Protests, Riots, Looting, Ever consider the police?

Dr KingProtests are people speaking out to demand redress of grievances.

A protest is folks holding signs, marching, demanding to be heard.

Dr. Martin Luther King showed us how to protest. He did it very well. Yes there were scuffles and even some riots but these were fairly contained. Civil Rights protests were demanding equality. A totally justified and reasonable demand.

Protests demanding accountability of Police Officers are also legitimate. I think that “Bad” cops should be punished and they shouldn’t be cops.

Growing up in the time and place that I did. The police were neighbors, family friends, and trusted to be the person you could get help from.

As a child, if I got lost, I looked for a blue uniform. I knew they’d help me find my parents and even knew that I could get a ride home from an officer if I was hurt. (As happened after a particularly nasty tumble on my bicycle.)

That’s the role i think most police officers would prefer to have. The role of trusted protector. And yes, there are some officers that become officers for the wrong reasons. Just as there are some doctors who become doctors for money, not to help their patients.

A riot is a protest gone wrong. Riots can be spontaneous and often appear to be an upwelling of rage that finding no other outlet leads to destruction.

As a youngster, I remember riots on the national news. I remember seeing broken windows, and damaged police cars. I remember seeing the perpetrators of the damage being hustled into police vans and being told by my elders that those people were going to jail not for protesting, but for rioting and looting.

There was a line, and those few people crossed that line. It was an easy logic. Free Speech and Freedom to Assemble were protected rights. Rioting, looting and wanton destruction were crimes and would be punished as such.

The role of the police in protest situations was to make sure there was some order and to protect the protesters. Even if the police didn’t agree with the beliefs of those protesters.

What we’ve seen over the past few days has generally been that same stance. In this case, I think the police are in a tougher situation.

I’d bet that the vast majority of the police agree with the protesters marching against police brutality and many of the officers may even be feeling shame that one of their own was so blatantly brutal.

Equally, I’d bet that officers are facing intense internal conflicts. On the one hand during the day they’re providing support to the legitimate protesters. But at night, everything changes.

Imagine briefly, what being an officer on the line might be like.

DerekChauvinYou’re ashamed of what you saw. You know that officer Chauvin was wrong.

You know that the other officers present were wrong in that they saw something that shouldn’t have been happening and they chose not to act.LA1

Even worse, there were people standing there filming the whole thing.

Those people could have stepped in too. They should have stepped in.

They could have made a difference when it counted, they could have saved a life.

But they didn’t. The question you ask yourself is why?

Those people knew what was happening was wrong. The knew it in their heart and yet were so involved in filming they did nothing. It’s obvious something was wrong with Chauvin, What the hell was wrong with those other people?

MN2And then you have to go out to protect the protesters who are rightfully angry, and you’re angry about the same thing for the same reasons.

The difference is you’re being pelted with bottles, and rocks, and spat upon, threatened, and called names.

You’re unable to speak out or to be heard when you say you’re as angry as they are. Even if you spoke out, you wouldn’t be heard because the protesters see you as the enemy.

MN1As an officer, you know that Derek Chauvin is being investigated and will face justice.

You also know that justice isn’t instant. You know that all the details will have to be investigated, written down, and the specifics of the entire event must be written formally for the court to try the case.

The reason there are laws is so that we don’t have “Frontier Justice”, As a good officer, you know that lynchings don’t lead to a stable society, they lead to anarchy.

You’re tired, you’ve been catching an hour of sleep here and there and you dread sundown.

At sundown you know that the legitimate protesters will go home, they’ll have dinner, and talk about the good work their protest did to bring attention to the problem.

You’ll still be on the line.

You’ll see the movements of the protesters for whom marching and chanting isn’t enough.

You’re there when twilight falls. The fist embers of fires blossom. Bottles shatter around you, thrown from the gathering dark. Rocks hit you, again from the dark. Nearby firecrackers sound, are they a prank, or cover for gunshots?

You check your colleagues, everyone is still standing, you exhale a sigh of relief.

The crashing of glass sounds down the block, a brick lands at your feet thrown from the top of a building. More fires, more windows breaking, you can see looters running in and out of the shops.

