Dec 142020
 


Adolphe Yvon Genius of America c1870

 

Data Shows Ample US Hospital Capacity Nationwide (JTN)
‘Autoantibodies’ May Be Driving Severe Covid Cases (G.)
‘Like Nothing Happened’: Sydney Restaurants Are Bustling (AFR)
Ivermectin May Improve the Prognosis of Patients With COVID-19 (Science)
Sen. Manchin: Bipartisan COVID19 Relief Plan To Be Released On Monday (JTN)
Electoral College Voting Is Slated For Monday (JTN)
China’s Global Power Tops The US? New Measures Say No! (Brands)
Major Leak Of Members ‘Lifts The Lid’ On The Chinese Communist Party (Sky.au)
Expect the Most Evictions in History as Ban Expires (Mish)
Iowa Autopsy Report: DNC Meddling Led To Caucus Debacle (Pol.)
Hillary So Far Finds No Role On Team Biden (JTN)
Britons Told Not To Stockpile Food Ahead Of January (BBC)
President Trump Open to the Idea of Pardoning Edward Snowden (LH)

 

 

 

 

Too much panicking about this. To know if a system is overwhelmed at any given point, you must know what its normal occupancy rate is. 90% capacity sounds scary, but not if it’s always at that capacity this time of year.

Data Shows Ample US Hospital Capacity Nationwide (JTN)

As fears persist of overwhelmed medical systems and at-capacity hospitals nationwide, data indicate that ample hospital space remains available for both COVID-19 patients and other medical needs, with one official at a major hospital network stating that the country is “managing pretty well” the latest surge of COVID-19. For most of 2020, rising positive test results of COVID-19 have brought with them fears of swamped hospitals, overwhelmed medical systems, emergency patients being turned away, and COVID-19 patients being triaged, suffering and dying in hallways and vestibules. Much of that fear crystallized in the early stages of the pandemic, when parts of the northern Italian medical system were put under significant strain due to a crush of COVID-19 patients.

In response, leaders and medical officials around the world suspended elective surgeries and constructed emergency medical facilities to cope with anticipated waves of COVID-19 patients. In many cases those facilities were eventually shuttered for lack of patients, even after millions of dollars had been invested in their construction. In Chicago, for instance, the city spent $120,000,000 on four facilities to treat a total of 38 patients. The latest spike in positive COVID tests has brought renewed fears of hospitals straining under an influx of COVID-19 patients, with some facilities across the country reporting difficulties managing large numbers of patients, either from a dwindling number of scarce beds or not enough medical officials to man them, or both.

Yet federal government data compiled from state-level reports suggests that hospitals nationwide have considerable space left to deal with both routine medical issues and COVID-19 patients. The Department of Health and Human Services offers on its website estimates of hospitalization rates across the United States. The data, the department says, is “estimated from hospital submissions, either reported through their state or reported through HHS Protect,” which the department describes as “a secure data ecosystem … for sharing, parsing, housing, and accessing COVID-19 data.” The HHS numbers belie forecasts of impending collapse of the U.S. medical system. As of Saturday, the department estimated that hospitals nationwide were at about 75% capacity. ICU beds were even lower, at 63.5%. Patients who had tested positive for COVID-19 occupied just under 15% of all beds nationwide.

Even in areas that have recently posted huge surges in positive COVID tests, the numbers were largely similar to the national average: In New York, 76% of hospital beds (and 61% of ICU beds) were taken. Dr. Joanne Roberts, the chief value officer of Providence St. Joseph Health system, told Just the News that “a well-functioning hospital probably runs about 85% capacity on an average day.” The problem, she pointed out, is that a virus like COVID-19 can “quickly overwhelm that last 15%” due to its virulency and ability to send a significant number of patients to the hospital at once.

Read more …

“Because antibodies can persist for a long time, it’s conceivable that they may contribute to the development of long-Covid diseases..”

‘Autoantibodies’ May Be Driving Severe Covid Cases (G.)

Dramatic levels of “friendly fire” from the immune system may drive severe Covid-19 disease and leave patients with “long Covid” – when medical problems persist for a significant time after the virus has been beaten – scientists have said. Researchers at Yale University found that Covid-19 patients had large numbers of misguided antibodies in their blood that targeted the organs, tissues and the immune system itself, rather than fighting off the invading virus. The scientists compared immune responses in patients and uninfected people and discovered scores of aberrant antibodies in the former.These blocked antiviral defences, wiped out helpful immune cells, and attacked the body on multiple fronts, from the brain, blood vessels and liver to connective tissue and the gastrointestinal tract.

Further tests revealed that the more “autoantibodies” patients had in their blood, the worse their disease. The Covid-19 patients had more antibodies that had turned on them than people with lupus, an autoimmune disease caused by similar wayward antibodies. “Covid-19 patients make autoantibodies that actually interfere with immune responses against the virus,” said Aaron Ring, an immunobiologist at Yale and senior author on the study. Numerous other autoantibodies attacked parts of the body that are known to become damaged in those with the disease. “We certainly believe that these autoantibodies are harmful to patients with Covid-19,” said Ring, adding that the harmful effects may well continue after the infection has abated, leaving patients with longer-lasting medical problems. “Because antibodies can persist for a long time, it’s conceivable that they may contribute to the development of long-Covid diseases,” he said. Ring partnered with Akiko Iwasaki, a professor of immunobiology at Yale, to screen 194 patients and hospital workers with varying severities of Covid infection for autoantibodies that targeted nearly 3,000 human proteins.

Antibodies disable viruses by latching on to proteins on the virus surface, but autoantibodies are the wrong shape and mistakenly bind to proteins that are on, or have been released by, human cells. Writing in the study, which has yet to be peer reviewed and published in a journal, the scientists describe how Covid patients had “dramatic increases in autoantibody reactivities” compared with 30 healthy hospital workers who did not have the virus. While certain autoantibodies in some patients were apparently present before Covid-19 infection, others appeared and ramped up as the disease progressed. More than 5% of hospitalised patients had autoantibodies that weakened a key arm of the immune defence that is orchestrated by proteins called interferons. These patients were unable to control the amount of virus in their bodies and so developed more serious illness.

Read more …

Has the word “ivermectin” been banned on social media? I see people spell it as iv3rm3ctin.

Ivermectin May Improve the Prognosis of Patients With COVID-19 (Science)

Dear Editor:
The pandemic coronavirus disease 19 (COVID-19), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), has been spread rapidly worldwide with considerable morbidity and mortality. COVID-19 patients have various clinical presentations: asymptomatic, exhibit mild flu-like symptoms, be severely ill or death. In addition to elder age and comorbidities, higher levels of D-dimer and C-reactive protein (CRP) and lower levels of lymphocyte and eosinophil as well as a cytokine storm are associated with disease severity in COVID-19 patients. The virus load may be a main determinant underlying the pathological diversity in COVID-19 patients.

