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William DiPuccio:
“…Skepticism is at the heart of the scientific method. Question everything. Test everything. Scientific knowledge is established by evidence, not authority. The method is sound, but the execution may be imperfect. That’s why I have faith in the methods of science but not necessarily in scientists.
Experts in science have a store of credibility that can be maintained only by their performance. I have a great deal of trust in the meteorologists at the National Weather Service because their forecasts are 80%–90% accurate (no weatherman jokes, please — I used to be one!). But if most of their predictions began to fail, I would turn elsewhere for my weather forecasts.
So it comes as a surprise that so many in the public have expressed a growing trust in medical scientists, even after a series of spectacular failures. According to a newly published survey by Pew Research, public confidence in medical scientists to act in the best interest of the public increased from 35% in 2019, with “a great deal of confidence before the outbreak,” to 43% in April 2020.
Granted, some of the public health failures surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic were the result of incomplete data, but many of them could have been avoided:
The public’s growth in confidence, following these failures, parallels the reaction of cult followers who, after a failed doomsday prediction, double down in their adherence to the cult and its leadership. A rational response to failed predictions and bad advice would be to reject any new declarations, or at least approach them with skepticism. But cult followers place their faith in authority rather than evidence, so their confidence is largely unshaken by contradictory data.
This newfound confidence in medical scientists correlates directly with political affiliation. Among Republicans (and those leaning Republican), there was virtually no change in public trust, which stands at 31% this year (a 1% decrease from 2019). But among Democrats (and those leaning Democrat), confidence rose from 37% in 2019, to 53% in 2020 — a 16% increase. The difference in public confidence between the two parties amounts to 22 percentage points…”
Peter Barry Chowka:
“…Almost totally absent from the mainstream news Friday, as the violent insurrection in the wake of George Floyd’s death spread to cities nationwide, were the preliminary results of his autopsy. The report was part of the arrest warrant for Derek Michael Chauvin, the disgraced former Minneapolis police officer who was taken into custody on Friday afternoon and charged with the third-degree murder of Floyd while he was in police custody last Monday evening. The brief mention of the autopsy suggests that the case against Chauvin, and possibly his three colleagues assuming they too will eventually be charged, for being totally responsible for the death of Floyd may not be as cut and dried as previously thought.
The Washington Times headlined its story Friday afternoon “Asphyxiation not the cause of George Floyd’s death: Autopsy.” An examination of the official complaint (arrest warrant) for Chauvin includes this sentence from a paragraph about Floyd’s cause of death on page 3:
The combined effects of Mr. Floyd being restrained by police, his underlying health conditions and any potential intoxicants in his system likely contributed to his death.
The eight-minute cell phone video showing Chauvin with his knee on Floyd’s neck after the latter’s arrest for allegedly trying to pass a $20 counterfeit bill, has become one of the most viewed videos of a police action of all time. Reporters, analysts, and almost everyone else in the country from left, right, and center have immediately jumped to the conclusion that Chauvin is clearly guilty of the murder of Floyd. The full autopsy, when it is finally made public, may render that popular conclusion before the wheels of justice have had a chance to turn another rush to judgement – not unlike what happened in the cases of Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, and Freddie Gray after additional evidence came to light in determining the responsibility for their deaths. “Guilty beyond a reasonable doubt,” after all, is a high standard to achieve in the American judicial system…”
“…When thousands of rioters burn down private businesses and even violently attack a woman in a wheelchair in response to an abhorrent act committed by one police officer, it is clear that the George Floyd riots are not about justice, as shown by the viral footage of the Minneapolis riots and the attacks on L.A. police officers yesterday. But what exposes this so-called movement as nothing but a dangerous anarchist mob, more than when and how they act, is when they fail to protest and actually remain silent when even more black lives are at stake.
The act of the officer who placed his knee on George Floyd’s neck for several minutes after he was completely neutralized and couldn’t move is obviously indefensible. As with every criminal act that leads to murder, he should be punished to the fullest extent of the law.
But why is it we never heard on the news about the endless trend of cop ambushes and executions at the hands of violent criminals in recent months? Why do we never hear about the cases where cops engage in near-suicidal restraint to go the extra mile to defuse a situation? That is the balance of coverage and perspective we rarely see.
The reason we never see this balance is because the media doesn’t have an agenda for justice or prudent policing, but to spark a racial war. This is why we never saw rioting or media outrage after a Somali immigrant police officer in Minneapolis fatally shot Justine Damond, an Australian woman, in cold blood in 2017 after she approached his patrol car to report a suspected rape behind her house. The only reason the cop was tried and sentenced to 12.5 years for manslaughter was that this was an international incident and the Australian government raised an outcry over it.
This illuminates a broader point about the focus of outrage on senseless murders in general. Why is the outrage related to policing and crime only in one direction and only when the race of the people affected is oriented a certain way?
Consider the following: According to the Washington Post’s database on police shootings, 17 unarmed African-Americans were killed by police in 2018. Let’s just assume the unlikely assumption that all 17 were unjustified in the mold of the choking death of George Floyd. That accounts for just 0.002% of the 7,407 black homicide victims that year, according to the FBI’s Uniform Crime Report, the overwhelming majority of whom were killed by black criminals, not white criminals or police. In cases where the races of both the victim and offender were known, a staggering 88.9% of black homicide victims were murdered by black criminals.
