Dr. Joseph Ladapo explains on ‘Tucker Carlson Tonight’ why the left’s targeting him as he makes ‘data-based decisions about public health in Florida.’
Dr. Uché Blackstock went on a rant against Florida‘s surgeon general, Joseph Ladapo, on MSNBC’s “ReidOut” Wednesday, saying she was “shocked” his license had not been revoked over his stance on COVID-19.
“I mean, essentially, he’s violating the Hippocratic Oath – which is do no harm. So every time he gets up there at a press conference or a hearing, and says something that is anti-science, he’s violating the Hippocratic Oath. And at this point, I am shocked that his license hasn’t been suspended or revoked,” she said.
Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo and Gov. Ron DeSantis (Joe Cavaretta/Sun Sentinel/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
The segment highlighted a hearing at a Florida Senate committee in which Ladapo was grilled on vaccines. The legislature’s Democrats, disappointed with the responses, walked out of the hearing and said they would not vote to confirm Ladapo.
Ladapo had said during the hearing that he believes vaccines are effective at preventing severe COVID-19 cases.
“They [vaccines] reduce the risk of hospitalization and death from COVID-19 … I don’t think the objective of public health is coercion. I think it’s education, and I think it’s to allow people to make choices, so they don’t feel coerced,” said Ladapo to reporters.
Florida State Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo (Paul Hennessy/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)
Blackstock also said that she was “mortified” to have attended the same prestigious medical school as Ladapo, who was appointed by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis in September. The MSNBC guest added an ominous statement saying, “We need to round up our girls and go down there and get this man because he is dangerous.”
“I think [Ladapo] has ulterior motives: power, influence, money – is probably also very important to him. I don’t think he actually believes vaccines are [not] effective. I bet he is vaccinated and boosted. I bet his entire family is. I bet his children, if they’re eligible, are also vaccinated. So this is all because of politics, because he has not prioritized … his medical duties.”
Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh)
Florida’s Department of Health Communications Director Weesam Koury released a statement to Fox News following Joy Reid’s segment saying, “We wish Joy well and hope she finds peace.”
“We don’t feel that we are getting any answers met,” a state Democrat said after the hearing. “We know that there is a long agenda today with a lot of bills. So the Florida Senate Democrats in this committee now are going to abstain, walk out and come back when we have more business to attend to.”
Even without their colleagues on the left side of the aisle, Republicans voted to confirm Ladapo.
Two high-ranking Russian lawmakers on Sunday criticized those carrying out Russian President Vladimir Putin’s move last week to draw up some 300,000 reservists to fight in Ukraine.
Valentina Matviyenko, who chairs Russia’s upper legislative chamber the Federation Council, wrote in a Telegram post that she was aware of men who are ineligible to fight in the war getting called up to serve, according to Reuters.
“Such excesses are absolutely unacceptable,” said Matviyenko, a close Putin ally. “I consider it absolutely right that they are triggering a sharp reaction in society.”
Another Putin ally, Vyacheslav Volodin, the Speaker of Russia’s lower chamber the State Duma, said he was also receiving complaints and that “if mistake is made, it is necessary to correct it.”
“Authorities at every level should understand their responsibilities,” he wrote in a Telegram post, per Reuters.
Putin announced the partial mobilization order last week after a successful Ukrainian counteroffensive pushed back Russian troops in the northeast of the country.
Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said the order applies to reservists who previously served in the military or had special skills, but Putin’s decree is broad and anyone up to the age of 65 is considered a reservist.
The president’s order drew widespread protests on the day it was issued, and on Saturday, at least 1,300 Russian protesters were detained across 40 cities. Thousands of Russians have also been attempting to flee the country.
On Saturday, Putin signed a new bill that toughens punishments for soldiers who disobey officers, desert the army or surrender in combat.
Along with the top Russian lawmakers, state-controlled news station RT expressed concern about military conscription offices “driving people mad” by rounding up Russians who should not be drafted.
