murphy and Robert Weisman Globe Staff, April 9, 2020
As the number of COVID-19 cases in long-term-care facilities soars, families are growing increasingly frustrated with state officials, saying they have allowed the sites to hide crucial information about how deeply the virus has infiltrated and how their loved ones are doing.
As the number of cases skyrockets, so has the worry and anger of families around the state who are unable to get information about their relatives.
That calls into question their professed concerns regarding the rest of us, really. They are allegedly doing all this to protect us because they care so much. Well, talk is cheap.
Amid the worsening crisis, state officials have repeatedly resisted requests to release a list of senior housing facilities with positive cases, even as they conduct daily phone calls with those facilities and track the number of cases at each.
On Wednesday the state launched a hot line for families of nursing home residents, designed to connect them with the appropriate state agencies, but officials said the line does not provide information about the number of cases in individual nursing homes.
The COVID-19 Response Command Center said in a statement that the state is strongly encouraging facilities to maintain open communication with the families of residents, especially since visitation has been restricted.
“If a family is having difficulty communicating with a facility about concerns they have regarding their loved one, we will help them get answers they need,” added Thomas H. Lyons, a spokesman for the state, but Mary Anne Ferreira, whose 91-year-old mother has lived at Bear Hill Rehabilitation and Nursing Center in Stoneham for five years, said the hot line couldn’t tell her how many people had died of the coronavirus at Bear Hill or how many workers or residents had tested positive. “It’s not helpful for anyone wanting to know what’s going on in a particular nursing home with the coronavirus," she said.
She says “they will not tell us how bad it is.”
The state has ramped up testing in nursing homes. Last week it implemented a program with the Massachusetts National Guard that has now tested 2,031 people in 122 nursing and rest homes and a few assisted-living facilities. The large spike in the number of cases is likely due in part to the increase in testing.
I discussed the inaccuracies and flaws in the tests yesterday.
Marylou Sudders, the state’s secretary of health and human services, announced Thursday that the program will be expanded to offer more mobile testing, so nursing facilities can request kits and administer tests on-site.
In the meantime, AARP this week joined the calls for the state to release the names of facilities with confirmed cases, and a state lawmaker filed a bill that would require more transparency.
Boston attorney Paul Tetzel, who specializes in nursing home abuse and negligence cases, said state and federal regulations require nursing homes to keep residents and family who oversee their health care informed, even during this unprecedented pandemic.
Well, all regulations have been temporarily shelved during the plandemic.
Some facilities have been more forthcoming, but other family members are leaving voicemail after voicemail on jammed phone lines at nursing homes that are increasingly short-staffed because so many workers have fallen ill or been sent home to quarantine.
“The lack of communication is shameful. Human beings deserve better," said Melinda Cox, whose 73-year-old mother has early-onset dementia and lives at Beaumont Rehabilitation and Skilled Nursing Center in Westborough.
They certainly do, and our cherished elders in particular!
Cox’s mother was moved to the Westborough facility with two days’ notice last week from a sister site in Worcester that was relocating residents to become a COVID-19 recovery center for hospital patients.
You can take a look at the facility at least.
Cox said her mother and other Worcester residents weren’t tested before being transferred, and the nursing home operator, Westborough-based Salmon Health and Retirement, hasn’t told her family if other relocated residents were also infected. She said her calls to the Baker administration to protest the involuntary move weren’t returned.
Beaumont’s operator issued a statement late Thursday night saying “our priority at this time is direct staff communication with family members about their loved one." The statement said families are being informed if residents test positive or if there are positive tests at their location.....
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Related:
"A California nursing home where dozens have tested positive for the novel coronavirus was forced to evacuate Wednesday after a majority of its staff failed to show up to work for the second consecutive day, according to public health officials. People wearing masks, gloves, and protective gowns could be seen wheeling residents of the Magnolia Rehabilitation and Nursing Center in Riverside, Calif., one by one on stretchers to waiting ambulances that would take them to other care facilities in the area. At the time of the evacuation, the center was looking after more than 80 patients, 34 of whom have tested positive for coronavirus, Riverside County Public Health Officer Cameron Kaiser said at a news conference. Five employees have also contracted the virus, Kaiser said. Riverside County officials say they do not yet know why many of Magnolia’s staff members stopped reporting for duty. As of Wednesday, Kaiser said his office had not received any complaints from the staff about working conditions at the 90-bed center, which bills itself as ‘‘one of the finest skilled nursing facilities in Riverside, California,’’ but no matter how justified the reasoning may be, Kaiser said he is concerned that the employees’ actions ‘‘could rise to the level of abandonment. Nationwide, all of our health care workers are considered heroes and they rightly are,’’ he said, ‘‘but implicit in that heroism is that people stay at their posts.’’
