Day: December 22, 2021

U.S. Army Disputes Report Which Inaccurately Claimed COVID-19 Vaccine Under Development Was Tested on Omicron

Peter D'Abrosca

The Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR) said in a Wednesday statement that some information in a report about its vaccine production is inaccurate. 

“Some recent reports about Walter Reed Army Institute of Research’s COVID-19 Vaccine Development have led to inaccurate representations which require clarification,” WRAIR said in a statement provided to The Star News Network. “Last week, the preclinical results of the Army COVID-19 vaccine, SpFN, were published in Science Translational Medicine. The Spike Ferritin Nanoparticle platform is designed to protect against an array of SARS-CoV-2 variants and SARS-origin variants but was not tested on the Omicron variant.”

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Pentagon Issues New Guidance on ‘Extremist Behavior’ Within Military Ranks

Virginia Star Staff

On Monday, the Department of Defense, in an effort to further crack down on political dissent, is revising its previous definitions of “extremist behavior” in order to deter uniformed members from certain political affiliations, CNN reports.

The Countering Extremism Working Group, a panel that was created for the purpose of ostensibly investigating “extremism” within military ranks, issued a report outlining its findings, claiming that there are indeed some “extremists” in the military. The report alleges that there were roughly 100 instances of uniformed members who either had “extremist” beliefs or joined “extremist” groups in 2021, which the report claims is an increase from previous years.

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Commentary: January 6 Is Looking Like a ‘Fedsurrection’

The Epoch Times
Close up of Capitol with Trump and America flag in the wind

Things are always worse than they seem.

That seems to be a good rule of thumb these days.

Take the FBI.

Every sentient person knows that the Bureau has had a rough couple years.

The Russia Collusion hoax revealed an agency shot through with corruption and partisan bias.

But the rot goes far beyond the large handful of top Bureau bad hats: the James Comeys, the Andrew McCabes, the Peter Strzoks, and Kevin Clinesmiths.

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As His First Cabinet Pick, Youngkin Names School Data Guru Aimee Guidera to Be Secretary of Education

Eric Burk

Governor-elect Glenn Youngkin announced that Aimee Rogstad Guidera will serve as Secretary of Education. During the No Child Left Behind era, Guidera founded the Data Quality Campaign (DQC) which focuses on better data gathering to help improve school quality.

In his Monday press release, Youngkin said, “Aimee will be a critical partner in restoring expectations of excellence; overseeing a record education budget to invest in teachers, facilities and special education; rolling out innovation lab and charter schools; and standing for a curriculum that prepares Virginia’s children for a dynamic future and removes politics from the classroom.”

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Democrats Urge Health Officials to Require Vaccination or Negative Test for Domestic Flights

Virginia Star Staff

A group of Democratic lawmakers sent letters to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Monday asking officials to require proof of vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test to fly domestically.

The letters, sent to FAA Administrator Steve Dickson and CDC Director Rochelle Walensky, were signed by Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California, along with Reps. Eric Swalwell of California, Donald Beyer of Virginia and Ritchie Torres of New York. The lawmakers cited the recent emergence of the Omicron variant of the coronavirus as justification for the request.

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Study Shows 40 Percent of Latinos Are Concerned Democrats Are Embracing Socialism

Virginia Star Staff

A new study from Equis Research, a firm dedicated to better understanding the American Latino electorate, found over 40% of Latinos think Democrats are embracing socialist policies.

The study findings that indicate challenges for Democrats in upcoming elections considering Latinos, who accounts for roughly 1 in 8 eligible U.S. voters, are a significant part of the party’s voter base and include many who came to the U.S. to try to escape the socialist governments of their former countries.

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Kellogg’s Employees Agree to New Contract Ending over Two Month Long Strike

Virginia Star Staff

The roughly 1,400 striking Kellogg’s workers ended a 10-week strike and voted in favor of a new labor contract with the cereal giant, multiple sources reported.

“Our striking members at Kellogg’s ready-to-eat cereal production facilities courageously stood their ground and sacrificed so much in order to achieve a fair contract,” Anthony Shelton, the president of the workers’ union, the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union, said in a statement, The New York Times reported. “This agreement makes gains and does not include any concessions.”

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In Email to Fauci, National Institutes of Health Director Collins Asked for Media Hit Piece to Smear ‘Fringe’ Harvard, Stanford, Oxford Epidemiologists

Virginia Star Staff

Last fall, outgoing National Institutes of Health Director (NIH) Francis Collins asked Dr. Anthony Fauci in an email to pursue a “quick and devastating” media hit piece to discredit the Great Barrington Declaration, recently released emails show.

More than 60,000 infectious disease epidemiologists and public health scientists signed the declaration to express their “grave concerns about the damaging physical and mental health impacts of the prevailing COVID-19 policies.”