According to RT, Putin signed another order exempting university and vocational students from being drafted.
In his nationally televised address last week, Putin also gave his backing to referendums in Russian-occupied regions in Ukraine, which the West has called a “sham” and pretext for illegal annexation by Moscow.
The Kremlin reportedly began administering referendum votes in the Ukrainian regions of Kherson, as well as the southern Zaporizhzhia and the eastern Luhansk and Donetsk regions.
The US ambassador to the United Nations said the Security Council would confront Russia over its military threat against Ukraine as two senators predicted a vote as soon as this week on the “mother of all sanctions” against the Kremlin.
Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the US ambassador to the United Nations, said the Security Council on Monday would press Russia on its massive troop buildup along Ukraine’s border and fears that an invasion is imminent.
“They know that they cannot block the meeting and I expect that, knowing what we’re dealing with, that they will make an attempt,” Thomas-Greenfield said on ABC News’ “This Week,” noting Russia’s veto power as one of the council’s permanent members.
“But the Security Council is unified, our voices are unified in calling for the Russians to explain themselves. We’re going to go into the room prepared to listen to them, but we’re not going to be distracted by their propaganda and we’re going to be prepared to respond to any disinformation that they attempt to spread during this meeting,” she said.
The US has repeatedly warned Russian President Vladimir Putin that an invasion on Ukraine would result in “severe” consequences and penalties for the country.SPUTNIK/AFP via Getty Images
The US has warned that an attack on Ukraine would spark “severe” economic consequences for Russia but there has been disagreement about pre-emptive sanctions.
Those divisions may have been resolved as Sen. Bob Menendez, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, floated the idea that some penalties may be imposed immediately to deter Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“There are some sanctions that really could take place up front because of what Russia’s already done — cyberattacks on Ukraine, false-flag operations, the efforts to undermine the Ukrainian government internally,” Menendez (D-NJ) said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”
In the event of an invasion, Menendez said the Kremlin would face “the mother of all sanctions” targeting Russian banks to cripple the country’s economy.
At the same time, US would step up supplying Ukraine with lethal aid.
”These are sanctions beyond any that we have ever levied before,” Menendez said.
Sen. James Risch, the ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said a bipartisan group of senators are prepared to vote on the measures to deter Putin.
He said he didn’t think the Russian leader has made up his mind on invading Ukraine but warned the US must show strength and unity in the face of the threat.
Sources claim that Russia has stationed as many as 100,000 troops along the Ukrainian border.AFP via Getty Images
“There’s a lot of us that believe that, if Putin sees weakness, if he sees bumbling, if he sees ineptitude, if he sees indecision, that he will take advantage of that. I don’t think he’s made a decision to do that yet,” Risch said on CNN, appearing alongside Menendez.
“What Bob and I and a coalition of bipartisan senators are attempting to do is to project the resolve that we have, as Americans, to see that he doesn’t do that, to provide the strength, to project the strength, and convince him that this would be a very, very bad idea, and it’s going to be extremely painful,” Risch (R-Idaho) said.
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby also said Sunday that the US is weighing a level of sanctions that would go beyond anything Russia has ever seen.
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby reiterated that there would be economic consequences for Russia but that there is still time to reach a diplomatic solution.AP
Kirby was asked by “Fox News Sunday” host Dana Perino about the potential consequences Putin could face if he launches an invasion into Ukraine.
“I think we’ve been very clear with Mr. Putin about the economic consequences that could come his way and the way the Russian people should he further incur — invade inside Ukraine. And one of the things about sanctions is once you trip that, then the deterrent effect is lost,” he said.
“I think we’ve been very, very clear that we’re going to look at sanctions and economic consequences, the likes of which we have not looked at before even considering even as far back as 2014,” Kirby said, referring to Russia’s invasion of Crimea.
Despite Russia’s saber-rattling, Kirby said, “it doesn’t have to come to conflict.”