That's what Hitler told Germans on the Eastern Front when the Soviet steamroller was rolling, and COVID-19 is ripping through California like wildfire.
"About 1,000 spring flowers, some of which were going to line the route of the 2020 Boston Marathon, will be arranged in a heart outside Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and given to health care workers Friday morning as they conclude long shifts at the hospital. Hydrangeas, tulips, pansies, and daffodils will be placed outside Beth Israel by workers from Cityscapes, the Boston-based floral company. A song called “Give A Little Plant,” set to the tune of Supertramp’s 1977 hit “Give A Little Bit,” will play from a Cityscapes truck as the health care workers exit the hospital and take their flowers. Many of the daffodils used in the heart were supposed to line the route of the Boston Marathon on April 20. This year’s marathon was postponed to Sept. 14 due to the spread of COVID-19."
Some must feel guilt at the hero celebration when they are sitting around doing a drill, right?
Also see: All five national parks are closed in Utah
That's odd because they are opening them here.
Just don't break the social distancing rules:
"The City Council passed an emergency ordinance allowing police to fine those who fail to comply with social distancing guidelines to curb the coronavirus, an official said. The new measure allows police to enforce the state’s prohibition of public group gatherings of ten or more people by issuing fines starting at $50, said council president Melinda Barrett. The council took the step Tuesday after people gathered in large groups at Plug Pond, she said. “Folks were clustered in large groups, and when the police asked folks to disperse, [they were met] with a mixed response," Barrett said. The ordinance does not prohibit ten or more people from gathering in a public space, given they are at least six feet apart from each other. Governor Charlie Baker and other state leaders say social distancing is essential to prevent the spread of COVID-19, which had killed 503 people in Massachusetts as of Thursday. Those not in compliance will be fined $50 for a first offense, $100 for a second offense, and $300 for a third and subsequent offenses, Barrett said."
Some resistance still out there, huh, as those who have known freedom chafe under the lash.
"Before coronavirus, 2 out of 3 Mass. nursing homes broke the rules for preventing outbreaks; Violations ranged from staff not following basic hygiene measures to failing to track and monitor infection" by Matt Rocheleau and Robert Weisman Globe Staff, April 9, 2020
When the coronavirus began creeping into the state, posing a particular menace to older residents, many nursing homes already were struggling to comply with federal standards designed to prevent the spread of infections.
Nearly two-thirds of nursing homes in Massachusetts were cited at least once within the past three years for a deficiency in infection control, violations that ranged from staff not following basic hygiene measures to failing to track and monitor outbreaks, according to records from the US Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.
Even weeks into the coronavirus outbreak, nursing homes across the nation have been failing to follow rudimentary infection-control rules in startling numbers.
Federal inspectors have visited about 80 facilities since March 23 and reported staff weren’t properly washing their hands at more than one-third of facilities they visited; officials didn’t release state-level findings. Personal protective equipment wasn’t properly used at a quarter of the locations, even though both are longstanding federal requirements, officials said, “and that was right in front of the inspectors. So you know what it must be like when there are no inspectors around,” said Charlene Harrington, professor emerita at the University of California, San Francisco, who has closely studied nursing home quality for decades.
Experts say the track record of infection-control deficiencies, coupled with the abrupt arrival of a new, fast-spreading virus that is particularly troublesome for older populations, has left many nursing homes outmatched.
As of Wednesday, there were 1,236 confirmed cases of coronavirus among residents and staff at 140 long-term care facilities in Massachusetts, according to state health officials. The figures are believed to vastly undercount the actual number of cases because testing remains widely unavailable.
They want to test everyone!
The violation data for Massachusetts nursing homes, from the US Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, largely tracks with national statistics that show more than 70 percent of nursing homes were cited at least once within the past three years for a deficiency in infection control.
