Feb 202022
 
 February 20, 2022  Posted by at 9:42 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,


Vincent van Gogh On the outskirts of Paris near Montmartre 1887

 

Geert Vanden Bossche: Why The COVID Vaccine Is A Bad Idea For Kids (Loesch)
Omicron A Wolf In Sheep’s Clothing (Vanden Bossche)
Vaccinating Teens for COVID Is Literally ‘Heartbreaking’ (Setty)
More Attractive People Have Stronger Immune Systems, Study Says (SF)
Leaders of Freedom Convoy Charged With “Mischief” (CTH)
Alberta Premier Files Legal Challenge To End Trudeau’s Emergencies Act (ES)
U.S. ‘People’s Convoy’ Ready To Roll On Wednesday (JTN)
West Promised Not To Expand NATO – Der Spiegel (RT)
Does NATO Really Pose A Threat To Russia? (Diesen)
US Doubles Downs on Russian ‘Invasion’ Rhetoric (Lauria)
“Operation Cyclone: Ukraine Edition” – Is This The Real Plan? (O’Reilly)
The Washington Post: The Voice of the CIA (Paul Craig Roberts)
Ruling Against Trump Leaves More Questions Than Answers On Free Speech (Turley)
How Trains Abolished By Switzerland Are Now Back In Business In Greece (Bersi)
Zuckerberg’s Facebook Empire Collapsing (RT)
Why Canada Will Become a Dictatorship Under Trudeau (Dickin)

 

 

Jim Rickards @JamesGRickards
Brexit never had to happen except David Cameron called a referendum and lost. Freedom Convoys never had to happen except Trudeau and Fascist Freeland refused to listen. The coming general strike and supply chain collapse is on them. The elites sure are dumb.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1494832194573021186

 

 

The Ontario Superior Court of Justice asked self-custody wallet provider @nunchuk_io to disclose user information and freeze user’s bitcoin. This was the team’s response.

 

 

Bill Gates: Sadly

 

 

“By vaccinating children with this mRNA ‘vaccine’, you are actually suppressing their own robust immune system, making them vulnerable to other diseases.”

Geert Vanden Bossche: Why The COVID Vaccine Is A Bad Idea For Kids (Loesch)

Dana (@DLoesch / @DanaLoeschRadio) talks with Dr. Geert Vanden Bossche (@GVDBossche on Twitter, and @GVandenBossche on GETTR), who has a PHD in virology – Certified Expert in microbiology and infectious diseases – with a long standing career in human vaccinology, and Dr. Vanden Bossche talks about the fact that it isn’t even necessary to inject children with this mRNA ‘vaccine’, as the FDA and Dr. Fauci (along with the pharmaceutical companies) want to do. He has previously pointed out that this virus is an infection in children, like the flu – and not a disease. By vaccinating children with this mRNA ‘vaccine’, you are actually suppressing their own robust immune system, making them vulnerable to other diseases.


Dr. Vanden Bossche mentions that these vaccinations will not – and CANNOT – eliminate a virus, but that our own immune systems CAN. The worldwide government push to inject these people, is actually making people more vulnerable, and any mandate needs to stop immediately. Governments doing this, are actually forcing this virus to evolve and avoid elimination, which certainly keeps the virus going indefinitely.

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“..Omicron has the capacity to evolve into a much less benign variant..”

Omicron A Wolf In Sheep’s Clothing (Vanden Bossche)

Given the high and steadily increasing vaccine coverage rates in large parts of the world and the ongoing mass vaccination of children and continuation of booster campaigns, I am of the opinion that Omicron has the capacity to evolve into a much less benign variant, regardless of whether or not infection prevention measures are relaxed or lifted.

A coronavirus (CoV) can only replicate and mutate. The widely held belief that during the course of a pandemic viruses tend to become more infectious but less virulent is a myth—one kept alive by those who don’t understand the evolutionary dynamics of a pandemic. The latter are fully dependent upon the outcome of the interplay between the virus and the host immune system at a population level. Abiding by this ‘rule’ is the sole qualifier necessary to be an expert of viral pandemics. For several months I’ve been warning that continued mass vaccination and high vaccine coverage rates would prevent SARS-CoV-2 (SC-2) from generating sufficient herd immunity to control, let alone end, the current pandemic. The advent of Omicron hasn’t changed my mind, on the contrary!

Now that mass vaccination campaigns have quickly rendered the virus resistant to the adaptive immune response (cfr. Omicron), I am fearful that this may have a snowball effect. I’ve been postulating that the mechanism of innate immune adaptation to viral exposure (i.e., through a process of epigenetic changes referred to as ‘training’) is compromised in the vaccinated population and I am now predicting that the resulting burden of infectivity will cause massive population-level immune pressure on Omicron. In an attempt to overcome high immune pressure on Omicron’s infectiousness, natural selection of viral mutants that are capable of resisting both the acquired SC-2-specific and the CoV-reactive innate immune response in vaccinees is likely to occur.

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This post-vaccine reaction may represent an overly exuberant immune response..”

Vaccinating Teens for COVID Is Literally ‘Heartbreaking’ (Setty)

Pathologists who examined the autopsies of two teenage boys who died days after receiving Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine concluded the vaccine caused the teens’ deaths. The three pathologists, two of whom are medical examiners, published their findings Feb. 14 in an early online release article, “Autopsy Histopathologic Cardiac Findings in Two Adolescents Following the Second COVID-19 Vaccine Dose,” in the Archives of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine. The authors’ findings were conclusive. Two teenage boys were pronounced dead in their homes three and four days after receiving the second Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 dose. There was no evidence of active or previous COVID-19 infection. The teens had negative toxicology screens (i.e. no drugs or poisons were present in their bodies).

These boys died from the vaccine. Histopathological examination of their cardiac tissue revealed an important new finding: Neither heart demonstrated evidence of typical myocarditis. Instead, the authors found evidence of microscopic changes consistent with a different form of heart injury called toxic cardiomyopathy. They wrote: “The myocardial injury seen in these post-vaccine hearts is different from typical myocarditis and has an appearance most closely resembling a catecholamine-mediated stress (toxic) cardiomyopathy.” [..] The pathologists determined there was a different mechanism of heart injury at play in these two boys, distinct from a purely infectious process that would result directly from a viral infection like COVID-19.

This is an important finding. There may be a way to distinguish cardiac injury resulting from a SARS-COV-2 infection from cardiac injury where the vaccine predisposes the patient to stress cardiomyopathy before contracting COVID-19. However, the authors are careful not to assume that cardiac injuries from COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccines can always be sorted out under the microscope. They explain that stress cardiomyopathy, or “broken heart syndrome,” may also occur in a rare hyperinflammatory state that is known to occur in COVID-19 infection as well: “This post-vaccine reaction may represent an overly exuberant immune response and the myocardial injury is mediated by similar immune mechanisms as described with SARS-COV-2 and multisystem inflammatory syndrome (MIS-C) cytokine storms.”

Yeadon

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“..men and women have very different ideas about what makes a face attractive and healthy..”

More Attractive People Have Stronger Immune Systems, Study Says (SF)

The beautiful people get all the breaks. A new study finds an interesting link between how attractive someone is and the strength of their immune system. A team at Texas Christian University found that when people had to rate a group of photos based on the attractiveness of each person’s face, they consistently rated individuals with stronger immune health as more attractive than other photos in the study. Although beauty is often in the eye of the beholder, researchers say there has been a historical link between what societies consider attractive and reproductive success. The TCU team theorized that, because certain evolutionary traits tie into more mating success, people who seem more attractive to others may also appear healthier to the opposite sex.

To test that theory, researchers gathered 159 men and women and photographed each one without makeup and while displaying a neutral expression on their face. Study authors then took blood samples from each person to measure their levels of white blood cells — which battle disease and infections. The team then brought in 492 other people to rate members of the opposite sex in these photos based on their attractiveness. The volunteers did not have any information on each person’s immune health and only had that one neutral photo to base their rating on. Results show people with stronger immune systems were rated as being more attractive by the 492 volunteers.

