The Land of The “Free”: The True Cost of Free Stuff

“From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs…”

Some of you may already know where this famous quote comes from and who wrote it, but for those who aren’t familiar with it and its context, I want you to ponder its meaning. It sounds pretty straightforward: Those who can contribute more resources should and the resources should be given to those most in need of them. On its face it sounds like a great way of running a community, however have you thought deeper into the implications and perhaps unintended consequences of such a policy? How much should people be obligated to contribute to wider society? What types of resources should be given to the collective whole? Labor? Materials? Food supplies? Healthcare? Shelter? Do those who give get compensation for their output or not and if so, how much is fair? Who gets to receive this bounty of whatever is given by those who are able to give? What exactly makes one eligible to receive it? Perhaps more importantly yet more abstractly, is it fair that some can get with little effort what others must work hard for? Just because someone has a harder time acquiring some resource for themselves, does it mean they shouldn’t have to put in equal effort into getting it as someone who puts in great effort and is able to obtain more of it?

If it hasn’t been clear by now, the person who this quote is attributed to none other than Karl Marx. Yes, the one and only communist “revolutionary”. In Marx’s vision, society would collectively provide for the needs of everyone and there wouldn’t be social inequalities. However, communism in practice rather than theory in countries such as Russia, Venezuela, Cuba etc… has only led to turmoil, unrest and drastic shortages of the very resources this ideology claims to distribute equitably so that there would be no shortages! People flee in droves from countries with Marxist policies including the quote above. A great case study being how badly East Germans wanted to go escape to West Germany. One country, yet divided with two different social policies and everyone wanted to go to the non-communist side! Countries with communist and socialist policies overall are plagued by shortages of resources such as food/water, clothes and other goods, materials, decent shelter, healthcare and more!

So what does this have to do with the United States since technically we aren’t a communist country? We have a capitalist system, yet this is often highly criticized as being too cut throat and sink or swim in nature to serve everyone. We also do in fact, collectively give to certain resources such as taxpayer money funding infrastructure such as roads and the upkeep of public spaces, public schools, emergency services as well as resources such as social security, welfare, food stamps etc. However there are privatized industries here too, including healthcare, private schools, housing, higher education, supermarket chains, and businesses that cater to one’s every need or whim. Some of these privatized industries many argue, ought to be collectively funded and given for free to everyone like in other countries. For example, Canada and many European countries have free healthcare paid for by everyone’s tax contributions. Same for higher education in many other countries. Many countries have paid maternity leave for far longer than America. People cite inequalities and obstacles to getting these resources here, and say we ought to be like those nations and all our problems would be solved. The grass may not be greener on the other side though…

Have you ever heard the phase “too good to be true”? Something sounds really cool and the best part is, there are no strings attached and yet, it would be incredibly naïve to think that there wasn’t a catch! When we think of the word free, we tend to think this means there is literally no cost involved in acquiring something. Free samples are just handed out at no charge to you in the supermarket. Free items like those dinky office supplies are given out at a career fair. You can just take whatever you find in the free box at a yard sale. So why not then, wouldn’t that apply to “free” healthcare, higher education, food, shelter etc? Well, doesn’t it still require labor and resources to make these a reality? Imagine how many moving parts and people it takes to smoothly run a large hospital, or University. How many hours of labor and manpower does it take to grow food then distribute it nationwide? How much do materials cost to build houses as well as hours of labor to build them? Should those who are able to work hard to give us these incredible resources do it with no compensation for themselves? Would it be remotely fair to ask people to do it for free? To give the raw materials for free? Their expertise they had to get at a cost to them? Case and point is, these so called free resources aren’t truly free! So then the question becomes, who’s paying?

