Jan 112024
 
 January 11, 2024  Posted by at 9:50 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , ,  40 Responses »


Salvador Dalí Figure at a window 1925

 

BRICS Member South Africa Takes Zionism To Court (Pepe Escobar)
The War Within Israel’s War Cabinet (Cradle)
Ukraine Conflict Drove Up Ammo Prices Tenfold – Sweden (RT)
Lavrov Knew of ‘Secret’ Ukraine Meeting Weeks Before Bloomberg Report (Sp.)
Ukrainians Will Benefit From Zelensky’s Fall – Medvedchuk (RT)
West Got Ukraine ‘Painfully Wrong’ – Slovak PM Robert Fico (RT)
Ukrainians In UK Told To Register For Military Service (RT)
US Government Debt Biggest Threat To Global Economy – Russian NGO (RT)
China Has Become More Aggressive – UK Foreign Secretary (RT)
Germany’s ‘Krisenmodus’ Has No End in Sight (Conor Gallagher)
German Government Is Ripping Off The Farmers Who Feed The Country (Marsden)
UK Parliament Cold, Damp, and Infested With Mice – Politico (RT)
Hunter Biden Defends Including Father On Business Calls (Fox)
Can Big Pharma Be Held Accountable? (Paul Craig Roberts)
Trump Says Georgia Case ‘Totally Compromised’ (ET)

 

 

Fani Willis and her beau were there, but so was Letitia James. It was all coordinated.

 

 

Trump

 

 

Before: Russia exported cheap energy to European industries & imported European industrial goods. Now: Russia exports cheap energy to Asia & imports Asian industrial goods.

 

 

Hunter

 

 

 

 

Rogan study

 

 

LGBTs

 

 

 

 

Poland

 

 

 

 

“Both Pretoria and Tel Aviv are members of the ICJ – so the rulings are binding..”

But are they enforcable?

BRICS Member South Africa Takes Zionism To Court (Pepe Escobar)

Nothing less than the full concept of international law will be on trial this week in The Hague. The whole world is watching. It took an African nation, not an Arab or Muslim nation, but significantly a BRICS member, to try to break the iron chains deployed by Zionism via fear, financial might, and non-stop threats, enslaving not only Palestine but substantial swathes of the planet. By a twist of historical poetic justice, South Africa, a nation that knows one or two things about apartheid, had to take the moral high ground and be the first to file a suit against apartheid Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ). The 84-page lawsuit, exhaustively argued, fully documented, and filed on 29 December 2023, details all the ongoing horrors perpetrated in the occupied Gaza Strip and followed by everyone with a smartphone around the planet.

South Africa asks the ICJ – a UN mechanism – something quite straightforward: Declare that the state of Israel has breached all its responsibilities under international law since 7 October. And that, crucially, includes a violation of the 1948 Genocide Convention, according to which genocide consists of “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.”South Africa is supported by Jordan, Bolivia, Turkiye, Malaysia, and significantly the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), which combines the lands of Islam, and constitutes 57 member states, 48 of these harboring a Muslim majority. It’s as if these nations were representing the overwhelming majority of the Global South. Whatever happens at The Hague could go way beyond a possible condemnation of Israeli for genocide. Both Pretoria and Tel Aviv are members of the ICJ – so the rulings are binding.

The ICJ, in theory, carries more weight than the UN Security Council, where the US vetoes any hard facts that tarnish Israel’s carefully constructed self-image. The only problem is that the ICJ does not have enforcement power. What South Africa, in practical terms, is aiming to achieve is to have the ICJ impose on Israel an order to stop the invasion – and the genocide – right away. That should be the first priority. Reading the full South African application is a horrifying exercise. This is literally history in the making, right in front of us living in the young, tech-addicted, 21st century, and not a science fiction account of a genocide taking place in some distant universe.

Pretoria’s application carries the merit of drawing The Big Picture, “in the broader context of Israel’s conduct towards Palestinians during its 75-year-long apartheid, its 56-year-long belligerent occupation of Palestinian territory, and its 16-year-long blockade of Gaza.” Cause, effect, and intent are clearly delineated, transcending the horrors that have been perpetrated since the Palestinian resistance’s Operation Al-Aqsa Flood on 7 October, 2023. Then there are “acts and omissions by Israel which are capable of amounting to other violations of international law.” South Africa lists them as “genocidal in character, as they are committed with the requisite specific intent (dolus specialis) to destroy Palestinians in Gaza as a part of the broader Palestinian national, racial and ethnic group.”

Read more …

“..originally intended to be about post-war plans — a topic the prime minister appears reluctant to tackle given the potential risks to his political and personal future..”

The War Within Israel’s War Cabinet (Cradle)

Three months into Israel’s longest and costliest unconventional war, the country’s armed forces have emerged as a significant indirect source of pressure on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s extremist government. This development comes at a crucial juncture, both politically and in terms of security, for Tel Aviv. Amid ongoing internal differences over post-Gaza war strategies and proposed resolutions for Hamas’s prisoner exchange demands, the negative shift in international and regional public opinion over Israel’s 13-week Gaza assault has generated further stressors. At the same time, the escalating situation on the northern front with Hezbollah has compelled the Israeli army to establish a committee to investigate the political, security, and military shortcomings that led to the 7 October Al-Aqsa flood operation.

This decision by the Israeli army has triggered a political uproar, particularly from a faction uncertain about how to deal with intensifying Palestinian resistance activities brought on by the formation of Netanyahu’s coalition government – which is marked by extremism and controversial decisions, even by Israeli standards. During a recent cabinet meeting, far-right and nationalist Zionist ministers slammed army Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi’s decision to probe intelligence and operational failures leading up to the 7 October resistance operation, claiming that forming an inquiry commission during the ongoing Gaza war damages army and soldier morale. Some cabinet members rallied to scuttle the selection of former Minister of Defence Shaul Mofaz as head of the inquiry commission, largely because of his role in Israel’s unilateral Gaza disengagement plan in 2005.

The timing of the investigative committee’s formation is underscored by Defense Minister Yoav Galant and emergency cabinet member Benny Gantz’s vigorous defense of Halevi’s decision. They emphasize its importance in learning from past mistakes, addressing security gaps, and preparing for potential wider conflicts, particularly with Hezbollah in Lebanon. Less clear, however, is Netanyahu stance on the matter, despite the fact that he scheduled the session which was originally intended to be about post-war plans — a topic the prime minister appears reluctant to tackle given the potential risks to his political and personal future.

Netanyahu’s right-wing cabinet members view the inquiry as a tool to further undermine an already precarious government. They recognize that the findings of the commission could be especially damning for their governing coalition, which, since its formation, has implemented an agenda focused on the oppression of Palestinians living under occupation and the strangulation of their national aspirations. It is an agenda which security and military experts in Israel have consistently warned could heavily exacerbate the level of retaliatory violence against settlers and inflame the security situation, whether in the Gaza Strip or in the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem.

Read more …

In other news, Sweden is telling its people to prepare for war with Russia.

Ukraine Conflict Drove Up Ammo Prices Tenfold – Sweden (RT)

The deficit of ammunition in Europe has led to inflated prices as Western nations scramble to support Ukraine in its fight against Russia, the chief of staff of the Swedish Armed Forces has said. Speaking to Sveriges Radio national broadcaster on Tuesday, Michael Claesson said the conflict had led to a surge in demand in a very short period of time. He described the increase as “dramatic.” “I won’t give exact figures, but we are talking about an increase of between five to ten times compared to the time before the war started,” he said, noting that it impacted not only ammunition, but also other military materiel. According to Claesson, artillery shells for the Swedish-designed Archer 155mm self-propelled howitzer are now eight times more expensive than in 2021.

He told the broadcaster that the development had been caused by a significant rearmament campaign underway both in Sweden and other European countries. “All this creates an enormous demand and competition, essentially as if people were standing in a queue.” Commenting on weapons procurement in late December, Swedish Defense Minister Pal Jonson admitted that his country found itself in a “difficult situation” because it had not only to support Ukraine, but also take care of its own security. As of December, Stockholm has provided Kiev with $2.2 billion in military assistance. On Sunday, speaking online at the Society and Defense conference held in Sweden, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky urged his European partners to “create an arsenal for the defense of freedom” by stepping up joint arms production.

Russian officials have repeatedly said that the Western push to arm Ukraine will only prolong the conflict while becoming a burden on ordinary taxpayers. In October, Kremlin Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov stated that “the potential of the collective West to produce munitions is limited,” saying that it would have to spend a lot of time mobilizing its resources, an effort he suggested could cause “certain points of friction.” Meanwhile, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba admitted last month that Kiev senses a growing “war fatigue” in the West, and acknowledged that the country’s much-hyped counteroffensive had failed to produce swift and decisive results. Moscow has described Kiev’s push as a complete fiasco, claiming that Ukraine lost some 160,000 troops over the six months of the offensive.

Read more …

Secret meeting to discuss Zelensky’s “peace plan”, “that Kiev be given control over its pre-2014 borders, while calling for the prosecution of the Russian leadership and reparations from Moscow..”

Lavrov Knew of ‘Secret’ Ukraine Meeting Weeks Before Bloomberg Report (Sp.)

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov spilled the beans on the much-touted “secret meeting” of Ukrainian, Western, and Global South countries’ national security advisors in Riyadh on December 16 weeks before Bloomberg’s report on the gathering, telling Rossiya Segodnya chief Dmitry Kiselev about it on December 28. “Considering our good relations [with Global South countries, ed.], I can say that another meeting like this took place 10 days ago – the G7 plus the leading developing nations. Not all countries from the world majority attended. Some turned down their invitations. The meeting took place in complete secrecy. Nothing was reported about it; there were no leaks,” Lavrov said at the time. “But you know about it,” Kisilev interjected.

“Yes, we do. Our close allies and associates who attended that meeting did not promise to keep an issue that concerns Russia secret from us. Another meeting is scheduled to take place in January 2024 and a ‘peace summit,’ where [Ukrainian President Volodymyr] Zelensky’s ‘peace formula,’ is to be approved in February 2024,” Lavrov said. Commenting on Bloomberg’s report and the absurdity of organizing “peace talks” aimed at resolving the Ukraine crisis without inviting Moscow to the table, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told Radio Sputnik on Wednesday that the “secret meeting” had less to do with ending the conflict, and more to do with pumping up Mr. Zelensky’s ego.

“This is a well-worn concept of attracting political attention specifically to the Zelensky regime. This is PR for the Zelensky regime. Speaking in terms used in political science, [the talks] were about maintaining a sense of constant activity in the information and political space, at the center of which is Zelensky,” Zakharova stressed. “This has nothing to do with resolving the Ukrainian crisis. These are two completely different topics.” In fact, the spokeswoman suggested, holding “peace talks” without Russia, and on maximalist terms which Russia would never accept only serves to weaken the possibility of peace actually being reached.

“Because resolving the situation in Ukraine is, of course, painstaking work. This is work on the political and diplomatic track. This is negotiations, contacts and so on. This is not about the fate of one person, 10 people or their commercial, financial and economic interests, but about the fate of peoples and nations. That’s if we’re talking about the situation in Ukraine and a real resolution [to the crisis]. The PR around Zelensky, his so-called peace initiatives, his endless statements, appearances at various places and platforms – all this hype is created precisely to maintain the illusion of some kind of political activity while diverting the world’s attention from real processes of a possible settlement,” Zakharova said.

Read more …

“..an “unfunny parody of a dictator..”

Ukrainians Will Benefit From Zelensky’s Fall – Medvedchuk (RT)

President Vladimir Zelensky has antagonized all his allies, both domestic and foreign, and is doomed to be ousted this year, exiled Ukrainian opposition leader Viktor Medvedchuk has said. But his failure will be good for the Ukrainian people, he added. Medvedchuk was the leader of the Opposition Platform – For Life party, which Zelensky’s government banned for allegedly being “pro-Russian.” He was arrested and forced out of Ukraine in a prisoner exchange with Moscow. The politician has since been promoting a project, which would make his home nation a neutral state, prioritizing national interests, as opposed to being a Russian enemy. In a column published on Wednesday, Medvedchuk blasted the incumbent Ukrainian president, branding him an “unfunny parody of a dictator,” whose weakness sends a signal to all “political predators to eat him.”

“Zelensky has antagonized everyone he could: big businessmen, whom he blacklisted as traitors and oligarch, professional Nazis, who see his cowardice, the military, who sees his incompetence, and last but not least the people, who see his indifference and cruelty,” he wrote. Ukraine is in a deep crisis that is bound to lead to a national disaster once Western funding for the proxy war against Russia is reduced, he claimed. And Ukrainian citizens need to realize that Zelensky’s downfall “does not necessarily mean a defeat of the Ukrainian people.” Instead, the opposite is true, according to Medvedchuk. It will be a victory for them, since the president “has long betrayed them and is selling them out for cannon fodder.”

The column predicted hard times for the US, which Medvedchuk believes has lost its direction, and the EU, which he expects to be sacrificed by Washington to support the American economy. For Ukraine, it means no EU membership, and its citizens should know that “Europeans will have to give their financial goodies to the American elites, not Ukrainian refugees.” Medvedchuk believes that Russia may serve as an alternative to “impoverishing Europe.” He expects that “the number of Ukrainians in Russia will increase in 2024, benefiting not just them, but everyone.” Russia has become a major destination for Ukrainian nationals, with officials estimating that as many as five million fled eastwards after the hostilities erupted in 2022. Russian President Vladimir Putin has said he considers Russians and Ukrainians brotherly peoples. He described as tragic the fact that Kiev’s divisive policies after the 2014 armed coup had led to bloodshed between these peoples.

Read more …

“..in two or three years we will still be where we are now,” Fico predicted. “The EU alone will be perhaps 50 billion euros lighter, and in Ukraine, cemeteries will be full with thousands more dead soldiers.”

West Got Ukraine ‘Painfully Wrong’ – Slovak PM Robert Fico (RT)

Funding and arming Ukraine is a “futile waste of human resources and money” that will serve only to fill Ukrainian cemeteries with “thousands of dead soldiers,” Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico wrote in an op-ed on Tuesday. Fico’s article was a rebuttal to his country’s president, who has urged him to send weapons to Kiev. Following his party’s electoral victory in September, Fico immediately cut off Slovakia’s military aid to Ukraine and vowed to block Kiev’s accession to NATO. Slovak President Zuzana Caputova, however, has called for Ukraine to be given “the means needed to defend itself,” while pro-Western pundits in Slovakia have accused Fico of cozying up to the Kremlin. “I will no longer be subject to stupid liberal and progressive demagoguery,” Fico wrote in Slovakia’s Pravda newspaper. “It is literally shocking to see how the West has repeatedly made mistakes in assessing the situation in Russia.”

Despite pumping Ukraine with tens of billions of dollars’ worth of weapons and sanctioning Moscow’s economy, “Russia completely controls the occupied territories militarily, Ukraine is not capable of any meaningful military counter-offensive, [and] it has become completely dependent on financial aid from the West with unforeseeable consequences for Ukrainians in the years to come,” he explained. “The position of the Ukrainian president is shaken, while the Russian president increases and strengthens his political support,” Fico continued, pointing out that “neither the Russian economy nor the Russian currency collapsed, [and] anti-Russian sanctions have increased the internal self-sufficiency of this huge country.”

Should the West continue along the path desired by Caputova, “in two or three years we will still be where we are now,” Fico predicted. “The EU alone will be perhaps 50 billion euros lighter, and in Ukraine, cemeteries will be full with thousands more dead soldiers.” Fico’s Slovak Social Democracy (SMER-SD) faction currently leads a three-party coalition government, while Caputova is the co-founder of the Progressive Slovakia party. Caputova’s role as president is largely ceremonial, and Fico claimed in his op-ed that she is “impatiently waiting” for the end of her term this year so that she can re-enter parliamentary politics.Fico has labeled Caputova an “American agent” on several occasions. After consulting the American Embassy in Bratislava last summer, Caputova sued Fico over the remarks, Slovakia’s SITA news agency reported.

Read more …

“..Ukrainians living abroad who have not registered for military service may end up being denied both consular and banking services under the new law..”

Ukrainians In UK Told To Register For Military Service (RT)

Ukrainians living abroad must register for military service, according to a recently adopted government decree, the consulate in the UK has said. In a statement released on Wednesday, it explained that the move is in response to numerous inquiries from Ukrainians residing in the country. According to the new rules, Ukrainian nationals must register for the military “in case of staying outside Ukraine for a period of more than three months,” the consulate stated. New arrivals must show up at Ukrainian diplomatic institutions within a week of entering Britain, it added. Currently, there are no penalties for avoiding military registration, the diplomatic body said, adding that rumors of consular services being denied to people who do not sign up are not true.

The situation, however, could change if these provisions are included in the new mobilization law, which is currently being considered by the Ukrainian parliament, it warned. Previously, Batkivshchyna party MP Vadim Ivchenko, who sits on the parliamentary committee on National Security, Defense and Intelligence, warned that Ukrainians living abroad who have not registered for military service may end up being denied both consular and banking services under the new law. It remains unclear whether the provisions will be included in the new legislation, which is expected to be voted on in the first reading on Thursday. The mobilization law was introduced in the Ukrainian parliament late last year. It proposes lowering the draft age from 27 to 25, eliminating exemptions for some categories of disabled people, and other measures to bolster the ranks of the military.

Shortly before the mobilization bill was put forward, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky said the military had asked him to round up another 450,000 to 500,000 soldiers. This claim has been disputed by Ukraine’s top general, Valery Zaluzhny, who insisted the military had not come up with exact figures, but wanted the government to ensure a steady flow of recruits to meet its combat needs and make up for losses. Kiev has never officially disclosed the country’s casualties amid the conflict with Russia, yet the tally is widely believed to be in the hundreds of thousands. According to the latest estimates by Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu provided on Tuesday, Ukraine lost more than 215,000 troops and 28,000 pieces of military hardware last year alone. Last month, the minister said that Kiev lost more than 383,000 service members, killed or wounded, since the beginning of the hostilities, with more than half of the casualties sustained during its summer counteroffensive, which was launched early last June.

Read more …

“The excessive debt was accumulated at low rates but needs to be refinanced at high rates that limit economic activity and reduce cash flow..”

US Government Debt Biggest Threat To Global Economy – Russian NGO (RT)

US government debt and Washington’s budget deficit present the biggest threats to the global economy this year, Russian government agency Roscongress has warned. Washington’s $34 trillion burden is mathematically impossible to pay off, Roscongress has claimed in a report it published on Wednesday. The agency based its estimate on the current ratio between the size of the debt, the rate at which it is growing, and budget revenues. “The excessive debt was accumulated at low rates but needs to be refinanced at high rates that limit economic activity and reduce cash flow. In the medium term, the servicing of US debt will cost $1 trillion a year,” reads the report, titled ‘Key Events – 2024. Geoeconomics. Forecasts. Major risks’.

