July 19, 2025

Florida surgeon general calls on feds to help the 'vaccine injured'

In speech in Tampa, Joseph Ladapo calls for more research into the effect of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines.

Florida’s top health official blasted the manufacturer’s of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines and wants the federal government to do more to help those he described as the “vaccine injured.”

Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo described the vaccines manufactured by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna as “not fit for human use.” He also called on the federal government and the National Institute of Health to expand its research on long COVID to include people who had experienced adverse effects from either COVID-19 shots or boosters.

“We need to study this better,” he said. “We need to fund physicians who are caring for these patients clinically and who are doing scientific work in this area.”

Ladapo also praised Health and Humans Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s decision in May to remove the COVID-19 vaccine from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention immunization schedule for pregnant women and healthy children.

He did not mention that the federal government tweaked that guidance days later making the vaccine available for children six months and up in consultation with their pediatrician.

https://www.tampabay.com/news/health/2025/07/18/florida-surgeon-general-calls-feds-help-vaccine-injured/

July 19, 2025

Pranksters Fill Trump Tower Gift Shop With Epstein Postcards

Tourists searching for a Trump-themed souvenir could have scored a priceless surprise on Thursday.

A comedy duo placed Jeffrey Epstein-themed postcards in the gift shop at Trump Tower on Thursday in a hilarious stunt to embarrass the president’s business empire.

The postcards featured a well-known photo taken at Mar-a-Lago in 1997 of Donald Trump smiling alongside Epstein. Jason Selvig and Davram Stiefler, comedians who make up The Good Liars, showed off their work on X.

“There are some new postcards in the Trump Tower gift shop,” they wrote.

They also demonstrated that one of the souvenir carousels at the Fifth Avenue store was filled with copies of the postcard, which were ironically positioned right next to a postcard with Melania Trump’s face on it.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/pranksters-fill-trump-tower-gift-shop-with-epstein-postcards/

July 18, 2025

White House Admits Swollen Ankles Indicate Trump Suffers From Condition Of Being Super Old

Also probably serious varicose veins, so let's be grateful he never wears shorts.

American Emperor of All the Moons and Stars in the Firmament Donald Trump was sitting onstage at some event or other a few days ago talking to his wife, which must have been a startling moment for both of them. His poorly tailored suit pants had hiked themselves up past his shins as if trying to escape the scent of Ben-Gay and foot fungus. This was when eagle-eyed observers noticed that the president’s ankles were swollen by such a huge amount that if Air Force One ever crashes in water, he can use them as a flotation device.

Really, you didn’t need to be eagle-eyed to spot those puppies. The astronauts on the ISS were probably frantically radioing Houston to ask when those meteors slipped past them and hit Earth.

There was immediate widespread speculation that Trump’s celestial-object-sized cankles were a sign of some larger illness. Perhaps his ancient heart, pummeled for decades by Quarter Pounders aimed straight at his arteries like Tomahawk missiles, was on the verge of collapsing in on itself.

The cankles were so obvious that not even this White House could spin them away by attacking reporters for noticing them in the first place. Which is too bad, because we were really looking forward to Karoline Leavitt explaining that Donald Trump has always had ankles like tree trunks, the strongest ankles of any president in history, which is how he has managed to maintain his robust fitness, and only the fake news would say they might be a sign of poor health but the American people aren’t going to be fooled.

https://www.wonkette.com/p/white-house-admits-swollen-ankles

July 18, 2025

Elderly Woman Keeps Mind Active Justifying Trump's Actions

LEXINGTON, KY—Stressing the importance of regularly performing mental gymnastics to prevent cognitive decline, local 80-year-old Edna Connolly confirmed Thursday that she keeps her mind active by justifying President Donald Trump’s actions.

“I try to break out of my routine and engage my mind by rationalizing what the president is doing, even when it’s completely against the promises he made to voters,” said Connolly, explaining that she spends at least 30 minutes a day improving her mental faculties and problem solving skills by making excuses for Trump’s constant attacks on civil liberties.

