Hidden history found beneath Alcatraz

BBC

"A team from Texas A&M University has gathered in the prison's recreation yard, where inmates would have spent as little as an hour a week away from the confines of the main block.

"The researchers are slowly dragging a bright yellow cart along the ground, pulling it up and down in straight lines.

"That's ground-penetrating radar," says Prof Mark Everett.

" 'The cart has a transmitter and a receiver - it sends an electromagnetic wave into the ground that then reflects off all the different structures underneath.

" 'Much like medical imaging would make a scan of the body, we are making a scan of the ground under the rec yard."

"Using this technique, the team has made a remarkable discovery: they have found the remains of a military fortress, which was thought to have been destroyed.

"Standing in the middle of the yard, which is still enclosed by 6m-high (20ft) walls, Prof Everett points to a spot where he has found evidence of a subterranean tunnel system." . . .

. . . 

"The biggest potential discovery so far is at the south of the island, lying beneath the prison's parade ground.

" 'This is an area that is of most historical significance to the park service. It is a very important part of the fortifications," says Prof Everett.

" 'It is called a caponier, and it is a large structure that juts out into the bay and provides defensive cover. We have seen it in the old photographs but it has completely disappeared from present view.' " . . .

. . . Hat tip to Jeff Hayden; Texas

‘Partisan Hogwash’: Tim Scott Rips Pelosi, Senate Dems for Coronavirus Distractions

Washington Free Beacon

Senate Democrats defeated the initial stimulus package on Sunday in a procedural vote after Pelosi announced her desire to push her own stimulus package. Pelosi's stimulus bill was 1,100 pages long, featured a wealth of progressive agenda items, and mentioned "diversity" 32 times.

"Sen. Tim Scott (R., S.C.) on Tuesday criticized Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) and Senate Democrats for slowing down the progress on the coronavirus stimulus package for partisan reasons.

" 'For absolutely no reason, the speaker's passion for partisan hogwash started causing the type of delays that doesn't simply cripple our economy, but it imperils our health care response to people who are infected by the coronavirus," Scott said on the Senate floor.

" 'I honestly cannot believe we are still here not having already passed legislation that would make such a big difference in the lives of so many," he added. "Instead we had to waste time explaining to the speaker and to some of our friends on the other side that airline fuel emissions is not important in this legislation."

"He took aim at Senate Democrats for attempting to include their policy preferences, such as same-day voter registration, early voting, and diversity initiatives in their version of the stimulus package. He said the debates should be had at other times, but not in a moment of crisis.

" 'We all should be interested in diversity, but let's not hold up assistance from families because some folks like the speaker want to use this legislation as a way to bring diversity to boards," Scott said. "Listen, that is not the place for this debate. This conversation should be a conversation about our health care workers, about those infected, about those impacted. Not about partisan political gains."

"Senate Democrats defeated the initial stimulus package on Sunday in a procedural vote after Pelosi announced her desire to push her own stimulus package. Pelosi's stimulus bill was 1,100 pages long, featured a wealth of progressive agenda items, and mentioned "diversity" 32 times." . . .

More

As president, Joe Biden would smash religious freedom with ‘Equality Act’; equality plan will allow LGBT ideology to re-shape our civil liberties.

Paula Rinehart

Former .V.P Joe Biden grows irritated while defending calling V.P. Mike Pence 'a decent guy.'

"As COVID-19 captures headlines, Joe Biden’s plan to promote equality at the expense of religious liberty has quietly slid under the media radar. His newly unveiled policy is called “The Plan to Address LGBTQ Equality in America and Around the World.” It has vast implications for people of faith.

"In his plan, Biden solidifies the Democratic Party’s lurch to the left, leaving behind moderate faith voters whose support he, conceivably, might have won. A quiet legion of faith voters whom Biden likely cannot see privately confess they could be wooed by his personality and winning smile.

"Before Christians jump on the Biden bandwagon, though, they should carefully consider what his equality policy would mean to their everyday lives — and those of their children. His plan profoundly undermines religious liberty, which is the right to live out religious convictions in the public square. It leaves scarcely any aspect of life untouched. 

