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Author: New Neo

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New Neo

Neo is a writer with degrees in law and family therapy, who blogs at the new neo.

Posted by New Neo on October 08, 2014 18 Comments
Spain's Ebola patient zero is a nurse's assistant. No one can say she kept mum about the fact that she'd been near an Ebola patient recently. Authorities were well aware of her exposure, because she was on the team that cared for a Spanish missionary and a Spanish priest, both of whom were shipped back to Spain after they contracted Ebola in Africa. Both of them have died. But although health workers in Dallas did not originally know that America's patient zero, Thomas Duncan, had been recently exposed to Ebola, there is a similarity between the unnamed nurse's disease trajectory and that of Duncan. As with him, there also was a delay in her hospitalization and diagnosis. She is said to have reported her first symptom, a fever, on September 30, and yet she was only hospitalized this week. Since authorities knew in advance that she'd been exposed, why the delay, which put many more people at risk? Should they not have erred on the side of caution? There are various possibilities. Perhaps the authorities had such faith in their isolation and protection techniques that they thought it impossible that a health worker could contract Ebola while working under state-of-the-art conditions in a Western hospital, as opposed to in Africa. Or perhaps (as I'm beginning to suspect) the diagnostic criteria for Ebola aren't rigorous enough. One of the first symptoms of Ebola is a fever, defined as above 101.5. But see this [emphasis mine]:

Posted by New Neo on October 04, 2014 13 Comments
US Ebola patient zero, Thomas Eric Duncan, recent arrival from Liberia, had to go to Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital twice to get admitted. On his first go-round, the hospital sent him home with antibiotics even though a nurse had obtained information that he'd been in Liberia, and despite the fact that his symptoms were consistent with the early signs of Ebola. If Duncan had been admitted on that initial visit his diagnosis would still have been a big story and a distressing one, but nothing as awful as the situation we're currently in. That being said, it's been difficult to obtain much information about how the mistake happened. Here's the relevant section of the initial press conference with hospital official, Dr. Mark Lester:
(INAUDIBLE QUESTION) LESTER: A checklist was in place for Ebola in this hospital for several weeks. And Dr. Ed Goodman (ph), to my right, had led the implementation of that. That checklist was utilized by the nurse who did ask that question. That nurse was part of a care team. And it was a complex care team taking care of him in the emergency department. Regretfully, that information was not fully communicated throughout the full team. And as a result, the full import of that information wasn't factored into the clinical decision-making. The overall clinical presentation was not yet typical for Ebola; so as the team assessed him, they felt clinically it was a low-grade common viral disease. That was the presentation. (INAUDIBLE QUESTION) LESTER: He volunteered that he had traveled from Africa in response to the nurse operating the checklist and asking that question. (INAUDIBLE QUESTION) LESTER: I can't answer that question because that's one piece of information that would be factored into the entire clinical picture. The clinicians did not factor it in. So it was not part of their decision-making. (INAUDIBLE QUESTION) LESTER: I -- that's a question that's really not in my domain.

Posted by New Neo on October 01, 2014 32 Comments
On September 19 the Secret Service managed to stop an intruder with a knife who had entered the White House, but why did it take so long for the fuller (and even more alarming) story to emerge?:
An armed man who jumped the White House fence this month made it far deeper into the mansion than previously disclosed, overpowering a Secret Service agent inside the North Portico entrance and running through the ceremonial East Room before he was tackled, according to a member of Congress familiar with the details of the incident. The man, Omar J. Gonzalez, who had a knife, was stopped as he tried to enter the Green Room, a parlor used for receptions and teas, said the congressman, Representative Jason Chaffetz of Utah, the Republican chairman of a subcommittee looking into the security breach. Earlier, Secret Service officials indicated that Mr. Gonzalez, 42, had only made it steps inside the North Portico after running through the door.
That wasn't the only error made, either, not by a longshot. There were multiple slip-ups of basic protocol. What on earth is going on?