Most often, it’s YOU! You’re paying for these free resources out of your own tax dollars. You might pay into a collective system that isn’t even relevant to your own needs while another benefits but doesn’t pay a cent for it! You may not ever need welfare, but have put your blood, sweat and tears figuratively or even literally, into providing a decent home for your family yet have to also foot the bill for another family’s home who hadn’t even put in a fraction of the effort you have to get it. While some people have a genuine need for resources such as welfare, or food stamps, and work hard to get off both, the system as it stands is ripe for abuse and freeloading. Why put in effort to have what is easily given to you for free? The Left’s perfect excuse for giving out these resources like candy is that since shelter is a basic need, it therefore must be an indisputable human right, justifying others footing the bill! Since it’s a human right to have a decent place to live, people are entitled to live in a neighborhood or a house you worked all your life to be able to barely afford. The homeless put in fancy hotels in some cities are living in suites you saved years to spend a night or two with your family for a luxury vacation. They may need shelter, but do they need the king sized bed, panoramic view, and the jacuzzi that goes with the room? People need food and water, yet is it fair you have to pay a large grocery bill each week and your water bill and some don’t? Some may argue that you have the privilege to afford these things so you shouldn’t be so selfish to think others who aren’t able should struggle. However, who said it was easy to budget to put food on your own table? Do these detractors look at your pay stubs and your grocery bills? What about the fact you hold down a job you may not like to afford these and the other guy is getting food stamps off welfare? Just because you can afford something doesn’t mean that was easy for you! Are equal outcomes fair when unequal effort was put into getting it?

The other possibility of who picks up the tab for all this free stuff is even scarier: The government. Our tax dollars go to certain things in our countries and locally, however the government then uses these funds in any way they see fit. Take the free healthcare systems of Canada and Europe for examples. Everyone can get medical care without having an astronomical hospital bill, or get a life saving medicine free of the sometimes outrageous prices in this country! Sounds great, right? Something many would be happy to contribute to as we all will need healthcare at some point in our lives. The catch is, he who pays, makes the rules! You need an important treatment or surgery? Make sure you’re eligible to meet the government’s criteria for a priority case such as your age, SES, race (yes, even if they’ll never admit it!) sex etc… Note I never mentioned anything about an actual clinical need for prioritizing your case! Heaven forbid you’re medically complex and old enough to just be quietly “ignored” and left to die! Your end of life care might come sooner than you wanted! If you’re a white middle aged male who needs a life saving bypass surgery don’t be surprised if your surgery is pushed out to squeeze in the “marginalized” patient with a similar issue but less medically urgent need. Free access to a limited resource will still produce unequal access, only difference is the buyer can pick and choose who gets it and who doesn’t according to any social agenda they choose! Maybe that hospital bill doesn’t look so bad if it means being able to choose the healthcare right for your needs over whether or not your case is politically favorable…

Another case is something we currently have now: Public schools. The government controls public schools and look where that leaves us: Brainwashing our kids with only one “desirable” view of the country, pitting one race against another, denying clear science over sex and gender, rewriting history to suit their narrative and teaching them to see their own parents as backwards if they don’t subscribe to what the school teaches them. Compared to private schools, public schools have lower test scores and less academic rigor overall. There are better student/teacher ratios, smaller class sizes, more individualized instruction, more resources for learning, a greater variety of class subjects offered, greater networking opportunities, and more. Not that some private schools aren’t teaching radical Left leaning propaganda too as many are sadly, but overall you will find a better environment for your children than public can offer. Sadly many families can’t afford private, and I myself went to public k-12, but the point is, the option is out there and one can see the sad state government run schools are in. If the point is equal access to a great education, why not put more effort into creating a better public system?

A final point to bring up aside from the strings that are indeed attached to the so called “free” resources is not only the financial cost of their upkeep, but also the ethical and moral costs. What is equitable is not always fair. As asked earlier, is it fair for someone to get easily what someone else worked several times harder to get? Is it fair another person can live in the same neighborhood on welfare you saved decades to be able to afford to live in due to some zoning law about subsidized housing requirements? Is it fair you work hard at a job you wish to leave but can’t to put cheaper groceries on your family’s table while someone on food stamps can cheat the system and buy luxury brands, or afford their booze and cigarettes but claim they can’t feed their children so they get on food stamps while an injured veteran and his family are pushed to the back of the line? Poverty may equalize, but not all circumstances that get one there are equal…

