Apr 072021
 


Jacobello Alberegno The Beast of the Apocalypse 1360-90

 

0.1% Of Covid-19 Cases In Ireland Come From Outdoor Transmission (IT)
Ron Paul Urges Americans To ‘Wake Up’ And Reject Vaccine Passports (RT)
Texas Becomes 2nd US State To Ban Vaccine Passports (RT)
Yup, Still Waiting for the Maskless Texan Apocalypse (NR)
California’s Failed Response To COVID (Bhattacharya/Kulldorff)
AstraZeneca Trial Involving Minors Halted As EMA Links Jab to Blood Clots (ZH)
Only Half Of Americans Intend To Vaccinate Their Children Against Covid (F.)
Travel Bubble Between New Zealand And Australia To Start On 19 April (G.)
Australia Calls On EU To Supply Outstanding Astrazeneca Vaccine Doses (G.)
Comedy Club Pulls Out Of Covid Safety Trial After Online ‘Hate Campaign’ (G.)
In Biden Change Of Tune, US Mulling Boycott Of 2022 Beijing Olympics (ZH)
Biden Admin Mulls Restarting Border Wall Construction (ZH)
The Greatest Game (Booth)

 

 

Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it’s time to pause and reflect.
– Mark Twain

 

 

 

 

Or maybe it’s even as high as twice that, 0.2%?!

Here in Greece, as in many other places, all outdoor sites, like restaurant and café terraces, remain closed, forcing people indoors, where the other 99.9% of infections occur.

And when people do go outside, they have to wear a mask. For an 0.1% risk.

0.1% Of Covid-19 Cases In Ireland Come From Outdoor Transmission (IT)

Earlier on Tuesday, a professor of immunovirology said figures showing 0.1 per cent of Covid-19 cases in the State come from outdoor transmission may be an underestimate. Prof Liam Fanning of University College Cork said he was surprised by the figures and felt there could be a “slight bias” in the Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC) data on cases linked to outdoor transmission. Figures from the HPSC showed just one confirmed case of Covid-19 in every thousand is traced to outdoor transmission. Of the 232,164 cases of Covid-19 recorded in the State up to March 24th this year, 262 were as a result of outdoor transmission, representing 0.1 per cent of the total, the data revealed. There were 42 outbreaks associated with outdoor gatherings, with one community outbreak accounting for seven cases.


Speaking to Newstalk Breakfast on Tuesday, Prof Fanning said there was an obvious difference in transmission rates of the virus between outdoor and indoor locations. He cautioned that meeting people outdoors still posed a risk, as the virus could be spread if someone infectious was “face-on chatting” to other individuals. People should try to avoid speaking directly face-to-face and instead attempt to speak to each other while side by side when outdoors, a common method used during the Spanish flu, he said. Prof Fanning said financial support to encourage more outdoor dining spaces should also be “much higher”, given the low transmission rates outdoors. At present, restaurants, cafes and bars are restricted to delivery or takeaway services only, with no outdoor dining permitted.

Read more …

Liberty. It’s an easy concept.

Ron Paul Urges Americans To ‘Wake Up’ And Reject Vaccine Passports (RT)

Ron Paul has warned that Covid-19 vaccine passports could be used by the US government to restrict freedoms, stirring up an already heated debate over whether such IDs are necessary. The former US congressman and physician said on Monday that requiring certificates to verify vaccination for international travel or daily activities would “solidify the whole idea that our lives belong to the government.” “They own liberty and now you are going to get permission to use a little bit of it. They are going to divvy it out a little bit. You’ll never get back what you should have,” he said while speaking on his program, the Ron Paul Liberty Report. The Biden administration has acknowledged that it is collaborating with tech companies to develop a variety of potential vaccine passport apps.

At the state level, New York has already created its own digital certificate that grants entry to venues. Paul warned that the initiative could be used to regulate nearly all aspects of life, including where you will be allowed to go and what kind of activities you will be permitted to participate in. He said he hoped Americans would “finally wake up” and oppose vaccine IDs. If people don’t “take a stand” now things are going to get “bad,” the former Texas lawmaker predicted. He called on his supporters to reach out to family and friends in order to start a grassroots movement against identification programs, adding that those who choose to do so should understand “what life and liberty is.”

The message resonated with many. Some commenters echoed Paul’s fears that the initiative could be used to usher in a dystopian nightmare. Others said Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ pledge to ban the use of vaccine passports should be emulated nationwide and expressed hope that the Supreme Court will ultimately rule the IDs unconstitutional. One observer said they opposed storing personal health data in a digital device but saw nothing wrong with doctors issuing paper certificates showing vaccination status. There were plenty who disagreed with Paul, however. “The government is there to serve & protect us,” argued one Twitter user, adding that while passports could potentially lead to discrimination, the spread of Covid-19 poses a greater threat to our freedoms.

Read more …

Dormant rights?! Oxymoron.

“..bars and restaurants in Florida and Texas were thronged with people celebrating their long-dormant right to gather outside their homes..”