“We still believe there’s room and space for diplomacy and we’d like to see that be the solution here,” he added.
Russia on Sunday shrugged off claims that it was poised to invade its neighbor despite the presence of more than 100,000 troops along the border.
“At this time, they’re saying that Russia threatens Ukraine — that’s completely ridiculous,” Nikolai Patrushev, the head of Russia’s Security Council, said Sunday, according to the Russian news agency Tass.
Thomas-Greenfield was skeptical of Russia’s denial.
“You don’t amass 100,000 troops if you don’t have intentions to use them,” she said on ABC.
The ambassador said the Security Council meeting will give Russia another opportunity to find a diplomatic way out.
“We’ve made clear that we’re prepared to address our concerns, Ukrainian concerns and Russian concerns at the diplomatic table, but it cannot be done on the battlefield,” Thomas-Greenfield said.
SEOUL/TOKYO, Oct 4 (Reuters) – Nuclear-armed North Korea test-fired a ballistic missile farther than ever before on Tuesday, sending it soaring over Japan for the first time in five years and prompting a warning for residents there to take cover.
U.S. President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida spoke by phone and condemned the test in the “strongest terms,” calling it a danger to the Japanese people, and Biden reinforced the “ironclad” U.S. commitment to the defence of Japan, the White House said.
The United States asked the U.N. Security Council to meet on North Korea on Wednesday but diplomats said China and Russia are opposed to a public discussion by the 15-member body.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the launch as a “reckless act” and a violation of Security Council resolutions. Sanctions have been imposed on North Korea’s weapons programs. U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said it was a serious concern that Pyongyang had again disregarded international flight and maritime safety.
It was the first North Korean missile to follow a trajectory over Japan since 2017, and its estimated 4,600 km (2,850 mile) flight was the longest in a North Korean test, which are usually “lofted” into space to avoid flying over neighbouring countries.
Japan warned its citizens to take cover and suspended some train services when the missile passed over its north before falling into the Pacific Ocean.
In response, U.S. and South Korean warplanes practiced bombing a target in the Yellow Sea and fighter jets from the United States and Japan also carried out joint drills over the Sea of Japan, the U.S. military said, the latest move in a cycle of muscle flexing.
A U.S. aircraft carrier made a port call in South Korea for the first time since 2018 on Sept. 23, and North Korea has conducted five launches in the last 10 days.
The period has also seen joint drills by the United States, South Korea and Japan, and a visit to the fortified border between the Koreas by U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris.
North Korea accuses Washington and its allies of threatening it with exercises and defence build-ups.
Recent tests had drawn relatively muted responses from Washington, which is focused on the war in Ukraine and other crises.
But the U.S. military has stepped up displays of force and the White House National Security Council called the latest test “dangerous and reckless.” The United States was still analysing the test “so we can better understand what capabilities they put in the air”, national security spokesman John Kirby told Fox News.
South Korea’s defence minister, Lee Jong-sup, told parliament North Korea had completed preparations for a first nuclear test since 2017 and it might use a smaller weapon meant for operational use, or a big device with a higher yield than in previous tests.
Lee said it was difficult to predict when North Korea would conduct its seventh nuclear test, but lawmakers briefed by intelligence officials last week said a window could be between China’s Communist Party Congress this month and U.S. midterm elections in November.
1/7
A man watches a TV broadcasting a news report on North Korea firing a ballistic missile over Japan, at a railway station in Seoul, South Korea, October 4, 2022. REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji
The top U.S. diplomat for East Asia, Daniel Kritenbrink, said a nuclear test was likely only awaiting a political decision and would represent “a grave escalation that would seriously threaten regional and international stability and security.”
Kritenbrink accused China and Russia of emboldening North Korea by not properly enforcing sanctions.
The White House said Biden and Kishida “resolved to continue every effort to limit the DPRK’s ability to support its unlawful ballistic missile and weapons of mass destruction programs.”