The US government cannot solve the problem by restarting the printing press this year because that would lead to higher inflation, the report added. The country saw consumer prices shoot up to the highest levels in decades in 2022, prompting the Federal Reserve to embark on a series of rate hikes to tame inflation. US government federal debt toped $34 trillion for the first time in history at the end of December. It now amounts to about $102,000 for every man, woman, and child in the country. US total public debt is roughly equivalent to the economies of China, Germany, Japan, India, and the UK combined, as pointed out by the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, a nonpartisan fiscal policy group in New York.

Among other threats to the global economy, Roscongress identified the global real estate bubble, mentioning the high-profile bankruptcies of Chinese property developers Country Garden and Evergrande; the volatility of the US stock market; and demographic issues, namely the shrinking of China’s population. The Roscongress Foundation was established in 2007 and is a key organizer of nationwide and international congresses and exhibitions with an economic and social focus. Among the events it hosted recently is the Russia-Africa forum in St. Petersburg in July, a high-profile international gathering attended by dozens of delegations from African nations.

Read more …

As I said the other day, Cameron was hired as war secretary, not Foreign Secretary.

China Has Become More Aggressive – UK Foreign Secretary (RT)

British Foreign Secretary David Cameron has claimed that China has become more “aggressive and assertive” in the years since he headed the UK government and tried to build warm relations with Beijing. Speaking in front of the UK Foreign Affairs Committee on Tuesday, Cameron, who was prime minister from 2010 to 2016, said that while there had been a lot of incentives for the UK to develop business relations with China in the previous decade, “a lot has changed” since then. The diplomat pointed to China’s alleged repression of Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang province, which Beijing denies, as well as its policies in Hong Kong and its “wolf warrior diplomacy” as some of the primary examples of the country’s aggressive and assertive attitude.

Nevertheless, Cameron insisted that it was still crucial to engage with Beijing on various policy issues because China represented “a fifth of humanity.” “We’re not going to solve climate change without talking with the Chinese. We’re not going to work out the rules of the road on AI without at least engaging with the Chinese,” Cameron said, noting that he believes this is the foreign policy the UK should pursue. Meanwhile, China reported on Monday that it had detained the head of an overseas consulting firm for allegedly gathering sensitive data on the Asian nation on behalf of the British Secret Intelligence Service MI6.

Beijing’s Ministry of National Security accused the UK spy agency of hiring a man identified as Huang Moumou, who it claims was recruited by MI6 in 2015. He had allegedly been ordered to travel to China to collect state secrets and identify personnel to “incite rebellion.” The ministry added that London had provided Huang with intelligence training in the UK and other places, and with special spy equipment. The UK has so far declined to comment on the incident. In October, however, the British Security Service MI5 warned of the “epic scale” of Chinese espionage, claiming that more than 20,000 people in the UK had been approached by operatives who sought to acquire various secrets. China has consistently denied that it is engaged in spying against the US and UK.

Read more …

“..the fairytale that Germany’s crises are just a string of bad luck as opposed to the result of government policy..”

Germany’s ‘Krisenmodus’ Has No End in Sight (Conor Gallagher)

The Association for the German Language chose the term Krisenmodus as the ‘Word of the Year’ for 2023. I’m not sure they’ve ever awarded a back-to-back winner, but krisenmodus (crisis mode) looks to have a chance to repeat in 2024. The current government coalition has lost almost all trust from the public, yet they soldier on determined to make things worse for the vast majority of Germans. The Greens push for more war, the Free Democrats want more social spending cuts, and Chancellor Olaf Scholz and his Social Democratic Party (SPD) are in the middle adopting the worst from both sides and leading Germany to ruin. The chancellor’s decision making likely won’t get any better after a Christmastime bout with Covid-19 – if he sticks around much longer.

On the international front, Deutsche Welle declares that this year “Berlin must find ways to deal with two wars, an increasingly aggressive China, and a world order in transition.” Led by the ill-equipped and overconfident Green, Annalena Baerbock, Germany’s foreign policy has been disastrous and has spilled over into the domestic arena. Severing itself from Russian energy drained government coffers; at the same time, in addition to the money and weapons already sent to Ukraine, Berlin wants to increase military spending and become more interventionist. After running up the tab in these areas, there are now calls for a renewed fiscal responsibility, which means social spending cuts at home. A botched energy transition led by the Greens, which has industry collapsing and higher prices for consumers, militarization, and austerity – has proved to be an awful combination for the average citizen. And the data is grim.

Inflation continues to be problematic, the economy is contracting as industry shrinks, exports to China are declining and there is constant pressure from Atlanticists to self-impose a further reduction, living standards are declining, political paralysis reigns on most matters except social cuts and more military spending, wealth inequality grows, and industry continues to leave the country. Farmer protests are also now taking place across the country in response to the government’s decision to phase out a tax break on agricultural diesel. Scholz paid homage to the krisenmodus in his New Year’s address (including erroneously blaming Putin for “turn[ing] off the tap on our gas supplies”), centered around the fairytale that Germany’s crises are just a string of bad luck as opposed to the result of government policy.

He concluded with the following: “If we realize this, if we treat each other with this respect, then we don’t need to be afraid of the future, then the year 2024 can be a good year for our country, even if some things turn out differently than we expected today, on the eve of this New Year.” Such vacuous rhetoric is a sign that Scholz knows the path the country is currently on is doomed and yet plans nothing to change it. If anyone was watching, it was another reminder why Scholz’s approval rating has sunk to a miserable 26 percent and he and/or his government could soon be headed for an early exit.

Tucker Vlaar

Read more …

“Team Scholz is making one of the most productive elements of German society pay a heavy price for its own relentless screwups..”

German Government Is Ripping Off The Farmers Who Feed The Country (Marsden)

Farmers and their tractors started gathering on Monday here in Berlin as well as in cities across all of Germany’s federal states, including Hamburg, Cologne, and Bremen. The culmination, a massive planned protest, is set for Monday, January 15. The aim? To get Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition government to backtrack on its decision to eliminate tax breaks on the diesel fuel used for farming – a sector already struggling with high energy costs as a result of the government’s de facto policy to screw itself and its own citizens over “for Ukraine” by cutting off cheap fuel from Russia because Brussels ordered it to. And then deciding that it’s cool because gas isn’t “green” enough anyway. Who knew that the German economy couldn’t just run on wind and sun? Not this government, apparently.

Feeling the heat, Team Scholz has already said that it’ll now just slow roll the cuts to subsidies. Apparently he’s never tried removing a band-aid really slowly. The farmers responded with some slow rolling of their own – right down the Autobahn and up to the Brandenburg Gate. The other issue is a road tax exemption for agricultural vehicles that the government decided to reimpose. Well, at least the farmers are getting their money’s worth this week by taking their tractors out for a spin along roads they probably never would have bothered with, just to join up with the protests.

This whole mess is a result of Team Scholz’s own screwup. What else is new? Pretty standard operating procedure for the Western establishment: they screw up, then the cost of their mess gets dumped onto the average person. Scholz quietly took €60 billion ($65 billion) from a Covid recovery slush fund and plonked it into a fund for the much put-upon German industry. But only for the “green” industrials. Everyone else can just shove off. Which is also the arrogant attitude being bandied about by some establishment figures when it comes to farm diesel subsidies. Anyway, Scholz was ordered by the courts to put the misappropriated cash back – lest the government run the risk of incurring a debt. Whoops, too late. Berlin ended up €13 billion short in repaying it. So then the government had to figure out who it was going to have to screw over in an attempt to drum up some quick cash. Apparently those who literally feed the German people were identified as viable cash cows.

The government can now hear and see the honking tractors and big rigs from the Bundestag, gathering just a stone’s throw away from the epicenter of the protests at Brandenburg Gate. But Scholz has been talking instead about the need for European nations to mirror Germany in devoting more money to Ukraine – like he has nothing else going on inside his own country. You’d think that if he didn’t keep loading Ukraine up with cash and weapons then Russian tanks would just roll right into Berlin. He really should be more concerned about the German tractors and trucks that are already nearly right up under his office window. Germany doubled its Ukrainian military aid to €8 billion just before the New Year. Compare that with the €900 million that its rolled back tax breaks on farmers are expected to save them.

If Team Scholz was so blasé about shuffling money around in the creation of this whole debt problem, you’d imagine it would be easy enough at the very least just to hold onto that cash for Ukraine and take the jackboots off the necks of the farmers. It seems that German farmers may have to move to Ukraine to get treated fairly by their own government. Team Scholz is making one of the most productive elements of German society pay a heavy price for its own relentless screwups. The precise cost amounts to €10,000 annually for some farmers, who say it represents a potentially catastrophic loss for them. But the message being peddled by government officials is that farmers are already subsidized enough. You’d think they were just rolling in cash. Clearly, the reality is quite the opposite when €10,000 represents a make-or-break scenario.

Read more …

“..temporarily fixing problems as they appear is costing the British taxpayer £2 million ($2.54 million) per week..”

UK Parliament Cold, Damp, and Infested With Mice – Politico (RT)

Politicians and aides alike “dread” coming to work at Westminster Palace, Politico reported on Tuesday, describing how the crumbling Victorian building is driving them to work elsewhere in order to avoid the cold, the mold, and the rodents. British lawmakers returned to work at the House of Commons on Monday, as the Met Office warned that freezing temperatures will linger for the next week. Westminster Palace offers little respite from the winter weather, multiple staffers told Politico, citing persistent heating failures, power cuts, and moldy bathrooms. A report compiled by the GMB trade union – which represents parliamentary aides – in 2022 also noted crumbling masonry and falling glass even in one of the more modern buildings of the complex, as well as an outbreak of the legionella bacteria in showers on the estate.

“If it wasn’t a protected heritage site, there would be absolutely no way – with the current health and safety regulations – that we would be allowed to even set foot in a building this broken and damaged,” a Conservative Party staffer told Politico. “I would never go in again [if I could],” a Labour Party staffer said. “I think there is a sense that parliament is a very important building, you’re very lucky to be here – but there are basic standards, actually.” Much of Westminster Palace was built in the 19th Century and has not been renovated since before World War II. Some politicians have been demanding restoration works for years, but a vote authorizing this work will not be held until at least 2025. In the meantime, temporarily fixing problems as they appear is costing the British taxpayer £2 million ($2.54 million) per week, an anonymous official told Politico last September.

“This building is falling down and becoming a hazard to all those who work here,” Scottish National Party MP Pete Wishart said in an address in 2019. “It is so overrun with vermin that even the mice in this place now wear overalls.” Earlier this year, the Public Accounts Committee warned in a report that there is a “real and rising danger” that the building could be destroyed by a “catastrophic incident” before repairs take place. Labour leader Keir Starmer has almost completely eschewed working in the palace, multiple officials told the news site. Instead, he chooses to work up to three days per week at the party’s newly-built headquarters in Southwark, around a mile away. “It doesn’t feel as imposing, it’s not freezing cold, and it’s much more modern,” a Labour staffer said of the new building, describing it as “good for morale.” Despite the litany of complaints, politicians are unlikely to advocate too loudly for renovations these days, a GMP representative told Politico. “I don’t think that the general public have a lot of sympathy for politicians and their staff complaining about being cold at work… when there’s a lot worse things going on in other workplaces,” she said.

Read more …

“Yes, but why did you talk to him during business meetings if he had nothing to do with your business?”

Hunter Biden Defends Including Father On Business Calls (Fox)

Hunter Biden defended including his father on business calls with Ukrainian associates while speaking to a FOX Business reporter on Wednesday. Hunter Biden was questioned by FOX Business’ Hillary Vaughn after walking out of a House hearing as Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., began to question him about President Biden’s ongoing impeachment probe. “Why did you put your dad on speakerphone during these business meetings if he had nothing to do with your business?” Vaughn asked as Biden left the Rayburn office building on Capitol Hill. “Do you have a dad? Does he call you?” the first son asked in reply. “Yes,” Vaughn said. “Do you answer the phone?” Biden continued. “Yes,” Vaughn answered. “OK,” Biden said. “Yes, but why did you talk to him during business meetings if he had nothing to do with your business?” Vaughn pressed.

Devon Archer, a former best friend and business associate of Hunter Biden in Ukraine, testified to lawmakers in July that President Biden met with dozens of Hunter’s business associates while he was serving as vice president between 2009 and 2017. Archer testified about meetings he witnessed attended by both Bidens — Hunter and Joe — either in person or via telephone. During the meetings, Hunter would specifically introduce his father to foreign business partners or prospective investors, Archer claimed. Archer said Hunter put his father, then the vice president, on speakerphone while meeting with business partners at least 20 times. He described how Joe Biden was put on the phone to sell “the brand.”

Crack

Read more …

“..there is to be no more accountability for Big Pharma’s mass murder than there is for Israel’s mass murder of Palestinians..”

Can Big Pharma Be Held Accountable? (Paul Craig Roberts)

In 1935 Trofim Lysenko, a fraudulent agronomist took control of Soviet genetics and agronomy and destroyed the science with political and ideological explanations. With biology under Lysenko’s dominance, the principles of Mendel’s classical genetics were banned, and real scientists suffered political repression. The Lysenko affair exemplifies my point that without truth there can be no science and no scholarship. Tony Fauci and his puppet-masters introduced their own form of Lysenkoism with the Covid campaign. It was early apparent to independent scientists that the virus was a manufactured one made in a laboratory and that the “vaccine” was more dangerous than the virus. The distinguished scientists who sounded the alarm were suppressed, deplatformed, fired, prosecuted, and stripped of medical licenses. Big Pharma was a modern day Lysenko, and the large part of the medical profession under Big Pharma’s control discredited distinguished scientists by branding them spreaders of disinformation. The useless media did no investigation.

The Cleveland Clinic has shown that the “vaccine” actually makes it easier to catch the virus, and the excess deaths on the heels of mass vaccination demonstrate the killing and health injury power of the Covid mRNA “vaccines.” Professors Angus Dalgleish and Paul Goddard have just published a book, The Death of Science. Big Pharma has taken over regulatory agencies such as FDA, NIH, CDC, and controls with research grants the findings published in medical journals and the curriculums of medical schools. The fraud is far more extensive than the fraud imposed by Lysenko. We are in danger of losing medical science altogether as the young entering the profession are Big Pharma indoctrinated. When older generations such as Dalgleish and Goddard pass, there will be none to take their place. Medical science will die with them.

Congress and medical schools can do nothing about it as both are dependent on Big Pharma’s money. Scientists are not always adept at speaking to the public. If you have any doubts that a deadly world-wide fraud was perpetrated in service to private agendas, read The Death of Science. This is my only posting for today. Because of its importance, I do not want to distract you with multiple offerings. Dr. Reiner Fuellmich, a world-renowned international trial lawyer who was leading an organized effort to hold Big Pharma accountable is sitting in a German prison detained on false charges orchestrated in order to stop a campaign that was nearing success. In other words, there is to be no more accountability for Big Pharma’s mass murder than there is for Israel’s mass murder of Palestinians. When mass murderers cannot be held accountable, what is the prospect for humanity?

Read more …

It’s almost funny.

Trump Says Georgia Case ‘Totally Compromised’ (ET)

Ms. Willis brought the case against President Trump and more than a dozen co-defendants under Georgia’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, a law drafted to fight organized crime. The indictment accuses President Trump, and 18 others, of being part of a “criminal organization” that sought to overturn the Georgia results of the 2020 presidential election by unlawful means. “It’s illegal. What she did is illegal. So we’ll let the state handle that, but what a sad situation it is,” President Trump added.Ms. Willis’s office did not respond to a request for comment from The Epoch Times, though a spokesperson for her office told media outlets that she would “respond through appropriate court filings.” Ms. Willis brought the case against President Trump and more than a dozen co-defendants under Georgia’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, a law drafted to fight organized crime. The indictment accuses President Trump, and 18 others, of being part of a “criminal organization” that sought to overturn the Georgia results of the 2020 presidential election by unlawful means.

Mr. Roman, who faces seven charges in the Georgia election interference case, served on President Trump’s 2020 campaign as director of Election Day operations. In Monday’s court filing, Mr. Roman cited “discussions with individuals with knowledge” about Ms. Willis and Mr. Wade allegedly being “romantically involved” before the special prosecutor was brought onto the case by Ms. Willis. “Sources close to both the special prosecutor and the district attorney have confirmed they had an ongoing, personal relationship during the pendency of the special prosecutor’s divorce proceedings,” states the filing, which also accuses Ms. Willis of bringing Mr. Wade on as a special counsel without obtaining proper government authorization. The filing further states that Mr. Wade allegedly had a “lack of relevant experience” although he was paid hundreds of thousands of dollars by the county.

Mr. Roman’s filing also accused Ms. Willis of having potentially committed “an act to defraud the public of honest services” due to what he called an “intentional failure” to disclose her alleged relationship with Mr. Wade, which she “personally benefitted from.” Records obtained by a local media outlet show that Mr. Wade was paid over $650,000 in legal fees since January 2022 and that the district attorney is the one who authorizes it. Mr. Roman’s filing alleges that checks sent to Mr. Wade from Fulton County and vacations that he purchased with Ms. Willis could amount honest services fraud, which is a federal crime.

“Willis has benefitted substantially and directly, and continues to benefit, from this litigation because Wade is being paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to prosecute this case on her behalf,” the filing states. Mr. Roman’s filing states that Ms. Willis and Mr. Wade could be prosecuted under a federal racketeering statute. Besides the public comments President Trump made on Tuesday in response to Mr. Roman’s filing, he also took to Truth Social to post that the case “should be immediately dropped” and that Ms. Willis should apologize. Earlier court filings by President Trump’s co-defendants have alleged that Mr. Wade’s work is “void as a matter of law” because he allegedly failed to file his oath of office paperwork in time to formally join Ms. Willis’ team.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

Ad

 

 

Fave

 

 


Tiger and her cubs drinking from a creek in the forests of India. – Ricky Patel

 

 

Ocean

 

 

Cheetah

 

 


Most of you is 10 years old or less, because your cells are always renewing. The epidermis recycles every 2-4 weeks, red blood cells every 4 months, and your skeleton every 10 years.

 

 

Plastics water

 

 

 

 

Support the Automatic Earth in wartime with Paypal, Bitcoin and Patreon.

