POLITICAL ILLUSION
IN POLITICS, THINGS ARE NEVER WHAT THEY APPEAR TO BE ... OFFERING AN ALTERNATIVE REALITY TO THE LIBERAL-DOMINATED MEDIA
Monday, March 01, 2021
From Cuomo To CPAC, Corporate Media Keeps Getting Things Wrong
Biden Homeland Security Secretary Denies There Is A Crisis At The Border
Biden Lied And 105,334 People Died
Why The Virtual Golden Globes Fell Flat
Self-Serving Teachers Union Head Seen Taking His Kid To In-Person School
Sunday, February 28, 2021
DeSantis: 'Florida Got It Right And The Locked-Down States Got It Wrong'
Gov. Kristi Noem At CPAC: 'Dr. Fauci Is Wrong A Lot'
Saturday, February 27, 2021
How do you know anything about climate change?
Kavanaugh and Barrett: John Roberts Retreads?
The Federal Reserve Is Taking Us into Uncharted and Deadly Waters
Amazon Strips Clarence Thomas Documentary From Streaming Service
Why Are There Still Military Troops And Fences In DC?
Friday, February 26, 2021
Joe Biden's Cabinet Nominees Prove His Unity Claims Are A Lie
'Fact Check' Is Another Way of Saying 'Left-Wing Propaganda'
After Just One Month In Office, Biden Orders Airstrike In Syria
Thursday, February 25, 2021
'Erasing Family' Doc Illuminates The Suffering Divorce Causes Kids
Prepare For A Deluge Of Dishonest CPAC Coverage
To Prevent Blackouts From Happening Again, Texas Should Go Nuclear
Wednesday, February 24, 2021
5 Ways To Help Your Child Not Grow Up To Be A Socialist
CDC Report Buries Shocking Data About Asymptomatic Spread
Democrats starting to panic over a reckoning at the polls for blue-state bungling of COVID
Where is Biden? Biden’s Failure to Get Food and Water Distributed to Texans is Being Ignored by the Leftist Media
Senate Hearing On The Capitol Riot Exonerated Trump
Biden's Foreign Policy Is Obama Again: Boosting Enemies At Our Expense
'Roe v. Wade' Movie To Premiere Friday To CPAC's Sold-Out Crowd
Tuesday, February 23, 2021
By Offering Amnesty Now, Democrats Are Setting Up An Immigration Crisis
Little-Known Civil Rights Law Could Bring Big Tech to Its Knees
The New York Times Finally Discovers Unintended Consequences
Reopening America is going to bring a reckoning
Monday, February 22, 2021
A light at the end of the COVID tunnel?
Feudalism Is Coming to America, and You're the Serf
Unmasking the Medical Experts
WHO Covid Report Is Such Blatant Chinese Propaganda, Even Biden Admin Admits It
Psaki Threatens Months Of 'Sacrifice' And Masks Before Pandemic Ends
Sunday, February 21, 2021
Biden's Obvious Politics-Playing On Opening Schools Is Alienating Parents
A Thousand Little Lies Replace the ‘Big Lie’
Understanding the Texas Energy Crisis
Saturday, February 20, 2021
An Insider Explains Why Texans Lost Their Power
Guest column: Like Cuomo, Wolf must be held accountable for nursing home deaths
By Lowman S. Henry
It appears New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo deserved that Emmy award after all. Not for his performance at news conferences during the COVID-19 pandemic, but for lying effectively about the number of nursing home deaths triggered by his failed policies.
The bombshell revelation that the Cuomo administration had under-reported the number of COVID-19 related deaths in New York nursing homes by 50% and subsequent admission by a key staffer that the fudging of the figures was intentional has triggered a political firestorm in the Empire state.
Adding fuel to the fire, the Associated Press reported that records showed 9,056 COVID-positive patients were released into nursing homes last spring at the direction of the Cuomo Administration. That number is more than 40% higher than had previously been reported by the state’s health department.
It is important to note these revelations are not an exercise in partisan politics. New York Attorney General Letitia James, a Democrat like Cuomo, has been instrumental in bringing the truth to light.
The Cuomo administration’s disastrous directive sending COVID-19 positive patients back into nursing homes, which housed those most vulnerable to the disease, was copied by a number of other states including Pennsylvania where Gov. Tom Wolf and former state health secretary Dr. Rachel Levine had stoutly defended the policy.
COVID-19-related deaths in Pennsylvania nursing homes and long-term care facilities topped 12,000 in mid-February. That is over 50% of the 23,136 deaths from COVID-19 during that time frame. Clearly, the policy has been as deadly in Pennsylvania as it has been in New York.
The question now is can we believe statistics released by Pennsylvania’s Department of Health or has there been a New York-style effort to keep the real extent of the tragedy from the public? Statistical reporting from the department has been haphazard at best. There was even one point last year where the number of deaths reported dropped, the first recorded rising from the dead in over 2,000 years.
To date Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, has remained on the sidelines, failing to provide the same degree of oversight exercised by his counterpart in New York. Former Auditor General Eugene DePasquale, another Democrat, likewise failed in his watchdog role before leaving office last month.
Making matter worse the Wolf-Fetterman administration has operated as the least transparent administration in state history. While exercising unprecedented emergency powers the administration has worked hard to with-hold information from the public at times even defying a legislative subpoena and refusing to comply with rulings from the state’s Office of Open Records.
With the state’s deployment of the COVID-19 vaccine mired in chaos and bureaucratic ineptitude Gov. Wolf has embarked on a campaign of deflection. In recent weeks he has proposed a massive increase in taxes, advocated for the legalization of recreational marijuana, and touted a plan to raise the minimum wage. This, rather than keep the spotlight on what should be the number one goal of universal vaccination to end the pandemic.
Nursing homes, which should be a vaccination priority, are getting the short end of that stick as well. “Pennsylvania has allocated less than 20% of its vaccine supply to long-term care facilities,” said Zach Shamberg, CEO and President of the Pennsylvania Health Care Association. He called the situation “both shocking and insulting.”
Checks and balances have been woefully absent from the entire state response to COVID-19. But, given recent developments in New York, the spotlight should return to the tragedy which has unfolded in nursing homes here in Penn’s Woods. The Department of Health’s statistics must be audited to determine if we have been given accurate information. The outcome of such an investigation would either give us confidence in the numbers reported or reveal any attempt at a cover-up.
Further, Wolf along with Cuomo and the governors in other states whose policies of sending COVID-19 patients back into nursing homes must be held accountable for their actions. It is clear the death toll from these policies is staggering. There were warnings and red flags along the way making these governors culpable, and perhaps even criminally negligent.
It is now time for those tasked with oversight to step up and do their job.
Lowman S. Henry is Chairman & CEO of the Lincoln Institute and host of the weekly Lincoln Radio Journal and American Radio Journal. His e-mail address is lhenry@lincolninstitute.org.