Tag Archives: WA

Current Events

Welcome to Seattle – “The Emerald City”

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Once a great city known as the Gateway to the Pacific. What a great place to live — NOT!

Shoplifting as Usual in Seattle

From the Wall Street Journal

Friday 6 May 2022

Lowe’s employees came to recognize William Piccone by his skinny jeans, distinctive gait and posture—and his prolific shoplifting, police say. Over a 97-day spree last year, he allegedly stole from the same store 27 times, walking away with more than $4,650 in merchandise. Welcome to Seattle, where impunity reigns.

That’s what Ann Davison, Seattle’s newly elected city attorney, is learning as she acts on a voter mandate to restore order. Her office ran the numbers and discovered that 118 individuals were responsible for more than 2,400 crimes in Seattle over the past five years. Her effort to crack down on the worst repeat offenders is facing progressive resistance.

At issue is Ms. Davison’s proposal to exclude prolific criminals from Seattle’s Community Court. In 2019 her predecessor signed an agreement with the Seattle Municipal Court and the Department of Public Defense. Some two dozen classes of misdemeanor cases now go straight to the Community Court, which releases the accused after referring them to support services and sometimes assigning them a life-skills class or community service.

Theft of up to $750 in a single incident in Seattle is a misdemeanor. Other crimes that go express to Community Court include residential trespassing, possession of tools for burglary or auto theft, and property destruction.

The 2019 agreement includes no eligibility restrictions, so those with serious criminal histories qualify. Seattle criminals get four tries in the Community Court before they flunk out. Each can encompass multiple charges. Repeat offenders see the lack of consequences as an invitation to commit more crimes.

Since 2017 Mr. Piccone has been charged in some 60 criminal cases across Washington, and police have referred him for prosecution to the Seattle city attorney 46 times, Ms. Davison’s office says. Twenty-two of his most recent cases were referred to the Seattle Community Court, where he was turned loose, the city attorney’s office says. The King County Prosecuting Attorney, which handles Seattle felonies, has three current cases against Mr. Piccone for organized retail theft and burglary. On a judge’s order Mr. Piccone was released into a halfway house after receiving detox treatment. On April 28, Mr. Piccone missed a hearing after he was arrested on multiple municipal warrants earlier that day.

Mr. Piccone has pleaded not guilty to a second- degree burglary charge and didn’t respond to a message left at a phone number listed for him in police records. His public defender didn’t respond to our inquiry by deadline.

“With regard to Mr. Piccone, court documents show significant mainstream criminal court involvement predating the creation of community court,” said Anita Khandelwal, the director of Department of Public Defense, in a written response to our inquiry.

She continued: “That involvement resulted, at times, in multiple months of incarceration, but it neither ended his involvement with the system nor addressed his unmet needs. Those same documents suggest that Mr. Piccone is experiencing housing instability. Providing him housing is much more likely to promote safety than continued court involvement.”

As Ms. Davison seeks to renegotiate the 2019 agreement, she sits across the table from Ms. Khandelwal and Judge Damon Shadid, a progressive who oversees the Seattle Community Court. On April 27, Ms. Davison told the Seattle Municipal Court that negotiations had reached an impasse. Is it any wonder?

Ms. Davison has now asked the Seattle Municipal Court to intervene. The court said in a statement that it was considering her proposal and would work “to identify how to move forward together and create a prioritized plan for people whose needs and issues are not being addressed, and have not been addressed historically, by our criminal justice system.”

Here’s hoping the court means the victims of crime, not the criminals. But I doubt it!

Originally posted 2022-05-09 12:45:24.

Current Events

The Empire State

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Folks, I may raise some feathers with this, but I make no apologies. If you live in NY , I feel sorry for you, but my empathy for you is awfully small, especially if you are my age! I don’t care if you have a great job, live close to your kids and grandkids, and simply like living in a state run by complete idiots. Actually, I have little empathy for anyone who lives in CA, OR, or WA either. And I might even throw in WI, MI, or PA. All these states have gone mad to one degree or another. This latest from the Empire State is simply unbelievable. Stand by Ojiisans, you are next! You elected this fool, so live with it!

New York to Give Preference to Minorities in Receiving Covid Antivirals and Monoclonal Antibodies

by bunkerville

One more reason to leave New York. This one is unconscionable. One could reasonably ask why productions of these drugs have not been stepped up. The same question regarding testing. What this leaves of course is rationing. Something the Progressives have had in mind since the Obama days.

There have been rumbles about healthcare for minorities receiving preference. This one takes it to a new level. If anyone thinks it will stop here, think again. Denying treatment based on ethnicity is a slippery slope. Age and disability will be next on the list.

New York Post:

New York City’s and state’s departments of health have reached a divisive and destructive low. In new guidelines rationing scarce, lifesaving oral antiviral medications and the one monoclonal antibody preparation that is effective against the Omicron variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19, they instruct providers to “consider race and ethnicity” and give preference to those who are “Black, Indigenous, and People of Color.” These directives are immoral, illegal and bear no relation to the science.

The city’s Health Advisory #39 directs providers to adhere to the state Department of Health’s prioritization guidance for utilization of these COVID-19 treatments that are in short supply. It asks providers to consider whether patients are immunocompromised, their age, their vaccine status and the number of risk factors (medical conditions) they have for severe illness.

The problem with the state’s guidance is the instruction that “nonwhite race or Hispanic/Latino ethnicity should be considered a risk factor, as longstanding systemic health and social inequities have contributed to an increased risk of severe illness and death from COVID-19.” Hence, all other risk factors such as age, immune, and vaccination status being equal, “nonwhite” and “Hispanic/Latino” patients will be granted superior treatment access compared with whites.

The race-based approach in treatment has already begun to have real-world consequences. One Staten Island doctor said he filled two prescriptions for Paxlovid this week and was asked by the pharmacist to disclose the race of his patients before the treatment was authorized.

“In my 30 years of being a physician I have never been asked that question when I have prescribed any treatment,” said the doctor, who requested anonymity. “The mere fact of having to ask this question is a slippery slope.”

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This approach is not uncommon for the Progressives and harkens back to the days of Obama.

Recall this? Kidney Patients told to accept death, forgo Dialysis –  Asking Kidney Patients to Forgo a Free Lifeline

As they calmly say:

“It was meant to keep young and middle-aged people alive and productive, many of the patients who take advantage of the law are old…  Full story: New York Times

Kidney specialists are pushing doctors to be more forthright with elderly people who have other serious medical conditions, to tell the patients that even though they are entitled to dialysis, they may want to decline such treatment and enter a hospice instead. In the end, it is always the patient’s choice. But for how much longer?

One idea, promoted by leading specialists, is to change the way doctors refer to the decision to forgo dialysis. Instead of saying that a patient is withdrawing from dialysis or agreeing not to start it, these specialists say the patient has chosen “medical management without dialysis”.  ”That is the preferred term,” said Nancy Armistead, executive director of the Mid-Atlantic Renal Coalition, a Medicare contractor that collects data and patient grievances.

Obama:

“Our approach lowers the government’s health care bills by reducing the cost of health care itself,” Obama said. Really? The only way that will happen is by rationing. You may not like the use of the phrase “death panel,” but make no mistake about it — at the end of your life, in Barack Obama’s America, his death panel will throw you under the bus in a way much closer to reality than metaphor. At  RedState

Originally posted 2022-01-04 12:43:43.