Thus, an effective antiviral treatment is essential to improve the prognosis of patients with COVID-19.7 In the absence of specific anti-SARS-CoV-2 agents, various drugs with antiviral potential are now used to contain the virus in COVID-19 patients. Ivermectin, a US FDA-approved anthelminthic, has garnered enormous interest for treating COVID-19 as it is safe and cheap and has strong antiviral activities against board ranges of viruses including SARS-CoV-2 in vitro. Despite the widespread use of ivermectin, to our knowledge, there is currently no published clinical reports of ivermectin in COVID-19 patients. Here, we assessed the clinical efficacy of ivermectin in COVID-19 patients.

This retrospective study enrolled a total of 325 consecutive patients with SARS-CoV-2 infection confirmed by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) of nasal swabs in SK hospital, a unit dedicated to COVID-19 at Mymensingh Medical College Hospital (MMCH), Mymensingh, Bangladesh, from April to June 2020. Of these, the present study included 248 adult COVID-19 patients free from any other serious pathological conditions: 115 received ivermectin plus standard care (SC), while 133 received only SC. Remaining 77 patients who were under 18 years of age or transferred from other facilities and received different management approaches including partial hospital stays or treated with different therapeutic agents prior to hospital admission were excluded from the analysis.

The two groups were compared in terms of time to SARS-CoV-2 negativity, disease progression (develop pneumonia to severe respiratory distress), duration of hospital stays, and mortality rate. Ivermectin was given once at dose of 12 mg within 24-h after hospital admission. SC was provided as required and included antipyretics for fever, anti-histamines for cough, and antibiotics to control secondary infection. The study was approved by MMCH and informed consent was obtained from all patients or their relatives before starting treatment. Categorical variables are shown as frequencies and percentages and continuous variables as the median and interquartile range (IQR). Differences with 95% confidence intervals (CI) were computed to show the level of certainty. Paired t-tests or Pearson Chi-square test were used to analyze statistical differences. All calculations were performed using SAS, version 9.4 (Cary, NC, USA).

Read more …

Meanwhile, on the other side of the world…

‘Like Nothing Happened’: Sydney Restaurants Are Bustling (AFR)

At lunchtime in Barangaroo in downtown Sydney, it’s as though the pandemic never happened. Restaurants and cafes are bustling, and Matias Munoz, assistant manager at Bel and Brio, says the Italian restaurant has been flat out from open to close. “I think it’s because they’ve had a really tough year and they want to celebrate. That’s what the customers say to me,” Mr Munoz said. The NSW government on Monday lifted a public health order requiring employers to let staff work from home in the hope of bringing customers back to struggling city businesses. New mobility data shows residents in most capital cities are driving more than ever, with Sydney 17 per cent above the benchmark set in January before the pandemic lockdown.

Capacity on NSW’s public transport is being boosted as the government rolls back health restrictions and social distancing requirements. Most employers do not plan to bring workers back to their desks until early next year, and consumer data shows hospitality venues in central business districts have been gutted. But tell that to Mr Munoz, whose restaurant reopened in July after the first lockdown. “We reopened and it looked like nothing happened. People were coming like normal,” he said. The restaurant is handling 400 bookings per day. Trade lulled during the early days of Victoria’s second wave as even Sydneysiders stayed home before quickly recovering.

“Compared to the last year, we’re doing the same numbers,” Mr Munoz said. Even on a Monday, typically their quietest day, the restaurant is packed. Joseph Le, manager at nearby Lotus, was overseeing a full house and said it was good to be back to normal after the worrying he experienced during the early days of the pandemic. “[I thought] am I going to lose my job? How can I pay my bills?” Mr Le said. “I’m so happy and lucky to be here.”

Read more …

Better get it done, and done well. It’s Christmas time.

Sen. Manchin: Bipartisan COVID19 Relief Plan To Be Released On Monday (JTN)

Senator Joe Manchin during an interview on Fox News Sunday with host Chris Wallace said that a bipartisan group of lawmakers’ proposed COVID-19 relief legislation will be released on Monday. Wallace asked if a $908 billion compromise plan is off the table, and if there were a chance that Congress would leave Washington for the rest of the year without passing a COVID relief bill. Manchin responded that “the plan is alive and well,” and he shot down the concept of Congress skipping town before approving any relief. “We’ll have a bill produced for the American people tomorrow, $908 billion dollars,” the West Virginia Democrat said about the proposal that will be shared. “We’re trying to get through the toughest first quarter of our country that we’ve ever faced.”


Manchin said he could not guarantee that the legislation would pass. “But I can tell you one thing: What’s the alternative? What are you going to do? We’ve given one month, day and night, our staffs have worked around the clock,” he said. “We’ve done everything we can to put an all-inclusive product together. Pick whatever parts you like, whatever parts you don’t like. Put it all together or take it as a whole. We’re gonna give it to you the way we think the American people need it. In an emergency situation, we need this legislation.”

Read more …

Sidney Powell announced 4 major cases to go before SCOTUS. We’re not done yet, but we’re getting there.

Electoral College Voting Is Slated For Monday (JTN)

Members of the Electoral College will cast their votes for president on Monday, with Joe Biden expected to receive 306 electoral votes compared to just 232 for President Trump. A candidate must secure 270 to win the presidency. The step comes as President Trump has so far chosen not to concede to Biden, filing a host of lawsuits alleging that fraud tainted the 2020 election. The U.S. Constitution provides that each state will have a quantity of electors equivalent to the combined number of senators and House members that the state is entitled to have in the nation’s legislature. Thus, states with larger populations have more electoral votes than states with smaller populations. The candidate who wins the national popular vote does not always win the Electoral College vote.

But the Electoral College vote, not the national popular vote, determines which candidate wins the presidential contest. The Associated Press reported that the Electoral College does not meet in one central location, but electors for every state and the District of Columbia gather at a location selected by their own legislature. With the exception of Maine and Nebraska, states award all of their Electoral College votes to the winner of the state’s popular vote. Nevada and Maine divide their Electoral College votes between the statewide winner and the victor in each congressional district. “Maine awards two of its four electoral votes to the statewide winner, but also allocates an electoral vote to the popular vote winner in each of its two congressional districts,” according to CBS News. “Nebraska gives two of its five electoral votes to the statewide winner, with the remaining three going to the popular vote winner in each of its three congressional districts.”

“In 32 states and the District of Columbia, laws require electors to vote for the popular-vote winner,” the AP reported. “Electors almost always vote for the state winner anyway, because they generally are devoted to their political party,” the outlet noted. On Jan. 6, Vice President Mike Pence will preside over a joint session of the U.S. Congress and the votes will be counted. If a minimum of one lawmaker from each chamber of the nation’s bicameral legislature objects via writing to some electoral votes, each chamber would debate the matter separately. “An objection to a state’s electoral vote must be approved by both houses in order for any contested votes to be excluded,” according to the Congressional Research Service.

Read more …

How to measure power.