Such deficiencies are the most common type levied against such facilities in the United States. Many nursing homes have been repeat offenders.....
Must be a tough job then.
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About five years ago there was a big $candal regarding the nur$ing homes, and even further back was the $candal where they were being fed massive amounts of pharmaceuticals as a captive population.
After that, the Pharma foisted opioids on us, overprescribe statins, and lowered BP targets so more prescriptions would be written. It's always something, as they need a constant stream of new revenue (the government money came just in time).
"Mass. reports 2,151 new coronavirus cases, 70 new related deaths; Baker promises to direct benefits to unemployed workers" by Martin Finucane and Travis Andersen Globe Staff, April 9, 2020
The devastating costs of the coronavirus pandemic continued to climb Thursday as the death toll in Massachusetts surpassed 500, the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases saw its largest single-day increase, and the state sustained a third consecutive week of massive layoffs.
Governor Charlie Baker vowed Thursday that the state would make every effort to deliver jobless benefits. As the economic fallout from the pandemic widened, state health officials reported that 70 more people had died from the outbreak, bringing the total to 503. A Suffolk County woman in her 30s was among the casualties.
Then he better $tart repleni$hing that fund as layoffs reach staggering levels for Mass. hotel, restaurant, and construction workers (Larry Edelman spoke with Samuel Kasten, who lost his sales job Tuesday at Toast, and Michael Goodman, an economist and executive director of the Public Policy Center at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth).
At least these companies make working from home almost fun, and check out these work-from-home office spaces as Vertex shares reach new heights amid pandemic. Seems like a crazy time to change chief executives, but it was a good quarter for biotech venture capital.
Elderly residents continue to bear the brunt of the virus’s onslaught. The overwhelming majority of the 503 deaths related to the coronavirus have been of people ages 70 or older, many with underlying health conditions. One percent of fatalities in Massachusetts have been residents under age 50.
In Massachusetts, almost half of the people who have tested positive for COVID-19 are under age 50. That figure is disproportionately low for a state in which 62 percent of the population is under 50, according to US Census figures.
“It’s really more about who has the complications leading to hospitalization and death,” said Dr. Shira I. Doron, an epidemiologist at Tufts University School of Medicine. “You expect your hospitalization data and your death data to track with age, but you don’t necessarily expect your positive test data to reflect a difference over age groups.”
Even at this point in the outbreak, it remains unclear how widely the virus has spread in Massachusetts. Although the state has significantly ramped up testing in recent weeks, there still has not been enough to provide a complete picture, Doron said.
Baker reiterated that state officials expect the COVID-19 “peak” to hit Massachusetts at some point between April 10 and 20. “I don’t have a crystal ball with respect to how long it’s going to last or how high it’s going to go," Baker said. “I really appreciate the seriousness that the people of Massachusetts have brought to distancing and staying at home.”
Nationally, Anthony Fauci of the White House coronavirus task force said that the number of deaths might reach 60,000 — far lower than the original 100,000 to 200,000 estimate.
In Chelsea, where at least 10 people have died from the illness and nearly 400 people have tested positive, the city manager urged residents to remain indoors at all times to slow the outbreak.
“These are desperate times,” said Thomas Ambrosino. “It seems like Chelsea is the epicenter of the coronavirus ... based on the sheer number of people infected per our population.”
It's a city of the working Latino immigrants.
Ambrosino called on state officials to commandeer local hotel rooms so residents can recover from COVID-19 in isolation and said widespread job losses have devastated the city. Chelsea and the city of Revere are already spending $800,000 to rent a motel for two months for recovering COVID-19 patients, he said.
“In the best of economic times, many people get by here on the margins. They scrape by working two or three jobs,” Ambrosino said. “Those jobs are gone now.”
At his daily briefing at the State House, Baker said Massachusetts officials had received some guidance on how to administer federal jobless benefits. Starting Thursday, all residents eligible for regular unemployment benefits will receive an additional $600 per week under the federal initiative. The funds are retroactive to March 29, he said, and will continue through the end of July. People who are eligible and already receiving unemployment benefits do not need to do anything to receive the extra money, he said.
The state expects to begin processing benefits through a second federal program at month’s end. That program will provide benefits to “individuals who are not working as a result of COVID-19 and are self-employed, independent contractors, gig economy workers, and others,” Baker’s office said.
Why not right away?