“The current research suggests that a relationship between facial attractiveness and immune function is likely to exist,” corresponding author Summer Mengelkoch and her team write in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B. Interestingly, the study finds men and women have very different ideas about what makes a face attractive and healthy. Researchers found that, on average, women rated men with higher levels of NK (natural killer) cells as more attractive. These cells play a key role in fighting off and killing bacteria. Men, on the other hand, found women with lower NK cell levels in their blood more attractive. Study authors believe the reason for this is women with lower NK levels generally have higher estrogen levels — a hormone important to sexual reproduction.

As for which features are likely to stand out and attract attention, researchers found a not-so-surprising list of qualities people look for in a pretty face. “Features such as clear skin, prominent cheekbones, bright eyes, and full, red lips have been deemed attractive throughout recorded human history,” the researchers write.

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“..y’all do realize we are talking about invoking the Emergency War Measures Act against people charged with mischief, right?“

Leaders of Freedom Convoy Charged With “Mischief” (CTH)

The need for control is a reaction to fear. What does the government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau fear so much that he invoked the first ever declaration of the Emergency War Measures Act? A group of middle class Canadians who challenged him. That’s it. That’s the sum total of the Trudeau justification. Need proof? Well, here’s the lead organizer of the Trucker rebellion, Tamara Lich, who triggered the declaration of a national emergency and invocation of the federal Emergency Act. What heinous crime against the state was she charged with? “Counseling to Commit the Offense of Mischief“. Think about it.

No, seriously, think about it. It is true that she may later be charged with removing mattress tags. However, for right now, the biggest domestic terrorist in the history of Canadian politics is currently charged with the same offense as if she stole the lids off the shampoo bottles at the hotel where the Liberal Party of Canada was holding their national convention. If the charge of “mischief” rings a bell for some of you, it’s likely because a very famous duo was previously charged with the same criminal offenses.

The Canadian Parliament is currently debating whether or not the members within government will support the use of the Emergency Act. The members of Parliament are spending hours waxing philosophically, with tremendous seriousness, about the need to support the same declaration that is used when Canada would decide to go to war with another country. And they are doing this because blue collar workers have infiltrated the capital city with a demand to remove COVID mandates. The crimes against the truckers are so serious, they require the invocation of the most massive weapon that can be deployed to remove the constitutional freedoms of Canadian citizens, in an effort to protect them from grave and serious harm stemming from… …. people charged with “MISCHIEF”.


It would be nice if someone, anyone, in the Canadian Parliament stood up and made this simple point. “Um, hey folks… ahem… I don’t mean to be all captain obvious and stuff… and I certainly do not want to deflate your sense of self-importance…. or the seriousness of the debate. However, that said, y’all do realize we are talking about invoking the Emergency War Measures Act against people charged with mischief, right?“

The cops don’t want to

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A bit half-ass. If the House votes on Monday/Tuesday to support Trudeau, what’s Kenney going to do? Or a judge?

Alberta Premier Files Legal Challenge To End Trudeau’s Emergencies Act (ES)

Alberta Premier Jason Kenney and his UCP government are so disgusted by the federal Liberals’ imposition of the Emergencies Act to end the truckers’ blockade of downtown Ottawa that they will file a legal challenge in Federal Court in Ottawa early next week to end Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s arbitrary and high-handed action. In an exclusive interview with Postmedia, Kenney said the use of Canada’s most powerful law was “unjustified in the circumstances,” an “overreach,” a violation of due process and “an intrusion into provincial jurisdiction.” As a consequence, lawyers representing the Alberta government will be asking judges not to overturn the act, but rather to suspend its use in the current situation.

The premier doesn’t want anyone to misunderstand his motives. “The situation in Ottawa is serious. Law and order has to be restored.” Protesters cannot be allowed to blockade the core of any Canadian city, much less our capital, Kenney explained, no matter what their cause. “But the Emergencies Act was designed to come into effect at the failure of the state,” at a time when it was possible our democratic institutions might fall. “However, there is no insurrection or coup,” Kenney said pointedly. “Police services already have all the powers they need through provincial authority. All the tools already exist” to clear the blockade and restore order, Kenney believes. The feds, for instance, don’t need the power to “seize and freeze” people’s bank accounts and other assets.

The banking provisions of the Emergencies Act were, according to Kenney, “designed to interrupt terrorism financing,” to choke off the money supply of radical cells plotting attacks within Canada. Now, according to the premier, the Trudeau government is instead using those provisions to harass “people whose opinions they disagree with.” Federal Justice Minister David Lametti even hinted on CTV that the feds are even considering having financial institutions freeze the accounts of anyone who used a credit card to donate a few dollars to the convoy.Kenney thinks if the Trudeau-ites are allowed to get away with freezing the finances of their political opponents, even if only for a few days “it sets a very dangerous precedent.” “Let’s stick to the basics here — the basics of law enforcement.”

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“..the exact location will be announced closer to the start of the event because of the “paramount” concern for operational security.”

U.S. ‘People’s Convoy’ Ready To Roll On Wednesday (JTN)

The “People’s Convoy,” a U.S. trucker protest against COVID-19 mandates, is set to begin on Wednesday in California. Inspired by the Canadian truckers’ “Freedom Convoy,” the People’s Convoy is expecting about 1,000 trucks to start the journey east, with more joining along the way. “We’re going to be starting the convoy out of Barstow, California,” Maureen Steele, the national organizer of the movement, told Newsmax, explaining that the exact location will be announced closer to the start of the event because of the “paramount” concern for operational security. “The Canadian convoy was pretty organic when it happened,” Steele said. “Ours, they had a month’s notice, so our concern is disruptive groups coming in. We’re trying to just prepare for counter-protests and to take safety precautions for that.”

Truckers can register with their license plates on the organizers’ website “so we know exactly who is in the convoy and to make sure that it’s going to be a safe ride,” she explained. According to the website, the organization is calling for the “declaration of a national emergency concerning the COVID-19 pandemic be lifted immediately and our cherished Constitution reign supreme.” The website has its own donation link instead of using GoFundMe or other crowdfunding services. Steele clarified that donations for the convoy will be held with a private bank to prevent them from being frozen by governmental opposition. “So our funds should not be able to be frozen or hijacked, and all the money is being held by this third-party firm, so we can assure that it absolutely gets to the truckers and it’s clean,” she said.

“That’s why it took so long. We have such an infrastructure built for this operation. It took us a while before we could come out.” The towns where the convoy plans to stop will be announced about 24 hours prior to their arrival for precautionary purposes, Steele said, but she did confirm that they will stop in Arizona and Texas. A few trucks will be ahead of the convoy “just to check in with law enforcement in towns ahead of the convoy, that if we’re going to be marshaling there that evening, to make sure they’re prepared for a massive convoy to roll into town,” Steele said.

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Of course they did.

West Promised Not To Expand NATO – Der Spiegel (RT)

A newly discovered document from March 1991 shows US, UK, French, and German officials discussing a pledge made to Moscow that NATO would not expand to Poland and beyond. Its publication by the German magazine Der Spiegel on Friday comes as expansion of the US-led bloc has led to a military standoff in Eastern Europe. The minutes of a March 6, 1991 meeting in Bonn between political directors of the foreign ministries of the US, UK, France, and Germany contain multiple references to “2+4” talks on German unification in which the Western officials made it “clear” to the Soviet Union that NATO would not push into territory east of Germany.

“We made it clear to the Soviet Union – in the 2+4 talks, as well as in other negotiations – that we do not intend to benefit from the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Eastern Europe,” the document quotes US Assistant Secretary of State for Europe and Canada Raymond Seitz. “NATO should not expand to the east, either officially or unofficially,” Seitz added. A British representative also mentions the existence of a “general agreement” that membership of NATO for eastern European countries is “unacceptable.” “We had made it clear during the 2+4 negotiations that we would not extend NATO beyond the Elbe [sic],” said West German diplomat Juergen Hrobog. “We could not therefore offer Poland and others membership in NATO.”

