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Hilarious! Billings-Puss Thinks A Paper That Refutes — On Science — A Sham Pseudo-Science Attempt To End Lockdowns… Is… CENSORSHIP?!

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Boys, its been over three years now.

And see — how the “marketplace of ideas” works here in America… is we encourage SCIENTIFIC debate. Even challenging debates, when based on real data.

Disagreement in these matters is… common. It is healthy. It is the way life sciences advance, without serious doubt.

But in epidemiology, the spreading of baseless and dangerous claims (DURING a pandemic, about drinking bleach or taking a bovine de-wormer — or colloidal silver potions!) — ones that ended up needlessly killing around 200,000 people in the US — before the real science took hold… ought to be… frowned upon.

And so Dr. Fauci, FDA, the NIH and CMS and HHS all put out wide-spread fact checks, and correcting pamphlets — all to ultimately save low-information / elderly folks’ lives.

The notion that the Powerline boys ludicrously equate this with “censorship“… is churlish beyond any serious argument.

In fact, it was Lloyd’s co-author, John Hinderaker, who throughout the Summer of 2020, kept saying that the fatalities were mostly over, at 20,000 people. He was wrong by a factor of 20X, when the real studies were tallied.

He was telling people to go out, maskless, and spend money in bars and restaurants, to keep his capitalism dreams alive. [HE personally wanted to eat nice dinners out — but few restaurants were doing sit-down dining.]

Telling him to shut his non-medically trained, narcissistic mouth… was no censorship. He was drowned-out, in the marketplace of ideas, by real facts.

These bitter old codgers regularly beclown themselves, now — but their readership is truly of what was once called… the “shop class track” now, so they get away with it, in the main. And Lloyd may be chief among these — just a few days ago, he was praising a guy from 1776 (patriarchal dead whyte dude who owned slaves, no less!) as “having the pulse” on the current, late-2023 actual practices of the Islam faith, and modern Muslims — all as a stereo-typical class. Ugh.

So stupid was that “hot take”, that Scott Johnson wrote a form of polite rebuke, yesterday — to suggest that the 1776 treatise was actually a critique of (wait for it!) Christianity — but used the phrasing “Mahomet”… over and over. Hilarious.

Scott’s utterly dubious claim is that the historians of the day could safely attack “heretical” faiths, like Islam — but critiquing Christianity… would be… a stoning offense. So (in Scott’s telling) everyone knew — just knew! — the words were meant to eviscerate Christian preachers, not Imams (like it was an elite secret code, of some sort). What a crock. And even if (or, ESPECIALLY IF!) that is true — Billings-puss in 2023 quoting it, and referring approvingly to this gross mis-characterization of modern Islam… and Muslims… is disgusting.

And, so… what a pair of putzes. Complete… putzes.

US Supremes Grant Special Counsel Cert. — Tangerine Must Defend “Absolute Immunity” Nonsense There, In Eight Elapsed Days.

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Not surprising — after all, Leon Jaworski got immediate Supremes’ review, almost 50 years ago now — in the Nixon / Watergate Tapes case. [And Nixon was still the sitting president, at the time — so his immunity claim was far stronger than Tangerine’s.]

And we all know how that turned out. He was out, like so much poop, through a goose:

…Dec. 11, 2023 — (Petition in 23-624) Motion to expedite consideration of the petition for a writ of certiorari before judgment is granted, and respondent is directed to file a response to the petition on or before 4 p.m. (EST) on Wednesday, December 20, 2023….

So, too — now Jack Smith will win (as Jaworski did)… and in the process, bury Tangerine, on his preposterous theory that he is immune for life, from prosecution for the felonies he may have committed while still in office.

Buckle up, GOP — you are thinking of nominating a (by then) convicted felon?

Good luck with that.

Sad Update, On The Kentucky Case… But Plainly Reflects Why Legislatures And Courts Should Not Invade Private Doctor / Patient Discussions.