Also, much of it is subjective, there is no objective standard to differentiate true needs from wants. For example, take coverage of certain medications. Insulin, a lifesaving drug for those with diabetes is astronomically priced and for many, a matter of life and death to be able to afford and access. Rightfully, many are pushing back against the corrupt pharmaceutical industry that grossly inflates prices of many essential medicines. However, Narcan, used to stop opioid overdoses is given out for free at most pharmacies! While it can be considered lifesaving due to its function, is it in the same ethical category as access to insulin? Sure, addicts deserve a second chance to get clean, but those with diabetes never chose to put something in their bodies that would directly create the problem! Addiction may alter one’s brain chemistry, but it started with the choice to use drugs. So why then is a drug like insulin not free yet Narcan is handed out to anyone who asks?! Another example is many women now demand free birth control. While some use it for other conditions than contraception, if all you need it for is to not get pregnant then you’re using it for a lifestyle choice, not a medical need. If you want to have an active sex life that’s your business and no one else’s, but don’t expect me to subsidize your lifestyle by paying for an elective drug. Same goes for anything that there is no clinical need for, but one chooses to do for their own reasons. (The benefit of private healthcare is you CAN make those choices 😉 ) What about those with deeply held moral objections paying for things they find repugnant? Those who deeply oppose abortion and view it as the moral equivalent to infanticide don’t want to pay for what they see as funding murder. If people who deeply opposed war in the past called for being conscientious objectors to being drafted then is there a way to opt out of paying for something one finds morally objectionable?

Lastly, there are unintended consequences of some of these decisions to provide collective free things. Take the free COVID vaccine. The government paid for it and distributes it- to whoever they deem politically desirable! This meant it was given first in “marginalized” communities as a priority, yet it turned out many didn’t want it and didn’t show up to get one. The vaccines can only be out for so long before going bad so it meant thousands were wasted and unusable! If they were given to areas with higher demand for the vaccine they could have used those doses rather than wasted that resource. However, it was seen as more politically correct to give it to the inner city rather than suburbia yet demand might have been higher in the latter area. The result: Thousands of doses WASTED!!!

There’s another saying: Freedom isn’t free… Well neither is “free” stuff!

Covid-19 Accidental Release Theory: Maybe Not So “Batty” After All…

Advanced Warning: This article is longer than usual and contains more technical language and concepts. I created a glossary at the end to help with new terms and concepts… If anyone is more scientifically versed in this subject I’d love to hear your perspective and expertise! Also any scientific corrections if I misunderstood something 🙂

Since Covid-19 emerged a little over a year ago, it’s been pretty clear that while the virus poses a significant public health risk, much of the hype has been overblown for political reasons, many of which I covered in detail before in previous posts. Now, with several vaccines rolling out and many becoming fully vaccinated, the country is starting to open up again and becoming more cautiously optimistic. However we are not out of the woods yet, and the scientific community is doing research not only in stopping the current pandemic, but preventing future ones. This all sounds like great news, except for one not so little hurdle: Pressure to reach politically desirable conclusions! Science should be an impartial, politically neutral process of discovering more about our world and bettering humanity, but as it’s done by people it is tainted with our all too human bias more than many care to admit. Questions still remain about how the virus was able to become such a virulent strain and infect the globe.

There are two main theories for how Covid-19 originated:

1. It was transmitted naturally from a non-human animal species, in this case a bat, to humans: This theory is the “mainstream” one and supports the idea that in Wuhan, China bats being sold in the wet markets over there had the coronavirus and it jumped to humans. Many viruses do this naturally and there are numerous examples with other coronaviruses such as the earlier SARS1 which causes an outbreak in 2002 and MERS which caused an outbreak in 2012, both originating in bats. As it is very common for viruses to mutate or recombine and evolve changes so they go from one species to another, on its face, this theory seems very plausible (and the mot politically desirable!).

2. It was accidentally leaked from a laboratory studying novel coronaviruses during research: This theory is considered the conspiracy fringe theory by the mainstream media and liberal organizations such as the CDC and WHO. Why then, is it even worthy of consideration then? This is where more scientific evidence comes in, as well as political motives for favoring the natural theory. Despite mainstream rejection, there are several compelling arguments supporting the lab accident theory enough to while not “prove” it, strongly favor it.

An article from The Bulletin titled “The origin of COVID: Did people or nature open Pandora’s box at Wuhan?” lays out the case for it most likely being a laboratory accident in deeper scientific detail and is worth the read! As it has some very technical language and concepts, I’ll lay out some of the most compelling arguments they make to support the possibility it could have been accidentally released.