China’s Global Power Tops The US? New Measures Say No! (Brands)

Traditionally, measures of power focused on attributes such as population, energy consumption and production of steel or other indicators of industrial strength. In the information age, these indices tell us relatively little about whether a country can get its way in world affairs. It is still common, though, to assess power through blunt measures like GDP or military spending. Analysts who argue that Beijing is overtaking the U.S. habitually note that China’s GDP may soon surpass America’s. But GDP is a snapshot of activity rather than a measure of overall wealth. Some countries that spend massively on military power, such as Saudi Arabia, are quite useless in projecting it. So how can we determine the balance of advantage in a long rivalry? The groundbreaking academic work is giving us better answers.

The first category focuses on refining our grasp of economic and military might. Michael Beckley of the American Enterprise Institute (where I am also a fellow) has developed a model that measures net power rather than gross power by accounting for things such as security costs (“the price a government pays to police and protect its citizens”) and production costs (how much it costs, in material and environmental degradation, to build that coal power plant). He finds, not surprisingly, that the U.S. fares far better than China, an authoritarian state with vast internal security costs and a prodigiously wasteful approach to stimulating growth. Similarly, it is critical that American per capita GDP dwarfs China’s, because that means the U.S. has more wealth left over, after it feeds its population, to pursue global influence. Other work has better accounted for the way wealth accrues over time, and found that the U.S. will still have far more overall economic power than China even after China’s GDP eclipses America’s.

The second category better captures the reality of “network power.” In a landmark paper published in 2019, Abraham Newman of Georgetown University and Henry Farrell, my colleague at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, argue that the centrality of the dollar to international financial networks — which persists, despite decades of handwringing about its decline — gives the U.S. outsized coercive leverage. Scholars have also affirmed something that policymakers have long understood: America punches far above its own weight in global affairs, because of the network of military, economic and diplomatic partners it leads. China has nothing equivalent.

The third category accounts for less tangible forms of power. For decades, analysts have grasped that soft power — the degree of admiration and emulation a country inspires — matters enormously. An intriguing study by Ted Hopf of the National University of Singapore, Bentley Allan of Johns Hopkins and Srdjan Vucetic of the University of Ottawa demonstrates that, even though America’s global favorability ratings have plummeted under President Donald Trump, there remains strong global support for democracy and free-market economic policies. That’s a body blow for an authoritarian, mercantilist China, which, the authors predict, “is unlikely to become the hegemon in the near term.” It also helps explain why European states are systematically turning away from Beijing even amid enormous turbulence in their relations with the U.S.

Read more …

A lot of interest in China these days.

Major Leak Of Members ‘Lifts The Lid’ On The Chinese Communist Party (Sky.au)

A major leak containing a register with the details of nearly two million CCP members has occurred – exposing members who are now working all over the world, while also lifting the lid on how the party operates under Xi Jinping, says Sharri Markson. Ms Markson said the leak is a register with the details of Communist Party members, including their names, party position, birthday, national ID number and ethnicity. “It is believed to be the first leak of its kind in the world,” the Sky News host said. “What’s amazing about this database is not just that it exposes people who are members of the communist party, and who are now living and working all over the world, from Australia to the US to the UK,” Ms Markson said. “But it’s amazing because it lifts the lid on how the party operates under President and Chairman Xi Jinping”.


Ms Markson said the leak demonstrates party branches are embedded in some of the world’s biggest companies and even inside government agencies. “Communist party branches have been set up inside western companies, allowing the infiltration of those companies by CCP members – who, if called on, are answerable directly to the communist party, to the Chairman, the president himself,” she said. “Along with the personal identifying details of 1.95 million communist party members, mostly from Shanghai, there are also the details of 79,000 communist party branches, many of them inside companies”. Ms Markson said the leak is a significant security breach likely to embarrass Xi Jinping. “It is also going to embarrass some global companies who appear to have no plan in place to protect their intellectual property from theft. From economic espionage,” she said.

Read more …

In a pandemic. Is there a worse idea possible?

Expect the Most Evictions in History as Ban Expires (Mish)

“Millions of U.S. renters face the prospect of eviction in January unless federal officials extend protections put in place during the Covid-19 pandemic. That month is when the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s ban on evictions is set to expire. The moratorium protects tenants who have missed monthly rent payments from being thrown out of their homes if they declare financial hardship. The CDC ordered the halt on evictions under the Public Health Service Act, which allows the federal government to enact regulations that help stop the spread of infectious diseases. Between 2.4 million and 5 million American households are at risk of eviction in January alone, and millions more will be vulnerable in the months after, according to estimates from the investment bank and financial-advisory firm Stout Risius Ross.

Landlords have already filed more than 150,000 eviction petitions during the pandemic in the 27 cities tracked by Princeton University’s Eviction Lab. Many of those tenants have lost their cases, and are now on the hook for all their back rent.” ‘I don’t see how it’s possible that we’re not going to see more evictions on Jan. 1 than we’ve ever seen in a month,’ said John Pollock, staff attorney at the Public Justice Center It’s easy to sympathize with tenants but what about landlords who cannot pay mortgages? Are we to postpone evictions forever while landlords lose their property? There has been no discussion in any of the recent Covid packages for further moratoriums nor aid to landlords who have not been paid for months. So unless there is specific aid sufficient aid in the bill to allow tenants to catch up, millions of evictions are on the way.

Read more …

After protecting the DNC for years, the press suddenly wake up?!

Iowa Autopsy Report: DNC Meddling Led To Caucus Debacle (Pol.)

Democratic National Committee meddling, combined with missteps by the state Democratic Party, were the primary drivers of the chaos that torpedoed the Iowa caucuses earlier this year, according to a new audit commissioned by the state party. The report, which was distributed to the Iowa Democratic Party State Central Committee at a meeting Saturday morning and obtained by POLITICO, identified a series of errors made by the DNC, IDP and the technology company contracted by the state party to build a reporting app to collect caucus results. The February caucuses were overrun by foul-ups: The state party was unable to report a winner on caucus night, the mobile app to report results failed to work for many precinct chairs, the back-up telephone systems were jammed and some precincts had initial reporting errors.

The state party chair, Troy Price, resigned in the wake of the debacle, which put Iowa’s status as the first in the nation nominating contest in serious jeopardy. But the report pins the blame squarely on the DNC for the heart of the problem on caucus night — the delay in the reporting of the results. According to the report, the DNC demanded the technology company, Shadow, build a conversion tool just weeks before the caucuses to allow the DNC to have real-time access to the raw numbers because the national party feared the app would miscalculate results. The DNC’s data system used a different database format than Shadow’s reporting app, which caused multiple problems.

“Attempting to graft an entirely new software element onto the back-end reporting system at the proverbial eleventh hour is likely always going to be problematic, and it was ultimately the cause of a major problem on caucus night,” the report concludes. “Furthermore, the IDP was not involved in the development of this tool. The IDP simply permitted the DNC to direct the IDP’s vendor.” The audit states the conversion tool had coding errors that spit out inaccurate numbers and caused confusion about the accuracy of the results, eventually leading to delays in reporting. But the state party’s app never malfunctioned nor was hacked, the report concludes.