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This morning, counsel for the plaintiff in Kentucky (as we mentioned last week) let it be known that the embryo no longer has a beating heart.

The fight is over (she should never have had to air her private pain, in public — just to have a right to bodily integrity). Will the Kentucky AG agree that he has no business — in this sensitive, highly private and deep life sciences arena (of doctor/patient)? I for one am more than slightly skeptical.
Here’s the latest:

…A pregnant woman in Kentucky who filed a lawsuit demanding the right to an abortion has learned her embryo no longer has cardiac activity, her attorneys said Tuesday.

Her attorneys didn’t immediately comment on what effect the development would have on the lawsuit filed last week in a state court in Louisville. The plaintiff, identified as Jane Doe, was seeking class-action status to include other Kentuckians who are or will become pregnant and want to have an abortion. The suit filed last week said she was about eight weeks pregnant….

Will the Kentucky AG still try, as other red state AGs have, to charge the woman, for loss of the zygote? I certainly hope not. But she’s become a political football, sadly — so who knows? This is all… awful, and ugly. Out.

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Power Alley: Merck Buys Access To Novel DACs For Cancers, At C4 Therapeutics — For Only $10 Million In Upfronts…

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This is smart use of smallish cash upfront, to get a very big “fisheye lens / periscope” look — at C4’s aptly named “torpedo” platforms, and their potential use in immuno-oncology.

The deal will be very lucrative for C4, in a few years, if even one of the torpedos arms itself, and shows efficacy in a clinical trial. But it is firmly pre-clinical at this point.

Still very much a good news / potential future diversifying revenue stream for Rahway into the next decades. Here’s the latest, this morning:

…C4 Therapeutics shares jumped 50% premarket on Tuesday after it forged an exclusive license deal with Merck to develop its degrader-antibody conjugates (DACs) for certain cancer targets….

Merck will be responsible for antibody conjugation to create DACs in the discovery phase and for advancing these DAC candidates through preclinical and clinical development as well as commercialization.

C4 Therapeutics (CCCC) will receive a $10M upfront payment plus milestone payments ~$600M for DACs directed to the initial oncology target. The company will also earn tiered royalties on future sales.

Merck will have an option to extend the collaboration to include three additional targets that would be exclusive to the collaboration, which… could result in payments of ~$2.5 billion to C4, across the collaboration, eventually….

Now you know — onward and grinning — into the very crisp sunshine this morning — as Harvard’s board votes to keep its president, despite the GOP distraction tours / silly House crisis actors, now trolling the Congress.

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Paul Mirengoff: Gunning For More Firings — When He Has Opposed Academic Speech Codes, His Whole Adult Life.

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I am bored to death with these morons.

They are more than moronic. They are malign reprobates. Updated: it is so insipid, he’s now hidden it behind his paywall. No, I won’t pay for that drivel. Nor should you.

That is, Paul doesn’t believe a word of this drivel he types, in truth. He knows that advocating for something, that targets no specific person, is bedrock First Amendment protected. He also knows that Dr. Gay was speaking of nuance — and that if it seemed that the speaker was trying to incite violence against Jews for being Jews… it would be a code violation, and grounds for expulsion — and likely prosecution, under federal hate crime statutes.

Here’s the proof: he complained — and bitterly so, with Hinderaker, in 2020, about DoJ using hate crime laws, in relation to Black people being beaten and killed — solely for being… Black. [Same, Asians — in 2019-20.] And, back in 2018, naturally, he complained that there weren’t enough “free speech” zones on a Georgia college campus, places where fundamental Christians could fire and brimstone public preach, with a mega-phone — to unwilling students passing by, on their way to class. Yup against the use of just those same speech codes,

Really Mirengoff — shut your prevaricating, whining pie-hole, on the topic of Harvard’s testimony on its speech codes, last week, before Congress.

Just shut it.

Of Hinderaker’s Entirely Unblinking Irony: Ask Gov. DeSantis, About 12 And 13 Year Olds Being Shown The Same Cesarini Painting.