Texas Becomes 2nd US State To Ban Vaccine Passports (RT)

Texas Governor Greg Abbott has announced a ban on so-called vaccine passports, becoming the second US governor to officially do so, just a few days after Florida’s Ron DeSantis. The issue has largely broken along political lines. Abbott made an announcement on Tuesday declaring that no Texas government agencies or political entities would be permitted to require “vaccine passports” in the state. “Don’t tread on our personal freedoms,” the governor warned, even as he made clear that he was not against the idea of vaccination in principle, but resented forced vaccination. “Every day Texans return to normalcy as more people get (and become immune to) the spread of Covid-19,” Abbott declared, adding that the jabs “help slow the spread of Covid, reduce hospitalizations and reduce fatalities.”

The Biden administration’s medical adviser, Anthony Fauci, seemed almost displeased with Texas’ refusal to slide down its predicted Covid-streaked death spiral, where “the restaurants and the bars are full and open, the ballparks are full, and yet we’ve seen cases and hospitalizations since then continue to tick downward,” as an MSNBC host put it. “It looks like 2019,” he said in shock, noting that bars and restaurants in Florida and Texas were thronged with people celebrating their long-dormant right to gather outside their homes. Attempting to explain why Texas and Florida’s case counts had dropped despite their having some of the least strict virus regulations, Fauci blamed a “lag,” arguing that the undesirable data everyone was waiting for was still coming – it was just a few weeks down the line.

“We’ve gotta make sure we don’t prematurely judge [the case numbers],” the doctor continued. At least 17 separate vaccine passes are in the works to track travelers’ medical data, the Biden administration told the media earlier this week, though the president has previously insisted that he has no plans for a nationwide vaccine passport. Abbott’s Florida counterpart, Ron DeSantis, unveiled a similar ban on Friday, barring all state agencies and local businesses from issuing “vaccine passports” and banning state government agencies from doing business with private companies that require such passports.

Read more …

What Fauci doesn’t like.

Yup, Still Waiting for the Maskless Texan Apocalypse (NR)

The day before Texas’s statewide mask mandate ended, March 9, Texas had 5,119 new cases of COVID-19, and the seven-day average for new cases was 3,971. On that day, the state had 126,404 active cases of COVID-19. As of March 9, the seven-day average for new deaths was 104. Yesterday, Texas had 2,906 new cases, and the seven-day average for new cases is 2,815. As of yesterday, the state had 96,640 active cases of COVID-19. As of yesterday, the seven-day average for new deaths was 81. When Texas governor Greg Abbott announced the decision, I argued that he and other state officials were not crazy or exhibiting “Neanderthal thinking.” I noted that masks were not disappearing from public life in Texas.

Major grocery chains and Walmart and Target still required them, as did many public-school districts, some localities, and so on. Austin, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and El Paso would require them in city-owned buildings. Since early March, I have noted that Texas COVID-19 statistics keep gradually getting better instead of worse, the opposite trend of what many mask advocates and all-purpose critics of Texas expected. Every time, folks on social media told me that it’s just too early to tell, and that the catastrophic consequences of the rescinding of the Texas statewide mask mandate are just around the corner. And yet, here we are, a month later, and all of the measuring sticks show significant improvement.

I am sure many people will declare that the huge crowd at yesterday’s Texas Rangers game is a potential “super-spreader” event. Before the event, President Biden called the stadium and state policies “not responsible.” And maybe yesterday’s large attendance will turn out to be a bad decision. But some other large gatherings, where people intermittently followed social-distancing guidelines if they followed them at all, did not turn into super-spreader events, like the crowds of thousands of people around the Super Bowl in Tampa. This pandemic is unpredictable, and the data rarely line up perfectly with people’s expectations or yearning for confirmation of their partisan preferences. By far the sharpest increase in cases occurring right now is in Michigan, where the masking and lockdown policies have been comparably strict.

Read more …

Dr. Jayanta Bhattacharya and Dr. Martin Kulldorff.

California’s Failed Response To COVID (Bhattacharya/Kulldorff)

From the beginning, the Golden State has taken an aggressive stance toward the epidemic, including imposing the earliest shelter-in-place order in the nation; ceasing in-person schooling for the vast majority of public-school kids; shuttering churches, parks, and playgrounds; mandating masks, with hefty fines for violators; and forcing the closure of “non-essential” businesses that cannot operate using distancing technologies, such as videoconferencing. Even Disneyland has been closed since March 2020. In short, California has followed one of the strictest lockdowns in the country. Though the state’s response received high marks in July from the “covidian” high priesthood, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, the state has seen exploding coronavirus cases and deaths.


Through March 28, 2021, 8.9 percent of all Californians have been identified as COVID cases – 3.6 million cases. Since most infections are not recognized as cases, a much larger fraction of the population has been infected with COVID. Through March 29 this year, nearly 57,800 people have died in California with COVID. To put these numbers in perspective, it helps to have a comparison state that has followed a very different policy. For that, we should consider Florida, which partially lifted its lockdown in May 2020 and then further relaxed restrictions in September (based in part on focused protection ideas advocated by us).

