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Remember: These Socialist Laws Are Never Opposed by Rabbis!

Rent Control, Jobs, Marriage

By 

July 13, 2020

 

Demand curves slope in a downward direction. This means that the higher the price, the less of an item, or good, or service, will be sought. The more road blocks, hurdles, thumb tacks, placed in the way of any given action, the less likely it will occur. Economists do not agree on many things, but on this insight there will be nary a dismal scientist who will not acquiesce.

Yet, there are several public policies in place that are incompatible with this common-sense understanding.

Consider first residential rental units. New York City, San Francisco, Cleveland and another half dozen major cities are now offering free legal advice to tenants threatened by eviction. At present this benefit is afforded mainly to those accused of a crime who cannot afford a lawyer, on the ground that such legal aid is needed to provide equal justice for rich and poor alike. Now, it is being extended to renters.

Some commentators even think that this strengthens the hands of tenants and reduces homelessness. They reckon, however, in the absence of downward sloping demand curves. They think only in terms of immediate, not long term effects. Yes, give them free legal advice and fewer people will be evicted; one point for the tenant.

But look at this from the point of view of the landlord, or, the would-be investor in residential real estate. It now becomes more difficult to evict non-paying, or obstreperous tenants. Will they be more or less likely to build, upgrade, repair, apartment dwellings? To ask this question is to answer it. They will tend to seek greener pastures elsewhere. They will try to convert extant dwellings into condominiums, commercial space, etc. But, with less residential housing available the situation of renters will become more dire, not less. Remember that downward sloping demand curve: with a lowered supply, rents will rise not fall, and a given square footage will accommodate fewer people, not more. More homelessness, here we come.

The same analysis applies to other efforts to “help” tenants. Under economic freedom, landlords may demand as much as several months’ worth of security deposits. This will indemnify them if there are damages. It will also protect them from bankruptcy since it typically takes months to evict non payers. This problem arises especially during the Christmas season; judges are particularly reluctant to toss people out onto the street during these times. Curiously, they do not at all have the same attitude regarding robbers during December. But what are non-paying tenants other than thieves of accommodation?

Next consider the labor market. In France in particular, and other countries as well, the law makes it more and more difficult to fire employees. The authorities want to protect workers, and, also, do not relish increased unemployment statistics. This “remedy” of theirs also fails to take into account downward sloping demand curves; it looks, only, to the immediate run, avoiding long run effects. For when barriers are placed in the way of laying off wage earners, less of it will occur. How do rational profit seeking entrepreneurs react? Why, by not hiring workers in the first place! Instead of offering full time employment, they take on only part timers. Firms resort to contracting out to smaller firms, or to the individuals themselves. The latter take on what are called “gigs” so as to escape these unwarranted legislative enactments.

These laws are also discriminatory. Workers can quit with no by your leave. Unless and until employers can sever relationships with employees as easily, justice, to say nothing of full employment, will not prevail.

Let us attempt to make this point in an unrelated arena of human interaction. Suppose a law were passed and fully enforced mandating that no divorce would be allowed, ever, for any reason whatsoever. The immediate effect of course would be to preserve marriage. Without the possibility of divorce, more marriages would stay intact than otherwise (we abstract from the effect of such a law on the rate of infidelity). But what would be the long run effect of such a law on this institution ? Demand curves slope downward even in this milieu. Place more barriers against an act, weddings in this case, and fewer of them will occur.

If society really has the best interests of tenants, of employees, and, also, of spouses, it will not in effect charge higher “prices” for them. The very opposite policies would be pursued.

From LRC, here.

A Serious Question Has Now Arisen Regarding America’s Future…

IMPLOSION

Even a cursory review of world history allows the reader to realize that great and mighty countries and empires fall not necessarily because of outside pressures, but because of the implosion of the society itself. Rome ruled the world for over five centuries, and, at the height of its power, it succumbed to barbaric tribes. The breakup and disintegration of the Empire came as Rome was undermined by the spread of Christianity within its society and the dissatisfaction and dissolution of social norms. These factors gave way to internal violence and a complete abandonment of any sense of loyalty to the Empire itself, or to the history that Rome had so carefully fashioned and preserved over its centuries of hegemony. In short, Rome collapsed from within and not from without.

