thewashingtonstandard--2020-02-27--Former Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh Sentenced to 3 Years In Federal Prison

After the sentence was handed down , Pugh ’ s supporters came to courtroom floor to console her .
“ This became a very large fraud , ” Chasanow said .
Pugh provided a video issuing an apology prior to the sentencing , knowing the inevitable .
“ I know better who I am , but I also know where I am and I accept responsibility , I accept total responsibility , ” Pugh said .
“ I pled guilty .
I ’ m sorry .
I don ’ t know any other words that could be stronger .
I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ am sorry.
” “ It ’ s created such a ringing negativity on our city .
And I know better who I am .
But also I know here I am right now .
And I accept responsibility .
I accept total responsibility .
I ’ ve pleaded guilty and I ’ m sorry , ” she said .
“ I just want to apologize to the citizens , to young people , to partners , my friends — everyone I ’ ve offended , everyone I ’ ve hurt and the city @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and being a part of all of this that had led me here today , ” Pugh said .
At the end of the video , Pugh sits with her hands crossed in front of her mouth as a voiceover plays : “ When I think about me and my capacity and my capabilities and all the things I ’ ve been able to do , I said , ‘ How do you end up here ?
I mean how do you mess this up ?
’ I messed up , I really @ @ @ @ @ @ @ sorry , I really am sorry.
” OK , fair enough .
She is willing to admit her wrongdoing and apologized .
Now the sentence will be carried out , but again , it won ’ t just be Pugh paying for her crimes .
Taxpayers will pay for them too with their property and livelihoods being held ransom to make sure that Pugh gets fed , clothed and housed for the time she will spend in federal prison .
Pugh pleaded guilty in November to charges of tax evasion and conspiracy to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a sentence of nearly five years in prison ; Pugh ’ s team recommends she spend one year and one day behind bars .

After the sentence was handed down, Pugh’s supporters came to courtroom floor to console her.
“This became a very large fraud,” Chasanow said.
Judge Deborah Chasanow said this was not a tiny mistake or lapse in judgement. “This became a very large fraud.” She called the disruption to the city “drastic”; impact on Baltimore “very tragic”. — Paul Gessler (@PaulGessler) February 27, 2020
Pugh provided a video issuing an apology prior to the sentencing, knowing the inevitable.
“I know better who I am, but I also know where I am and I accept responsibility, I accept total responsibility,” Pugh said. “I pled guilty. I’m sorry. I don’t know any other words that could be stronger. I’m so sorry, I really am sorry.”
“It’s created such a ringing negativity on our city. And I know better who I am. But also I know here I am right now. And I accept responsibility. I accept total responsibility. I’ve pleaded guilty and I’m sorry,” she said.
“I just want to apologize to the citizens, to young people, to partners, my friends — everyone I’ve offended, everyone I’ve hurt and the city’s image, by pleading guilty and being a part of all of this that had led me here today,” Pugh said.
At the end of the video, Pugh sits with her hands crossed in front of her mouth as a voiceover plays: “When I think about me and my capacity and my capabilities and all the things I’ve been able to do, I said, ‘How do you end up here? I mean how do you mess this up?’ I messed up, I really messed up. I’m so sorry, I really am sorry.”
OK, fair enough. She is willing to admit her wrongdoing and apologized.
Now the sentence will be carried out, but again, it won’t just be Pugh paying for her crimes. Taxpayers will pay for them too with their property and livelihoods being held ransom to make sure that Pugh gets fed, clothed and housed for the time she will spend in federal prison.
Pugh pleaded guilty in November to charges of tax evasion and conspiracy to defrauding the U.S. Prosecutors are seeking a sentence of nearly five years in prison; Pugh’s team recommends she spend one year and one day behind bars.


thewashingtonstandard--2020-02-27--PHARMA:  Award Winning Journalist & New York Times Bestselling Author Exposes The Lies & Crimes Of B

PHARMA:  Award Winning Journalist & New York Times Bestselling Author Exposes The Lies & Crimes Of Big Pharma

On March 10 , Gerald Posner , author of twelve books including Pulitzer Prize finalist “ Case Closed ” a spellbinding account of the John F. Kennedy assassination , will have his latest epic PHARMA hit book stores .
Almost five years into researching PHARMA , Gerald received a treasure trove of documents from an anonymous sender .
These documents , complete with never-before-seen-information , helped provide answers to long-standing questions .
This new information , coupled with Gerald ’ s dogged reporting , sets PHARMA apart from all books on this subject .
Last year , Gerald and his @ @ @ @ @ @ @ out to me regarding my 18 years of exposing Purdue Pharma and their owners , the Sackler Family , in their criminal marketing of OxyContin .
A friendship was forged and it was my distinct honor to have a chapter written about me in PHARMA entitled “ You Messed with the Wrong Mother.
” At one point , Gerald advised me that there were surprising revelations from government files about the Sackler brothers early political affiliations .
Readers of PHARMA will have to question why criminal charges were never lodged against this family @ @ @ @ @ @ @ but their culpability in the addictions and deaths of hundreds of thousands of people .
Why no prison time ?
In emails received from Gerald and Trisha , I was so honored to receive the below from them : One read “ You are one of my heroes in the book , and there are not many .
I can ’ t wait until people read the chapter about you that is titled “ You Messed with the Wrong Mother ” The second email was “ You are the center of the storm @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has it taken so long for a book of the magnitude of PHARMA to be written ?
Could it be that the sordid story could only be told by someone as brave as Gerald Posner and his wife collaborator , Trisha to put the years of research and documentation into unearthing a complete disregard for life by not only the pharmaceutical industry , but also the FDA ?
Pre-order best selling author , Gerald Posner ’ s latest blockbuster book PHARMA to be released March 10 .
Here is the link to order @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the out of control pharmaceutical industry and the profiteers involved .
I have an advanced copy of the book and am mesmerized by the history of the industry and more importantly how the Sackler Family , owners of Purdue Pharma , maker of OxyContin managed to destroy hundreds of thousands of lives in addiction and death — without a conscience .

On March 10, Gerald Posner, author of twelve books including Pulitzer Prize finalist “Case Closed” a spellbinding account of the John F. Kennedy assassination, will have his latest epic PHARMA hit book stores.
Almost five years into researching PHARMA, Gerald received a treasure trove of documents from an anonymous sender. These documents, complete with never-before-seen-information, helped provide answers to long-standing questions. This new information, coupled with Gerald’s dogged reporting, sets PHARMA apart from all books on this subject.
Last year, Gerald and his award winning author wife, Trisha reached out to me regarding my 18 years of exposing Purdue Pharma and their owners, the Sackler Family, in their criminal marketing of OxyContin. A friendship was forged and it was my distinct honor to have a chapter written about me in PHARMA entitled “You Messed with the Wrong Mother.”
At one point, Gerald advised me that there were surprising revelations from government files about the Sackler brothers early political affiliations. Readers of PHARMA will have to question why criminal charges were never lodged against this family for not only their subversive activity, but their culpability in the addictions and deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. Why no prison time?
In emails received from Gerald and Trisha, I was so honored to receive the below from them:
One read “You are one of my heroes in the book, and there are not many. I can’t wait until people read the chapter about you that is titled “You Messed with the Wrong Mother” The second email was “ You are the center of the storm about to sack the Sacklers.”
Why has it taken so long for a book of the magnitude of PHARMA to be written? Could it be that the sordid story could only be told by someone as brave as Gerald Posner and his wife collaborator, Trisha to put the years of research and documentation into unearthing a complete disregard for life by not only the pharmaceutical industry, but also the FDA? Pre-order best selling author, Gerald Posner’s latest blockbuster book PHARMA to be released March 10. Here is the link to order this spell-binding, explosive, narrative of the out of control pharmaceutical industry and the profiteers involved. I have an advanced copy of the book and am mesmerized by the history of the industry and more importantly how the Sackler Family, owners of Purdue Pharma, maker of OxyContin managed to destroy hundreds of thousands of lives in addiction and death — without a conscience. Pre-order here:


thewashingtonstandard--2020-02-27--It’s A Wonder More Youth Aren’t Supporting Sanders