Posted by New Neo on September 24, 2014 20 Comments
The NY Times made a rather large error the other day, and then issued a correction:
"...[Our article] gave an incorrect comparison between efforts by the president to seek allies' support for this plans and President George W. Bush's efforts on such backing for the Iraq War. The approach Mr. Obama is taking is similar to the one Mr. Bush took; it is not the case that "Unlike Mr. Bush in the Iraq war, Mr. Obama has sought to surround the United States with partners."
Hot Air points out that the Times is hardly alone in its egregious error (or was it a purposeful falsehood, otherwise known as a lie?) What's more, what took the Times ten days to figure it out, when the Times own contemporaneous coverage of the Iraq War easily refuted it? It's the old "fool or knave" question again. You might ask why we should care anymore, and I have to admit I care a lot less than I once did, because I have grown accustomed to the MSM's tendency toward stupidity/ignorance, reckless disregard for the truth, propensity to lie, blatant bias, and intense and shameless arrogance. But the process by which the Times and the rest of the MSM forms the opinions of the public (and it still is highly influential in doing so) remains a huge problem.

Posted by New Neo on September 18, 2014 16 Comments
Today's the day of Scotland's historic vote on whether it should be an independent country after 307 years of membership in Great Britain. This a simple majority vote, and is described as very close at a near 50-50 split. Which brings us to a bigger question: should such a momentous decision be made by a simple majority of voters on a single day, at a single point in time? My answer would not be "yes." It depends on how much a person believes in a pure democracy. I do not trust it overly; I fear the tyranny of the overbearing majority that Madison feared. Apparently the Scots have no such trepidation. So, this is the sort of thing Scotland will get:
Conor Matchett, 19, a philosophy student at the University of Edinburgh, said he was both nervous and optimistic about the outcome after voting Yes. "I want change. It's as simple as that," he said. "I believe a Yes vote is the only way to do that." Matchett, originally from York, in Northern England, but granted a vote in Scotland's referendum on the grounds of his residency here, said he was voting to counter what he felt was the continuing politics of austerity from British politicians down south in Westminster. "They are attacking the welfare state and many other things that people in Scotland hold really dear," he said.
It seems unwise that a 19-year-old college student, attending school in Scotland but actually from York, should have a say in this matter. Hope/change; sound familiar? "Simple as that."

Posted by New Neo on September 14, 2014 25 Comments
The families of James Foley and Steven Sotloff have complained that the Obama administration threatened to prosecute them if they tried to ransom their loved ones. It is completely understandable why the families would be upset about this: how could any family fail to do anything possible to save their loved ones from such a horrific fate? And how could any family not be horrified that their own government might try to stop them? I don't think there's anyone who could fail to sympathize. But that doesn't mean the government isn't rightr. Therein lies the terrible ethical, emotional, and practical dilemma. By paying ransoms, the behavior of the terrorists is rewarded, more kidnappings of Americans occur, and our enemies grow richer. Plus, there is no guarantee that a group such as ISIS is actually serious about such negotiations. Every now and then the Obama administration gets it right, and this is one of those times. However, Obama's staff being who they are, they were probably especially cold and insensitive in communicating with the families. That being said, it's not clear that under the circumstances there would have been any acceptable way to say "no," or that any approach short of complete cooperation would not raise the families' ire and frustration.

Posted by New Neo on September 08, 2014 25 Comments
Now that Ted Cruz has proposed that Americans who fight with ISIS be stripped of citizenship, there's been a rash of articles questioning whether this would be legal, such as this one at Hot Air. At American Thinker, Rick Moran has written:
Currently, natural born citizens of the US cannot have their citizenship revoked against their will. It is unclear whether Cruiz's bill would supercede the denaturalization law. It is also against international law to strip an individual's citizenship if they are not also a citizen of another country. In other words, the US cannot create a "stateless" person that no other country would accept.
The relevant law is this statute originally from the 1940s, as well as several subsequent SCOTUS cases. This is how that portion of the statute reads:
a) A person who is a national of the United States whether by birth or naturalization, shall lose his nationality by voluntarily performing any of the following acts with the intention of relinquishing United States nationality— ...

