THREAD

As Portman steps aside, I keep thinking about my tweet thread about Manchester, a small town on the Ohio River that is struggling.

It’s a symbol of the failed GOP agenda of the past generation

Manchester is in Ohio’s 2nd District, where Portman served for 12 years

1/

If anyone knew the challenges of Manchester, it would be Senator Portman, who represented it all that time.

Then he served as Senator for another 12 years.

No one in Ohio, and few in DC, had more influence, more sway, in the majority, than Senator Portman.

2/
And in that time, towns like Manchester voted for Portman again and again and again

And what did they get from Portman and the GOP?

Tax cuts for the best off, attacks on health care, precious little infrastructure, attacks on new ideas to lift new jobs (Ie. green jobs).

3/
Supports for big businesses and monopolies that are crushing small towns. Etc.

And an Ohio Republican Party and legislature that has attacked local government for years, both their autonomy as well as their funding.

Towns like Manchester needed so much. They got nothing.

4/
As a result, after 24 years of representation from as connected a Congressman or Senator as any town can have in America, Manchester’s Main Street looks like this today...

5/
Only a block from the cleanest section of the Ohio, complete disinvestment. Depressing

So if we’re going to replace Portman w a Dem, beyond talking national issues, it will take showing communities across Ohio that even w the most connected representative..

6/
...any town could have, one who could move mountains if he wanted to, one who could call the Bushes or Kochs and have his calls answered immediately, the end result of that GOP agenda for these communities is simply bad.

Even in the best case, that agenda will fail them.

7/
But it also requires a full-throated advocacy of a positive agenda that lifts communities large and small—from Cincinnati to Manchester—with infrastructure, health care, good jobs, etc

Ohio Dems won a number of mayor’s races in towns like Manchester in ‘19 w just this type..

8/
...of message.

Do it in ‘22 and you just might win a Senate seat against a crop of GOP candidates who’ve all pursued the same failed agenda Portman did.

END

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SunGard + SolarWinds

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https://t.co/U3P3SrrkM1


SunGard Data Center

In Nashville, around the corner from their "big pipe" connection, AT&T. Like any data center, highly secure. Only authorized personnel can enter, and even fewer can access the actual server rooms. Backup generators are available in case of power failure.


If the SunGard hardware was being used to "host" critical command and control software related to SolarWinds, the US powers would be very interested in gaining special access keys that are stored on the hard-drives of specific servers.
global health policy in 2020 has centered around NPI's (non-pharmaceutical interventions) like distancing, masks, school closures

these have been sold as a way to stop infection as though this were science.

this was never true and that fact was known and knowable.

let's look.


above is the plot of social restriction and NPI vs total death per million. there is 0 R2. this means that the variables play no role in explaining one another.

we can see this same relationship between NPI and all cause deaths.

this is devastating to the case for NPI.


clearly, correlation is not proof of causality, but a total lack of correlation IS proof that there was no material causality.

barring massive and implausible coincidence, it's essentially impossible to cause something and not correlate to it, especially 51 times.

this would seem to pose some very serious questions for those claiming that lockdowns work, those basing policy upon them, and those claiming this is the side of science.

there is no science here nor any data. this is the febrile imaginings of discredited modelers.

this has been clear and obvious from all over the world since the beginning and had been proven so clearly by may that it's hard to imagine anyone who is actually conversant with the data still believing in these responses.

everyone got the same R
The UN just voted to condemn Israel 9 times, and the rest of the world 0.

View the resolutions and voting results here:

The resolution titled "The occupied Syrian Golan," which condemns Israel for "repressive measures" against Syrian citizens in the Golan Heights, was adopted by a vote of 151 - 2 - 14.

Israel and the U.S. voted 'No'
https://t.co/HoO7oz0dwr


The resolution titled "Israeli practices affecting the human rights of the Palestinian people..." was adopted by a vote of 153 - 6 - 9.

Australia, Canada, Israel, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, and the U.S. voted 'No' https://t.co/1Ntpi7Vqab


The resolution titled "Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and the occupied Syrian Golan" was adopted by a vote of 153 – 5 – 10.

Canada, Israel, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, and the U.S. voted 'No'
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The resolution titled "Applicability of the Geneva Convention... to the
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Canada, Israel, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, and the U.S. voted 'No'
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Two things can be true at once:
1. There is an issue with hostility some academics have faced on some issues
2. Another academic who himself uses threats of legal action to bully colleagues into silence is not a good faith champion of the free speech cause


I have kept quiet about Matthew's recent outpourings on here but as my estwhile co-author has now seen fit to portray me as an enabler of oppression I think I have a right to reply. So I will.

I consider Matthew to be a colleague and a friend, and we had a longstanding agreement not to engage in disputes on twitter. I disagree with much in the article @UOzkirimli wrote on his research in @openDemocracy but I strongly support his right to express such critical views

I therefore find it outrageous that Matthew saw fit to bully @openDemocracy with legal threats, seeking it seems to stifle criticism of his own work. Such behaviour is simply wrong, and completely inconsistent with an academic commitment to free speech.

I am not embroiling myself in the various other cases Matt lists because, unlike him, I think attention to the detail matters and I don't have time to research each of these cases in detail.

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