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Feb. 2, 2021 - Epoch Times

21:30

Report Reveals: Nursing Home Deaths Are 50% Higher in New York | Facts Matter

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	Good evening.
	A large group of small investors have begun to gather online in order to take down the giant billion dollar hedge funds.
	And you know what?
	It looks like they are having success.
	Meanwhile, a new report from New York, it found that the official number of reported deaths from nursing homes, basically people who died from the virus, were underreported by as much as 50%.
	Now, over in Congress, a new Democrat-sponsored bill is working its way through the House, which would allow for broad, nationwide mail-in voting to basically everyone.
	And lastly, General Michael Flynn's brother, Charles Flynn, he has just been assigned to head up the U.S. Army Pacific.
	Let's go through these stories together.
	This is your daily Facts Matter update, and I'm your host, Roman, from the Epoch Times.
	So let's start today's discussion by talking about GameStop.
	Now, as you've probably already heard, a pretty large group of pretty small investors who were organizing on Reddit bought so much of GameStop's stock that it caused the price to go meteoric.
	Over the course of about two weeks, the price rose from about $20 to $350.
	Now, the reason that they did this was in order to try and bankrupt hedge funds that were shorting the stock.
	Basically, those hedge funds, they were making bets that GameStop would fail.
	And if it did, they would reap huge profits.
	Basically, here's what happened.
	This all started on a Reddit sub-forum called WallStreetBets.
	And on that forum, there were people who discovered that GameStop was basically one of the most shorted stocks in the entire stock market.
	Now, in case you don't know, let me explain to you a little bit about what it means to short a stock.
	Here's the way that it works.
	In order to short a stock, a person, or potentially a hedge fund, would go over to the brokerage house and borrow that stock.
	Basically, the brokerage house would lend them that stock.
	And then what they would do is to sell that borrowed stock into the stock market.
	So now they are short of those shares.
	They don't have them because they've sold them, but they borrowed them and they owe them back, and that's why it's called shorting.
	Because after borrowing those shares and selling them, they are short of those shares.
	Now, if the stock price goes down, they can buy those stocks back at a lower price than what they sold them for and make a tidy profit.
	For instance, here's the way it could potentially work.
	If a hedge fund borrows a stock and sells it into the market for $20, then the stock price drops to $6 and they buy that stock back, they can give that stock back to the brokerage house and keep the $14 difference as profit.
	That's how it works in theory.
	However, the danger here is if that stock price actually increases in value, then the hedge fund or whoever it is that borrowed the stock from the brokerage house then will have to buy the stock at an increased price and incur a loss.
	And what these small investors on Reddit, what they did was that they forced the price of GameStop to go so high that the hedge funds that were betting against GameStop, they lost billions of dollars.
	One of the biggest victims of this was Melvin Capital Management.
	Now Melvin is a huge fund that's worth about $12 billion, and they had bet $55 million that GameStop would fail.
	Now it's unclear as of right now how much Melvin has lost on their short position, but it's likely to be in the billions.
	Now as an interesting aside, I'd like to mention that the Reddit user that allegedly started this whole thing several months ago, he initially invested $750,000 into GameStop, which is now worth approximately $16 million.
	So now where is all this going?
	Well, based on recent posts on this Reddit subforum, the investors are betting that many Wall Street players, basically the large players, are still holding large short positions in GameStop and are struggling to get them out.
	They are urging their investors, they are urging these small investors, to not sell and in fact to keep buying, even at a high price.
	The goal here seems to be to force a situation where the institutional investors no longer hold any GameStop stock to sell, but some of them still hold short positions, which would force these big players, like these hedge funds, to buy the stock from the small investors.
	And if these small investors refuse to sell, the price could climb to even loftier and loftier heights.
	Now, this situation quickly escalated into what, in my opinion, can best be described as an open war between the more traditional hedge fund players and the often younger retail investors.
	But this war is actually, in my opinion, more emblematic of a larger issue.
	Basically, the larger issue here is that the opportunity to participate freely and fully in our financial markets is often slanted toward the larger players on Wall Street.
	So what wound up happening is that regulators, they began to look closely at the situation, and one brokerage firm, Robinhood, which is, by the way, very popular and was used heavily by these small investors who were buying off GameStop stock, they announced yesterday that they will suspend all buying of GameStop stock.
	In fact, Robinhood released this statement.
	Our customers have shown the world that investing is for everyone, not just institutional investors and hedge funds.
	Amid this week's extraordinary circumstances in the market, we made a tough decision today to temporarily limit buying for certain securities.