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Commentary: Dismissals of Safe Outpatient Drugs Cause Needless COVID Deaths According to Doctors

RealClearWire

For the first nine months of the COVID-19 pandemic, there were no officially approved outpatient treatments for combating the disease. From March 2020, when the virus first emerged in the United States, until that November, when the Food and Drug Administration authorized emergency use of monoclonal antibodies, health authorities advised that the infected do little but quarantine themselves, drink plenty of fluids and rest unless hospitalization was necessary.

During those chaotic final months of Donald Trump’s presidency, the medical establishment expressed extreme caution regarding outpatient treatments for the virus, and these warnings were amplified by major media hostile to the president, for example when he touted the anti-malaria medicine hydroxychloroquine.

Although an estimated 12% to 38% of prescriptions are written for FDA-approved drugs used “off-label” (including Botox and Viagra), Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, declared early on that providers should dispense only medicines proven to be safe and effective for COVID patients through “randomized, placebo-controlled trials.” These can take months or years to conduct, and often at great cost.

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Commentary: Gun Storage Laws Would Do More Harm Than Good

RealClearWire

Shortly after the Oxford High School shooting last Tuesday, politicians started calling for more gun control.

“Michigan’s laws are woefully inadequate,” Oakland County prosecutor Karen McDonald (pictured) announced at a press conference. “We [Michigan] don’t have a safe storage law. We’re not legally required to store your weapon in a safe manner. Children are allowed to attend [gun ranges] with their parents. … We don’t have strong enough laws.”

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Los Angeles Students Lost over 90,000 School Days in Compliance with Quarantine Protocol

Virginia Star Staff

A California activist group calculated that students in Los Angeles County missed over 90,000 school days in the span of a month, Fox News reported.

In about a month a total of 92,455 in-person school days in Los Angeles County were lost, which Jonathan Zachreson, the founder of Reopen California Schools called “astounding,” Fox News reported Monday. Quarantine measures to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic kept kids home from school, which led to the learning loss that Zachreson said “could have been avoided” if school officials hadn’t intervened in public health matters.

Many students were able to stay in school because of “Test to Stay” programs, which allow unvaccinated students who are exposed to the virus to stay in school as long as they are asymptomatic, wear a mask and take two COVID-19 tests a week, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report.

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COVID Researcher Was Called ‘Race Traitor’ for Investigating Lab Leak Theory

Virginia Star Staff

Alina Chan, a postdoctoral researcher at MIT and Harvard University, said she was accused of racism for investigating the possibility of COVID-19 leaking from a Wuhan, China, lab.

Chan began asking questions about the origins of the virus and challenging the wet market theory in March 2020, voicing her concerns on Twitter to an often hostile scientific community. Chan, who is ethnically Chinese, said she was called a “race traitor” for suggesting the virus could have been caused by a lab accident in Wuhan.

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Pentagon Issues New Guidance on ‘Extremist Behavior’ Within Military Ranks

Virginia Star Staff

On Monday, the Department of Defense, in an effort to further crack down on political dissent, is revising its previous definitions of “extremist behavior” in order to deter uniformed members from certain political affiliations, CNN reports.

The Countering Extremism Working Group, a panel that was created for the purpose of ostensibly investigating “extremism” within military ranks, issued a report outlining its findings, claiming that there are indeed some “extremists” in the military. The report alleges that there were roughly 100 instances of uniformed members who either had “extremist” beliefs or joined “extremist” groups in 2021, which the report claims is an increase from previous years.

Read More

Commentary: Gun Storage Laws Would Do More Harm Than Good

RealClearWire

Shortly after the Oxford High School shooting last Tuesday, politicians started calling for more gun control.

“Michigan’s laws are woefully inadequate,” Oakland County prosecutor Karen McDonald (pictured) announced at a press conference. “We [Michigan] don’t have a safe storage law. We’re not legally required to store your weapon in a safe manner. Children are allowed to attend [gun ranges] with their parents. … We don’t have strong enough laws.”

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Virginia Gov-Elect Youngkin Taps His Nonprofit’s CEO Caren Merrick to Serve as State Sec of Commerce and Trade

Eric Burk

Governor-elect Glenn Youngkin has tapped Caren Merrick to be his Secretary of Commerce and Trade. Merrick currently helms Youngkin’s non-profit VA Ready, which Youngkin started in June 2020, a month before announcing his departure from the Carlyle Group.

“Virginia’s jobs machine has stalled out, and Caren is going to play a pivotal role on the team that will jumpstart our economy and reinvigorate job growth here in the Commonwealth,” Youngkin said in a Tuesday press release. “Caren is an innovator, a business builder, and a true leader in workforce development—the kind of experience needed to develop talent, train workers, attract investment, and make Virginia the best state to start a business as we set out to add 400,000 jobs and launch 10,000 startups.

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