“When the DNC’s database conversion tool failed to work correctly, it caused the DNC to wrongly stop the IDP from reporting its results, and the IDP’s entire planned reporting process was thrown into disarray,” the report says. “The DNC’s interjection was the catalyst for the resulting chaos in the boiler room and in the IDP’s attempts to manually collect and confirm caucus results by hand. If the DNC had not interjected itself into the results reporting process based on its erroneous data conversion, caucus night could conceivably have proceeded according to the IDP’s initial plan.”

Read more …

But Samantha Power is back in, it appears.

Hillary So Far Finds No Role On Team Biden (JTN)

Have you noticed? Hillary Clinton is suddenly — and finally — nowhere to be found. Well before she lost the 2016 presidential election to President Trump, the former first lady pushed a conspiracy theory that eventually grew into a major, two-year investigation: Trump had colluded with the Russians in order to alter the outcome of the race. That didn’t pan out, but Hillary had other excuses. For months — which turned into years — she blamed FBI Director James Comey, Russia, computer bots, WikiLeaks, Sen. Bernie Sanders, Facebook, Joe Biden, fake news, Twitter, voter ID laws, the vast right-wing conspiracy, sexism, Barack Obama, ageism, child sex pervert Anthony Weiner, white women, xenophobia, black people, the Electoral College, the Democratic National Committee, misogyny, women cowed by their husbands, and even former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani (how America’s Mayor caused Clinton to lose Wisconsin and Pennsylvania and Michigan and Florida is anybody’s guess).

But the mainstream media despises Trump, and Clinton was a reliable gadfly, so she stayed in the news regularly. She even made millions hawking her book, “What Happened,” her take on why she lost the election. Yet it’s been more than a month since Election Day 2020, and Americans haven hardly heard a peep out of her. What’s more, the former secretary of state for President Barack Obama has been given no role in a prospective Biden administration, even though at 72 she’s younger the 78-year-old Biden. It’s not like Biden hasn’t made room for others from former administrations. After all, he found room as climate czar for John Kerry, who served as secretary of state from 2013 to 2017 under Obama. But so far, nothing for Clinton.

Clinton’s omission is odd, given that she won nearly 66 million votes in 2016. She also represents a powerful wing of the party — albeit an old and fading faction — along with her husband, former President Bill Clinton, who remains extremely popular with the rank and file of the party. And she’s got the bona fides: Secretary of State, two-term senator, and architect of a planned overhaul of health care that eventually morphed into Obamacare. As Biden made room for Kerry on climate, he could give Clinton a role on health care. And the former vice president could tap Hillary’s decades of experience, even if just as an adviser, whether formal or informal.

Shortly after Election Day, rumors circulated that Biden was considering Clinton for a role in his administration, perhaps as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. The move “would be a way for Biden to highlight the importance of that position in his administration, and that placing her there would raise the prestige of the U.N. itself at a time when global cooperation and the U.S. role on the world stage, has ebbed,” sources told the Washington Post. But a few weeks later, Biden picked Linda Thomas-Greenfield, a 35-year veteran of the foreign service who oversaw the Bureau of African Affairs during the Obama administration, for the slot.

Read more …

Yes, you got that right. The day after the UK government tells supermarkets to stockpile food, they now tell their citizens to do the opposite. Sweet Jesus.

Britons Told Not To Stockpile Food Ahead Of January (BBC)

Households have been warned not to stockpile food and toilet roll ahead of 1 January when the UK stops trading under EU rules. On Sunday, the UK and the EU agreed to extend a deadline aimed at reaching a deal on post-Brexit trade. The British Retail Consortium (BRC) said ongoing uncertainty made it harder for firms to prepare for the New Year. But it said shops had plenty of supplies and shoppers must not buy more food than usual. “Retailers are doing everything they can to prepare for all eventualities on 1 January – increasing the stock of tins, toilet rolls and other longer life products so there will be sufficient supply of essential products,” said BRC chief executive Helen Dickinson.


“While no amount of preparation by retailers can entirely prevent disruption there is no need for the public to buy more food than usual as the main impact will be on imported fresh produce, such as fresh fruit and vegetables, which cannot be stored for long periods by either retailers or consumers.” Supermarkets are now used to dealing with anxious shoppers. During the first lockdown earlier this year to stop the spread of the coronavirus, grocers introduced limits on goods such as toilet roll, dried pasta and UHT milk after panic buying by Britons. There are fears shoppers might think disruption at ports after 31 December could lead to shortages in shops as the UK transitions to new trading rules with the EU.

Read more …

Of course Snowden has urged him to pardon Assange.

President Trump Open to the Idea of Pardoning Edward Snowden (LH)

The push to have President Trump pardon NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden is heating up as a group in Congress has been urging the President to do the right thing and free this patriot. There have been a growing list of Republicans and Democrats that are pushing the outgoing President to do the right thing and grant a full and complete pardon of Snowden so he can return home to the United States. Edward Snowden is famous for declassifying an NSA program that was used to spy on the American people. He has been hunted for years by the federal government and has sought asylum in multiple countries.

Currently he resides in Russia where is viewed in Liberty circles as a patriot for his act to expose the governments attempt to pry into the lives of ordinary Americans. He deserves a pardon and Trump needs to use one of his last acts as President to make history right. Call your Congressman and women and urge them to put pressure of the White House. Contact the White House as well using this link.

Read more …

 

 

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Home Forums Debt Rattle December 14 2020

Viewing 40 posts - 1 through 40 (of 45 total)
  • Author
    Posts
  • #66813

    Adolphe Yvon Genius of America c1870   • Data Shows Ample US Hospital Capacity Nationwide (JTN) • ‘Autoantibodies’ May Be Driving Severe Covid Ca
    [See the full post at: Debt Rattle December 14 2020]

    #66814
    V. Arnold
    Participant

    Adolphe Yvon Genius of America c1870

    Wow! That’s an amazing painting for a huge number of reasons…
    …where to start?…
    The Title maybe? Or the composition?
    …or…or…or…

    #66815

    Wow! That’s an amazing painting for a huge number of reasons…

    Clicking it gives you the very large version. Yes, it might be good to have some kind of overview of every element he put in there, and the meaning(s).

    #66816
    Polder Dweller
    Participant

    The Covid-19 patients had more antibodies that had turned on them than people with lupus, an autoimmune disease caused by similar wayward antibodies.

    Errm, excuse me, but hydroxychloroquine is used to treat people with lupus.