Baker acknowledged delays in processing unemployment benefits and said improving the system is a priority.
“This is frustrating for many, many people here in Massachusetts who have lost their jobs through no fault of their own," he said. “You have our commitment that we are going to continue to do all that we can to get the resources out the door.”
The fault lies with people like him!
State lawmakers continued to address the widespread fallout from the pandemic.
Under a bill that the House and Senate sent to Governor Charlie Baker’s desk on Thursday, State Education Commissioner Jeff Riley would be required to waive MCAS requirements for the current academic year.
The bill also permits the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education to modify or waive high school graduation competency requirements to address the disruptions caused by the outbreak of COVID-19, which has forced schools to close.
Excuse me?
Everybody just passes?
Lieutenant Governor Karyn Polito said state officials are concerned about victims of domestic and sexual violence who may feel trapped at home.
Just now?
I'm more than three-quarters of the way through the article, and the Globe is just happy crime is down.
In Boston, city officials released data that showed stark disparities in infection rates between the city’s Black and white residents. Meanwhile, infection rates among the city’s white residents are almost the reverse.
“Equity remains a major focus as we respond to the coronavirus pandemic,” Mayor Martin J. Walsh said at a news conference. Walsh also noted that, although Sunday is Easter and Jewish residents are currently celebrating Passover, residents should continue to avoid large gatherings.
Was he wearing his mask?
“God certainly understands” that residents can’t go to church or temple or celebrate with large gatherings this year, he said, urging residents to “respect life by protecting life.”
Now Marty Walsh is speaking for God?
Not even I do that!
On Friday, the city will open the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center to COVID-19 patients, officials said.
In a hopeful sign, testing has begun in Somerville on a massive decontamination machine that officials hope can eventually clean as many as 80,000 respirator masks a day.
“We are doing test runs now,” said Dr. Paul Biddinger, medical director for emergency preparedness at Partners HealthCare. “We have to make sure it works.”
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Related:
Universities in Boston area to house health care workers, first responders during the COVID-19 crisis
They sent you kids home so they could run a drill!
Also see:
Coronavirus exposed the lack of Internet access. Now some in Congress want to close that digital divide
It's THE GREAT DIVIDE, and if the kids aren't wired up to 5G they are going to be ‘unreachable and will fall behind.’
(above fold)
The Massachusetts National Guard removed their hazmat suits after leaving Alliance Health at Marina Bay on Thursday. They were deployed to Quincy to assist nursing homes with COVID-19 testing. (Stan Grossfeld/ Globe Staff)
Yeah, that sure did catch the eye!
"Reports of child abuse and neglect are plummeting across New England. That’s not a good thing; In Massachusetts, child welfare officials say they’re prepping for their own ‘surge’" by Matt Stout Globe Staff, April 9, 2020
In a normal week in March, Massachusetts officials can be bombarded with thousands of allegations of children being left unsupervised, beaten, or worse, but, almost overnight, those reports have been sliced by more than half. Child welfare workers who spend their nights hustling to emergency calls are seeing far fewer.
None of that is good news.
As people retreat inside their homes to stem the escalating COVID-19 pandemic, reports of child abuse and neglect are plunging throughout New England.
The trend is tied not to evidence of some sudden drop in children being harmed, however, but likely to another reality: A host of mandated reporters — teachers, pediatricians, day care workers — are seeing at-risk children far less often, if at all, robbing states of their most reliable beacons for potential abuse.
They were not doing that hot before all this, and I am sick of writing the same thing every five or ten years. We are given the illusion of change from the agenda-pu$hing $tatus quo paper before said scandals are dispatched down the memory hole.
It’s not the only challenge facing the agency. DCF officials did not specify how many pieces of protective equipment they’ve distributed to workers, but Andrea Grossman, a DCF spokeswoman, said the agency last week received what she described as an eight-week supply of masks and gloves that have gone to 29 local offices. As of Wednesday, at least 12 DCF workers had tested positive for COVID-19.
Like those in most companies or agencies, workers are also trying to navigate an increasingly virtual operation, and to remain safe when they must still visit homes, including for emergencies or to remove a child from a house (Massachusetts courts are closed to the public, but remain open for emergency matters), but that new normal requires a two-way street: DCF workers have increasingly relied on iPads in recent years, but the low-income families they serve may not have the same technology.