Earlier this week , CNBC ’ s Jake Novak penned a column entitled “ Bernie Sanders is the front-runner because of how we raised our kids.
” Not surprisingly , the piece has garnered a respectable amount of attention from conservative commentators and has fired discussions around why so many younger voters are aligned with an out-and-out communist who would usurp all of their liberties and enslave them if given half a chance .
The title of Mr. Novak ’ s op-ed is largely true as a declaration , but there ’ s a little more to it than that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ my own children have reached the age where they would be quite welcome in the Sanders camp .
They could support Bernie Sanders , attend Sanders rallies , cheer and pump their fists as they condemn “ The Man ” and delight over all of the free stuff they think they ’ re going to get .
What , you say ?
Fat chance that my offspring would wind up hardcore lefties after being raised by a black-belt right-wing nationalist such as myself ?
Well , that may not be quite fair , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ compliment .
In truth , exposure to reality is never a guarantee that anyone will accept it as such .
Many will recall that the children President Ronald Reagan had with his wife Nancy not only fell far from the tree , they rolled down the hill , across the road and onto another orchard .
My children went to public schools , and , while we were fortunate in living in an area that was not lousy with communists , I definitely had to do my share of damage control on a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ light of the situation at hand , I thought it might be useful to do a bit of a “ compare and contrast ” ( mostly contrast ) as regards what young likely voters have to work with compared to what we older voters had to work with at their age .
Now , bear in mind that while I may have come of age shortly after the Earth cooled , I did grow up in New York , which was lousy with communists , even in the 1960s .
As a young @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tables from real revolutionaries , left-wing black nationalists and the like .
My peers and I knew who was running on the Communist ticket going into every general election because this was always widely advertised .
I ’ m quite certain that there are a lot of people witnessing the groundswell of support for the angry old communist stereotype ( Sanders ) and wondering how his young supporters can not know that he ’ s an angry old communist stereotype , that he ’ s selling them a bill of goods that has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ implemented it , and that enacting even one of his major platform policies would send this country into an economic tailspin .
Well … the short answer is that they don ’ t know these things because they ’ ve never been made clear to them .
In the 1960s , obviously our culture was quite different .
The political left had not yet made the kind of inroads that would effectively influence large numbers of young people in the direction of socialism .
Yes , there were young saps who lapped up @ @ @ @ @ @ @ professors were selling , but there were still too many competing influences to effectively sway masses of young people .
When I was a child , the Cold War was still very much on , and some of the most popular media fare was World War II movies , which obviously had an unambiguous delineation between the good guys and the bad guys .
We grew up with regular air raid drills , which were all about trying to protect ourselves from intercontinental ballistic missiles that might be launched by a certain communist @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ 60s and ’ 70s , nearly all secular Jews supported Israel , and one didn ’ t have to go very far to find a Jew ( or the relative of one ) who had escaped from Russia or Eastern Europe or survived the camps in Germany , and who could set the record straight if one had doubts .
We still had real journalists , so the pathetic economic floundering and horrible civil-rights records of communist regimes were laid bare on TV news shows with regularity and relish .
And of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fought in order to keep communists from gaining a free hand in Asia .
Contrast this with what millennials and the generations following them have had to work with .
First of all , there ’ s been 50 intervening years of leftist insinuation into our institutions that ’ s taken place since I was a child .
These influences have been very effective in implementing revisionist history ; consequently , the atrocities of the Soviet Union , China , Cuba and even Nazi Germany have been completely re-framed .
The educational system @ @ @ @ @ @ @ critical thinking from the tools young people have to use in processing pretty much everything .
We ’ ve had the purulent sensibilities of MTV , the explosion of cable TV and the advent of the internet , which have given rise to an entitled , profoundly narcissistic culture amongst millions of young people .
Then , there ’ s the anger and frustration of young adults who were convinced ( by society and their parents ) that higher education was the ticket to success .
Many have Master ’ s degrees now @ @ @ @ @ @ @ apartments with two or three roommates , and they need two or three part-time jobs to pay their bills and massive student loan debt .
So when we ask ourselves why young Bernie Sanders supporters don ’ t know that he ’ s a profoundly dangerous guy , we have to bear in mind that some of them were children when Barack Obama was elected president .
They were never exposed to the depth of his radicalism , and they ’ re too young to remember the young woman who wept with joy @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 4 , 2008 , because Obama was going to do the same things for her generation that Sanders is now promising his young followers .
I recall a few people I grew up with whose heads were on pretty straight when I left New York at the age of 25 .
Thirty years later , they ’ re dedicated leftists , quoting Hollywood celebrities ’ deepest insights on geopolitics and trashing me on social media at every available opportunity .
Considering this , perhaps the question we should be asking ourselves isn ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ supporting an angry old communist like Bernie Sanders , but why more of them aren ’ t supporting him .

Earlier this week, CNBC’s Jake Novak penned a column entitled “Bernie Sanders is the front-runner because of how we raised our kids.” Not surprisingly, the piece has garnered a respectable amount of attention from conservative commentators and has fired discussions around why so many younger voters are aligned with an out-and-out communist who would usurp all of their liberties and enslave them if given half a chance.
The title of Mr. Novak’s op-ed is largely true as a declaration, but there’s a little more to it than that.
Over the last few years, my own children have reached the age where they would be quite welcome in the Sanders camp. They could support Bernie Sanders, attend Sanders rallies, cheer and pump their fists as they condemn “The Man” and delight over all of the free stuff they think they’re going to get.
What, you say? Fat chance that my offspring would wind up hardcore lefties after being raised by a black-belt right-wing nationalist such as myself?
Well, that may not be quite fair, although I’ll gladly accept the compliment. In truth, exposure to reality is never a guarantee that anyone will accept it as such. Many will recall that the children President Ronald Reagan had with his wife Nancy not only fell far from the tree, they rolled down the hill, across the road and onto another orchard. My children went to public schools, and, while we were fortunate in living in an area that was not lousy with communists, I definitely had to do my share of damage control on a regular basis.
That said, in light of the situation at hand, I thought it might be useful to do a bit of a “compare and contrast” (mostly contrast) as regards what young likely voters have to work with compared to what we older voters had to work with at their age.
Now, bear in mind that while I may have come of age shortly after the Earth cooled, I did grow up in New York, which was lousy with communists, even in the 1960s. As a young man, I sat across coffee shop tables from real revolutionaries, left-wing black nationalists and the like. My peers and I knew who was running on the Communist ticket going into every general election because this was always widely advertised.
I’m quite certain that there are a lot of people witnessing the groundswell of support for the angry old communist stereotype (Sanders) and wondering how his young supporters can not know that he’s an angry old communist stereotype, that he’s selling them a bill of goods that has proven disastrous for every nation that has implemented it, and that enacting even one of his major platform policies would send this country into an economic tailspin.
Well … the short answer is that they don’t know these things because they’ve never been made clear to them.
In the 1960s, obviously our culture was quite different. The political left had not yet made the kind of inroads that would effectively influence large numbers of young people in the direction of socialism. Yes, there were young saps who lapped up the left-wing pablum activists and some college professors were selling, but there were still too many competing influences to effectively sway masses of young people.
When I was a child, the Cold War was still very much on, and some of the most popular media fare was World War II movies, which obviously had an unambiguous delineation between the good guys and the bad guys. We grew up with regular air raid drills, which were all about trying to protect ourselves from intercontinental ballistic missiles that might be launched by a certain communist superpower at any moment.
In the ’60s and ’70s, nearly all secular Jews supported Israel, and one didn’t have to go very far to find a Jew (or the relative of one) who had escaped from Russia or Eastern Europe or survived the camps in Germany, and who could set the record straight if one had doubts. We still had real journalists, so the pathetic economic floundering and horrible civil-rights records of communist regimes were laid bare on TV news shows with regularity and relish. And of course the Vietnam War was ostensibly being fought in order to keep communists from gaining a free hand in Asia.
Contrast this with what millennials and the generations following them have had to work with. First of all, there’s been 50 intervening years of leftist insinuation into our institutions that’s taken place since I was a child. These influences have been very effective in implementing revisionist history; consequently, the atrocities of the Soviet Union, China, Cuba and even Nazi Germany have been completely re-framed. The educational system has also been wildly successful in eliminating critical thinking from the tools young people have to use in processing pretty much everything.
We’ve had the purulent sensibilities of MTV, the explosion of cable TV and the advent of the internet, which have given rise to an entitled, profoundly narcissistic culture amongst millions of young people. Then, there’s the anger and frustration of young adults who were convinced (by society and their parents) that higher education was the ticket to success. Many have Master’s degrees now, but they’re living in apartments with two or three roommates, and they need two or three part-time jobs to pay their bills and massive student loan debt.
So when we ask ourselves why young Bernie Sanders supporters don’t know that he’s a profoundly dangerous guy, we have to bear in mind that some of them were children when Barack Obama was elected president. They were never exposed to the depth of his radicalism, and they’re too young to remember the young woman who wept with joy when interviewed on the night of Nov. 4, 2008, because Obama was going to do the same things for her generation that Sanders is now promising his young followers.
I recall a few people I grew up with whose heads were on pretty straight when I left New York at the age of 25. Thirty years later, they’re dedicated leftists, quoting Hollywood celebrities’ deepest insights on geopolitics and trashing me on social media at every available opportunity.
Considering this, perhaps the question we should be asking ourselves isn’t why so many young voters are supporting an angry old communist like Bernie Sanders, but why more of them aren’t supporting him.
Article posted with permission from Erik Rush


thewashingtonstandard--2020-02-28--HHS Whistleblower: Health Agency Leaders Engaged In “Corrupt Cover-up” Of Coronavirus Quarantines