The minutes later clarified he was referring to the Oder River, the boundary between East Germany and Poland. Hrobog further noted that West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl and Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher had agreed with this position as well. The document was found in the UK National Archives by Joshua Shifrinson, a political science professor at Boston University in the US. It had been marked “Secret” but was declassified at some point. Shifrinson tweeted on Friday he was “honored” to work with Der Spiegel on the document showing that “Western diplomats believed they had indeed made a NATO non-enlargement pledge.”


Screenshot of the minutes of a March 6, 1991 meeting of US, UK, French and German diplomats discussing NATO and Eastern Europe © screenshot via Kommersant

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“The concept of escalation dominance refers to the ability to increase military pressure and possibly resort to limited use of force, based on the logic that the stakes can be continuously increased until the other side is compelled to capitulate.”

Does NATO Really Pose A Threat To Russia? (Diesen)

Russia has laid down its red lines, insisting that NATO expansion towards its borders poses an unacceptable challenge to its policy of so-called “indivisible security.” As the US-led military bloc insists it exists solely to defend its members, Moscow’s requests for mutual security assurances have revealed the two sides no longer even speak the same language. Western governments committed themselves to a new defensive doctrine in all the main pan-European security agreements signed in the 1990s. The principle of “indivisible security” was explicitly defined in these agreements as the “commitment not to pursue national security interests at the expense of others,” which reflected the larger objective of ending the dividing lines in Europe.

Although, Russia was weak in the 1990s and the West could ignore these security guarantees by expanding NATO. Russia has now recovered, established firm red lines, and has demanded security guarantees based on these existing pan-European security agreements. The US and NATO, however, insist that “indivisible security” is interpreted as the right to choose alliance membership freely. The creative re-interpretation of very specific agreements does not clarify how the expansion of Cold War military alliances would achieve the overarching objective of ending the Cold War legacy of dividing lines in Europe.

[..] not long ago, it was commonplace across the West to argue that President Trump could start a major war with another great power. More recently, US Senator Roger Wicker casually suggested that America could engage in a war with Russia over Ukraine, in which even the use of nuclear weapons should not be taken off the table. Evelyn Farkas, the former US deputy assistant secretary of defense for Russia, Ukraine, Eurasia in the Obama administration, and former senior adviser to the Supreme Allied Commander in NATO, also penned an op-ed in which she argued that “The US Must Prepare for War Against Russia over Ukraine.”

Even if Washington would not follow the reckless advice of going to war with Russia, the growing US military presence along Russian borders can give the US escalation dominance. The concept of escalation dominance refers to the ability to increase military pressure and possibly resort to limited use of force, based on the logic that the stakes can be continuously increased until the other side is compelled to capitulate. With the knowledge that the US could defeat Russia in a war, the US could use its ability to escalate tensions to compel Russia to capitulate on strategically important issues.

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“..hundreds of millions of dollars in NATO lethal aid is being sent, supposedly for defense, but which Vershinin said could be intended instead for an offensive that could potentially set a trap for Russia.”

Yes. But Putin has seen this coming from miles away, too.

US Doubles Downs on Russian ‘Invasion’ Rhetoric (Lauria)

The U.S. began in November to portray the Russian troop deployment as an invasion force and has since worked its message into a crescendo of daily warnings of an imminent attack. In Spring 2021, Russia made a similar deployment near the Ukraine border and yet there were no Washington cries of invasion then. So what changed? This time the Russian troop movement coincided with Moscow presenting draft treaty proposals to the U.S. and NATO drawing a deep redline after decades of objecting to the Western military alliance moving ever closer to Russia, a country that was invaded by and defeated the largest European powers of the 19th and 20th centuries. The U.S. reacted to these bold proposals by changing the subject. They moved from the defensive to offense with a supreme distraction: the maniacal mantra of “the Russians are coming.”

NATO routinely carries out military deployments and exercises near Russia’s borders. Moscow never screams “invasion” when U.S. war planes practice cruise missile strikes at the Russian frontier. Instead Russia presented proposals that would see: • NATO roll back forward troop deployments from former Warsaw Pact states, now NATO members; • NATO would not admit Ukraine and Georgia as members and • The U.S. would remove long-range missiles in Romania and Poland and not deploy new ones in Ukraine. The U.S. and NATO have so far rejected the Russian draft treaties out of hand, except on the missile issue, which Washington is ready to negotiate (Joe Biden has promised not to deploy missiles in Ukraine.)

The New York Times could not, however, stop itself from mocking Russia on Thursday with a story, which it seems to have just discovered, headlined, “On the Edge of a Polish Forest, Where Some of Putin’s Darkest Fears Lurk: A U.S. missile facility in Poland is at the heart of an issue animating the Kremlin’s calculations over whether to go to war against Ukraine.” Instead of withdrawing forward NATO deployments from Eastern Europe, the U.S. delivered a slap in the face by sending more NATO troops to the east. This was supposed to be in response to the alleged Russian threat to Ukraine, where no U.S. or NATO troops are being deployed.

Instead hundreds of millions of dollars in NATO lethal aid is being sent, supposedly for defense, but which Vershinin said could be intended instead for an offensive that could potentially set a trap for Russia. In Blinken’s scenario, “The government will issue proclamations declaring that Russia must respond to defend Russian citizens or ethnic Russians in Ukraine. Next, the attack is planned to begin.” If Russian regular units enter Donbass to protect ethnic Russians and Russian citizens there from the offensive, that would be the invasion the U.S. is screaming about. It would unleash the “mother of all sanctions,” as a U.S. Senate sanctions bill against Russia has been called.

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“..tying Russia down for the foreseeable future in an Iraq-style military quagmire..”

“Operation Cyclone: Ukraine Edition” – Is This The Real Plan? (O’Reilly)

Ukraine has been under the rule of the successive US-EU friendly governments of Petro Poroshenko and Volodymyr Zelensky since the 2014 Euromaidan, a CIA and MI6-orchestrated regime change operation launched in response to then-Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych’s November 2013 decision to suspend an EU trade deal in favour of pursuing closer ties with the Russian Federation. With the ongoing collapse of the global COVID-19 media narrative following the highly coincidental timing of last month’s World Economic Forum Davos Agenda virtual event, a hypothetical Russian invasion of Ukraine has now taken centre stage amongst corporate media outlets with a track record of promoting war and regime change in countries refusing to kowtow to the demands of the US-NATO hegemony.

A media narrative which has seen thousands of US and British troops being deployed to Eastern Europe as a result – a highly provocative action and one, that should even a minor miscalculation occur amidst the current tensions, could easily escalate into a full-blown military conflict between East and West. Recent comments by current Ukrainian President Zelensky however, in which he poured cold water over the idea of a Russian invasion of Ukraine, as well as the recent supply of over 90 tonnes of weaponry to Kiev by the United States amidst the current tensions, and US President Joe Biden stating himself that Washington would not engage militarily with Russia, would suggest that although the possibility of the current crisis inadvertently spiralling into a global conflict between Russia and NATO remains, that that is not the current intention of the West.

Rather, a plan seemingly exists to provoke Russia into intervening in the eastern Donbass region of Ukraine to protect the predominantly ethnic Russian inhabitants of the breakaway Republics of Donetsk and Luhansk, before drawing Moscow into a wider guerrilla conflict in the rest of Ukraine, the second-largest country in Europe, with the intentions of tying Russia down for the foreseeable future in an Iraq-style military quagmire.

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“If I were Putin and I wanted Ukraine, I would just take it. I would say, you Americans took Iraq and Libya. The Israelis stole Palestine. I’m taking Ukraine.”