The same can be said of the Spanish Empire in the 16th century, which never recovered from its foolish, and self-destructive exile of its Jewish population at the beginning of the century. It no longer possessed the creativity and will to succeed that had driven it to become one of the major powers in the world.

The Ottoman Empire was also rotten from the inside, and any stress placed upon it would hasten its extinction and disappearance. The first World War provided that stress. and the Ottoman Turkish Empire never recovered. In our time, we have witnessed the destruction of Communism within the Soviet Union after 75 years of brutal and tyrannical rule. Once again, the Soviet Union collapsed from the inside and not from the outside. It had weathered all of the storms of World War II and the Cold War, but it could not survive because of the malaise of its population, the burdens of bureaucracy and inefficient government that it had foisted upon a helpless populace.

A serious question has now arisen regarding the future of the United States of America. It is a very polarized society, and over the past decades it has lost its moral footing. It has become dissolute, hateful of its own heritage, spoiled by too much material wealth, and subject to Marxist indoctrination emanating from its educational systems. Whether or not the United States will be able to survive this storm is, as of yet, an undecided question. However, it is clear to me that no matter what happens, it will become increasingly difficult for Orthodox Jews to maintain themselves in American society. The entire culture is hostile to Torah values and to a Jewish way of life.

Jews have waxed prosperous over the past decades, and the continuity of Orthodox educational institutions is contingent upon the continuation of that prosperity. However, whether America will have a prosperous future over the next few decades is a difficult question to answer. There will be more governmental regulations regarding curriculum, and the nature of educational classes in schools. Education separated by sex will certainly not be allowed, and the concentration on Torah studies will be severely limited. I hope that I am wrong regarding my fears, but my heart tells me otherwise.

Certainly, the America that I grew up in and lived in for most of my lifetime no longer exists. There is no longer wholesome entertainment nor a feeling of moral probity. America was once a religious country. Today it has become overwhelmingly secular with all the attendant evils that such a change in society inevitably engenders. History teaches us that nothing goes on forever, and that great countries and empires rise but inevitably fall.

For many years, I thought that the United States was an exception to that rule, but I no longer believe so. The curve has already flattened, and we are witness to the downward spiral that leads to irrelevance and impotence in world events, I fervently pray that I am wrong but these are my impressions as I view the current scene.

From Rabbi Berel Wein, here.

A Pandemic of Mask Misinformation

Physician And Medical Journal Editor: Healthy People Should Not Wear Face Masks

 POSTED ON

Healthy People Should Not Wear Face Masks

by Jim Meehan, MD
MeehanMD.com.

Via Health Impact News:

During the COVID-19 pandemic, public health experts began telling us to follow a number of disease mitigation strategies that sounded reasonably scientific, but actually had little or no support in the scientific literature. Community wearing of masks was one of the more dangerous recommendations from our confused public health experts.

The Pandemic of Bad Science and Public Health Misinformation on Community Wearing of Masks

Renowned neurosurgeon, Russell Blaylock, MD had this to say about the science of masks:

As for the scientific support for the use of face masks, a recent careful examination of the literature, in which 17 of the best studies were analyzed, concluded that, “None of the studies established a conclusive relationship between mask/respirator use and protection against influenza infection.”[R] Keep in mind, no studies have been done to demonstrate that either a cloth mask or the N95 mask has any effect on transmission of the COVID-19 virus. Any recommendations, therefore, have to be based on studies of influenza virus transmission. The fact is, there is no conclusive evidence of their efficiency in controlling flu virus transmission. – Russell Blaylock, MD

You can read Dr. Blaylock’s brilliant discussion of this matter at the end of this paper or at this link:

Blaylock: Face Masks Pose Serious Risks to the Healthy

Quarantining Healthy People – A Failed Experiment

We were told that everyone, even the healthy, should quarantine at home. All were told to “shelter-in-place,” isolate ourselves, hide alone, indoors, until the danger of the virus passed, despite the large body of scientific evidence that shows our immune systems thrive on diversity of exposures, sunlight, time in nature, and in loving company of others.