There are a lot of people dropping items as they run away. Your group is ordered to move forward to protect the businesses and as you start moving, more bricks, rocks, and bottles rain down in your path.

You smell gasoline in front of you, it registers that Molotov cocktails are being thrown at you.

Twilight gives way to night. Laughter and excited shouts echo from the darkened alleyways. You keep moving forward to the looters.

LootingYou know, by the time you get there, the shops will be empty, trashed, and the police will be blamed for failing to protect these businesses.

You tell yourself it’s not your fault but you feel that somehow it is.

Buildings burning in the distance now. You hear that the firefighters aren’t coming because the area isn’t secure. The buildings will continue to burn and the losses to local business owners will continue to rack up.

Finally the order comes from on high that you can fire teargas to herd the looters out of the area. Large fireworks go off in front of you. Some of your colleagues fire teargas in response.

You think, “large fireworks are essentially bombs, without the shrapnel,” as another concussion wave compresses your chest.

Other officers are firing rubber bullets in the direction that last firework came from.

This is no longer a protest, or even a riot. This is now an urban battlefield and you can’t really defend yourself as if it was Fallujah. You’re essentially unarmed.

One of your friends goes down, stumbling from a brick to the head. You stop to help them up and start scanning for the source, you see a target and fire your rubber bullets but aren’t sure that’s even the person throwing the bricks.

You think of your children and are grateful to know they’re safe. A large rock hits your helmet, followed by bottles from multiple directions. You stumble, hear laughter and taunting.

A woman comes out of the darkness screaming obscenities and spitting at you. She runs away into the dark.

“It’s not worth it,” you think. “I don’t want to do this anymore, not here.”

The night continues, in a wash, rinse, repeat, cycle of violence. Dawn reveals a scene of destruction. A testament to failure.

You tell yourself you didn’t fail, the system failed, the citizens failed, the elected officials failed, but you still feel like you personally failed.

Looking out the window of the squad car on the way back to the station you come to a decision. Typing up your report for the night you take a break and call home.

“Honey, I’m done. Call the Realtor and start packing. I’ve been at this for five years and I’ve not made any difference at all. Lets leave this city, let it burn. I don’t care anymore. If I’d wanted to be fighting urban war, I’d have stayed in the Marines. At least there I could adequately defend myself. ”

Your spouse says you’re just tired. They’re right, you are, but the tiredness you feel isn’t due to the past four days.

It’s a tiredness of the soul, a tiredness that comes from pointlessness, there will always be poor people, there will always be bad people, there will always be shitty politicians, and nothing you do will change that.

It’s pointless to keep trying because the people you help, forget in a second that you helped them. Those people will, based on the latest Twitter, News, or Facebook post, turn on you without a moment’s thought.

You turn in your report, then head to the Captain’s office to hand in your resignation. Unsurprisingly, you’re not the first one to hand in your badge, there are many others on his desk. The Captain accepts the document, your badge, and service weapon.

“I don’t suppose there’s any point in talking about this,” he asks.

You shake your head, “No”

“I can’t blame you, I’m working on my resignation too. I’ve got my twenty in. What are you planning to do?”

You shrug, “Anything, anywhere, but here.”

The Captain nods, stands, extending his hand, “It’s been a pleasure working with you. Good luck.”

“Thank you sir,” You turn and leave the office. At the door is a rookie. He’s got that same hollowed out look that you wear. He’s carrying a letter too…

Oh Nancy!

Ms. Pelosi…

Ipelosi78.jpeg’m sure that the Botox has paralyzed your brain.  You do realize that too much Botox may have side effects right?

Here, just for your information is the list of Botox side effects:

allergic reactions, rash, itching, headache, neck or back pain, muscle stiffness, difficulty swallowing, shortness of breath, nausea, diarrhea, stomach pain, loss of appetite, muscle weakness, fever, cough, sore throat, runny nose, flu symptoms, cold symptoms, respiratory infections, dizziness, drowsiness, tired feeling, anxiety, dry mouth, ringing in your ears, increased sweating in areas other than the underarms, urinary tract infections, burning/painful urination, and difficulty urinating.

injection site reactions including
bruising, bleeding, pain, redness, swelling, or infection, 

So Nancy, you might want to have a discussion with your doctor about being over-botoxed. I can understand your desire to be pre-embalmed, but even the Ancient Egyptians didn’t start the process pre-mortem. Although come to think of it you do look like a mummy now.