In sharp contrast to California, in Florida most schools and universities have been open for in-person instruction since the fall, normal human activities—sports, church going, visits to the park—occur with regularity, and businesses have been open for in-person activities. Local ordinances can recommend masks and social distancing and impose indoor-capacity limitations but cannot mandate closures, as is the case in California. Disneyworld has been open since July. At the same time, Florida increased testing and protection within its nursing homes to reduce the risk of COVID among its most vulnerable residents.


The Florida policy has drawn sharp criticism from Fauci, who said it “opened up too quickly” in July. However, the infection control results to date look remarkably similar to California’s, and in some ways better. Through March 28, 9.5 percent of Floridians have been identified as COVID cases. Once we account for the fact that Florida has one of the oldest populations in the country and California has one of the youngest, the death rates with COVID through March 28 are lower in Florida than in California. In fact, the COVID death rate for the under-65 population and the over-65 population are both lower in Florida than in California.

Read more …

How can anyone inject a child with a untested substance?

AstraZeneca Trial Involving Minors Halted As EMA Links Jab to Blood Clots (ZH)

Just days after Australia’s deputy chief medical officer, Michael Kidd, acknowledged that there was likely a connection between rare blood clots and the COVID vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford, officials from the EMA, Europe’s top pharmaceutical regulator, have finally acknowledged the link, even if the agency’s official stance – that there’s no evidence of a link, but no evidence to rule it out – remains unchanged. The EMA declared at the conclusion of a hasty “safety review” last month that the benefits of the AstraZeneca jab (which is expected to to be the workhorse of the global vaccination rollout as Covax, the WHO/Gates Foundation program to vaccination developing countries, expects to heavily rely on the jab) far outweighed any risks, while saying it couldn’t definitively rule out the possibility that the blood clots and the vaccine might be connected.

But researchers from Norway, Germany and elsewhere insisted they had found evidence of a connection. And after the UK acknowledged more than 2 dozen new cases of the rare clots – 9 of them fatal – it seems the dam has finally broken. New findings from the EMA show that there is indeed a link between the “very rare” blood clots in the brain and the AstraZeneca vaccine, but the exact possible causes are still unknown, according to a senior EMA official, who made the comments in an interview with the Italian newspaper Il Messagero. Here’s a Reuters summary of that report. “In my opinion, we can now say it, it is clear that there is an association (of the brain blood clots) with the vaccine. However, we still do not know what causes this reaction,” Marco Cavaleri, chair of the vaccine evaluation team at the EMA, told Italian daily Il Messagero.

Cavaleri provided no evidence to support his comment.[…] Cavaleri said the EMA would say in its review that there is a link but was not likely to give an indication this week regarding the age of individuals to whom the AstraZeneca shot should be given. In a separate interview, Armando Genazzani, a member of the EMA’s Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use, told another Italian newspaper, La Stampa, that a connection between the jab and the clots was “plausible.” The EMA is officially investigating 44 cases of the brain blood clots, an ailment known as a cerebral venous thrombosis (or CVST). More than 9.2M people in the EU have received the vaccine in total.

In response to Cavaleri’s comments, the Amsterdam-based EMA said in a statement on Tuesday: “EMA’s Pharmacovigilance Risk Assessment Committee (PRAC) has not yet reached a conclusion and the review (of any possible link) is currently ongoing.” While the EMA refused to confirm the comments made by individual officials, WSJ reported Tuesday that the University of Oxford had decided to pause trials of the vaccine in the UK that involved children between the ages of 12 and 15. An Oxford spokesman said Tuesday that while no safety issues have arisen in the trial, broader concerns about rare clotting problems in adults have triggered further regulatory reviews in the UK and Europe to investigate any potential link with the vaccine.

Read more …

“All states have the power to require vaccination among students attending school; many do for diseases like polio and measles.”

Yes, but those are tested and approved actual vaccines.

Only Half Of Americans Intend To Vaccinate Their Children Against Covid (F.)

Only half of Americans intend on getting their children immunized against Covid-19 as soon as vaccines become available, according to a new Axios/Ipsos survey published Tuesday, another potential barrier towards expanding vaccine access ahead of schools returning in fall. 48% of parents surveyed in April said they are not likely to have their children vaccinated against Covid-19 when the shots first become available. The figure contrasts with growing adult acceptance of the vaccines, which has grown from around 38% in September and October to nearly 70% today. Vaccine hesitancy remains a problem, however, and polls throughout 2021 show that one in five Americans consistently say they are unlikely to get vaccinated.

The Axios poll found Republicans (31%) and those with a high school education or less (28%) to be most resistant to vaccines. Vaccinating children is going to play a major role in ending the pandemic and getting life back to normal as schools return in fall. While children and young teens don’t often get seriously sick from Covid-19, they can and do: 227 children have died from Covid-19 in the U.S., according to the New York Times. They can also pass on the virus to others, notably adults who are likely to be much more vulnerable. A vaccine for this age group would help cut the risk of illness, limit transmission from children and better contain outbreaks. Now that adult vaccination drives are well under way, manufacturers are starting to trial shots in younger people.