Furthermore, it seemed that the public health experts were ignoring the very real harms that result from shutting down the economy, putting tens of millions of workers out of work, and the shadow pandemic of suicides, drug abuse, overdoses, and other harms that follow massive economic downturns. [R][R]

Historically and by definition, quarantines had always been about sequestering the sick. Never before had anyone beat a virus by quarantining the healthy. We were not told that quarantining healthy people was a first-of-its kind experiment. And the experiment failed. More on this topic later.

Community Wearing of Masks is a Bad Recommendation

We were frequently confused by the mixed messages coming from public health agencies. Early in the pandemic Dr. Fauci, the U.S. Surgeon General, and the WHO all told the public, in no uncertain terms, not to wear masks. Then, over the course of the next several weeks and months, the CDC twice changed their recommendations, as did the WHO, and the recommendations always contradicted each other!

The CDC made the mistake of telling us cloth masks worked, and they even provided directions on their website for making homemade cloth masks.

To clear up the confusion, I will show that the scientific evidence not only does not support the community wearing of face masks, but the evidence shows that healthy people wearing face masks pose serious health risks to wearers.

Hiding our faces behind masks and isolating in our homes is not the solution, at least not for most people with healthy immune systems. Supporting the health of your immune system, confidently confronting all pathogens, and allowing herd immunity to develop and protect the vulnerable populations should be the goal.

What’s happening in the world today, including the misinformation surrounding community mask wearing, is about political agendas, symbolism, fear, and dividing and isolating the people. It has nothing to do with science.

Medical Masks are Bad for Health

As a physician and former medical journal editor, I’ve carefully read the scientific literature regarding the use of face masks to mitigate viral transmission. I believe the public health experts have community wearing of masks all wrong. What follows are the key issues that should inform the public against wearing medical face masks during the CoVID-19 pandemic, as well as all future respiratory disease pandemics.

Face masks decrease oxygen, increase carbon dioxide, and alter breathing in ways that increase susceptibility and severity of CoVID-19

Mask wearers frequently report symptoms of difficulty breathing, shortness of breath, headache, lightheadedness, dizziness, anxiety, brain fog, difficulty concentrating, and other subjective symptoms while wearing medical masks. As a surgeon, I have worn masks for prolonged periods of time in thousands of surgeries and can assure you these symptoms do occur when surgical masks are worn for extended periods of time. The longer a surgical mask is worn, the more saturated with moisture it becomes, and the more significantly it inhibits the inflow of oxygen and outflow of carbon dioxide.

In fact, clinical research shows that medical masks lower blood oxygen levels[R] and raise carbon dioxide blood levels.[R] The deviations in oxygen and carbon dioxide may not reach the clinical criteria for hypoxia (low blood oxygen), hypoxemia (low tissue oxygen), or hypercapnia (elevated blood carbon dioxide), but they can deviate enough to cause even healthy individuals to become symptomatic, as occurred with the surgeons studied and published in this report:

Preliminary Report on Surgical Mask Induced Deoxygenation During Major Surgery

At the same time masks inhibit oxygen intake, they trap the carbon dioxide rich breath in the mouth/mask inter-space. Thus, a fraction of carbon dioxide previously exhaled is inhaled at each respiratory cycle.

Masks force you to re-breathe a portion of your own breath, including all the stuff (infectious viral particles) the lungs were trying to remove from the body (more on this later).