Based on the side effect list, is it just possible that it’s the Botox and not The President that’s causing that nagging pain in your neck?

It was kind of you to express your concern about the health of The President upon his disclosure that he’d been taking Hydroxychloroquine for the past two weeks.

However it is exactly opposite of your previously expressed desires. While you personally may not have suggested that you hope he falls ill, your flying monkey minions most certainly have. It’s safe to say they are your mouthpieces, so what they say are certainly echos of your desires.

I think I should point out for you, and your minions that if The President is incapacitated or dies, You still won’t be president, nor will Hillary Clinton. There’s the little matter of Vice President Pence. Or are you expecting for something untoward to befall him too?

Is your plan to insert Hillary as VP in the interim before the election and then let the Hillary Curse take care of then presiding President Pence? Or is that the plan if Biden is elected? 

You’ll have to pardon my misgivings about you and our government. Your tone deafness to the American People does not engender trust. Suffice it to say that you do not have my vote. I’d sooner cast my vote for a homeless syphilitic drug addict than you. At least such a person would do little harm to the nation.

Ms. Pelosi, Fat Shaming? Oh my… that’s low, even for you. Is this yet another example of your hypocrisy.

Is your intent to suggest that fat shaming is only wrong if it’s against Women? You know men have fat shaming issues too. We’re simply not as likely to whine in public about it. I’d imagine that we’re more likely to seek comfort in the solitude of our closed garages with our beloved cars motor running.

But of course that’s of no concern to you. After all, many of your minions clearly hate men, or at least believe that all men are evil, with the notable exception of Joe Biden.

He’s allowed to completely sidestep rather serious and somewhat credible allegations of sexual misconduct. The fact notwithstanding that he’s been observed, in public and often, behaving inappropriately.

Brett Kavanaugh on the other hand was excoriated for something that could at best be described as college hijinks and stupidity. Even the witness wasn’t sure about what happened. 

Double standard much?

I don’t hate you, I won’t waste the energy on hatred or even intense dislike. I’m a big believer in Karma. I know you’ll get what’s coming to you, because your kind of evil always does.

When you lose your election, when you see your works dismantled piece by piece, when you’re the one testifying before congress for your misdeeds, when you lose all that you have and are cast upon the rubbish pile of history, and yet continue to live a long, long life.

I’ll be smiling. I’ve learned first hand, that Karma is a stone bitch. I dare to hope that Karma is in a particularly bad mood the day she looks at you. It would be an absolute joy to see you duckwalked in handcuffs out of congress. 

Understand it’s not necessarily your politics that I find so distasteful. It’s your duplicity.

Hmmm A petition to recall MI governor Whitmer

Whitmer.jpgThat’s interesting!

I got a video taken by a guy wandering around in a Michigan Walmart.

The gardening supplies, seeds, plants, painting supplies, and BBQ stuff were all yellow taped. It wasn’t that the shelves were empty, they were full, just taped off.

His commentary was interesting because he’s muttering to himself about being stuck at home and not being able to do home projects.

I thought it was one single instance of a store misunderstanding lockdown instructions. When I saw the video I didn’t think much of it other than, “Boy someone is dumb.”

This morning, while catching up on the news. (I’m only taking the news in small doses every couple of days) I saw a headline on Breitbart that said; “Over 200,000 Michiganders Sign Petition to oust Governor Whitmer

It turns out that the Walmart hadn’t misunderstood. They were complying with Michigan’s governor’s order.

Which leads to WTF?

I’m uploading the executive order Here.

The relevant part of the order reads:

For stores of more than 50,000 square feet:

(1)  Limit the number of customers in the store at one time (excluding
employees) to 4 people per 1,000 square feet of customer floor space.
The amount of customer floor space must be calculated to exclude
store areas that are closed under subprovision (2) of this subsection.

