Divemedic

Trump, 9/11, & Trump Derangement Syndrome

The day that terrorists brought down the towers, Donald Trump was interviewed by NBC news. During that report, he told reporters (who called him a “local real estate developer”) that he had hired hundreds of workers at his own expense to go to ground zero and help with rescue efforts.

The left can’t let a warm, positive story circulate about Donald Trump. So the fact checkers are working overtime to make sure that this story is killed. They are claiming that the interview is genuine, but there is no evidence that Trump was telling the truth at the time.

This is what TDS looks like. Their hatred is so complete that they cannot admit that Trump did anything good or positive for this nation. They have forgotten that Trump was known to be a close friend of the Clintons. He and Bill used to play golf together, and Bill Clinton was one of the people who urged Trump to run for office.

By Divemedic, ago

The Choice

Twenty two years ago today. I still remember that morning in more detail than all but of a few of the mornings that have come since. The sky was a beautiful blue, the sun was warm, and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. A typical Central Florida day. My shift, C shift, had just started our 24 hour workday.

I was driving Engine 2 that morning. Dennis was riding in the seat next to me as the Lieutenant, and Justin was the back seat firefighter. Our shift had begun at 7:30 that morning as it always did. We did our morning routine as we always do. At 8:30, we left the station to do annual flow testing of fire hydrants.

By 8:45, we were behind the Winn Dixie and just about to test our first hydrant. Our Battalion Chief called us and told us to return to the station and turn on the TV. I remember jokingly asking Dennis who the guy on the radio was and what they had done to the Chief, since he would never tell us to watch TV during the workday.

We arrived back in the station just in time to see the second plane hit the south tower. I remember watching Fox news and seeing them switch to the DC bureau, where reporters said they could see a column of smoke. Things were happening so fast, I couldn’t figure out what that smoke was coming from. I commented “There is no way that the smoke from NYC is visible in Washington.” It was then that a fellow firefighter told me that the Pentagon had been hit.

The chief called us to disclose the plans for the remainder of the day. While I was on the phone with him, the first tower fell. The chief said to me, “Oh my God. 30,000 people just died.” I remember being stunned that so many people could be in a building.

By noon, we had an armed SWAT officer with an MP-5 riding along with us on all of our calls “for security.”

For weeks, we firefighters were stunned at the loss of 343 firefighters. I felt a sense of awe and respect for the guys who went into that second tower after watching the first tower fall. They went into that building knowing that they would never come out of the second tower. What was going through their minds? I asked myself if I was capable of making the same choice if I knew that I would not come out?

We all wanted to be able to say yes. It isn’t the same thing when you go into an ordinary fire. Firefighters are a cocky, professional bunch. When we run into a burning building, we tell ourselves that we are trained and experienced enough that it will not happen to us. Not so with those guys in the towers. They went in KNOWING that they wouldn’t come out. That is a time that you don’t know what you would do until the moment of truth comes.

I just hoped that I would have the fortitude to make the choice that needed to be made, to have the courage to choose duty and honor over self preservation and the fortune to never be placed in that position. I hoped that I would never have to make that choice.

I spent the majority of my adult life in one uniform or another, dedicated to the protection of American lives and values. I spent six years in the Navy, doing two combat tours in the Persian gulf. I wasn’t a big hero or anything. I, like millions of others, did my job. After that, I spent two decades in a firefighter’s uniform. In that time, I ran into hundreds of burning buildings, jumped into a dozen lakes, thousands of medical scenes, and traveled to 22 natural disasters. I was injured three times in the line of duty. I saw a couple of thousand dead bodies, dozens of shootings and stabbings, and saved more than a few lives.

In 2011, I retired. I had seen enough death, misery, and blood for one lifetime. I thought that the time of risking life and limb for the good of this nation and its people was over. I had given enough. I deserved to be left alone to grow old and enjoy the rest of my life in as much peace as I could manage.

All I want is to be left alone to grow old in peace. The events of the past two and a half years make me believe that this won’t happen. I fear that I may have to make that choice after all.

By Divemedic, ago

Don’t Misquote Me.

It’s been claimed that I said “all blacks are felonious homicidal maniacs.” Let’s be clear: I never said that. That would be ridiculous. What I said was:

Isn’t it time that we admit that blacks are largely a race of criminals who have a pathological inability to live in civilized society? It’s well documented that more than half of all homicides and nearly half of all violent crimes, are committed by blacks. 