The Washington Post: The Voice of the CIA (Paul Craig Roberts)

The Washington Post has always been a CIA asset. The CIA used the Washington Post to orchestrate the Watergate narrative used to drive President Nixon out of office. The CIA wanted Nixon gone, because Nixon was threatening the military/security complex’s budget and power by making arms control agreements with the Soviets and by opening to China. The CIA was afraid to assassinate Nixon because of the suspicion it was under for assassinating President Kennedy and Senator Kennedy. So the CIA used the Washington Post to assassinate Nixon politically. The entire history of the Washington Post is one of fake news. The latest fake news from the disinformation sheet claims that the Russian troop pullback is a “deliberate ruse to mislead the United States and other world powers” about Russia’s planned invasion of Ukraine. “Anonymous US intelligence sources” (the CIA) are cited as the source.

First of all, the Russian troops were part of an exercise, not an invasion plan. But push this fact aside and ask yourself what is the point of Russia concealing its plans? If Russia wants to invade Ukraine, no one on earth can do anything whatsoever about it. So why hide it? Indeed, with satellites overhead a force concentrated for invasion cannot be hidden. The presstitute who wrote the story and the CIA that dictated it are thinking in WW II terms when modern surveillance capabilities did not exist. Ask yourself also why Russia needs to create a false flag attack in order to justify invading Ukraine. If Russia wants Ukraine, Russia has plenty of up front reasons.

One is to prevent Ukraine from being a NATO member and hosting US missile bases on Russia’s border. Another is that Ukraine is part of Russia and had been for 300 years until the Americans broke it off from Russia when Russia was to weak to do anything about it. Another reason is that Ukraine has violated the Minsk Agreement and continues to attack the Russian population in the Donbass region. In actual fact, Russia doesn’t need any excuse, because no one can stop them. Also ask yourself what is the point of an excuse. No matter how good it is, Washington and NATO would not believe it. The excuse would do no good and serve no purpose. In fact an excuse would be worse than no excuse, because the excuse would simply result in the endless refutation of the excuse. If I were Putin and I wanted Ukraine, I would just take it. I would say, you Americans took Iraq and Libya. The Israelis stole Palestine. I’m taking Ukraine.

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“Judge Mehta’s opinion seems to reinforce the view that Trump’s speech was protected, too.”

Ruling Against Trump Leaves More Questions Than Answers On Free Speech (Turley)

A “one-of-a-kind case.” Judge Amit Mehta’s description of the litigation against four principal speakers at the Jan. 6 Trump rally may have been as much a prayer as a portrayal. As famed Supreme Court justice Oliver Wendell Holmes once said, “Hard cases make bad law” — and the litigation against President Trump and his associates is a hard case that just proved Holmes right. In consolidated cases brought by Democratic members of Congress and Capitol Police officers, Judge Mehta ruled on motions to dismiss by the former president, his son Donald Jr., former Trump counsel Rudy Giuliani and Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.), as well as several extremist groups like the Oath Keepers. The judge dismissed the claims of a violent conspiracy against Trump Jr. and Giuliani, and he invited Brooks to file a motion to dismiss on the same grounds. He rejected arguments that their speeches at the rally caused the subsequent rioting in the Capitol.

Yet, while admitting that the case raised difficult constitutional questions, he declined to dismiss the claim against Trump. The ruling will now allow a long-awaited appeal on core constitutional questions, including the protections for inflammatory speech. Most analysts expected that groups like the Oath Keepers would likely remain in the lawsuit, given their active role in the rioting and the recent charges of seditious conspiracy filed against them. The most controversial parties were the speakers at the rally near the White House before the riot. The judge’s 112-page opinion makes easy work of dismissing the claims against the other speakers. These speeches were reckless but constitutionally protected. Giuliani’s declaration — “Let’s have trial by combat” — has been cited by some critics as a clear incitement to an insurrection, but the judge found such arguments were implausible and that Giuliani’s words “were not likely” to cause a riot.

He also found that Trump Jr.’s comments on the election were “protected speech,” and he rejected claims that Brooks urging Trump’s supporters to “start taking names and kicking ass” could be the basis for liability. I previously wrote that the claims against these four Jan. 6 speakers might find “a sympathetic trial judge” but that “they will likely fail on appeal, even if they survive the trial level litigation.” All but one of those claims are now dismissed on the trial level. Moreover, Judge Mehta’s opinion seems to reinforce the view that Trump’s speech was protected, too. The judge could well be reversed on the threshold question of immunity, raised by Trump, that presidents cannot be sued for speaking on matters of public interest. Mehta was honest in saying that “this is not an easy issue” and that “the alleged facts of this case are without precedent.”

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The EU forced Greece to sell its national rail operator for €45 million. And pay the foreign buyer €50 million a year.

How Trains Abolished By Switzerland Are Now Back In Business In Greece (Bersi)

Delays, breakdowns, cancellations… For years, ETR 470 trains were the biggest headache of the Swiss railways. In the end, the Swiss sent them for scrap. But the Italian railways — which has been running all Greek passenger trains since 2017 — presented the very same trains as state-of-the-art. “Stay away from these trains,” say executives who know them first hand. So why is this train — that has repeatedly put passengers in danger in the past — getting a new lease of life? Twenty years ago, the Swiss press dubbed the ETR 470 train — serving the Milan-Switzerland route — ‘Pannenzug’, meaning ‘breakdown train’. Meanwhile, the website that documented its problems was named CessoAlpino, meaning (in elegant translation) ‘Alpine toilet’.

Two former officials familiar with this train, who were contacted by Investigate Europe and Reporters United, find it hard to believe that the five remaining ETR 470s not sent to the scrapyard are now being touted as the future of the Athens-Thessaloniki rail link — the most important route in the Mediterranean country. “The advice from Switzerland: hands off these trains,” says Walter Finkbohner, former secretary of the board of directors of Cisalpino AG, the subsidiary of Italian and Swiss railways that bought the ETR 470s from the manufacturer, Fiat Ferroviaria in the 1990s. “Buy proven trains or new trains. There is nothing for free in life,” he adds. But Greece is not in a position to accept such recommendations, nor to choose which rolling stock circulates on its tracks, since its railways were fully privatised five years ago, as required by its creditors.

The Italian state company Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane (FSI) bought 100% of TRAINOSE, the Greek rail operator, for a mere €45 million. The privatisation contract remains secret, but people familiar with its terms, such as the current vice-minister for infrastructure and transport, Giorgos Karayannis, dub it “colonial”. This is unusually strong language from a member of a conservative government. The Greek transport ministry has agreed to subsidise the Italian company to the tune of €50 million a year to run certain routes, as outlined in a Public Service Obligations (PSO) contract.

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“The $240 billion loss in market capitalization was the largest one-day loss in US corporate history.”

Zuckerberg’s Facebook Empire Collapsing (RT)

Once the world’s sixth largest firm with a valuation of over $1 trillion, Facebook’s parent company Meta finished Thursday’s trading with a value of $565 billion. According to data compiled by Bloomberg, the social media giant has tumbled out of the world’s 10 largest companies by market value, hammered by its worst monthly stock decline ever.

The stock rout has placed Mark Zuckerberg’s company in 11th place behind Chinese Tencent Holdings. Chip giant Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) holds the ninth spot. The list of the world’s most-valuable companies, ranked by market capitalization, includes Apple, Microsoft, Aramco, Alphabet, Amazon, Tesla, Berkshire Hathaway, and Nvidia. Data shows that the value wiped out by the selloff in Meta’s shares exceeds the market caps of all but eight companies in the S&P 500 Index. Meta’s share price is down about 40% year-to-date after the company reported two weeks ago that its social media platform Facebook lost about one million users from the third quarter to the fourth quarter of 2021. That’s the first such decline for the company in its 18-year history.

Meta’s stock plummeted 26.4% on February 3 after the company released its weaker-than-expected outlook. The $240 billion loss in market capitalization was the largest one-day loss in US corporate history. CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s personal net worth is down more than $46 billion from the beginning of the year, he’s currently worth $78.8 billion.