After Tuesday’s test, a South Korean air force jet dropped a pair of guided bombs on a target off its west coast, in what Seoul called a demonstration of precision strike capability against the source of North Korean provocations.
Japan said it took no steps to shoot the missile down but Defence Minister Yasukazu Hamada said it would not rule out any options, including counterattack capabilities, as it looks to strengthen its defences. South Korea also said it would boost its military and increase allied cooperation.
‘REAL-WORLD’ TEST
South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said the test appeared to have been of an intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) launched from North Korea’s Jagang Province. North Korea has conducted several recent tests from there, including multiple missiles that it said were “hypersonic”.
The initial details suggested the missile may have been the Hwasong-12 IRBM, which North Korea unveiled in 2017 as part of what it said was a plan to strike U.S. military bases in Guam, said Kim Dong-yup, a former South Korea Navy officer who teaches at Kyungnam University.
The Hwasong-12 was used in 2017 tests that overflew Japan, and Kim noted it was also test fired from Jagang in January.
Flying a missile such a long distance allows North Korea’s scientists to test under more realistic conditions, said Ankit Panda of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
“Compared to the usual highly lofted trajectory, this allows them to expose a long-range reentry vehicle to thermal loads and atmospheric reentry stresses that are more representative of the conditions they’d endure in real-world use,” he said.
South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol called the test “reckless” and said it would bring a decisive response from his country, its allies and the international community.
Japan’s Kishida called North Korea’s action “barbaric”.
Even so, Kritenbrink said Washington remained open to talks with North Korea, while warning of U.S. resolve to pursue further sanctions and other costs on Pyongyang.
Decades of U.S.-led sanctions have not stemmed North Korea’s increasingly sophisticated missile and nuclear bomb programs, and its leader Kim Jong Un has shown no interest in returning a failed path of diplomacy he pursued with former U.S. President Donald Trump.
Washington — A young student who survived the mass shooting at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, was among of group of witnesses who testified before House lawmakers at a hearing on gun violence, recalling how she smeared the blood of a classmate on herself to appear as if she were dead.
Miah Cerrillo, a fourth grader at Robb Elementary School, appeared in a prerecorded video before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform on Wednesday morning. The hearing came hours before the House was set to begin debate on a package of gun restrictions aimed at preventing future mass shootings.
Detailing one of the most horrific accounts of the massacre, Cerrillo said her class was watching a movie when her teacher got an email and went to lock the classroom door, making eye contact with the gunman in the hallway. She said the teacher told them to hide behind the teacher’s desk and their backpacks. The gunman went into an adjoining classroom before coming into hers, where he told her teacher “good night” and shot her in the head, Cerillo said. He then shot Cerrillo’s classmates and a whiteboard.
“When I went to the backpacks, he shot my friend that was next to me, and I thought he was going to come back to the room, so I grabbed a little blood and put it all over me,” she said. “I got my teacher’s phone and called 911 … I told her that we need help, and to send the police in our classroom.”
Cerrillo said she wants “to have security” and that she doesn’t feel safe at school. “I don’t want it to happen again,” she said.
Speaking through tears, her father Miguel Cerrillo told the panel: “I wish something would change, not only for our kids, but for every kid in the world, because our schools are not safe anymore. Something needs to really change.”
Miguel Cerrillo, father of Miah Cerrillo, a student at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, testifies to the House Oversight and Reform Committee on June 8, 2022.
ANDREW HARNIK/POOL/AFP via Getty Images
Democratic Rep. Carolyn Maloney of New York, the committee’s chairwoman, said the witnesses “have endured pain and loss” and displayed “incredible courage by coming here to ask us to do our jobs.”
“My goal for today’s hearing is simple. I am asking every Member of this Committee to listen with an open heart to the brave witnesses who have come forward to tell their stories about how gun violence has impacted their lives,” Maloney said. “Let us hear their voices. Let us honor their courage. And let us find the same courage to pass commonsense laws to protect our children.”
