Again, this is from the conservative National Review:
Some terrible ideas never go away, especially ideas that help politicians to disguise weakness as strength. One such scheme in the Beltway bag of tricks is the proposal to “punish” a hostile foreign power by allowing it to be sued in court.
Senators Marsha Blackburn (R., Tenn.) and Martha McSally (R., Ariz.) are the latest to try this tactic, proposing a bill that would allow Americans harmed by the coronavirus — or their estates if they have died from it — to sue China for damages. To pave the way, Senators Blackburn and McSally would strip of sovereign immunity any foreign state (i.e., China) that even accidentally discharges a biological agent upon the world.
Sounds ferocious, right? Except no American victim would actually get compensation, because Beijing would, of course, ignore the lawsuits . . . except to exploit them as a (further) excuse not to cooperate with American and foreign investigations; as a further basis not to honor its treaty obligations; as a reason to step up its aggression in the Far East; and as a rationale for retaliating by encouraging other countries to strip sovereign immunity from the United States, so that our nation and officials may be sued and indicted for harms real and imagined abroad.
This is foolish on so many levels it is tough to know where to begin.
By the way, kudos to Tim Seller at the Arizona Daily Star for calling out McSally on this:
When Martha McSally was still just a congressional candidate, she specified who she considered responsible for preventing epidemics in the United States: Congress and the president.
It was October 2014. The Ebola virus had suddenly gone from a distant concern in West Africa to a worry at home. A traveler had arrived infected in Texas, then two medical workers treating him were infected. Public concern spiked in mid-October, as ballots were mailed out ahead of the Nov. 4 midterm election.
In the last few weeks of the campaign, the Republican challenger McSally started hitting the Democratic incumbent, Rep. Ron Barber, on his response to the threat. I wrote a column on McSally raising Ebola as a campaign issue.
McSally’s written statement said: “It’s inexcusable that Congress and President Obama were unprepared for this threat considering we were aware of it months ago. Real leadership means taking action before there’s a crisis.”
That principle is as applicable today as it was in 2014. But now that McSally has served four years in the U.S. House and more than a year as an appointed U.S. senator, her clear vision of responsibility for epidemic prevention seems to have turned murky.
Asked by an Associated Press reporter April 10 about the federal government’s response to the novel coronavirus pandemic, McSally said “Nobody’s perfect.”
“No process is perfect, no government is perfect,” she went on. “But everybody is trying to do the best they can in order to save lives.”
McSally has gone from stern toward the federal government’s epidemic responses in 2014, when a Democrat was in the White House, to forgiving in 2020, with Republicans in charge. But she is eagerly finding fault for today’s COVID-19 epidemic. Rather than look to D.C. for responsibility, though, she is blaming China, as is President Trump and much of the GOP in a coordinated 2020 campaign.
Meanwhile, McSally’s opponent, Mark Kelly (D. AZ), is acting like a true public servant:
Senate candidate Mark Kelly donated blood in Tucson at Red Cross Saturday as blood shortages have risen.
Kelly supported the American Red Cross during these uncertain times and donated blood at the Broadway Blood Donation Center Tucson at 7139 E. Broadway Blvd. this afternoon.
Mark Kelly said “Folks knows there's a shortage of things right now, right, I think pasta, toilet paper, live sports, and also blood. It's very important the American Red Cross has a supply of blood especially as we get toward the summer months where usually the demand goes up we'll see if that happens now and they're a little bit behind they're starting to catch up, but I'm here to do my part to donate a pint of blood today.”
The American Red Cross is facing blood shortages and want to continue to meet patient needs during the pandemic.
Let’s defeat McSally again and help Kelly flip this seat blue. Click here to donate and get involved with Kelly’s campaign.