I stand behind that statement, and I think that the facts back that up. In fact, the evidence is overwhelmin:

  • Blacks are 13% of the population, but commit 43 to 53 percent of the murders (due to year to year variation) For example, in 2018, 43% of homicides were committed by blacks.
  • Of the nearly 770,000 violent interracial crimes committed every year involving blacks and whites, blacks commit 85 percent and whites commit 15 percent.
  • When a black person is the perpetrator, forty-five percent of their victims are white, 43 percent are black, and 10 percent are Hispanic.
  • When whites commit violent crime, only three percent of their victims are black.
  • Blacks are an estimated 39 times more likely to commit a violent crime against a white than vice versa, and 136 times more likely to commit robbery.
  • Blacks are 2.25 times more likely to commit officially-designated hate crimes against whites than vice versa.
  • In San Francisco, Blacks are the perpetrators of 85% of ALL violent assaults, and Asians are the victims in more than 98% of those crimes.
  • Black women are 3 times more likely to likely to be unwed teen mothers than other races, 4 times more likely to commit murder, deal drugs, become prostitutes, or be murdered than any other race.
  • Asians are only 4% of the population, but make up 20% of the student body in Ivy League schools.
  • The 20 cities in the US with the highest murder rates are majority black cities.
  • The CDC reports that the leading cause of death among black men age 15 to 44 is homicide. 20% of all black women who die between the age of 15 and 24 are murdered, and 92% of the time, it is another black person who did it.
  • Among men, blacks (28.5%) are about six times more likely than whites (4.4%) to be admitted to prison during their life.
  • Among women, 3.6% of blacks and 0.5% of whites will enter prison at least once. (U.S. Department of Justice)
  • Based on current rates of incarceration, an estimated 7.9% of black males compared to 0.7% of white males will enter Federal prison by the time they are age 20 .
  • 21.4% of black males versus 1.4% of white males will be incarcerated by age 30. (U.S. Department of Justice)
  • More black men are in prison in America than are in college. (The Black and White of Justice, Freedom Magazine, Volume 128) 

Is it ALL blacks? No, it isn’t. However, the evidence is overwhelming that a black man is just as likely to be incarcerated as he is to earn a 4 year degree. You can claim that this is some sort of conspiracy in the US to keep blacks poor, or that US citizens are secretly engaged in some sort of plot to discriminate, but that is easily disproven by looking elsewhere.

If the US were engaged in this sort of plot, there would be loads of successful black nations all over the world. Point to one.

It is so rare that the only successful black country is a fictional one. Wakanda.

That supports my original thesis: On average, Blacks either won’t or can’t form successful societies. I didn’t invent that. It’s just where the evidence leads. Instead of calling out the messenger, anyone who disagrees should busy themselves trying to fix it.

By Divemedic, ago

Weary

I do get so weary of the debate about transexuality. The worn out argument that trannies try to make is that, because about 1 in 1,000 live births involve Klinfelter’s syndrome, there can be no objective definition of what men and women are. That is silly nonsense. First, some biology:

Humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes. When we reproduce, the DNA in the reproductive cells splits, and those cells contain 23 chromosomes instead of 23 pairs. When a sperm and an egg meet, their DNA combines to again form 23 pairs.

The 23rd pair is the one that determines gender. In that 23rd pair, a man is one who has a Y chromosome as one of those chromosomes. All fetuses begin as female. The Y chromosome tells the developing fetus to grow male reproductive organs. Those reproductive organs then cause the development of secondary male characteristics like a male skeletal structure, etc. The absence of that Y chromosome means that the fetus remains female in structure.

That is how it is supposed to work, but there are sometimes defects that occur in that incredibly complex process. Perhaps the meiotic division in one of the parent haploid cells (its usually the mother’s) didn’t properly take place. In that case, the fetus winds up one chromosome (or part of one chromosome) too many or too few.

One chromosome missing means that one chromosome is left without its matching pair and is called a monosomy or partial monosomy. That usually results in miscarriage. Occasionally it doesn’t. If part of one chromosome is missing, this is called a partial monosomy. An example is part of the 5th pair missing, called Cri du chat syndrome. A missing chromosome at the 23rd pair can also be survivable. If there is only a single X and no matching X or Y, the fetus is female and has Turner’s syndrome. Is there is only a Y with no matching X, miscarriage. Less than 1 in 10,000 live births has a monosomy.

Sometimes there is one chromosome too many. This is called a trisomy, and trisomies are more survivable than monosomies. Trisomies are classified by which chromosomal pairs they occur at. For example, if the spare chromosome is in the:

There are others, but you get the point. Trisomies are abnormal conditions. About 3 in every 1,000 live births has some sort of trisomy.

The one that the left is most concerned with is a trisomy at the 23rd pair, which results in XXY and is called Klinefelter’s syndrome. Since there is a Y chromosome present, a person with this syndrome usually has male genitalia, but occasionally will be indeterminate sex (also called intersex) or will appear female. People with Klinefelter’s are infertile and cannot reproduce, making it a genetic dead end. About 1 in 1,000 people have Klinefelter’s. It is a birth defect, no different than other genetic defects. That doesn’t mean we modify the definition of male and female so you can make the rest of us dance to your tune. The exception doesn’t mean that we change the rule.