(2)  Close areas of the store—by cordoning them off, placing signs in aisles,
posting prominent signs, removing goods from shelves, or other
appropriate means—that are dedicated to the following classes of
goods:

(A)  Carpet or flooring.

(B)  Furniture.

(C)  Garden centers and plant nurseries.

(D)  Paint.

WTF? I could see maybe carpeting and flooring, possibly furniture because folks take their time deciding what they want.

But if you walk in and say I want paint in color X, a flat of Pansies, 1 package each of cucumber, carrot, and watermelon seeds. There’s no reason you shouldn’t be able to buy them.

The executive order seems somewhat random in its constraints about what will and will not be allowed. 

For example, you can be outside running, walking, biking, kayaking, and participating in other outdoor activities as long as you maintain social distancing requirements. 

But there was a report, I have yet to confirm, saying that a man had been arrested for being in a boat alone, out on a lake fishing. This activity does not conflict with the executive order so someone may have been arrested, but there may be more to the story.

The petition is on Change.org here 

A lot of comments in both the Breitbart piece and on the Change.org site appear to be disgruntled MI residents who feel that their Governor has over-reached her authority and is unnecessarily restricting their freedom. Another thread of comments say that she’s a possibility for the VP slot in Biden’s campaign, and is posturing for that position.

Given that MI has one of the higher rates of COVID-19 I’m not sure that the freedom allegation holds water. But the VP slot could cause her to be remotely interviewing.

Well, that wasn’t unexpected.

Bernie Sanders via Fox NewsBernie Sanders has dropped out of the Presidential race.

All I can say is, Duh!

After his relatively poor showings in key states it was something that should have happened weeks ago.

Surprising that it took him so long to decide. 

I’ve never understood how someone like him who is rich, could condemn wealth. I’d trade places with him. Give him a taste of what being on the other side of the walled garden is like. I guarantee that after a week he’d be wanting to trade back. Of course by that time I’d have done a little redistribution of my own.

Honestly, I’m amazed that he did as well as he did.

Come on, you’ve got to admit in your heart of hearts that it’s going to be a tough sell. A rich guy telling a country of not rich people that being rich is bad?

My thought was always, “If being rich is so heinous Bernie, then give your money to those less fortunate in your home state.”  I know that wouldn’t happen in a million years.

Just so you know, I’m not above taking a 500K handout from him. I’d pay off my house, bills, and car, then I’d see if I could get a job at a fast food place until I could legitimately retire.

If you think about the fact the 500K would do it for me personally, you might start to understand my frustration with rich politicians.

With that relatively small amount, I could wipe my debt, and be in a situation where minimum wage would pay my utility bills, provide insurance, fund a retirement account, and allow me to have some monthly savings. Perhaps It would even allow me to take a vacation once every 5 years instead of once every 12 years.

Look at the amount of money folks like Bernie and other politicians waste & you’ll start to get why I’m opposed to bloated Government and high taxes.

If we could reduce the tax burden by the cost of countless pointless hearings and Pelosi follies, overall the average taxpayer would be better off.

Unfortunately that’s not the way it works. The Government will always find a way to keep what they’re taking and find new ways to take more.

Under Bernie, I wholeheartedly believe that it would have been business as usual and those of us in the middle class would have been worse off.

So it’s with a certain sense of relief that Bernie is out of the race.

Joe biden 2012 7 13Sadly, that leaves Biden. 

Biden was at one time a statesman that I respected.

But those days are past. He’s well past his prime and honestly I’m concerned over what appears to be his degraded mental state.

The last thing we need in a president is someone that’s not all there. With Trump we got lucky, he may not be all there, but he’s contentious enough that he’s not going to be manipulated without a fight.

Dourif lotrWith Biden I’m not so sure.

In his case, I start asking, “Who would be the power behind Biden?”

Would it be his VP? Or would it be some other shadowy character whispering into Joe’s ear?

If it was his VP then we could still come out ahead, so long as that VP was someone that had a brain and was minimally  interested in serving the people.