Read more …

Originally published in the Prince Arthur Herald.
12/12/2014 12:59pm EST | Updated February 11, 2015

Why Canada Will Become a Dictatorship Under Trudeau (Dickin)

It’s becoming clearer as the days of Trudeau’s Liberals wear on: if elected Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau would turn Canada into a dictatorship. This is the man who admitted he “admires China’s basic dictatorship.” It wasn’t just a sarcastic comment – he seriously said that he admires the dictatorship because they can get things done quickly. And it’s becoming clearer that Trudeau not only admires the dictatorship — he runs the Liberal Party like one too. How else can one explain the police-enforced acclamation of Andrew Leslie as the Liberal candidate for Orleans? Even with hundreds of Liberals attending the meeting to show their support for another candidate (and former Trudeau leadership rival), it was clear from the beginning that Leslie was Trudeau’s hand-picked favourite, and certainly wouldn’t be stopped by pesky processes like “democracy.”

Just the imagery of Trudeau’s chosen candidate being selected with police intervention is scary. It shows that Trudeau doesn’t just admire China’s dictatorship — he would practice one if he had the chance. The nomination in Orleans is only the latest rigged “open nomination.” Despite Trudeau’s promises to actually, you know, practice democracy, at least a half dozen Liberal nominations have been rigged or tampered with through the direct intervention of Trudeau’s office: mysteriously disqualifying candidates, changing nomination dates, paperwork going “missing,” and using dirty “back-room” politics to ensure the leader’s candidate is chosen at any cost. But those are only Liberal candidates; surely Trudeau would loosen his grip on his caucus colleagues once they’ve been elected, wouldn’t he? Unfortunately, no.

The Liberal caucus randomly learned one morning early last year that their leader had come up with a new diktat: that all Liberals would be expected, no, required, to vote pro-choice. When Trudeau’s pathetic attempted defence (that they were “the party of the Charter,” obviously missing those small sections about freedom of conscience and religion) agitated more than a few Liberal MPs, he attempted to invent some weird “grandfathering” rule. But then he went back on that too. The result is that Liberal MPs who dare question the diktat of Trudeau are being punished. Those who dare disagree have already been punished, resigned, or indicated that they won’t seek another term in office — at least not under the iron fist of Trudeau.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

 

Very eloquent protester


https://twitter.com/i/status/1493408984270835714

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Home Forums Debt Rattle February 20 2022

Viewing 40 posts - 1 through 40 (of 131 total)
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  • #102156

    Vincent van Gogh On the outskirts of Paris near Montmartre 1887   • Geert Vanden Bossche: Why The COVID Vaccine Is A Bad Idea For Kids (Loesch) •
    [See the full post at: Debt Rattle February 20 2022]

    #102157
    Germ
    Participant

    Must listen –

    #102158
    Germ
    Participant

    Who would have thought – inducing your body to produce trillions of Spikes would lead to Long Covid-like symptoms!

    https://www.science.org/content/article/rare-cases-coronavirus-vaccines-may-cause-long-covid-symptoms

    🤡🤡🤡

    #102159
    Germ
    Participant

    Dr. Bryan Ardis explains how Remdesivir was proven to have the highest mortality rate in clinical trials (causing kidney, heart and liver failure), and has actually been the cause of many deaths attributed to Cv, and yet it is still currently the ONLY drug certified by the FDA for use in Cv hospital patients in the USA, and in Jan 2022 they just approved it to be used on infants older than 7 days.

    #102160
    Dr. D
    Participant

    “Credit Suisse Ignored Cocaine-Linked Murder while Helping Bulgarian Wrestler Launder Money”

    And Citi bought jumbo jets for the Zetas so they could move coke and guns. But Bitcoin is for criminals. Trust the banks will have the KYC laws and stop Hunter from moving money for the “Big Guy” out of Ukraine.

    “U.S. to Invade Canada to Establish a Democracy” –BBee

    And they have oil. Sounds like they need them some FREEDOM!

    CNN whole page, non-stop war, as if Iraq II invasion they are so proud of. Oh, got the minute ticker, world news ticker, the whole embarrassment. …Which the the plural word for CNN articles.

    Meanwhile, back in reality: “Ukraine Defense Chief Says “Low Probability” of Major Conflict with Russia, Contradicting Biden”

    And Russia already said what they would do, as explained by Orlov: they are stealing all million remaining men and leaving the infrastructure to Ukraine to fix, possibly while also denying them entry to the WHOLE PROVINCE.

    Er, how did Winken, Blinken and Nod not know this was the strategy? Is there any clearer way for Russia to express it? Nah I expect it’s “reality”: THEY JUST DON’T CARE. The Fed needs a war, Interest rates are up, stocks are teetering, bonds need buyers, Biden needs PR. I don’t care about a real war if I can have one on CNN and it does the trick.

    “The Atlantic” is dismal. Since I’ve already gone over previous article line-by-line with how irrational and unscientific they are, I spared you doing that for two more they wrote this week. They are the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen, and as per criticisms of PMC poser-class, are only masters of dropping irrational words for other PMCs who think the existence of signalling, dictionary words is an “argument”. That was for how Omicron is really, rahhly dangerous, and not “mild” at all, although it doesn’t kill anybody, and the article couldn’t find a scrap of evidence it did, in any way, even with hospital overruns. So Mild = Deadly WeAllGonnaDieeeee!!! They pay for it, eat it up, hang on every word, and now these Science-worshippers refuse to believe and follow the CDC, WHO, in favor of continuing their personal fear that I think makes them feel important. Gives meaning and structure to their lives, lacking religion. I understand that, but couldn’t you pick something, you know, not a lie that destroys and/or murders everyone around you?

    Yeah, posting Atlantic articles is amazing. Some say they’re furiously moon walking backwards to CYA, but I don’t fully see that, or not just in an obvious, single face-value event. That author still loves vaccines, prob doesn’t believe in lab-leak, worships science which never-dun-wrong, but at least the two years of complete, murdering, undermining, one-way, f-ups is openly published and admitted by them. Along with admitting maybe dissenters are on to something. I’d take off the filter for 20 minutes and read it to check and calibrate the system.

    Bitcoin Nunchucks. Yes, I’ll have to look into them. This is how you do it and it ain’t very hard. Like real internet proxies: I don’t keep logs. Therefore, I cannot answer subpoenas. Have a nice day.

    I’m not much for VDB or if it was him, that article yesterday. I don’t think the primary problem is going to be non-sterilizing vaccines during a pandemic. Although plausible, it is true that pathogens generally evolve downward. Then it is statistical, so there is no essential reason we should hit a lottery number at any given time. Third, Omicron may have erased CV for the time being. Fourth, we have a much more immediate problem in that we appear to have a vaccine that creates a 40% increase in death rate at all ages.

    And in other immediate problems, the CDC recommends vaccines for the pregnant, while having no data on this yet, AND while officially also having an opposite requirement that pregnant women NOT BE IN THE SAME ROOM as the vaccinated. Explain?

    Reality a la carte. Like Fauci, we say all things and their opposites, and let our advertising dept influence which truth you choose. The masses choose who’s popular; the minority choose who is scientific.

    “…y’all do realize we are talking about invoking the Emergency War Measures Act against people charged with mischief, right?“

    Same as J6. Congressional investigation, insurrection act, 1y solitary for “Trespassing”. Officially. For a rebellion where 100,000 multiple gun owners brought zero guns.

    That’s okay, right now it’s a scam. RCMP doing full catch-and-release on everyone. We can hypothesize why but it’s not a really all SS on anyone yet, which is fine. The shock troops are clearly outsiders (although Canadians) and finding enough psychos in the Mounties and Special Forces of Canada may be why it took so long to respond. They are being well-paid to be psychos we hear, to be investigated shortly. However, things are not necessarily what they seem: Protesters are still in the next street over, chanting “We love you” to the police riot squad. They shot back tear gas grenades, all caught on international TV. If I were them, I would too. 1) you look great to your boss and can say “But boss, isn’t this what you want? I was following YOUR orders“. 2) by doing this, it undermines the legitimacy of the police action, Turdeau, Canada, and the reaction will cause the end of this illegal action faster than anything else I could do, e.g. putting down my shield and baton and hugging them back. I’m not saying that’s TRUE, but it’s possible, so think about the 1st, 2nd, 3rd level effects. So although counterintuitive, shooting back at them harmlessly is helping them a lot.