“It’s a really big issue in the child welfare world during the pandemic,” said Susan Elsen, a child welfare advocate at the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute. "There’s a lot of good work going on to make that available to families, which is so important because you can have the best services but if the families can’t access them, they don’t do any good.”
That is the point of the COVID-19 panic and psyop. Get all the kids connected.
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Not going to go into the link between peanut allergies and the vaccines today.
What stinks?
"A new warning: Vaping and smoking may increase risk that COVID-19 will hit you hard" by Felice J. Freyer Globe Staff, April 9, 2020
Attorney General Maura Healey and Massachusetts General Hospital warned that smoking and vaping may increase the risk of severe illness from COVID-19, in an advisory sent Thursday to medical professionals, educators, and parent and advocacy groups.
Healey and Mass. General assert that smoking and vaping damage the lungs and weaken the immune system, putting people at greater risk of needing hospitalization and advanced life support if they become infected.
(COUGH)
This is being trotted out at this time, along with the air pollution explanation, is an attempt to distract from the 5G.
That is not to say smoking is good for you. I think drawing any hot smoke into your lungs can't be good for lung capacity. That's a given. The flip side of it is the medical properties of some herbs and the relief it brings to some people, so who are you or I to take that away from them?
The advisory was quickly denounced as a political stunt by a pro-vaping advocacy group, which pointed out the lack of studies connecting vaping with COVID-19 illness and cited Healey’s ongoing legal battle with JUUL, the largest e-cigarette maker, but several experts agreed that now is a good time to urge people to quit both smoking and vaping.
I'm glad to see the "experts" are not allowing a ‘‘crisis to go to waste.’’
Healey is “sending a message out that could potentially have a far greater positive impact than normal, because we’re all worried about what we can do to make sure we have as healthy lungs as possible,” said Matthew L. Myers, president of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids.
I am sick of getting messages from liars.
There is, in fact, no data showing whether vaping — either tobacco or cannabis — increases the severity of COVID-19, because no one has gathered the information, but research shows that smokers are more likely to need intensive care or to die if they become infected with the novel coronavirus, and a bread-crumb trail of studies about vaping’s effects on the lungs lead to the notion that vaping could make people vulnerable.
Look at all the qualifiers in that one!
“This is just plain common sense at this time to get off of these products,” said Dr. Jonathan Winickoff, director of pediatric research at the Massachusetts General Hospital Tobacco Research and Treatment Center.
It probably does, but we are supposed to be a free country with adults allowed the choice of what legal products they wish to consume.
Related: Thai alcohol ban to curb virus now spans 16 million
Oh, yeah, Charlie left the liquor stores open (must be the campaign ca$h) because we don't want to be like Thailand.
In both vaping and smoking, Winickoff said, tiny particles enter the lungs and paralyze the cilia, the hair-like protrusions on cells that clear the lungs of mucus before viruses and bacteria can attach. This makes a person more vulnerable to infections. Additionally, he said, other research shows that e-cigarettes impair the immune system and that the flavoring agents increase inflammation, which makes it harder for lungs to oxygenate the blood.
There they go again, laying the groundwork for the spin.
Vaping cannabis can also damage lung cells and, in animals, smoking marijuana has been shown to increase viral replication, Winickoff said.
“Clean air is what the lungs should be inhaling, especially during a global pandemic," he said.
This as they order you to stay home and stay inside!
(COUGH)
Winickoff also pointed out that the hand-to-mouth contact common during smoking and vaping could lead to faster spread of the coronavirus.
For Healey, the advisory continues a long history of anti-vaping efforts, which include suing JUUL Labs for marketing their products to young people and suing eight online e-cigarette retailers for illegally selling to Massachusetts consumers.
The renewed concern over vaping comes exactly four months after Governor Charlie Baker’s ban on e-cigarette sales ended. Baker had imposed the ban amid a nationwide surge in lung illnesses related to vaping, mostly the use of illicit cannabis products with toxic additives.
In retrospect, it appears that the vaping crisis was not what I had initially $u$pected. I had thought it was an underhanded way to sabotage the marijuana markets, and maybe it still was. They couldn't ban flower outright without making Tucker and looking like fools; however, it now appears that COVID -- if it exists -- might have been loose in American much earlier (the BU bio lab is just down the street). The symptoms are the same, and maybe authority was simply flailing about for an explanation and cover at that time, with the added benefit of restricting vape sales. They never found any toxic materials or cause, either. They just quietly dropped the whole thing after a few months.
