Undeniably Right

I have seen a claim that generally says something like this: black Americans make up 13% of the total population, pay 6% of all taxes, and received 26% of government benefits. I did a little bit of research and the artificial intelligence answers from several search engines confirm that these numbers are pretty accurate. I guess you could make the argument that we have already been paying reparations but that might make some of the woke left upset. One of the articles I read referenced a report from the Office of Tax Analysis that claimed the implications of these numbers is misleading because white Americans 'receive' $10 billion from the EITC each year. Numbers lie and liars use numbers.

Several sports governance groups recently held a conference in Finland. One of the panel discussions was entitled “Who has a right to compete? Exploring the inclusion of transgender athletes in sport.” Among the panelists was Joanna Marie Harper, an adjunct professor at Western University in London, Canada. Joanna is a transgender female and has participated in competitive long distance running events since 1971. Joanna had moderate success running as a man with impressive times that averaged apparently around 2 1/2 hours for a marathon. Around 2004 is when Joanna decided to transition, becoming a woman.

Which science?

How many of you recognize the name Maria Corina Machado? Before today? 99.9% of you have never heard that name. If you have it's because you are from or have family in Venezuela and even then, you probably just recognize it. But she is now the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. You would think that brokering a peace deal in the Middle East on top of stopping the war in Syria and at least for a while getting North Korea to stop development and sale of nuclear weapons might qualify you for the award. Not for the elitists.

I saw another post from a member of the meme brigade. This was a post of a meme that claimed DOGE cuts are gutting cancer research and people are dying. The proudly ignorant member of the brigade that posted it said, in so many words, without government funding, cancer patients will die. A number of other people liked or loved his post. It seems to me that it takes a lot of work to remain this ignorant.

Based upon figures from several sources including the American Cancer Society, in the United States alone, about $57 billion is spent on cancer research each year. Funding from the federal government ranges from $7-8 billion annually. Just under 15% of all funding. That doesn't sound like gutting the funding at all. I'm not saying it isn't significant but, gutting funding implies a much higher percentage would be gone.

I guess we'll have to listen to discover the difference?

Sorry I forgot to post this last week, so you get two from Mike today.

One of the undeniable truths of life in my world is that we underestimate the average person's ability to understand complex issues. Many of these issues are not as complex as they are made out to be by the so-called subject matter experts. We are told that we can't understand our education system even though most of us went through it and know what worked and didn't work.  We are told that medical, scientific, and legal issues cannot be understood by the common man. That is very wrong and history proves otherwise.

That takes us to the latest episode of Trump Derangement Syndrome, Tylenol and autism. In response to his press conference about the possible link between acetaminophen and increased rates of autism, ADD, and ADHD, the left is telling us once again that Trump and RFK Jr are trying to kill people with their pseudoscience. There is no scientific link between acetaminophen and those conditions. Additionally, autism, ADD, and ADHD are not illnesses and cannot be cured, as Trump is accused of claiming.