“I’m developing new neural pathways each time I shrug off Trump’s clear violations of the Constitution and his total contempt for our system of checks and balances. You know, I have some friends who didn’t spend time rationalizing Trump’s actions, and they ended up in nursing homes.”

At press time, Connolly was reportedly stimulating her creativity by justifying the president’s decision to reverse course on releasing the Epstein files.

https://theonion.com/elderly-woman-keeps-mind-active-justifying-trumps-actions/

July 18, 2025

Fox News Accused of Deceptively Editing Trump's Epstein Answer

A top Democrat believes Fox may have “deliberately sought to shield then-candidate Trump from any further association with Epstein.”

It’s Fox News’ turn to answer questions about “selective editing.”

A top Democrat in Congress is demanding answers about comments Donald Trump made in an interview that aired on the network in June of 2024, in which the then-candidate tried to cast doubt on any information related to the Jeffrey Epstein case.

Trump told interviewer Rachel Campos-Duffy—wife of current Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy—that as president he may choose not “declassify” documents related to Epstein in case they contain “phony stuff”—but the network left that part out of his answer when it first aired on television.

A Fox News spokesperson denied that the omissions were “selective editing,” in a statement to The Daily Beast, but California Rep. Robert Garcia, who heads the House Oversight Committee, insists in a letter obtained by CNN that “Fox News’ selective omission raises serious concerns that the network may have deliberately sought to shield then-candidate Trump from any further association with Epstein.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/fox-news-accused-of-deceptively-editing-trumps-epstein-answer/

July 18, 2025

UF researchers say discovery could pave the way for universal cancer vaccine

Study found that generic mRNA vaccine prompted anti-cancer reaction in immune system.

University of Florida researchers have stumbled upon a discovery they say could lead to development of a universal vaccine that can jumpstart the immune system to fight cancer.

A study, published today in Nature Biomedical Engineering, showed that an experimental mRNA vaccine boosted resistance to tumors when paired with common anticancer drugs in mice.

If the same effect occurs in humans, it could provide an alternative to surgery, radiation and chemotherapy. It could also mean much earlier treatment for patients in cases where the cancer has either evaded detection by the body’s immune system or has exhausted the body’s ability to fight it.

The vaccine is now being trialed in human patients. It could be commercialized as universal cancer vaccines to ratchet up the immune system’s response to a tumor, said UF Health pediatric oncologist Elias Sayour.

https://www.tampabay.com/news/health/2025/07/18/uf-researchers-say-discovery-could-pave-way-universal-cancer-vaccine/

So...naturally the Trump administration is slashing funding for this type of research...

July 17, 2025

Study: Majority Of Billionaires Consider Selves  Middle Class

ST. PAUL, MN—In a comprehensive new survey of how the wealthy view their socioeconomic status, a study published this week in the Journal Of Economic Perspectives found that the majority of billionaires consider themselves to be middle class.

The study—which collected responses from 865 of the richest Americans, including Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, Alice Walton, and Michael Bloomberg—reports that 70% of individuals with $1 billion or more in assets said they belong to moderate-income households. Of those, around a third acknowledged that as a result of their hard work, they may now be doing well enough to qualify as upper middle class.

“The billionaires we surveyed spoke a great deal of the challenges they face just keeping up with all their bills,” said study co-author Simon Mendoza, who observed that while economic data suggests the wealthiest 0.0001% are doing better now than at any point in U.S. history, most do not feel this is reflected in their personal experience. “Many described themselves as simple small business owners who, for example, are often forced to lay off hundreds or even thousands of employees just to keep the lights on in all their vacation homes.”

He added, “Others cited structural disadvantages, such as supply constraints that continue to squeeze some billionaires out of private island ownership.”

Among the typical middle-class concerns shared by those who participated in the study was the increasing cost of putting kids through college. Many billionaires complained that a donation of a few million dollars was no longer sufficient to guarantee acceptance to elite universities, which now expect parents to subsidize a new research facility, performing arts center, or library before agreeing to admit their academically unqualified children.

https://theonion.com/study-majority-of-billionaires-consider-selves-middle-class/

It's the Onion, folks...