 

 

 

 

 

Nov 302022
 
 November 30, 2022  Posted by at 9:20 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , ,  35 Responses »


Pablo Picasso Coffee maker 1943

 

Twitter Stops Enforcing COVID-19 Misinformation Policy (ZH)
‘Negative Efficacy’ Should Have Stopped COVID Vaccine Recommendations (ET)
12 Ways To Hold Big Pharma Accountable For Covid Evils (Fed.)
A Look from Inside – The Fauci Deposition
Elon Musk’s Twitter Is A Monster Of The Left’s Own Making (QTR)
Musk Says Exposé of Twitter’s ‘Free Speech Suppression’ Coming ‘Soon’ (ET)
Kremlin Outlines Conditions For Ukraine Talks (RT)
NATO Says ‘Door is Open’ for Ukraine Membership….But (Celente)
EU Fails To Agree On Russian Oil Price Cap As Full Ban Looms (ZH)
Rand Paul Calls Out Complete Lack Of Oversight On Ukraine Aid (SN)
The Four Fuckeries (Jim Kunstler)
Will The US Try To Pull Off A “Grenada” In Serbia? (Saker)
US Paralyzed By Islamic Republic Of Iran’s Strategic Swing (Escobar)
Apple Turns Off China Protest Communication Tool (SN)
SBF Doesn’t Know What Happened To His Twitter Stake (Axios)

 

 

 

 

Actual scientists are speaking out. Watch. “Most of them fall asleep crying.”

https://twitter.com/i/status/1597663704044408832

 

 

 

 

Finland PM Marin Sanna visits New Zealand.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1597825029324296192

 

 

 

 

A good step, but only step no. 1. You will have to address the lives lost due to censorship of for instance doctors, on top of the whole Pfizer/Fauci/White House/EU terror. Twitter is complicit in this.

Twitter Stops Enforcing COVID-19 Misinformation Policy (ZH)

Twitter will no longer enforce its Covid-19 misinformation policy, under which users who deviated from prevailing establishment narratives frequently had their accounts locked or suspended. The longstanding policy did not apply to misinformation from government officials, who regularly lied about things such as transmission, masks, vaccine efficacy, side effects, or any of the other ‘science’ which turned out to be patently false. Twitter did not officially announce the change, rather, the company added a note to a page on its website outlining its Covid-19 policy. “Effective November 23, 2022, Twitter is no longer enforcing the COVID-19 misleading information policy,” reads the note, which follows a line that still reads: “As the global community faces the COVID-19 pandemic together, Twitter is helping people find reliable information, connect with others, and follow what’s happening in real time.”

What’s more, Sky News reports that the company’s Covid-19 ‘misleading information’ policy was nuked, which showed that the company operated on a strike system in which those who had a label added to their tweets were given one strike, while those with deleted tweets were given two strikes. Users with two to three strikes would have a 12-hour lockout, while those with four strikes were permanently suspended. “The platform suspended more than 11,000 accounts and removed nearly 98,000 pieces of content for violating its COVID misinformation policy between January 2022 and September 2022, according to information published by Twitter. The site also reduced the visibility of tweets or accounts believed to be in violation of the policy by stopping tweets or retweets from those accounts appearing in certain parts of Twitter, displaying their replies in lower positions in conversations and excluding their tweets or account from recommendations on the site.” -Sky News

Of note, half of Twitter’s content moderation, human rights and communications teams were laid off when new owner Elon Musk took over. Hundreds more left after Musk issued an ultimatum to staff requiring them to sign up for “long hours at high intensity” or leave.


Twitter reports that since January of 2020, 11.72M accounts were “challenged,” 11,230 accounts were suspended, and 97,674 pieces of content were “removed.”

Read more …

Talk about sliding scales. Not even when we knew the mRNA was endangering and killing people, did we stop.

‘Negative Efficacy’ Should Have Stopped COVID Vaccine Recommendations (ET)

It is a well known fact that COVID vaccine effectiveness wanes quickly as time goes on; this is confirmed by countless studies. Although the official narrative for COVID-19 vaccines nowadays only emphasizes its efficacy on protection against ICU admission and death rates, it actually implies the indisputable fact that vaccines don’t protect, contrary to their design, against infection or even symptomatic infection, especially after the emergence of various Omicron variants. Even the protection two shots offers against hospitalization drops to about 40 percent after less than a year. It’s actually looking worse for protection against severe symptoms, as efficacy rates seem to drop into the negatives about five months into full vaccination.


When a vaccine’s efficacy drops into the negatives, it means that vaccination actually elevates the risks of hospitalization and severe diseases rather than reducing the risks. In simple terms, it does more harm than good when the efficacy is negative. During the time prior to the pandemic, any vaccine with an efficacy less than 50 percent would be regarded as a poor product. When a product shows negative efficacy, it should be banned. It seems that the pandemic isn’t only bad for our health, but also is tugging at our common sense.

Read more …

No room for all twelve here.

12 Ways To Hold Big Pharma Accountable For Covid Evils (Fed.)

What is the common denominator between the pharmaceutical companies, the public health bureaucracy, medical associations, the corporate media, and Big Tech companies when it comes to censorship and medical misinformation? Money, of course. According to Statista, the pharmaceutical and medical industry spent $5.6 billion on U.S. television advertising in 2021, second only behind the life and entertainment industry at $10.1 billion. For reference, total U.S. TV ad spending is expected to exceed $68 billion in 2022. According to eMarketer, pharmaceutical and health care companies combined spent an estimated $9.5 billion on digital media in 2020, with 56 percent going toward search advertising, dominated by Google and Facebook, which have aggressively censored medical information that deviated from the official public health narrative.

This accounted for about 7.1 percent of all U.S. digital ad spending. The pharma industry pays, in the form of user fees, for 75 percent of the FDA’s drug review budget, according to Forbes, and 45 percent of its overall budget. One investigation showed that 40 of 107 physician advisers on the FDA committees examined “received more than $10,000 in post hoc earnings or research support from the makers of drugs that the panels voted to approve, or from competing firms.” According to an analysis by the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has numerous conflicts of interest, including openly accepting private gifts through the CDC Foundation, accepting supposedly “prohibited” donations, and “automatic” conflict of interest waivers for advisory committee members.

In 2010, the CDC inspector general noted a “systemic lack of oversight” of its ethics program. The CDC uses taxpayer money to develop patents and then receives money from pharma companies in the form of licenses and royalties. The NIAID, headed by Fauci, also accepts donations, such as a $100 million pledge by Bill Gates for work on gene therapies. Individual public health officials and scientists, including Fauci and former NIH Director Francis Collins, receive royalties on patents used by the industry, teaching hospitals accept industry donations, and doctors accept “consulting fees,” and other travel and meals payments from pharma companies when they promote their products.

Read more …

Strange story: a 7-hour Fauci deposition, and absolute crickets from the media.

Jim Hoft and attorney John Burns were present at the deposition. Excellent read.

A Look from Inside – The Fauci Deposition

Here are some observations and highlights from the Fauci deposition: ** Fauci is a skillful liar. As we have seen now for months in his public comments, he lies when he feels he can get away with it or when he feels there will be no meaningful consequences. ** Fauci frequently lied unless and until he was confronted with alternate facts. For example, he claimed he really wasn’t familiar with Ralph Baric (creator of the COVID virus) or Peter Daszak (who brokered Fauci’s NIAID grant money to the Chinese biolab in Wuhan), until he was confronted with evidence that his own chief of staff emailed him describing Daszak and Baric as being part of Fauci’s team! ** Fauci claimed that he had no knowledge that his communications team did not coordinate with social media companies to stop “misinformation and disinformation” until he was forced to admit that he actually did know of certain instances of coordination.

** Fauci continued to push the now-debunked assertion that COVID-19 was a naturally occurring virus. ** Fauci said disinformation and misinformation (information he disagrees with) puts lives at risk. ** Fauci refused to define “gain of function” research saying it was too broad of a term to define. ** FUN FACT: until VERY recently, Fauci’s daughter worked for Twitter. ** FUN FACT: Fauci is a hypochondriac. In a bizarre and stunning segment during the deposition, Fauci blew off some of his frustration on the poor court reporter. The court reporter transcribing the deposition sneezed, and Fauci stopped the deposition and scolded the court reporter: “WHAT’S WRONG WITH YOU??? Do you have some sort of respiratory illness, because in the era of COVID, I’m concerned about being near you.” Court Reporter: “I’m not sick, I just have allergies. I can wear a mask though.” Fauci: “Ok. Thank you, because the last thing I want is to get COVID. [notably, (1) Fauci himself did not wear a mask at any point during the deposition, and (2) he appeared to be several feet away from the court reporter].

** FUN FACT: in another Fauci hypochondria spasm, Fauci conspicuously mean-mugged Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry after Landry sneezed into his suit coat jacket. ** Gamesmanship. Whenever introduced to a difficult topic, he dishonestly refused to define key terms so he could avoid being pinned down and held accountable. For example, when discussing the topic of “gain of function” research, he refused to acknowledge what the term meant, objecting that it was a term so broad it could not be defined. ** Fauci repeatedly claimed that he “couldn’t recall” or “couldn’t remember,” and attempted to bolster these incredible statements by appealing to the volume of emails he would receive or issues or studies that would come across his desk. This is simply not credible for nearly all of such statements, because the incidents in question were either recent or within the past three years, and they were all highly politically charged.

[..] ** Other Fauci deceit tactics: throwing subordinates under the bus. Fauci is a famous survivor among bureaucrats. One way he has survived this long is by only taking credit for wins and pawning off losses on hapless subordinates. This trend continued in his deposition, in which he brazenly argued that, while he is the head of the NIAID and its $6 billion dollar budget, he repeatedly didn’t have any knowledge about what his immediate direct reports were doing right under his nose. Fauci supports accountability, so long as he has a subordinate to sacrifice.

Read more …

“The social media platform had been the topic of political discussions about censorship, but no one had really done anything about it.”

Elon Musk’s Twitter Is A Monster Of The Left’s Own Making (QTR)

I don’t believe Musk about everything, as my long-time followers know, but I do believe him when he says the platform has become more popular since he took it over. Not only is it more entertaining than its ever been, it’s simply a nice feeling not to have to run my Tweets over in my head before publishing them, thinking: “What would some hyper left-wing hipster in a beret in an office in San Francisco working a 4 hour work week as a content moderator think of what I’m about to post?” But this article isn’t just for those who are enjoying Twitter’s re-birth. More importantly, it’s for those who are having emotional meltdowns over it. What these users, former users, advertisers and general fragile individuals need to understand is that Elon Musk buying Twitter never even happens without an environment that creates the impetus for it to take place.

Putting Musk’s actual motives aside (I have often wondered if he actually wanted to buy Twitter when it came down to brass tacks), he projected publicly that his interest in taking a stake in the company was because they were actively suppressing free speech. Soon, a public discussion about Twitter’s censorship – which had kicked off years prior when Tim Pool publicly skewered head Twitter censor Vijaya Gadde on Joe Rogan’s podcast – was on the table. The social media platform had been the topic of political discussions about censorship, but no one had really done anything about it. Nobody made drastic moves to affect change. And love him or hate him, that’s exactly what Elon Musk did. The impetus for Musk to throw his hat in the ring on the discussion wasn’t just run-of-the-mill moderation issues, either. It was, instead, an incessant and burning need to eliminate content that Twitter didn’t view as favorable to its political leanings.

No matter what side of the aisle you’re on politically, it’s tough to push back against the idea that conservatives were targeted for suspension disproportionately on the platform. Furthermore, legitimate news stories that otherwise would have been worthy of Pulitzer Prizes – like the New York Post’s Hunter Biden laptop story – were actively blackballed from the platform and users who discussed them risked being suspended or banned. These are nearly the very same actions that Beijing takes on Chinese social media when a story or narrative gets out that isn’t stamped with the government’s approval. Now, it looks as though we’re going to find out exactly what was going on behind the scenes at Twitter when the decision to actively censor a major story that could have had an impact on the 2020 election was made. And I don’t care who is running the platform, that type of transparency is sorely needed.

Read more …

This goes back to the lives lost to mRNA. Let’s see you do it.

Musk Says Exposé of Twitter’s ‘Free Speech Suppression’ Coming ‘Soon’ (ET)

Elon Musk said Monday that Twitter’s internal files on the company’s “free speech suppression” will be revealed “soon,” raising expectations that light will be shed on the circumstances around Twitter’s censorship of the New York Post’s explosive story that exposed information on a laptop allegedly belonging to Hunter Biden. “The Twitter Files on free speech suppression soon to be published on Twitter itself. The public deserves to know what really happened …” Musk said in a post late Monday. Critics have long held that Twitter has used vague standards to censor or suspend accounts and that the ones targeted are predominantly those expressing conservative views. Twitter has denied any bias in its actions, repeatedly insisting it is simply following its content moderation policies.

Weeks before the 2020 presidential election, the New York Post published an article that allegedly detailed meetings President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, had with a Ukrainian energy firm before then-Vice President Biden pressured Ukrainian government officials to fire a prosecutor probing the company. The story was seen by Biden’s political opponents as evidence of corruption and the news quickly spread across Twitter, prompting the social media firm to start removing links to the article and, for a period of time, suspending the New York Post’s Twitter account. Conservatives saw Twitter’s actions in this regard as evidence of the company’s pro-Biden, anti-Trump bias. Twitter said at the time that it was simply enforcing its rules on hacked materials, which prohibit distribution of information that is obtained through hacking.

Musk in April spoke out in opposition to Twitter’s decision to temporarily suspend New York Post’s Twitter account. “Suspending the Twitter account of a major news organization for publishing a truthful story was obviously incredibly inappropriate,” Musk said in April, responding to a post about the Hunter Biden laptop story. Musk, who took over Twitter in late October, has vowed to make the platform into a politically unbiased bastion of free speech. He said in an open letter following his acquisition of Twitter that he bought it because “it is important to the future of civilization to have a common digital town square, where a wide range of beliefs can be debated in a healthy manner, without resorting to violence.” “There is currently great danger that social media will splinter into far right wing and far left wing echo chambers that generate more hate and divide our society,” Musk added.

Read more …

“Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky emphasized that “there will be no Minsk-3 [agreement], which Russia would violate right after sealing it.”

Of course Zelensky knows full well Russia didn’t violate Minsk 1 and 2. Ukraine did. And US.

Kremlin Outlines Conditions For Ukraine Talks (RT)

Peace negotiations could start between Russia and Ukraine if Moscow sees genuine “political will” on the part of Kiev to engage in dialogue, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov has said. Earlier this month, he noted that the Ukrainian leadership seemed reluctant to sit down for talks at present. When asked by Russian journalists on Tuesday whether there are any preconditions for any potential dialogue to begin between Moscow and Kiev, Peskov said: “It has to be political will, readiness to discuss those Russian demands which have been known for long.” Speaking via video-link during the G20 summit in Indonesia’s Bali in mid-November, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky emphasized that “there will be no Minsk-3 [agreement], which Russia would violate right after sealing it.”

The Ukrainian head of state was referring to the Minsk-1 and Minsk-2 agreements brokered by Germany and France back in 2014 and 2015, respectively. The accords, among other things, envisaged special status for Donetsk and Lugansk regions within the Ukrainian state. Russian President Vladimir Putin cited Kiev’s failure to implement the agreements as one of the reasons for the start of Moscow’s military campaign against its neighbor in late February 2022. Commenting on Zelensky’s remarks at the G20 summit, Peskov argued at the time that they “absolutely confirm” Kiev’s unwillingness to engage in talks. Addressing leaders in Bali, the Ukrainian head of state proposed ten steps that, in his view, would lead to peace. Among the key points of his plan is the complete withdrawal of Russian forces from all Ukrainian territories and respect for the country’s borders drawn up in 1991, following the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Meanwhile, Moscow claims some of those regions, most notably Crimea, as its own, following referendums it had held there. It came shortly after The Washington Post reported in early November that the Biden administration had privately asked Zelensky to signal willingness to hold talks with Russia, if only just for show. Washington was reportedly concerned that Kiev’s irreconcilable position could see support from some of its Western allies dwindle amid what anonymous White House officials described as a growing “Ukraine fatigue.” The article claimed that Washington was not serious about getting Kiev to negotiate, and only sought to ensure that weapons and other aid kept flowing from as many nations as possible.

Read more …

Escalation tactics. Anytime it’s clear Russia is winning, they bring in heavier weaponry. Forcing Russia to follow suit. Same with dangling NATO membership in front of Zelensky. The war must go on.

NATO Says ‘Door is Open’ for Ukraine Membership….But (Celente)

Jens Stoltenberg, the secretary general of NATO, dangled the possibility that Ukraine may someday, in the future, join the Alliance and benefit from the protection of Article 5 that, when distilled, says: an attack on one, is an attack on all. He made the comment during a two-day summit in Bucharest where Ukraine’s electric grid and Russia’s relentless air campaign took center stage. The Russian strikes have left millions in the dark as temperatures hit 19 degrees in Kyiv. “NATO’s door is open,” he said, according to The New York Times. But he noted that the calvary is not coming during this conflict. “NATO will continue to stand for Ukraine as long as it takes. We will not back down.” In September, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, announced that Kyiv filed a new, expedited application to join NATO in light of Russian President Vladimir Putin annexing four occupied regions in the country.

Zelensky, correctly said in a statement that Finland and Sweden benefited from an accelerated accession into the Alliance. (But neither of those countries are members.) “De facto, we have already proven interoperability with the Alliance’s standards, they are real for Ukraine — real on the battlefield and in all aspects of our interaction,” Zelensky said. “Today, Ukraine is applying to make it de jure. Under a procedure consistent with our significance for the protection of our entire community. Under an accelerated procedure,” the statement continued. Jake Sullivan, Biden’s national security adviser, killed the idea and said, the issue should be taken up “at a different time.”

NATO’s refusal to accept Ukraine into the fold is understandable because it would assure the beginning of WWIII. But it has still been a sensitive subject in Kyiv. Last summer, Ihor Zhovkva, the deputy chief of staff for Zelensky, said in an interview that Kyiv was told by NATO that it is “not a member because we do not want you.” “NATO is telling us we are not giving you anything,” he said in an interview with a local news outlet in Kyiv, according to Bloomberg. Some could argue that Ukraine was the victim misleading public statements from the U.S. and NATO prior to the invasion. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Stoltenberg said Moscow would be met with a“forceful” response if there was an invasion. Blinken went further and said the U.S. has a “sacred obligation” to defend its allies.

Under Article 10 of the 1949 Washington Treaty, NATO has the right to invite any willing European country into the fold. But Stoltenberg made it clear, before the invasion, that there is a distinction between a NATO partner and ally. Kyiv is a partner. NATO is compelled to only defend allies. NATO countries never embraced Ukraine as an ally because it meant certain war with Russia.

Read more …

“(see, it was all theater, everything – from day one – and politicians knew it as soon as they did the math)”

EU Fails To Agree On Russian Oil Price Cap As Full Ban Looms (ZH)

In its relentless pursuit of virtue-signaling hills that it is willing to die on within minutes, several months ago the EU had a brilliant idea: let’s implement a toothless oil price cap on Russian oil exports, one which actually has zero impact on deeply discounted Russian oil and thus doesn’t lead to any more European energy shocks, but because of the optics and the much “lower” permitted transaction price, it will make for great headlines and show the world just how powerful the EU is. Well, the plan almost worked… until Poland and the Baltics forgot to read the fine print, thought that Europe actually does mean business, and blew up the deal. Recall on Friday, negotiations on the Russian oil price cap were suspended – despite a willingness by most European nations to just cross the checkmark and move on – as Poland and the Baltic states objected to a proposed ceiling of $65.

