ATT'N HAJDU: COUNTERFEIT CHINESE DATA

   Last week, the U.S. began yanking protective masks out of the hands of other countries for its own use, including allegedly arranging the effective hijacking of a shipment of 3M masks from China that was originally headed for Germany and rerouting it to the States. U.S. President Donald Trump also told U.S.-based 3M it should stop shipping masks to Canada and Mexico and focus on its home country, if it knows what’s good for it.
   But China did these things first. In February it commandeered foreign-owned factories that produce masks and medical equipment (while it accepted supplies donated by well-meaning countries like Canada). It began rapidly importing medical supplies while blocking exporters. Beijing just recently began re-allowing limited exports, apparently satisfied it has now properly supplied itself — although some of the N95 masks its sending to Canada and elsewhere have been found to be counterfeit or don’t work properly.
   Of course it’s natural for China to put its own interests first in how it manages its medical supplies — and its coronavirus data. And, as the National Post’s Terry Glavin pointed out on Twitter the other day, Chinese authorities had already effectively acknowledged their data were flawed when they announced last week that they would now start including asymptomatic cases in their case numbers, which they hadn’t been doing before, essentially admitting they failed to report literally millions of cases. They revealed that the day before Hajdu scolded that CTV producer for questioning their data.

AUZZIE NEWS SLAPS BACK AT CHINA

   The Daily Telegraph this week received a letter from the Australian Consulate General of the People's Republic of China, who took gentle issue with our excellent coverage of the coronavirus crisis.
   Following is a point-by-point response to the Consulate General and China’s communist dictatorship:
   Recently the Daily Telegraph has published a number of reports and opinions about China’s response to COVID-19 that are full of ignorance, prejudice and arrogance.
   If a state-owned newspaper in China received this kind of complaint, subsequent days would involve journalists waking up in prison with their organs harvested.

COMRADE HAJDU

“There’s no indication that the data that came out of China in terms of their infection rate and their death rate was falsified in any way,” Hajdu said sternly.

This was a remarkable moment. A top member of Trudeau’s inner circle was ardently defending a communist regime known for grave human rights abuses and lying on the world stage, while tacitly accusing our top ally and most important international partner of spreading false information.

To add insult to injury, when Brown tried to push back with facts, Hajdu lashed out at him, accusing the reporter of “feeding into conspiracy theories.”

AUSTRIA REFUSES EU MIGRANT DISTRIBUTION

Austria’s Europe minister has said that the EU’s compulsory migrant redistribution scheme “has failed” and member-states should be able to choose whether to accept migrants or not.

While some 150 non-governmental organisations have put pressure on Austria to accept Middle Eastern migrants stuck in Greece because of the worsening coronavirus pandemic, two government spokesmen have said that Austria will maintain its current policy and not accept any more asylum seekers.

FUN & GAMES FOR WORKERS AND BOSSES

When the coronavirus crisis ends, many “laid off” employees will never be recalled.

Many employers are using the COVID-19 crisis to rid themselves of employees they had considered terminating for years, free of the stresses which accompanies building up cases for misconduct and of the inevitable discomfort and morale problems with which all dismissals are replete.

Employers will also find that they can make do with fewer employees. They will ultimately realize that some functions are redundant or not worth the cost of the salaries. Pregnant employees and those protected by human rights legislation are also being displaced under the guise of economic need.

MANN'S DERANGED AND DESPERATE MOVE

   Steyn:  The two most non-essential professions on the planet right now are that of Big Climate alarmist and his attorney in a vanity lawsuit. Yet Michael E Mann, inventor of the global-warming "hockey stick", and his counsel John Williams are disinclined to let their lousy eight-year-old defamation suit against me shelter in place for a couple of months, and the other day they made a surprise move. By which I mean a deranged and desperate move.

   Anyway, as many readers will know, Stephen McIntyre and Ross McKitrick are the dynamic duo that broke Mann's hockey stick - to the fury of the warm-mongers. They are not parties to what Steve calls "Mann's stupid lawsuit", but nevertheless:

I have a nominee for most absurdly venal activity during COVID lockdown. Michael Mann has ramped up his vanity libel lawsuit. Last Friday, McKitrick and I (who are non-parties in lawsuit) were notified by a Washington lawyer for one of the defendants that Mann's lawyer had requested that he (the defendant's lawyer) accept service of (separate) subpoenas to McKitrick and myself for documents.

TRUDEAU IGNORES WARNINGS FROM DND & CSIS

Despite warnings against the deal from the Department of Defence and CSIS, the Liberal government has let China take control of a Canadian company with close links to our national security.