(image: Michelle Zellner)

MICHELLE ZELLNER IS BACK TO TALK EXCUSES One of my favorite things about Michelle is that she is a no BS fitness person. She's going to tell you getting healthy and fit is hard but she's gonna help you get there. However in my past I have found myself finding ALL KINDS of excuses as to why I couldn't eat right or work out and I know I'm not alone. Today we're talking about knocking down excuses and how to fit fitness into your busy life. Find out more about Michelle or have her come speak to your group or just JOIN You University by clicking here!

WHY ARE HOMELESS METH COOKERS TREATED DIFFERENTLY THAN REGULAR METH COOKERS So maybe you didn't see this story today, but a meth lab that was part of a homeless encampment BLEW UP and was subsequently cleared by police. Sounds pretty reasonable to me. Imagine my surprise when I saw this:

He knew that if he didn’t act fast, the fire could take out several city blocks. But if he did, he would violate a court order that, he says, treats drug labs in homeless camps differently than those in homes. It requires 48 hours notice before clearing a homeless camp.

Robinson says when the court issued its ruling, the city asked for emergency exceptions and was denied. He hopes it will now modify its order, which “shows a clear lack of understanding as these orders were put out by judiciary.”

Robinson signed an executive order to clear the camp anyway and now risks being cited by the court. But that’s not what worries him.

The Robinson in question is Denver Public Safety Manager Murphy Robinson who may now be in trouble with the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals for not giving the homeless meth cookers 48 hour notice. You read that right. We are required to give meth heads who have decided they'd rather live for free while cooking their drugs on the streets of Denver 48 hours notice before we shut down a toxic waste site. When is this enough? When do our civic leaders show some courage? When do Republicans make this a campaign issue and run a serious candidate for Mayor in Denver? This last sentence really makes any compassion I might have had for chronically homeless disappear:

He says the city offered those who had been living in the encampment housing but only one person took them up on the offer

I have no compassion for people who choose to live like animals and I'm not sorry about it. Help those who want it, tell the rest to leave our city. Period.

THE JOHNSON AND JOHNSON VACCINE HAS BEEN "PAUSED" IN THE US To investigate a very small number of blood clot issue with women who have gotten the vaccine. When I say a very small number, I mean a TINY number out of the 6.8 million vaccine shots given. How tiny? Six. Six women have had an issue a week or two after the shot. The real issue is that the normal blood clot treatment actually makes it WORSE in these situations. Here are the symptoms you should be concerned about if you are woman between the ages of 18-48 who got the J+J shot:

They are recommending that people who were given the J&J vaccine who are experiencing severe headache, abdominal pain, leg pain, or shortness of breath within three weeks after receiving the shot contact their health care provider.

Again, SIX out of 6.8 MILLION.

BIG CHANGES TO POT LAWS IN DENVER BUT ARE THEY LEGAL? I understand what the progressive Denver City Council is trying to do by only giving new hospitality licenses for pot to those in a certain "social equity" category, but is this legal? Haven't we already decided that things like quotas for hiring and stuff like that violates the Equal Protection Clause? Now the way they did this, by using criteria like the neighborhood you live in, or if a family member or you were arrested for a marijuana crime, doesn't mention race, but considering this is what was said about the bill it's hard to argue it's not about race:

By providing exclusivity to social equity applicants, Denver officials are trying to make up for the damage caused by the War on Drugs and the unequal persecution of disadvantaged communities for marijuana.

“We give (them) a fighting chance to get a real foothold in this industry without being edged out by more established, well-funded competitors,” said Abbey Borchers with the Department Excise and Licenses when presenting the bills.

Here's the thing. The way the current state laws are written to exclude people who have a prior conviction for pot needs to be changed. That has excluded many, many people of color from the booming pot industry. But we can't create a program that excludes EVERYONE else to try and make up for this. I see the city getting sued over this one.

TRUMP HEADLINE: OVER 3,000 KIDS IN CAGES VS BIDEN HEADLINE: KIDS IN CAGES FALLS BY 45% I only point this out so we never forget how hopelessly biased the Pravda media has become as they fall all over themselves at CNN to spin kid in cages at the border as some kind of good news. These people honestly make me sick at this point.

SO WHEN DO WE GET BACK TO NORMALISH? Isn't that the question we are all asking when it comes to covid restrictions? These doctors wrote a column about where we need to be based on things like what happened in Israel when. From the column:

The key is the gradual loosening of restrictions tied to high vaccination rates and low rates of severe disease, hospitalizations and death. But what are the rates at which we can safely lift restrictions? Many experts have indicated restrictions should be lifted when our hospitalizations and deaths from the coronavirus reach those similar to influenza, an infection for which we do not impose societal restrictions. But influenza leads to an average of 55 to 140 deaths a day in the United States. For covid-19, we’re currently seeing a seven-day moving average of 745 deaths a day. At this point, there is no threshold that has been set for what death rate is acceptable from covid-19, but we must make decisions as a society for what we can tolerate. (Other countries have used specific thresholds, such as the four-step Go-Slow Plan to take England out of lockdown by summer.)

As clinicians and epidemiologists, we see the tipping point at which restrictions like masks and social distancing can be lifted by looking at two parameters: 1) severe disease from covid-19 as represented by hospitalizations and 2) vaccination rates. The goal for hospitalizations from covid-19 should be less than 5 cases per 100,000 people, or about 16,000 hospitalizations in the nation, less than half of where we are right now. This is lower than the hospitalization rates from influenza during the height of the flu season, which normally shows an average of 20 to 40 hospitalizations per 100,000 people, but mortality for hospitalized covid patients remains very high. Further, the coronavirus vaccines are all much more effective than the current influenza vaccines. And as such, the Israeli experience suggests that once we manage to get at least 40 percent of people at least one dose, we can expect substantial and sustained drops in infection rates. Of course, this percentage will be influenced by other factors, such as the underlying rate of immunity from previous infections. It’s important to look at these quantitative numbers as key metrics for easing restrictions in each state. It will be a gradual process based on data, not dates. States will need to continue to be nimble and vary restrictions accordingly during this transition phase of vaccine rollout.

Now the bad news is we are nowhere near these numbers....yet. But we are rolling out vaccinations at a crazy high rate now and if we can get to 40% we should be good a few weeks after.

JOHN STOSSEL TALKS TO STEVEN CROWDER ABOUT YOUTUBE DECIDING WHAT'S TRUE And I don't watch Crowder all the time

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