	As a brokerage firm, we have many financial requirements, including SEC net capital obligations and clearing house deposits.
	Some of these requirements fluctuate based on volatility in the markets and can be substantial in the current environment.
	These requirements exist to protect investors and the markets, and we take our responsibilities to comply with them seriously, including through the measures we have taken today.
	Starting tomorrow, we plan to allow limited buys of these securities.
	We'll continue to monitor the situation and may make adjustments as needed.
	So basically, what their announcement meant was that the large hedge funds can still sell their short positions, only buying was banned.
	And that caused the price of GameStop to plummet, at least yesterday, and it helped the giant hedge funds and it hurt the small investors.
	And a lot of people criticized this move as basically a decision by Robinhood to favor the giant institutional players.
	Now, this whole story will likely continue well into the future, and it might be the beginning of a total re-evaluation of our financial institutions.
	Only time will tell whether that's the case or not.
	But in fact, right now there seems to be a bipartisan push to investigate this type of action by Robinhood, wherein even Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted, This is unacceptable.
	We now need to know more about Robinhood App's decision to block retail investors from purchasing stock while hedge funds are freely able to trade the stock as they see fit.
	As a member of the Financial Services Committee, I'd support a hearing if necessary.
	And Ted Cruz, he responded, Fully agree.
	Never thought I'd see that happen.
	Now, if you'd like to read more about what's happening with this GameStop stock, this issue surrounding this Reddit sub-forum, or any of the surrounding issues in general, I'll throw all those links into the description box below this video for you to check out.
	And while you're down there, do me a quick favor.
	Do not short that like button.
	Instead, smash that like button.
	That's right.
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	And Home Title Lock, thank you so much for sponsoring this episode.
	And now Roman in the studio, back to you.
	Now, let's talk about a few things that are happening around the U.S., starting over at the Pentagon.
	Officials there just announced that Lieutenant General Charles Flynn, who is the younger brother of Michael Flynn, is being assigned to head the U.S. Army Pacific.
	So just to give you a bit of background on him, since you probably know more about his brother, Charles Flynn is a graduate of the U.S. Naval War College, where he earned master's degrees in national security, as well as strategic studies.
	And previously, he had been approved for promotion to a four-star general position, and He's been serving as Deputy Chief of Staff for G3, 5, and 7 of the U.S. Army.
	So under this new assignment that was just announced, General Flynn will be posted over at the headquarters of the U.S. Army Pacific in Hawaii, where he will serve as the commanding general.
	Now, don't expect any congratulatory messages from his brother via Twitter though, because General Michael Flynn, he's been kicked off of Twitter as part of that platform's censorship efforts.
	However, as you already know, Twitter is, of course, not the only platform that is ratcheting up its censorship.
	A few days ago, YouTube, they removed several videos from the YouTube channel of a U.S. senator.
	The senator is Ron Johnson, who is a Republican from Wisconsin, and the deleted video centered around doctors who were testifying treatments for people with COVID-19.
	For example, one video showed Dr.
	Pierre Corey, who is the associate professor of medicine at a medical center in Milwaukee, and he was testifying before several senators during a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs hearing last month.
	And YouTube, or at least YouTube's algorithm, they made the determination that we...
	The American people should not have access to the contents of that senatorial hearing.
	In a statement, here is what Senator Johnson had to say about it.
	Where does this end?
	Apparently, the doctors at Google know more about practicing medicine than heroic doctors who have the courage and compassion to actually treat COVID patients and save lives.
	Now, I will mention two other things here for your reference.
	First of all, a few days ago, YouTube's CEO wrote a letter saying that the platform has removed 500,000 videos for violating the rules about COVID-19 since February of 2020.
	And second of all, here's what Google's website states...
	YouTube does not allow content that spreads medical misinformation that contradicts local health authorities or the World Health Organization's WHO medical information about COVID-19.
	Now, on that website, though, it does not mention the fact that the WHO itself has spread misinformation about the pandemic and that they have close ties to the Chinese Communist Party.
	Now, we reached out to Google for comment about these videos being removed from the senator's channel, but have yet to hear back.
	However, while we're on the subject of big tech platforms, let's talk a little bit about Facebook, who have just hired Roy Austin as their Vice President of Civil Rights.
	Who exactly is Roy Austin?
	Well, he is a former Obama administration official, as well as a member of Joe Biden's transition team.
	And now he is the VP of Civil Rights over at Facebook.