Posted by New Neo on September 02, 2014 19 Comments
Lee Harris's book Civilization and its Enemies: The Next Stage of History first came out in 2004. 2004 seems like a long time ago. And in a sense it is: ten years. But Harris's book has only grown more topical every day. That's unfortunate, because it's not a book that offers a lot of comfort. But his writing is insightful, so thoughtful and yet compressed that it's one of those books where the reader would do well to pause every paragraph or so in order to contemplate and digest what has just been said. Here's an excerpt. In the passage that follows, Harris has previously defined his use of the word "ruthlessness" as meaning "dreadfulness, frightfulness, horror, horribleness, terror, terribleness, atrociousness, atrocity":
...[T]he more the spirit of commerce triumphs, the closer mankind comes to dispensing with war, the nearer we approach the end of history, the greater are the rewards to those who decide to return to the path of war, and the easier it will be for them to conquer. There is nothing that can be done to change this fact; it is built into the structure of the world... People who have been trained in the practice of civility, and who find it second nature, will be reluctant to challenge the conduct of another on the ground that he is lacking civility The ruthless party therefore knows that he will be able to push very far before a break point is openly acknowledged Because once the break point is acknowledged, all bets are off and you no longer can be sure of the next step.

Posted by New Neo on August 30, 2014 45 Comments
It's really just common sense: "Americans" who leave this country to fight for ISIS, or any other country or entity or group who is our enemy, should no longer be referred to as "Americans" by the press. I know; fat chance. Also, the laws governing the involuntary revocation of citizenship should be scrutinized to see whether they apply. If not, they could be expanded by the legislature to explicitly include fighting for designated foreign terrorist entities such as ISIS. And this isn't just true of Somali-Americans or whatever hyphenated-Americans might be guilty of this behavior. It's true of people like John Walker Lindh, one of the first "American" jihadis. Remember him? Four years ago, Joe Lieberman proposed an expansion of the current law in order to make sure it included those who fight as jihadis abroad. Back then Lieberman said, "I'm now putting together legislation [so that] any individual American citizen who is found to be involved in a foreign terrorist organization, as defined by the Department of State, would be deprived of their citizenship rights." The case has only grown stronger in the intervening years. Lieberman didn't succeed back then, but the relevant statute is here. These portions seem especially apropos:

Posted by New Neo on August 27, 2014 10 Comments
No, they don't come right out and say they support Hamas, but that's the effective message of the petition these historians signed, which condemns Israel for "war crimes," and asks the US to withdraw military aid from the country. And Hamas? It's never even mentioned. It's as though it doesn't exist. Many of the original signers are members of the hard left. Even I recognized that fact from some of the names, and Ron Radosh---who was once a prominent leftist himself---recognized many more:
As a historian who has studied the American far Left for many years, and decades ago was part of, I immediately noticed that many on the initial list of signers are veterans of the already old New Left and either supporters of or fellow-travelers of the defunct Soviet Union and the Communist movement. Indeed, I know many of them personally, and are aware of their old affiliations and political allegiances.
I looked up the first eight or so people on the list, and it was an interesting exercise.

Posted by New Neo on August 25, 2014 46 Comments
On Saturday the WaPo featured a wordy piece devoted to Darren Wilson's dysfunctional family of origin, and the racial and other problems in the police force he used to work for, difficulties that seem to have had nothing whatsoever to do with him. As William A. Jacobson has written, it's an attempt at guilt by association. That effort seems even more biased when it is contrasted with a lengthy AP article published the very next day in the Sunday WaPo that tells us what a great guy Michael Brown was. From Saturday's article about Wilson, Darren Wilson’s first job was on a troubled police force disbanded by authorities:
...[E]veryone leaves a record, and Darren Dean Wilson is no exception. People who know him describe him as someone who grew up in a home marked by multiple divorces and tangles with the law... Wilson has had some recent personal turmoil: Last year, he petitioned the court seeking a divorce from his wife... His parents divorced in 1989, when he was 2 or 3 years old... In 2001, when Wilson was a freshman in high school, his mother pleaded guilty to forgery and stealing. She was sentenced to five years in prison, although records suggest the court agreed to let her serve her sentence on probation.

Posted by New Neo on August 20, 2014 119 Comments
Fox News is reporting that police officer Darren Wilson was severely beaten by Michael Brown during the confrontation that ended with Brown's death:
Darren Wilson, the Ferguson, Mo., police officer whose fatal shooting of Michael Brown touched off more than a week of demonstrations, suffered severe facial injuries, including an orbital (eye socket) fracture, and was nearly beaten unconscious by Brown moments before firing his gun, a source close to the department's top brass told FoxNews.com. “The Assistant (Police) Chief took him to the hospital, his face all swollen on one side,” said the insider. “He was beaten very severely.”... The source also said the dashboard and body cameras, which might have recorded crucial evidence, had been ordered by Ferguson Police Chief Thomas Jackson, but had only recently arrived and had not yet been deployed.
Too bad about those cameras; what poor timing. The article also says that St. Louis County police, now in charge of the investigation, have refused to confirm or deny the story. They say they will present all the evidence to a grand jury when the time comes.

