Louisiana is full of mainly conservative leaning individuals who usually just don’t vote until they get angry enough/fed up with corruption.

Idk if you’ve heard of Bobby Jindal? But he was a Republican Governor corrupt enough to get the state to vote for a Democrat for the next 8 years. That’s part of why we’re one of the few red states with a Medicaid expansion.

We’re the second most dependent state in the country on Medicaid, and the House Speaker, Mike Johnson of Louisiana, was encouraging cuts to Medicaid in order to pay for a tax cut to the wealthy.

Right now people are very pissed. They need to be kept informed of what’s actually going on so they stay pissed and keep putting pressure on these people.

Good reading skillz

Oh I agree, I don’t believe it was created as a bioweapon, or even created in a lab at all, but I think we have to be ready to acknowledge the lab had safety issues and address accusations we’re likely going to be hearing from Trump’s team in the near future.

If the blame for the pandemic should be pointed anywhere, I think there are several bizarre actions taken by the Trump administration and some serious questions we should be demanding Trump’s own team answer.

Like when Obama’s team attempted to welcome the new administration by holding training exercises for how to handle an emergency response to something like SARS or MERS, Trump’s team was pretty open about what a waste of time they thought it was.

I mean to be completely fair, the Wuhan lab did have substandard safety practices, however that does not in anyway prove the lab leak theory. As far as that being on the NIH, they did not have authority to force a lab in China to conform to U.S. safety standards

1. Oddly, the P3CO recommendations provided to Trump’s administration by Obama also included plans to enforce the same standards of safety required by U.S. NIH research labs for:

A. Any privately funded labs conducting similar research in the U.S.

B. Any labs outside the U.S. receiving NIH funding through collaboration

If Trump’s staff had actually followed those recommendations in the framework THEY CREATED in 2017 to lift the 2014 pause on NIH “dangerous” gain of function research, it would have provided a way for the NIH to actually enforce those standards on the Wuhan lab.

What’s even weirder, is that the NIH was set to release an updated set of guidelines this summer, which probably would have done just that. However, given Trump’s “restructuring” who tf knows.

Those same rules also would force private companies to be regulated by the federal government lab safety standards to conduct similar research, which would mean too much oversight when Trump bans all public funding and completely privatizes GOF/vaccine research for some reason just isn’t a priority for Trump

2. There are accusations that members of the lab showed symptoms and reported to area hospitals with some of the earliest cases. However, if this is actually true, and we’re jumping to substandard safety practices being responsible for the virus, shouldn’t we at least be mentioning that these lab members could have easily been exposed to bat virus while taking samples from caves in Wuhan?

If the lab members were also doing this without proper protection, they would seem to be the perfect vectors allowing the virus to eventually mutate and begin spreading to others.

EcoHealth, the U.S. lab that was actually receiving NIH funds and collaborating with the already established Wuhan lab, had actually previously conducted similar research in other countries studying coronaviruses such as MERS.

A 2013 NYT article includes information from one EcoHealth member studying MERS, about the often uncomfortable precautions taken in order to always avoid potential exposure while exploring caves.

Trump: Por que no los dos?

You know normally I think the argument that people are less imaginative/creative than they used to be in the past is BS.

After reading the sentence “He made his way to the roof by threatening guards with a fake pistol and nectarines painted as grenades.” I think maybe that’s true

I wrote a summary above, but the missing link is the Heritage Foundation, and Idk if bought or partnered with is the better way to put it.

“You capture the Soviet Union – I’m going to capture the states.” -Thomas Roe, member of the Heritage Foundation and creator of the State Policy Network

Yeah it’s definitely not “just one guy,” this is a collective effort by a group of very wealthy people who are creating policy at the federal level and state level.

This is decades in the making. It is a sort of “civil war” but the thing is, it’s a small group of wealthy people who are hoping to manipulate enough Americans into believing they have some kind of common in-group interest that will motivate them to fight against any Americans resistant to their takeover. Which, after actually typing that out, and reading it, I’m realizing that is also exactly what the American civil war was, there was just no way for people to be informed about who was actually pulling the country’s strings at the time.