    #66817

    GLOBAL OUTAGES OF GOOGLE SERVICES REPORTED: GMAIL, YOUTUBE & OTHERS ARE DOWN

    #66818
    Mister Roboto
    Participant

    Based on what Dr. Chris Martenson has been informing me about Ivermectin, it shows rather more than just “promise”. I’m reasonably sure that if an Ivermectin-based treatment-regimen were implemented worldwide, I would entirely cease being concerned about Covid, as Ivermectin would appear to have prophylactic effects, curative effects on both acute and chronic Covid-related sickness, and it knocks out transmissibility, to boot. The only reason it isn’t being implemented instantly, completely, and universally, I really do think, is because Ivermectin is cheap and doesn’t make the big bundle of cash for Big Pharma that these new and relatively untested vaccines will. You will recall that I recently posted a comment about Dr. Martenson’s video about Ivermectin being censored by YouTube and Facebook.

    I also deplore the fact that hydroxychloriquine was derided as a treatment option merely because President Trump recommended it. I’m no fan of the man at all, but something isn’t automatically wrong just because Donald Trump said it!

    #66819
    Mister Roboto
    Participant

    @Raul: My G-Mail is working just fine right now.

    #66820
    John Day
    Participant

    Georgia Governor, Brian Kemp did not attend the Trump rally after his 19 year old daughter’s 20 year old boyfriend was killed in a fiery inferno right after his car crashed Friday 12/4/20. The governor also went back on his promise to check all the signatures on the ballots after that. Picture of the flaming car, billowing smoke to the sky is here, along with pictures of the lovely young couple. “Accident”? Warning?Lucy described the feelings of grief she felt over Deal’s death.
    ‘The love he showed me was beyond comprehension and I didn’t deserve it. My heart aches at the hole he left in my heart, but oh what a blessing it is that I can rejoice in the truth that we have a sovereign God and Harrison is at home with Him, and I will see him again.
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9022709/Daughter-Georgia-Gov-Kemp-mourns-death-Sen-Loefflers-aide.html

    If you saw this, then my gmail is working in Austin this morning.

    #66821
    John Day
    Participant

    Hydroxychloroquine , zinc and azithromycin was the best combination going in the spring, and was widely used, and people taking Hcq chronically had a very low incidence from COVID, and rare mortality.
    Ivermectin seems to be much netter, as information has come in since late spring and early summer, all very favorable.

    #66822
    John Day
    Participant

    These guys have it together. You met Pierre Kory MD, already. Thanks Dr Clif.

    Home

    #66823

    In which ivermectin now takes the place of azithromycin?!

    #66824
    Mister Roboto
    Participant

    My guess is that Iver. takes the place of Hydroxy.

    #66825
    John Day
    Participant

    Votes And Vaccines post is up. https://www.johndayblog.com/2020/12/votes-and-vaccines.html

    You can buy ivermectin, zinc, doxycycline treatment kits from India here. Dosing is one-size-sorta-fits-all. Thanks Jeremy:
    https://www.rxindia.com/medicines/medicines-by-therapeutic-class/covid-19/ziverdo-kit/

    “Pathogenic Priming” is that good thing I have mentioned several times, which happens when a vaccine induces an antibody response which inadvertently makes you sick or kills you when the infectious agent enters the body, and the immune response is activated.
    It’s usually detected in animal trials.
    This was the problem with all the coronavirus vaccine attempts after SARS. Lab animals died when the vaccine was “successful”.
    Pfizer COVID Vaccine Trial Shows Alarming Evidence of Pathogenic Priming in Older Adults

    Pfizer COVID Vaccine Trial Shows Alarming Evidence of Pathogenic Priming in Older Adults

    ​ Another funny thing can happen with 2-dose vaccines, which is what Astra-Zeneca/Oxford discovered when half of a first dose worked better than a whole first dose. What happened was that the immunity induced by the first full dose was directed against the viral vector, meant to enter the human cell and deliver the genetic material. So, the viral vector got destroyed pronto, and the second dose never did mch. When the first dose was accidentally halved in one arm of the trial, it worked better. Russia can help, by letting Astra-Zeneca give one dose of Sputnik-V vaccine, which uses a different viral vector, so the full dose enters cells each time.
    That’s science for ya’. Never know what will turn up in carefully run experiments. Gotta’ double and triple check for problems. Takes years.
    Both AZ and Russian vaccines are cheap-for-the-world and very similar.​( I’ve got vitamin-D, and ivermectin ready, so not rushed.)
    https://www.moonofalabama.org/2020/12/russian-cooperation-saves-british-vaccine.html

    ​Vitamin-D, Bill. Ivermectin, Bill…​
    Bill Gates Says Lockdowns Should Carry On Into 2022
    Declares ‘normal’ will not return until there are “high vaccination rates”

    Video: Bill Gates Says Lockdowns Should Carry On Into 2022

    #66826
    Dr. D
    Participant

    Iverm3ct3n (trying to be cool and trendy)
    https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/results/NCT04425850

    Study: ZERO cases as prophylactic, very high effectiveness when taken early, a virtual cure.

    pic

    By why would we use it when we can throw people in ovens and take their gold teeth?

    So add to the long, long list of medical mass-murders.

    #66827
    Mister Roboto
    Participant

    So add to the long, long list of medical mass-murders.

    I’m in complete agreement with you, for a change. Normally, I’m very conspiracy-theory averse, but I’m really starting to wonder if perhaps the oligarchic PTB simply want to get rid of as many of the poor people with chronic poor health/ preconditions and the elderly as they can in anticipation of…something.

    #66828
    Polder Dweller
    Participant

    @Mr Roboto

    That’s something that an awful lot of people are thinking but very few dare say out loud, so it’s good you say it. There are certainly those amongst the rich and famous who talk openly about the world being overpopulated.

    #66829
    Mister Roboto
    Participant

    We’ve been adding a billion more people every 12-13 years since 1961, so I’m thinking we are going to hit a wall with that, at some point. Still, I will never countenance any sort of mass-murder as a solution.

    #66830
    Polder Dweller
    Participant

    Amen to that.

    #66831
    madamski cafone
    Participant

    The situation with population control is like that with organ harvesting: no one has the courage to deal with it plainly as a resource issue, so we leave it to donations and waiting lists and an ever-growing black market, some of it under semi-open government control.

    A hundred years ago, women were tortured and jailed in America for promoting safe modern birth control methods. Abortion is deemed evil incarnate by the same political faction that most insistently endorses sending young men overseas to kill and maim and be killed or maimed for dubious causes. Abortion is deemed sacred, and war evil, by the loyally opposing other political faction while it embraces policies that attack the existence of human family structures both directly and indirectly, and consistently votes for politicians whose foreign policies make Dubya look nice.

    Both sides seem equally unwitting where not willfully ignorant.

    Meanwhile, the population can no longer be sustained. Its current growth arc has its future decimation ingrained into its structure. We the people show little interest in curbing our personal reproduction rates. Like everything else, we feel that “somebody ought to do something about it”. Apparently, somebody is. How dare they?! Don’t these leaders, whom we uphold and enrich despite their glaring unworthiness for their positions, know they are supposed to not try and fix things but only make vaguely agreeable verbal noises about the issues or things that somewhat resembles those issues?