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So… we all well know MAGA GOP Florida Gov. DeSantis is a book banner/burner. As is Texas Gov. Abbott.

The pair have independently threatened teachers with firing or prosecution — ones who’ve allow middle school kids to read materials on the Holocaust (as one example — slavery, as another).

Here we have a series of nude young women, in a masterpiece of oil — from Cesarini. But Hindereaker goes on for several paragraphs about how Muslim parents in France ought not be allowed to object to the content of it, for 12 year olds.

I guarantee you, John, that Gov. DeSantis would charge teachers as groomers / child pornographers, if it were learned that they showed it to 12 year olds, in any public middle school.

And John would be right there, cheering the prosecutions.

[Of course killing French middle school teachers is no answer. But John’s suggestion that this is a serious problem… in America… is NOT a serious person’s position. It is a polemicist’s.]

Irony is an amazing thing, Hinderaker. Take a teaspoon — or a tall glass — on second thought, you better drink the tall glass of it.

Part II — Of The Nine Cowards — On The Supreme Court Of Texas. Disgusting.

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The Texas Supremes now know they’ve awakened the righteous indignation of all educated Texans, but especially the women of Texas. What else might explain this frankly BS opinion’s issuance, only after Ms. Cox’s counsel let it be known by press release that she’s left the state (since the Texas Supremes on Friday night had effectively blocked her right to a medically necessary abortion — as determined by her own physician)? Nothing else.

I won’t quote the odious sophistry of the Texas Supreme Court. These (at the moment, entirely) political creatures have twisted themselves — and the rules of civil procedure in Texas — into a pretzel, to avoid admitting the obvious: the sitting Attorney General of Texas, on this past Friday, openly threatened in a public press release he posted to Xitter — that he would bring felony charges against any hospital or clinic that aided Ms. Cox — or her physician. AG Paxton himself wrote:

…[Anyone] allowing an abortion to proceed will not insulate hospitals, doctors, or anyone else, from civil and criminal liability for violating Texas abortion loss. This includes first-degree felony prosecutions….

That is simply a gestapo tactic — one the highest court of Texas ought (if it had any respect for ordered liberty under the rule of law) to admonish him against, and perhaps even sanction him, for a false public statement about what Texas law actually provides. That was an en terrorem and falsely premised attempt — and as hideous as it was. . . it turned out to be momentarily effective (yet and still, she will be vindicated, in Colorado or Illinois or California).

Paxton drove Ms. Cox out of the state.

It matters not a whit, that tonight the Texas Supremes only vaguely imply he hasn’t that authority. They could have ruled he was out of bounds. They did not. They never breathed a peep about it — at all.

They were willfully blind to the threats made, lawlessly — as an absolutely crystal clear abuse of his office… and instead published a half-assed, chicken-feed opinion, saying that doctors themselves (perhaps with some future guidance from a Texas medical board) must risk criminal prosecution, if AG Paxton remains in office.

That is, these Texas Supremes won’t rule that any given situation… is a reasonable medical judgment. They… punted — when there could scarcely be a clearer case that the medically necessary exemption ought to cover.

Cowardice — that is what rules the Texas GOP Supreme Court. Nothing more. Out.

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Deplorable — The Texas Supreme Court Has Driven A Woman Who Needed A Medical Procedure… To Leave The State. Positively… Medieval.

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There are no actual medical doctors on the State Supreme Court of Texas. AG Ken Paxton is no MD. Gov. Abbott is no doctor.

And yet, a woman whose own doctor’s medical opinion (based on genetic testing — i.e., real science) has said she is endangering herself, physically and certainly psychologically — by carrying what will be a still-birth (due to a rare but well-known Trisomy-18 abnormality)… in Texas, amounts to… nothing. At least at the Texas “Supremes”.

To say this is… barbaric — by the Court — is to insult barbarians, everywhere… and give them a… black eye.

