Page 4 - Mid Valley Times 10-28-21 E-edition
P. 4

  Serving the Readers of the Reedley Exponent, Dimuba Sentinel and Sanger Herald.
A Mid Valley Publishing Newspaper
Founded March 26, 1891, in a two-story building on the corner of 11th and F streets, by A.S. Jones
In my OPINION More evidence of U.S.
wounds being self-inflicted
Trunk or treat! Halloween events in cities are returning in force
Fred Hall — Publisher
Jon Earnest — Editor
Dick Sheppard — Editor Emeritus
Thursday, October 28, 2021 | A4 | Mid Valley TiMes Editorial & Opinions
      I can remember, going back to my childhood, adults saying that “among all of God's creatures, that mankind is the only one who fouls his own nest.” Of all the ills and misfortunes currently so manifest in the United States, one would easily find consensus that the wounds were self-inflicted. Poor politi- cal decisions and institutional indoctri- nation of younger, college-educated vot- ers have placed America at great risk.
"Trunk or Treat" events — where tables and stations are set up to provide candy and other treats to children and kids-at- heart — have become a popular tradition in cities in recent years, before the onset of COVID-19 in early 2020 ended up wiping out the bulk of these events. We did report on a drive-thu Pumpkin Patch event in Dinuba last year, but most of the traditional city events were canceled.
But if there's a sign that some events are returning to normal, it's in the return of the Trunk or Treat. Sanger and Reedley have scheduled city- hosted events this week; with Sanger's coming Thursday, Oct. 28, from 6:30 to 8 p.m. at the in- tersection of 7th and N streets. The next night, on Friday, Oct. 29, Reedley returns with its "Trick or Treat on G" event from 3 to 5 p.m. downtown. On Halloween, Parlier will host a Trunk or Treat at Heritage Park from 6 to 8 p.m. with an event that will feature candy, a haunt- ed house, food vendors, pump-
kins, a hay maze and music. More encouraging is the growing popularity and tradi- tion of church-based and civic Trunk or Treats. Reedley and Dinuba have some notable events, all on Halloween eve- ning. Reedley has the Trunk or Treat at Redeemers Church from 5 to 8 p.m. while Reedley Mennonite Brethren has its annual Fall Family Fun Night, also from 5 to 8 p.m. Folks in Dinuba also can go to a Trunk or Treat event at Palm Method- ist Church from 4 to 6 p.m. And Dinuba seniors can enjoy at Halloween Party lunch Thurs- day, Oct. 28 at the Senior Center
Social Hall (11 a.m. to 1 p.m.). Those looking for a good scare during this Halloween week can make the trip out to the popular Hobb's Grove out- side Sanger now through Hallow- een. Special attractions include a Monster Masquerade Costume Party on Oct. 30 and the Hallow's
Eve party on the 31st.
Of course, it's likely that in-
creased numbers of children,
their parents
and adult guard-
ians will be trav-
eling the streets
during this Hal-
loween that falls
on a weekend.
If you're out
driving in the
city streets and rural roads that night, be extra careful and on the lookout for trick-or-treaters walking the streets.
•••
It's also the season for fall
and winter parades, with two Veterans Day Parades planned for Saturday, Nov. 6. The 11th annual Sanger Veterans Pa- rade will start at 10:30 a.m. with opening ceremonies at 7th and O streets, followed by the 11 a.m. parade. Meanwhile, the 2021 Cutler-Orosi Veterans Day Parade will begin at 9 a.m. at Orosi High School and end at Ledbetter Park in Cutler. More details on these events in the Nov. 4 issue of The Times.
Jon Earnest is news-sports editor for The Times.
Fred Hall
QUOTE
“Today you can go to a gas station and find the cash register open and the toilets locked. They must think toilet paper is worth more than money.”
— Joey Bishop (1918-2007)
   Jon Earnest
  Granted, there were wild accusations and mindless attacks on the previous administration, but all indicators were positive and encouraging under that management. The idea of “America First” was more than just a cam- paign slogan and had the country obviously headed in the right direction. Then came the pandemic, followed by the election of unqualified people to run the country as a default position. A country, suffering from bureaucrati- cally exacerbated virus fatigue, somehow bought into the premise than one little old, cognitively-challenged man was going to stop COVID-19 dead in its tracks.
Now, there appears to be evidence that government health agencies might have been indirectly complicit in the development of this awful virus. We don't under- stand why American taxpayer dollars ever should have gone to a Chinese bio lab, but they did.
Corporate media and big tech continue to do their very best to obfuscate the obvious blunders and mis- takes of Joe Biden and his left-wing minions who all seem to have Marxist leanings. If there were any lin- gering doubts about that, simply peruse the resumes and recent past positions of most of the president's appoint- ment s to government jobs.