The anti-vaping message Thursday was denounced as “shameful” by Gregory Conley, president of the American Vaping Association, a group that works to encourage adult smokers to switch to vaping and that receives funding from e-cigarette retailers.
“Adult smokers should not be scared off from switching to smoke-free nicotine products by unscrupulous politicians out to generate headlines,” Conley said in a statement.
Or anything else they tell us, for that matter!
The Vapor Technology Association, an industry trade group, raised similar objections in a statement, calling it “reckless” to suggest a link between COVID-19 and vaping. “The more public officials discourage Americans from vaping, the more they are encouraging smoking at the worst possible time and without a scientific basis for doing so,” the statement said.
Those are our public and health officials for you!
Dr. Michael B. Siegel, a Boston University tobacco researcher who supports vaping as an alternative to smoking, nevertheless welcomed Healey’s initiative — cautioning that quitting vaping “should not come at the expense of going back to smoking. Many vapers are former smokers,” and the effects of smoking, he said, are clearly more severe, especially in suppressing the immune system. “With vaping, we’re not talking about a very specific effect. It’s a general irritant effect which may make it more difficult to deal with severe lung illness,” he said. “This is a perfect time to really emphasize the risk of smoking and the use of any tobacco product,” Siegel said.
With children sequestered at home, many parents are learning for the first time that their children are vaping, either because they discover vaping products or because their children go into nicotine withdrawal, said Dorian Fuhrman, a co-founder of PAVe - Parents Against Vaping e-cigarettes.
Fuhrman said her New York-based advocacy group has been receiving distress calls from many families. A mother who had been active in PAVe was shocked to see a disposable vaping pod fall out of her teenage son’s pocket. Another wrote that her daughter and husband, terrified of COVID-19, had both decided to quit, and after one day they were “melting down.” Fuhrman pointed them to resources to help cope.
They still sell cigarettes, right?
Andy Tan, assistant professor of social and behavioral sciences at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, noted that smoking rates are highest among low-income and marginalized populations, the same people who are facing the most stress, such as job loss, amid the pandemic.
Urging people to quit an addictive substance in the midst of such troubles “is asking a lot,” he said, but he said many of these people are vulnerable to COVID-19 in other ways, and it would be to their advantage to remove the risk that comes with tobacco use.
Healey’s advisory includes suggestions on how to quit, such as obtaining nicotine patches or gum, seeking coaching and support, and.....
How about BANNING TOBACCO ENTIRELY?
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Baker is coming under fire from all quarters now:
"Gun shops, others sue Baker to allow firearms sales amid pandemic; Governor has ordered firearm dealers to close under nonessential business ban" by Matt Stout Globe Staff, April 9, 2020
A coalition of gun shops, advocacy groups, and would-be gun owners sued Governor Charlie Baker in federal court Thursday in a bid to allow shuttered firearm dealers to legally reopen amid the novel coronavirus pandemic.
The lawsuit argues Baker stepped on prospective owners’ constitutional rights when he ordered gun shops to close as part of a sweeping ban on nonessential businesses designed to help stop the spread of COVID-19. The decision, the lawsuit states, amounts “to a ban on obtaining modern arms for personal defense."
“This emergency — like any other emergency — has its constitutional limits,” the 18-page complaint reads. “It would not justify a prior restraint on speech, nor a suspension of the right to vote. Just the same, it does not justify a ban on obtaining guns and ammunition.”
The plaintiffs, which include four gun shops and groups such as Commonwealth Second Amendment and the Second Amendment Foundation, also argue that “personal self-defense is most acute during times of uncertainty and crisis.” They cite the potential release of some inmates amid the pandemic and that some suspects “may be less likely to be taken into custody in the first place.”
“It is precisely times like these that the Plaintiffs and the Plaintiffs’ members need to be able to exercise their fundamental rights to keep and bear arms,” the lawsuit reads.
It’s the second legal challenge Baker has faced in as many days after a group of marijuana businesses and consumers sued him in state court over his decision to shut down recreational cannabis operations.
And you thought I forgot about that!