    Same for the timing. So Mooselini calls War Powers and immediately takes action. I think he needs to have that approved in Parliament. But Parliament went on a sudden vacation. Why? Duh, when they reconvene they can declare every action complete scandalous and illegal and let Turdeau swing for it, saving themselves from swinging beside him. Think strategy here, like weasel. The more he looks like a tyrant, the more they can clutch their pearls and survive. Don’t let them. They supported same thing 2 years = Out.

    “stakes can be continuously increased until the other side is compelled to capitulate.”

    Says a group that hasn’t won a war in 80 years and didn’t win that one either.

    “If you’re so rich, why ain’t you smart?” Or vice-versa or something.

    “a plan seemingly exists to provoke Russia into intervening in the eastern Donbass region of Ukraine to protect the predominantly ethnic Russian inhabitants of the breakaway Republics of Donetsk and Luhansk, before drawing Moscow into a wider guerrilla conflict in the rest of Ukraine, the second-largest country in Europe, with the intentions of tying Russia down”

    This seems quite plausible, but since our Harvard PMCs are illiterate crayon-munching glue-sniffers, they’re incapable of just simply reading what Russia said their plans are and adjusting. This isn’t hard guys: they literally TOLD YOU the battle plan. But failure is the only option for PMCs. They’ve never done anything else and they aren’t going to start now. Daddy didn’t buy me into Harvard (“W”) for nothin’, you know!

    That is, the same Harvard that lost $1 Billlllllion dollars (channeling Dr. Evil) under PMC Larry Summers, top Treasury head and top economist. …I expect he made the losses on purpose to embezzle it to the zero-sum other party. Lose a billion dollars? Congratulations, you’re an “Expert”!

    “The Washington Post has always been a CIA asset. The CIA used the Washington Post to orchestrate the Watergate narrative used to drive President Nixon out of office. The CIA wanted Nixon gone, because Nixon was threatening the military/security complex’s budget and power by making arms control agreements with the Soviets and by opening to China. The CIA was afraid to assassinate Nixon because of the suspicion it was under for assassinating President Kennedy and Senator Kennedy. So the CIA used the Washington Post to assassinate Nixon politically.” –PCR

    Wow, the probable truth in open print. I didn’t think I’d see that in my lifetime.

    Aaaand back to normal: “extremist groups like the Oath Keepers.”–Turley

    Does he know what an “Oath” is? Which oath they are keeping? Clue: they are former police and army veterans and pro-constitutionalists. Perhaps the “extreme” is that they want to uphold existing Federal law as written and passed in 1788 that is still in full force today. And if they want that, and that’s “extreme”, then what exactly does their opposition want? Like most, Turley cedes all ground and argument to the enemy before he even begins. He must be a Republican!

    “Back In Business In Greece”

    They will keep raping you until you make them stop. So do it. You’ll have to sooner or later anyway.

    “The $240 billion loss in market capitalization was the largest one-day loss in US corporate history.”

    Yes, but I can’t figure out why they’re not worth zero. Like most of the U.S. stock market. That’s coming in the next few days I hear.

    #102161
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    People who receive more positive than negative attention for their appearance receive relatively high levels of good feelings about themselves (all other things being equal, of course), and positive emotional input is associated with stronger immune systems.

    Feeling good about oneself is a major source of good health. The general ennui and alienation, that most people feel (imo) in today’s technospheric world, surely contributes significantly to the generally tepid health of the average Euromerican these days. (I recall an early SNL commercial parody ending with words to this effect: ‘Somehow, these two people’ (boy and girl) ‘found each other without commercial beauty products.’

    #102162
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    “I’m not much for VDB or if it was him, that article yesterday. I don’t think the primary problem is going to be non-sterilizing vaccines during a pandemic. Although plausible, it is true that pathogens generally evolve downward.”

    On their own, yes. In a hothouse environment like billions of folks getting vakzinated within a short time (a year or so) with non-=sterilzing vakzines, variants emerge at a frantic rate, greatly increasing the chances of a variant that is both infectious and highly toxic.

    What some are calingl VAIDS (Vakzine induced immune deficiency syndrome) is not mutually exclusive from its delivery mechanism, a toxic “vaccine” that does more harm than good if itself before we even factor in the VAIDS.

    Double-trouble.

    #102163
    Figmund Sreud
    Participant

    Question about Klaus in Canadian Parlament:

    F.S.

    #102164
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    A

    “Fired Georgian College instructor becomes face of convoy protest in Ottawa”

    B

    “Tom Marazzo Trucker Convoy Organizer Announces Retreat
    150,581 viewsFeb 19, 2022”

    I wonder what ‘C’ could be?

    #102165
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    AN elderly (90 years old!) old-school knee-jerk liberal lady in our apt prison complex has a bumper sticker that says Fight Right Wing Extremism. (I suspect I mentioned this a few months ago?) One wants to place another sticker next to it, But Support Left Wing Extremism.

    And maybe, in the dog poop area/rose garden (efficiency, you know) next to her apt, a poster that says: ALL EXTREMISTS MATTER!

    #102166
    EoinW
    Participant

    The last two twitter captions are brilliant. This guy is a hero. All the protesters are heroes! We’re lucky to have such people in Canada. Especially when nearly all the Canadians I know are mushrooms. They just want to stay in the dark and know nothing. I’m not sure we deserve such heroes fighting for us all.

    Thank you for sharing.

    #102167
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    ““If you’re so rich, why ain’t you smart?” Or vice-versa or something.”

    Major facet of the story of my life. Money is everything in our time, from an emotional basis to a global economy monolithically financialized with great disregard for little things like physical reality and its attendant resource restraints and the generally annoying nuances of finity.

    #102168
    those darned kids
    Participant
    #102169
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    “@ Boscohorowitz said:

    How about you mind your own business …

    You need a nappy change?”

    Thanx for speaking directly to me, aspnaz. Whether I personally appreciate the remark or not, the discursive environment at TAE benefits, I firmly believe, from such basic respect between interlocutors, i.e., telling a person to their face what you think of them or their remarks rather than slinging it in some general direction.

    In Fung Yoo’s The Art of Flung Poo, it says, ‘When flinging poo at someone, aim at the target only when there is a clear line of fire. This avoids unwanted collateral damage.’ Thanx for keeping your eye on the target. emy

    #102170
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    tdk: I know this is pathetic but my eyes are old. Can you offer us a “money quote” for the CDC 2019 Novel Coronavirus (nCoV) Real-Time RT-PCR Diagnostic Panel – Instructions for Use document?

    I prefer to start from the core and spiral my way out rather than the top down, I save that for other linear narrative challenges.

    Willis and I would both be grateful.

    Bosco Horowitz
    Junior Tech/Tesla Air Quality Control Systems
    77 Elon Row
    Muskovia, Mars

    #102171
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    We are often surprised when what we predict comes true. Most of us here fear and believe that some degree of Iron Bootheel smackdown response is heading our way sooner or later.

    The brave trucker in those Twitter captions that EoinW so admires talks about gobs of people pouring in to show support.

    A) yesterday was, in soft post-modern Euromerican flannel jammy terms, like the Cossacks charging in the beginning of the Communist Revolution or whatever we call what happened to Russia around 1917.

    B) a part of me wonders if this huge influx of people crowding in will be subjected to a much more severe ‘Cossack charge’? I have no feeling or opinion on its likelihood. It’s more like I’m sniffing the ground for black swan fewmets. I have no clue other than, in times like this, things are so highly charged, the top is both spinning and wobbling so fast, that that which was more unthinkable than not just last week or even yesterday, has a wide open avenue down which to Tiananmen Square the protest circle.