There was some hope that this opposition was just for show, and that come Monday the Poles would relent after some “closed door” negotiations, Europe would slap a $65 price cap, Russia would continue to sell its oil to China and India, and – quietly – to Europe, and gradually renormalize a fractured oil market where India and China pay a 25% discount for oil while the rest of the world has to pay a premium as an offset. However, it was not meant to be, and on Monday European Union governments again failed to agree on a price cap on Russian seaborne crude oil, as Poland again insisted that the cap had to be set lower than proposed by the G7 to cut Moscow’s ability to finance its invasion of Ukraine, diplomats told Reuters. “There is no deal. The legal texts have now been agreed, but Poland still can’t agree to the price,” one diplomat said.

No new date for talks has been set yet, diplomats said, even though a far worse outcome may await Europe in just one week: as a reminder, the price cap mechanism is to enter into force on Dec. 5. And if there is no agreement on the G7 price cap idea by next Monday, the EU would implement harsher measures agreed at the end of May – a ban on all Russian crude oil imports from Dec. 5 and on petroleum products from Feb. 5, Polish diplomats said. That would be a truly catastrophic scenario, and one which could promptly send the price of oil into the stratosphere as JPMorgan explained not too long ago. To be sure, it’s not too late for Poland to fall in line: Hungary and two other landlocked central European states secured exemptions from that ban for the pipeline imports they rely on.

Meanwhile, even the G-7 group of nations has proposed a softer version of the EU ban to keep oil supply to the global economy steady, because Russia supplies 10% of the world’s oil (see, it was all theater, everything – from day one – and politicians knew it as soon as they did the math). It proposed that the EU and other global customers keep buying Russian crude, but only if its price is at or below a G7 agreed level. That would cut the Kremlin’s revenues. The G7 has proposed a cap of $65-70 per barrel, but Poland and some others argue this will not hurt Moscow because Russian crude is already trading below that range at $63.50, and after today’s oil price rollercoaster, the “Russian” price briefly dipped below $60. With Russian production costs estimated at around $20, Moscow has a very large profit from its oil exports. Poland, Lithuania and Estonia have been pushing for a price cap of $30 per barrel.

And yet, despite consensus that Polish opposition would be overturned, the country’s resolve has only hardened: “The Poles are completely uncompromising on the price, without suggesting an acceptable alternative,” the EU diplomat said. “Clearly there is growing annoyance with the Polish position.” Which is hilarious because only Poland is adhering to the principle of what the price cap was supposed to achieve – namely choke off Russian oil profits; and yet for all the pompous rhetoric by G-7 nations, everyone is happy to keep the spectacle going knowing full well that this is just one giant virtue-signaling scheme. Everyone, except Poland that is… and as a result the “annoyance” is not with Putin but with the “Polish position” which is keeping fat European technocrats away from their well-deserved 3-star meals for a fake job well done.

Read more …

“..the Biden administration inspected only 10% of 22,000 weapons the U.S. has provided to Ukraine..”

Rand Paul Calls Out Complete Lack Of Oversight On Ukraine Aid (SN)

Senator Rand Paul reacted Monday to news that the Biden administration is struggling to account for some $20 billion in aid that was sent to Ukraine, noting that both political parties ignored his call for an inspector general to overlook it. A report from Fox News, linked in a tweet by Paul, notes that according to the Washington Post, the Biden administration inspected only 10% of 22,000 weapons the U.S. has provided to Ukraine between February and November. It also outlines how Republicans could push for audits to determine where all the military aid is going and how much of it is ending up in the wrong hand.


“Didn’t someone try to legislatively mandate a special inspector general to scrutinize Ukrainian spending?” Paul urged, adding “Oh, that’s right, it was my amendment and most Democrats AND Republicans opposed any semblance of oversight.” Just a fortnight ago, following the throughly debunked “Russian missile attack” on a Polish border town, which turned out to be a Ukrainian missile that had stayed off course, Biden asked Congress to provide another $37.7 billion in emergency aid to Ukraine. The United States has already pledged more than 52 billion euros in military, financial and humanitarian aid to Ukraine since the war began in February 2022 and October 3, way more than any other nation or nations combined.

Read more …

“..and also stranded the media in an endless loop of ass-covering they are still locked into..”

The Four Fuckeries (Jim Kunstler)

“We want to save the planet, and the life upon it, but we’re not willing to pay the price and bear the consequences. So we make up a narrative that feels good and run with it.” — Raul Ilargi Meijer.” I doubt there is another era in the history of Western Civ when the forces in-motion acting on society were so mystifying to those acted upon. And isn’t it especially galling that this is so in an age after rational scientific practice had decoded so many of nature’s secrets? Did that project somehow fail in the end? Has the Enlightenment been defeated? How have we become trapped like frogs being boiled haplessly in our own pond-water? I have reduced these forces to four obvious streams of the sheerest seemingly evil fuckery, which is to say nefariously managed events meant to harm us. They are surely all related in some way. Let’s try to de-mystify them to understand what we’re up against.

First: Covid-19. How is it that we don’t know for sure how this organism came into the world, or understand what ensued after it did? Answer: the people who caused it to happen in the Wuhan lab have been busy covering their asses for three years, and successfully so. Yet we know exactly what Anthony Fauci, Francis Collins, Peter Daszak, Ralph Baric and others did. The paper trail in correspondence and patents alone is clear. We just can’t seem to do anything about it. We don’t know why they did it yet, too, but there are plausible guesses. Maybe Dr. Fauci wanted to cap his long, checkered career with a final heroic triumph: the introduction of world-saving mRNA vaccines — incidentally, a great financial boon to himself and the pharma industry he secretly served. Like everything else Fauci worked on for forty years, this experiment ended in disaster: a Frankenstein disease that persists in the population and vaccines that maim and kill people. How did Fauci and company get away with it? Here’s how:

Two: Government’s war on its own citizens. I’d date this for the sake of simplicity to the DOJ’s and FBI’s campaign to defenestrate Donald Trump starting in 2016 for the crime of winning an election. What began as the Russia collusion prank morphed into RussiaGate, another ass-covering extravaganza in which public officialdom gave itself blanket permission to lie about everything it was doing. The likes of James Comey, Andrew McCabe and Barack Obama’s girl squad in the White House — to name just a few of many participants — also managed to hook in the mainstream news media under the supposition that they were the good guys fighting a disgusting, pussy-grabbing supervillain, which disposed the news media to go along with all the FBI and DOJ lies, and also stranded the media in an endless loop of ass-covering they are still locked into.

Read more …

“..it was simply impossible to fail no matter how inept and incompetent the entire invasion was..”

Will The US Try To Pull Off A “Grenada” In Serbia? (Saker)

Remember the 1983 US invasion of Grenada aka “Operation Urgent Fury”? It all began on October 23, 1983 when two truck bombs blew up the buildings housing the US and French “Multinational Force in Lebanon”. This attack resulted in 307 people killed including 241 U.S. and 58 French military personnel. Following the bombings, US diplomats engaged in their usual frantic flag-waving and promises to never ever give in to terrorism. The biggest problem for the US was that it had no way to retaliate in a way which would satisfy the flag-waver’s desire for blood. Just blowing up random buildings in Lebanon made very little impact, as for the promises to stay for as long as needed, it was obvious PR – it was clear to everybody that the time to pack and leave had come.

Of course, this was very humiliating for the wannabe “indispensable nation” cum “city upon a Hill”,,, So Reagan, with his undeniable genius for PR and optics, ordered the invasion of Grenada just two days after the bombings in Beirut. Why Grenada? Well, for one thing it was barely defended (mostly by Cuban engineers and locals with small arms) and truly tiny (so tiny, in fact, that the overwhelming majority of US Americans had no idea where it was or why there was suddenly an urgent need to invade. Second, it was very close to the USA, so everybody could get a slice of the cake, including the 1st and 2nd battalions of the US Army’s 75th Ranger Regiment, the 82nd Airborne and the Army’s rapid deployment force, U.S. Marines, Army Delta Force, Navy SEALs, and ancillary forces totaling 7,600 troops.

In terms of hardware, the US brought in 7,300 troops, 4 tanks, 1 LHA (USS Saipan LHA-2), 1 aircraft carrier, 3 destroyers, 2 frigates, 1 ammunition ship and even 27 F-14A Tomcats. All that against a few hundred construction workers armed only with small arms! I won’t go into all the details here, but let’s just say that this invasion was one of the worst and most poorly executed operation in the history of warfare: a truly HUGE US force was brought in to strike at a basically defenseless tiny island nation with the sole purpose of changing the optics of the disaster in Lebanon.

But, no to worry, the Pentagon handed our more medals than the number of participants, while some US special forces who wanted to press charges against helicopter pilots for cowardice (who abandoned the SOF on a runway because of small arms fire) were “counseled” against the idea. Bottom line is this: after the epic disaster in Beirut, the US wanted a quick and easy war to restore the “prestige” of the US armed forces, only to end up with yet another epic disaster, but at least in the case of Grenada, it was simply impossible to fail no matter how inept and incompetent the entire invasion was.

Read more …

Iran=BRI, SCO, INSTC, BRICS+.

US Paralyzed By Islamic Republic Of Iran’s Strategic Swing (Escobar)

Iran’s parliament has just approved the accession of the Islamic Republic to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), previously enshrined at the Samarkand summit last September, marking the culmination of a process that lasted no less than 15 years. Iran has already applied to become a member of the expanding BRICS+, which before 2025 will be inevitably configured as the alternative Global South G20 that really matters. Iran is already part of the Quad that really matters – alongside BRICS members Russia, China and India. Iran is deepening its strategic partnership with both China and Russia and increasing bilateral cooperation with India.

Iran is a key Chinese partner in the New Silk Roads, or Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). It is set to clinch a free trade agreement with the Eurasia Economic Union (EAEU) and is a key node of the International North-South Transportation Corridor (INSTC), alongside Russia and India. All of the above configures the lightning-fast emergence of the Islamic Republic of Iran as a West Asia and Eurasia big power, with vast reach across the Global South. That has left the whole set of imperial “policies” towards Tehran lying in the dust. So it’s no wonder that previously accumulated strands of Iranophobia – fed by the Empire over four decades — have recently metastasized into yet another color revolution offensive, fully supported and disseminated by Anglo-American media.

The playbook is always the same. Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei actually came up with a concise definition. The problem is not bands of oblivious rioters and/or mercenaries: “the main confrontation”, he said, is with “global hegemony.” Ayatollah Khamenei was somewhat echoed by American intellectual and author Noam Chomsky, who has remarked how an array of US sanctions over four decades have severely harmed the Iranian economy and “caused enormous suffering.”

Read more …

Apple is not looking good lately.

Apple Turns Off China Protest Communication Tool (SN)

As it mulls kicking Elon Musk’s Twitter off the app store, it has now been revealed that Apple restricted the use of AirDrop in China, a move that harmed the organizational efforts of demonstrators protesting against the CCP’s lockdowns. Over the past week, multiple major cities across China have seen massive protests against lockdowns, with the normally compliant Chinese exploding into rage in response to their government’s ‘zero COVID’ policy. Much of the unrest blew up in response to an incident in Xinjiang’s capital Urumqi, where at least 10 people, some say up to 40, were killed during an apartment fire because lockdown rules stopped residents from fleeing the burning building.

Most of the city’s residents have been prevented from leaving their homes for over 100 days as a result of the draconian rules, which are still in place nearly three years after the pandemic began. With Beijing now trying to contain what some are calling the most serious mass uprising since Tiananmen Square, Apple is apparently helping them to crush dissent. Earlier this month, Apple restricted the use of AirDrop in China, which protesters had been using to evade censorship. AirDrop allows local connections between devices, meaning it cannot be monitored or censored by local authorities. However, Apple launched an update to the app in China that restricted usage to just 10 minutes, making it harder for protesters to communicate with other activists, as well as send messages nearby bystanders and tourists.

AirDrop was also being used by protesters in Hong Kong, who were brutally suppressed by the CCP during months of unrest in 2019. The smartphone company chose to roll out the new “feature” in China only right as the country experienced its biggest demonstrations in decades, which some would suggest is more than just a coincidence. “Apple has helped Beijing to suppress public dissent multiple times, mostly by complying with its requests to remove apps used by protestors for information and communication,” reports Reclaim the Net. “Apple also helps the Chinese Communist Party prevent users from remaining private by banning VPNs in the region.”

Read more …

“..Bankman-Fried, as of Nov. 10, either believed that Alameda owned a stake in Musk’s Twitter, or that he was uncertain, and therefore misleading potential investors.”

SBF Doesn’t Know What Happened To His Twitter Stake (Axios)

Sam Bankman-Fried tells Axios that he always intended to roll over at least a portion of his former firm’s $100 million Twitter stake into the new, privately held entity led by Elon Musk. But the former FTX CEO said in an interview on Monday night that he’s not sure that ever happened with the Alameda Research controlled stake. It’s the first time Bankman-Fried has addressed the question around his Twitter stake since Musk said last week that neither SBF nor FTX ever held a position in the privatized Twitter, a statement that contradicted a Semafor news report. Alameda Research, the entity that Bankman-Fried said owned the Twitter stake, is the trading firm that he controlled and is the entity at the center of FTX’s implosion.

A text message seen by Axios that Bankman-Fried sent to Musk said the Twitter stake Alameda owned was worth around $100 million. “I believe that that it was intended for Alameda to rollover at least $20 million or more,” Bankman-Fried told Axios. “I don’t know for sure whether that ultimately happened.” Bankman-Fried noted that at least some of the Twitter stake may have been sold prior to Twitter going private, but he could not confirm. Bankman-Fried, through his advisers, had offered to help Musk buy out Twitter in the spring with potentially billions of dollars. But he later backed out of his offer after the two spoke by phone, Axios previously reported.

Bankman-Fried said at the time that he was interested in rolling the stake into the privatized company, with Musk acknowledging that Bankman-Fried was “welcome to roll.” The Twitter stake was listed on a Nov. 10 balance sheet shown to prospective FTX investors before the company went bankrupt, according to the Financial Times. The balance sheet, upon which Semafor also relied for its reporting, listed $43.3 million of Twitter stock as an illiquid deliverable — or sellable — asset. That suggests that Bankman-Fried, as of Nov. 10, either believed that Alameda owned a stake in Musk’s Twitter, or that he was uncertain, and therefore misleading potential investors.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

 

 

Big house cats. Sound on.
https://twitter.com/i/status/1597818714631852033

 

 

Backwards dog

 

 

Blob top jellyfish
https://twitter.com/i/status/1597658696481312768

 

 

 

 

Support the Automatic Earth in virustime with Paypal, Bitcoin and Patreon.

 

 

 

 

 

Sep 022022
 
 September 2, 2022  Posted by at 5:41 pm Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , ,  56 Responses »


El Greco Dormition of the Mother of God 1565-1566

 

 

Not the kind of thing I would do often, making a video the protagonist of an article, but here’s an exception. Now, I know that -thank God- most of my readers are familiar with the ivermectin topic, but you too, watch the 13:38 min of this. Take that time.

You see, I think we owe it to the doctors who have lost their jobs, their reputations, to this, and who nevertheless have kept on pushing. G-d knows how many people died because these doctors were banned and censored, maybe they would have a better estimate than me. We’re talking millions of human lives.

Personally, I have had ivermectin at my disposal since April 2020, ordered from India, and still use it now. But when I offer it to others, they are not sure. Because they don’t read what I do, they read the MSM, and wherever you are in the world, Pfizer et al have the MSM covered. It’s horse paste.

I’ve always written here that if you up your vit. D level enough, that is about 50% of the game (boost your immune system) . Zinc (+quercetin) is the next 25% (virus can’t enter cells) . And ivermectin will fill in the rest. There’s no guarantee that if you’re severely obese, or you’re 90 years old, or both, ivermectin will keep you from getting infected. But if you’re either -or all- of those, you have bigger issues.

Mike Yeadon, Paul Marik, Robert Malone, Peter McCullough, Robert Urso, Pierre Kory, Simone Gold, Tess Lawrie, and dozens of others (thank God), sorry for leaving many of you out. These doctors are very brave people, they have lost their jobs, their reputations, their pensions, everything, after mostly stellar careers, because Tony Fauci and his Big Pharma backers wanted it that way, because they wanted to make billions of off untested “vaccines”, for which there was never any need -let alone evidence-. And we owe the doctors a huge thank you. You guys deserve medals. And tons of recognition.

As we move into fall and winter, Big Pharma has already got their pills lined up, of course. They claim to have an “Omicron Special”. Don’t fall for that nonsense. Take Vit. D and zinc, and ivermectin if you can get it. In the US, the NIH just sneakily added ivermectin to its list of covid cures very recently, would you believe it.

At the same time, there are ever more reports of more people dying from the vaccines than from covid. You take your pick. As booster number 8(26) comes.

 

 

 

 

We try to run the Automatic Earth on donations. Since ad revenue has collapsed, you are now not just a reader, but an integral part of the process that builds this site. Thank you for your support.

 

 

Support the Automatic Earth in virustime with Paypal, Bitcoin and Patreon.

 

Aug 192022
 


Edward Hopper Seven A.M. 1948

 

Ukraine Planning Nuclear Provocation On Friday – Moscow (RT)
Russia Warns Of Another Chernobyl Over Ukraine’s Attacks (RT)
Playing With Fire in Ukraine (Mearsheimer)
Ukraine Conflict Could End Western Hegemony – Hungary (RT)
Xi and Putin Confirmed For November’s G20 Summit In Bali (AlJ)
Russia Deploys MiG Jets Armed With Hypersonic Missiles To Kaliningrad (ZH)
US Must Arm Ukraine Now, Before It’s Too Late (Hill)
Dozens Of Foreign Fighters Eliminated In Strike On Ukrainian Base – Russia (RT)
Russia Explains Terms For Nuclear Arms Use (RT)
Sabotage, Terroristm, Diversionary Attacks Are A Real Risk For Russia (Saker)
Sleepy Greek Port Becomes US Arms Hub (NYT)
Winter Is Coming For Europe (Bill Blain)
EU Gas Prices Seven Times Higher Than In US – CNN
FBI Unit Leading Mar-a-Lago Probe Earlier Ran Russiagate Hoax (Sperry)
Big Pharma Spent $205 Million In 2 Years Lobbying vs Lower Drug Prices (CHD)
1,200 Scientists and Professionals Say “There is No Climate Emergency” (DS)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stelter Biden
https://twitter.com/i/status/1560354199954653185

 

 

 

 

 

 

Malhotra

 

 

 

 

Not just Moscow.