The Point of Origin

The mainstream theory argues that Covid-19 originated from bats in the wet market in Wuhan, China. Cases did indeed begin in Wuhan, however there is evidence potential earlier cases in Wuhan were not linked to the wet market or bats. However, the Wuhan Institute of Virology is in Wuhan, and studies coronaviruses similar to Covid-19. Other geographic concerns arise too as the closest variants of coronaviruses to Covid-19 are in a species of bat in Yunnan. Evidence would support a naturally occurring jump if people around Yunnan were among the first cases, and that species of bat doesn’t travel too far. Wuhan is 1,500 km away from Yunnan, way too far for those bats to travel. Of course, someone who was in Yunnan could have traveled to Wuhan that was infected, but why then was no one infected by them along the way for a fairly infectious virus? Geographically speaking, it is possible, but less plausible for Covid-19 to have originated in bats so far away then come to Wuhan, whereas there is a lab studying viruses just like it in Wuhan.

One of These Things is Not Like The Other?

Some argue that there are no signs the virus was manipulated by humans. Indeed, in the past it was more obvious for scientists to tell if a virus’ genome was “cut and pasted”. Now however, it can be done undetectably through what is called “seamless” methods or a process called serial passage, where viruses are grown in a series of cell cultures until the right changes are made. With both methods of engineering a virus one can’t tell it whether was made in a lab or not. This sounds like evidence for the natural occurrence theory, but it also means that you can’t conclude it wasn’t lab made due to the absence of detectable signs of artificial creation. This simply means it can be done in a lab without being detected.

Mousey In The Middle?

Viruses that jump from non-human animals to humans often have an intermediary host. This is another species the virus evolves to infect before going onto infecting humans. In the SARS1 outbreak that host was an animal called a civet. For the MERS outbreak the intermediary host was a camel. It is less likely for viruses to do one big leap from animals such as bats, directly to humans. However, no intermediary host was found for Covid-19 in nature. The more likely explanation could be that if the virus was designed to target human cells such a leap wouldn’t be needed and there actually was a known host: Laboratory grown “humanized” mice processing the (human) target protein for the virus! The natural way for the leap to occur is not impossible, but much more implausible.

Signs of Artificial Manipulation

Every virus has a very specific structure that binds to a target protein on the surface of the cell it wants to infect. It is like a key to a specific lock to get inside a locked door, in this case, a cell. Once inside, the virus insets its own genetic code into the cell so the cell itself will make more of the virus. Viruses then burst out of the cell, killing the cell and go on to infect more cells repeating the process again, and again and again throughout the body. For Covid-19, it has a specific spike protein as its “key” to bind to a specific protein on human respiratory cells called ACE2. Another part of the spike protein then helps Covid-19 fuse with the cell’s membrane once let inside. These two components, called S1 and S2 respectively, need to be separated for each to do its task and the site where that happens is unique to Covid-19 compared with other coronaviruses. This very specific spot where both parts are separated is called a Furin cleavage site, but other coronaviruses split their spike proteins in a different location using a different way. Human cells have a protein called Furin that cleaves both hence the name. A mutation could have happened to Covid-19 to give it this unique site, but it is highly unlikely and not common in viruses like it. If it evolved gradually there would be evidence in case histories of people who got sick. As other viruses don’t need a Furin cleavage site to do the exact same thing, there is no evolutionary pressure to naturally select for such a site. However, the virology community is very familiar with well known literature on how to make more virulent strains by creating a Furin cleavage site in experiments to develop vaccines and get ahead of the game in anticipating naturally occurring deadlier strains.

Further oddities are in regards to the structure of the Furin cleavage site itself. As you may remember from school, DNA has four nucleic acids: Adenine, Thymine, Cytosine and Guanine represented by the letters A, T, C, and G (RNA has Uracil, or U instead of T for Thymine). A codon is a combo of three of these letters and stands in for an amino acid. Stringing several codons together which make up different amino acids, gives the instructions or recipe for a protein. In short, three nucleic acids make a codon, codons make amino acids and amino acids make proteins. Think of it like letters make words, and words make sentences and so on. Different organisms can have preferred codons for making amino acids as several different codons can code for one amino acid. A part of the Furin cleavage site has the amino acid arginine, which can made with codons CGT, CGC or CGG in humans. CGG is the least popular codon to make arginine in other viruses but is popular for humans and guess what else? Covid-19! Why does Covid-19 share a preferred codon that humans use but not viruses related to it? In fact, it has two CGG codons in a row in the Furin cleavage site and this is not found in any other coronavirus like Covid-19! Guess which codon is also popular to use in labs studying viruses in humans? CGG…