    Who else here sometimes thinks that thinking the unthinkable is, like, their main hobby?

    fwiw, I think that the stakes and tensions are as high as can be tolerated under a wannabe totalitarians regime run by a guy who openly admires China’s version of same.

    “Many of the protest leaders were imprisoned, some of whom wouldn’t be released for more than a decade, and the government has worked hard to remove all mention of the massacre from Chinese history and media, seeing it as a threat to the legitimacy of its continued one-party rule.

    So far, at least, it appears to have worked. On the 30th anniversary in 2019, no public memorials or events marking the day are expected in mainland China.
    Ah well. Every Day Is a Winding Road

    #102172
    chooch
    Participant

    Winken, Blinken and Nod. Enjoyed it all, but that brought a grin. Thanks Dr. D.

    #102173
    zerosum
    Participant

    A Science Fiction World

    The closing ceremonies of the Winter Olympics

    “The Peoples’ Convoy Caravan” of 1,000’s of campers that will unite as they will be crossing the USA from California to Washington.

    The symbol of freedom and peaceful opposition to overreach by governments – the Canadian maple leaf flag

    #102174
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    Waddya know:

    Confronting moment Chinese student rips down Tiananmen Square posters supporting Hong Kong at an Australian university while she laughs about tortured Uyghurs and claims the 1989 massacre never happened

    I don’t mind living in the USA. It means I’m not living in mainland China, which strikes me as being headed for a denouement revolution that may make the Cultural Revolution seem tame.

    #102175
    Germ
    Participant

    Great reading!

    https://igorchudov.substack.com/p/covid-vaccine-hiv-and-vaids-an-explanation

    The vaxxed are fucked in so, so many ways – “Six ways to Sunday” in fact, for those that remember !!

    🤡🤡🤡

    #102176
    Germ
    Participant
    #102177
    Oroboros
    Participant
    #102178
    Oroboros
    Participant
    #102179
    those darned kids
    Participant

    re canadian parliament: also important is that when the ndp mp tried to comment, they cut him off, too. and then, the audio and video is just fine again.

    #102180
    Oroboros
    Participant

    Even Trump won’t shake this ponce’s hand

    Yuck

    .
    https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FMAvvBFX0AAlz9b?format=jpg&name=small

    #102181
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    aspnaz made some mention of this sort of thing:

    RCMP and OPP set up command centre in Ottawa as police chief Peter Sloly resigns (4 days ago)

    Looking up its history, we learn about the OPP:

    “Following the disbanding of World War II auxiliary forces, growing Cold War tension and fear of a nuclear attack led to the belief that police services should “recruit and train volunteers to augment their strength in times of emergency”. As a result, in 1954, the Provincial Civil Defence Auxiliary was created, but the need to more closely associate the auxiliary with the OPP soon became apparent.[citation needed]

    On 14 January 1960, the Provincial Civil Defence Organization was dissolved. A new oversight body known as the Emergency Measures Organization—Ontario (EMO) came into being. Each department of the government became responsible for its own operational planning. The organization of auxiliary police forces became the responsibility of all interested municipal police forces, as well as the OPP.[citation needed]

    In April 1960, a new organization more closely affiliated with the OPP came into being. The Ontario Auxiliary Police were organized in 12 of the 17 OPP districts and by the end of the year, 376 volunteers had signed up to be equipped and trained by experienced OPP personnel. Two OPP inspectors were assigned to work with Emergency Measures Ontario as liaison officers for the volunteers. This close connection continues today with the OPP auxiliary playing a critical role in emergency and disaster planning and occurrences. By 1961 there were 466 auxiliary volunteers who accompanied regular provincials on traffic and law enforcement patrols and during the year logged more than twenty-six thousand hours of volunteer duty.[22]”

    ‘Heckuva job, Brownie’ comes to mind

    #102182
    Oroboros
    Participant
    #102183
    willem
    Participant

    Seeing the obscene deployment of mounted police against a peaceful crowd at the Ottawa protest reminded me of the scene in the movie “Doctor Zhivago” where cossacks are sent to charge into peaceful demonstrators.

    #102184
    Oroboros
    Participant

    I’m old enough to remember drinking Bosco from this jar, not the Ancient Old

    .

    #102185
    Oroboros
    Participant
    #102186
    D Benton Smith
    Participant

    Regarding the Olympics

    China thinks it has stolen something valuable, but all it has done is broken something beautiful.
    Maybe someday the games will regain that sacred position in people’s minds, and I believe that the place is still reserved, but for the time being the Olympics are simply televised tragic farce. The competitors have had their years, dreams, hard work and sacrifice stolen by gangsters.

    #102187
    EoinW
    Participant

    I’d credit the CCP’s 30 year success with the fact that the Chinese people had no good alternative options. A revolution to create a western-liberal democracy couldn’t be that appealing considering how the West had treated the Chinese for a century leading up to Communist rule. For goodness sake the British actually tried to control the population by turning them all into opium addicts! Really want to open the door and let the Anglo-Americans back in?

    Then all Chinese got to witness the 1990s and the rape of Russia. Russians paid a terrible price for liberal democracy.

    People in the West are not trapped in such a situation. We may be in 50 years time if the Covid Karens get their way, however we are not there yet. At the most, we’ve had 2 years of totalitarian rule and even that has been stealth authoritarianism. The Chinese had had 4 decades of communist rule by 1990. For many, that was all they’d ever known.

    I’m not expecting us to go the CCP route. Doesn’t mean our rulers won’t destroy society. Their aim is total control, not chaos. Yet their actions keep creating the potential for a great deal of chaos. With slim hope of controlling anything more than their “bug out” plan to escape to New Zealand.

    #102188
    Noirette
    Participant

    ezixa wrote:

    As others are asking, where may this trend be heading? I feel that the trend in the Anglosphere and a number of European nations towards de-democratisation will not stop. We’re in for a period of fascistic rule, and can only hope that it will burn itself out when people learn that fascism will not save us from ourselves any more than any other political -ism.

    Yes. Adding… Fascism is an aberration of the Center, it is neither ‘left’ nor ‘right.’ Both of which can be ‘authoritarian’ within their own vague deologies, in different ways.

    Which explains, in part, US Democrats being anti-working class (scorning “deplorables” etc.) as the Dems. have become super-centrist, representing a sorry terrified ‘middle class’ fighting to maintain their now rapidly crumbling social and financial status. They have attempted to compensate for their treachery with identity politics simultaneously championing and exploiting ppl who are considered to be ‘put down’ because of intrinsic perso-characteristics, such as skin color, ethnic origins, being F or M, sex orientations, etc.

    I read that in Canada the Police were arresting / stopping / ppl / vehicles waving Can. flags! The national flag has become a symbol of resistance… to the very Gvmt. of the Nation one supports! Such an epitome of a globalist mind-set (‘Nationalism’ to be repressed, as a symptom of racism, white supremacy, etc.) it is just staggering.

    Fascism is the melding of ‘National’ and ‘Corporate’ power.

    Who holds power in the “W” today? Large Corporations, note these are Globalists, and National Gvmts who are their Front Men, or their ‘partners,’ as well as some Oligarchs and otherwise powerful ppl. Plus, those who control the Police, the Military (aka, internal control forces) – today these are ‘National’ for some part but increasingly run by Big Corps who hire and manage mercenaries, which comes down to the same actors. (An extreme ex. is Ukraine where militias are directly paid for and run by Oligarchs.) (I have left out the Energy circuit, big corps after all, but v. important – it gets complicated.)

    #102189
    those darned kids
    Participant

    bosco: All clinical samples should exhibit fluorescence growth curves in the RNase P reaction that cross the threshold line within 40.00 cycles (< 40.00 Ct), thus indicating the presence of the human RNase P gene.

    .••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

    • Detection of viral RNA may not indicate the presence of infectious virus or that 2019-nCoV is the causative agent for clinical symptoms.