The Department of Health and Human Services ( HHS ) has received a complaint that was then leaked to the New York Times that makes allegations that health workers responding to coronavirus lacked training and proper protective gear , as well as health agency leaders being involved in a “ corrupt cover-up ” when complaints were issued by staff .
According to the New York Times : The team was “ improperly deployed ” to two military bases in California to assist the processing of Americans who had been evacuated from coronavirus hot zones in China and elsewhere , according @ @ @ @ @ @ @ shared with Congress and obtained by The New York Times ahead of a formal complaint to the Office of the Special Counsel , an independent government agency that handles federal whistle-blower complaints .
Staff members from the Department of Health and Human Services ’ Administration for Children and Families were sent to Travis Air Force Base and March Air Reserve Base in late January and early February and were ordered to enter quarantined areas , including a hangar where coronavirus evacuees were being received , the complaint said .
They were not provided @ @ @ @ @ @ @ assignment , said the whistle-blower , who is described as a senior leader at the health agency .
Without proper training or equipment , some of the exposed staff members moved freely around and off the bases , with at least one person staying in a nearby hotel and leaving California on a commercial flight .
Many were unaware of the need to test their temperatures three times a day .
According to the complaint , which was filed with the Office of the Special Counsel , “ I soon began to field @ @ @ @ @ @ @ deployed staff members expressing concerns with the lack of H.H.S .
communication and coordination , staff being sent into quarantined areas without personal protective equipment , training or experience in managing public health emergencies , safety protocols and the potential danger to both themselves and members of the public they come into contact with.
” The Department of Health and Human Services acknowledged the complaint .
“ We take all whistle-blower complaints very seriously and are providing the complainant all appropriate protections under the Whistleblower Protection Act , ” said Caitlin B. Oakley @ @ @ @ @ @ @ national spokeswoman for the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs .
“ We are evaluating the complaint and have nothing further to add at this time.
” While President Trump has downplayed the risks of coronavirus in the US , apparently , it will become an election issue now .
The whistle-blower ’ s account raised questions about whether the Trump administration has taken adequate precautions in its handling of the virus to date , and whether Mr. Trump ’ s minimization of the risks has been mirrored by other top @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The report went on to point out that the handling of the issue seems to not be proper .
The complaint raised questions about whether the Trump administration had taken adequate precautions in its handling of the virus , and whether Mr. Trump ’ s minimization of the risks had been mirrored by other top officials when confronted with potentially disturbing developments .
The levels of protection varied even while he was at Miramar , he said .
Standards were more lax at first , but once people arrived who appeared to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ protective equipment .
He is now back at work , and has yet to be tested for coronavirus exposure .
In the complaint , the whistle-blower painted a grim portrait of agency staff members who found themselves on the front lines of a frantic federal effort to confront the coronavirus in the United States without any preparation or training , and whose own health concerns were dismissed by senior administration officials as detrimental to staff “ morale.
” They were “ admonished , ” the complaint said , and “ accused of not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ their “ mental health and emotional stability questioned.
” After a phone call with health agency leaders to raise their fears about exposure to the virus , the staff members described a “ whitewashing ” of the situation , characterizing the response as “ corrupt ” and a “ cover-up , ” according to the complaint , and telling the whistle-blower that senior officials had treated them as a “ nuisance ” and did not want to hear their worries about health and safety .
Representative Jimmy Gomez ( D-CA ) appeared to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at a House Ways and Means Committee hearing with Alex M. Azar II , the secretary of health and human services .
“ To your knowledge , were any of the A.C.F .
employees exposed to high-risk evacuees from China ?
” Mr. Gomez asked Mr. Azar .
“ They should never have been , ” Mr. Azar responded , unless they had special suits designed to protect against infection .
“ To maintain quarantine , that should be the case.
” Mr. Gomez said his understanding was that the teams sent to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ chaotic ” situation .
“ I would not accept your proposition that it was chaotic at all times , ” Mr. Azar said .
“ I am not aware of any violation of quarantine or isolation protocols.
” Ousted Oklahoma Judge Turned Florida Attorney Michael Chionopoulos Involved In Possible Malpractice In Depriving Rape Victim Of Hundreds Of Thousands Of Dollars “ Do you think that breaking basic protocols and exposing untrained human service employees to the coronavirus before allowing them to be dispersed around the country could have endangered the employees and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ I don ’ t believe that has taken place , ” replied Azar .
The complaint , which was reported by The Washington Post , surfaced the day after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed the first known instance of a person testing positive without exposure to anyone known to be infected with the coronavirus , also known as Covid-19 , or recent travels to any of the countries where it is circulating .
The C.D.C .
said that it was possible the patient , who is a resident of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Travis Air Force Base — could have been exposed to a returning traveler who was infected .
March Air Reserve Base in Riverside , Calif. , housed 195 people evacuated from Wuhan , China , for 14 days beginning in late January , while Travis in Northern California has housed a number of quarantined people in recent weeks , including some of the approximately 400 Americans on the Diamond Princess cruise ship that had docked in Japan .
The whistleblower claimed that the staff were not properly prepared for what they were engaging @ @ @ @ @ @ @ some experience with emergency management .
“ They were not properly trained or equipped to operate in a public health emergency situation , ” wrote the official .
“ They were potentially exposed to coronavirus ; appropriate measures were not taken to protect the staff from potential infection ; and appropriate steps were not taken to quarantine , monitor or test them during their deployment and upon their return home.
” If the reports we are getting from China are to be believed and this stuff spreads as easily as it is claimed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ serious thing .
However , it could also be something else , which we are not being told about .

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has received a complaint that was then leaked to the New York Times that makes allegations that health workers responding to coronavirus lacked training and proper protective gear, as well as health agency leaders being involved in a “corrupt cover-up” when complaints were issued by staff.
According to the New York Times:
The team was “improperly deployed” to two military bases in California to assist the processing of Americans who had been evacuated from coronavirus hot zones in China and elsewhere, according to a portion of a narrative account shared with Congress and obtained by The New York Times ahead of a formal complaint to the Office of the Special Counsel, an independent government agency that handles federal whistle-blower complaints.
Staff members from the Department of Health and Human Services’ Administration for Children and Families were sent to Travis Air Force Base and March Air Reserve Base in late January and early February and were ordered to enter quarantined areas, including a hangar where coronavirus evacuees were being received, the complaint said. They were not provided safety-protocol training until five days into their assignment, said the whistle-blower, who is described as a senior leader at the health agency.
Without proper training or equipment, some of the exposed staff members moved freely around and off the bases, with at least one person staying in a nearby hotel and leaving California on a commercial flight. Many were unaware of the need to test their temperatures three times a day.
According to the complaint, which was filed with the Office of the Special Counsel, “I soon began to field panicked calls from my leadership team and deployed staff members expressing concerns with the lack of H.H.S. communication and coordination, staff being sent into quarantined areas without personal protective equipment, training or experience in managing public health emergencies, safety protocols and the potential danger to both themselves and members of the public they come into contact with.”
The Department of Health and Human Services acknowledged the complaint.
“We take all whistle-blower complaints very seriously and are providing the complainant all appropriate protections under the Whistleblower Protection Act,” said Caitlin B. Oakley, a deputy assistant secretary and a national spokeswoman for the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs. “We are evaluating the complaint and have nothing further to add at this time.”
While President Trump has downplayed the risks of coronavirus in the US, apparently, it will become an election issue now.
NYT adds:
The whistle-blower’s account raised questions about whether the Trump administration has taken adequate precautions in its handling of the virus to date, and whether Mr. Trump’s minimization of the risks has been mirrored by other top officials when confronted with potentially disturbing developments.
The report went on to point out that the handling of the issue seems to not be proper.
The first American case of coronavirus in a patient with no known contact with hot zones or other coronavirus patients emerged this week near Travis Air Force Base.
The complaint raised questions about whether the Trump administration had taken adequate precautions in its handling of the virus, and whether Mr. Trump’s minimization of the risks had been mirrored by other top officials when confronted with potentially disturbing developments. The levels of protection varied even while he was at Miramar, he said. Standards were more lax at first, but once people arrived who appeared to be sick, workers began donning personal protective equipment. He is now back at work, and has yet to be tested for coronavirus exposure. In the complaint, the whistle-blower painted a grim portrait of agency staff members who found themselves on the front lines of a frantic federal effort to confront the coronavirus in the United States without any preparation or training, and whose own health concerns were dismissed by senior administration officials as detrimental to staff “morale.” They were “admonished,” the complaint said, and “accused of not being team players,” and had their “mental health and emotional stability questioned.” After a phone call with health agency leaders to raise their fears about exposure to the virus, the staff members described a “whitewashing” of the situation, characterizing the response as “corrupt” and a “cover-up,” according to the complaint, and telling the whistle-blower that senior officials had treated them as a “nuisance” and did not want to hear their worries about health and safety. Representative Jimmy Gomez (D-CA) appeared to allude to the complaint on Thursday morning at a House Ways and Means Committee hearing with Alex M. Azar II, the secretary of health and human services. “To your knowledge, were any of the A.C.F. employees exposed to high-risk evacuees from China?” Mr. Gomez asked Mr. Azar. “They should never have been,” Mr. Azar responded, unless they had special suits designed to protect against infection. “To maintain quarantine, that should be the case.” Mr. Gomez said his understanding was that the teams sent to March and Travis air bases faced a “chaotic” situation. “I would not accept your proposition that it was chaotic at all times,” Mr. Azar said. “I am not aware of any violation of quarantine or isolation protocols.” “Do you think that breaking basic protocols and exposing untrained human service employees to the coronavirus before allowing them to be dispersed around the country could have endangered the employees and other Americans?” Gomez asked. “I don’t believe that has taken place,” replied Azar. NYT added: The complaint, which was reported by The Washington Post, surfaced the day after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed the first known instance of a person testing positive without exposure to anyone known to be infected with the coronavirus, also known as Covid-19, or recent travels to any of the countries where it is circulating. The C.D.C. said that it was possible the patient, who is a resident of Solano County, Calif. — home to Travis Air Force Base — could have been exposed to a returning traveler who was infected. March Air Reserve Base in Riverside, Calif., housed 195 people evacuated from Wuhan, China, for 14 days beginning in late January, while Travis in Northern California has housed a number of quarantined people in recent weeks, including some of the approximately 400 Americans on the Diamond Princess cruise ship that had docked in Japan. The whistleblower claimed that the staff were not properly prepared for what they were engaging, even though some of them had some experience with emergency management. “They were not properly trained or equipped to operate in a public health emergency situation,” wrote the official. “They were potentially exposed to coronavirus; appropriate measures were not taken to protect the staff from potential infection; and appropriate steps were not taken to quarantine, monitor or test them during their deployment and upon their return home.” If the reports we are getting from China are to be believed and this stuff spreads as easily as it is claimed, then this could be a very serious thing. However, it could also be something else, which we are not being told about.