    People are going to die in unprecedented huge numbers over the next few decades, period. Old people are the most dispensable and expensive part of our growing unsupportable population. Nursing homes are a cultural blight that shows how everything has been compartmentalized into manageably marketable pens. As cryptic forced euthanasia goes, it makes sense. (I am at an age and condition of health where many people look to nursing home care. Ick, I say, but note that I am pointing a finger at myself when I identify the geriatric as the first most dispensable demographic profile.)

    So, if the world’s bloated plutocrats and oligarchs choose to do something about arguably the single most pressing and defining issue of our times, while we bicker over reproduction planning policies and who to (stop) bomb(ing) next, we must of course oppose them. Because we, the romantically glorified people of a mighty democratic republic, who won’t come together to fix things except in the most trivial (yet typically hostile) ways, will not tolerate the powers that be doing anything except the usual: bomb (or not) the hell out of foreigners while burning out the brains of our fellow citizens.

    ^&*

    Google’s platforms have been acting wonky over the weekend, but especially Sunday night, for at least a month. Major overhauls must be happening. Hackers probably exacerbate this, since they would recognize immediately the situation and exploit its vulnerabilities.

    #66832
    madamski cafone
    Participant

    The following video was shared above. I repeat it to ask us to lookat Gates’ facial expressions. I don’t think a human could show more internal conflict without chewing his face from the inside and then swallowing it:

    Bill Gates Lockdown Video

    #66833
    Mr. House
    Participant

    @madamski

    I just have a problem with people who think they can play god.

    #66834
    Doc Robinson
    Participant

    ‘Like Nothing Happened’: Sydney Restaurants Are Bustling (AFR)

    Now Australia is at the point where they are just locking down their borders, instead of locking down their people. Back in July it was looking grim there.

    Looking back at the Debt Rattle for July 22 2020:

    It Has Become Clear Elimination Of The Virus Is The Best Option (Age)

    …Our already-stretched health system is at risk of being stretched beyond its limit. We have tried to suppress this virus; to keep infection numbers low enough to allow our hospitals to cope, while not actively trying to stamp it out. In Melbourne, it has failed… Many have argued for an explicit elimination strategy, acknowledging that while not without its costs, ultimately it is the best choice for our society and economy…Yet the current six-week lockdown is unlikely to eliminate the virus, according to new analysis in the Medical Journal of Australia. We must either go harder, or go longer.

    While it is the best option for Australia, elimination has three important drawbacks: its impacts would be disproportionately felt by disadvantaged and marginalised people; it would require a longer, more intense period of initial lockdown; and it would make us dependent on a vaccine… Better to do it once (or twice, as in Melbourne) and do it properly, rather than wait for infections to rise again in a few months and have to do it all again.

    If we succeed in ridding ourselves of SARS-CoV-2, we will make ourselves reliant on a vaccine. Until one is found, our borders will have to remain closed. The virus will become endemic in many other countries – countries who, unlike us, no longer have the option of eliminating it. Opening our borders too early would simply be kicking the can down the road.

    https://www.theage.com.au/politics/victoria/as-more-doctors-and-nurses-fall-sick-it-has-become-clear-elimination-is-the-best-option-20200721-p55dzi.html

    https://www.theautomaticearth.com/2020/07/debt-rattle-july-22-2020/

    #66835

    The ivermectin story is heartbreaking. It’s so simple: You can have this safe drug or this dodgy vaccine. The real puzzle is how many would still want the prick.
    I find the metaphors of religion have been very useful lately. It sure seems there are evil forces at work these days.

    We need to kill the trusting and obedient-
    Our dear, dark Lord insists it’s for the best.
    To only leave the fighters is expedient
    To feather Baphomet’s dank, mangy nest.

    “Their outrage is delicious,” says the Deep One.
    “Adrenochrome makes blood so very sweet-
    The thrashing entertains, and power is such fun
    When the prey are at it, fighting in the street.”

    “/S”
    China is our buddy.
    China is our friend.
    China knows how things are run-
    They’ll run it ’til the End.

    Madamski: Organ harvesting. I have a feeling that child-trafficking is the “friendly” cover story for the organ harvesting market. I used to think it was blackmail that runs the show, but that’s just the stick. The carrot is hearts, lungs, kidneys, and more if you play along.
    As for population control, I believe we already know that if women have access to, and privacy concerning birth control, they have fewer children. To force a child on a woman who loathes it doesn’t just ruin her life, it can produce the future sociopath- the person with a chip on his or her shoulder who has a rotten model of love.

    Mt. Etna: each district looks like a lava flow.

    #66836
    phoenixvoice
    Participant

    The best ethical ways to get a handle on the population?
    1. Free, effective birth control available to all.
    2. A cultural mythos that promotes choosing when to have children, rather than allowing nature to take its course.
    3. Social security or something akin to it so that old age care is guaranteed and not dependent upon whether or not one has children or how many children one has.
    4. A cultural mythos that supports anyone who doesn’t want to have children — so that childlessness is a viable choice that is not frowned on.
    5. Closely examine any anti poverty measures that inadvertently “pay” people to have children. For example, an impoverished parent will often be eligible for Medicaid, while an impoverished adult with no dependents is not eligible for Medicaid. Same goes for food stamps. Parents should be supported in their decisions to raise children — society’s future depends on it — but if our population needs to be curbed ethically, we also need to be supportive of individuals who choose not to procreate. Too often in capitalism there is belief that society must allow the poor to suffer in order to incentivize them to better their position…all the while perpetuating a system that makes it very difficult for the poor to better their situation regardless of how much effort they put into their own betterment. Raising children in this situation is even more hellish, so we have all sorts of programs designed to mitigate the suffering somewhat for adults with dependent children. What we really need is to change the system that relies on poverty to prop itself up…at the very least, we can provide help to all who are impoverished and not just to parents.

    (This list is not exhaustive…I welcome additions.)

    #66837
    John Day
    Participant

    @Madamski : Thank You, Sister.
    I have found a Bill Gates CNN interview video that is not Twitter here: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/bill-gates-on-the-next-few-months-of-the-coronavirus-pandemic-its-bad-news-11607893787
    I admit I had not watched it, but now I have. My read of Mr Bill is that he should not play high stakes poker.
    He is very pleased with himself numerous times in the interview, with a huge smile that he actually tries to suppress a few times to look appropriately serious. He always smiles when speaking glowingly of his own prior predictions, now come true, and the efforts of his foundation and their allies, and of the failures of the Trump Administration. He is very careful in choosing his words to give them no credit at all. He speaks glowingly of Biden and Fauci and all the big vaccines, and says he will take his shot in public, only when his turn comes. He implies this is a massive, life-saving good, and he wants to be in the same line as the common people. He says things will not be back to normal until 2022, but implies they may be better next summer. Nothing about vitamin-D, though his comments seem to imply that he is taking it into account, summer, and winter, and all.
    Again, Gates reads like a fairly open-faced book if you know where he has been coming from for the last 15 years. I read something telling by him, about 15 years ago. He was fascinated with vaccines, including vaccines as birth control. Now he does not say that.

