90 Miles From Tyranny

Wednesday, June 15, 2022

Politico: Vaccine injury compensation programs overwhelmed as congressional reform languishes

A pair of federal programs compensating people who suffer injuries from vaccines and pandemic treatments are now facing so many claims that thousands of people may not receive payment for their injuries any time soon.

The first program, meant for standard vaccines, such as measles and polio, has too little staff to handle the number of reported injuries, and thousands of patients are waiting years for their cases to be heard.

A second program designed for vaccines and other treatments created or used during pandemics has seen unsustainable growth. Between 2010 and 2020, the Countermeasure Injury Compensation Program received 500 complaints. In the two years since Covid-19 appeared, it has received over 8,000 complaints.

More than 5,000 of those are directly related to the Covid-19 vaccines, with injuries ranging from a sore shoulder to death, according to the Health Resources and Services Administration. An additional 3,000 complaints related to everything from drugs and devices to the failure of hospital staff to limit infection spread have also been filed.

Yet the pandemic fund has paid zero claims, in part because officials are waiting for people to submit detailed medical records and documentation to back up their allegations.

“Compensation determinations are made based on individual case reviews, and the statute sets a very high standard that a claimant must meet to be eligible for compensation,” HRSA spokesperson David Bowman said.

Should Covid-19 shots become routine once the pandemic ends, alleged injuries would eventually be handled by the already over-burdened standard Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. Patient advocates, attorneys and the pharmaceutical industry fear that without drastic reforms, that program could collapse.

Despite bipartisan calls for change, Congress has failed to act, frustrating those who say that the VICP — which covers nearly three times as many vaccines today as it did when it was created three decades ago — is overwhelmed.

There are fears those optics could fuel vaccine hesitancy if the public mistakes the situation as too many injuries flooding the program, when in fact the number of vaccines covered by the program has grown without a commensurate increase in resources.

“The cost of this program failing will be like throwing kerosene on the antivax fire,” said Renee Gentry, director of George Washington University’s Vaccine Injury Litigation Clinic.

Covid-19 shots have proven to be...

Sacrificing Americans’ constitutional rights to hoaxing Democrats is something Republicans should lose their jobs and leadership positions over.

The corporate media is abuzz with news that senators have reached a “bipartisan” gun deal that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell endorsed on Tuesday — but sacrificing Americans’ constitutional rights to hoaxing Democrats who have and will use their power to target their political enemies is nothing for Republicans to be proud of. It’s the type of ideological surrender that they should lose their jobs and leadership positions over.

The bill text is still not available but from what Democrat Sen. Chris Murphy’s Twitter feed and the official framework indicate, the legislation could include sweeping measures such as problematic red flag laws that overstep too many constitutional bounds for Republicans to comfortably sacrifice.

Despite concerns that the legislation could compromise Americans’ Second, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendment rights, McConnell and 10 of his squishiest GOP colleagues including Sens. John Cornyn of Texas, Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Roy Blunt of Missouri, Rob Portman of Ohio, Richard Burr of North Carolina, Mitt Romney of Utah, Bill Cassidy of Lousiana, Susan Collins of Maine, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania plan to join the Democrats’ anti-gun escapades. Together, they caved to the emotional blackmail wielded by Murphy and amplified by the corporate media.

Republicans have no good reason to trust Democrats to skilfully create legislation that is mindful of Americans’ rights. Nor do GOPers have reasons to support legislation that yields little evidence of actually deterring criminals from committing crimes that are already illegal.

After all, the leftist legislators supporting the gun deal are the same politicians who supported spying on a president, falsely accused a Supreme Court nominee-turned-justice of rape, defended the Biden administration when it sicced the feds on parents who wanted a say in what happens in their child’s classrooms, and so much more.

In the past, when Democrats have been given inch-sized opportunities to restrict gun rights, they’ve sought to take miles and ban certain guns and gun parts altogether.

As my colleague Federalist Senior Editor David Harsanyi recently noted, historically, “Democrats have not only tried to expand the definition of partner” in domestic violence-motivated gun grabs but have also tried to broaden “the reasons for losing your gun rights to include many types of...

Morning Mistress

Before You Click On The "Read More" Link,

Please Only Do So If You Are Over 21 Years Old.

If You are Easily Upset, Triggered Or Offended, This Is Not The Place For You.

Please Leave Silently Into The Night......

The 90 Miles Mystery Box: Episode #1750

You have come across a mystery box. But what is inside?

It could be literally anything from the serene to the horrific,

from the beautiful to the repugnant,

from the mysterious to the familiar.

If you decide to open it, you could be disappointed,

you could be inspired, you could be appalled.