Ukraine Planning Nuclear Provocation On Friday – Moscow (RT)

Ukraine plans to carry out artillery strikes on the Russia-controlled Zaporozhye nuclear power plant on Friday, and then accuse Russia of causing a disaster at the site, the Russian Defense Ministry said on Thursday. The predicted attack will be timed to coincide with the ongoing visit to Ukraine by UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, the ministry claimed. The Russian ministry said it has detected movements of Ukrainian troops, indicating a looming “provocation.” Kiev has deployed units trained in responding to the use of weapons of mass destruction, pre-positioning them to report a radiation leak and demonstrate a purported action to mitigate it, Russian military spokesman Igor Konashenkov said.

The ministry said it expects a Ukrainian artillery unit to attack the plant on Friday from the city of Nikopol. “The blame for the consequences [of the strike] will be attributed to the Russian armed forces,” the statement said. In a separate statement on Thursday, Igor Kirillov, who heads Russia’s Nuclear Biological and Chemical Defense Troops, said his directorate has modeled possible scenarios for a disaster at the Zaporozhye plant. A plume of radioactive materials from the site may reach Poland, Slovakia and Germany, he warned. Russia has accused Ukraine of conducting frequent drone and artillery strikes against the nuclear power plant in the city of Energodar over the past few weeks.

Kiev has denied responsibility and said Russian forces were attacking the plant to discredit Ukraine. Ukrainian officials have also claimed that Russia is using the Zaporozhye facility as a military base. During the briefing, Konashenkov denied Ukrainian claims that Russia has deployed heavy weapons at the Zaporozhye plant and is attacking Ukrainian troops from the site. The only Russian troops at the facility are lightly armed guards providing physical security, the official said. The ministry pledged to do its best to prevent damage to the nuclear facility.

Gonzalo

Read more …

So does Erdogan.

Russia Warns Of Another Chernobyl Over Ukraine’s Attacks (RT)

Ukraine’s ongoing attacks on the Russia-controlled Zaporozhye nuclear power plant may cause a far worse disaster for Europe than the current energy crisis, a Russian Defense Ministry official has warned. Igor Kirillov, who heads Russia’s Nuclear Biological and Chemical Defense Troops, illustrated the likely worst-case scenario of a direct hit on Europe’s largest nuclear plant, during a briefing on Thursday. He showed journalists a map, with plumes of radioactive material from the site reaching Poland, Slovakia, Romania, Moldova, Belarus and even Germany. He blamed Ukraine’s Western backers for trying to downplay the danger of targeting the atomic plant, and forgetting the lessons of the 1986 Chernobyl disaster and the 2011 Fukushima nuclear incident.

According to Kirillov, both disasters involved “the failure of support systems, the disruption of power supply and partial and complete shutdown of the cooling systems, which led to overheating of nuclear fuel and the destruction of the reactor”. The fallout of the Chernobyl disaster affected some 20 countries, while causing 4,000 deaths, a major spike in cancer cases, and the permanent relocation of around 100,000 people. The effects of the Fukushima nuclear incident might seem “insignificant” at first glance, but up to 500,000 people have abandoned their homes because of it, he noted. “Our experts believe that the actions of the Ukrainian armed forces may cause a similar situation at the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant,” Kirillov said.

Strikes by the Kiev forces could render the plant’s cooling systems and other support infrastructure inoperable, which would lead “to overheating of the core and, as a result, the destruction of reactor units at the largest nuclear power plant in Europe, with the release of radioactive substances into the atmosphere and their spreading for hundreds of kilometers,” he warned. “Such an emergency will cause mass migration of the population and will have more catastrophic consequences than the looming energy crisis in Europe,” the military official added. Moscow has accused Kiev of carrying out 12 attacks on the nuclear facilitity, which provides energy to both Russian- and Ukrainian-controlled areas, since mid-July.

Read more …

“..given that the consequences of escalation could include a major war in Europe and possibly even nuclear annihilation, there is good reason for extra concern..”

Playing With Fire in Ukraine (Mearsheimer)

Western policymakers appear to have reached a consensus about the war in Ukraine: the conflict will settle into a prolonged stalemate, and eventually a weakened Russia will accept a peace agreement that favors the United States and its NATO allies, as well as Ukraine. Although officials recognize that both Washington and Moscow may escalate to gain an advantage or to prevent defeat, they assume that catastrophic escalation can be avoided. Few imagine that U.S. forces will become directly involved in the fighting or that Russia will dare use nuclear weapons. Washington and its allies are being much too cavalier. Although disastrous escalation may be avoided, the warring parties’ ability to manage that danger is far from certain.

The risk of it is substantially greater than the conventional wisdom holds. And given that the consequences of escalation could include a major war in Europe and possibly even nuclear annihilation, there is good reason for extra concern. To understand the dynamics of escalation in Ukraine, start with each side’s goals. Since the war began, both Moscow and Washington have raised their ambitions significantly, and both are now deeply committed to winning the war and achieving formidable political aims. As a result, each side has powerful incentives to find ways to prevail and, more important, to avoid losing. In practice, this means that the United States might join the fighting either if it is desperate to win or to prevent Ukraine from losing, while Russia might use nuclear weapons if it is desperate to win or faces imminent defeat, which would be likely if U.S. forces were drawn into the fighting.

Furthermore, given each side’s determination to achieve its goals, there is little chance of a meaningful compromise. The maximalist thinking that now prevails in both Washington and Moscow gives each side even more reason to win on the battlefield so that it can dictate the terms of the eventual peace. In effect, the absence of a possible diplomatic solution provides an added incentive for both sides to climb up the escalation ladder. What lies further up the rungs could be something truly catastrophic: a level of death and destruction exceeding that of World War II.

Putin premeditated

Read more …

“He pointed to “the Chinese, Indians, Brazilians, South Africa, the Arab world, Africa” as regions not supporting the Western line on the conflict.”

Ukraine Conflict Could End Western Hegemony – Hungary (RT)

The deadly conflict in Ukraine has the potential to “demonstratively” put an end to Western hegemony globally, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has claimed. In an interview with German online magazine Tichys Einblick, published on Thursday, Orban said he expects the European Union to emerge weaker in the global arena once the fighting in Ukraine is over. The Hungarian leader argued that the West is incapable of winning the conflict militarily, and that the sanctions it has imposed on Moscow have failed to destabilize Russia. To make matters worse, the punitive measures have spectacularly backfired on Europe, he said. Orban also noted that a “large part of the world” is clearly not getting behind the US when it comes to Ukraine.

He pointed to “the Chinese, Indians, Brazilians, South Africa, the Arab world, Africa” as regions not supporting the Western line on the conflict. “It is quite possible that it will be this war that will demonstratively put an end to Western supremacy,” Orban said. On the other hand, non-EU powers are already benefiting from the situation, he said, pointing toward Russia, which “has its own energy sources.” The premier noted that while EU energy imports from Russia have plummeted, Russia’s majority state-owned gas giant Gazprom has seen its revenues skyrocket.

Beijing, too, is now better off than before the start of the conflict, Orban claimed. He explained that China had previously been “at the mercy of the Arabs,” but is not anymore, apparently referring to the oil market. The other beneficiaries, in the Hungarian prime minister’s view, are “big American corporations.” To prove his point, Orban pointed to profits doubling for Exxon, quadrupling for Chevron and increasing six-fold for ConocoPhillips. While going along with EU sanctions against Russia, Hungary has maintained a neutral stance since the outbreak of the conflict, by not providing either side with weapons or making any harsh statements against Moscow or Kiev. Budapest has insisted that it cannot not risk the security of Hungarians, and will not be dragged into the conflict.

Read more …

Last chance for the west to talk peace and prevent their ecoomies from freezing.

Xi and Putin Confirmed For November’s G20 Summit In Bali (AlJ)

Chinese and Russian presidents Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin have both confirmed they will attend the G20 summit on the resort island of Bali this November, according to President Joko Widodo. “Xi Jinping will come. President Putin has also told me he will come,” Widodo told Bloomberg News in an interview, confirming their attendance for the first time. The November summit will mark the first time that Putin, Xi and United States President Joe Biden will have met in person since Russia invaded Ukraine in February, triggering sanctions from Western countries as well as G20 members Japan and South Korea. China has avoided condemning the attack or joining the sanctions, which took place days after Beijing and Moscow announced a “no limits” partnership. A longtime adviser to the Indonesian president also confirmed Putin and Xi would attend the summit.

“Jokowi told me that Xi and Putin are both planning to attend in Bali,” Andi Widjajanto, who heads the National Resilience Institute, told the Reuters news agency. The Kremlin said in a statement that Putin and Widodo had discussed preparations for the G20 summit in a phone call on Thursday without confirming that the Russian leader would attend. Another official familiar with the situation told Bloomberg that Putin plans to attend the meeting in person. A trip to Bali would be significant given it would be Xi’s first time outside China since the start of the pandemic in early 2020. China has maintained a strict zero-COVID policy that has all but sealed its borders, and Xi is preparing to secure an unprecedented third term as president during the congress of the ruling Communist Party, which is expected to take place in late October or early November.

Chinese officials are also thought to be making plans for a meeting in Southeast Asia between Xi and US President Joe Biden, who will also be in Bali, according to the Wall Street Journal, amid rising tension between the two countries. As head of the G20 this year, Indonesia has faced pressure from Western countries to withdraw its invitation to Putin because of the invasion of Ukraine, which he has called a “special military operation”. Indonesia has also invited Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy to the Bali summit. Widodo has sought to position himself as a mediator, and at the end of June travelled first to Moscow and then to Kyiv to meet both presidents and urge an end to the war. This week, he said both countries have accepted Indonesia as a “bridge of peace”.

Read more …

Supersonic jets with hypersonic missiles.

Russia Deploys MiG Jets Armed With Hypersonic Missiles To Kaliningrad (ZH)

Russia’s defense ministry announced Thursday that it has deployed fighter planes equipped with cutting edge hypersonic missiles to its Baltic region exclave of Kaliningrad, which a statement said will provide “additional measures of strategic deterrence.” The statement detailed that three MiG-31 fighters armed with Kinzhal hypersonic missiles have landed at the Chkalovsk air base in Kaliningrad Oblast. The defense ministry emphasized that the warplanes will be put on “round-the-clock alert” – at a moment tensions with Ukraine’s powerful Western backers like the United States continue to soar. On a few alleged occasions over the last six months of war in Ukraine, Russia has been accused of launching hypersonic missiles on Ukrainian targets; however, the Pentagon has downplayed that it’s not a gamechanger.

But such an intentionally publicized move as placing hypersonic missile armed MiG fighters on “alert” at Russia’s Baltic outpost is an escalatory move aimed at NATO and Ukraine’s Western backers which have been ramping up longer-range missile and weapons shipments to Kiev. Kaliningrad borders NATO members Poland and Lithuania, both of which will see this move as a severe threat to their national security. The Associated Press is reporting that Finland is alarmed its airspace may have been violated by the MiGs as they were en route to the Kaliningrad base: A video released by the Defense Ministry showed the fighters arriving at the base but not carrying the missiles, which were apparently delivered separately.

Finland’s Defense Ministry said Thursday that two Russian MIG-31 fighter jets were suspected of having violating Finnish airspace in the Gulf of Finland off the southern town of Porvoo, west of Helsinki. The Nordic country’s Border Guard started a preliminary investigation into the incident. sThe Russian MoD and state media released video of the MiG fighters arriving in Kaliningrad. Ukraine government-linked officials have also highlighted the transfer with alarm…

Read more …

View from the dark ages:

“..a campaign of genocide aimed at erasing the Ukrainian nation from the map..”

US Must Arm Ukraine Now, Before It’s Too Late (Hill)

Nearly 20 of our fellow experts and national security professionals — whose digital signatures appear at the end of this op-ed — agree: The war in Ukraine has reached a decisive moment and that vital U.S. interests are at stake. Long before the Kremlin first invaded Ukraine in 2014, we have — from senior positions in the U.S. government and military — followed Moscow’s foreign policy and the grave dangers it presents to the United States and our allies. We have carefully watched Moscow’s major offensive since February and the response of the Biden administration and its allies and partners. We have maintained close touch with Ukrainian, U.S. and European officials. Two of us just returned from meetings with Ukraine’s defense and military leaders.

Although the Biden administration has successfully rallied U.S. allies and provided substantial military assistance, including this month, to Ukraine’s valiant armed forces, it has failed to produce a satisfactory strategic narrative which enables governments to maintain public support for the NATO engagement over the long term. By providing aid sufficient to produce a stalemate, but not enough to roll back Russian territorial gains, the Biden administration may be unintentionally seizing defeat from the jaws of victory. Out of an over-abundance of caution about provoking Russian escalation (conventional as well as nuclear), we are in effect ceding the initiative to Russian President Vladimir Putin and reducing the pressure on Moscow to halt its aggression and get serious about negotiations.

Moscow’s imperialist war against the people of Ukraine is not just a moral outrage — a campaign of genocide aimed at erasing the Ukrainian nation from the map — but a clear danger to U.S. security and prosperity. American principles and interests demand the strongest possible response, one sufficient to force the Russians as much as possible back to pre-February lines and to impose costs heavy enough to deter Russia from invading a third time. With Russian forces struggling to regroup in the east and stave off Ukrainian efforts to retake Kherson in the south, now is the time for Ukraine’s allies to pull out all the stops by providing Ukraine the means it needs to prevail. Dragging out the conflict through so-called strategic pauses will do nothing but allow Putin to regroup, recover and inflict more damage in Ukraine and beyond.

But so far, neither the administration nor European allies have succeeded in making clear why this is important to the United States and the West. It is important because Putin is pursuing a revisionist foreign policy designed to upend the rules-based security system that has ensured American and global stability and enabled prosperity since the end of World War II. Putin’s aggressive designs do not end in Ukraine. As Russian officials have repeatedly made clear, if Russia wins in Ukraine, our Baltic NATO allies are at risk, as are other allies residing in the neighborhood. Prudent policy today identifies tomorrow’s risk and seeks the right place and time to deal with that risk. For the U.S. and NATO, that time is now — and the place is Ukraine, a large country whose population understands that its choice is either defeating Putin or losing their independence and even their existence as a distinct, Western-oriented nation. With the necessary weapons and economic aid, Ukraine can defeat Russia.

Read more …

“Thousands of fighters from Poland, Canada, the US, the UK and other countries..”

Dozens Of Foreign Fighters Eliminated In Strike On Ukrainian Base – Russia (RT)

Dozens of foreign mercenaries, fighting for Kiev against Moscow, have been killed in an attack on a compound in the city of Kharkov in northeastern Ukraine, Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Thursday. “A temporary base of foreign mercenaries in the city of Kharkov was hit with a ground-based high-precision weapon. More than 90 militants were killed,” ministry’s spokesman Lieutenant General Igor Konashenkov announced during his daily briefing. The Russian Air Force also struck Ukrainian manpower and military hardware in Kherson and Nikolaev Regions, eliminating 80 combatants and injuring 50 others, he added. Compounds, hosting foreign mercenaries in Ukraine, have already been targeted by Russia several times this month, leading to multiple casualties.


Thousands of fighters from Poland, Canada, the US, the UK and other countries responded to a call by President Vladimir Zelensky and flocked to Ukraine. In April, the Russian military estimated their numbers at nearly 7,000. However, last month it said that only 2,741 foreign fighters remained in Ukraine. Many of them were killed, while others fled to their home countries and later complained about chaos in the ranks of the Kiev forces, and a lack of arms and other equipment. Konashenkov had earlier warned that mercenaries aren’t viewed as combatants under international law and “the best thing that awaits them if they are captured alive is a trial and maximum prison terms.”

Read more …

“the use of the nuclear arsenal is possible only in response to an attack as a self-defense measure and in extreme circumstances..”

Russia Explains Terms For Nuclear Arms Use (RT)

Russia is a responsible nuclear power and will only use its nuclear arms if attacked with weapons of mass destruction or if its existence is under threat, a spokesman for the country’s foreign ministry has said. Meanwhile, some Western officials argue that nukes can play a role on the battlefield, Ivan Nechaev added. According to Russia’s official nuclear posture,“the use of the nuclear arsenal is possible only in response to an attack as a self-defense measure and in extreme circumstances,” the deputy press secretary of the ministry said during a daily briefing on Thursday. The diplomat was responding to a question about the risk of nuclear escalation in the conflict with Ukraine. Russia is not in the habit of “saber-rattling, especially with nuclear weapons,” he said.


Moscow is determined to keep the situation in Ukraine conventional and has no need to use a nuclear option in Ukraine, Nechaev asserted. He lamented that the leaders of Western powers have become far less responsible than their Cold War-era predecessors when it comes to deterrence issues. “The liberal-globalist circles think it possible to discuss lowering the benchmark for the use of nuclear weapons,” he said, citing NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg as one example. The Russian Defense Ministry has repeatedly reassured that its goals in Ukraine can be achieved without the use of nuclear arms. Deploying them would not make any military sense, Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu said this week.

Read more …

” The entire Russian military is trained, and well trained, to operate in a hostile nuclear, chemical or bacteriological environment.”

Sabotage, Terroristm, Diversionary Attacks Are A Real Risk For Russia (Saker)

The only thing Russians can do is to 1) prepare for a very long counter-intelligence and counter-diversionary operations lasting many years and 2) accept the reality of war for what it is and not freak out the next time the Ukronazis blow up something, be it a ship, a train, an aircraft, a bridge or any other target in the LDNR or Russia. The one good news the Russians also need to keep in mind is that most of such diversionary/terrorist attacks are still fundamentally part of PSYOPs and are mostly designed for PR effect. In terms of their actual impact on Russian military capabilities, it is close to zero, just like the Israeli strikes in Syria have made exactly *zero* difference on the ground in Syria.

To really affect military operations you need to have a large, viable and sophisticated partisan/”stay behind” force, which the Ukrainians do not have, not by a long margin. Also, to really affect military operations, such diversionary tactics need to be carefully coordinated with “regular” friendly military forces (like the Soviet partisans during WWII who closely worked with the Soviet armed forces). So yes, this is a problem, a very unpleasant one, one which will be hard to deal with, but not one which will affect Russian military operations. Even if the Ukronazis blow up both the Chernobyl AND Zaporozhiie NPs, this will not significantly affect the SMO or even the war between Russia and the united West. The entire Russian military is trained, and well trained, to operate in a hostile nuclear, chemical or bacteriological environment.

As for Russian logistics, they are extremely sophisticated and highly redundant, so even if the Ukronazis blow up one node of the resupply network, it will be quickly fixed and/or easily replaced or bypassed. That being said, I would personally recommend that we all mentally prepare for what is almost certainly about to happen in the not too distant future. If we understand what such operation can and cannot achieve we will see them in a sober, pragmatic way, and not cave in to the hysterics (by many sides, including the Russian 6th column) which will inevitable follow any such attack.