    • The performance of this test has not been established for monitoring treatment of 2019-nCoV infection.

    • The performance of this test has not been established for screening of blood or blood products for the presence of 2019-nCoV.

    • This test cannot rule out diseases caused by other bacterial or viral pathogens.

    •••••••••••••••••••••••

    he analytical sensitivity of the rRT-PCR assays contained in the CDC 2019 Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) Real-Time RT-PCR Diagnostic Panel were determined in Limit of Detection studies. Since no quantified virus isolates of the 2019-nCoV were available for CDC use at the time the test was developed and this study conducted, assays designed for detection of the 2019-nCoV RNA were tested with characterized stocks of in vitro transcribed full length RNA (N gene; GenBank accession: MN908947.2) of known titer (RNA copies/μL) spiked into a diluent consisting of a suspension of human A549 cells and viral transport medium (VTM) to mimic clinical specimen. Samples were extracted using the QIAGEN EZ1 Advanced XL instrument and EZ1 DSP Virus Kit (Cat# 62724) and manually with the QIAGEN DSP Viral RNA Mini Kit (Cat# 61904). Real-Time RT-PCR assays were performed using the Thermo Fisher Scientific TaqPath™ 1-Step RT-qPCR Master Mix, CG (Cat# A15299) on the Applied Biosystems™ 7500 Fast Dx Real-Time PCR Instrument according to the CDC 2019-nCoV Real-Time RT-PCR Diagnostic Panel instructions for use

    ••••••••••••••••••••••

    there’s probably more….

    #102190
    D Benton Smith
    Participant

    A remark to the room, in general. Just a thought.

    Now would be a good time for a General Strike. Around the entire world. Every last corner.

    No need for flags, slogans or news coverage. No need for speeches explanations or threats. It does not require ANY organization at all. Just stay home.

    The criminal slave masters will know damned well what the message is. The strikers ARE the power. It really is just as simple as that.

    Stay home with your loved ones. Do whatever you want . If you see a fellow human in dire need, then save their life or feed that child or put out that fire . . . as best you can. There’s enough food in the cupboard to stay alive for longer than you might think, even if the cupboard is bare. Share if you want to.

    One week to “flatten the curve”. An additional week to reduce the so-called elites to powerless, terrified, totally impotent zeroes.

    Two weeks to Freedom.

    General Strike by all HUMAN beings. Sunrise tomorrow.

    #102191
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    The elderly gal in my area with the Stand Up To Right Wing Extremism bumper sticker also had one that says FIGHT HATE.

    Some clever wag scratched out HATE, which works on at least two levels.

    ***

    Oroboros: I’ll agree about with the ‘sniveling liberals’ meme but with this caveat: TODAY’s liberals are etc.etc. I know lifelong liberals who’ve put their heads on the baton line. Plus, I’ve known ample contemporary self-described conservatives including many of the evangelical stripe.

    They are very fond of their flannel jammies too, and also prefer not to be bothered getting dirty, hot, and sweaty actually gitting ‘r dun.

    tdk: eez perfect. As thanx, here’s the only decently recorded song by a guy I (very briefly) played drums with. He was much better live back then than what his recordings on youtube reveal, so please don’t judge him too harshly: by the time he did some studio recording, way too much coke et al had him writing sophomoric shit, singing off key, blowing off gigs (which is why all we did was a few rehearsals), and the studio results are crap.

    Except for this one, where he managed to almost sound like the guy I knew in high school who was the neighborhood rock star, opened for some big names, blah blah:

    Mr. Moonlight

    In person, the guy was 6’2″ and looked like a cross between Sean Connery and Jimmy Cagney. Could really sing for awhile. Wrote 2-3 Big Hit quality tunes, fucked himself out of a major record label contract.

    I’m grateful it fell through. I wouldn’t have lasted long in that environment, and while I had a fine ear for drumming and strong sense of groove, I also had a broken left wrist bone that didn’t like playing for hours at a stretch.

    #102192
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    oroboros: yes. BOSCO syrup was BOSS when I was a kid. Came in a cool jar with a squirt pump.

    Nice to know I’m best still BEST (Batty Eccentric Silly Truthful)!

    #102193
    phoenixvoice
    Participant

    Re Elon Musk and billionaires not such “nice guys.”
    I watched a video some time back by Elon Musk’s first wife, recounting details of their courtship and marriage. She was very careful not to slander Musk, but the events recounted made it very clear (to me, at least, married 12 years to someone who is bpd/npd) that Musk is NOT a “nice guy.” He is a narcissist and she had to conform to his image of who he expected her to be.

    #102194
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    Much as I hate to say it, I think that DBS’s thing is the Right Thing To Do. I don’t hate DBS being right; in my experience he is rarely wrong, and it’s a joy to me. I just hate to say it cuz this means driving a whole buncha innocent people in my email box (half whom I don’t remember knowing) crazy while convincing them even more that ‘crazy’ means moi.

    My logic for taking such a reputation-hammering long shot? This:

    We.still.can, and any day we may well not. Someone from the area approached me recently about joining a protest in Portland. I declined cuz I’m too frail to spare the energy and, furthermore, I am known to physically confront even assault police officers yet am somehow still alive; and my wife would friggin’ KILL me if I got myself killed.

    But I can make a fool of myself with this ancient pile of names in my email, some of whiuch may actually be read.

    If anyone hammers me about it, my response will be along the lines of:

    ‘I know it sounds crazy but I nonetheless am personally passionately convinced that now is the time to stand up to what I and many others see as a fatal disease taking over our nation and, in fact, most of the nations of the world. I am taking the risk now of alienating many people with this out of the blue email because I.still.can. The internet is not yet entirely censored like that of China, but they do appear to be working on it.

    ‘Thank you for taking the time to rread my email.’

    Oh god, I’m gonna hate this, but again, I have to agree with DBS’ passionate, maybe even pugnacious attitude about this stuff: if this ain’t now or never, now or never will never be.

    ***

    (Hmmm… I can imagine my naysayers thinking “he’s so full of shit; what a lying dreamer”. While I know that addressing such skepticism, especially unvoiced skepticism, like this is actually likely to make me sound less than more credible, but whatever. Truth is truth. Some of us somehow stumble into wild and crazy lives. Why, a whole buncha the guys in high school who graduated just before me got sent overseas to wage war in exotic locales with rice paddies, tropical forests, and tiny beautiful Asian women. The stories THEY told, or the ones my Chicago fireman Dad could tell — or just the tales from his childhood growing up in Chicago’s stockyards Irish area — make me think I’m still in my flannel jams learning to not pee my pants when Godzilla appears on the TV.

    I would think others here have some very wild stories indeed to tell. Too bad WES has to type on a handroid with old fingers.

    Anyone care to regale us? Lots of us here have protest experiences to share. That’s on-topic, yes? 😉

    We learn by sharing our stories. Let’s keep talking.

    #102195
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    “General Strike by all HUMAN beings. Sunrise tomorrow.”

    A tad soon. Give people a week to process it and talk about it.

    Also: there is one other consequence: they take off the Velvet Glove and expose the Iron Claw and turn all the goons and weapons who’ll comply on us. If fascism can happen here in full-flower as we see just now popping out of the bud, so can war by the government on the people. In fact, from what I’ve read in history, it’s what they usually do.

    ‘As I’ve often said, sonny’ said Grampa, working his gums and enjoying some fresh synaptic fire for a change, ‘some mules are too dim to know when they’re getting their hind end whupped.

    That description fits our current TPTB quite well, imo. Narcistic sociopaths are loath to commit suicide but if their demise via disgrace seems imminent, they will commit suicide, usually while taking out their wife and children before shooting themselves in front of the toddler they didn’t have the heart to kill nor the heart to care that it will be massively scarred for life.

    Such are our Turdeaus and Biden-handlers, and I see major potential for all the Tiananmen Square we can handle and more.

    Still, stop them in the streets or accept slaver, torture, and death.

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