July 17, 2025

Trump officials halt 'dangerous' research, overriding NIH career scientists

The Trump administration’s actions on NIH gain-of-function research have raised concerns among scientists, who argue the move could block experiments that are safe and potentially lead to new treatments and medicines.

In May, President Donald Trump signed an executive order in the Oval Office surrounded by his top health officials, vowing a crackdown on “dangerous gain-of-function research” on viruses and pathogens that he alleged was occurring in the United States with inadequate oversight. “It’s a big deal,” Trump had said, alluding to the highly contested theory that the covid pandemic was caused by a lab leak related to such research in China.

Soon after, researchers at the National Institutes of Health spent weeks assessing experiments for risk and preparing a report for the White House on what studies to halt, according to internal emails obtained by The Washington Post and interviews with two career staffers familiar with the process.

But after the director of the NIH’s infectious-disease institute signed off on the findings, the politically appointed No. 2 in command at the NIH, Matthew Memoli, overrode career staff, according to the emails and staffers, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss internal deliberations.

Nearly a dozen tuberculosis studies that relied on long-standing research methods deemed safe by the reviewers were then added to the list.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/2025/07/16/nih-research-viruses-trump-administration/

July 17, 2025

California can fix Trump's EV mistake

When he signed his budget bill into law on July 4, President Trump dealt a heavy blow to America’s electric vehicle industry, ending most federal support for U.S. electric vehicle manufacturing and hobbling automakers’ $100-billion effort to catch up with China, the world’s new automotive manufacturing superpower. Now California alone has the size and market power to fill the void left by Washington’s surrender. Our leaders in Sacramento must step up.

The gutting of EV support never got the national debate it deserved. Americans, including many in Congress, fail to see the real EV issue: China. As the world moves toward a future auto market dominated by electric vehicles — a reality no global auto executive doubts — China has seized the opportunity. It’s China, not the United States, the European Union or Japan, that now rules global automotive manufacturing. For every car, SUV or pickup built in America, China builds about three, and the Chinese have the manufacturing muscle to build five.

Detroit understands this. Along with their European and Asian peers, U.S. automakers have invested tens of billions in North American factories to build the next generation of EVs and compete in global markets. This month at the Aspen Ideas Festival, Ford Chief Executive Jim Farley put it bluntly: “If we lose this [the race for EVs], we do not have a future Ford.”

Unfortunately, the Trump administration is forcing free-world automakers to race against China at a disadvantage. Chinese automakers, awash in government help and subsidies, now manufacture 70% of the world’s EVs. Their advanced, low-priced cars are quickly taking market share in Australia, Europe, Latin America and the Middle East. Mexico is a sobering example. In 2017, 1% of Mexican cars came from China. Last year that number was 20%.

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2025-07-17/california-china-ev-electric-vehicle-donald-trump

July 17, 2025

Florida wants to ban gay pride crosswalks and keep us on the path of intolerance

These colorful Gay Pride crosswalks are in Delray Beach, West Palm Beach, Miami Beach, Fort Lauderdale, Key West, Gainesville, Jacksonville and St. Petersburg.

It’s not a secret that Florida goes out of its way to demean and discriminate against its LGBTQ residents.

For starters, state law still allows for gay people to be denied housing, employment or accommodation in a hotel or restaurant based on their sexuality.

The anti-discrimination protections that exist in Florida based on race, color, religion, sex, pregnancy, national origin, age, disability and marital status do not extend to sexual orientation or gender identity.

Local governments have sidestepped this prejudice by writing their own anti-discrimination laws protecting LGBTQ civil rights and finding ways to affirm their support for all people in their communities.

Cumulatively, about 60% of Florida is covered under human rights ordinances passed by municipalities and counties that extend anti-discrimination in those areas.

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/opinion/columns/2025/07/17/florida-gay-pride-crosswalk-ban-traffic-safety-orlando-lgbtq/85208628007/