	Now it's not exactly clear what his specific responsibilities will be over at Facebook.
	The VP of Civil Rights doesn't exactly explain what the position means.
	However, here's what their general counsel had to say.
	I'm delighted to welcome Roy to Facebook as our VP of Civil Rights.
	Roy has proved throughout his career that he is a passionate and principled advocate for civil rights, whether it is in the courtroom or at the White House.
	It's hard to imagine anyone better qualified to help us strengthen and advance civil rights on our platform and in our company.
	Now, this appointment of Roy Austin underscores the closeness that Facebook appears to have with the Biden administration.
	That's because, besides Roy Austin, Jessica Hertz, who was formerly Facebook's associate general counsel, she later became the Biden transition's general counsel, and now she is a White House staff secretary.
	Jeffrey Zients, who is Biden's coronavirus czar, served on Facebook's board of directors between 2018 and 2020.
	Austin Lin, who is a former program manager at Facebook, was on one of Biden's agency review teams before being tapped for a deputy role over at the White House's Office of Management and Administration.
	And Erskine Bowles, a former Facebook board member, reportedly advised the Biden transition team.
	Now, we here at the Epoch Times, we reached out to Facebook, and we also reached out to Roy Austin for comment on his new position, but I've yet to hear back.
	However, here's a statement from Roy about what he will be doing.
	I'm excited to join Facebook at this moment when there is a national and global awakening happening around civil rights.
	Technology plays a role in nearly every part of our lives, and it's important that it be used to overcome the historic discrimination and hate which so many underrepresented groups have faced, rather than to exacerbate it.
	I could not pass up the opportunity to join a company whose products are used by so many, and which impacts the civil rights and liberties of billions of people, in order to help steer a better way forward.
	Now, I'd like to highlight something from that statement.
	His reference to underrepresented groups potentially raises the specter of political bias, because that has been the underlying reasoning tied to tech companies enforcing their content rules unevenly.
	For example, in a memo from Facebook from 2018, moderators at Facebook were told that prohibited hate speech against certain groups was to be left alone, as long as it aligned with the company's agenda.
	Here's what the memo said.
	Anything that is delete, per our hate speech policies, but is intended to raise awareness for Pride or LGBTQ was to be temporarily allowed.
	That was what the post stated, specifying that this may occur especially in terms of attacking straight white males.
	Now, furthermore, in 2019, Facebook updated its policy to actually allow threats that could lead to death against those on the company's list of dangerous individuals and organizations.
	Now, who is exactly on that list?
	Well, besides groups like the KKK and individuals tied to Nazism, Facebook also placed individual people on that list, such as the commentator Paul Joseph Watson and the conservative activist Laura Loomer.
	Now, Facebook faced such backlash for this change in their policy that they actually did quietly remove the exception from the publicly available version of its policy.
	But, according to an insider at Facebook, this change was never communicated to the actual content moderators inside the company, and so in practice, at least according to him, you could still theoretically threaten these people with death on Facebook without consequence.
	Now this whole approach, everything we're talking about, does align with critical theory, which is a quasi-Marxist doctrine, which basically what it does is it divides society into oppressors and those who have historically been oppressed based on characteristics such as race, gender, along the lines of Marxism's class division.
	Now, if you'd like to read more about this new appointment at Facebook, that link will be in the description box below this video for you to check out.
	And now, let's switch gears a little bit and talk a bit about mail-in voting.
	Yesterday, Democratic lawmakers introduced a bill which they called the Vote at Home Act.
	What's it about?
	Well, it seeks to massively expand vote-at-home ballot access by enacting automatic voter registration and providing voters with prepaid ballot envelopes.
	The co-sponsor said that they introduced the bill after being encouraged by what they described as...
	The successful expansion of voting at home and by mail in the November 2020 election, wherein almost 50% of voters cast ballots by mail.
	They went on to say that, Last year, we saw a widespread expansion of vote-at-home access as a safe and secure way to participate during the COVID-19 pandemic.
	We should continue to make voting easier, not harder.
	This important bill would strengthen and clarify the right to vote at home, the most secure and convenient way for voters to exercise the franchise.
	Now this initiative, the so-called Vote at Home Act, stands in contrast to another bill that was introduced by Republicans several weeks ago.
	That other bill is the so-called Save Democracy Act, and it's pretty much the exact opposite.
	The Republican bill would actually tighten voter registration and narrow the rules for when and how mail-in ballots can be accepted.
	Basically, it wants to strengthen the integrity of federal elections.
	And so these two bills, working their way through the House right now, are literally night and day.