As medical masks lower oxygen and raise carbon dioxide in the blood, the brain senses the changes and the risk they pose to the maintenance of normal physiology. Thus, the brain goes to work to bring things back in order. To obtain more oxygen and remove more carbon dioxide, the brain tells the lungs to increase the rate (frequency) and depth of breaths.[R] Unfortunately, struggle as they may, your brain and lungs can not fully compensate for the negative effects of the mask. Some may even suffer the symptoms of carbon dioxide toxicity.

For people with diseases of the lungs, especially chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), face masks are intolerable to wear as they worsen breathlessness.[R]

In the case of respiratory pathogens, the negative effects of masks and the respiratory changes they induce could increase susceptibility and transmission of CoVID-19, as well as other respiratory pathogens.

Viral particles move through face masks with relative ease. Studies show that about 44% of viral particles pass through surgical masks, 97% pass through cloth masks, and about 5% through N95 masks. Increasing tidal volume (depth of breaths) results in literally sucking more air, more forcefully through and around the mask. Any SARS CoV-2 particles on, in, or around the mask are more forcefully suctioned into the mouth and lungs as a result of the compensatory increases in tidal volume.

The changes in respiratory rate and depth may also increase the severity of CoVID-19 as the increased tidal volume delivers the viral particles deeper into the lungs.

These changes may worsen the community transmission of CoVID-19 when infected people wearing masks exhale air more heavily contaminated with viral particles from the lungs.

These effects are amplified if face masks are contaminated with the viruses, bacteria, or fungi that find their way or opportunistically grow in the warm, moist environment that medical masks quickly become.

Despite the scientific evidence to the contrary, public health experts claim that medical masks do not cause clinically significant hypoxia (low oxygen) and hypercapnia (high CO2). I would like to ask those experts to explain the growing number of cases in which medical masks worn during exercise have resulted in lung injuries and heart attacks:

Two Chinese boys drop dead during PE lessons while wearing face masks amid concerns over students’ fitness following three months of school closure [R][R]

Jogger’s lung collapses after he ran for 2.5 miles while wearing a face mask [R]

If medical masks were perfectly safe and effective, then why would healthy boys suffer heart attacks or a 26 year old man collapse his lung while wearing masks and running?! In my opinion, these are tragic examples of the risks of wearing medical masks. And we are only getting started.

Continue reading…

From Natural Blaze, here.

Masterpiece Cakeshop Tyranny Was Copied to Israel – Now Comes the Appeal

Printing house appealed: We did not discriminate

Posted on July 2, 2020

Thursday, July 2, 2020, 12:27

The owners of the “Tzivei HaKeshet” printing house appealed to the Be’er Sheva District Court regarding the ruling by Be’er Sheva Magistrates Court Judge Orit Lipschitz which obligates them to compensate the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI), specifically Israel’s LGBT Task Force associated with it, known as “The Aguda”, for discrimination. The owners of the printing house were required to pay The Aguda the sum stipulated in the suit and also the maximum compensation set by law. In the appeal the printing house owners claim that they acted in accordance with the freedoms of religion, conscience and trade, and point out the flaws in the court ruling.

The appeal was filed by Honenu Attorney Menashe Yado, who wrote that the fundamental question in the case is, “Is it appropriate and is it possible to compel a religious business owner to produce a product contrary to his beliefs, his values, his sensitivities, and the commandments of his religion?” Also the court ruling faced the appellants with the dilemma of either earning an income or following the Torah.

Yado stated that the court ruling “creates secular coercion according to the LGBT narrative and imposes it on religious people, and that is a severe and precedential violation of the freedom of religion and trade in the private sector.” He explained that the Be’er Sheva Magistrates Court erred in its interpretation of the anti-discrimination law being as in the case of the printing house there was no discrimination: the place in question is not a public place, the service requested was not a public service, the matter did not involve a product or the supply of a product, but rather the matter pertained to providing a service.

The appeal claimed that the right of the appellants not to perform a service contrary to their beliefs – such as when an issue involves tension between social groups based on the rights of an individual – is the right of the religious public as a whole. Additionally, the Be’er Sheva Magistrates Court erred when it did not consider the freedom of trade of the appellants and their freedom of religion and also did not consider the halachic opinion which they submitted.