    @ Mr House: Nobody who is not in the God-play-group likes people who play god.
    It’s a clear threat.
    Bill Gates wants to play a very clever god, a smug and pleasant god, who deeply loves himself and invites all of us to do the same. It will be best for all of us.
    His obvious point would be that the least painful form of population reduction is birth-reduction.
    It’s less bad than war, pestilence, famine and death, but it does not exclude them.

    What might I suggest as a counter-offer?
    I don’t play god. I don’t eat critters, because I practice non-violence.
    I am not a tyrant. I think that we should be past massive slaughter as a means of population control. We are technologically and intellectually able to leave it behind, but we have not yet fully found the societal disposition to leave it behind, not exactly.
    What I suggest is our human strong point, distributed problem solving in small groups. Nothing is assured, but it is what we, as a species, do best, and it is what has brought us to the point where we are about to extinct ourselves from success.
    Going forward, we will have the already-begun severe and permanent decline in global oil, natural gas and coal, especially the cheap, easy and high quality stuff that the permanent-growth economy needs.
    The change in direction has already taken place, but it has been mislabeled as COVID Pandemic.
    COVID has destroyed “demand” for the fuel and products that are now in decline, but we do not have to think they are in permanent decline. “Back-to-normal” just keep getting put off until later, while our owners work things out in THEIR smallish groups.
    The Davos-crowd, World Economic Forum clan may be as smug and self-satisfied as Mr Gates looks in the video, though it is going less-according-to-plan for many of them. At least they foresee destruction of their nationalist rivals, so they can work out one, big, good solution for all of humanity, and put it into action. It’s a work in progress, but they and their best experts are on it, all over it.
    I must disclose that what I advocate is not laid out at all, but the potential strength of it lies in customizing adaptation by specific locations and cultures and groups, like towns and churches and employee-owned -enterprises, for instance. Just everybody does homework in small groups for 30 years. That’s my suggestion.
    I’m doing my homework. My health remains good at 62.
    The supply lines are breaking globally. Merry Christmas. More and more things are out of stock. Noticed that?
    It’s time to invest, not to consume. Invest in what you need to survive, not in New York (if I may be so bold) or Phoenix (I’m now aware of your situation, Sister) , not in an isolated bunker, somewhere.
    Risks involve a lot of uncertainty, and an ideal situation in 2-3 years might be terrible in 12-13 years.
    We are renting a little half duplex from my Mom, in Austin, where we both work. The weather here won’t kill you, even without utilities. We have paid off the gardening “homestead” in Yoakum, population 6000, with a rail line, and agricultural and oil mixed economy. Oil is shot now. Eagleford shale fracking went black. That’s ok for the moment. What’s next? It’s a 2 hour drive each way. We spend weekends working there, and weekdays working our paid jobs. When will we have to choose one or the other?
    The country used a lot less gasoline in the 1970s, and a lot less of everything else.
    Recall gas lines?
    When will supply-destruction become apparent? With supply destruction as a limiter, you can’t buy what you need, and prices shoot up into hyperinflation. They sure will this time.
    Stagflation again; hyper-stag-flation…
    Can you learn to grow some of your food. Mainly, it gives you a comprehension of how difficult and uncertain it is, but you also develop skills and expertise. Perspective. Working-knowledge.
    Look to how you might survive for a month if the utilities go out. Grocery store utilities will be out, too.
    Gas pumps need electricity. Utilities need electricity. Phone systems need electricity.
    I’m not being extreme.
    The God-play-group will have to sacrifice billions of us, somewhat arbitrarily, I foresee.
    The birth-control-surprise cannot work fast enough to deal with the absolute decline that factory farming go though in 10-20 years. You may think my timeline is wrong. It might be. Some failures are bound to come sooner.
    Preparing some, physically preparing as much as you can, not just thinking, is better than not preparing.
    Do have a sensible, multi-purpose bike, and some spare tunes, tires, grease and tools.
    Ride it at least every other day.

    #66838
    Dr. D
    Participant

    Back to the Peak Oil route, great Smith article:
    https://www.oftwominds.com/blogdec20/gasoline12-20.html

    Extends the point here, but question: if all cars are electric, who uses the gasoline? Do you stop pumping oil and shut off asphalt, bunker, diesel, and jet? Do you dump the petrol in the river to get rid of it? Yeah, nobody’s thought of it, because it’s not about engineering or solutions: they’re up to something.

    Post Script: After 20 years of all-stops investment and buildout, all renewables combined are now 4% of energy. You could increase it 10-fold and still half the people would die if you went Carbon-free. Luckily, 10x is not possible even in dreams. Present renewables would be hard-pressed to double to 8%.

    Australia wins! By having a continent-wide totalitarian police state. In a fascist nation, the trains sure run on time. …Or else. Sure, you can’t speak and your kids die because they can’t cross the border to the other hospital, but that burger joint is great! Besides, in the U.S. we die AND we can’t get a burger, so who’s laughing now?

    Going with Peak Oil here, suppose you knew Peak Oil, or you knew there was a Ice Age, comet, a micronova, or even as ridiculous and unscientific as the data is: Global Warming. So in 10-20 years, you KNOW, or at least believe, for an actual FACT that the weather will fail, and with it all crops worldwide.

    So you’re the smart guys, the insiders, do you tell everyone and start a panic, instant in-fighting, cutting off all your tax revenue and supply lines? Do you find a way to radically reduce population with an “old age virus” that cuts human overhead, thereby slowing the impact speed of hitting the wall? And since the world to you is over, do you bother with rules, laws, insider trading, bailouts, payouts?

    “It’s not a dream, you moron. It’s real. Anybody not wearing two million sunblock is gonna have a real bad day, get it?! You think you’re safe and alive? You’re already dead! Everybody! This whole place! Everything you see is gone! You’re the one living in a ****ing dream! You know I believe it so don’t F*** with me!!”

    So from their perspective, it’s a mercy, a necessity as the brave, true leaders, the elect, the deep, caring, loving, shepherd of the herd.

    From my perspective, they’re mad. driven insane with ego and hubris. The first thing you’d do is reduce the technical level to c1840, ruralize, and tell people as fast as you can to they can come up with a thousand ideas and solutions. Instead, they hypertechnicalized so THEY might escape the planet leaving us behind, over-concentrated, over-centralized, stripped life surface-wide, over-stressed, over-worked, over-extracted, over-complicated life to a degree that’s fatal even WITHOUT a disaster event. Everyone thinks they’re the good guy. Just strikes me from their actions what they’re really about, what would make them think they’re the good guys. While openly killing everyone they can find.

    What would you think it is?

