COVID-19 Stimulus Check

Posted on by Thor

Kyle Rittenhouse traveled from his home state to Kenosha Wisconsin where he shot 3 people and murdered two. He felt threatened by hands, a skateboard and someones feet. Had he not been walking around with a weapon he was to young to own, 36-year-old Joseph Rosenbaum, of Kenosha, and 26-year-old Anthony Huber, of Silver Lake, Wisconsin would not have died that night. Gaige Grosskreutz, 27, a protester from West Allis, had his arm vaporized. The jury accepted the defenses claims of self defense and he was acquitted on all charges.

The Washington Post reported that  the shooter used his COVID-19 stimulus check to purchase the AR-15 he used in the fatal Kenosha shooting. “The Post found that the shooter, who was too young to buy a rifle, had arranged for an adult friend to buy the weapon for him using money he had received from a government stimulus program.”

That friend, 19-year-old Dominick Black of Burlington, Wisconsin, purchased the weapon for him at an Ace Hardware store in Ladysmith, Wisconsin on May 1, 2020, according to a criminal complaint charging Black with two felony counts of intentionally giving a dangerous weapon to someone under 18, resulting in death. The gun was then stored at Black’s stepfather’s house in Kenosha, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.

The shooter said, “I got my $1,200 from the coronavirus Illinois unemployment because I was on furlough from YMCA,” he said. “And I got my first unemployment check so I was like, ‘Oh, I’ll use this to buy it.’”He told the Post he lived with his mother, a circumstance that would typically mean she claims him as a dependent on her taxes. That would make him ineligible for the $1,200 stimulus payment.

He was referencing several weeks of unemployment compensation approved through the CARES Act, said Washington Post Investigations Editor Jeff Leen. He said the shooter’s mother later told the paper that money for the gun came from “special unemployment” related to the pandemic. It’s more likely the shooter was referring to unemployment than the stimulus program itself, based on his life circumstances and description from him and his mother. That is indeed a “COVID-19 stimulus,” but not the one people would think of based on this post’s description.

Regardless you have to wonder how many more guns were purchased with COVID related government funds. As of November 21, the year 2021 has already become one of the deadliest on record for mass shootings. According to the Gun Violence Archive (GVA), there have been 637 mass shootings in 2021, and more than 39,883 individuals have died via guns by their own hand or at the hand of another.

There has been a rush to buy guns since the pandemic began. According to the FBI, a record-setting 3.7 million firearm background checks were completed in March 2020, the month COVID-19 shutdowns began in the United States. This record was shattered only a few months later as protests for racial justice following the police murder of George Floyd rocked the nation, leading to 3.9 million firearm background checks.

Now that vigilante justice is the accepted norm in America, you can expect the number of senseless deaths to continue to rise.

Security

Posted on by Thor

In a news conference Tuesday June 16, 2020, Governor Ron DeSantis said that 260 workers from the Orlando International Airport tested positive for Covid-19 after nearly 500 employees were tested. Airport Chief Executive Phil Brown had to correct the Governor’s statement. According Brown, of the 500 airport workers who were tested for Covid-19, only two had positive results. Those tests were done over a three day period.

Between mid-March and through June 6, there were 132 employees of all the airlines, rental car companies, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) and the Aviation Authority that tested positive, according to the statement. Another 128 people who tested positive were not airport employees but were traceable connections to the workers who tested positive for Covid-19, according to the public health team. so, 132 plus 128 is, 260 people with some affiliation with the airport have tested positive for Covid-19. This shell game is rather funny as executives try to confuse and downplay the numbers.

Clearly the airport executive tried to downplay the number of workers affected but regardless, 260 people were infected by the virus. That left me wondering, what would it be like to try and get through security knowing the TSA agents might be infected with the virus. A pat town might not just be invasive but downright terrifying.