Now to be clear, people with birth defects still have rights, are still human, and deserve treatment. What I have an issue with is people with mental problems latching on to a birth defect that happens in less than 0.5% of all humans and using that to justify their aberrant and sexually deviant behavior.

This is no different than a person faking a limp so they can park in handicapped parking, or go to the head of the line at a theme park. You are wearing the modern equivalent of blackface so that you can force the rest of us to treat your mental illness as if it were normal behavior.

If you want to believe that you are a different sex than the one you were born with, the odds are overwhelming that you do not have Klinefelter’s. You most likely have a mental illness. The fact that it has become trendy in some circles to pretend otherwise doesn’t change the objective facts.

Trannies can wear gender bending outfits. I don’t care, as long as you aren’t hurting anyone else. What I do care about is when you demand that the rest of us play along with your delusion or when you attempt to inflict it on children. Live and let live goes both ways. Stop trying to convert us into your mental illness.

By Divemedic, ago

US Military Running Out of Money & Supplies

The US has sent about $49 billion in aid to the Ukraine so far in 2022. That is about $1.75 billion per week, or $1,100 for every man, woman, and child in Ukraine. Meanwhile, the US Air Force has announced pay cuts to some airmen, citing lack of funds as the reason.

Not only that, but it turns out that the US military doesn’t have enough artillery shells, rockets, and missiles. It turns out that we have given the Ukraine 800,000 shells for 155mm artillery pieces and another 108,000 shells for 105mm cannons. Nearly a million shells given away, and we don’t have enough as it is.

That isn’t smart.

By Divemedic, ago

Early Season

In Florida, our summers are marked by two weather related things: it is already at least 75 degF at sunrise, and we get a sea breeze driven rainstorm most afternoons between 3 and 8 pm.

The change to fall is marked by a shift in rain patterns. Instead of afternoon driven downpours, fall sees slower, constant rain that can last for days. This usually begins around mid September, and last until the end of November, although the rains usually are done by the end of October. I remember one year that it rained all of Thanksgiving week- that Monday all the way until Sunday.

Anyhow, we have our first fall rain storm today:

The best news is that our morning temperatures are dropping into the low 70s. Last week, the low at my house was 78 degF, and the high was 97. Today, the low was 72.

Fall is about two weeks early in Central Florida this year.

By Divemedic, ago

Not Embarrassing at All

According to MSNBC, Governor Desantis has turned Florida into an international embarrassment. Why? Because the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination has declared that Florida’s HB 1: Combating Public Disorder is a violation of human rights. The claim here is that the new law unduly restricts the right to peaceful assembly following antiracism protests of 2020. It seems that the UN is claiming that the Republicans “cherry-picked isolated incidents of violence in an effort to portray all antiracist protesters as dangerous and to delegitimize their cause.”

What exactly does this law say that makes it so racially discriminatory? The law says that if you are a part of a riot, you are committing a crime. The law makes it a felony to deface or damage property during a riot, commit burglary or loot businesses during a riot, and creates a mandatory six month minimum jail term for attacking a cop during a riot.

The left is claiming that this is illegal because the riots of 2020 were “mostly peaceful.” See, according to the left, if an assembly contains a thousand people but only 250 of them were actively committing violent acts, then it is a mostly peaceful event. That definition doesn’t apply if the protesters are not liberals, though. Just ask them about J6. Hell, according to the left, it’s violence to use the wrong pronouns when talking about someone.

DeSantis responded to the UN report by saying that the people of Florida are the only ones who matter in this discussion. I agree. Let’s take a look at just WHO is on this UN committee.

  • Ms. LI Yanduan from China. Because China has a great record on racial discrimination. Just ask the Uyghurs.
  • Ms. ALI Al-MISNAD Sheikha Abdulla of Qatar, whose rich residents still maintain women in forced labor.
  • Mr. AMIR Noureddin of Algeria, whose secret police make anti government protesters “disappear” for torture, there is no freedom of the press, and women are chattel (Muslim law).
  • There is a Korean representative. Korea still allows people to be refused service if they are not ethnically Korean.
  • The German delegate is an Iranian born Muslim.
  • Turkey, that bastion of human rights, has a delegate.
  • The Ivory Coast sits on it, even though they still use slaves to harvest cocoa.
  • The remaining countries have poor human rights records. Most of them are third world shitholes whose residents wish they lived here in Florida, where our poorest black residents live better than the richest of their own nations.

Half of the 18 nations represented on the board are African. A quarter of them follow Sharia law. So with a membership like that, they have no room lecturing Florida on human rights.

In short, I flat don’t give a flying rat’s ass what the UN has to say about Florida or its laws. I also don’t care what the liberal assholes at NBC have to say about it.