This is a reoccurring epidemic every year and is made worse by the broad and indiscriminate war on cops and public safety. Even the fear of dying from coronavirus didn’t stop the murder and mayhem in America’s inner cities. If black lives actually mattered, as all lives do, where is the outrage?…”
John Hinderaker:
“…From the first hours after George Floyd died on Lake Street in Minneapolis, the rush to convict the officers who took him into custody seemed unstoppable. The frenzy was fueled by a video of one of the officers kneeling on Floyd, seemingly on his throat, while the officers waited for an ambulance to arrive. Every politician in Minnesota (and elsewhere) denounced the video as “appalling,” “disgusting,” and so on, and called for the policemen’s heads. Only a few brave souls suggested that we should at least wait to learn the cause of Floyd’s death before stringing anyone up. Or burning anything down.
Today we got the first information from Hennepin County’s Medical Examiner, in an attachment to the criminal complaint against officer Derek Chauvin:
The Hennepin County Medical Examiner (ME) conducted Mr. Floyd’s autopsy on May 26, 2020. The full report of the ME is pending but the ME has made the following preliminary findings. The autopsy revealed no physical findings that support a diagnosis of traumatic asphyxia or strangulation. Mr. Floyd had underlying health conditions including coronary artery disease and hypertensive heart disease. The combined effects of Mr. Floyd being restrained by the police, his underlying health conditions and any potential intoxicants in his system likely contributed to his death.
Emphasis added. Further, the complaint’s Statement of Probable Cause recites that Floyd complained of being unable to breathe well before Officer Chauvin put his knee on Floyd’s neck:
While standing outside the car, Mr. Floyd began saying and repeating that he could not breathe.
Does this mean that the officers’ handling of the situation was a model of fine police work? Of course not. And the manner in which they handled Floyd could have contributed to his death, according to the Medical Examiner. But the outrage over the Floyd case has mostly been based on the assumption that Officer Chauvin choked him to death by kneeling on his throat. If that assumption is false, the story is far more nuanced.
There is a great deal about this incident that we do not know. To cite just one example, we don’t know, as far as I am aware, whether Floyd was, in fact, the person who tried to pass a counterfeit bill. We also don’t know whether drugs played a role in his death; the Medical Examiner refers to “potential intoxicants in his system.” The full report will contain chemical analyses of any such intoxicants. Maybe there weren’t any, but at this point, no one has ruled out the possibility that Floyd died not on account of police brutality, but from a drug overdose.
It may be that when all the facts are in, we will conclude that George Floyd died as a result of negligence on the part of Minneapolis policemen. If so, there will be plenty of time for an accounting. But today’s disclosure of the Medical Examiner’s preliminary findings reminds us why lynch mobs have always been a bad idea, and calls for overnight justice are nearly always misguided…”
Have we seen this movie before? The media inflamed and at least partially created the riotous criminal mobs through irresponsible reporting and non-stop hyping of unsubstantiated claims of racism.
CNN HQ in Atlanta getting overrun by leftist protesters that they themselves whipped into a frenzy.
Many are defacing and vandalizing the giant CNN logo outside the building.
You're watching Dr. Frankenstein get destroyed by his own monster.#GeorgeFloyd pic.twitter.com/i6EP0Tl8z5
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) May 29, 2020
https://twitter.com/formercombatvet/status/1266243966267097088
“…We have witnessed a massive failure of leadership in the City of Minneapolis and the State of Minnesota. Boy Mayor Jacob Frey has been exposed as a childish nonentity. Meanwhile, what about the Minneapolis City Council, which is responsible for the city’s Police Department? It is one of the most far-left political bodies in the U.S., and so far it has not been heard from, as far as I have seen. Governor Tim Walz, too, has been AWOL, although I do have to give him a little credit for his State Police cracking down on CNN. Amid the general incompetence, President Trump is threatening to step into the breach:
At this point, I suspect that there are a good number of Democrats in the Twin Cities who wouldn’t mind seeing the president make good on his promise…”
MSNBC reporter just now: "I want to be clear on how I characterize this. This is mostly a protest. It is not generally speaking unruly."
The guy is literally standing in front of a burning building in the middle of a riot. pic.twitter.com/IzCV6On4sF
— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) May 29, 2020
Here is what the liberal “journalists” wont tell you,
“…The police chief is a Democrat. The Hennepin Co Attorney is a Democrat. Amy Klobuchar is the Democrat former DA of Hennepin Co who refused to charge the very cop that allegedly ended this man’s life. The Mayor of Minneapolis is a Democrat. The Governor is a Democrat. Leftist leadership has failed Minneapolis for decades…”
JOHN NOLTE:
“…I don’t know of anyone defending his sadistic treatment at the hands of the Minneapolis police. Everyone’s condemning what happened. President Trump is demanding justice and an investigation. The U.S. Attorney’s office in Minnesota and the FBI’s Minneapolis field office issued a joint statement saying they are in the midst of “a robust criminal investigation.”
If such things were allowed today, the appalling death of George Floyd could bring the country together, could heal the racial divide that was cynically widened by the Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown hoaxes… Some good could come from this, could come from our shared humanity and revulsion over what happened to Mr. Floyd.
But Democrats and our nihilistic media cannot allow that.
Coming together is now forbidden in this country, thanks to a media that has lost so much credibility with the public it has turned to nihilism, has turned to fomenting chaos — because causing anarchy is the only influence the media have left…”
It is almost as it Democrats don’t believe their own push-polling
These guys say they support the protests but not the looting. Showed up to help this tobacco store owner stop people from breaking in pic.twitter.com/x2FMQiQwVK
— Max Nesterak (@maxnesterak) May 28, 2020
Brooke Baldwin suffers emotional breakdown LIVE on air. Suck it up cupcake.
I can’t stand back & watch this happen to a great American City, Minneapolis. A total lack of leadership. Either the very weak Radical Left Mayor, Jacob Frey, get his act together and bring the City under control, or I will send in the National Guard & get the job done right…..
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 29, 2020