"The centerpiece of Biden’s 7000-word plan is the passage of the Equality Act, which includes the goal of overturning Trump-era religious policies. The real rub is that sexual orientation and gender identity are granted special legal status with the power to trump religious convictions. Faith-based adoption and foster care agencies would not receive federal grants unless they agreed to place children in same-sex homes. Housing, employment, medical services — all would feel the impact of policies that label religious conviction as discrimination, with the power to sue in court. Some have called this “persecutory progressivism.' ” . . .

All the facts you ever need to know about ABORTION

Lifesite

"The very moment a male sperm cell penetrates a female egg cell, a new human life comes into being. This event, known as fertilization, forms a tiny, single-celled human distinct from his or her mother mother.

This little life is called a zygote, meaning “yoked or joined together.”1 It's the living seed that will be a newborn baby in nine months’ time.   

The zygote’s DNA has its own set of chromosomes and genetic blueprint with data such as whether it’s a boy or a girl, which parent she’ll resemble more, and what color her eyes will be. The information in this one cell is so vast it would take 1.5 million pages to write out!2

The new life is also so small - less than 1/15th the size of a pinhead3 - it can barely be seen by the naked eye. But it packs a punch: it will grow to one billion cells with 4,000 distinct anatomic structures in only 8 weeks.4

Days 4-12 - Embryo implants in mother's uterus

By day four the zygote has left the fallopian tube and entered the uterus, where it can benefit from the nutrients its mother will provide. 

Because the new life is so genetically distinct, it must release a special protein to prevent a defensive response by the mother’s immune system. Then the embryo can implant in the uterine lining,5 where the lifeline between mom and baby begins to form. This process is complete by day twelve after fertilization.6

The embryo also produces a hormone called human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) about eight days after fertilization. This hormone brings the menstrual cycle to a halt, allowing the pregnancy to continue. Present in the mother’s blood and urine, hCG is the substance detected in most pregnancy tests." . . .

. . . Week 20-22 - Baby begins to respond to sound . . .

. . . Week 23 - Baby can learn and remember . . .

. . . "Third Trimester " . . . Able to hear before birth, the fetus becomes highly familiar with the sound of his mother’s voice. So much so that the newborn baby, studies demonstrate, prefers her voice to others. The newborn also prefers “female voices to male voices and familiar lullabies heard before birth to new lullabies after birth.”42

Trump Campaign Calls Twitter’s Bluff On Misleading Campaign Clips

Twitter appears to have walked back its position on flagging campaign video and audio clips.

The Federalist

"Twitter has still not flagged fake news content published by the Biden campaign or the Democratic Super PAC Priorities USA for falsely portraying President Donald Trump calling the Wuhan coronavirus a “hoax.”

"Last month, both former Vice President Joe Biden’s campaign and Priorities USA published deceptively edited videos depicting Trump downplaying the threat from the Wuhan virus by characterizing the outbreak as a new Democratic “hoax” similar to impeachment and Russiagate.

. . . 

"The video from Biden’s campaign racked up more than 300,000 views while the Priorities USA ad went viral garnering more than 15 million on the platform ,despite mainstream fact-checkers such as PolitiFact, Snopes and FacCheck.org each labeling the Democratic charges as false. The resistance Washington Post even rated the Biden video with four Pinocchios, the highest single false rating awarded by the paper. Facebook also flagged a Politico article making the assertion on the platform as fake news.

"Meanwhile, Twitter used its new policy regarding “manipulated media” to tag a video from the Trump campaign where Biden says “we can only re-elect Donald Trump” as misinformation in early March." . . .

Is Biden campaigning to be president of America or Iran?

Former Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who worked with Biden during the Obama administration, said of him, “I think [Biden’s] been wrong on nearly every major foreign policy and national security issue over the past four decades.”  . . .

The New Yorker

Andrea Widburg  "During Joe Biden’s vice presidency, Barack Obama entered into the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, which lifted sanctions from Iran and gave the mullahs $1.7 billion in cash, all based upon Iran’s promises that it would slow its drive towards becoming a nuclear power. Even as he was entering into the deal, Obama admitted that Iran would probably use the money to continue its military build-up and worldwide terrorism.