This is much worse — since those flowing, showy black robes… are supposed to mean something. Obviously, they do not (and what of the three whyte women on the court?! Who ARE these people?!).

In any event, here is the latest — damn.

. . .A Texas woman who had sought a legal medical exemption for an abortion has left the state after the Texas Supreme Court paused a lower court decision that would allow her to have the procedure, lawyers for the Center for Reproductive RIghts said Monday.

State District Judge Maya Guerra Gamble last week had ruled that Kate Cox, a 31-year-old mother of two from Dallas, could terminate her pregnancy. According to court documents, Cox’s doctors told her baby suffered from the chromosomal disorder trisomy 18, which usually results in either stillbirth or an early death of an infant.

In response to Gamble’s decision, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton warned a Texas medical center that it would face legal consequences if an abortion were performed….

Kudos to Judge Maya Guerra Gamble (you did your duty, faithfully) — and… a pox on all nine “justices” — depicted at lower right, in my graphic.

Travel well, and travel light, Kate Cox… but I’d advise not returning to Texas for a year or so — as the cretin Paxton will very likely seek to charge you, on your return. You’ve been plenty brave enough. Now go protect yourself, your partner and your children: go, and live — in Colorado! Out.

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Over Short Alito Dissent, Unsurprisingly, The Supremes Deny Kennedy The Privilege Of Line-Jumping, Out Of Monroe, Louisiana

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This is little more than trivia — but here you have it.

This morning, just as we predicted, the Supremes (over a short dissent from “Bought by BusinessTM” Alito) said there is no right to “line jump” to the Supremes, simply by saying “Hey ya’! I am running an utterly quixotic campaign for president, so I get to skip the line — and dive right into a Supreme Court case, on the docket!” Nope. That’s just not… how any of this works — it does not make it so.

Yup, that is today’s silly trivia — and I post on it, largely because this is the same argument Tangerine is making, about his gag order as he appeals it, out of DC. To be clear — that one is even more beyond the pale, as it comes in the context of a felonies prosecution — where Tangerine is also very likely guilty (but as yet uncharged with) witness tampering under 18 USC § 1512(b)(1). He, like Kennedy, will lose.

In fact, just this very morning, Jack Smith, as prosecuting Special Counsel in DC, has petitioned the Supremes to rule against Tangerine, on his claim of absolute immunity. Tangerine… simply doesn’t have it. Out.

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Moderna and Merck Team Up Again — This Time With mRNA-4157 / V940, An INT Candidate — Now Enrolling A Phase III, In Australia, Against Certain Classes Of NSCLC…

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As promised, this is the power alley item for the morning. This is also a very astounding time to be alive, in bioscience.

The idea here is individualized mRNA generated proteins, from one’s own T-Cell factories… may be immensely helpful in stopping, and in fact reversing the spread of certain classes of lung cancers, using mRNA-4157, or (V940), in combination with pembrolizumab (Keytruda).

And the pair has a long history of working very well — and very profitably — together (think also of COVID-19- and Ebola- vaccines, here). Just search any of over 100 posts in the box, under the name “Moderna”, at right. Here’s the latest:

…Moderna and Merck said on Monday they have started a late-stage trial of their experimental personalized mRNA cancer treatment in combination with blockbuster drug Keytruda for patients with a type of lung cancer.

The therapy, V940, belongs to a class of treatments called m-RNA-based individualized neoantigen therapy (INT) and is tailored for each patient to generate T-cells, a key part of the body’s immune response, based on the specific mutational signature of a tumor….

The study is called INTerpath-002. It is a global, randomized, double-blind, placebo- and active-comparator-controlled Phase 3 trial evaluating approximately 868 patients with completely resected Stage II, IIIA or IIIB [N2] NSCLC. Following complete surgical resection and adjuvant chemotherapy, participants 18 years and older (in Australia, at first) will be dosed with the combo.

Now you know. Onward — smiling at the world that is… now arriving. Excellent. And looking to the south this morning four times, already… Grin.

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