Laboratory Safety Concerns and Other Cases of Escapes

Laboratories that work with such dangerous biohazards like deadly virus strains have varying degrees of stringent safety levels depending on the risk level. These go through levels 1 through 4 with 4 being the most stringent. Most scientists work in conditions below level 4, as level 4 requires a full hazmat suit and working in closed airtight chambers making work cumbersome, hard to see and twice as long to do. The labs working on coronaviruses can have safety levels around level 2, the same as the average dentist’s office in terms of biohazard safety! Even in more stringent labs, viruses have escaped and cased real harm including smallpox, and SARS1 which escaped not one, but four times from a lab in Beijing! It is very plausible for an accidental escape to happen even in the best labs, so even more so in a lab with less stringent precautions. Wuhan’s lab had level 4 facilities but these were subpar upon inspections and researchers try to work at a levels that are less stringent for convenience.

Research into Viruses Like Covid-19 is Becoming More Common

With all the extreme risk involved and the easy potential for deadly new strains to fall into the wrong hands, why on earth would anyone want to make more deadly strains? The answer lies in being prepared ahead of time for a naturally occurring one. If we can make a vaccine for a deadlier strain we create, it would likely work on a similar deadly strain naturally occurring in the future, or at least we’d know how to make vaccines faster. The reason why we were able to get Covid-19 vaccines so fast is thanks to this type of research. Many virologists do experiments called Gain of Function Experiments that are designed to make viruses more virulent and transmissible to serve as models to make vaccines against. As explained earlier, there are several signs Covid-19 has of having been used in gain of function experiments in labs such as that unique codon sequence CGG that is commonly used in labs but not naturally occurring as well as its spike protein’s Furin cleavage site also not naturally occurring in coronaviruses like it but commonly used in such experiments. With such research being so popular, it is statistically more probable for more accidental leaks to happen for labs the world over of deadly strains. Just as it is common in nature for viruses to leap species to species, now it is probable for viruses in countless labs to be released by accident. Covid-19 shows several signs of being artificially manipulated like others in labs and while is it possible some could have sprung up naturally it is far less likely several did all at once!

Science isn’t The Only Thing In This Debate

Sadly scientific controversies are often beyond just scientific: When Galileo had his dispute with the Catholic Church, you can bet it wasn’t just theology on the table! Politics and science have had a very troubled past and science is not free by any means from the desires of others without pure motives of inquiry and discovery. By arguing Covid-19 was accidentally leaked from the Wuhan lab, it puts China in a very bad light and had deep political ramifications for international relations with China. As it was clearly seen early on in the pandemic, associating Covid-19 with China at all was deemed politically incorrect including calling it Wuhan virus despite many other pathogens being named after places, such as Zika virus, Ebola, Spanish Flu, Lyme disease etc… Of course unfairly scapegoating one place or people is wrong as said before, ANY lab can have a leak, not just labs in China! However the WHO has ties with China and others who denounced an accidental release theory have had conflicts of interest with labs like Wuhan’s involving funding and grants which could be jeopardized if they come to unsavory conclusions. However covering it up to protect the interests of one group only hurts the global community as if it is true it was accidental and not naturally occurring, other labs around the world should learn from their mistakes so it won’t happen again. With so much pressure to deny an accidental release possibility, the adamant refusals to even consider such a possibility are not based in science but political bias and unethical coverup.

These are just a few points brought up in that very long but excellent article! To read further into the arguments in detail and probably explained better than I’ve done, go take a look 🙂 I’ll leave you with this though: They clearly state from the beginning there is no conclusive proof either way for Covid-19 being naturally occurring or a laboratory leak. Just strong evidence pointing towards what they argue, to be an accidental release by a lab. So I’ll leave it with you to decide for yourself what you think happened. You can easily find arguments against their analysis by any mainstream media, the CDC and WHO. But don’t let arguments from authority sway you: Let the science do the persuading!