Posted by New Neo on August 19, 2014 25 Comments
ISIS has released a video purporting to show the beheading of American journalist James Wright Foley, who had been missing for almost two years. The video, which also threatens to do the same to a man identified as American journalist Steven Sotloff, will not be linked to on this blog. Foley had gone missing in northwest Syria in November of 2012, and Sotloff, a reporter for Time, had disappeared in mid-2013, perhaps in Libya. ISIS accompanied the video with a message that:
...U.S. President Barack Obama’s authorization of strikes against the group places the United States “upon a slippery slope towards a new war front against Muslims,” according to BNO. “Any attempt by you, Obama, to deny Muslims liberty & safety under the Islamic caliphate, will result in the bloodshed of your people,” the ISIS person added. Foley also speaks in the video, saying: “I call on my friends, family members and loved ones to rise up against my real killers, the U.S. government.”
There is a longer version of Foley's statement here.

Posted by New Neo on August 18, 2014 88 Comments
According to the preliminary report from the autopsy requested by the Michael Brown family, Brown was shot six times, four in the right arm and two in the head, the last head shot killing him. All of the shots entered from the front. These findings could end up being revised, but so far the forensic evidence contradicts the reports of several eyewitnesses who reported that at least some shots were fired from behind as Brown was fleeing. One of those witnesses, Dorian Johnson, had reason to lie, since he was Brown's friend and it was later revealed that he had been present at the time of the convenience store robbery that preceded the confrontation with Officer Wilson. Eyewitness testimony is prized by the public but is often extremely flawed. It is unnecessary to allege eyewitness bias in this case in order to doubt the reliability of the eyewitnesses: study upon study has demonstrated how poor eyewitness testimony often tends to be. Here's an interesting point about focus that's relevant to the Brown shooting:
The weapon focus effect suggests that the presence of a weapon narrows a person's attention, thus affects eyewitness memory. A person focuses on the central detail (for example, the weapon) and loses focus on the peripheral details (for example, the perpetrator's characteristics). While the weapon is remembered clearly, the memories of the other details of the scene suffer...Another hypothesis is that seeing a weapon might cause an aroused state. In an aroused state, people focus on central details instead of peripheral ones.
That's not the only focus problem. There's more:

Posted by New Neo on August 16, 2014 27 Comments
We keep hearing that Obama has checked out and is no longer interested in being president. But was he ever especially interested in the work of being president? From the very start, what seemed to interest him was giving speeches and campaigning. For the rest, he appeared to believe that just being his glorious self would somehow magically cause all the things he wanted to happen to actually occur, with a minimum of effort. And although that sounds rather deluded, in a sense it was reality-based in his case. Isn't that more or less how much of his life had gone until now? Obama never was very engaged with the work of government, although much of his career has been spent in government. As president, even his signature "accomplishment" early in his administration, Obamacare, was designed and pushed mostly by others (Pelosi, for example), who did the heavy lifting for him. That doesn't mean he's not an ideologue with leftist goals; it merely means that he wasn't very interested in the day-to-day specifics of the hard work he'd have to do to reach them. Obama is used to adulation and feeds off it, and when the adulation stops he doesn't seem very interested in going on with the activity. Campaigning and elections are tailor-made for a personality such as his. They feature speeches and promises and debates (words) rather than the need to work with others and accomplish something concrete. The main activity is travel---constant movement---and speaking before adoring crowds. Most important of all, they are time-limited and have an easily-defined and perceived payoff---the election results, which Obama has almost always (with the single exception of his run for Congress to unseat Bobby Rush) won handily. Campaigns last about a year or a little more, and then the candidate gets his/her reward. It is a relative sprint compared to the longer-distance race that is a presidency, especially a two-term presidency.

Posted by New Neo on August 12, 2014 20 Comments

Suicides, whether famous or not, leave behind a legacy of pain for their families and friends....

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