After promising preliminary results from a clinical trial in late March, Pfizer said it plans to apply for an expanded emergency use authorization for young teens in Europe and the U.S. in coming weeks. Moderna also has several ongoing trials exploring its vaccine’s effectiveness in young children and adolescents. Experts are still debating whether the B.1.1.7. variant of the virus, first found in the U.K., is able to infect children more readily. Though few states have started to fully grapple with the idea of requiring vaccination for Covid-19 in children—Tennessee and Pennsylvania have said vaccination will remain optional—some school districts have signaled an intent to mandate it, setting the stage for wider conflict if and when vaccines are approved for use, especially if resistance remains high. All states have the power to require vaccination among students attending school; many do for diseases like polio and measles.

Read more …

Does New Zealand even have vaccines?

Travel Bubble Between New Zealand And Australia To Start On 19 April (G.)

After nearly a year shut off from the world, New Zealand is cracking open its borders, with a trans-Tasman travel bubble allowing two-way quarantine-free travel with Australia. The NZ prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, announced on Tuesday the bubble would open from 19 April, allowing quarantine-free travel between the two nations. Travellers from New Zealand have been able to enter selected Australian states without quarantining since October but the arrangements did not apply in the other direction. Australia’s prime minister, Scott Morrison, applauded Ardern’s announcement while airlines in both countries hurriedly advertised hundreds of weekly flights and routes. However, tourism operators warned the benefits would be muted in the short term, as the first passengers would likely be low-spending travellers visiting family.


At a press conference on Tuesday, Ardern said she was “confident not only in the state of Australia, but in our own ability to manage a travel arrangement”. More than 600,000 New Zealanders live in Australia, and many families straddle the border. “One sacrifice that has been particularly hard for many to bear over the past year has been the separation from friends and family who live in Australia, so today’s announcement will be a great relief for many,” Ardern said. “This is the next chapter.” Ardern said the arrangement – of two countries, both maintaining a full elimination strategy for Covid-19 opening up to international travel – was potentially unique in the world. The plan has been in the works for months now, but was paused repeatedly after outbreaks of Covid-19 on either side of the border.

Read more …

Australia has some vaccines, but not enough.

Australia Calls On EU To Supply Outstanding Astrazeneca Vaccine Doses (G.)

Scott Morrison denies his government has presented the public with overly rosy assessments about the state of its Covid-19 vaccine rollout, as he steps up calls for the European Union to allow 3.1m outstanding AstraZeneca doses to be shipped to Australia. While declaring that vaccine supply issues were a matter of “straightforward maths”, the prime minister also attempted to calm a growing diplomatic dispute between Australia and the EU, insisting he had not made any criticism of Brussels over its handling of the matter. Earlier on Wednesday, the Morrison government issued a statement accusing the European Commission of “arguing semantics” by saying just one shipment of 250,000 AstraZeneca doses had been formally blocked.

The government said the commission had signalled it would block other applications to export vaccine doses from the region. The government also complained that the European Commission has not responded to Australia’s request for 1m doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine to be made available to Papua New Guinea, one of the countries hardest hit in the region. The latest statements follow comments by a European Commission spokesman on Tuesday that the only export request rejected out of nearly 500 received has been a shipment of 250,000 doses to Australia in March. Morrison told reporters on Wednesday the government was asking AstraZeneca to resubmit its application to the European Commission to export the remaining 3.1m of the 3.8m contracted vaccine doses to Australia.

He was seeking further talks with the commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, to discuss the issue. The prime minister said he was “pleased to hear that the European Union overnight has indicated that they are not seeking to restrict these vaccines to Australia”. He said the government would therefore encourage Brussels to allow the rest of the 3.8m does to come to Australia, including 1m “to provide support to our Pacific family in Papua New Guinea that are undergoing a humanitarian crisis”. He also wanted the remaining doses to “be part of the vaccination rollout here in this country”.

Read more …

Of course there’s resistance.

Comedy Club Pulls Out Of Covid Safety Trial After Online ‘Hate Campaign’ (G.)

A comedy club has pulled out of a trial to test how venues can operate safely after it said the government failed to clarify whether it would involve Covid-19 vaccine passports. The Hot Water comedy club in Liverpool said it was subjected to a “hate campaign” online after reports suggested it was working with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) to trial Covid-status certification. Club co-owner Binty Blair said he had tried to contact DCMS to clarify whether vaccine passports would be trialed in the pilot event, but to no avail. The club has subsequently cancelled its event, which was due to be the first in the pilot. It had been due to take place on 16 April with an audience of 300 at Liverpool’s M&S Bank Arena Auditorium. “The reason for us backing out is the government wasn’t clear about the Covid passports,” Blair told the PA news agency.