thewashingtonstandard--2020-02-28--The Waco Siege: What Happened When the Feds Laid Siege to the Branch Davidian Compound

The siege of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco , Texas , is an important event in American history because it directly led to one of the biggest terrorist attacks on American soil – the bombing of the Oklahoma City Federal Building .
It ’ s not necessary to defend this act of terrorism to understand why the entire freedom movement of the time was so incensed by it .
Indeed , it stood as a symbol of federal overreach and the corruption of the Clinton Administration .
It ’ s important to separate fact from fiction when it comes @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as it is important to do so with the siege of Ruby Ridge or the attack on the American consolate in Benghazi .
With every event , it is important to stick to the facts and what can be extrapolated from them to make the strongest argument about what went wrong and why , and what could be done differently in the future .
Background : Who Are the Branch Davidians ?
The Branch Davidians were a tiny offshoot of mainstream Seventh-Day Adventism .
This stemmed from an earlier split between the main @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s Rod , The Rod or the Davidians .
It was effectively a reform movement within Adventism , albeit with some beliefs considered heretical by the mainstream church , none of which are important or relevant for this discussion .
The Branch Davidians were established some 20 years later , and a much more radical departure from Seventh-Day Adventism born from disappointment at the failure of earlier prophecies to materialize .
There was some wrangling over the leadership of the group after the death of its founder , but Vernon Howell , better @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ultimately won out over the wife and son of the founder .
Everyone liked Howell when he first showed up at the compound in 1981 , including the head of the organization at the time , Lois Roden , with whom he had an affair , despite a more than 40-year age gap ( he was in his late 20s , she was in her late 60s ) .
He wanted to have a child with her , one that he believed would be the Chosen One of their religion .
Her @ @ @ @ @ @ @ upon her death , which led to a power struggle between the two .
Roden challenged Howell to raise the dead , going so far as to exhume a corpse for this purpose .
Howell attempted to file charges against Roden over the grave robbing , but the police told him that more evidence was needed .
It was then that Howell and seven of his followers raided the compound armed with five .223 caliber semiautomatic rifles , two 22 caliber rifles , two 12-gauge shotguns , and almost 400 rounds of ammunition @ @ @ @ @ @ @ collect evidence of illegal activity on the compound , but forgot to bring a camera with them for that purpose .
This was the definitive split where Howell won control of the Branch Davidian church at Mount Carmel .
Those who did not follow him continued to use this name and argue that he was never rightfully in possession of it .
It was then that Vernon Howell became David Koresh , a name based on the historical King David and Cyrus the Great ( “ Koresh ” being the Hebrew version of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Koresh began marrying the members ’ wives and daughters , some as young as 12 , which was cited as a reason for the eventual raid .
He claimed this came from an order from God .
The men in the group other than Koresh were to remain celibate .
Koresh first began getting media attention from the Waco Tribune-Herald in February 1993 .
“ The Sinful Messiah ” was the name of a series of articles by Mark England and Darlene McCormick about Koresh and his followers .
The articles mostly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Koresh ’ s claim that he had over a dozen children , some of them with girls as young as 12 .
Additionally , the group was suspected by local law enforcement of “ stockpiling ” illegal weapons .
Local law enforcement alerted the ATF in May 1992 , based on a call from a concerned UPS driver .
By June 9th , the ATF had officially opened an investigation into the group .
This is perhaps the time to begin talking about some of the misconceptions or smears about the Branch Davidians @ @ @ @ @ @ @ or not the group was a “ cult , ” as this can be defined differently by different people .
However , the notion that Koresh kept his people in line with either mesmerism or fear does not square up with reports to Congress and elsewhere from survivors of the group .
What ’ s more , rather than the dregs of Waco , many in the group were educated , most were religiously serious , and the group eschewed drugs and junk food .
Contrary to popular belief , Koresh did not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Christ , but rather to be a new messiah for a new age .
The term “ sinful messiah ” was in fact one of Koresh ’ s own coinage , meaning that he was a messiah like Christ but , unlike Christ , had a sinful nature .
The allegations of child abuse that prompted the final siege on Mount Carmel is even highly in dispute .
Most of the allegations against Koresh come from either disgruntled former members or those involved in child custody battles .
The church was investigated by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ no solid evidence was ever found .
That Koresh married a 14-year-old girl is true , but this would have been totally legal with parental consent at the time – so what were state authorities supposed to do ?
Assuming that the allegations of child sexual abuse were true – and we consider them to be extremely dubious – what was the ATF or the FBI doing there ?
And how does opening fire , throwing hand grenades , poison gassing and burning alive children serve to protect them ?
These are the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ indictment of federal law enforcement , even if one accepts that child abuse was taking place within the compound .
As with Ruby Ridge , the allegations of the federal government and their toadies in the corporate media are distortions ( “ Koresh claims to be Christ ” ) , dubious ( “ Koresh is abusing children ” ) and , more to the point , irrelevant ( “ The Branch Davidians were cooking meth ” ) .
The FBI and ATF were on the scene in Waco for one reason and one @ @ @ @ @ @ @ warrant to determine whether or not the Branch Davidians were making automatic weapons .
The actual events of the raid can be difficult to tease out .
Each side disagrees as to what the sequence of events were .
What we know is that , based on an affidavit filed by Davy Aguilera , the ATF obtained a search warrant .
This was based on the testimony of a postal agent about what he considered to be suspicious deliveries to Mt .
Carmel .
However , none of the deliveries were in and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ such as 45 AR-15 upper receivers , and five M-16 upper receivers .
The search warrant was mostly based on the number of weapons possessed by the Davidians .
But in the United States of America , we have the right to own as many weapons as we can afford .
What ’ s more , the notion that the Davidians were “ stockpiling ” weapons is a red herring : They were selling weapons ( legally ) in addition to buying them , so “ inventory ” might be the more accurate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Carmel .
According to Dick J. Reavis , author of The Ashes of Waco : The ATF ’ s raid , codenamed “ Showtime , ” was moved up one day in response to a local newspaper ’ s article on the Davidians .
The local sheriff was not aware of the raid , but the Davidians knew it was coming .
The ATF chose to raid the property rather than pick up Koresh while he was in town .
An ATF agent who had infiltrated the group reported that they knew @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was blown .
When asked what they were doing when he left the property on the day of the raid , he said that the Davidians were praying .
There was another factor influencing the ATF ’ s decision to raid the Davidians when they did : Money .
According to Henry Ruth , one of three independent reviewers of the Treasury Department ’ s report on Waco : There is much discussion and debate about who fired first , however , there is ample evidence that it was the ATF when they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in their kennels on the way to surrounding the compound .
What ’ s more , the ATF showed up in a cattle trailer protected by a tarp , wearing no body armor .
They were not dressed for an armed confrontation with apocalyptic religious extremists .
A ceasefire was negotiated by local authorities .
The sheriff claims that the ATF only withdrew once they were out of ammunition .
What this means is that if the Branch Davidians were the dangerous extremists they were portrayed as , they could have easily shot @ @ @ @ @ @ @ when they went out to recover their dead .
They did not ; the Davidians honored the ceasefire .
And so began the 51-day standoff in Waco , Texas .
The standoff is frequently thought of as a benign and inert non-confrontation .
However , this is untrue .
While it ’ s true that no shots were fired , there was a virtual constant low-level assault on the compound in the form of noise ( rabbits being slaughtered , jet planes , pop music and other loud noises ) , threatening tank @ @ @ @ @ @ @ bang grenades .
Federal agents would frequently give the middle finger to or “ moon ” the people inside Mt .
Carmel .
The tanks were used to crush the outer perimeter , out buildings , private vehicles belonging to the Branch Davidians , and were repeatedly rolled over the grave of Branch Davidian Peter Gent , despite protests from both Branch Davidians and federal negotiators .
While none of this is acceptable , two of these activities bear special examination : the gas and flash bang grenades .
The “ tear gas @ @ @ @ @ @ @ grade , a type that can turn toxic very easily .