Here is the honest truth: If you don’t live in Florida, your opinion doesn’t matter. If you do live here, you are free to protest- just don’t commit violent acts while doing it. Don’t tear up people’s stuff.

By Divemedic, ago

It’s Political

Precedent. If you get two acts that were committed, but are declaring one to be illegal and the other not, you are being a political hypocrite unless you can articulate a reasonable explanation as to why one situation is fundamentally different than the other.

So Trump has records at his house that are left over from his Presidency. You claim that it is because he can’t keep anything from his time in the White House.

Then explain why it wasn’t a crime when Obama did the same thing, keeping tractor trailer loads of records from the White House, while shredding tens of thousands of documents.

”In a break from tradition, Barack Obama’s presidential library is actually opting out of any sort of relationship with the National Archives…Meanwhile gone with the wind are all scandals that took place when Obama was in the Oval Office. How did Obama get away with it? When you can go about fundamentally transforming America after bragging before the election that this was your intention, to get away with it and continue in private life to try to overturn the results of the 2016 election, you can get away with most anything. 

Or how about the time that Clinton kept records from when he was President. Judicial Watch actually sued over that one, and the court ruled that Presidents have the ability to rule certain records to be personal property, and are thus exempt from public records acts.

The case in question is titled Judicial Watch v. National Archives and Records Administration and it involved an effort by the conservative watchdog to compel the Archives to forcibly seize hours of audio recordings that Clinton made during his presidency with historian Taylor Branch.

Here is the important part:

But Jackson’s ruling — along with the Justice Department’s arguments that preceded it — made some other sweeping declarations that have more direct relevance to the FBI’s decision to seize handwritten notes and files Trump took with him to Mar-a-Lago. The most relevant is that a president’s discretion on what are personal vs. official records is far-reaching and solely his, as is his ability to declassify or destroy records at will.

To those who are all over the classification issue, both Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama signed executive orders — which remain in force to this day — declaring that presidents have sweeping authority to declassify secrets and do not have to follow the mandatory declassification procedures all other government officials do.

So anyone who says otherwise, provide the reasons why these cases do not apply to Trump. The White House certainly can’t. That makes this political.

By Divemedic, ago

History Rhymes

In a nation weakened by worldwide economic issues and a world that has grown weary of war and strife, a chief executive struggles

The head law enforcement officer of the nation, acting on orders of the chief executive, orders a raid on the opposition party’s headquarters. There, the police find evidence of seditious material, including a plot to attack public buildings. The chief executive takes to the airwaves with claims that the opposition is planning to attack the capitol.

Shortly thereafter, the capitol is attacked, and one of the men arrested in an unemployed construction worker who admits to being under the command of the leader of the opposition party. The chief executive declares, “we must crush out this murderous pest with an iron fist.”

A few hours later, the chief executive issued an executive order that effectively abolished freedom of speech, assembly, privacy and the press; legalized phone tapping and interception of correspondence; and that 4,000 people be arrested, imprisoned and tortured.

Later that year, a sensational criminal trial got under way. The man who burned the Capitol, the leader of the opposition party, and several key figures of the opposition party went on trial for sedition.

As the trial proceeded, a different kind of trial captured the public discourse. A member of the opposition undertook an independent investigation of the destruction of the Capitol. The combined research resulted in the publication of The Brown Book on the Insurrection. It included early accounts police brutality, as well as an argument that the insurrectionists were simply pawns. The chief executive’s party members were the real criminals, the book argued, and they orchestrated the insurrection to consolidate political power. The book became a bestseller, translated into 24 languages and sold around Europe and the U.S.

At any rate, a full 5% of the legislature was declared to be in league with the accused insurrection. They were imprisoned and held for a trial that would never come. Their seats were left vacant, and the leader’s party was free to hold legislative referendums without them present. Kind of like this:

Fearing that the insurrectionists were gaining enough power to become a threat to the very nation, the legislature passed an enabling act that temporarily granted emergency legislative powers to the chief executive so that he and the head of the nation’s law enforcement could deal with the spreading insurrection. Soon thereafter, the chief executive passed away after a sudden and brief illness. The chief law enforcement executive then declared himself to be the new chief executive, then used his emergency powers to pass a law declaring himself to be the permanent head of government and disbanded the legislature. He ordered jailed anyone who opposed his new powers.

Every bit of the preceding story actually happened, and this rise to power was 100 percent within the law. It was years of planning and meticulous use of legal loopholes that allowed this dictator to set the entire world on fire.

Anyone familiar with history knows that this is a common story. The story above is modeled on Hitler’s rise to power, but that example is not the only time that a national emergency has been seized upon by a would be dictator to enable his rise to power. It could easily be applied to any number of historical power grabs.

Like now.

By Divemedic, ago