Read more …

“..Erdogan – always willing to chart a different course – has positioned Turkey as a mediator…”

Sleepy Greek Port Becomes US Arms Hub (NYT)

It is an unlikely geopolitical flashpoint: a concrete pier in a little coastal city, barely used a few years ago and still occupied only by sea gulls most of the time. But the sleepy port of Alexandroupoli in northeastern Greece has taken on a central role in increasing the US military presence in Eastern Europe, with the Pentagon transporting enormous arsenals through here in what it describes as the effort to contain Russian aggression. That flow has angered not only Russia but also neighboring Turkey, underlining how war in Ukraine is reshaping Europe’s economic and diplomatic relationships. Turkey and Greece are both NATO members, but there is long-standing animosity between them, including conflict over Cyprus and territorial disputes in the Mediterranean, and Turkey sees a deeper relationship between Greece and Washington as a potential threat.

The spike in military activity has been welcomed by the government of Greece, most of its Balkan neighbors and local residents, who hope that Americans will stimulate the regional economy and provide security amid rising regional tensions. “We’re a small country,” said Yiannis Kapelas, 53, an Alexandroupoli cafe owner. “It’s a good thing to have a big country to protect us.” Raising the strategic stakes is the impending sale of the Alexandroupoli port. Four groups of companies are competing to buy a controlling stake – two include American firms, backed by Washington, and two have ties to Russia. US military operations in Greece have expanded greatly since Russia invaded Ukraine in February, and top officials from Russia and Turkey have called that a national security threat.

“Against whom were they established?” President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey said in June, referring to the US military outposts in Greece. “The answer they give is ‘against Russia.’ We don’t buy it.” While most of NATO has sided emphatically with Ukraine, Erdogan – always willing to chart a different course – has positioned Turkey as a mediator. In May, the Greek Foreign Ministry said Turkish fighter jets violated the country’s air space over Alexandroupoli, 11 miles from the Turkish border. The incident unnerved local residents concerned with Turkey’s claims to parts of Greece. The complex interplay of interests at Alexandroupoli highlights how the war is shifting the strategic focus of Europe to the Black Sea region.

“The Black Sea is back on the global agenda in an unprecedented way,” said Ilian Vassilev, a former Bulgarian ambassador to Moscow who now works as a strategic consultant. “Security in the Black Sea is central to the issue of how you contain and deal with Russia.” Greece and Russia share deep historical, economic and cultural ties centered on the common Orthodox Christian religion. Greeks are among the few Europeans who largely want to maintain economic ties to Russia, polls show. But the war in Ukraine has badly strained those bonds.

Read more …

‘For’, not ‘In’.

Winter Is Coming For Europe (Bill Blain)

Vladimir Putin could not have planned or executed his crippling energy strike on Europe better. While we promise ourselves Western Sanctions must be impacting Russia, the reality is Europe’s problems are about to get much, much worse through the run up to Winter. What possible incentives does Russia have to increase Nord Stream 1 supplies from their current 20% of capacity? They can feed Europe 1/6 of the Energy they delivered in January this year, and still make as much – selling the rest to the very many nations that have failed to condemn to assault on Ukraine. They may decide to cut supplies completely even as planned maintenance in Norway’s gas infrastructure cuts supplies. A dismal European winter is coming, and European politicians will do anything to avert it.

That will include appeasement – putting pressure on Ukraine to come to a deal with Russia that allows Putin to end the war looking like he achieved something. It would be a major long-term blow to Europe – knowing we’d had to cut a deal with the Devil, and would not immediately solve the West’s reliance on Russian power. (It could take 3 years before Europe can eliminate its reliance of Russian gas with new gas distribution infrastructure – but it can be done!) Power cuts, factory closures, business crisis already appear nailed on. It’s difficult to contemplate German workers welcoming job losses and stagflation, plus the expectation they pay the costs of Southern Europe to cope with the Energy war – but that’s effectively the ECB strategy: to balance European debt market credibility with German money to support Italy’s debt weakness.

While there may be many good reasons and indications to accept the US economy has already passed the nadir of economic woe for this year, the instability engendered by rising European energy prices, the threat of autumnal and winter power outages, combined with rising industrial strife across Europe as inflation and power trigger rising wage demands… means the whole Western Economy is going to struggle. It’s difficult to envisage the US market thriving when Europe is suffering a potentially crippling winter of stagflation and economic strife.

Read more …

“Every spare molecule we can find, we are shipping to the Eurozone..”

EU Gas Prices Seven Times Higher Than In US – CNN

European natural gas prices are trading at levels equivalent to about $70 per million British Thermal Unit (BTUs), which is roughly seven times higher than prices in the United States, CNN reported on Wednesday, citing Lipow Oil Associates. Analysts told the outlet that Europe’s natural gas crisis is contributing to higher prices in America, noting however that it’s not the main driver. US natural gas prices have surged to levels unseen since 2008, closing at $9.33 per million BTU on Tuesday. “Higher global prices are trickling down to the US. Natural gas has become a global commodity with the emergence of LNG,” said Rob Thummel, senior portfolio manager at Tortoise Capital Advisors.


The United States has stepped up its exports of LNG to Europe in an effort to mitigate the impact of declining flows from the continent’s major natural gas supplier, Russia. “Every spare molecule we can find, we are shipping to the Eurozone,” Robert Yawger, vice president of energy futures at Mizuho Securities, said. European gas prices have quadrupled since the start of the year on thinning Russian flows. This week, the cost of gas futures on the TTF hub in the Netherlands exceeded $2,600 per thousand cubic meters for the first time since March. Prices are forecast to spike 60% this winter, exceeding $4,000 per thousand cubic meters.

Read more …

Same people. It’s a big club, and Trump’s not in it.

FBI Unit Leading Mar-a-Lago Probe Earlier Ran Russiagate Hoax (Sperry)

The FBI division overseeing the investigation of former President Trump’s handling of classified material at his Mar-a-Lago residence is also a focus of Special Counsel John Durham’s investigation of the bureau’s alleged abuses of power and political bias during its years-long Russiagate probe of Trump. The FBI’s nine-hour, 30-agent raid of the former president’s Florida estate is part of a counterintelligence case run out of Washington – not Miami, as has been widely reported – according to FBI case documents and sources with knowledge of the matter. The bureau’s counterintelligence division led the 2016-2017 Russia “collusion” investigation of Trump, codenamed “Crossfire Hurricane.”

Although the former head of Crossfire Hurricane, Peter Strzok, was fired after the disclosure of his vitriolic anti-Trump tweets, several members of his team remain working in the counterintelligence unit, the sources say, even though they are under active investigation by both Durham and the bureau’s disciplinary arm, the Office of Professional Responsibility. The FBI declined to respond to questions about any role they may be taking in the Mar-a-Lago case. In addition, a key member of the Crossfire team – Supervisory Intelligence Analyst Brian Auten – has continued to be involved in politically sensitive investigations, including the ongoing federal probe of potentially incriminating content found on the abandoned laptop of President Biden’s son Hunter Biden, according to recent correspondence between the Senate Judiciary Committee and FBI Director Christopher Wray.

FBI whistleblowers have alleged that Auten tried to falsely discredit derogatory evidence against Hunter Biden during the 2020 campaign by labeling it Russian “disinformation,” an assessment that caused investigative activity to cease. Auten has been allowed to work on sensitive cases even though he has been under internal investigation since 2019, when Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz referred him for disciplinary review for his role in vetting a Hillary Clinton campaign-funded dossier used by the FBI to obtain a series of wiretap warrants to spy on former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page. Horowitz singled out Auten for cutting a number of corners in the verification process and even allowing information he knew to be incorrect slip into warrant affidavits and mislead the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court.

Read more …

In praise of the Inflation Reduction Act?!

Big Pharma Spent $205 Million In 2 Years Lobbying vs Lower Drug Prices (CHD)

As the Inflation Reduction Act heads to President Biden’s desk that includes long overdue authority for Medicare to negotiate lower prescription drug prices with big drug companies, an analysis from Accountable.US found the pharmaceutical industry has spent at least $205 million in recent years lobbying and resisting lower drug prices for seniors and families. This includes over $57 million in paid ads PhRMA (the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, a lobbying group) and its allies ran against Medicare drug negotiations over the last year. According to Liz Zelnick, Accountable.US Spokesperson:

“Big Pharma spent massive sums to maintain the broken status quo where drug companies could charge whatever they please while millions of seniors are left to choose between food and medicine. Medicare finally being allowed to harness its bulk purchasing power will save lives. “The same big drug companies that claim they can’t afford to offer fairer prices have continued to break profit records and enrich a small group of wealthy investors on the backs of patients in need for years — all while paying virtually nothing in taxes. Industry opposition to lower drug prices has always been about squeezing maximum profits out of vulnerable consumers. Luckily their efforts failed, and the American people won. “The Inflation Reduction Act is a case study in how change demanded by Americans for years didn’t come easily in the face of powerful and greedy special interests with plenty of lawmakers in their pockets — but it’s possible.”


The analysis follows Accountable.US’ recent findings that major drug company CEOs have raked in over $292.6 million in compensation while their companies saw skyrocketing profits — at a time Americans spend an average of $1,200 per person on prescription drugs and as many as 18 million Americans simply cannot afford their prescribed medications. The government watchdog also previously found Republican lawmakers on the House Energy & Commerce Committee who voted against allowing Medicare to negotiate the prices of prescription drugs with drug companies (H.R. 3) have taken nearly $1.7 million in career contributions from industry groups and the five largest pharmaceutical companies opposed to Medicare drug negotiations.

Aus vaccines
https://twitter.com/i/status/1560018943737303041

Read more …

Discuss!!

1,200 Scientists and Professionals Say “There is No Climate Emergency” (DS)

The political fiction that humans cause most or all climate change and the claim that the science behind this notion is ‘settled’, has been dealt a savage blow by the publication of a ‘World Climate Declaration (WCD)’ signed by over 1,100 scientists and professionals. There is no climate emergency, say the authors, who are drawn from across the world and led by the Norwegian physics Nobel Prize laureate Professor Ivar Giaever. Climate science is said to have degenerated into a discussion based on beliefs, not on sound self-critical science. The scale of the opposition to modern day ‘settled’ climate science is remarkable, given how difficult it is in academia to raise grants for any climate research that departs from the political orthodoxy.

Another lead author of the declaration, Professor Richard Lindzen, has called the current climate narrative “absurd”, but acknowledged that trillions of dollars and the relentless propaganda from grant-dependent academics and agenda-driven journalists currently says it is not absurd. Particular ire in the WCD is reserved for climate models. To believe in the outcome of a climate model is to believe what the model makers have put in. Climate models are now central to today’s climate discussion and the scientists see this as a problem. “We should free ourselves from the naïve belief in immature climate models,” says the WCD. “In future, climate research must give significantly more emphasis to empirical science.” Since emerging from the ‘Little Ice Age’ in around 1850, the world has warmed significantly less than predicted by the IPCC on the basis of modelled human influences.

“The gap between the real world and the modelled world tells us that we are far from understanding climate change,” the WCD notes. The Declaration is an event of enormous important, although it will be ignored by the mainstream media. But it is not the first time distinguished scientists have petitioned for more realism in climate science. In Italy, the discoverer of nuclear anti-matter Emeritus Professor Antonino Zichichi recently led 48 local science professors in stating that human responsibility for climate change is “unjustifiably exaggerated and catastrophic predictions are not realistic”. In their scientific view, “natural variation explains a substantial part of global warming observed since 1850”. Professor Zichichi has signed the WCD.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

 

B,S&T
https://twitter.com/i/status/1560120044402921473

 

 

 

 

 

Recursion
https://twitter.com/i/status/1559866660638654464

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Support the Automatic Earth in virustime with Paypal, Bitcoin and Patreon.

 

 

 

Apr 142022
 
 April 14, 2022  Posted by at 7:41 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , ,  31 Responses »


Andy Warhol Shot Sage Blue Marilyn 1964 (click pic for great article!)

 

Putin Vows ‘Consequences’ For Those Who Interfere In Ukraine (DM)
The Fog of War and the Global Paradigm Shift (Vianna)
How To Wrest War Reparations From Russia: Ukraine, West Count The Ways (JTN)
Zelenskyy’s Steinmeier Snub Triggers Backlash In Germany (Pol.eu)
Bretton Woods III: “Suicidal Europe Saved By Gold?“ (Vilches)
My Video Call With The WHO This Morning (Tess Lawrie)
The Anatomy of Big Pharma’s Political Reach (CHD)
C19 “Vaccine” – The Cause Of Causes (CdC)
GOP Lawmakers Demand FDA Publish Covid Vaccine Safety And Efficacy Data (JTN)
The Horrible, Terrible, Bad, Bad Results of CNBC’s Biden Performance Poll (CTH)
Annual Wholesale Inflation Rises 11.2%, Mirroring Record CPI Numbers (JTN)
Hunter Biden Mixing Business Affairs With Hunger Charity (JTN)
My Personal Experience in Twitter’s Assault on Free Speech (Scott Ritter)

 

 

 

 

“This Is the Largest Experiment on Human Beings Ever Performed in the History of the World”
https://twitter.com/i/status/1514014220345561093

 

 

 

 

The Daily Mail says faltering invasion twice in two sentences. They must be afraid once is not enough.

I saw a headline yesterday about Russia threatening arms shipments into Ukraine, but can’t find it back right now.

Putin Vows ‘Consequences’ For Those Who Interfere In Ukraine (DM)

Vladimir Putin today warned his enemies in the West they will face ‘consequences’ if they ‘worsen the situation’ in Ukraine, as the Russian strongman threatened to create ‘waves of migrants’ in Europe. Putin, speaking in front of dozens of rockets at the Vostochny space launch facility in Russia’s Far East, insisted that his faltering invasion of Ukraine would prevail as he warned of world starvation as a result of Western sanctions against Moscow. The Russian President claimed Russia’s economy and financial system withstood the blow from what he called the Western sanctions ‘blitz’ and insisted the move would backfire by driving up prices for essentials such as fertiliser, leading to food shortages and increased migration to the West.

Despite Putin’s faltering invasion, which saw Russian troops retreat from Ukrainian cities and instead focus on the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine, the leader said his war effort is going to plan as he vowed Russia would triumph in all of its ‘noble’ war aims. Putin said that ‘common sense should prevail’ and added that the West should ‘come back to reason and make well-balanced decisions without losing its face.’ He argued that new Western restrictions on high-tech exports will encourage Russia to move faster to develop new technologies, opening a ‘new window of opportunities.’ Putin also claimed on Tuesday that the images and footage of dead bodies strewn across the Ukrainian town of Bucha were fake, parroting the same lines his spokesman gave earlier this week. He compared the accusations to those concerning the use of chemical weapons by the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. ‘It’s the same kind of fake in Bucha,’ Putin said.

[..] An unconfirmed video uploaded last night appears to show two Russian coastal defence missile systems moving along a road on the Russian side of the border that leads to Helsinki. The missile systems, which were seen driving past a sign to the Finnish capital, are thought to be the K-300P Bastion-P mobile coastal defence system, designed to take out surface ships up to and including aircraft carrier battle groups. The Russian deployment comes as Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin said she expects her government ‘will end the discussion before midsummer’ on whether to apply for NATO membership.

Recent opinions polls by a Finnish market research company put 84% of Finns as viewing Russia as a ‘significant military threat’, up by 25% on last year. In response, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov euphemistically warned the move would ‘not improve’ the security situation in Europe, and Moscow lawmaker Vladimir Dzhabarov added more bluntly it would mean ‘the destruction of the country’. ‘We have repeatedly said that the alliance remains a tool geared towards confrontation and its further expansion will not bring stability to the European continent,’ Peskov said.

Read more …

“..the deepening of the continuous and unlimited reproduction and expansion of the american military empire is a reality that became even clearer after the first russian tank entered ukrainian territory..”

The Fog of War and the Global Paradigm Shift (Vianna)

With ukrainian president Vladimir Zelensky being a kind of spokesman of a script written in Washington – or, who knows, Hollywood – the repeated attacks on european leaders who have worked so hard for the normalization of Russian-European Union relations, as is the case of the recent attack on former chancellor Angela Merkel, indicate that the instruments of fourth generation war, already used by the United States in other regions of the planet, are intensifying in the heart of the western alliance. Not only the maintenance, but the deepening of the continuous and unlimited reproduction and expansion of the american military empire is a reality that became even clearer after the first russian tank entered ukrainian territory, even if this meant destabilizing, or even destroying, old and loyal allies.

In this sense, the old premise carried by many scholars of the “realist” school of International Relations, as well as by great thinkers of the World System, that the concentration of global power in a single state would be an essential condition for lasting world peace, falls to the ground. The “Hyperpower Paradox” is confirmed as a slap in the face of the enormous theoretical consensus developed since the mid-1970s of the last century. In other words, since the first minute of the US bombing of Iraq in 1991, which followed the 48 military interventions of the 1990s, and the 24 interventions in the first two decades of the 21st century – which in turn culminated in 100,000 bombings around the globe – the International System is immersed in a somber process of permanent, or infinite, war, which contradicts the kantian utopia of perpetual peace reflected in the idea of hegemonic stability.

Thus, it was a mistake to consider that the unipolar global power that emerged with the victory in the cold war could exercise its hegemony in the name of peace and global stability, assuming, therefore, a responsible leadership and in the name of a great global governance. On the contrary, what we have witnessed over the last 30 years is the escalation of interstate competition, with the reaction of other states to the insane and inconsequential process of power expansion carried out by the American military empire.

Read more …

The same way Yemen, Libya, Syria etc etc will wrest war reparations from the US, one would presume.

How To Wrest War Reparations From Russia: Ukraine, West Count The Ways (JTN)

Seven weeks into a war that seems poised to escalate before it ends, Kyiv and Western leaders are calculating ways to exact reparations from an aggressive Moscow. Russian President Vladimir Putin on Feb. 24 launched an attack into Ukraine, pummeling cities and wreaking havoc on lives and infrastructure. Aside from the intangible damages to society, experts have estimated that the damages range from $700 billion to a projected $1.5 trillion. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told Moscow last month that he expected that country to pay for the damages. “We will restore every house, every street, every city,” Zelensky said in a video address. “You will reimburse us for everything you did against our state, against every Ukrainian, in full.”

Although Putin most likely would dismiss such claims, the West may already have the means to earmark reparations on Ukraine’s behalf, one analyst said. “In the past, reparations have been paid after hostilities ended by the aggressor country — that was Germany in the first two world wars,” according to the Brookings Institution’s Robert Litan. “Now, the fact that many countries already have control over Russia’s holdings of foreign currency means that, in effect, reparations for the Ukrainian invasion have been pre-funded by Russia itself,” Litan wrote in a March essay. Significant sums of Russian money have been frozen by governments around the world. But funneling it toward reparations may present a number of hurdles, others say.