The federal agents knew there were children and even infants in the house , children too small for any gas mask to cover .
They shot the grenades in anyway , effectively considering the suffering of the children inside as acceptable collateral damage .
Further , flash bang grenades are deadly and certainly violated the spirit , if not the letter , of the ceasefire .
Koresh became concerned with the safety of the group due to increasingly aggressive tactics .
All @ @ @ @ @ @ @ house , all of whom were arrested as material witnesses , with one indicted for conspiracy to commit murder .
Children inside were increasingly unwilling to leave Koresh ’ s side , especially once they learned that the children who had previously left had been separated from their mothers and other women in the group who had been caring for them .
Communication predictably began to break down .
The FBI considered using snipers to take out Koresh and other leaders of the movement , and feared a mass suicide .
However , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and those leaving the compound had seen no plans in place for a mass suicide .
How the Media Portrayed the Standoff Koresh and the Davidians watched what the ATF and other federal agents were saying publicly about the initial raid during their 51-day standoff .
The public narrative didn ’ t line up with what the Davidians had experienced , making negotiations even more difficult : Jim Cavanaugh , ATF negotiator : Well , I think we need to set the record straight , and that is that there was no guns @ @ @ @ @ @ @ initial raid ) .
There was National Guard officers on those helicopters .
.
.
Koresh : Now Jim , you ’ re a d*mn liar .
Now let ’ s get real .
Cavanaugh : David , I .
.
.
Koresh : No !
You listen to me !
You ’ re sittin ’ there and tellin ’ me that there were no guns on that helicopter !
?
Cavanaugh : I said they didn ’ t shoot .
There ’ s no guns on .
.
.
Koresh : You @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Well , you ’ re wrong , David .
Koresh : You are a liar !
Cavanaugh : OK. Well , just calm down .
.
.
Koresh : No !
Let me tell you something .
That might be what you want the media to believe , but there ’ s other people that saw too !
Now , tell me Jim again .
You ’ re honestly going to say those helicopters didn ’ t fire on any of us ?
Cavanaugh : What I ’ m sayin ’ is .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ , now you listen to me , OK ?
Koresh : I ’ m listening .
Cavanaugh : What I ’ m sayin ’ is that those helicopters didn ’ t have mounted guns .
OK ?
I ’ m not disputing the fact that there might have been fire from the helicopters .
If you say there was fire from the helicopters and you were there that ’ s OK with me .
What I ’ m tellin ’ you is there was no mounted guns , ya know , outside mounted @ @ @ @ @ @ @ I agree with you on that .
Cavanaugh : Alright .
Now , that ’ s the only thing I ’ m sayin ’ .
Now , the agents on the helicopters had guns .
Koresh : I agree with you on that !
Cavanaugh : You understand what I ’ m sayin ’ ?
Koresh : I agree with you .
Cavanaugh : OK , OK .
So see , we ’ re not even in dispute and Steven ’ s getting all worked up over it .
Koresh : Well , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , I believe Jim , is that you said they didn ’ t fire on us from the helicopters .
Cavanaugh : Well , what I mean is a mounted gun .
.
.
like a , you know , like a mounted machine gun .
Koresh : Yeah .
But like that ’ s beside the point .
What they did have was machine guns .
This distrust by the Davidians of the ATF and their lead negotiator , Jim Cavanaugh , helped exacerbate the standoff .
The newly minted U.S. Attorney @ @ @ @ @ @ @ progress being made at Waco , and invoked ( what else ) the abuse of children in her pitch for a resolution to the conflict .
For his part , President Clinton , who had dealt with a similar situation as Governor of Arkansas in 1985 – with The Covenant , The Sword , and The Arm of the Lord – initially urged waiting out the group .
Reno , however , cited antsy agents and budgetary concerns .
Ultimately , Clinton told her to do whatever she thought was best .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the “ Hostage Roasting Team ” and which denied any evidence of child abuse – came armed with 50 caliber rifles and punched holes in the walls of the building with explosives so they could pump CS poision gas into a building with small children and infants inside .
The plan was to announce to the group that there was no plan to take the house by force while slowly pumping greater amounts of CS gas inside to increase pressure on them to leave .
The fires began around noon on the final @ @ @ @ @ @ @ maintains that they were started deliberately by the Davidians , with some survivors claiming that the FBI started the fires either intentionally or accidentally .
Footage of the Davidians talking about gasoline seem to refer to them making Molotov cocktails to fight the FBI with .
Nine people left the building during the fire .
The remaining people inside all died either from the fire , smoke inhalation , were buried alive by rubble or were shot .
Some showed signs of death by cyanide poisoning , which would likely have been a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ All told , there were 76 deaths .
FBI claims in the 51 days during the standoff they never fired a single shot .
Then 27 of the people in the compound died of bullet wounds .
Then those were self-inflicted or inflicted by other members inside the compound .
Federal investigators considered suicide as a possible form of gunshot death for the Davidians .
It did not consider forced execution to be a likely cause of death .
An exchange between Sen. Chuck Schumer and Assistant Attorney General Edward Dennis in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ summed it up best : Today the only building on the site is a small chapel erected years after the raid .
The building itself was razed .
The incoming head of the ATF , John Magaw , was critical of the raid and made the Treasury Department ’ s Blue Book report on the matter required reading for incoming agents .
Nine Branch Davidians received sentences of up to 40 years for counts including voluntary manslaughter and weapons charges .
Several other Davidians , including foreign nationals , were imprisoned indefinitely as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ British national , was held in McLennan County Jail for seven months , with the bulk of this time in solitary confinement .
Livingstone Fagan claims to have been repeatedly beaten by guards at Leavenworth and other places .
It was here that Fagan claims he was sprayed with cold water by a high-pressure hose before the guards put an industrial fan outside of his cell .
Guards strip searched him every time he left his cell , so he began refusing exercise .
Over 100 civil suits were brought against the government @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Most of these were dismissed before ever coming before a jury .
Where cases were brought to court , the Davidians were ruled against .
A jury in San Antonio , however , acquitted Branch Davidians in the killing of four ATF agents on grounds of self defense .
Perhaps the most important piece of evidence that the ATF fired first was lost .
Houston attorney Dick DeGuerin testified under oath that the right-hand entry door to the building had only incoming bullet holes in it .
A Texas state trooper testified @ @ @ @ @ @ @ looked like that door into a Uhaul .
The Branch Davidians argued at trial that the condition of the left-hand door ( i.e.
, intact ) means that the right-hand door was not destroyed in the fire , but “ lost ” on purpose .
There seems to be no better explanation considering how buttoned down the crime scene was and the stakes involved in shielding the ATF and other federal agents from investigation .
The door was not the only evidence that was “ lost.
” The ATF ’ s footage of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and miraculously , depending on what side you ’ re on ) somehow lost .
All this , despite congressional demands to produce both : What the Waco Siege Tells Us About the Federal Government The Waco siege does not provide any new or stunning insight about the federal government or how it operates .
It does , however , confirm something that we know all too well : That when the federal government makes mistakes , its tendency is not to address and remedy those mistakes , but to double down , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ measure they can to conceal their wrongdoing .
However , there is another more sinister strand to this story : Did the FBI kill men , women and children because of budgetary concerns ?
There is some evidence to suggest that they did .
Federal law prevents the military from enforcing federal law .
What ’ s more , any training that law enforcement agencies receive from the military must be paid out of their own budgets – unless the training is for enforcing “ drug laws.
” Late Congressman Steven Schiff of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ order for the Bureau of Alcohol , Tobacco and Firearms to have obtained the military assistance they did receive , not because of the Posse Comitatus Act , but because of existing military policy , they misrepresented to the military that this was an anti-drug raid when it was never an anti-drug raid.
” In David Hardy ’ s “ This is Not an Assault , ” he stresses , “ Once the military trainers pointed out that the ATF would have to pay , the ATF suddenly claimed that the Davidians – @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tobacco , cow ’ s milk and junk food – were a ‘ dangerous extremist organization ’ believed to be producing methamphetamine.
” There is no evidence that the Branch Davidians were in any way involved in drug production .
There is , however , ample evidence to suggest that the federal government callously ignored the lives and safety of those inside to grandstand before cameras and justify bigger budgets .