But we all know it doesn’t work that way. A corrupt VP could do much more damage to the country than a bad president. I know if I were nefarious, a VP slot with an “out of it” President would be perfect…

You do pretty much whatever you want, work it out so that you have two terms, arrange your power, take as much cash as you can, and let the outgoing President take the blame…

You bail to Malta with untold millions and live out your days quietly, opulently, and laugh every time your investments double.

I never said it would be right, moral, or ethical. 

It’s because I think of shit like this, that I’m mistrusting of government. The potential for abuse is just too damn high and no-one is above temptation.

Hell, I’m a straight shooting, ethically bound, guy. I can tell you without hesitation, If I were a VP with Biden as President, I’d have a tough time not taking advantage of the situation I described.

I don’t believe that the majority of politicians are equal to me in ethics, or morality.  

That being said, I think Biden in his current state, isn’t the man for the job. I think he’s not there enough to realize he’s being manipulated. Which leads me to believe if he’s elected we’ll have 8 years of super bad stuff happening in this nation.

Just my 2 cents.

This election year I again find myself in a position where I either vote for the Devil I know, or don’t vote at all.

Another thing I have to thank the Democratic party for… Really? You couldn’t come up with better candidates?

OH and for the record… I’m registering Independent. Because both parties have so utterly and completely failed our nation.


Later that day…

Well, that was easy. I just changed my voter registration to “Independent” online. Gee it’s nice when governmental online stuff actually works.

Now, if only the same could be said for CoveredCalifornia’s website or the Employment Development website. Both sites are terrible, buggy, and clearly untested across multiple web-browsers and operating systems.


Later Still… 

I realized that the American Independent Party doesn’t really align with my world view. In fact they seem to be a little to the right of the more radical parts of the Republican party. Clearly I’d confused The American Independent with someone else. 

So I began more research. I know that it’s not ever going to be a perfect fit between a party and me so it’s a matter of who fits best.

So the American Independent party is out.

The Democratic party is a complete no-go

The Republicans have drifted away from the principals they had back in my Dad’s time (When I first registered to vote)

The Green party is the Democratic party on steroids and a no go.

Obviously the Communist party is right out.

The Libertarian Party… Hey, their platform / mission statement resonates. Minimal Government, Freedom of the individual, personal responsibility, individualism.

Hmmmm.

Wow! There are a lot of political parties in the US. This is going to take some time to analyze.

But analyze I will. I want to be a member of a party that actually represents my beliefs and I want to be joined by other like minded people because in numbers there is strength.

I’m tired of tone deaf political parties that are only interested in their agendas and actively ignore the will or rights of the people they’re supposed to be representing.

Aren’t we tired of this yet?

Adam Schiff (D-CA) wants a 9/11 type investigation into what went wrong with our Coronavirus response.

Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) on Thursday announced a new select House committee to review the Trump administration’s response to the Chinese coronavirus pandemic.

AOC Tweet 20200403.pngRep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) on Friday demanded future coronavirus relief measures to be “drafted with a lens of reparations” to atone for “environmental racism” and other “underlying health conditions” that are causing the virus to “disproportionately” affect minority communities.440px Ilhan Omar official portrait 116th Congress

Thursday on SiriusXM’s “The Dean Obeidallah Show,” Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) said that President Donald Trump’s incompetence during his administration’s response to the coronavirus crisis could lead to “hundreds of thousands of deaths.”


I SURE AS HELL AM!

Of course none of this is any surprise. These people are simply pissed off that there’s not a Democrat in the oval office.

They’re still butt hurt that their impeachment didn’t work.

So now they’re piling on to waste more time and more taxpayer money in yet another “Roman Circus” during a national crisis.

adam_schiff.jpgI personally would love to tell the all

SIT DOWN and SHUT THE FUCK UP!

Yeah, we weren’t as prepared as we should have been. After all, we had 100 years to prepare. (see articles on the 1917-1918 Influenza)

Yep I said it, Doctors, Scientists, Immunologists, Virologists, and the entire fucking biological and medical field have been saying that a pandemic is not and never has been a matter of IF It happens… but WHEN.

pelosi.jpgOkay so it happened on your watch… NEXT!