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Glossary

ACE2: The protein on the cell’s surface Covid-19’s spike protein binds with to infect the cell.

Amino Acid: Building blocks that make up proteins, made with codons. Humans have 20 different types to make our thousands of proteins.

Biohazard Level: Laboratory safety levels according to risk of biohazards such as deadly pathogens. These levels go from 1 to 4, 4 being most stringent.

Codon: A string of three nucleotides that code for an amino acid. Importantly in this case, different organisms can have different preferences for which codons to use to code for specific amino acids. Example: CGG is preferred to code for arginine in humans but not naturally in other coronaviruses except Covid-19, and it is common in labs to use human codons.

Coronaviruses: A family of virus species Covid-19 is part of along with others such as MERS and SARS. Research has been done pre-Covid with other coronaviruses that helped with Covid-19 research.

DNA: Deoxyribonucleic Acid. The “building block of life” and carries genetic instructions for organisms.

Furin Cleavage Site: The site where Covid-19’s spike protein can be split into two separate units, one to bind with the target protein on the cell’s surface and the other to fuse with the cell membrane afterwards. Other coronaviruses use a different site than Covid-19. Furin is the protein on human cells that separates both parts.

Gain of Function Experiment: An experiment done in laboratories to make a virus more potent and contagious so it can be used to develop vaccines for deadly strains.

Humanized Mouse: A laboratory bred mouse that has the human version of the ACE2 protein Covid-19 binds with to infect the host organism used in research. This is an ethical alternative to testing on human subjects.

Intermediary Host: An animal that is the organism between a virus jumping from the initial host species to humans. This was not found yet for Covid-19 but known for other coronaviruses. Example: SARS1 jumped from bats, to civets, then to humans. Civets are the intermediary host.

Mutation: A change in the genetic code of an organism often by accident that alters it. Viruses mutate often creating various strains.

Natural Selection: A process where certain traits are selected for in nature if they give an organism an advantage over others without the trait. Viruses can develop traits that give it an edge over a competing strain, but it is more random and less precise than specifically targeted traits created in labs.

Nucleotide: Basic building blocks of DNA and RNA, three make a codon to code for an amino acid. They are Adenine, Thymine, Cytosine and Guanine. Uracil takes the place of Thymine in RNA.

RNA: Ribonucleic Acid. Some viruses use RNA instead of DNA. RNA can be coded into DNA and vice versa so scientists take advantage of this as it is easier to work with DNA.

Seamless Methods: Ways to alter viral genomes without it being obvious the virus has been artificially manipulated by scientists.

Serial Passage: A method in laboratories for developing viruses by growing them successively in a series of cultures until desired traits are achieved. Both seamless methods and serial passage can make it unknowable if a virus has been altered by humans so one cannot conclude it was not altered simply by lack of signs of human intervention.

Spike Protein: A specialized protein on the surface of a virus to allow it to gain entry into a cell.

Target Protein: A protein on a cell’s surface the virus binds to in order to infect the cell.

Virology: The study of viruses.

A Tale of Two Protests…

A rally that was supposed to be a peaceful demonstration for patriots to stand up for Trump on January 6th disappointingly turned into a chaotic event. Scores of people occupied the Capitol building and some stepped over the line into fear tactics, and even violence. When the dust finally settled, 4 died, the National Guard had to be called, a curfew enforced in DC, and several arrests. I think we can all agree this violent mob chaos was a disgrace and does not represent the real patriot or mainstream Trump supporter. Indeed, many prominent conservatives, including our President openly decried and denounced the violence and chaos, reminding every fellow American that no matter what the cause, violence and fear is never the answer to create change in a democracy. Despite the widespread condemnation of the rotten apples who only hurt Trump’s cause and the conservative community, the liberal media is swarming over this as proof of “right wing” domestic terrorism and proof we are dangerous insurrectionists who need to be censored and banned. The left even went as far as to give Trump a permanent ban on Twitter, a heavily left leaning platform! In some ways not surprising, as they were looking for any excuse, and this seems to be the perfect one.

