Quote for the Day…
Life’s tragedy is that we get old too soon and wise too late. – Benjamin Franklin
In today’s column, I take a quick look at these people/issues:
- “Private” Event
- Anti-Vaccine Mandate Rallies
- Word of the Year
- Gianforte & Hanukkah
- The Western Word Poll
“PRIVATE” EVENT:
The Daily Montanan reported that Attorney General Austin Knudsen and Hamilton Sen. Theresa Manzella will be among those to speak at an event in Sidney on Monday night pushing back on the Sidney Health Center’s recent decision to follow a federal vaccine mandate that requires all hospitals receiving federal Medicaid or Medicare funds to vaccinate their employees.
The Daily Montanan reported the following:
Citing fears of retribution among employees, media is not explicitly allowed at the event, Hall said. The Montana Daily Gazette and RoundUp —a weekly paper covering eastern Montana — will be attending the event. Originally, the Sidney Herald was denied access by organizers, but that decision was reversed, Hall said.
The press is invited by invitation only and must sign legal docs that all attendees’ names and images be kept private in the press. Several press outlets tried to invite themselves via e-mail. This is a private meeting. I’m sorry, but it doesn’t work that way. We will absolutely turn away uninvited press at the door, especially biased news sources. – JD Hall,” read a post from the Facebook page Conservatives United for Richland County.
If Knudsen and Manzella are speaking to the group because of their positions and their travels are being paid by taxpayer funds, then the event is not private. They are attending to people’s business. The people have a right to participate and the press (all press) have a right to cover it. It’s bullshit to even try to claim otherwise.
As for the reason for the meeting to fight the federal vaccine mandate, in my opinion, the employees who do not want to abide by the mandate and who only want to fight it because they dislike the President, should quit.
Read the full story from the Daily Montanan HERE.
ANTI-VACCINE MANDATE RALLIES:
I guess there were some rallies across Montana on Sunday in opposition to a federal COVID-19 vaccine mandate for health care workers and employees of any company with more than 100 workers. (MTN News)
MTN reported that the rally organizers all agreed that if they were forced to have the COVID-19 vaccine, they would quit their jobs.
Good. Quit your jobs.
One person said she would wait tables instead of taking the vaccine. I hope she is not waiting tables at a place I frequent.
Read the complete story from MTN HERE.
WORD OF THE YEAR:
Hey, anti-vaxxers – the Merriam-Webster 2021 word of the year is “VACCINE.”
Go HERE to learn more.
GIANFORTE & HANUKKAH:
Montana Governor Greg Gianforte and his wife Susan wished all Montanans celebrating Hanukkah a holiday of light, love, good health, and peace via Twitter.
He then posted a photo of a seven-lamp menorah on Twitter instead of the nine-lamp menorah. One person responded with, “Please put an accurate Menorah on your post. How insensitive! It’s a celebration of 8 nights plus the center candle.”
While I am not an expert about Hanukkah, I would have at least checked with an expert before posting. Maybe this advice will help for next time:
Maybe if the Governor and his staff memorized the Adam Sandler song about Hanukkah they would not have made this mistake.
Put on your yarmulke
Here comes Hanukkah
So much funukah
To celebrate Hanukkah
Hanukkah is the festival of lights
Instead of one day of presents, we have eight crazy nights
THE WESTERN WORD POLL:
This week’s poll question asks, “Should we ‘throw out’ Montana’s Constitution and replace it?” (Background)
Results will be posted later this week.
The Western Word 
Stay, right ain’t over til it’s over. The case orders all mention, ?when was this done before?. Well never. Congress controls the purse strings, not the president. All the orders mention that if a state wants to mandate vaccines it has that power.
Withholding of funds ala Federal transportation dollars is authorized by Congress, for instance.
Please D.V.F.T.P. (don’t vote for these people). If the virus were more deadly, these stupid arguments would not fly (they don’t anyway). You would either stay home and self-quarantine or be detained. Make no mistake (study history) the next pandemic could be very deadly and we are not prepared. D.V.F.T.P. If it cost them an election they will shut up (I hope)
I had one of those half-awake dreams the other night. Talking to a few people who loudly refused to wear masks or get vaccinated. One of them, a construction worker, was wearing a hard hat. I asked him, “I’ve worn a hard hat. They’re hot, uncomfortable, and make you look like a brain-damaged toadstool. Why are you wearing one?”
His reply: “Because my job requires it.”
So, I asked, “So, why does your employer do that?”
Reply: “Because OSHA requires them to.”