Getting a true picture of events and tendencies, one must be inquisitive enough to dig deep behind the head- lines and ferret out information that goes unreported or is so skewed as to be useless as a news source. The num- ber of illegals streaming — almost two million at this point, with tens of thousands on the way — through our open Southern border goes unchecked — even encour- aged, some might say. While the material to complete that wall lays rusting and unused, stacked along the border, Biden is having a “million” dollar wall erected around his Delaware beach house. He seems not to care if American citizens are protected, as long as his family is safe. Talk about hypocrisy!
The bumbling of this administration began day one with the inauguration of Biden and Kamala Harris. This new president set about signing a whole stack of execu- tive orders, which really served no practical purpose than undo as many of Donald Trump's successes as possible.
Speaking of undoing, much of that animus was tar- geted at energy producers and were so scripted as to promote a wildly premature “new green deal” being pro- moted by a small group of the most radical Democrats. America, under Trump, had become energy independent and was a net exporter. Biden, quite inexplicably, has put himself in the position of having to plead with OPEC and Russia to increase their production just to meet Ameri- ca's growing need. Lack of supply and increased demand is how one begins to see $7 and $8 per gallon gasoline in parts of California.
All of this is happening while California government and Congress begin discussions of ways to increase tax on the product.
In the face of all this, Gavin Newsom has issued ex- ecutive orders to phase out certain gasoline-powered en- gines within the next couple of years. Cars and trucks will soon follow. This is just another example of poor planning, because the support and apparatus for such a dramatic shift from petroleum products to electric- ity does not currently exist. Having PG&E in charge of powering our economy with alternative fuels is a scary prospect, indeed. We'll never have enough solar panels or windmills to get us there.
But, as always, that's only one man's opinion.
Biden surrending U.S. IP to China for free
 By Mark Cohen
Guest columnist
The Biden administration wants to improve America's international reputation. That's why it endorsed a proposal be- fore the World Trade Organi- zation to waive all intellectual property rights related to CO- VID-19.
The president intends for this offer to be seen as a gener- ous gesture that his "America First" predecessor would never have made.
Yet this endorsement is toothless virtue-signaling at best — and dangerous econom- ic capitulation at worst.
It caught our European al- lies by surprise. The EU na- tions, especially Germany, do not support the proposed waiv- er. Even the WTO did not fully agree with the original propos- al which would have applied to a wide range of medical equip- ment and diagnostics.
The easiest way for Amer- ica to boost its international standing is to serve as the world's "arsenal" of vaccines, to quote President Biden. His administration has already pledged to donate over one bil- lion of our surplus doses to de- veloping countries.
Waiving IP rights, by con- trast, won't boost vaccine sup- ply — for a number of legal and logistical reasons. All 164 WTO members have to agree for proposals to go into effect.
A similar effort to deal with patents and the HIV epidemic was launched in 2001 and was not finally agreed to until 2017.
Even if the waiver does ulti- mately gain unanimous consent from major supply countries and the developing world, there are major obstacles that will prevent it from boosting supply.
First, most facilities that can produce vaccines are al- ready doing so. The Serum Institute in India, the world's largest vaccine manufacturer, says it's on track to produce a billion doses this year. Aspen Pharmacare, South Africa's largest generics manufactur- er, is on track to produce hun- dreds of millions of doses.
Second, the supply bottle- neck right now stems from a shortage of raw inputs, not IP protections. When a Guardian journalist asked the Serum In- stitute's CEO whether he agrees with the accusation that "the de- velopers who hold the patents on the vaccines have licensed too few manufacturers to make them?" the chief executive flatly replied "No. There are enough manufacturers. It just takes time to scale up [production]."
Third, there are few scien- tists and engineers who fully understand the know-how be- hind mRNA vaccines. If the waiver were implemented, governments would have to work with the brand-name makers to transfer that know- how and possibly compel the
transfer of their senior staff. All of those issues could take months, if not years, to resolve.
In other words, the waiver won't increase vaccine produc- tion, and certainly not in time to quell developing countries' Covid-19 outbreaks or new variants. But it could hand over leading-edge American tech- nology to our competitors and cripple our ability to respond to future challenges.
There has been remark- able bipartisan concern about IP theft from China and other countries.
It now appears that we would eliminate the risk of thievery by giving away the technology. It's staggering that the Biden administration would make it more likely that future medical breakthroughs come with a "Made in China" label. After all, mRNA has many po- tential uses beyond COVID-19. Scientists are already testing whether the technology could prevent cancer and HIV.
Today, giving away IP rights risks more than economic com- petitiveness. It also risks the ability of the United States to respond safely and effectively to the pandemics of the future for all.
Mark Cohen is Director of the Asia IP Project at the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology at the University of California, Berkeley. This piece originally ran in the In- ternational Business Times.

































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