Concerning the principle of tolerance, the appeal claimed, “It is obvious that butcher shop owners would not order design work from a vegetarian designer, members of the ‘No’am’ political party would not request printing of ‘Man + Woman = Family’ fliers from a printing house owned by LGBT owners, right-wingers would not print fliers in memory of Rahavam Ze’evi, z”l, at a Muslim Arab printing house and a bereaved parent would not be required to provide stage services for an evening in joint memory of Israeli and Palestinian victims.”

In the appeal Yado mentioned a similar ruling handed down in the USA concerning a Christian baker who refused to bake a wedding cake with male figurines for a homosexual couple. There the court ruled that with all due respect to desire of the couple to receive recognition, it was not possible to force someone to give them the recognition at the expense of his sensitivities and his conscience. “There must be tolerance for the values, the beliefs and the sensitivities of others, in this instance those of a religious person.”

The summary of the appeal states that the Be’er Sheva Magistrates Court compelled the appellants to violate religious prohibitions and that the court erred in its decision to convict the appellants of discrimination against the respondent, because there had not been discrimination but rather ideological opposition.

Honenu Attorney Menashe Yado, who is representing the appellants, the printing house owners: “The appeal is supported by strong and sound claims and we hope and believe that the [Be’er Sheva] District Court will accept our claims and overturn the ruling handed down by the [Be’er Sheva] Magistrates Court.”

“We reiterate that approximately two months ago a court ruling was handed down concerning the refusal of a printing house in Be’er Sheva to produce material for the LGBT association on the Ben Gurion University campus. The association emailed a request for a price estimate for printing material. In response, the printing house emailed a warning not to send them abhorrent material: ‘We do not handle abhorrent material; we are Jews,’ and refused to print the requested material. The Association for Civil Rights in Israel sued the printing house owners and the Be’er Sheva Magistrates Court convicted them of discrimination. The owners have filed an appeal on the decision, and we hope that our claims will be accepted.”

Honenu: Support the printing house!

Immediately after the Be’er Sheva Magistrates Court ruling Honenu distributed fliers – see image above – calling on the public to support the printing house: “Today, in the Jewish State, a printing house that refused to print fliers which violated Jewish law and their faith, was fined over 50,000 NIS [50,00 NIS to the plaintiffs in addition to legal expenses] by the court!! This is the price of keeping mitzvot in the State of Israel.

“Following the publication of the scandalous ruling we have received many requests for information from citizens interested in assisting the business owner who was fined. Whoever needs quality printing services is invited to place an order.”

Shmuel (Zangi) Meidad, the director of Honenu: “Today, unfortunately a court in Israel crossed a line. What is left for us is the People of Israel, solidarity, and mutual assistance. ‘They helped every one his neighbor; and every one said to his brother: “Be strong”.’ (Isiah 41:6) The Torah and faith in G-d were here long before the court and they will be here forever.”

From Honenu, here.

Apply This to Israeli Government ‘Second Wave’ Corona Fearmongering…

Why I’m Not That Worried About Latest Increase in U.S. COVID Cases (At Least Not Yet)

Monday, July 6, 2020

As we have lifted the lockdowns, we move closer and closer to whatever the “new normal” may be. Those have been clamoring for extended lockdowns worry that the lockdowns have been lifted prematurely. The New York Times dismally lamented about a gloomy picture. The Los Angeles Times analogize the spread of COVID-19 to a forest fire. One of the main metrics that lockdown proponents have used to try to justify either returning to lockdowns or prolonging reopening provisions is that of increased confirmed cases. As we see below (figures extracted from Johns Hopkins website on July 5), the number of confirmed cases has reached 52,391. The percent of positive cases has also increased to 7.6% from its 4.4% trough. Dr. Anthony Fauci called last week “a very disturbing week” in terms of this increase. While it might make some intuitive sense to use number of confirmed cases as basis for whether the pandemic is getting worse in the United States (especially relative to other countries), I have some reasons to doubt that assertion.