That’s why they exploit political, racial, and religious divisions. They don’t actually care about any ideology. It’s a tool to manipulate and control in order to further exploit groups to do their fighting for them.

The Heritage Foundation first infiltrated the government by providing Reagan with a copy of their Mandate for leadership, and getting him on board back in the early 80s.

Over 40 years later, they are back in the White House ready to implement Project 2025.

Since Reagan opened the door for them, America has gradually accepted that social benefits are handouts, but corporate welfare actually benefits all of America, because somehow corporations ARE people.

Citizens United was a huge victory for this wealthy group of individuals, because they now have to jump through fewer hoops/hide the source of money used to buy elections.

The Heritage Foundation has also created a network of nonprofit think tanks in all 50 states that pays to promote state level policy benefitting wealthy individuals and corporate donors while disguising it as “small government” representative of state residents.

The creator of this network was Thomas Roe, an early member of the Heritage Foundation. As Roe himself explained to another Heritage Foundation trustee, Robert Krieble, “You capture the Soviet Union – I’m going to capture the states.”

T.l.d.r., it’s a bit more complex than one guy.

Also, if you didn’t know, Ukraine has warned that China is providing weapons to Russia

And as of yesterday, Russia’s highest court declared the Taliban, no longer a terrorist organization. Not surprising since Putin has declared the Taliban a trusted ally and began pursuing an allegence last year when the U.S. and Europe became more involved defending Ukraine

So while Russia is partnering with North Korea, China, the Taliban, and Iran, we are also removing the agency that is supposed to prevent disinformation from these places from targeting Americans.

Meanwhile America’s President is telling us that Ukraine was actually the aggressor against Russia the whole time, and as of yesterday Hegseth is telling Europe they need to figure out their own defense.

We’re also removing cybersecurity protections against Russia and China and making our own infrastructure vulnerable to an attack while distancing ourselves from our allies. If we leave NATO, that means we lose any expectation of protection from our allies. If America is attacked by any of our former enemies that we suddenly are pretending are our friends, they could also easily target our water and electricity grids, leaving us completely at their mercy.

If you can’t see how bad this is, the only explanation is that you must support it.

Guys don’t worry about losing the entire E.U. as an ally now that Trump is aligning us with Russia. Putin has some really cool new friends that we can also be aligned with.

This is the Republican party in 2025, representing traditional American values by destroying the United States, crushing democracy and supporting a Russian dictator and the Taliban.

He’s Trump’s science advisor, Peter Theil’s protege, and son in law of Brexit Secretary Sir David Davis. The best of the best.

Was it a stun gun or a Jewish space laser?

Yeah it was a dumb thing to say, that’s the point

Have you never seen a dystopian scifi movie? If this administration somehow attempted to time travel, you don’t think the world would look exactly like it does now?

I mean, if we are to go by Kratsios’ speech, it would appear they are just the first brave and innovative enough to take advantage of technology already existing but intentionally weighed down by regulations. This timeline being a result of their brave innovation makes a lot of sense.

Maybe in your house, but in the White House, I’m not so sure. Mr. Kratsios holds a political science degree (with a focus on Hellenic studies) and appears to have no hard science qualifications.

Just to be clear, the point is that Kratsios seemed to be making a sciencebro sales pitch about U.S. innovation under Trump, but given how delusional and unethical this administration has already been when it comes to making a name for U.S. tech supremacy, people took it seriously.

Wasn’t expecting such a weirdly strong reaction to pointing this out, but yikes.

You just gave me a mental image of the dumbest BTFII reboot

Nope. But given our elite technologist leaders often have some dangerous ideas about innovation and “improvements to society,” that don’t quite align with reality, I can’t say I blame people for worrying they might actually try.

I would make an inappropriate Ted Kaczynski joke if I didn’t know everything we do is being constantly monitored at all times by a bunch of turds with zero sense of humor.