"There’s reason to believe that Iran used that money to fund its deadly incursions in Syria. In 2018, Donald Trump withdrew from the agreement – something that he was easily able to do because Obama never bothered even trying to get Congress to sign off on the agreement. Trump reimposed sanctions on Iran, which greatly increased that despotic regime’s fragility.

"Joe Biden, though, still thinks that, if we just make nice to Iran, it will be our friend. In some ways, you have to admire a man who still has the naivete of a kindergartener, but that's still not what you want in a potential president of the United States.

"Biden’s latest push to help Iran comes in the form of a formal statement at Medium, in which he says that, because Iran is suffering so badly from COVID-19, America needs to help out. Joe admits, because he has to, that “the Iranian government has failed to respond effectively to this crisis, including lying and concealing the truth from its own people, and it continues to act provocatively in the region. . . .”

"Biden adds, though, that part of Iran’s suffering is Trump’s fault . . ."

The Coronavirus vs. Hollywood Liberals

CELEBS URGE ALL AMERICANS TO ‘SHELTER-IN-MANSION’ LIKE THEY DO

. . . “Have your personal assistants go out for food and liquor,” Cher added. “They’re more expendable. And they can leave stuff at the door and then stay in the guest house until scientists find a cure for this thing.” Other celebrities echoed their sentiments.  . . .

Wayne Lusvardi  "According to data compiled by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health (LACDPH), there have been 3,352 laboratory-confirmed cases and 65 deaths from COVID-19 virus in Los Angeles County since late February 2020.  This equates to a 1.9 percent mortality rate out of all cases or 6.5 deaths out of every 1 million persons in the county or 335 cases (not deaths) per 1 million persons.

"Public health data has been sorted in the data tables below by the highest, lowest and moderate rate of cases, not by deaths. 
Location
"The highest rates of COVID-19 cases are located in Democrat West Los Angeles and Hollywood communities (103 to 201 cases per 100,000) compared to Republican suburbs in East LA County with the lowest case rate (0 to 17 cases per 100,000).  A moderate level of rate of cases is located in Democrat Central Los Angeles in lower-income communities (15 to 34 cases per 100,000). 
Age
"The typical age for contracting the virus ranges from 18 to 65, with a median of about 35 years old and only 20 percent in the elderly 65 and above age group.  Less than 1 percent are children under age 18. 
Income
"Income is bimodal -- meaning greater income is associated with both the highest disease rates (Democrat West LA -- $33,694 to $112,927 per household) and the lowest rates (Republican Eastern suburbs -- $66,891 to $187,444).  Those living in Central LA County with the lowest household income levels ($25,161 to $30,579) have a moderate disease rate. " . . .
Occupation
"Occupation is ighly associated with a higher rate of cases of COVID-19.  White-collar communities clustered in Democrat West LA County have much higher rate of cases (134 out of every 100,000) than in suburban Republican Eastern LA County with mixed blue collar and white-collar occupations (10.5 out of every 100,000)." . . . 

Miley Cyrus changes name to ‘Miley Virus’ to raise awareness of herself  (Parody)

. . . "Well, up steps Miley Cyrus. Though she won’t have any kids until we clean up this “piece-of-s^*t planet”, there are other personal sacrifices equally worthy. As of noon today she has volunteered to be called “Miley Virus”." . . .

                              Pictured, right: Cy...er..Virus.

A Sick Media; They use the coronavirus crisis to play propagandistic arbiters.

The American Spectator  "The other day Chris Hayes of MSNBC was pouting about the media’s coverage of Donald Trump’s press briefings. He called the airing of them “crazy.”