This is not for the faint of heart or the easily offended.

You have been warned.

Girls With Guns

Visage à trois #300

Three Videos For Your Viewing Pleasure:

Three Additional Bonus Videos:

He Called America Racist, Now He's in Charge of Our Nukes

“When I see what happened to Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, George Floyd, Rayshard Brooks… that could be me.”

Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is an investigative journalist and writer focusing on the radical Left and Islamic terrorism.

It was the summer of 2020. Black Lives Matter riots were terrorizing, destroying, and burning American cities. And the first black deputy commander of Air Force Global Strike Command told everyone in the Air Force that he was terrified that white people could kill him at any moment.

“Here I am as a lieutenant general in the United States Air Force," then Lt. Gen Anthony Cotton whined to Air Force Magazine. “When I see what happened to Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, George Floyd, Rayshard Brooks—and the list goes on and on."

"That could be me," he claimed.

Since Cotton was, unlike Breonna Taylor, probably not harboring an armed drug dealer who opened fire on police or, unlike George Floyd, overdosing on fentanyl during a struggle with police as the climax to a long criminal career, that was a disingenuous smear from a top officer.

The spectacle of successful black men like Obama, Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier, or Gen. Anthony Cotton falsely claiming that America is so racist that any of them could suffer the fate of career criminals simply because of an accident of skin color is pathetic and disgusting. The Merck CEO or the Air Force general are as likely to suffer the fate of George Floyd as their white counterparts are to end up like a dead white meth addict shot in a raid in Georgia.

But Cotton knew what he was doing. What he was doing was dishonorable and self-serving.

And it worked.

Two years after complaining about police lights flashing in his rearview mirror and someone challenging his parking spot, Cotton has been nominated by Biden to head U.S. Strategic Command.

It’s been a rapid ascent for Gen. Anthony Cotton who had been appointed to head Air Force Global Strike Command last year, after being Deputy Commander of the same in 2019, up from the head of Air University in 2018. Air University, like a lot of Air Force and Navy educational institutions, had gone painfully woke. And Cotton earned his political stripes in the process.

Gen. Anthony Cotton is now likely to become a four-star general. The last few years of his career have some “firsts” attached to them, but that doesn’t seem to help.

Charles Q. Brown, Jr. is the Air Force's first black chief of staff, and has been tipped to replace Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Gen. Milley. That hadn’t stopped Brown from crying racism and smearing the country he claims to serve.

In a speech in which Brown “seemed to barely contain his rage”, he ranted “that the ideals of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution ‘that I’ve sworn my adult life to support and defend’ have not always delivered ‘liberty and equality’ to all.”

"I am a Black man who happens to be the Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force," Kaleth O. Wright, the second black man to serve as the highest ranking noncommissioned officer, tweeted. "I am George Floyd…I am Philando Castile, I am Michael Brown."

Cotton is following a familiar identity politics career model that’s bad for America, but good for unprincipled men who are willing to smear their country and play...

As confidence in the Biden administration reaches new lows, vulnerable Democrats running in the 2022 midterms want to disassociate from their party, according to an Associated Press report.

Democrats in Congress are localizing their campaign issues to create distance between them and the embattled administration in Washington, D.C. Even though her party is currently enjoying a legislative majority, Nevada senator Catherine Cortez Masto says on her campaign website she is running against "dysfunction in Washington." Pennsylvania Senate candidate John Fetterman, another vulnerable Democrat, said in a recent TV ad showing footage of a town in his state, "Washington, D.C., attacked towns like this for years." Wisconsin Senate candidate Mandela Barnes has described the Democratic-controlled Senate as an "out-of-touch millionaire’s club," the AP reported. And New Hampshire senator Maggie Hassan has criticized in recent weeks President Joe Biden’s withdrawal from Afghanistan and border policies, as well as challenged her party to address soaring gas prices.

"I’m taking on members of my own party to push a gas tax holiday, and I’m pushing Joe Biden to release more of our oil reserves," Hassan said in a May campaign ad.

Almost 50 Democratic officials doubt President Joe Biden can prevent sweeping losses for Democrats in the midterms, interviews conducted by the New York Times revealed. The president is unpopular among both parties as the cost of goods climbs and gas prices reach an average of $5 for the first time in history. After the past two years brought a disastrous Afghanistan withdrawal, border crisis, and record inflation, party leaders, including former president Barack Obama’s chief campaign strategist, are also concerned about Biden’s age and efficacy if he ran again in 2024.

"To say our country was on the right track would flagrantly depart from reality," Steve Simeonidis, a Democratic National Committee member from...