“The problem is we don’t know what we signed up for.” On Tuesday evening, the government confirmed there will be no requirement for participants in the initial pilot events to have received a vaccination in venues like a comedy club. DCMS announced over the weekend that a series of pilot events were planned for the coming months as officials look to find a way for venues such as football grounds and nightclubs to reopen without the need for social distancing. It said Covid-status certification would be trialled as part of the programme, while detailing a number of events on an initial list of pilots, including Hot Water comedy club. Blair said he had agreed to take part in the pilot in March but only learned of the government’s plans to trial Covid-19 vaccine passports two days ago. He said four acts had lost £300 each as a result of the cancelled event.

Read more …

Brought to you by the same people stoking unrest in Ukraine.

In Biden Change Of Tune, US Mulling Boycott Of 2022 Beijing Olympics (ZH)

As if US-China relations weren’t bad enough at this moment, things are about to escalate further – potentially taking the Biden White House past even beyond the low-point of the trade war during the Trump presidency. State Department spokesman Ned Price told reporters during a daily briefing on Tuesday that the US and its allies are discussing a joint boycott of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing. = It’s not the first time the issue has been addressed, and previously it was mainly Republicans pressuring action regarding the Olympics and China’s egregious human rights record. In early February the White House had indicated it “had no plans” for a boycott, with Jen Psaki asserting at the time, “We’re not currently talking about changing our posture or our plans as it relates to the Beijing Olympics.”

But “plans” have clearly changed, especially following the March 22 coordinated sanctions slapped on top Beijing officials over the Uighur crackdown by the US, UK, EU and Canada. The Canadians in particular have been the most vocal in parliament for urging an international boycott of the 2022 games, which has riled China. Here’s what the State Department’s Ned Price said in the Tuesday afternoon comments: “It [a joint boycott] is something that we certainly wish to discuss,” …he told reporters when asked about the Biden administration’s plans ahead of the international games. “A coordinated approach will not only be in our interest but also in the interest of our allies and partners,” he added.

Price said that the United States has not yet made a decision but was concerned about China’s egregious human rights abuses. The Olympic Games are due to take place between Feb. 4 to Feb. 20. When pressed over a possible timeline of when such a decision would be reached, Price added: “We’re talking about 2022, and we are still in April of 2021, so these Games remain some time away.” “I wouldn’t want to put a time frame on it, but these discussions are underway.”

Read more …

It’s almost too funny.

Biden Admin Mulls Restarting Border Wall Construction (ZH)

Less than 90 days after President Biden signaled his immense virtue by halting construction on Trump’s border wall and canceling future contracts, Biden’s beleaguered Department of Homeland Security is exploring whether to restart border wall construction in order to ‘plug gaps’ in the current barrier, according the Washington Examiner, citing DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. This of course would make Biden a xenophobic tyrant, if we’re playing by the Trump-era media guidebook. “In a conversation with Immigration and Customs Enformcement employees last week Mr. Mayorkas was asked about his plans for the wall and he said that while President Biden has canceled the border emergency and halted Pentagon money flowing to the wall, “that leaves room to make decisions” on finishing some “gaps in the wall.”

“Mr. Mayorkas, according to notes of the ICE session reviewed by The Washington Times, said Customs and Border Protection, which oversees the wall, has submitted a plan for what it wants to see happen moving forward.” -Washington Examiner. “It’s not a single answer to a single question. There are different projects that the chief of the Border Patrol has presented and the acting commissioner of CBP presented to me,” said Mayorkas, adding “The president has communicated quite clearly his decision that the emergency that triggered the devotion of DOD funds to the construction of the border wall is ended. But that leaves room to make decisions as the administration, as part of the administration, in particular areas of the wall that need renovation, particular projects that need to be finished.”

According to Mayorkas, the work would cover “gaps,” “gates,” and areas “where the wall has been completed but the technology has not been implemented.” Former President Trump’s acting commissioner of CBP, Mark Morgan, said Mayorkas’ comments were “more spin and misdirection,” and that the agency has always given the administration options on how to proceed with the wall. When Trump left office, around 460 miles of border wall was completed – most of which being improvements in areas with existing wall and/or outdated designs, or vehicle checkpoints that people could simply walk around.

Read more …

“..by preventing failure in economies in the short term, Creative Destruction has only moved — now to the level of our international economic system..”

The Greatest Game (Booth)

Breakthroughs, that step-change our lives for the better, invariably come from something that most people couldn’t see. Our belief of how the world should exist and operate is shaped from looking backwards, not forward, so it makes sense that new paradigms that change everything — face resistance in our minds. Because most people don’t see them, breaking through an existing paradigm needs to provide enough compelling value for users to disrupt an old paradigm. Apple’s iPhone for instance, didn’t copy the market leader, Research in Motion’s Blackberry design of needing a keyboard or selling to businesses who required RIM’s security. It created a digital interface when that wasn’t ‘needed’ and created an entirely new platform that changed the industry as a result.


