JIM TREACHER: Who Was Gary Lenius, the Guy Who Allegedly Drank Aquarium Cleaner Because He Thought Trump Said It Cured the Virus?

IN RELATED NEWS, JOHN DILLINGER REJECTS CALL FOR BANK ROBBERY INVESTIGATION: Coronavirus: China rejects call for probe into origins of disease.

Watching the press, you can tell who’s hiding something — and who’s helping them.

CREEPY PORN LAWYER UPDATE: Michael Avenatti Gets Break From Jail Thanks to Coronavirus.

DOES ANDREW CUOMO HAVE BLOOD ON HIS HANDS? Coronavirus patients admitted to Queens nursing home — with body bags. I thought we were supposed to be keeping coronavirus OUT of nursing homes. But no: “The first coronavirus patients admitted to a Queens nursing home under a controversial state mandate arrived along with some grim accessories — a supply of body bags, The Post has learned. An executive at the facility — which was previously free of the deadly disease — said the bags were in the shipment of personal protective equipment received the same day the home was forced to begin treating two people discharged from hospitals with COVID-19.”

Related: The fix is obviously in on Cuomo’s ‘investigation’ of nursing-home horrors.

KEVIN WILLIAMSON: States Should Not Receive Bankruptcy Protection.

Mitch McConnell believes he has hit upon a solution for states that are upside-down on their pension obligations and other financial commitments: “I would certainly be in favor of allowing states to use the bankruptcy route,” he told Hugh Hewitt on Wednesday. “It’s saved some cities, and there’s no good reason for it not to be available.”

* * * * * * * *

Eventually, the political problem becomes a math problem, with the states obligated to spend more money than they have or can borrow. Even the Supreme Court of Oklahoma cannot produce blood from a stone.

The most likely way forward — the only plausible way forward short of gutting the Constitution — is for states to engage in a long, painful, disruptive negotiation with their creditors, their pensioners, and other interested parties. There will be endless lawsuits, unpopular budget cuts, unpopular tax hikes, and much else that is designed to make no one happy except for the lawyers. (The lawyers always get paid.) But these are the decisions the democratically elected representatives of the people of the several states have made, and they will have to live with them.

Call me an optimist, but: The more it hurts, the less likely they are to repeat the error.

I’m not at all sure about that – Amity Shlaes’ new Great Society book is a reminder that politicians sure love spending their as much taxpayer money as they can get their hands on, whether it’s good times economically, or bad.

IT’S A LONG, LONG WAY FROM WSJ’S NEWS SIDE TO THE EDITORIAL PAGE: David Marcus, one of many outstanding talents working for The Federalist these days, performs a systematic dissection of the Journal’s recent hit piece on HHS Secretary Alex Azar and finds a terminal disease – malicious liberal bias.

THE POWER LINE WEEK IN PICTURES: Same Damn Thing Edition.

OUT ON A LIMB: Communist China Looks for Europe’s Backbone, Confirms It Doesn’t Have One.

TOM BRADY MORPHED INTO FLORIDA MAN SO QUICKLY, EVERYONE NOTICED: Tom Brady Accidentally Trespasses In Tampa, ‘Holy S**t, He’s In My House!’

IT’S COME TO THIS: France limits sale of nicotine products after coronavirus research.

I LIKE THE GEORGE COSTANZA PIC: Indiana University orders faculty to report naked students on Zoom class sessions.

Just remember, the people who want to be publicly naked are almost never the people you want to see undressed.

MAN WHO DIED INGESTING FISH TANK CLEANER REMEMBERED AS INTELLIGENT, LEVELHEADED ENGINEER. Yes, the headline is in the typical trolling Washington Free Beacon style. But once you get past it:

“What bothers me about this is that Gary was a very intelligent man, a retired [mechanical] engineer who designed systems for John Deere in Waterloo, Iowa, and I really can’t see the scenario where Gary would say, ‘Yes, please, I would love to drink some of that Koi fish tank cleaner,'” one of his close friends told the Washington Free Beacon. “It just doesn’t make any sense.”

