A mask is better than a ventilator,

   Home is better than ICU.

   Prevention is better than Cure.

   It's not CURFEW,

   it's CARE FOR YOU.

A handful of Trump officials are quietly reaching out to President-elect Biden's transition team.    
There are two months until the inauguration.

Covid-19 is ravaging the United States.    
Health and Human Services Sec'y Azar announced during a briefing that HHS staff will not work with the transition team until the Trump appointee ascertains the election results. The refusal to allow covid briefings for Biden's team could delay the distribution of vaccines to end this nightmare.

It is critical that National Security clearances are processed so briefings with the transition team can begin.

Covid skepticism and election denialism are NOT a political philosophy.

We are in trouble if Americans do not acknowledge facts.

Life is NOT a game.    
Covid is reality, Americans' lack of respect for facts is exhausting and killing frontline workers.
Democratic elections are not games where we "rough up" the referees to change the outcome of fair elections. 

Imagine you're on a team whose record is 0-8, but if you want to be on the team you must publicly declare you're leading the league and the officials are all corrupt.

Covid is soaring, families will be separated for Thanksgiving and winter holidays...  
Not a moment too soon,    
Emily Murphy, director of the General Services Administration, has opened the door for President-elect Biden's transition team to receive covid data and coordinate with Dr Fauci and other federal health officials to streamline the process to vaccinate Americans. Background checks can begin on Biden's White House staff appointments and Cabinet picks, and national security briefings can begin.    
Not a moment too soon.

"A Republic, if you can keep it."    
-- Benjamin Franklin

Let us thoughtfully count our blessings on this Thanksgiving Day.

Reporters look forward to getting their lives back on January 20th when Trump loses his bully pulpit.
President-elect Biden is moving us past the era of "fake news" and he will not be tweeting in the middle of the night.  
Trump is a master of disinformation, and now during the transition to Biden's administration, he continues to perpetrate accusations of massive fraud in the 2020 election.    
He spent $3 million for a recount in two Wisconsin counties which increased his losing margin by 87 votes, and he is moving forward with legal challenges in six states (WI, MI, PA, GA, AZ, NV) which even Trump-appointed judges are throwing out of court for lack of evidence.

On the heels of Thanksgiving gatherings and travel, Trump continues to deny the pandemic and to contest that he lost the election.
Some Trump Twitter followers have slowly begun to move away from Trump's disinformation campaign and to disengage from his world of "fake news".

Which side are you on?  
It's time to STOP the voter fraud delusion.  
Death threats and intimidation are dangerous and wrong.    
GA Republican official blames Trump for inciting violence.    
MA official calls on GOP to condemn Trump's behavior.

Disputing Trump's persistent, baseless claims, AG Barr declared the U.S. Justice Department has uncovered "no evidence of widespread voter fraud that could change the outcome of the 2020 election."

What is more important?  
Collective safety or Individual rights ? ? ?    
Do legal measures protecting collective safety infringe on individual rights?

These QUESTIONS have been posed countless times in our brief history -    
to the early Puritans,  
to our founding fathers,  
and even now, during the coronavirus pandemic.

The Puritans are a prime example of a group that put collective safety before all else. Wm Bradford, governor of the Plymouth colony, opens a window into the Puritan world, and offers a comparison between the communal, Puritan lifestyle, and the individualistic lifestyle of the sailors who brought the Puritans to the new world.

The colonists were completely unprepared for the harsh New England winter that struck them. Only six or seven of the original one hundred settlers were able to take care of the sick, which they did, day in and day out, repetitively fetching wood, building fires, dressing and feeding the sick, washing their clothes - they did it all "willingly and cheerfully." Bradford used the words "willingly and cheerfully" very precisely to paint a sharp picture of the helpful and serving attitude of the Puritans. The few colonists who were healthy prioritized (above all else) the health and safety of the sick: this was the only way they could survive.

In sharp contrast to the Puritans, the sailors who brought them over held no apparent regard for one another. Forsaking any sense of community, they focused only on themselves; as sickness spread they cursed each for their bad fortune and refused to help those who were ill. All who fell sick were left to die (or were murdered).

The Puritans' focus on the health of their community was their strength;  
the sailors' lack of regard for communal safety was their downfall.

The importance of communal safety transcends time and affects people regardless of societal position or time period, and while it seems paradoxical, true freedom is only attained through collective safety.

Tonight I feel pity for Donald Trump.  
It is painful to watch anyone so publicly display uncontrollable desperation.
The agony Trump is suffering because of his loss at the polls is all too apparent.  
He is like a fish thrashing about on the end of a fisherman's line with the hook firmly embedded in its jaw.

Mitch McConnell at last acknowledged President-elect Joe Biden this morning on the Senate floor. "Yesterday, electors met in all 50 states, so as of this morning our country has officially a president-elect and a vice president-elect. The Electoral College has spoken, so today I want to congratulate President-elect Joe Biden."