The lawsuit also follows others around the country where critics have challenged similar closures, including in states that later reversed course.
New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy initially closed but then allowed gun shops to reopen after federal officials changed their guidelines. Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf also allowed gun dealers to reopen last month after three justices on the state’s highest court urged him to do so.
Baker ordered a swath of businesses, including gun dealers, to shutter their physical stores on March 24. He expanded the list of businesses considered “essential” roughly a week later, including adding gun distributors and manufacturers.
The list also included, albeit briefly, retailers and shooting ranges, but they were abruptly removed the same day. Baker’s office has said it followed federal guidelines but “tailored the list to reflect [the state’s] unique economy."
So not only is his administration an outlaw, they are damn liars, too.
A spokesman for Baker declined to comment Thursday on the lawsuit, which also names Baker’s public health commissioner and several local chiefs who enforced the order.
According to the lawsuit, one plaintiff, Jim Simmons of New Bedford, bought a handgun from a Westport gun shop on March 30 — even though Baker’s first order closing gun retailers had already been in effect for close to a week, but "due a delay in the background check system,” Simmons was told to come back three days later, on April 2. In the time between, Baker released his revised order, and the state on April 2 sent notices to local police “reinforcing” the order, according to the lawsuit.
Simmons, who has a valid gun permit but doesn’t own any guns, returned to the story that day only to be turned away by Westport police, according to the lawsuit.
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Also see:
Suspended head of Holyoke Soldiers’ Home accuses state officials of lying
State officials lie?
Surely he jests!
Meanwhile, on display in the dairy aisle are empty MBTA trains are rumbling into empty stations as subway ridership has plummeted (Green Line down 95 percent; Red Line, the most traveled of all subway routes, down 92 percent; Orange Line dropped 91 percent; Blue Line down 88 percent).
Family and city celebrate Woburn woman’s 102nd birthday with social distancing motorcade
You couldn't even run alongside it.
Boston Sports Clubs finally stops collecting fees at closed gyms
They aren't refunding any money, though.
"Prosecutors rip bid by Lori Loughlin, other ‘Varsity Blues’ parents to dismiss indictment in college admissions case" by Travis Andersen Globe Staff, April 9, 2020
Federal prosecutors on Wednesday blasted an effort by Hollywood star Lori Loughlin and several other parents charged in the “Varsity Blues” college bribery case to have their indictment dismissed, calling the request a “smokescreen” meant to obscure their unlawful conduct.
Prosecutors made the assertions in their written opposition, filed in US District Court in Boston, to the defendants’ motion to dismiss the indictment or, in the alternative, suppress certain evidence.
Loughlin and her husband, fashion designer Mossimo Giannulli, are among several parents charged with multiple crimes for allegedly paying bribes to get their children into selective colleges as fake athletic recruits. They’ve pleaded not guilty.
The defendants last month filed their dismissal motion, asserting prosecutors withheld evidence from the scheme’s admitted ringleader, William “Rick” Singer, indicating Singer told parents their payments were legitimate donations to school athletic programs.
In Wednesday’s filing, the feds pushed back hard.
“The defendants’ core allegations of misconduct are premised on a straw man: that this case is only about bribery. It is not,” prosecutors wrote. “The defendants are charged with conspiring to engage in a single, sweeping scheme to gain admission for their children to college by, among other things, lying about their academic and athletic qualifications so that complicit coaches, induced by bribes styled as ‘donations’ to their programs, could purport to recruit them as elite athletes.”
I already have a reasonable doubt. Lelling is a grandstander and didn't turn over evidence!
I guess the law is for the rest of us and not the Party, 'er, $TATE.
In the case of Loughlin and her husband, prosecutors wrote, Singer helped get both their daughters into USC as phony crew recruits. The university confirmed last fall that the daughters are no longer enrolled.
In August 2016, prosecutors said, Singer told Loughlin and her spouse that he would “create a coxswain profile” for their older daughter and that “[i]t would probably help to get a picture with her on an ERG [indoor rowing machine] in workout clothes like a real athlete too.”
The daughter did not row competitively, prosecutors said, but Giannulli responded via email, "Fantastic. Will get all.” Following the daughter’s provisional admission to USC as a bogus recruit, the feds said, Singer directed Giannulli via email to send a $50,000 check to a former school athletics official, now charged in connection with the case, with the check made out to USC Athletics.