    #66839
    zerosum
    Participant

    @phoenixvoice
    Getting your list on Biden’s agenda might be your first step


    @John
    Day
    Biden might be too late to change the traditional way of population control.

    #66840
    Dr. D
    Participant

    P.S. if you want to reduce tech to c1840 and allow everyone the freedom to play with fireworks and not wear a seatbelt, you’ll have a nice start on reducing population. …And increasing liberty and quality of life, something far more precious than GDP.

    #66841

    I have no idea how true this is, but it sure feelz right.

    Poor young Billy had no friends and this made Billy sadly
    Filled with hatred and despair- it made young Billy madly
    Anxious to exact revenge- to make those people pay.
    He made enough to get his wish- and here we are today.

    Poor young Tony had no friends -a hand held out in greeting
    Was drawn back quick with laughter, and this left poor Tony bleating:
    “I’ll get you back you rotten kids, I’ll get you back some way!”
    He got the power to get his wish- and here we are today.

    Poor young Klaus was so ignored by everyone who knew him,
    His lonely brain was filled with ways to kill those who outgrew him.
    “I’ll make you suffer, first,” he growled, “in every single way!”
    He formed a club to help him out and here we are today.

    So next time when some geeky kid who wants to join the party
    Comes bumbling in, his hand held out- just shake it good and hearty.
    Be nice to those who don’t fit in. Don’t make them cruelty’s prey
    Lest we end up in Payback Land like where we are today.

    #66842
    madamski cafone
    Participant

    @ my parents said know:

    I quite understand the benefits of abortion and birth control.

    @ Mr. House:

    I understand. But anointing leaders to god-like status is what humanity DOES. We have a very long history of it. To quote a fave song of mine:

    “We will not mourn what we have not lost,
    We will learn to row with the oars we have got.”

    Meaning that until someone figures out how to bell those enormously powerful fat cats playing God, I’ll tend to distance myself from howling about same: it takes energy away from dealing with the problems they and so many others, including wee little mice like you and I, create on the local level.

    But, since we are humans and therefore must pretend to obey the directives of a man playing God, I nominate Putin. He’s got the look:

    Putin As God

    @ Dr. Day:

    The technology of 1840 will likely elude us for sometime. I forsee something more neolithic with a rusty neo-Iron Age overlap. As for elitists’ visions of high tower castle fortress protection from the mess below, it will crumble rapidly, I firmly believe.

    The illusion of control seems virtually universal. (A seeming illusion: sounds like an accurate description of this trhing we call reality.) Some bizarre fools, like Gates, cast their illusion on a globally vast screen because they can. Most of us cast ours on screens ranging from mega big screen to ipad scale becausae that’s all we can afford or all we want. Both illusions are, well, illusions, although the tiny ipad ones are comfortingly mobile to those who wish to see the world itself as part of their personal screen. (Humanity as a mise en abyme of a person viewing themself viewing themself from a cellphone. I fear such an app already exists?)

    Fate is doing what Fate does. The illusion of humanity being in control of its fate, or being able to commandeer Fate, is just another thread in a tapestry that even on a tiny planetary scale is beyond our comprehension, much less the relationship between Fate and Cosmos, assuming the two are separate.

    #66843
    WES
    Participant

    Dr. D.:

    4% renewable energy currently and doubling it to 8% would be very hard as fossil fuel is required to sustain the current 4% share of world energy.

    To reach 8% renewable energy would require the use of even more fossil fuels than we are currently using!

    The real problem with our current 4% renewable energy is that it can not sustain itself without using fossil fuels!

    #66844
    WES
    Participant

    Madamski:

    I see you have nominated my good buddy Putin for Times Man of the Year!

    I can tell that the top 1% globalists are very unhappy with what Putin has wrought!

    Putin’s top central banker, is one hell of a smart lady!p

    #66845
    Bill7
    Participant

    “Nothing can be done, ’cause Fate™ has agency over all!”

    Mmm.

    > But anointing leaders to god-like status is what humanity DOES.

    Mmm, really. “humanity”? This human doesn’t..

    #66846
    ezlxa1949
    Participant

    One way to reduce birth rates is to give women BOTH an education AND a measure of prosperity, i.e. SHARE the good things in life. Birth rates then seem to decline quite readily. Ages ago when I was a relatively new environmentalist I read or heard a report from Mali, where a woman was asked how many children she wanted. Her answer was eight. I thought this was a ridiculous ambition, that Mali couldn’t possibly support that many people. But later and upon reflection it struck me that her ambition was, for her society and her times, entirely reasonable. Eight children would provide a workforce for the farm and retirement security for the aged parents.

    The World Bank website has data showing global GDP as having grown on average at 3% per annum since 1970. This means a doubling every 23 or 24 years. Growthism is built into the structure of the elites’ thinking; indeed, the neoliberal system needs constant growth or it will collapse and die. It cannot survive on non-growth.

    Think about it: doubling every 23 years. Double the mining. Double the soil deplection. Double the wastes and run-off. Double the waste heat. And the politicians and economists will expect another doubling over the succeeding 23 years. Preferably a doubling over the succeeding 5 years.

    How long can this go on?

    Forever, because technology will always save us and outer space is chock full of stuff!

    #66848
    Bill7
    Participant

    > Fate is doing what Fate does.

    Tell us more, cuz you sound really, really smart.

    “There’s nothing we [you little proles] can do!

    mmm.

    #66849
    madamski cafone
    Participant

    @ Bill7

    There’s a difference between humanity and a human. Something to do with separate egos housed in separate bodies with separate consciousnesses. That’s one of the reasons why you are a Numbered Person, Bill7.

    I sound smart? Guess I’ll have to settle for smart. We can’t all be geniuses:

    Daringly Stupid

    #66850
    madamski cafone
    Participant

    “Nothing can be done, ’cause Fate™ has agency over all!”

    Well, if you say so, but I disagree. Control and agency have some overlap but are nonetheless separate things.

    #66851
    Bill7
    Participant

    Tell us more about this collective “humanity” that takes these actions you attribute to it; and also, about how
    the actions of what you call “Fate” somehow, *somehow*, end up benefiting the Very Few 99.9% of the time..

    “Fate”, my arse.

    -Bill7

    #66852
    V. Arnold
    Participant

    Clicking it gives you the very large version. Yes, it might be good to have some kind of overview of every element he put in there, and the meaning(s).

    Thanks Ilargi; I’d forgotten to click to enlarge.
    I can’t say it helped much, but did make some details more clearly viewable.
    The date, 1870, is post Civil War, but I’m still at a loss for the title: The Genius of America…
    The bottom right corner doesn’t seem to show a free black man and woman…
    Oh well…

    #66853
    John Day
    Participant

    @Madamski:
    I have given this considerable though and consideration for a long time.
    I think we should shoot for 1970, as an economic model, not 1840, then work it out from there going forward in a different direction.
    What are you thinking about a path forward?

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