	The Democrat bill would have all registered voters nationwide receive ballots in the mail weeks before the election, whether they request one or not, and then all registered voters can cast their ballots by mail or at drop boxes.
	On the other hand, the Republican bill would prevent automatic voter registration for federal elections and prohibit states from sending out unrequested absentee ballots, and they would call for a ban on using public ballot collection boxes.
	So, what will actually pass?
	Only time will tell.
	We'll be following these two bills as they're going to be making their way through the House, and keep your abreast of any developments.
	If you want to read more about these two bills, the links will be in the description box below this video for you to check out.
	And now let's talk a bit about what's happening over in New York.
	According to a report, which was just released by the Attorney General of New York, state health officials underreported COVID-19-related nursing home deaths by as much as 50% in some places.
	So this report, which was just released yesterday, it's pretty big.
	It's about 76 pages.
	And basically, it followed an investigation into, firstly, the claims of neglect, and secondly, into other conduct that allegedly led to the deaths of nursing home residents as well as nursing home employees.
	And what it did was it compared the data from 62 nursing homes, which, by the way, is about 10% of the nursing homes in all of New York State, and it found that the nursing homes were underreporting the number of deaths that were occurring there.
	According to the Office of the Attorney General, they found that nursing home resident deaths appeared to be undercounted by the Department of Health by approximately 50%.
	The attorney general said that, Furthermore, she also added that Cuomo's decision to order recovering nursing home patients to be returned to the nursing home facilities to free up hospital bed space may have led to more deaths.
	And the report actually goes further, because not only does it claim that Cuomo's policy to basically return recovering COVID patients into nursing homes led to more deaths, but also that state officials covered up the real numbers.
	For instance, in just one example, in an unidentified facility, 11 confirmed and presumed deaths were reported to the state's health department as having occurred at that facility.
	However, the Attorney General's survey of that facility, they found that 40 deaths occurred, including 13 in hospitals and 27 in the nursing home itself.
	And furthermore, the report states that Preliminary data obtained by the Attorney General suggests that many nursing home residents died from COVID-19 in hospitals after being transferred from their nursing homes.
	And the Cuomo administration, generally, was not forthcoming with the real numbers.
	Earlier this month, they received heavy criticism for not releasing data on the total number of nursing home residents who died from the virus, basically saying that they're going to wait another two months to do so.
	In fact, the Empire State for Public Policy, they released a statement saying that the state is stonewalling, plain and simple.
	Now, this is a very, very big deal because according to state data, as of this week, about 70% of New York COVID deaths were among people who were aged 70 years old or older.
	Now, to be fair, the Cuomo administration flatly denied the allegations, saying that admission policies to nursing homes were not a significant factor in nursing home fatalities, and data suggests that nursing home quality is not a factor in mortality from COVID. However, if I were you, I would expect the story to get much, much bigger.
	Because just yesterday, a House rep for New York, she urged the Attorney General as well as the Justice Department to subpoena the Cuomo administration for documents, as well as communications related to their handling of the pandemic.
	When commenting on this giant report, she characterized it as a massive corruption and cover-up scandal at the highest level of New York state government, and that every New Yorker deserves transparency, accountability, and answers regarding the orchestration of this illegal cover-up.
	Now, we here at the Epoch Times, we reached out to the Cuomo administration for comment, but I've yet to hear back.
	If you'd like to read this report for yourself, or if you'd like to read the statements from the Attorney General's office, those links will be in the description box below this video for you to check out.
	And now lastly, as I mentioned before, on the very same day that Joe Biden was sworn into office, YouTube decided to demonetize our channel.
	We can now no longer run pre-roll, mid-roll, or post-roll ads on Facts Matter.
	However, if you would like to support Honest Journalism, if you'd like to support our investigations and all of our reporting, I would highly recommend that you subscribe to The Epoch Times.
	I'll throw a link into the description box below this video for you to check out.
	It costs only a few dollars a month, and you will honestly be supporting real, transparent reporting that you cannot get anywhere else.
	And especially at a time when big tech censorship is just so rampant and all platforms are removing anyone that goes against the established narratives, supporting honest, independent media, in my opinion, is more important than ever.
	So I'll throw that link into the description box below this video, and I hope you'll subscribe.
	And now lastly, if you haven't already, smash that like button for the YouTube algorithm.
	Subscribe to this YouTube channel to get honest reporting delivered directly into your YouTube feed while you still can.
	And until next time, I'm your host, Roman from the Epoch Times.

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