“The record of the Waco incident documents mistakes. What the record from Waco does not evidence, however, is any improper motive or intent on the part of law enforcement.” Joseph Biden, U.S. Senator, Delaware (D) and member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which issued the Waco Investigation Report
The siege of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, is an important event in American history because it directly led to one of the biggest terrorist attacks on American soil – the bombing of the Oklahoma City Federal Building. It’s not necessary to defend this act of terrorism to understand why the entire freedom movement of the time was so incensed by it. Indeed, it stood as a symbol of federal overreach and the corruption of the Clinton Administration.
It’s important to separate fact from fiction when it comes to the siege of Waco, just as it is important to do so with the siege of Ruby Ridge or the attack on the American consolate in Benghazi. With every event, it is important to stick to the facts and what can be extrapolated from them to make the strongest argument about what went wrong and why, and what could be done differently in the future.
Background: Who Are the Branch Davidians?
The Branch Davidians were a tiny offshoot of mainstream Seventh-Day Adventism. This stemmed from an earlier split between the main church and a group called Shepherd’s Rod, The Rod or the Davidians. It was effectively a reform movement within Adventism, albeit with some beliefs considered heretical by the mainstream church, none of which are important or relevant for this discussion.
The Branch Davidians were established some 20 years later, and a much more radical departure from Seventh-Day Adventism born from disappointment at the failure of earlier prophecies to materialize. There was some wrangling over the leadership of the group after the death of its founder, but Vernon Howell, better known to the world as David Koresh, ultimately won out over the wife and son of the founder.
Everyone liked Howell when he first showed up at the compound in 1981, including the head of the organization at the time, Lois Roden, with whom he had an affair, despite a more than 40-year age gap (he was in his late 20s, she was in her late 60s). He wanted to have a child with her, one that he believed would be the Chosen One of their religion.
Her son, George Roden, took over upon her death, which led to a power struggle between the two. Roden challenged Howell to raise the dead, going so far as to exhume a corpse for this purpose. Howell attempted to file charges against Roden over the grave robbing, but the police told him that more evidence was needed.
It was then that Howell and seven of his followers raided the compound armed with five .223 caliber semiautomatic rifles, two 22 caliber rifles, two 12-gauge shotguns, and almost 400 rounds of ammunition. They said they were trying to collect evidence of illegal activity on the compound, but forgot to bring a camera with them for that purpose. This was the definitive split where Howell won control of the Branch Davidian church at Mount Carmel. Those who did not follow him continued to use this name and argue that he was never rightfully in possession of it.
It was then that Vernon Howell became David Koresh, a name based on the historical King David and Cyrus the Great (“Koresh” being the Hebrew version of “Cyrus”).
By 1989, Koresh began marrying the members’ wives and daughters, some as young as 12, which was cited as a reason for the eventual raid. He claimed this came from an order from God. The men in the group other than Koresh were to remain celibate.
The Sinful Messiah
Koresh first began getting media attention from the Waco Tribune-Herald in February 1993. “The Sinful Messiah” was the name of a series of articles by Mark England and Darlene McCormick about Koresh and his followers. The articles mostly revolve around the child abuse claims and Koresh’s claim that he had over a dozen children, some of them with girls as young as 12.
Additionally, the group was suspected by local law enforcement of “stockpiling” illegal weapons. Local law enforcement alerted the ATF in May 1992, based on a call from a concerned UPS driver. By June 9th, the ATF had officially opened an investigation into the group.
This is perhaps the time to begin talking about some of the misconceptions or smears about the Branch Davidians. We are agnostic as to whether or not the group was a “cult,” as this can be defined differently by different people. However, the notion that Koresh kept his people in line with either mesmerism or fear does not square up with reports to Congress and elsewhere from survivors of the group. What’s more, rather than the dregs of Waco, many in the group were educated, most were religiously serious, and the group eschewed drugs and junk food.
Contrary to popular belief, Koresh did not claim to be the Second Coming of Christ, but rather to be a new messiah for a new age. The term “sinful messiah” was in fact one of Koresh’s own coinage, meaning that he was a messiah like Christ but, unlike Christ, had a sinful nature.
The allegations of child abuse that prompted the final siege on Mount Carmel is even highly in dispute. Most of the allegations against Koresh come from either disgruntled former members or those involved in child custody battles. The church was investigated by state authorities but not prosecuted, because no solid evidence was ever found. That Koresh married a 14-year-old girl is true, but this would have been totally legal with parental consent at the time – so what were state authorities supposed to do?
Assuming that the allegations of child sexual abuse were true – and we consider them to be extremely dubious – what was the ATF or the FBI doing there? And how does opening fire, throwing hand grenades, poison gassing and burning alive children serve to protect them? These are the important questions which stand as a stunning indictment of federal law enforcement, even if one accepts that child abuse was taking place within the compound.
As with Ruby Ridge, the allegations of the federal government and their toadies in the corporate media are distortions (“Koresh claims to be Christ”), dubious (“Koresh is abusing children”) and, more to the point, irrelevant (“The Branch Davidians were cooking meth”). The FBI and ATF were on the scene in Waco for one reason and one reason alone: To serve a search warrant to determine whether or not the Branch Davidians were making automatic weapons.
The Raid of Waco
The actual events of the raid can be difficult to tease out. Each side disagrees as to what the sequence of events were.
What we know is that, based on an affidavit filed by Davy Aguilera, the ATF obtained a search warrant. This was based on the testimony of a postal agent about what he considered to be suspicious deliveries to Mt. Carmel. However, none of the deliveries were in and of themselves illegal, and included items such as 45 AR-15 upper receivers, and five M-16 upper receivers.
The search warrant was mostly based on the number of weapons possessed by the Davidians. But in the United States of America, we have the right to own as many weapons as we can afford. What’s more, the notion that the Davidians were “stockpiling” weapons is a red herring: They were selling weapons (legally) in addition to buying them, so “inventory” might be the more accurate term for what they had at Mt. Carmel.
According to Dick J. Reavis, author of The Ashes of Waco:
“One of the prophecies that has been around Mt. Carmel since 1934 called for an ultimate confrontation between God’s people, or those at Mr. Carmel, and the forces of an armed apostate power called Babylon . . . Perhaps with that in mind, in 1991, the Davidians began studying armaments and buying and selling guns. He (Koresh) pretty quickly found out there is a lot of money to be made at gun shows and he and other people started going to gun shows. And they bought and sold. They bought items that weren’t guns, and they bought items that were guns. We now say, or the press now says, most people say, they stockpiled weapons. All gun dealers stockpile weapons. We call those stockpiles an inventory. There was an inventory of weapons at Mt. Carmel. A number of guys were involved in the gun shows, just as a number were involved in souping up and restoring cars, and just as a number were involved in playing in the band. There were circles or knots or subsets of people who had hobby interests that were only indirectly related to theology, and guns were one of those interests.”
The ATF’s raid, codenamed “Showtime,” was moved up one day in response to a local newspaper’s article on the Davidians. The local sheriff was not aware of the raid, but the Davidians knew it was coming. The ATF chose to raid the property rather than pick up Koresh while he was in town. An ATF agent who had infiltrated the group reported that they knew of the raid and that his cover was blown. When asked what they were doing when he left the property on the day of the raid, he said that the Davidians were praying.
There was another factor influencing the ATF’s decision to raid the Davidians when they did: Money. According to Henry Ruth, one of three independent reviewers of the Treasury Department’s report on Waco:
“With appropriations hearings a week away, a large successful raid for the ATF would’ve proposed major positive headlines for the agency. It would’ve helped counter the narrative of the ATF as a rogue agency. And it would’ve spread fear about radical fringe groups which would put pressure on Congress to increase its budget. Part of their motivation was to use the siege at Waco as a publicity stunt.”
There is much discussion and debate about who fired first, however, there is ample evidence that it was the ATF when they went to shoot the Davidians’ dogs in their kennels on the way to surrounding the compound. What’s more, the ATF showed up in a cattle trailer protected by a tarp, wearing no body armor. They were not dressed for an armed confrontation with apocalyptic religious extremists.
A ceasefire was negotiated by local authorities. The sheriff claims that the ATF only withdrew once they were out of ammunition. What this means is that if the Branch Davidians were the dangerous extremists they were portrayed as, they could have easily shot down every ATF agent either then or when they went out to recover their dead. They did not; the Davidians honored the ceasefire.
“They could’ve killed every ATF agent out there the day of the raid, had they kept shooting. But when they said they would leave their property, they quit shooting. They were highly protective of their property.” Jack Harwell, Sheriff, McLennan County
And so began the 51-day standoff in Waco, Texas.
The Waco Standoff
The standoff is frequently thought of as a benign and inert non-confrontation. However, this is untrue. While it’s true that no shots were fired, there was a virtual constant low-level assault on the compound in the form of noise (rabbits being slaughtered, jet planes, pop music and other loud noises), threatening tank movements and poison gas, and flash bang grenades. Federal agents would frequently give the middle finger to or “moon” the people inside Mt. Carmel.