European officials reportedly are considering whether the seized property of Russian oligarchs can be applied toward rebuilding Ukraine. A more lucrative move would be to confiscate Russia’s central bank reserves that are held in foreign banks. But such a move would be complex in light of legal constraints, one analyst said. “There is international law that puts property of foreign states under special protection,” according to Stephan Schill, a professor at the Amsterdam Center for International Law.

Read more …

This is the US speaking. Pick on someone who has visibility but no power.

Zelenskyy’s Steinmeier Snub Triggers Backlash In Germany (Pol.eu)

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s decision to declare his German counterpart Frank-Walter Steinmeier unwelcome in Kyiv has triggered dismay among German politicians and warnings that the move may backfire. Steinmeier, seen as a symbol of Germany’s soft line on Moscow before the invasion of Ukraine, had planned to visit Kyiv on Wednesday along with the presidents of Poland and the three Baltic states, but the German president had to cancel his trip — which had not been made public in advance for security reasons — after Kyiv indicated that he was not welcome. The move was a humiliation for Steinmeier — a former foreign minister closely associated with Berlin’s previous policy of pursuing close economic and diplomatic ties with Russia — but also for Germany as a whole.

As federal president, Steinmeier is the highest-ranking representative of the German state. The fact that Zelenskyy communicated his decision just hours before Steinmeier’s planned secret trip, after days of preparation between Berlin and Kyiv, and that Ukrainian officials leaked the snub to German tabloid Bild, deepened the diplomatic insult for Germany. Chancellor Olaf Scholz said he found Zelenskyy‘s decision not to welcome Steinmeier “irritating.” Reacting to a Ukrainian invitation for him to visit Ukraine himself, Scholz told RBB24 radio he was not planning any such trip in the near future. The chancellor argued that he had been to Kyiv just about a week before the outbreak of the war and that he was speaking regularly to Zelenskyy on the phone, most recently on Sunday.

In an official statement, a government spokesperson voiced a sober reaction to the Ukrainian move, saying that Steinmeier “has taken and is taking a very clear and unambiguous position on the side of Ukraine,” and stressed that he had also directly appealed to Russian President Vladimir Putin to respect Ukraine’s sovereignty. Others were more critical. “While understanding the existential threat to Ukraine posed by the Russian invasion, I expect Ukrainian representatives to adhere to a minimum level of diplomatic manners and not unduly interfere in our country’s domestic politics,” said Rolf Mützenich, the parliamentary group leader of the center-left Social Democrats, the party of both Steinmeier and Scholz.

Read more …

“Goal (A) is having all countries being able to gradually repatriate their gold bullion now theoretically in custody at the Bank of England..”

Good luck with that. Theoretically.

Bretton Woods III: “Suicidal Europe Saved By Gold?“ (Vilches)

In a nutshell, right now our Western Graeco-Roman Judeo-Christian millenary culture needs to rise to the occasion. Dear “Europa”, as the cradle of Western civilization that you are supposed to be, please be advised that this is it. Otherwise, not just our culture but also our species could soon become functionally disabled. Or, in financial terms which technocrats enjoy so much, we can soon become a forever ´non-performing asset´ a.k.a. wasted garbage. Accordingly, this draft Plan attempts to AVOID the UK-EU Armageddon that “NATO´s internal gold war” would necessarily bring about. And also please be advised that our success would be the only way at hand to prove the Davos agenda wrong which actually was what brought us to the situation we are now facing in the first place.

The basic philosophy behind this über urgent project is probably best represented by a photograph taken at Verdun in 1984 wherein French President Francois Mitterand and German Chancellor Helmut Kohl are firmly holding each other´s hand like two school children both looking straight at the camera for the whole world to see. These two most serious, intelligent and very powerfull elderly statesmen were silently screaming something instantly understood by everyone after French and Germans had killed, maimed and hatefully destroyed each other for decades. Say no more.

Lacking public domain data, let´s accept a spitball yet trustworthy “back-of-the-envelope” guesstimate of 5000 tons of gold deposited by EU members for custody at the Bank of England. So, if such tonnage were now physically available at today´s ultra low central-bank-manipulated prices it would pay for all of Europe´s oil & gas imports for one full year …while if gold were priced at USD $ 5000 per ounce Troy it would pay for 2,5 years of Europe´s oil & gas needs… And if gold were priced at USD $ 50,000 per ounce (something quite possible if genuine price-discovery mechanisms were set free without central bank manipulation…) those 5000 metric tons of gold at current oil & gas prices (which could be lower due to deflationary pressures) would pay for 25 years of EU´s fuel needs, or more.

2022 goals of The Plan, Goal (A) is having all countries being able to gradually repatriate their gold bullion now theoretically in custody at the Bank of England if they so desire with a serious and foreseeable schedule in place to be unequivocally complied with. Goal (B) being able to sell such gold bullion even with buyers taking physical delivery but always at a genuine market price most probably very much higher than today´s fully manipulated quotes thru central bank daily interventions. s

Read more …

“No one in their right mind would want the WHO in charge of a global pandemic.”

“On Sunday, it launched a so-called ‘public participation process’ and invited video and written submissions. They gave two days to make video submissions, and written submissions must be received by 5pm CEST today. That’s five days for the world’s citizens to have their voices heard. Five days – and no public announcement.”

My Video Call With The WHO This Morning (Tess Lawrie)

As you may know, the WHO is proposing a global pandemic agreement that would give it undemocratic rights over every participating nation and its citizens. Put simply, in the event of a ‘pandemic’, the WHO’s constitution would replace every country’s constitution. Whether your country’s elected government would agree or not, the WHO could impose lockdowns, testing regimes, enforce medical interventions, dictate all public health practice, and much more. Throughout this pandemic, the WHO has demonstrated its incompetence, dishonesty and corruption. It has withheld safe and established older medicines, ignored the experiences of frontline doctors, disregarded evidence from low, middle and high-income countries, and taken no heed of the values and preferences of people affected by their recommendations.


It has ignored the huge numbers of adverse reactions on its own database and has failed to issue warnings about the gene-based vaccines. It has also advertised that the mRNA vaccines are as safe as normal vaccines – and this is simply not the case. No one in their right mind would want the WHO in charge of a global pandemic. And yet, that’s precisely what it is proposing with its global pandemic treaty. The World Council for Health wrote a response to this a while back and has been watching developments closely. Well, this week the WHO pulled a fast one on the world. On Sunday, it launched a so-called ‘public participation process’ and invited video and written submissions. They gave two days to make video submissions, and written submissions must be received by 5pm CEST today. That’s five days for the world’s citizens to have their voices heard. Five days – and no public announcement. If you’re angry, you have every right to be.

Read more …

Full portrait of the world’s biggest lobbying enterprise.

The Anatomy of Big Pharma’s Political Reach (CHD)

Pfizer has outspent its peers in six of the last eight election cycles, coughing up almost $9.7 million. During the 2016 election, pharmaceutical companies gave more than $7 million to 97 senators at an average of $75,000 per member. They also contributed $6.3 million to president Joe Biden’s 2020 campaign. The question is: what did big pharma get in return? To truly grasp big pharma’s power, you need to understand how The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) works. ALEC, which was founded in 1973 by conservative activists working on Ronald Reagan’s campaign, is a super secretive pay-to-play operation where corporate lobbyists – including in the pharma sector – hold confidential meetings about “model” bills. A large portion of these bills is eventually approved and become law.

A rundown of ALEC’s greatest hits will tell you everything you need to know about the council’s motives and priorities. In 1995, ALEC promoted a bill that restricts consumers’ rights to sue for damages resulting from taking a particular medication. They also endorsed the Statute of Limitation Reduction Act, which put a time limit on when someone could sue after a medication-induced injury or death. Over the years, ALEC has promoted many other pharma-friendly bills that would: weaken the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) oversight of new drugs and therapies, limit FDA authority over drug advertising, and oppose regulations on financial incentives for doctors to prescribe specific drugs. But what makes these ALEC collaborations feel particularly problematic is that there’s little transparency — all of this happens behind closed doors.

Congressional leaders and other committee members involved in ALEC aren’t required to publish any records of their meetings and other communications with pharma lobbyists, and the roster of ALEC members is completely confidential. All we know is that in 2020, more than two-thirds of Congress — 72 senators and 302 House of Representatives members — cashed a campaign check from a pharma company. The public typically relies on an endorsement from government agencies to help them decide whether or not a new drug, vaccine or medical device is safe and effective. And those agencies, like the FDA, count on clinical research. As already established, big pharma is notorious for getting its hooks into influential government officials.

Here’s another sobering truth: The majority of scientific research is paid for by the pharmaceutical companies. When the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) published 73 studies of new drugs over the course of a single year, they found that a staggering 82% of them had been funded by the pharmaceutical company selling the product, 68% had authors who were employees of that company and 50% had lead researchers who accepted money from a drug company. According to 2013 research conducted at the University of Arizona College of Law, even when pharma companies aren’t directly funding the research, company stockholders, consultants, directors and officers are almost always involved in conducting them.

Read more …

“Though myocarditis gets the most notoriety, the entire circulatory system is under attack..”

C19 “Vaccine” – The Cause Of Causes (CdC)

The official Massachusetts database of death certificates contains proof that C19 “vaccines” killed thousands of people in Massachusetts in 2021. This article details a forensic journey in a one-of-a-kind, brute-force, pedestrian, forensic analysis of the official Massachusetts government data to discover what happened and is happening in a population of ~ 6.9 million people at the fore of C19 “science.” Massachusetts is a leading medical and pharmaceutical technology exporter to the world. Some leaders say it is a model for C19 response planning. The truth is that Massachusetts is a model for fraud on the people.

As demonstrated in particularity below, there was a short pandemic of respiratory deaths in 2020. Then, in the year of injections en masse, deaths switched to mainly circulatory system deaths. Something is attacking the circulatory systems of citizens of Massachusetts. Three main events are initially depicted: a pandemic, an extremely attenuated second wave of disease no longer a pandemic, and a nearly steady-state excess death anomaly in the second half of 2021 (likely began around February 2021, but was obscured by lower than normal deaths of 85+yo’s due to culling from C19 in spring 2020).

Investigation of the anomaly indicates that excess deaths are circulatory system involved, also known and documented in the C19 vaccine trial data. Though myocarditis gets the most notoriety, the entire circulatory system is under attack. Hereinafter, the C19 “vaccine” will be called “gene modification” because it is a more accurate descriptor of the biological injectable product. Industry and government chose “vaccine” because it is more psychologically acceptable to consumers. “Vaccine” has product-class recognition and reputation. Ergo, the definition of “vaccine” was changed in 2020 to accommodate the inclusion of C19 gene modification into this product-class. Lawsuits based on this issue of “definition” are pending.

Read more …

“Time is of the essence, as the FDA is expected to authorize vaccines for children as young as six months old..”

GOP Lawmakers Demand FDA Publish Covid Vaccine Safety And Efficacy Data (JTN)

Two months after the CDC acknowledged hiding the vast majority of its COVID-19 data, partly to protect the reputation of vaccines, the FDA is under pressure to release its current and future safety and efficacy data on COVID vaccines and therapeutics. “The fact that the data in the FDA’s possession has remained behind an FDA firewall for more than 18 months is appalling,” Rep. Bill Posey (R-Fla.) wrote to Commissioner Robert Califf, noting the agency unsuccessfully asked a court to dribble out Pfizer vaccine data over 55-75 years. Nine House GOP colleagues joined Posey’s April 11 letter, including Kentucky’s Thomas Massie, the leading libertarian in the caucus, and Alabama’s Mo Brooks, who sponsored a bill to defund vaccine mandates.

In light of mandates and liability shields for manufacturers, “[n]othing is more important to physicians, parents, patients, public health officials and elected officials than having access to as much information as possible when evaluating immediate and long-term responses to the pandemic,” the letter says. The House Republicans want the agency to “immediately” release safety and efficacy data for COVID products granted emergency use authorization (EUA) and full approval, and ongoing publication of data within 14 days of receipt by the FDA. It’s already requiring manufacturers to submit most of this information “in redacted and releasable form” and “should have been preparing to immediately release data once licensure was granted” to enable “rigorous independent review,” they said.

[..] The responses of public health agencies to Posey’s previous letters on COVID products and authorization, going back to fall 2020, were “not serious,” Posey spokesperson George Cecala told Just the News. He shared Posey letters calling attention to a British Medical Journal investigation of a Pfizer contractor’s trial practices and a 2021 British study reporting rare polyethylene glycol-induced anaphylaxis from the coating around the vaccine. The Science Committee member also sponsored a bill to establish a COVID commission. Time is of the essence, as the FDA is expected to authorize vaccines for children as young as six months old, Cecala said. Pfizer data showed 2-4 year-olds received no benefit from two doses, but the FDA asked for an EUA application while it tests a third dose.

When the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program was created in the 1980s, “it was regularly understood that it would be a small percentage of people” who suffered, Cecala said. Nobody thought it was a “conspiracy theory,” which is how COVID vaccine injury is portrayed. The feds haven’t used vaccine safety systems “optimally” since the pandemic’s onset, said epidemiologist Martin Kulldorff, who was removed from the CDC’s COVID Vaccine Safety Technical Work Group for criticizing its “pause” in Johnson & Johnson vaccine distribution. The well-known Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System lacks basic health information that can determine “whether the [COVID] vaccine was responsible” for reported side effects, the former Harvard Medical School professor wrote in a Brownstone Institute essay Monday.

Read more …

81 million votes.

The Horrible, Terrible, Bad, Bad Results of CNBC’s Biden Performance Poll (CTH)

CNBC commissioned a poll by Hart research and associates, a friendly outfit for the left. Unfortunately, that means CNBC then needed to tell everyone what the results were. That task fell to CNBC’s Steve Liesman; an appropriate name given the task at hand. The irony doubles when you remember this was the same CNBC pundit who refused to accept the horrible economic data that began surfacing last fall. There was even a public broadcast where Liesman said the BLS statistics had to be wrong, because the results were so horrible. A few months later, and here he is explaining how the country now feels about Joe Biden.

(CNBC) – […] The pessimism is clearly dragging on Americans’ opinions of President Joe Biden. In fact, nothing looks to be working in the Biden presidency from the public’s viewpoint. The president’s approval rating sank to a new low of just 38%, with 53% disapproving. Biden’s -15% net approval rating is measurably worse than his -9% approval in the CNBC December survey. What’s more, his approval rating on the economy dropped for a fourth straight survey to just 35%, with 60% disapproving, putting the president a deep 25 points underwater.

Read more …

“The Treasury sent out checks, transferring the reserves to people’s banks. The Treasury then borrowed another $2 trillion or so, and sent more checks…”

Annual Wholesale Inflation Rises 11.2%, Mirroring Record CPI Numbers (JTN)

Wholesale prices in March increased by 11.2%, compared to 12 months earlier, the Labor Department said Wednesday. The report also show the prices increased 1.1% from February to March. The newly released numbers follow the agency saying Tuesday the price of consumer goods in March increased by 8.5%, compared to the same time last year, making the Consumer Price Index’s so-called “annualized rate” the highest since December1981. The wholesale numbers, officially the Producer Price Index, measures the price of goods and services that businesses pay one other. The recent invasion of Ukraine by Russia, a global energy provider, has resulted in soaring fuel prices, which were a major fact in the wholesale and consumer inflation.


Another factor continues to be COVID-19-related supply chain problems, with some economists also arguing the federal government’s ongoing fiscal response to the pandemic, particularly the infusion of trillions of dollars into the economy, is another major factor. Hoover Institution economist John H. Cochrane wrote in a beginning-of-year message that reads: “In response to the disruptions of COVID-19, the U.S. government created about $3 trillion of new bank reserves, equivalent to cash, and sent checks to people and businesses. Mechanically, the Treasury issued $3 trillion of new debt, which the Fed quickly bought in return for $3 trillion of new reserves. “The Treasury sent out checks, transferring the reserves to people’s banks. The Treasury then borrowed another $2 trillion or so, and sent more checks. Overall, federal debt rose nearly 30 percent. Is it at all a surprise that a year later inflation breaks out?”

Read more …

“In February 2017, Hunter Biden flew to Miami to meet with CEFC chairman Ye Jianming. There, Ye offered Hunter a three-year deal at $10 million per year for “introductions alone.”

Hunter Biden Mixing Business Affairs With Hunger Charity (JTN)

With his father’s eight-year tenure as Barack Obama’s vice president waning, Hunter Biden received a remarkable overture in 2015: One of China’s richest businessmen wanted to make a sizable donation to the World Food Program USA (WFP USA), which was led by the VP’s son. WFP USA is a U.S.-based nonprofit dedicated to raising funds and building U.S. support for the World Food Program, the United Nations organization that fights global hunger. But soon, memos gathered by the FBI show, the charitable discussions evolved into an expanding relationship between Hunter Biden and Chinese energy giant CEFC to include business deals that would eventually reap the Biden family millions of dollars.

“CEFC China is very interested in exploring humanitarian initiatives of mutual interest to the World Food Program USA and discussing investment opportunities with Burnham,” an email received and then forwarded by Hunter Biden in October 2015 stated. Burnham was one of the many firms through which Hunter Biden and his partners like Devon Archer scored large investments. The story of CEFC’s dual pitch for charity and business opportunities is documented in emails and memos stored on the notorious laptop Hunter Biden abandoned at a Delaware computer repair shop. The device was eventually turned over in December 2019 to the FBI, which is leading an investigation into the taxes, finances and foreign business dealings of the president’s son.

The FBI’s former intelligence chief said the Chinese overture to Hunter Biden fits the classic pattern of a foreign influence operation, much like was seen with Democratic congressman Eric Swalwell a few years ago. “First, you have to understand that China does not donate to American led charities because they are altruistic,” explained former FBI Assistant Director for Intelligence Kevin Brock. “And Chinese intelligence operatives like Christine Fang don’t cozy up to Rep. Eric Swalwell because he’s a fun guy to be around. Chinese intelligence does what it does in order to steal information and influence American policy makers.”

[..] In February 2017, Hunter Biden flew to Miami to meet with CEFC chairman Ye Jianming. There, Ye offered Hunter a three-year deal at $10 million per year for “introductions alone.” To close the deal, Ye gave Hunter a three-carat diamond valued at over $80,000, memos show. When asked about this fateful meeting in Miami, Hunter Biden told the New Yorker’s Adam Entous he was there for WFP USA charity work when the meeting unexpectedly “turned to business opportunities.” Hunter Biden, however, went there with two other business partners who had been intimately involved in pitching private business deals to CEFC. Over the next year, the CEFC money began to flow, and Hunter Biden reaped nearly $6 million from the Chinese energy giant.

Read more …

Excellent account.