Still puzzled, I asked, “Isn’t that blatant government overreach? Doesn’t that infringe on your ‘god-given, constitutionally guaranteed’ right do decide that sort of thing for yourself? Why aren’t you refusing to comply?”
Reply: “Well, it’s that way to make workers safer. And if I refuse, they’ll fire me!”
Still puzzled, I tried to make sense of the exchange. “So OSHA determined that people wearing hard-hats were less likely to to get head injuries and maybe die?”
Reply: “Well………..yeah, I guess so.”
Still puzzled, “So OSHA, based on medical science, determined that people wearing masks were less likely to contract a pandemic virus, AND were less likely to infect their friends, families, and co-workers. I’m trying to find the difference there.”
Reply: The sound of crickets chirping in the background.
Fred – great message. Thanks, JmB
Yes, indeed! Good point!
Knudsen and Manzella sure have been working together quite a bit lately, and now both traveling to that noted den of iniquity Sidney, Montana? People are going to start talking. Let’s just hope they both have the good sense to not be traveling on the taxpayer dime that might accidentally appear in some public record.
So “biased” news sources will not be allowed at their closed event, but the Montana Daily Gazette will? Because that publication meets the dictionary definition of unbiased? LOL. As that pub’s “about” section says, “Therefore whatever you have spoken in the dark will be heard in the light, and what you have spoken in the ear in inner rooms will be proclaimed on the housetops. And if it is (at all) it will be filtered through an exclusive extremist right wing Christian lens (Luke 12:3, KJV).”
However the real scandal that is being overlooked is that Knudsen is neglecting his duties as Montana AG to appear at these private events as a private citizen (wink wink). Mike Lindell could find no takers among the Attorneys General of the USA to sign onto his SCOTUS suit to toss out Biden votes in swing states on the road to getting Trump reinstated. Surely this sort of thing is right in the wheelhouse of the nuttiest AG in America. Come on Austie, get with it and blaze a trail! You haven’t made Montana a national laughingstock for a couple of weeks now.
Regarding the rally, as I read the Helena IR article (https://helenair.com/news/local/helena-rally-opposes-vaccine-mandate-for-health-care-workers/article_38c84004-1c25-5423-bb7b-e63e4e2c1feb.html), it struck me how flippin’ silly people can be. They get all worked up about a “mandate,” but they live with multiple mandates without scrawling some insipid motto on a placard and standing on a street corner. When was the last time you saw a rally against stopping at a red light? Or paying property tax? For Pete’s sake, spare us and get the shot.
Jcolemanmoore- Exactly. There are so many “mandates” in the world that to draw the line in the sand on this one seems ridiculous. Thanks, JmB
There aren’t a lot of “mandates.” Mandates are authoritative commands.
There are a lot of Laws, red lights, drivers license and such. If you haven’t read the stay order on the OSHA case you should. A new stay came down on the Federal contractors “mandate. ” Even if Covid vaccines are the best thing since chopped liver it still doesn’t mean a president can mandate most people to get it.
Schools or private companies probably are able to require them.(my guess) The (Trump) CDC evictions moratorium was shot down because the power to do it (mandate it) was never authorized by Congress.
Folks are just saying, “Hey you’re not my mother! “
Mary – I think the keyword is “stay.” As you are well aware, nothing has been decided. Ultimately, the pandemic will be over or the feds will withhold funding for anything that gets funding from the feds (hospitals, etc.) The latter is more likely.
I still like the chances of the feds being able to mandate vaccines for anyone who works and gets any sort of federal funding.
As always, thanks for your comments and expertise!
-JmB
I like the insipid motto in the one picture of the rally, “Educate Don’t Mandate”. That’s what Gianforte has been saying all along, and look how well it has worked. His year long education campaign has got his state up to what, 51% of eligible? Nice work, Greg. That’s leadership.
You would think the State would take the same approach to drunk driving, because education works so well in that regard, too. But no, 85 or so of our 200 plus annual auto crash deaths attributable in part to alcohol, and all sorts of laws. 100% of our 2,600 and counting in just 1.5 years Covid deaths and all those hospital bills, all due to some diseased person infecting someone else, and let’s not get hasty with mandates now.
Terry – Thanks. The milquetoast angle from many Republicans so they won’t piss off their base is not real leadership. -JmB
I think you would be hard pressed to find any person not wanting to be forced to take the vaccine only because they don’t like the President.
Mary – I don’t know about that. Lots of Trump love and Biden hate in Montana.
Thanks for your comments. – JmB