He particularly didn’t like MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell using one of them to talk about “reading the Bible.”
"Hayes’ pouting captures the arrogance and secularist prejudice of the media perfectly. The media sees its role not as a reporter of news but as a propagandistic arbiter — a Big Brother that will tell the public what it can and cannot take seriously.
"The media every day conforms more perfectly to Trump’s description of it as an “opposition party.” Its pulling away from presidential briefings during a national crisis vividly illustrates its status as an opposition party, engaged in a propaganda battle with a president whom it hates.
":The more propagandistic the media becomes, the more it insists that its coverage is “factual.” But no one takes that seriously. As Trump once told the media, “You guys have a real problem. No one believes you anymore.”
"The media has become all opinion, all the time. All the journalistic rigors of yesteryear have disappeared. Most hosts don’t even bother to fake up a just-the-facts mien. They now act like what they are: anti-Trump pundits who look high and low for new angles from which to attack him." . . . More here...

Give Hayes credit where it is due. even if the target was an easy one back in 2016:
MSNBC’s Chris Hayes Condemns Democrat Mob Violence: Participants Should be ‘Identified and Prosecuted’

The press as part of the resistance

OAN flap demonstrates some flaming White House press corps hypocrisy  "The press has been publishing negative stories about One America News correspondent Chanel Rion for quite some time now. She's young, she's conservative, she was homeschooled, she's bright, she's not perfect (any more than they are -- she occasionally gets stories wrong or follows the wrong rabbit holes) and she certainly isn't part of their 'in' crowd. A CNN denizen calls this competitor network "a fringe outlet." Another CNN denizen claims that Rion promotes 'conspiracy theories' which sounds kind of funny coming from the network that spent years promoting the Russia collusion conspiracy. Worst of all, she's liked by President Trump." . . .

Sucking CNN: Anti-Trump Network Fails to Get One Show to Crack Top 20 in First Quarter Ratings

While The Media Plays Politics…A Truthful Timeline of Trump’s Coronavirus Response Emerges  "While the media plays politics to try and use the coronavirus crisis to harm President Trump, one social media hero posted a great timeline of everything the president has done since the beginning of the crisis.
"It’s something that sheds light on the incredible job the president and his team have done. it also pushes back on the constant drumbeat of the media narrative that the president didn’t act soon enough to stop the spread of the coronavirus." . . .

ABC’s Pitts to Pence: Do You ‘Talk to God’ About Those Who Died Because You Acted Late? . . . "So here we had a journalist ask the Vice President if he prays to the Lord with a heart of repentance for having been responsible for dead Americans. Surely, Chuck Todd would be proud of that question." . . .

Coronavirus Consequences Coming into View

Conrad Black
Democrats seeking electoral advantage from this crisis are in an untenable position.  Even in suboptimal circumstances, it is hard to see where any case can be made for mismanagement by the administration.

"The new Democratic pre-electoral chorus is already audibly arising like a Wagnerian finale from the largely hidden choir. President Trump, they intone, bungled this and must be investigated for his incompetence which is costing countless American lives. Because of his negligence and stupidity, the country must be shut down for months to ensure an economic disaster entirely attributable (unsurprisingly) to the contemptible ineptitude of the Bad Orange Man.

Stelter, CNN

"CNN’s Brian Stelter, one of the battle-scarred, grizzled, veterans of the Long March of media Trump-haters, choreographically synchronized with the Washington Post, New York Times, and MSNBC, has already kicked off this new campaign, on the air and on the internet. He has gathered together the usual sampling of Trumpophobic media group-thinkers, and followed Saul Alinsky’s first rule, accusing the enemy of precisely what he and his comrades are doing. Stelter has gone forth to battle with the same grim earnest that he brought to the previous unsuccessful crusades for the Trump-Russia election rigging fable and the impeachment fantasy.
"The pro-Trump media, outnumbered but victorious, will indeed have the effrontery to defend the president and join with the 60 percent of Americans who think that he has generally led well in this struggle against the coronavirus, despite an overly optimistic launch.
"For so long Stelter has uttered the old stock phrases “walls are closing in,” and “the drip, drip, drip,” and the almost daily “bombshell” of each new damaging allegation (that evaporated overnight), that he could be operating on autocue as he storms out of the firehall again, tearing through the pandemic-deserted streets to assault the president on a completely spurious charge one more time. No one can deny the vigor and imperishability of the hate and vitriol that propels the president’s media enemies again and again, no matter how often they are mowed down by the facts." . . .

