What Else Is News: Sat., Jan. 11
North Korea Bans Hot Dogs?
If you are planning a trip to North Korea and looking forward to enjoying a hot dog there, please know your plans might be changing. Kim Jung Un, the leader of North Korea, is alleged to have banned the sale of hot dogs. According to Vice, “The hot dog is a symbol of Westernization to him, so he has allegedly decreed that the serving or selling of hot dogs is now classified as an act of treason. Dastardly hot dog eaters or sellers face arrest and potential hard labor service.”
Imagine being sent to a labor camp for eating processed meat. Try doing that in America.
Hurricane Helene Victims Still Plead for Assistance
Amid the horrible fires raging in parts of California, one has to wonder how displaced residents will find short-term housing and a way to rebuild. Considering that some residents of Western North Carolina continue to battle government resources for basic necessities following Hurricane Helene in September, recovery for California could prove difficult.
Daily Mail reports that many people still live in tents even as snow and freezing temperatures barreled down on the region this week. Those fortunate enough to be living in hotels offered through FEMA have been told by the government agency that they need to vacate immediately. The problem is they have nowhere to go.
For the most part, North Carolinians in distress have been relying on the kindness of the community, within the state and around the country. A group of Amish from Pennsylvania donated labor and materials to build tiny homes for displaced residents in Boone, NC. Several nonprofits have donated new or used RVs to people in places like Burnsville, NC.
Community support is crucial in times of disaster, but at what point will government resources bring the greatly needed relief?
Mr. Fetterman Goes to Mar-a-Lago
Democratic Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania will be the first sitting Democratic U.S. Senator to visit the famed Florida home of President-elect Donald Trump. While some Democrats and Republicans disagreed over the meeting, Fetterman defended it in the name of bipartisanship.
"I think that one, he's the President, or he will be, officially," Fetterman told CBS News. "And I think it's pretty reasonable that if the president would like to have a conversation — or invite someone to have a conversation — to have it. And no one is my gatekeeper."
The meeting is said to be taking place this weekend.
FBI Couldn’t Inform White House of COVID-19 Origins
According to reports in the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post, researchers with strong evidence suggesting that COVID-19 began in a lab in Wuhan, China, were discouraged from sharing their findings. Members of the Defense Department and the FBI allegedly suppressed that theory in favor of one that said the virus sprang from a wet market in Wuhan.
As a result, the findings were not included in a 2021 report delivered to President Biden’s White House.
According to the New York Post, three researchers with the Defense Intelligence Agency’s National Center for Medical Intelligence found these results while researching the origins of COVID-19:
The COVID virus contained a feature allowing for easier transmission to humans that was constructed in a manner similar to that described in a years-old Chinese study
A Chinese military researcher applied for a patent for a COVID-19 vaccine just weeks after the virus was first sequenced in 2020. (He later died after falling from the infamous Wuhan Institute of Virology’s roof, according to US investigators.)
WIV researchers worked with US researchers who trained them to construct viruses without leaving a trace of them being engineered.
Sen. John Fetterman - a Remarkable Recovery: Given his stroke, I didn't think John Fetterman was up to the job, but his recovery is remarkable. Good for him for his tenacity!
"Daily Mail reports that many people still live in tents even as snow and freezing temperatures barreled down on the region this week. "
It's hard to understand why NC and the Feds have not made sure the afflicted in NC were housed. It's hard to understand the lack of urgency and compassion for people during winter.
Of course, we've seen people (including politicians such as MTG and Kari Lake) screaming to deny aid to the Ukrainian people. Russia broke a dam which caused people, livestock, and homes to be washed away. To add to the horror, many of those who tried to flee the raging waters were shot at by Russian soldiers.
Russia sent missiles into apartment buildings, hospitals, schools, boiler facilities, and energy grids leaving people without shelter, housing, water, or heat. Yet, well-fed Americans demanded that we allow them to suffer and renege on the Budapest memorandum and screamed, "Not another dime!"
I wonder how people could become so callous.