Other witnesses at the hearing included Felix and Kimberly Rubio, whose daughter Lexi was among those killed in Uvalde. Zeneta Everhart, the mother of one of the victims wounded in the mass shooting in Buffalo, New York, also appeared, along with Dr. Roy Guerrero, a pediatrician from Uvalde.
Kimberly Rubio recounted the agonizing hours after the attack as she and her family tried to find Lexi, driving to the hospital and the local civic center seeking answers.
“Soon after we received the news that our daughter was among the 19 students and two teachers that died as a result of gun violence,” she said through tears. “We do not want you to think of Lexi as just a number. She was intelligent, compassionate, and athletic. She was quiet. Shy, unless she had a point to make. When she knew she was right, as she so often was, she stood her ground. She was firm, direct, voice unwavering.”
Felix and Kimberly Rubio, the parents of Alexandria “Lexi” Rubio, who was killed in the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, appear via video before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform on Wednesday, June 8, 2022.
CBS News
Everhart, whose son Zaire Goodman was an employee at the Tops grocery store in Buffalo and wounded in the shooting, implored lawmakers to pass gun restrictions to prevent future mass shootings.
“To the lawmakers who feel that we do not need stricter gun laws, let me paint a picture for you: My son Zaire has a hole in the right side of his neck, two on his back and another on his left leg, caused by an exploding bullet from an AR-15. As I clean his wounds, I can feel pieces of that bullet in his back. Shrapnel will be left inside of his body for the rest of his life,” Everhart said. “Now, I want you to picture that exact scenario for one of your children. This should not be your story — or mine.”
Dr. Roy Guerrero, a pediatrician who has lived in Uvalde for his entire life, said he rushed from his clinic to the hospital once he learned of the shooting and found “parents outside yelling children’s names in desperation, and sobbing as they begged for any news related to their child.” He said the first patient he came across in the ER was Cerrillo.
“She was sitting in the hallway. Her face was still, still clearly in shock, but her whole body was shaking from the adrenaline coursing through it,” he said. “The white ‘Lilo and Stitch’ shirt she wore was covered in blood and her shoulder was bleeding from the shrapnel injury.”
Guerrero recounted the gruesome scene as two children killed in the massacre first arrived at the hospital.
“Two children, whose bodies had been pulverized by bullets fired at them, decapitated, whose flesh had been ripped apart, that the only clue as to their identities were the blood-spattered cartoon clothes still clinging to them, clinging for life and finding none,” Guerrero told lawmakers.
“Making sure our children are safe from guns, that’s the job of our politicians and leaders. In this case, you are the doctors and our country is the patient. We are lying on the operating table, riddled with bullets like the children of Robb Elementary and so many other schools. We are bleeding out, and you are not there,” he said. “My oath as a doctor means that I signed up to save lives. I do my job, and I guess it turns out that I am here to plead, to beg, to please, please do yours.”
The shootings in Buffalo and Uvalde have spurred renewed efforts by Democrats in Congress to pass more stringent gun control measures. Following Wednesday’s testimony, the Democratic-controlled House passed a package of legislation called the Protecting Our Kids Act, mostly along party lines, that that would raise the minimum age for buying semi-automatic rifles from 18 to 21, limit magazine sizes and ban so-called “ghost guns,” among other provisions.
Any meaningful changes to the nation’s gun laws, however, must also pass the evenly divided Senate, where the support of 10 Republicans is needed to advance legislation. A bipartisan group of senators has been negotiating a set of narrower reforms that could include strengthening background checks for gun sales and encouraging states to adopt “red flag” laws, which allow courts to order the confiscation of firearms from those deemed a threat to themselves or others.
This is a widget area - If you go to "Appearance" in your WP-Admin you can change the content of this box in "Widgets", or you can remove this box completely under "Theme Options"