The tanks were used to crush the outer perimeter, out buildings, private vehicles belonging to the Branch Davidians, and were repeatedly rolled over the grave of Branch Davidian Peter Gent, despite protests from both Branch Davidians and federal negotiators.
While none of this is acceptable, two of these activities bear special examination: the gas and flash bang grenades.
The “tear gas” used against the compound was military grade, a type that can turn toxic very easily. The federal agents knew there were children and even infants in the house, children too small for any gas mask to cover. They shot the grenades in anyway, effectively considering the suffering of the children inside as acceptable collateral damage. Further, flash bang grenades are deadly and certainly violated the spirit, if not the letter, of the ceasefire.
Koresh became concerned with the safety of the group due to increasingly aggressive tactics. All told, 11 people left the Davidian house, all of whom were arrested as material witnesses, with one indicted for conspiracy to commit murder. Children inside were increasingly unwilling to leave Koresh’s side, especially once they learned that the children who had previously left had been separated from their mothers and other women in the group who had been caring for them.
Communication predictably began to break down. The FBI considered using snipers to take out Koresh and other leaders of the movement, and feared a mass suicide. However, Koresh denied such a thing was imminient and those leaving the compound had seen no plans in place for a mass suicide.
How the Media Portrayed the Standoff
Koresh and the Davidians watched what the ATF and other federal agents were saying publicly about the initial raid during their 51-day standoff. The public narrative didn’t line up with what the Davidians had experienced, making negotiations even more difficult:
Jim Cavanaugh, ATF negotiator: Well, I think we need to set the record straight, and that is that there was no guns on those helicopters (used in the initial raid). There was National Guard officers on those helicopters . . .
Koresh: Now Jim, you’re a d*mn liar. Now let’s get real.
Cavanaugh: David, I . . .
Koresh: No! You listen to me! You’re sittin’ there and tellin’ me that there were no guns on that helicopter!?
Cavanaugh: I said they didn’t shoot. There’s no guns on . . .
Koresh: You are a d*mn liar!
Cavanaugh: Well, you’re wrong, David.
Koresh: You are a liar!
Cavanaugh: OK. Well, just calm down . . .
Koresh: No! Let me tell you something. That might be what you want the media to believe, but there’s other people that saw too! Now, tell me Jim again. You’re honestly going to say those helicopters didn’t fire on any of us?
Cavanaugh: What I’m sayin’ is . . . now I listened to you, now you listen to me, OK?
Koresh: I’m listening.
Cavanaugh: What I’m sayin’ is that those helicopters didn’t have mounted guns. OK? I’m not disputing the fact that there might have been fire from the helicopters. If you say there was fire from the helicopters and you were there that’s OK with me. What I’m tellin’ you is there was no mounted guns, ya know, outside mounted guns on those helicopters.
Koresh: I agree with you on that.
Cavanaugh: Alright. Now, that’s the only thing I’m sayin’. Now, the agents on the helicopters had guns.
Koresh: I agree with you on that!
Cavanaugh: You understand what I’m sayin’?
Koresh: I agree with you.
Cavanaugh: OK, OK. So see, we’re not even in dispute and Steven’s getting all worked up over it.
Koresh: Well, no. What the dispute was over, I believe Jim, is that you said they didn’t fire on us from the helicopters.
Cavanaugh: Well, what I mean is a mounted gun . . . like a, you know, like a mounted machine gun.
Koresh: Yeah. But like that’s beside the point. What they did have was machine guns.
This distrust by the Davidians of the ATF and their lead negotiator, Jim Cavanaugh, helped exacerbate the standoff.
The Final Siege of Mount Carmel
The newly minted U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno was unhappy with the progress being made at Waco, and invoked (what else) the abuse of children in her pitch for a resolution to the conflict. For his part, President Clinton, who had dealt with a similar situation as Governor of Arkansas in 1985 – with The Covenant, The Sword, and The Arm of the Lord – initially urged waiting out the group. Reno, however, cited antsy agents and budgetary concerns. Ultimately, Clinton told her to do whatever she thought was best.
The FBI Hostage Rescue Team – derisively nicknamed the “Hostage Roasting Team” and which denied any evidence of child abuse – came armed with 50 caliber rifles and punched holes in the walls of the building with explosives so they could pump CS poision gas into a building with small children and infants inside. The plan was to announce to the group that there was no plan to take the house by force while slowly pumping greater amounts of CS gas inside to increase pressure on them to leave.
The fires began around noon on the final day of the standoff. The FBI maintains that they were started deliberately by the Davidians, with some survivors claiming that the FBI started the fires either intentionally or accidentally. Footage of the Davidians talking about gasoline seem to refer to them making Molotov cocktails to fight the FBI with.
Nine people left the building during the fire. The remaining people inside all died either from the fire, smoke inhalation, were buried alive by rubble or were shot. Some showed signs of death by cyanide poisoning, which would likely have been a result of the burning CS gas. All told, there were 76 deaths.
FBI claims in the 51 days during the standoff they never fired a single shot. Then 27 of the people in the compound died of bullet wounds. Then those were self-inflicted or inflicted by other members inside the compound. Federal investigators considered suicide as a possible form of gunshot death for the Davidians. It did not consider forced execution to be a likely cause of death.
An exchange between Sen. Chuck Schumer and Assistant Attorney General Edward Dennis in the Clinton Administration in the subsequent congressional investigation summed it up best:
Charles E. Schumer, U.S. Congressman, New York (D): We’ve heard that in the 51 days the FBI was involved, they did not fire a single shot . . . First, That would mean quite certainly that 27 of the people who died in the compound, I think the autopsy report showed 27, I may be off by one or two, who died of bullet wounds, those were self-inflicted or inflicted by other members within the compound . . . Edward Dennis, Former Assistant Attorney General, Clinton Administration: I think that’s a key issue. The fact that Koresh was capable of setting the fire, of killing his own followers, that parents were capable of killing children, or adults were capable of killing children, really says more about the mentality of the individual that you were dealing with and the difficulty in trying to figure out the best way to talk he and his followers out of that compound.
After the Raid
Today the only building on the site is a small chapel erected years after the raid. The building itself was razed. The incoming head of the ATF, John Magaw, was critical of the raid and made the Treasury Department’s Blue Book report on the matter required reading for incoming agents.
Nine Branch Davidians received sentences of up to 40 years for counts including voluntary manslaughter and weapons charges. Several other Davidians, including foreign nationals, were imprisoned indefinitely as material witnesses. Derek Lovelock, a British national, was held in McLennan County Jail for seven months, with the bulk of this time in solitary confinement. Livingstone Fagan claims to have been repeatedly beaten by guards at Leavenworth and other places. It was here that Fagan claims he was sprayed with cold water by a high-pressure hose before the guards put an industrial fan outside of his cell. Guards strip searched him every time he left his cell, so he began refusing exercise.
Over 100 civil suits were brought against the government by Branch Davidians and their surviving families. Most of these were dismissed before ever coming before a jury. Where cases were brought to court, the Davidians were ruled against. A jury in San Antonio, however, acquitted Branch Davidians in the killing of four ATF agents on grounds of self defense.
Perhaps the most important piece of evidence that the ATF fired first was lost. Houston attorney Dick DeGuerin testified under oath that the right-hand entry door to the building had only incoming bullet holes in it. A Texas state trooper testified that he saw two men load what looked like that door into a Uhaul. The Branch Davidians argued at trial that the condition of the left-hand door (i.e., intact) means that the right-hand door was not destroyed in the fire, but “lost” on purpose. There seems to be no better explanation considering how buttoned down the crime scene was and the stakes involved in shielding the ATF and other federal agents from investigation.
The door was not the only evidence that was “lost.” The ATF’s footage of the original raid was also mysteriously (and miraculously, depending on what side you’re on) somehow lost. All this, despite congressional demands to produce both:
“I will just make one comment to the witnesses relative to the video and the front door. We have consistently asked as a committee to get a copy of the videotape which they now say is blank. We have asked for the door, and the door is missing.” William H. Zeliff, Jr., U.S. Congressman, New Hampshire (R)
What the Waco Siege Tells Us About the Federal Government
The Waco siege does not provide any new or stunning insight about the federal government or how it operates. It does, however, confirm something that we know all too well: That when the federal government makes mistakes, its tendency is not to address and remedy those mistakes, but to double down, come back harder, and take every measure they can to conceal their wrongdoing.
However, there is another more sinister strand to this story: Did the FBI kill men, women and children because of budgetary concerns?
There is some evidence to suggest that they did. Federal law prevents the military from enforcing federal law. What’s more, any training that law enforcement agencies receive from the military must be paid out of their own budgets – unless the training is for enforcing “drug laws.” Late Congressman Steven Schiff of New Mexico testified that, ”In order for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms to have obtained the military assistance they did receive, not because of the Posse Comitatus Act, but because of existing military policy, they misrepresented to the military that this was an anti-drug raid when it was never an anti-drug raid.”
In David Hardy’s “This is Not an Assault,” he stresses, “Once the military trainers pointed out that the ATF would have to pay, the ATF suddenly claimed that the Davidians – who in fact eschewed hard liquor, tobacco, cow’s milk and junk food – were a ‘dangerous extremist organization’ believed to be producing methamphetamine.”
There is no evidence that the Branch Davidians were in any way involved in drug production. There is, however, ample evidence to suggest that the federal government callously ignored the lives and safety of those inside to grandstand before cameras and justify bigger budgets.
Written by Sam Jacobs Article posted with permission from Ammo.com