We didn’t prepare as well as we should have. Oh, and it’s not like we didn’t have warnings.

Remember a little thing called HIV? How about SARS? Ebola anyone?

All of these were spread because with air travel, we break down natural barriers that would have slowed or contained the spread.

I’m not suggesting that we abandon air travel. It is a fact of modern life. But given that air travel makes disease spread a lot easier, we should be much more attentive to preparation.AOC.jpeg

Governments don’t want to put money away for emergencies. Governments want to spend all the money they get because they’ll just raise taxes when they need more. After all, it’s not their money is it?

Why should we stockpile filtration masks? We’ll just order them when we need them. Why should we stockpile anything… We can order it from Amazon and have it tomorrow.

Riiiigghtt!

There are things that can be stockpiled and things that can’t. Hard goods like food, equipment, masks, and surgical supplies, can be stockpiled. Vaccines and other perishable items can’t. Which means that all of our drug and perishable production should be on American soil. So that those items can be manufactured locally and distributed quickly. 

The Pentagon will tell you that the single greatest challenge to a military force is long supply lines. Yet our elected officials ignored that simple fact too. The Pentagon will also tell you just how fast and far a biological or nuclear contaminant will spread. They’ve done research on this exact problem since the 1950’s.

It’s not like the data wasn’t available. 

If our elected officials had spent any time with that data they’d have seen the cold hard truth. Apparently, the cold hard truth didn’t fit someone’s narrative and was ignored.

The Trump administration hasn’t failed. OUR ENTIRE GOVERNMENT HAS!

The four politicians listed above are shining examples of waste and failure.

There are others, to be sure. (R), (D), (I), you name the party.

I simply had these four morons assault me in the news this morning.

Now is not the time for a partisan blame game. Now is the time for all America to see just what kind of stupidity passes for politicians in the hallowed halls of our Government.

And come November it’s time for us, to clean house.


04/05/2020

Here’s a little update from USA Today fact checking the Trump administration’s assertion that the national stockpile was depleted.

Guess what? 

It was, and not replenished as it should have been. Starting with the Bush administration and going right on through the Obama & Trump administrations. They’ve all failed the country.

Read the article here

I’m including the text in case the article disappears as so many things seem to do these days.

Perhaps the Fabulous Four mentioned above should read the Damn paper.


Fact check: Did the Obama administration deplete the federal stockpile of N95 masks?

Matthew Brown
USA TODAY
Published 12:45 p.m. ET Apr. 3, 2020 | Updated 3:31 p.m. ET Apr 4, 2020

The claim: The Obama administration used and did not replenish the nation’s emergency stockpile of medical supplies, including N95 masks

As the novel coronavirus pandemic strains health care systems, questions around the U.S. government’s response have circulated in the media and online.

On March 26, The Daily Wire published an article centering on the Obama administration’s role in using and allegedly failing to replenish the federal stockpile of N95 masks.

“The Obama administration significantly depleted the federal stockpile of N95 respirator masks to deal with the H1N1 influenza outbreak in 2009 and never rebuilt the stockpile despite calls to do so,” the piece begins.

The article draws from the reporting of outlets including Bloomberg News and the Los Angeles Times. According to Bloomberg News, “after the H1N1 influenza outbreak in 2009, which triggered a nationwide shortage of masks and caused a 2- to 3-year backlog orders for the N95 variety, the stockpile distributed about three-quarters of its inventory and didn’t build back the supply.”

“After the swine flu epidemic in 2009, a safety-equipment industry association and a federally sponsored task force both recommended that depleted supplies of N95 respirator masks, which filter out airborne particles, be replenished by the stockpile,” the Los Angeles Times reported.

On Wednesday, President Donald Trump said during a press conference the country’s stockpile of personal protective equipment, including medical gear like N95 masks, is almost depleted.

A history of the national emergency stockpile

Established in 1999 to prepare the country for threats like pandemics, natural disasters and acts of bioterrorism, the United States has used and maintained its Strategic National Stockpile of medical supplies during times of acute crisis in the health care system.