Along the way, the Blackberry died, unable to compete with the value for users, that was now increasing exponentially on Apple’s platform. That process describes “Creative Destruction” a paradoxical term first coined by Joseph Schumpeter in 1942 to describe how Capitalism works in a “free market.” Entrepreneurs innovate and “create” value for society — and that value gained by society also often “destroys” the former monopoly power. That process and its importance is at the centre of how all modern economies have evolved and given rise to most of the benefits to society we take for granted today. New winners become so valuable that they disrupt existing market power or structures. It is all driven from a near-constant flow of innovative entrepreneurs with bold ideas and the capital backing them that go up against the status quo and are only successful, “if’’ they create value for society.

For the process to work, failure is critical! Both for entrepreneurs and the capital in them whose business doesn’t work, and for legacy businesses that get disrupted by them if their innovation brings better value to society. And while failure is hard, preventing failure is much worse. Why? Because by preventing failure, market incentives become warped, and in doing so, eventually put a small number of people (government/central banks) in charge of choosing who gets what, instead of the free market. Unfortunately, preventing failure has been the policy makers tool for the last 20 years and it has enormous consequences.


By socializing losses and preventing failure in our economies, central banks and governments have all but ensured that the existing monetary system of the world collapses — and is replaced by something new. In other words, by preventing failure in economies in the short term, Creative Destruction has only moved — now to the level of our international economic system. I believe with what is to come, Bitcoin has a higher than average probability of overcoming all barriers and becoming a global reserve currency. More importantly, I believe it gives humanity its best chance for a peaceful transition to the future. A world where the abundance gained from our technological progress is more widely distributed. It is not hyperbole to say that almost everything changes as a result of this innovation.

Read more …

 

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Home Forums Debt Rattle April 7 2021

Viewing 12 posts - 81 through 92 (of 92 total)
  • Author
    Posts
  • #72694
    Mr. House
    Participant

    Ah Krystal Ball, quite the hottie. Wonder what her parents were thinking when they named her, gosh we’re clever?

    #72695
    Mr. House
    Participant

    Then again she’s married, so maybe that’s her husbands last name? In this topsy turvy world who knows these days.

    #72696
    sumac.carol
    Participant

    This Dr. Yeadon from Pfizer is a real disappointment to me.
    He says that evil, rather than greed, is behind vaccinating everyone, because you could achieve the same financial gain by charging twice as much and vaccinating half as many people. So what? They chose to vaccinate everyone and will make lots of money. Dr. Yeadon is attributing one motive (evil) where it is quite possible that good old fashioned greed is at play. Dr. Yeadon then says he thinks depopulation is quite possibly the motive for unnecessary top-up vaccinations. Again, the simplest motivation I can think of for this would also be good old-fashioned greed – we are talking about a corporation don’t forget.
    I do not underestimate the ability of TPTB to do really bad things intentionally to enrich or empower themselves or accidentally due to incompetence. However, throwing the depopulation argument out here on the basis of so little evidence makes me question everything else he says.
    Between this “expert” and that Vandenbosche guy, I am getting a bit weary of these experts who are trying to save us from the mainstream. If you really want to try to save us, do us a favour and make darn sure your arguments are water-tight. Otherwise all you are doing is fanning the flames of conspiracy theories or creating anxiety among others who sense that there is something untoward in the mainstream, but do not have the expertise to properly kick the tires on what these alternative folks propose.

    #72697
    V. Arnold
    Participant

    @ Mr. House

    Thanks for the above link; very interesting.
    It does confirm what I think I know about the fairy tales now being told…

    Yesterday I had a very interesting discussion with a young woman (23yo) here in our village regarding the covid.
    She is very savvy, and pointed out the vaccine fallacies being touted by the MSM, even here in Thailand. She also said she will not take a vaccine at this time no matter what the government says in their favor.
    I seconded her on her POV.
    Likewise, my wife and I are unified in our course of action.. No vaccine at this time…

    #72706
    Dr. D
    Participant

    How interesting. Here you have a direct insider, with direct, specific knowledge, giving loud, direct, public warnings. And you say he’s a conspiracy theorist on th subject for which he’s trained, in the corporation for which he was head.

    If there were a whistleblower, and he did come out in public and reveal crimes and attempted murder, what would that look like? You say you don’t underestimate the capacity of corporations to do bad things, then trust the corporation explicitly, not the whistleblower.

    Aren’t we supposed to do the opposite? The individual, who is risking all, is generally considered the truthteller, having a lot to lose, and the bureaucracy and organization is generally considered to be up to something and protecting itself?

    I just can’t get my head around how this is common these days. Did anyone come up through the Vietnam war, the anti-war protests, and the Pentagon papers? Are we all too young to remember Iraq with open arms, WMD and ties to al Qaeda, as I’m forced to say almost every day? Was Snowden and Assange forgot? Did they make it all up while Clapper told the sole truth? Are we too young to even remember RussiaGate, with two years of Mueller unlimited? And now we consider, with worldwide bankruptcy and possibly a trillion at stake, the pharmaceutical companies – who are caught fabricating studies and retracting drugs for +10k deaths almost every year – are considered lily-white and completely trustworthy?