On Wednesday June 17, 2020, the Greater Orlando Aviation Authority approved a new policy requiring all 22,000 airport employees to wear facial coverings in public areas of the airport. Employees will need to observe social distancing “to extent that they can.” I imagine social distancing goes out the widow as a TSA agent spears the virus all over your clothes as they pat you down.

Some people have felt they were sexually assaulted when they were patted down. a well-known CNN political commentator and analyst, Angela Rye was subjected to a humiliating vaginal pat-down before boarding a regular flight from Detroit to New York. In addition to being screened by the backscatter X-Ray machine, the female officer advised that she had to be patted down. It was only supposed to be “a backhanded pat around her upper thigh.” Instead, the female officer went down her leg, up her dress and her hand sideways touched Rye inappropriately. The same officer then faced Rye, and her sideways hand once again hit the middle of Rye’s genitals. Rye believed she was sexually assaulted. She filed a complaint.

OIA is stepping up its cleaning efforts in high traffic areas, and hand sanitizer stations have been added throughout the airport. And as reported earlier they are downplaying the tread of the virus.

I hear flights going into and out of OIA all day long. Airlines have to keep the flights on schedule even if they are empty because it is a requirement of the 25 billion dollars in government bail outs. Known as the CARES Act, airlines receiving aid are required to continue flying to every domestic destination they already serve, even with low passenger numbers. The requirement is designed to keep supply chains stable and transport essential personnel, like government and healthcare workers, as well as to maintain connectivity to smaller areas. While airlines collected 25 billion dollars small businesses are folding all over the county. So, ghost planes are flying all over the country literally empty except for plane crews and very few passengers.

We are living in the age of ghost planes and zombie molestation in the name of “security.”

Unemployment Line

Posted on by Thor

Hundreds of people risked exposure to the Covid-19 virus to stand in line in Hialeah, Florida on Tuesday April 7, 2020. The line was for people who don’t have internet access or printers, so they could pick up unemployment forms in person.The line snaked outside of the John F. Kennedy Library, and around the block, before it opened at 11
a.m. Social isolation to lower  cases of COVID-19, prompted an unemployment crisis
that the state government was not prepared for. Some people had been out of work for a whole month.

Many are still having issues submitting
applications for benefits after having lost their jobs through no fault
of their own. Applicants who had access to the Internet were dealing with error
messages and hours of waiting on the phone while calling a helpline that
was of no help. People started lining up as early as 6-7 a.m. The online servers could not handle the sudden influx of people seeking claims. The online server had to be taken down overnight Sunday April 5, 2020 into Monday. From about 10 p.m. until 5 a.m., the Florida Department of Economic
Opportunity will not be accepting reemployment benefit applications
online. The agency had received 1.5 million calls in the past week.

By the end of the week, there will 82 new servers to increase connectivity. Last week, DEO had nearly 200 staff working on the claims. There are now
579 additional employees and more than 2,300 state employees. In the past two weeks, the department has spent $25 million on
improvements to the computer and phone systems it uses to collect
unemployment benefits applications.

The Department of Labor reported Thursday that 227,000 Floridians
initiated unemployment claims the week prior, up from 74,313 the
previous week. Another 56,000 were expected last week as Governor Ron
DeSantis issued a statewide stay-at-home order that took effect on
Friday.

The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act, also known as
the CARES Act, signed into law on March 27, 2020, expands benefits. DEO
is working to incorporate the new provisions of the CARES Act to ensure
all Floridians who are eligible get their full amount of Pandemic
Unemployment Assistance and Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Assistance
as it becomes available. Benefits will be paid from the date they became
eligible under the CARES Act. 

It was horrifying to watch people standing in line with no social distancing. Tempers flared as people stood in the oppressive Florida heat. If any one person was infected their could be a flair up of infections and deaths.

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In an equally callous and short sighted instance, Michigan held it’s primary voting in the midst of the Pandemic. Voters had to chose between their health and their civic duty. Wisconsin Republicans, the state’s conservative supreme court risked voters’ lives by sending them to polls. People will die.