Lucianne

‘Here We Go Again’—Donald Trump Trashes Nancy Pelosi Coronavirus ‘Witch Hunt’
. . . "Democrats announced Thursday that they would create a new select committee to investigate President Trump’s response efforts and his $2 trillion economic relief package."

Pelosi and Schumer, get out of the President's way and let him run the country

*Amid the confusion, fear, and uncertainty surrounding the outbreak of the Chinese coronavirus pandemic in the United States, one thing is obvious: this country is astonishingly fortunate to have Donald Trump as our president.

Unhinged: Pelosi Claims She Knew About Coronavirus Threat, Defends Prioritizing Impeachment…
"Is that why she dozed off while Trump addressed coronavirus during the SOTU?"

So then the N.O. mayor should blame Pelosi instead?

"You may recall that the most dangerous place on earth, Bob Dole wisely observed, is between Chuck Schumer and the TV cameras".
“If you spent less time on your ridiculous impeachment hoax … and instead focused on helping the people of New York, then New York would not have been so completely unprepared …. You have been missing in action, except when it comes to the “press.”

But the left never gives up:
Pelosi Forms Committee to Investigate Trump Handling of Coronavirus Pandemic
"Committee focus supposed to be on spending of stimulus funds, but has broad enough scope and subpoena power to turn into another impeachment-style fiasco in the middle of a national crisis."

*President Trump Stands Tall

Amid the confusion, fear, and uncertainty surrounding the outbreak of the Chinese coronavirus pandemic in the United States, one thing is obvious: this country is astonishingly fortunate to have Donald Trump as our president. . . .

. . . In stark contrast, national Democrats and national liberal media figures look small.  Chuck Todd of NBC tried to toss poor Joe Biden a softball by asking him if "Trump has blood on his hands for his initial slowness to react to the crisis."  Once he understood the question, even Biden wouldn't agree with Todd.  But rather than acting like a statesman — an American statesman — and publicly supporting the president, Biden has instead either been silent (offering nothing constructive or supportive) or made 8th grade–style snarky criticism from the safety of his unaccountable sidelines.  Biden has confirmed his smallness. . . 

The bottom line of all this: The greatest worry of most journalists and other Democrats is not the virus, it is that Trump might win reelection
We must place our country into the hands of those who love this nation, not those who are the choice of Bett Midler, Maxine Waters, AOC, Rashida Tlaib, Bill Maher, Mazie Hirono, Nancy Pelosi, Megan Rapinoe and most of the US Women's soccer team, Stephen Colbert, anyone now at CNN and MSNBC, Alyssa Milano, Headhunter Griffin, Robert DeNiro and, well... you can name many others, can't you?  The Tunnel Dweller

Trump Acts While Democrats Act Out

The American Spectator
COVID-19 has exposed the grotesque cynicism to which their party has succumbed.

"Numerous news outlets noted on Wednesday that COVID-19 has now killed more Americans than the 9/11 attacks and reported the grim White House revelation that it could end up killing as many as 50 times the number of our fellow citizens than we lost in those acts of terrorism. Very little commentary, however, was devoted to the difference between the Democratic response to the current crisis compared to their reaction to that national emergency. Then, the Democratic Senate majority stood with the Republican House majority at the Capitol and sang “God Bless America.” Even then-Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) said the following about President Bush:

I know that the most important thing now — having been at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue for eight years — is for us to be united, united behind our president and our government, sending a very clear message that this is something that transcends any political consideration or partisanship.

"Now, for the Democrats, the potential deaths of more than 100,000 Americans and the destruction of our national economy no longer “transcend” political considerations or partisanship. Last Sunday morning, for example, the current Democratic Speaker of the House took to the talking-head circuit to make the bizarre claim that President Trump’s management of the coronavirus pandemic is comparable to the negligence of the Roman Emperor Nero, who is supposed to have played a lyre and sung in his palace while watching the city go up in flames." . . .