thewashingtonstandard--2020-02-28--Drag Queen Dances Suggestively For Little Girl – Adults Applaud & Cheer

These are the kinds of things to which our children are now being subjected .
In the US , we ’ re seeing Drag Queen Story Time show up in various cities .
However , it seems that a young girl is subjected to a mentally disturbed drag queen who performed a suggestive dance for her as she sat in a chair and adults sat around her applauding and cheering .
The story was reported by Paul Joseph Watson at Summit News : According to the video , which was labeled “ This sweet little girl asked her mom to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ young girl , somewhere between possibly 5-7 is seen sitting in a chair in the middle of a room , possibly a pub , as the man dressed as a woman crawls across the floor to her with most of his backside hanging out of tiny shorts .
Though the title claims the little girl asked to get a better view , the look on her face implies something else , especially as this man strokes her hair and kisses her .
Though quite sickening , this was the video uploaded to Tik @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is the fact that not one adult in the place is standing up against this sort of thing .
For the life of me , I can not understand how no one is charged with contributing to the delinquency of a minor in all of this .
Despite drag queens being an inherently sexual form of performance , leftists still insist there is nothing odd about exposing children to them .
This video clearly suggests otherwise .
As we previously highlighted , a Scottish MP invited a drag queen called ‘ Flowjob ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to Twitter to a primary school and then called parents who complained “ homophobic.
” Even some drag queens have questioned why parents are allowing them to perform to children .
Last month we highlighted the words of an actual drag queen , Kitty Demure , who posted a viral video in which he expressed his amazement at why ‘ woke ’ parents are allowing their kids to be around drag queens , asking , “ Would you want a stripper or a porn star to influence your child ?
” • Super @ @ @ @ @ @ @ For First Time Ever We have been doing our own reporting on some of this degeneracy as well .
• Texas : School District Allowed Drag Queen Miss Kitty Litter ATX To Read To Children Knowing He Was A Sex Offender • 12-Year-Old Drag Queen Appears With Sodomites In Front Of “ Rohypnol ” Painting ( Video ) • Washington : Drag Queen Does Strip Tease for Kids at King County Library • Dallas : Parents Mobilize To Protest “ Drag Queen ” Reading To Small Children “ What Color Is Your Underwear @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Hour Provides Child Sex Offender & Transgender Prostitute To Groom Your Kids • “ Annie Christ ” Drag Queen Allowed To Read To Kids At Library Despite Protests • Why No Arrests ?
10-Year-Old Drag Queen Photographed With Naked Adult Male Of course , some in our culture are pushing back .
• Disentanglement Act : The Means To Put An End To Guys Competing In Women Sports , Drag Queen Story Time , Etc .
– Get A Custom Copy For Your State Here !
• When the Lone Preacher Shuts Down @ @ @ @ @ @ @ • Maryland : Activists & Angry Parents Expose Drag Queen For Running Sex-Oriented Business , Posting Porn Photos Of Nude Men Online – Wants To Read To Children • Washington : Angry Parents Confront & Expose Another Depraved Drag Queen That Wants To Read To Your Kids The entire twisted drag queen sodomy story is all about grooming the next generation .
These criminals are targeting your kids and if you are actually stupid enough to take your kids to see this , it ’ s going to be a terrible judgment day @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at what you are subjecting those God has entrusted to you and repent .
As for those exposing their crimes and protesting and doing everything they can to shut them down , more power to you .
Don ’ t give up !
Article posted with permission from Sons of Liberty Media

These are the kinds of things to which our children are now being subjected. In the US, we’re seeing Drag Queen Story Time show up in various cities. However, it seems that a young girl is subjected to a mentally disturbed drag queen who performed a suggestive dance for her as she sat in a chair and adults sat around her applauding and cheering.
The story was reported by Paul Joseph Watson at Summit News:
According to the video, which was labeled “This sweet little girl asked her mom to get a better view,” the young girl, somewhere between possibly 5-7 is seen sitting in a chair in the middle of a room, possibly a pub, as the man dressed as a woman crawls across the floor to her with most of his backside hanging out of tiny shorts.
Though the title claims the little girl asked to get a better view, the look on her face implies something else, especially as this man strokes her hair and kisses her.
Though quite sickening, this was the video uploaded to Tik Tok.
Here’s a drag queen dancing suggestively for a young girl while the adults look on and cheer pic.twitter.com/b4P5OLcPdE — Matt Walsh (@MattWalshBlog) February 28, 2020
What is even more disgusting is the fact that not one adult in the place is standing up against this sort of thing.
For the life of me, I cannot understand how no one is charged with contributing to the delinquency of a minor in all of this.
Summit News adds:
Despite drag queens being an inherently sexual form of performance, leftists still insist there is nothing odd about exposing children to them.
This video clearly suggests otherwise.
As we previously highlighted, a Scottish MP invited a drag queen called ‘Flowjob’ who had previously uploaded sexually explicit content to Twitter to a primary school and then called parents who complained “homophobic.”
Even some drag queens have questioned why parents are allowing them to perform to children.
Last month we highlighted the words of an actual drag queen, Kitty Demure, who posted a viral video in which he expressed his amazement at why ‘woke’ parents are allowing their kids to be around drag queens, asking, “Would you want a stripper or a porn star to influence your child?”
We have been doing our own reporting on some of this degeneracy as well.
Of course, some in our culture are pushing back.
The entire twisted drag queen sodomy story is all about grooming the next generation. These criminals are targeting your kids and if you are actually stupid enough to take your kids to see this, it’s going to be a terrible judgment day for you for sure, but look at what you are subjecting those God has entrusted to you and repent.
As for those exposing their crimes and protesting and doing everything they can to shut them down, more power to you. Don’t give up!
Article posted with permission from Sons of Liberty Media


thewashingtonstandard--2020-02-28--COVID-19 Infects Iranian Vice President – Kills Iran Ambassador To Vatican

Nothing says ‘ we ’ ve got this under control ’ like confirming that a handful of your government ’ s most senior officials have caught the virus at the root of a deadly pandemic sweeping the globe .
Update ( 0940ET ) : FARS news agency reports that for former Iranian Ambassador to The Vatican has died from Covid-19 .
After confirming on Thursday that its ‘ official ’ death toll from the outbreak had reached 22 with 141 cases confirmed ( lawmakers have claimed that the death toll as of Monday was up to 50 in Qom alone @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the country ’ s vice president for women and family affairs , Masoumeh Ebtekar has tested positive for the virus .
Will A Face Mask REALLY Protect You From The Coronavirus ?
She is the third senior official to be infected , alongside the Deputy Health Minister and Cleric Hadi Khosroshahi , who succumbed to pneumonia due to his advanced age .
In a recent tweet from Ebtekar ’ s twitter account ( because seemingly every senior Iranian official including the Ayatollah is on twitter ) , Ebtekar , an immunologist by training @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by news reports .
Iran canceled Friday prayers in Tehran on Friday as the virus spread further in the capital city .
With Iran ’ s economy badly damaged by sanctions that have also contributed to shortages of essential supplies including medicine and medical products , it is uniquely vulnerable to the virus ’ s devastation .
And the more the regime scrambles to try and contain it , the further it spreads , as Iran ’ s neighbors close their borders to its citizens and turn away from the Middle East ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” .
And as more government officials fall ill , we can ’ t help but wonder how much longer until the Ayatollah gets sick ?

Nothing says ‘we’ve got this under control’ like confirming that a handful of your government’s most senior officials have caught the virus at the root of a deadly pandemic sweeping the globe.
Update (0940ET): FARS news agency reports that for former Iranian Ambassador to The Vatican has died from Covid-19.
* * *
After confirming on Thursday that its ‘official’ death toll from the outbreak had reached 22 with 141 cases confirmed (lawmakers have claimed that the death toll as of Monday was up to 50 in Qom alone), Iranian state media reported that the country’s vice president for women and family affairs, Masoumeh Ebtekar has tested positive for the virus.
Will A Face Mask REALLY Protect You From The Coronavirus?
She is the third senior official to be infected, alongside the Deputy Health Minister and Cleric Hadi Khosroshahi, who succumbed to pneumonia due to his advanced age.
In a recent tweet from Ebtekar’s twitter account (because seemingly every senior Iranian official including the Ayatollah is on twitter), Ebtekar, an immunologist by training, criticized hysteria and panic being propagated by news reports.
As an immunologist, the important point I would like to make is that #COVID-19 outbreak is a health issue that requires experts evidence based observations. Fake, politicized news or posting can be life threatening…
WHO & Health Ministry protocols should be taken seriously. https://t.co/mzYLYgCft4 — Massoumeh Ebtekar (@ebtekarm) February 25, 2020
Iran canceled Friday prayers in Tehran on Friday as the virus spread further in the capital city. With Iran’s economy badly damaged by sanctions that have also contributed to shortages of essential supplies including medicine and medical products, it is uniquely vulnerable to the virus’s devastation.
And the more the regime scrambles to try and contain it, the further it spreads, as Iran’s neighbors close their borders to its citizens and turn away from the Middle East’s worst virus ‘”hot spot”.
And as more government officials fall ill, we can’t help but wonder how much longer until the Ayatollah gets sick?
Article posted with permission from Mac Slavo