    On that note,

    Covid is the only thing where you can quote the CDC research, from the CDC website, and still be considered a Conspiracy Theorist.”

    What does that mean anymore: “Conspiracy Theorist”? It means, I’m aligned with and have internalized the corporations, the billionaires, the status quo. I love Bezos more than my children. They are me, I R Us. Just at a loss as to how this happens psychologically.

    I can’t get individuals I know and grew up with to tell me the truth, much less MNCs who are charged with expansive crimes and pay billion dollar fines almost yearly, as do MF Global, Mansanto, Morgan.

    It’s not people here, it’s everywhere. NY Times lies every day 21 years in a row, still credible. Government lies every day since the Church report, still credible. Pharma lies every day since thalidomide, vioxx, statins, zantac, and opioids, still credible. VP exec from Pfizer, talking about what he personally witnessed with his peers? Not credible. He doesn’t know his own life experience.

    #72712
    madamski cafone
    Participant

    @ Mr. House

    Her father was named Ball.

    #72715
    madamski cafone
    Participant

    This apparently passes for critical thinking these days:

    The Doomsday Prophecy of Dr. Geert Vanden Bossche A Belgian virus expert has scared the Internet by claiming the COVID-19 vaccines will doom humanity. No need to panic.

    Firstly, the headline: “scared the internet”. The internet is now a scarable entity. No, he didn’t mean that. He means… some people on the internet are frightened by what Bossche said. But, we are reassured, “there’s no need to panic”.

    I dunno: have we stopped beating our spouses yet?

    “Dr. Bossche asserts that vaccines are like antibiotics in that, when they are both overused and imperfect, they allow germs to mutate in dangerous ways. With antibiotic use, the bacteria that have developed a mutation or acquired a gene that gives them protection from the antibiotic will escape death and soon become the dominant strain. That’s antibiotic resistance. Bossche claims that the same thing will happen with the coronavirus. Because, he says, the vaccines are imperfect, they will allow the virus to keep being transmitted from person to person and thus mutate inside of us, until a dangerous new variant emerges.This is not complete nonsense.”

    Implying that it’s mostly nonsense… before establishing anty reason why it would be nonsense. Wow. Crtkl thnkng iz fun!

    Then, claims explained by analogies with minimal hard data:

    “I reached out to Dr. Paul Offit, a paediatrician specialized in vaccines and immunology and the co-inventor of the rotavirus vaccine, to get his thoughts on whether antibiotic resistance and vaccine-associated immune escape are indeed comparable. “In a sense it is, but he misses the main point,” Dr. Offit told me. A vaccine shows your body an inert part of the virus so that it can make neutralizing antibodies against it. If the body ends up making low levels of these antibodies, i.e. not enough to swiftly kill the virus when you catch it, this could allow the virus to stick around in your body for a little bit and make copies of itself. Some of these copies may by chance have the right kinds of errors in their genetic code to become variants of concern, although the mutation rate of this coronavirus is quite low.

    “But if you have a vaccine that results in high levels of neutralizing antibodies, that’s not a way to create variants,” he continued. To use an analogy, if a gaggle of invaders is coming but you have only managed to round up a few soldiers, be prepared for a long siege during which the enemy might learn a thing or two about your defences and adapt. But if you have a full and overpowering army at your command, the invaders won’t stick around for long.”

    Uh, vaccines don’t think, that we know of. They don’t have a general making strategic decisions based on available virus-power and attrition rates. Darwinian logic doesn’t work like that.

    And so forth… but this is exemplary of What Is Bullshit?:

    “Our immune system is divided into two main branches: innate and adaptive. Basically, innate immunity is a bit like Dory the amnesiac fish from Finding Nemo. It doesn’t remember much. You can throw the same virus at your innate immune system and it will not remember it. It will not get any stronger fighting it each time. By comparison, the adaptive immune system has a memory built in. It remembers tiny invaders and fights them back with more vigour each time. Vaccines make use of the adaptive part of our immune system.

    Dr. Bossche, however, seems to be a big fan of the innate immune system and he worries that all of these COVID-19 vaccines and public health measures are getting in the way of our innate immune system fighting off the coronavirus. He claims that keeping people in lockdown during the pandemic is not beneficial to their innate immune system, which requires exposure to viruses and bacteria to remain in tip-top shape. This is a bad argument. As Dr. Offit pointed out to me, even at home we are exposed to legions of microorganisms. “The food you eat isn’t sterile,” he reminded me, “the dust you inhale isn’t sterile, the water you drink isn’t sterile.” We get exposed to a lot of microorganisms.”