The reserve was originally named the National Pharmaceutical Stockpile, but was renamed during a 2003 restructuring when additional materials were added to the supply. The stockpile is jointly managed by the departments of Defense and Health and Human Services.

While officials rarely discuss specifics about the reserve, like the exact locations and value of its contents, the fund’s restocking contracts are largely public, including a July 2019 deal for vaccines valued at $1.5 billion.

Warnings about the United States’ lack of preparedness for a serious pandemic have come from both inside the federal government and elsewhere since at least the early 2000s and as recently as last year.

“SARS has infected relatively few people nationwide, but it has raised concerns about preparedness for large-scale infectious disease outbreaks,” a 2003 analysis from the Government Accountability Office reads.

HHS Secretary Alex Azar said in April 2019 the BioDefense Summit that a pandemic was among his top concerns, CNN reported on Friday. “Of course, the thing that people ask: ‘What keeps you most up at night in the biodefense world?’ Pandemic flu, of course. I think everyone in this room probably shares that concern,” Azar told the summit. (His full remarks are available on the HHS website.)

The stockpile has been used at least 13 times since its creation, including during the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks and 2001 anthrax attacks. Also during the George W. Bush administration, the national stockpile was deployed in response to hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005 and then again for Hurricanes Gustav and Ike in 2008, according to the stockpile’s history published by the HHS.

In 2005, the Bush administration published a report that urged investment in local and national stockpiles, increasing domestic production capacity and coordinating research efforts toward cures and vaccines. In 2006, Congress approved expanding the stockpile to include protective gear like N95 surgical masks.

During the presidency of Barack Obama, the national stockpile was seriously taxed as the administration addressed multiple crises over eight years. About “75 percent of N95 respirators and 25 percent of face masks contained in the CDC’s Strategic National Stockpile (∼100 million products) were deployed for use in health care settings over the course of the 2009 H1N1 pandemic response,” according to a 2017 study in the journal Health Security.

Again according to NIH, the stockpile’s resources were also used during hurricanes Alex, Irene, Isaac and Sandy. Flooding in 2010 in North Dakota also called for stockpile funds to be deployed. The 2014 outbreaks of the ebola virus and botulism, as well as the 2016 outbreak of the zika virus, continued to significantly tax the stockpile with no serious effort from the Obama administration to replenish the fund.

ProPublica reported on April 3 that congressional budget battles in the early years of the Obama administration contributed to stockpile shortages. But the article notes available funds were used not to replenish masks: “With limited resources, officials in charge of the stockpile tend to focus on buying lifesaving drugs from small biotechnology firms that would, in the absence of a government buyer, have no other market for their products, experts said. Masks and other protective equipment are in normal times widely available and thus may not have been prioritized for purchase, they said.”

During the presidency of Donald Trump, analysts have warned the United States is not prepared for a serious pandemic.

“We assess that the United States and the world will remain vulnerable to the next flu pandemic or large scale outbreak of a contagious disease that could lead to massive rates of death and disability, severely affect the world economy, strain international resources, and increase calls on the United States for support,” the 2019 World Threat Assessment from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence states.

The Trump administration has not taken significant steps to replenish the masks in the Strategic National Stockpile.

Our rating: True

We rate this claim TRUE because it is supported by our research. There is no indication that the Obama administration took significant steps to replenish the supply of N95 masks in the Strategic National Stockpile after it was depleted from repeated crises. Calls for action came from experts at the time concerned for the country’s ability to respond to future serious pandemics. Such recommendations were, for whatever reason, not heeded.

Our fact-check sources:

Department of Health and Human Services, Strategic National Stockpile: History
Government Accountability Office, 2003 Report on Public Health Capacity
Health Security, Personal Protective Equipment Supply Chain: Lessons Learned from Recent Public Health Emergency Responses
Homeland Security Council, 2005 National Strategy for Pandemic Influenza
National Institute of Health, The Strategic National Stockpile: Origin, Policy Foundations, and Federal Context
2019 Worldwide Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community