  • Confirmed cases are not indicative of total amount of infected individuals. One of the best features in favor of confirmed cases as a metric is that it is one of the earlier indicators within the infection timeline. Hospitalizations lag infections, and deaths lag hospitalizations. As nice as it might seem, it does not tell us as much as we would like. As a matter of fact, well-renown statistician Nate Silver wrote a piece in April about how coronavirus tests are actually meaningless. Especially at the beginning of the pandemic, the testing was prioritized for those showing symptoms. While the testing is still skewed in that direction, increased testing capabilities has allowed for more mildly symptomatic or asymptomatic individuals to get tested. Since the testing is not randomized, it suffers from a selection bias that makes COVID-19 look deadlier than it is. Over time, we see that the crude fatality rate (CFR) end up higher than the infection fatality rate (IFR), the latter of which being the apparent death rate.
    • On June 25, the CDC said that for every confirmed case, there are about ten people who had antibodies. At that moment, there were about 2.3 million confirmed cases, which means there were at least an estimated 23 million actual cases.
    • In case you did not have enough evidence that there are a lot more infected than we think, the Pennsylvania State University released an eye-opening paper late last month. This Penn State study examined influenza-like illnesses (ILI) surveillance data. After looking through the ILI data, they concluded that the initial infection rate was much higher. Rather than the initially estimated 100,000 new cases in the last three months, they estimated that there were actually 8.7 million cases, which implies an initial infection rate over 80 times higher than initially estimated. They also found that the number of cases also double twice as quickly as initially estimated (Silverman et al., 2020).
    • As Reason Magazine points out, even if we want to use CFR as a metric (although it is a poor one), the CFR has fallen from more than 6 percent on May 16 to less than 5 percent as of June 28 (see Worldometers data here).
  • Demographic shift in who is getting infected. At the beginning of the pandemic, what we observed in the United States that it was those 60 and older disproportionately contracting COVID-19. Using Florida as an example, the median age dropped from 65 in March to 35 in June. On the whole, 43 percent of COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. took place in long-term care facilities. As the Heritage Foundation reminds us, the age demographics matter a lot when it comes to a serious illness. Younger adults are not immune from contracting a serious case of COVID-19, but the probability of a severe case or death for this demographic is much less likely. What has happened in recent weeks is that younger adults are accounting for a greater share of those infected. With more young adults contracting COVID-19, it is likely that the incident of severe cases and deaths vis-à-vis the IFR will be lower. While there is concern for younger adults infecting the elderly (which means we can have stricter protocols for long-term care facilities instead of another round of lockdowns), this shift is accompanied by other positive trends.
  • Decline in new hospitalizations. According to The Covid Tracking Project, which provides nationwide and state-level COVID data, there has been an increase in overall hospitalizations. At the same time, we have to be mindful of the number of new hospitalizations. Even when accounting for a two-week lag between infection and symptom onset, the CDC still shows an overall decline in new hospitalizations since mid-April. Looking at the CDC’s interpretation of hospitalization forecasting, most of the models show a nationwide plateau of new hospitalizations in the upcoming weeks, although certain states (e.g., Arizona, California) are expected to see an increase.
  • Decrease in COVID-19 Deaths. It is more difficult to draw conclusions from the death data since it can take several weeks between infection and death. At the same time, what CDC data show us is that there has been a decline in all age demographics from the April 18 peak.
  • Our ability to treat COVID-19 has improved. Aside from adequate hospital capacity in most jurisdictions, we preliminarily have two treatments that show at least some promise: remdesivir and dexamethasone. We also have greater knowledge on how to treat COVID-19 in terms of treatment protocol (e.g., how to better use ventilators and their limits, prone positioning). I expect preparedness, palliative care, and treatment to only improve as time passes.

Continue reading…

From Libertarian Jew, here.