    Well, doh. But the bacteria we most want exposure to is the KIND THAT LIVES INSIDE OUR FELLOW HUMAN BEINGS. Social distancing reduces said contact, and as the articvle’s author says: “innate immunity is a bit like Dory the amnesiac fish from Finding Nemo. It doesn’t remember much. You can throw the same virus at your innate immune system and it will not remember it. It will not get any stronger fighting it each time.”

    It needs constant reinforcement, the immune system. The adaptive part needs exposure (because t-cellscan forget over time too), the innate part needs constant raw reinforcement.

    There is too much evidence, in the main body of ummunology research, showing how reduced physical activity and social/environmental interaction correlate to reduced immune strength, for the experts in this article to morally or professionally justify spouting such bullshit. Whether they know they’re ignorant is a question I can’t answer. Monkey see monkey do explains to so much so often, alas.

    The rest of the article is raw ad hominem.straw man junk about rhetoprical tactics not medicine.

    I’ll dissect the summary:

    “Take-home message:
    – Dr. Geert Vanden Bossche is a veterinarian who recently released an open letter boldly claiming that the COVID-19 vaccines will be harmful to humanity by allowing the virus to mutate in dangerous ways”

    True.

    “- If we are worried about dangerous variants emerging, it is much riskier to allow the virus to spread between unvaccinated people”

    As if virus spread between vaccinated people doesn’t matter, when that is exactly what Bossche most fears: spread of mutated survivors among groups who’ve been given their green light-passport for social reengagement (something that seems to be running into problems as the authorities ask folks to continue masking/locking down ever after “vaccination”.

    Not to mentiona that variants will also spread between “vaccinated” people BECAUSE THEIR “VACCINE” DOESN’T RECOGNIZE THOSE VARIANTS ANY MORE THAN ANTIBODIES OF THE UNVACCINATED… EXCEPT those innate antibodies that just beat up on any stranger in town. Incidentally, there’s another apsect to this: ALlergists are investigating a line of reasoning brought forth by data analysis suggesting that the epidemic of asthma coincident with modern life isn’t just because ofd so many agricultural/industrial lung irritants in the air, but also because our immune systems are so weakened, so out of shape, that they panic and attack foreign objects that our ancestors’ immune systems apparently ignored, or so the very minor presence (compared to today) of major allergies and asthma in pre-industrial times.

    So our tenmdency to create cytokine storms and such may be part of having sissified immune systems. (Well, my sister IS a sissy. 😉 )

    “- If coronavirus variants emerge for which the current vaccines offer little to no protection, the vaccines can be reformulated to be a better fit, much like the annual flu vaccine”

    Well, jhow convenient for your job security and retirement investment portfolio. How inconvenient for us.

    “- Dr. Bossche proposes the use of a new type of vaccine based on natural killer cells, which he claims he is working on but for which there is no published evidence”

    Not if he wants to patent the final result, no. Major vaccine/drug research efforts by big pharma are also secretive. How dare hge behave like major big pharm virologists!

    #72716
    madamski cafone
    Participant

    As for modern life/lockdown and our immune systems:

    How staying indoors affects your immune system

    #72717
    madamski cafone
    Participant

    P.S. Any more, I tend to avoid places like rational wiki and anything that cites itself as espousing The ONe True Right RATIONAL Way. Being rational is being rational; saying you’re rational is itself irrational, which is a typically human thing to do but, then, humans are mostly irrational with a sliver of capacity for rational thought if we try really really hard.

    #72721
    sumac.carol
    Participant

    Okay but here’s the problem: the former VP from Pfizer dies not agree with Bosche. Which expert are you gonna trust?

    #72723
    madamski cafone
    Participant

    @ Dr. D

    Nice to hear you speak on a personal level about your discomfort with humanity’s preference for delusion versus truth:

    “I can’t get individuals I know and grew up with to tell me the truth”

    There it is. The reason I so often weary of ranting against NYT,corporate media, etc., is because those are abstract constructs one can’t really touch except by special levers guared by powerful interests. But your neighbors, friends, spouse, your dog… that is ground level truth-telling/evasion turf. From this angle, it makes sense to me to say “everyone is lying”. Well, it’s true.

    From there. we can proceed to ferreting out the lies still resident within oneself so we can train our bullshit antibodies to remove that infection and make us that much more honest rather than irrational, delusional, deceptive, our most basic nature as civilized beings.

    Truth cannot be demanded any more than love. It can be manipulated into manifestation, as can love, but it cannot be demanded. Only service can be demanded, and only if you pay for it (I’ll note here that coercion is an operating expense). Otherwise, we only serve what we love.

    To get the truth, it is necessary to love the teller and use that love to teach them to love the truth.

    In a world as loveless as ours has become, truth naturally goes extinct.

    mask on

    The image, btw, comes from a shutterstock category called Pandemic Denial Images I believe there is an inverse correspondence ratio between truth and irony. So little truth, so much irony.

    #72780
    V. Arnold
    Participant

    In a world as loveless as ours has become, truth naturally goes extinct.

    …an interesting turn of phrase…and I largely agree…
    In the west, love has become synonymous with sex…some still know better…………..

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