Now contrast the widespread (and justified) condemnation for the behavior shown at the Capitol Building with the BLM riots and “autonomous zones” from this past summer. Violent insurrection? Check. Calling the National Guard? Check. Curfews? Check. Destruction of property? Check. Making people fear for their safety? Check. Arrests? Check. We can go on and on… Yes, the cause may be different, the side may be different, even the scale and duration of events is different. But the chaos? The violence and fear? Nope! Those riots caused for more destruction and went on for longer and with more people in several cities across the country. Did their behavior honestly reflect the simple idea that black lives matter as much as any other life? Were their actions reflective of a movement who only wants equality and justice? No matter what your opinion is of BLM, violent riots, chaos and looting harms volumes more than it ever would help actual black lives.

Yet, there was no widespread condemnation from BLM leaders. They encouraged the riots in the name of “reparations”! The left did nothing to condemn and stop the chaos, and called anyone a racist for criticizing them. Despite it being also within a raging pandemic no one even blinked at the thought of thousands packed in the streets like sardines. As businesses shut down, they were broken into and looted while the business owners could only stand by and watch or face arrest. The famous “autonomous zone” CHAD, CHAZ, or CHOP or whatever else, stood for a whole month before being cleared out! Name a prominent left leaning politician or celebrity or any public figure who condemned the behavior shown over the past summer. Name anyone on the left who said the rioter’s behavior dishonored, not honored, the lives lost to alleged police brutality.

Now going back to the recent events on the Capitol: President Trump decried the violence. Several conservative politicians decried the violence. Fellow conservatives on social media all decried the violence. Even though we all dislike, even hate, the policies of many who work in the Capitol, we never said they deserve violence and to fear for their lives. True conservatives know a democracy and the rights we all have as Americans applies to all, not merely those who we agree with. We are deeply embarrassed and disgusted our peaceful event was corrupted into what it was. Thing is, new evidence is coming to light, (despite being suppressed by the leftist mainstream) that many of the actual rioters and violent agitators were Antifa and other far left groups disguised as Trump supporters to sabotage our peaceful event. Yes, every group has its wing-nuts and we’re no different, but the wing-nuts don’t represent the other 99%. At every other Trump inspired event, thousands of fellow patriots gathered together without incident. This is out of character with the other events led by conservatives for Trump and should have raised suspicions from the start.

Before all this, I watched a video by Vox, a heavily left leaning news site geared towards college age millennials and teenagers that argued that the news coverage of the violence in many cities over the past summer mischaracterized a vast majority peaceful movement. They argued that news often focuses on the outliers, the more extreme ends to sell a more interesting story, violence is more eye catching, and also because it can be hard to capture all nuances of the complex subjects protests can cover whereas focusing in on an extreme helps simplify it for outsiders. It wrapped up by saying not to buy into the media’s mischaracterization and oversimplification of their chosen movements by the actions of a few bad apples. Now, compare that attitude towards how the leftist media has covered this event! The left is blatantly turning a blind eye to violence from their own chosen causes, yet is quick to condemn the actions of a tiny minority within the 75 or so million who voted Trump in this past election. In contrast, as stated before, numerous conservatives including President Trump swiftly condemned the violet actions allegedly done in the name of conservatives and Trump. You can see the hypocrisy in black and white.

No one has the right to use violence and terror to get their way in this country or in any democratic society. This applies to any political party, religion, race, ethnic group, special interest groups etc… I and fellow conservatives have always upheld the rule of law for everyone, including ourselves. We aren’t justifying the violence that happened at the Capitol when we call out the utter hypocrisy of how it’s been covered compared to left leaning insurrectionists and their violence. I don’t care about your opinion on whether the election was stolen, or if BLM is a worthy movement reflective of the inherent value of black lives when you cross that line. Violence is violence no matter who it comes from, so why is one group’s violence covered up en masse, while another’s is characterized as representative of 75 million people of whom 99% are peaceful law abiding citizens? Why are our leaders condemning the bad apples in our barrel while theirs cover up, deny and then attack you for calling out their silence about theirs? Saying we condemn violence done in our name, yet we also condemn the double standards being applied to how it’s perceived compared to the left’s own share of violence and chaos is not mutually exclusive!

Patriots, we must show the country that those who took part in this disgrace were not us. This was never us. And most likely were literally not us!