When Giannulli asked if he should categorize the check as a donation for accounting purposes, Singer replied, “Yes,” prosecutors wrote. The couple later made additional payments totaling $400,000 to Singer’s sham charity as purported donations after the daughters were formally accepted, prosecutors allege.
In late 2018, when Singer was cooperating with the FBI, he had a secretly recorded phone conversation with Loughlin in which he told her the IRS was auditing his charity, but “nothing has been said about the girls, your donations helping the girls get into USC to do crew even though they didn’t do crew,” prosecutors wrote.
Loughlin, prosecutors said, replied, "So we just – so we just have to say we made a donation to your foundation and that’s it, end of story?” Singer said, "That is correct,” prosecutors wrote.
“The gravamen of the defendants’ motion is their contention that the government fabricated evidence that they understood their payments to be illicit ‘bribes’ going ‘to the coaches’ rather than legitimate ‘donations’ ‘to the university,’ and then sought to withhold evidence of that fact from them,” prosecutors wrote, “but that contention is flatly untrue – it is belied by the allegations in the indictment and the evidence in this case – and it doesn’t even make logical sense.”
It wouldn't be the first time government has fabricated "evidence" and then lied about it.
In fact, it's seems to be Standard Operating Procedure.
A representative of Loughlin and Giannulli’s legal team didn’t immediately respond to an e-mail seeking comment Thursday.
The defense said in last month’s dismissal motion that notes kept by Singer show federal agents engineered “a sham . . . in an effort to ‘entrap’ Defendants and ‘nail’ them ‘at all costs,’ ” and that prosecutors hid those notes from defense attorneys.
That's what it looked like to me.
The defendants say at least two federal prosecutors saw Singer’s notes in October 2018, but “the prosecution buried this evidence and repeatedly misrepresented to Defendants and the Court that it had fully complied with its” legal obligations.
The disclosure of Singer’s notes should have been made no later than 30 days after indictment under court rules, the lawyers said.
In Wednesday’s filing, prosecutors conceded they should have disclosed Singer’s notes in a more timely manner but argued that the defendants, who aren’t scheduled to go to trial until October at the earliest, haven’t suffered any unfair prejudice.
“Moreover, the notes are just 47 pages long and, of those, the defendants contend that only a few lines are exculpatory,” the feds wrote.
That their "legal" argument, is it?
--more--"
Actress Lori Loughlin left Moakley Federal Court last August. (John Tlumacki/Globe Staff/file)
I don't blame her for being wary of the Globe, as she is a scholar and an artist even if her career is dead:
Hal Willner, part producer, part synthesizer of genres
He had symptoms consistent with the coronavirus and died in his apartment on the Upper West Side of Manhattan.
Idelle Weber, who stretched the meaning of pop art, dies at 88
She had been in an assisted living facility, according to her daughter, who confirmed the death but did not specify a cause.
John Prine said profound things in simple ways
His lyrics caught and kept you.
Mort Drucker, Master of the Mad Caricature, Is Dead at 91
His daughter, Laurie Bachner, told the Associated Press that he fell ill last week, having difficulty walking and developing breathing problems. She did not give a specific cause of death and said that he was not tested for the coronavirus.
Former Syracuse football coach Frank Maloney dead at 79
He died Monday at his home in Chicago, his family told the university. The cause was metastic brain cancer.
At least the Draft remains on track.
Forbes list values Red Sox at $3.3 billion
They are very much alive then!
John G. Davies, Olympic medalist, Rodney King judge, 90
The cause was cancer, his son, Jack, said.
James Drury, taciturn star of ‘The Virginian’
They did not specify a cause.
"State Police are asking for the public’s help to identify the body of a man found washed up on Revere Beach earlier this week, officials said Thursday.The body was found near the Oak Island bath house around 6:50 a.m. Tuesday by a resident of a high-rise housing complex who called police. The cause and manner of death is still under investigation. A post-mortem examination showed the man stood about five feet 11 inches tall, and is thought to be between 30 and 40 years old, the statement said. A metal plate was found in his back during his autopsy, indicating he had lower back surgery in the past, according to the statement. Anyone with information about a man who matches that description, who is missing or unaccounted for, should call the State Police Detective Unit for Suffolk County....."