Right NOW we have a hunger crisis in the U.S. and unless McConnell works with the Senate to pass a COVID-19 relief package, evictions and foreclosures are going to leave millions of families homeless, because families are unable to pay the rent and the landlords are unable to pay the mortgages.

"Foxes have dens and birds have nests."    
Many Americans have no place to call home.

"We've finally identified the source of fraud in the 2020 election. It's being perpetrated by Ron Johnson, Republican Senator of Wisconsin.

"President Trump lost the election. He lost the recounts. He lost the vote certifications, by Republican and Democratic officials alike. He lost 59 of 60 court cases. He lost the electoral college vote. His own attorney general said 'we have not seen fraud on a scale that could have effected a different outcome.'

"But Johnson, chair of the Senate Homeland Security Comm, undermined Christopher Krebs, [former CISA Director, who urged his fellow Republicans to stop the disinformation (which has led to death threats against him and elections officials around the country)],    
and he (Johnson) forged ahead with his fraudulent attempt to undermine the election -- and the credibility of elections in the United States generally. Though Johnson passively admitted 'the conclusion has collectively been reached' that any fraud was too small to reverse President-elect Joe Biden's win, he then spent nearly four hours today in a hearing trying to suggest otherwise. He repeatedly announced that his attempt to discredit democracy is perfectly healthy for democracy.

"The Republicans on the committee displayed a distinct lack of self-awareness as they wondered aloud why most Trump voters believe there was fraud. Johnson said they have to work together to restore confidence in elections: in short, 'to clean up the mess he (Johnson) and his cohorts have made'."

with attribution to Dana Milbank, WaPo, December 16, 2020 

The New York Post Editorial Board says: "Give it up, Mr President --- for your sake and the nation's.  
STOP
 THE
   INSANITY
It's time to end this dark charade.  
You have tweeted that, as long as Republicans have "courage" they can overturn the results and give you four more years in office.    
In other words, you're cheering for an undemocratic coup.    
(Your efforts to investigate the election have found no evidence of fraud.).    
Sidney Powell is a crazy person. Michael Flynn suggesting martial law is tantamount to treason.  
We offer this as a newspaper that endorsed you.    
You're helping the Democrats write you off as the King Lear of Mar-a-Lago, ranting about the corruption of the world. 

"Distributing the COVID-19 vaccine is the most significant public health undertaking of our lifetimes," DHS Deputy Secretary Julie Willems said.

Though Moderna vaccine does not need to be stored at the extreme sub-zero temperatures that Pfizer's vaccine requires, Moderna's vaccine must be stored at temperatures between negative 13 degrees and 5 degrees Fahrenheit and then for a max of 30 days in temperatures between 36 F and 46 F before it must be thrown out.

The Food and Drug Administration notes that Moderna vaccine's specific requirements are due to the fact the medicine does not contain preservatives and the particles in it are highly fragile. Once the vaccine has been thawed, it cannot be refrozen.

Advocate Aurora Health officials in Grafton, Wisconsin, said 50 vials of Moderna vaccine were removed from the refrigerator to access other items and were not put back into the refrigerator overnight on Christmas Day night. Each vial contained 10 doses.

Some of the vaccine was administered to team members on December 26th within the approved 12-hour post-refrigeration window, but most of it had to to be discarded due to the temperature storage requirements necessary to maintain its viability.

Losing any number of vaccines is significant.    
The hospital system did not specify who was to receive the vaccine doses that were discarded.    
The spokesperson added, "We are clearly disappointed and regret this happened."

It is hard enough to accept human error even when it's acknowledged with regret and disappointment (see above entry),    
but Trump's tweet for states to "Get moving!" to administer the COVID-19 vaccine is NOT a plan and it's NOT presidential leadership.  
Too much help from the government is not a problem in America today.

More info will follow from Grafton, WI...   
the employee who left the vials of Moderna vaccine out of the hospital refrigerator acknowledges the act was intentional.

Hospital officials corrected the number: it was 57 vials of Moderna vaccine that were removed from the hospital refrigerator and had to be discarded.  
The employee has not been identified, but is no longer with the hospital.  

The FBI is assisting the Grafton PD with an investigation.  
Moderna and the FDA are working with the hospital.

THE FIRED EMPLOYEE - A HOSPITAL PHARMACIST - ALSO ADMITTED TO LEAVING THE SAME VIALS OF VACCINE OUT OF THE REFRIGERATOR THE PREVIOUS NIGHT / OVERNIGHT FROM CHRISTMAS EVE TO CHRISTMAS DAY.

THUS THE VACCINE USED DECEMBER 26th TO VACCINATE PEOPLE WAS EXPIRED VACCINE. THE HOSPITAL HAS NOTIFIED EVERYONE WHO RECEIVED EXPIRED VACCINE, AND IS WORKING WITH MODERNA AND THE FDA TO FIGURE OUT HOW TO PROPERLY VACCINATE THOSE PEOPLE AGAINST COVID-19.