Lenius passed away on March 22 after he and his wife, Wanda Lenius, drank sodas that she had mixed with a fish tank cleaner not intended for human consumption, Wanda Lenius told the Free Beacon.

Trump critics and the news media have held up his death as a warning against following the president’s amateur medical advice, with some claiming that Trump is “lethal,” has “blood on his hands,” and should be tried at the Hague for “crimes against humanity.”

Those who know Gary Lenius, however, say they are troubled by how he has been portrayed in the media and can’t imagine him agreeing to drink an aquarium treatment. “I would like people to know that Gary was not the fool that some of the media stories and comments are depicting him to be,” said the same friend. “I really don’t think Gary knew what he was taking.”

Lenius spent over three decades as a senior engineer at John Deere in Waterloo, Iowa. He met Wanda in 2000. In 2012, he purchased a home in a gated mountain community in Mesa, Ariz. After he retired, the couple moved southwest full time. 

Read the whole thing; Democratic Party operatives with bylines aren’t happy that the WFB did actual journalism: Brave Reuters journo is super-pissed that the Washington Free Beacon did the MSM’s job for them — and did it better.

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Colleges nationwide cut costs with hundreds of layoffs, furloughs.

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CHANGE: FCC Signals Likely Revocation of Four Chinese Telecom Firms’ Licenses: Commission says the state-owned businesses must prove they aren’t subject to Chinese government control.

The Federal Communications Commission ordered four Chinese state-owned telecommunications operators to explain why it shouldn’t withdraw permission for them to operate in the U.S., paving the way for likely license revocations.

The FCC sent orders Friday to the U.S. units of state-owned carriers China Telecom Corp. and China Unicom, as well as to Pacific Networks Corp. and ComNet (USA) LLC, both of which are controlled by Chinese government investment firm Citic Group Corp.

In a statement, the FCC said its orders “give the companies the opportunity to demonstrate that they are not subject to the influence and control of the Chinese government.”

The move is part of a recent push by U.S. regulators to root out Chinese links to U.S. telecommunications infrastructure.

The orders “reflect our deep concern—one shared by the U.S. Departments of Commerce, Defense, Homeland Security, Justice and State and the U.S. Trade Representative—about these companies’ vulnerability to the exploitation, influence and control of the Chinese Communist Party, given that they are subsidiaries of Chinese state-owned entities,” FCC Chairman Ajit Pai said in the statement.

It’s going to be hard for them to prove that they’re not under Chinese government control, since they’re under Chinese government control.

PUNCH BACK TWICE AS HARD: Flynn attorney seeks immediate dismissal, saying new evidence shows Trump adviser was ‘framed.’ ‘The government has deliberately suppressed this evidence from the inception of this prosecution,’ defense motion says.

TEXAS TOWN REOPENS AHEAD OF STATE; NEIGHBORING MAYOR: STORES ARE ‘PANICKING:’ “While Texas is one of the more aggressive states in its reopening schedule, one town has made the decision to outpace even Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s ambitious timeline. Colleyville, Texas has become the first city in the state to reopen several ‘non-essential’ businesses and organizations, including churches, gyms and salons.”

LIFE AND DEATH IN CUOMO’S NEW YORK: New York refused to send nursing home’s COVID-19 patients to nearly empty USNS Comfort.

AT AMAZON, Fingertip Oximeter Blood Measure Oxygen Saturation Monitor,Digital Readings for Pulse Rate.

ANALYSIS: TRUE. Pompeo blasts ‘wildly soft’ Obama-Biden coddling of Beijing: ‘Allowed China to walk all over us.’

OMINOUS RUMBLINGS:

TRUMP’S NOT DOING THESE THINGS BECAUSE THEY HURT HIM POLITICALLY: Voters: Virus briefings show ‘bias and disrespect’ of Trump by media.