My Personal Experience in Twitter’s Assault on Free Speech (Scott Ritter)

By the evening of April 5, I believed I had more than enough information to try and put forth a counter-narrative to the one being pushed by The New York Times and President Biden, namely that Ukraine, not Russia, was responsible for the Bucha killings. “The Ukrainian National Police,” I composed on Twitter, “committed numerous crimes against humanity in Bucha.” Drawing on the precedent of the Nuremburg International Military Tribunal established at the end of the Second World War to prosecute Nazi war criminals, I then went on to state that “Biden, in seeking to shift blame for the Bucha murders onto Russia, is guilty of aiding and abetting these crimes. Congratulations, America…we’ve created yet another Presidential war criminal!” At 9:42 p.m. I hit “send,” and the deed was done.

As far as Twitter metrics go, this tweet didn’t do so badly—5,976 “likes”, 2,815 retweets, and 321 comments, for a total of what Twitter calls 265,098 “impressions.” It also got me suspended from Twitter. The next day, April 6, at 11:57 a.m., I received an email from Twitter Support, notifying me that my account, @RealScottRitter, “had been suspended for violating Twitter Rules,” specifically for violating rules against abuse and harassment. “You may not engage in the targeted harassment of someone or incite other people to do so. This includes wishing or hoping that someone experiences physical harm.” I re-read the tweet in question, wondering how anyone could possibly interpret its contents as violating the rules cited by Twitter Support. Who had I harassed or incited others to harass?

I followed the procedures to appeal the suspension and went on with my daily routine—minus the part where I interact with the people I follow, and those who followed me, on Twitter. My suspension caught the eye of several people who follow my tweeting activity. Several of these people reached out to inquire as to what happened and were as confused as I was over the grounds cited by Twitter for the suspension. The end result of this was a very heart-warming grass-roots protest against the Twitter decision to suspend my account of such intensity, that one had to believe it caught the eye of one of the Twitter bureaucrats tasked with monitoring the temperature in Twitterdom. On April 6, at 11:54 p.m., I received an email from Twitter Support notifying me that “After further review, we have unsuspended your account as it does not appear to be in violation of the Twitter Rules.”

Life, it seemed, could return to normal, with me safely ensconced in my overstuffed arm chair, frantically working the controls to the television remote while monitoring my all-important, and recently restored, Twitter account. Nothing good, however, lasts forever.

Land of the free

Read more …

 

 

 

 

 

Maher Joe Rogan
https://twitter.com/i/status/1513983596956196873

 

 

You were warned even as a child…

 

 

 

 

Support the Automatic Earth in virustime with Paypal, Bitcoin and Patreon.

 

 

 

Jan 032022
 


Albert Bierstadt Storm in the Mountains c1870

 

 

In my first article of the year, I must thank everyone who has followed us, and read us, and commented, especially those of you who have made donations both to the Automatic Earth, and to the Monastiraki kitchen for the homeless in Athens, Greece. Both don’t reach millions of people, but the thousands we do connect with, we reach them well. Every reader who learns something is a win, and every homeless person who gets a good meal, well, that’s obvious.

Thank you so much. You are the ones who make this happen.

 

 

If I say that 2020 was the year of the virus, and 2021 the year of the vaccine, most people would probably agree. But 2021 was so much more than that; it was also the year of propaganda, media capture and narrative control at levels beyond anything we’ve ever seen. Even if many -most- people haven’t experienced it that way.

And that has likely had more negative impact on us than the vaccine itself. A close call perhaps, I know. The good thing that has come out of this is that so much of it has been exposed. Much of the underlying tendencies towards authoritarianism, and disregard for truth, and blind desire for profit, for a Great Reset, population control, abandonment of freedoms and human rights, it’s all there now for us to see.

We need to act upon that exposure. Get rid of Fauci, Walensky, Pfizer, CDC, and their peers across the planet, of the WHO, of all health “experts” that receive income from/via Pfizer et al (which is the vast majority), put a halt to the influence of money (Bill Gates) on health policy. A society, a country, need to be their own boss over their own fundamental policies. And that means paying for it ourselves.

And not have policies easily changed by a group of politicians and unelected officials (“experts”) who happen to have grabbed power at a particular point in time. A society needs roots, and ours have been uprooted. From principles, from laws, from rights. This will not be easy, we already gave them a 2 year advantage, but if we don’t use this time when the spotlights are directed at them, we will lose even much more than we have already lost. We’ve let them play their games, virtually uncontested, and we cannot afford that.

This appears to culminate in Twitter’s handling of Joe Rogan and Robert Malone recently, and that’s fine, Twitter is not big enough to tackle Rogan, while CNN and MSNBC audiences are drops in the ocean compared to Joe’s. They bit off one too big for them to chew.

But that’s just the US, and that’s just one podcaster, one voice. The control virus that has come with the corona virus has delved much deeper into the world’s various societies. Just yesterday, we saw video from my country of birth, Holland, where police set attack dogs on peaceful elderly protesters, and say what you will, but that country is neither free nor a democracy. That claim is 100% obsolete.

That it is accepted regardless gives credence, and a lot, to Matthias Desmet and his “Mass Formation Syndrome” theories, but we should not really need his analysis, useful as it may be, to figure out what is going on. All we need to do is take a step back and wonder what the hell is going on. To ponder how we saw our societies 2+ years ago, how we ourselves would have seen these recent developments in the light of back then. We can’t have forgotten all of it?!

 

 

That Anthony Fauci is still in his job is absolutely insane. He became head of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), 40 years ago, he’s 81, older than Joe Biden. He’s been building ties to Big Pharma, especially Pfizer, all that time, in the shadows, the best place for such deals.

He was in his position when Pfizer received the biggest criminal fine in US corporate history in 2012, of $2.3 billion, for lying and cheating and more. Now, a few years later, Fauci works with Pfizer and the rest of Big Pharma, and makes their owners billionaires and their shareholders very rich. He is the very last person who should have been in his where he is, both 2 years ago and now.

Fauci is not the best doctor in the US, he’s just the best connected to the pharma industry. That guarantees Americans the worst deal they could get, not the best. And of course anyone else at the upper echelons of the NIAID, CDC, FDA, they need to go too. Fauci et al put them there.

In the US and elsewhere, any politician, individual or through their party or otherwise, and any health experts, individual or through their organization or company, who have received funds from Big Pharma or Bill Gates, should be discarded, put out by the curb. We should be able to figure this out, because it’s NOW that they stand exposed. Perhaps not TO Covid, but certainly BY Covid.

It’s the only way we can cleanse the system. Which is needed if we want to survive, with our health, our conscience, and our freedoms and rights. We have let an enormous amount of mold, rot, grow at the pillars of our societies, and we should be glad we can see it now, because this allows us to exterminate it.

We cannot allow Pfizer to gain even more influence over our health systems. Which will be a very hard fight, because our politicians and experts handed them $100s of billions, which they are using as we speak to buy more politicians and lobbyists and influence, and profit.

You can’t stop this by voting for another party. Pfizer probably has more lobbyists on K Street than all of Big Oil put together. And they have them in party and every every country that matters, in every strategic position that matters, and they will soon have many more. No, you must cut their entire voice out of the politics and health care of your society. Yes, very difficult, sure. But today, you can at least see them. For a short time. That won’t last.

 

 

Along with all that the World Economic Forum, and their Great Reset, it will have to go. They don’t do anyone any good but themselves. A big club that we ain’t in. Which reminds me:

The Automatic Earth has shifted a lot towards Covid over the past 2 years, and surely many readers are not 100% happy with that. But the financial world is still captive to central banks that won’t allow price discovery, which makes “markets” just fake pantomimes that former investors get rich in while the poor suffer.

While the climate issue has been captured by the likes of COP 26, a toy for the rich who want to make you pay to “go green”, in accordance with Davos and the WEF. I feel sorry for the well-meaning people who expect anything from that set-up. Nobody who owes their money or their power to fossil fuels will voluntarily give up either, but they will make you fork over for windmills and solar cells whose energy dynamics you don’t actually understand.

Just like with Covid, if you want to free yourselves from the narrative, you will have to open your eyes and go to battle. An untested vaccine won’t set you free, and neither will an electric car. Those two are just things you are being sold by the narrative.

But believe you me, the no. 1 issue today is the vaccines. We need to stop those, before all of our children grow up with timebombs in their bodies. Every jab means more spike proteins, and boosters are worse because they come after your immune system has learned, and prepared for, how to attack those proteins, who by then may be in every organ in your body. And attack them it will, because they are toxic agents.

I don’t want to tell people to get a vaccine or not, but I do want to tell them to be very careful, to get informed well, and only then give their consent, if they decide to get jabbed. It’s just that you have to be confident that your immune system is strong enough to defend you from the effects of the vaccine, and that’s the opposite of what 99% of people understand is happening to them.

So, 2020 year of the virus, 2021 year of the vaccine, and 2022 year of the adverse effects of the vaccines?! And/or a grand awakening?

 

 

 

We try to run the Automatic Earth on donations. Since ad revenue has collapsed, you are now not just a reader, but an integral part of the process that builds this site. Thank you for your support.

 

 

Support the Automatic Earth in virustime. Donate with Paypal, Bitcoin and Patreon.

 

Jan 032022
 


Rembrandt van Rijn Bathsheba at her bath 1654

 

The MSM Is Losing The Fight Of Its Life…All Thanks To Joe Rogan (QTR)
Joe Rogan Joins GETTR As Twitter Censorship Intensifies (PM)
Understaffed Hospitals Ease Mandates, Rehire Unvaxxed Employees (JTN)
Vaccines Don’t Stop Covid Hospitalizations Or Deaths (Berenson)
Insurance CEO Says Deaths Up 40% Among Working Age People (JTN)
New York Woman Arrested For Giving Teen Covid-19 Vaccine At Her Home (RT)
Britain Got It Wrong On Covid: Long Lockdown Did More Harm Than Good, (G.)
Bizarre Neurological Illness Plagues Young Canadians
Navy, Air Force Issue Blanket Denials Of Religious Exemptions (JTN)
More Than 2,500 US Flights Canceled Sunday Citing Covid (JTN)
Biden Pick for FDA Chief Holds Millions in Big Pharma Investments (CHD)
US Dollar’s Status as Dominant “Global Reserve Currency” at 25-Year Low (WS)
Adam Schiff Says Russian Invasion Of Ukraine ‘Very Likely’ (JTN)

 

 

 

 

Australian Medical Whistleblowers Speak Out About Horrific Reactions Right After Vaccines

 

 

Rogan’s audience is much bigger than CNN and MSNBC combined. He’s an existential threat.

Quoth the Raven is a finance writer. Who sees this one very well.

The MSM Is Losing The Fight Of Its Life…All Thanks To Joe Rogan (QTR)

[..] after listening to Dr. Robert Malone‘s well reasoned arguments, delivered for three straight hours, concisely and calmly, it became clear to me that the entire mainstream media machine could wind up falling at the hands of content creators like Joe Rogan. It’s an interesting little piece of game theory, when you think about it. Rogan generates so many views and has grown so quickly – strictly because he allows open dialogue, civil discourse and approaches things with honest intent – that there is no financial incentive to de-platform him.

Ever notice how YouTube apparently had no problem taking down Rogan’s interview with Malone, but hasn’t banned Rogan’s channel from the site yet? One issue for media and political elites to consider is the fact that Rogan has supporters on both sides of the aisle. These supporters watch him because he routinely touches on topics that are considered faux pas or irreverent. The question of whether or not Rogan’s legacy and impact are here, and are going to remain here, can be answered with a resounding “yes”. Rogan has thrived, whether intentionally (bringing on people specifically because they are being censored) or unintentionally (shooting the shit with people he finds interesting), from the start, by shining light in the dark areas that the mainstream media refuses to discuss.

In the same way that bitcoin unintentionally became a global phenomenon as a result of the negative consequences of central banking, Joe Rogan has become a global phenomenon at the hands of the negative consequences of how the mainstream media and “big tech” does business. It reminds of me the scene in the 1989 version of Batman where Batman tells the Joker, “I’m going to kill you”, to which the Joker retorts: “You IDIOT! You made me. Remember? You dropped me into that vat of chemicals! That wasn’t easy to get over, and don’t think that I didn’t try!” And so now, as it stands, knob-heads like Brian Stelter and his merry band of buffoons over at CNN – who spent 2021 attacking Rogan – have little choice but to fall in line behind him.

You see, one of the great things about being the leader in an industry (in this case, media), is that you set the pace, you dictate the tone and you become the bar of expectation for integrity, honesty, open-mindedness, truthful dialogue and creating discussion that benefits the greater good, and not just those who you serve. Joe Rogan has raised the bar, whether people on the left, on the right, in the media or in politics care, or not. Not only has Rogan taken the lead by several lengths like Smarty Jones breaking loose around the final turn at the Preakness, he has also inspired and created a whole new crop of content creators that are following his model. In other words, it isn’t just Joe Rogan that the mainstream media is up against, it’s the hundreds, if not thousands, of content creators that are either looking to build media empires themselves, or are simply just inspired by open dialogue, like myself.

Malone Rogan EUA

Read more …

Within hours, Rogan had ten million followers on GETTR. Many of whom will also have opened accounts, if only to follow him.

I read some critical views on GETTR too, though. There are many alternatives to Twitter, just a matter of time before people choose.

Joe Rogan Joins GETTR As Twitter Censorship Intensifies (PM)

As Twitter continues to ban users from its platform, podcast superstar Joe Rogan announced on Sunday that he has set up a GETTR account. “Just in case shit over at Twitter gets even dumber, I’m here now as well. Rejoice!” Rogan wrote on his GETTR account Sunday afternoon. Most recently, Twitter has banned Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene from their platform, citing multiple violations of the social media giant’s COVID-19 policies. One of Rogan’s most recent interviews on his podcast was with Dr. Robert Malone, who was recently banned from the platform as well for his stance on the COVID-19 vaccine.

“They removed you for not going along with whatever the tech narrative is, because tech clearly has a censorship agenda when it comes to COVID in terms of treatment, in terms of the— whether or not you’re promoting what they would call vaccine hesitancy, they can ban you for that, they can ban you for in their eyes, what they think is a justifiable offense,” Rogan told Malone “I try really hard to give people the information and help them to think, not to tell them what to think. Okay? But the point is if I’m not — if it’s not okay for me to be part of the conversation, even though I’m pointing out scientific facts that may be inconvenient, then who is who can be allowed?” Malone said later in the conversation.

Gettr launched earlier this year as a competitor to Twitter. Jason Miller, a former senior adviser to the Trump administration and CEO of Gettr, said in July that the platform will remain open to opinions from any end of the political spectrum. Gettr allows users the option to “import their existing tweets into this new platform,” in addition to longer character count posts, and clearer photos. “GETTR is the marketplace of ideas. We will not cancel people for their political opinions, and GETTR offers far more features and better technology than anything else out there,” Miller said in the statement.

Malone Rogan Pfizer

Read more …

Traveling nurses.

Understaffed Hospitals Ease Mandates, Rehire Unvaxxed Employees (JTN)

After unvaccinated healthcare workers were fired for refusing to comply with vaccine mandates, some are being asked to return to work due to staffing shortages amid increasing COVID-19 cases. In Canada, for example, Alberta Health Services announced on Dec. 23 it will allow unvaccinated healthcare workers to resume their jobs starting Jan. 10 if they submit to frequent testing. AHS cited expected increased demands on the health system due to the spread of the Omicron variant for the policy change. As of the date of the announcement, 1,400 healthcare workers who were not fully vaccinated had been placed on unpaid leave. AHS said that unvaccinated workers will be responsible for paying for and coordinating their COVID tests, which they must complete no more than 48 hours prior to their shifts.


Quebec announced on Tuesday that some COVID-positive healthcare workers and other essential employees will be allowed to continue working in order to prevent breakdowns in services, CBC News reported. Healthcare workers who are triple-vaccinated will be prioritized. In Oregon, meanwhile, “30 percent of the nursing staff in some hospitals are made up of traveling nurses,” Matt Calzia, a registered nurse and member of the Oregon Nurses Association, told Fox 12 Oregon in October. “In others, turn over [sic] is high. The majority of a unit might be composed of traveling nurses during some shifts.” That same month, St. Charles Health System in Bend, Ore., having lost more than 100 full-time staff in the previous month, hired 120 traveling nurses and received aid from the state National Guard, OPB News reported. St. Charles had as of then approved a little more than half of all medical and religious exemption requests.

Read more …

The myth begins to crumble.

Vaccines Don’t Stop Covid Hospitalizations Or Deaths (Berenson)

Even at the peak of their protection earlier in 2021, Covid vaccines barely reduced the risk of hospitalizations in vaccinated people who had “breakthrough” infections, new data show. Vaccinated people in a study published Tuesday had a nearly 1 in 200 chance of of requiring hospitalization for Covid in the first six months after being “fully vaccinated.” That stunning risk came even though the median age of people in the study was only 51, and most were relatively healthy. Deaths, ventilator use, and other severe outcomes also occurred regularly in vaccinated people. The data comes from a study of about 600,000 vaccinated Americans seen at over 100 academic medical centers.

The study was published online Dec. 28 in the Journal of the American Medical Association – JAMA Internal Medicine. The data in the study also make clear how quickly vaccine protection fades after the second dose – and that the Centers for Disease Control hugely understated the number of vaccinated people hospitalized for Covid earlier this year. Of the 600,000 fully vaccinated people, about 2,800 required inpatient hospitalization for Covid in the first six months after “full vaccination.” That period starts 14 days after the second dose of mRNA vaccines, when vaccine protection should be at peak.

Almost 3 percent of fully vaccinated people, or 1 in 35, were infected over the first six months, with infection rates accelerating sharply at the end of the study. In all, 148 of the 600,000 vaccinated people had what the study’s authors called “serious” outcomes from Covid, including ventilation or death, in the first six months after full vaccination. The study does not reveal how many people were infected or hospitalized for Covid after the first dose or less than two weeks after the second, when rates of infection, hospitalization, and death are known to be even higher.

Read more …

“Most of the claims for deaths being filed are not classified as COVID-19 deaths..”

Insurance CEO Says Deaths Up 40% Among Working Age People (JTN)

The head of OneAmerica insurance said the death rate is up a stunning 40% from pre-pandemic levels among working-age people. “We are seeing, right now, the highest death rates we have seen in the history of this business – not just at OneAmerica,” the company’s CEO Scott Davison said during an online news conference this week. “The data is consistent across every player in that business.” OneAmerica is a $100 billion insurance company that has had its headquarters in Indianapolis since 1877. The company has approximately 2,400 employees and sells life insurance, including group life insurance to employers in the state.

Davison said the increase in deaths represents “huge, huge numbers,” and that’s it’s not elderly people who are dying, but “primarily working-age people 18 to 64” who are the employees of companies that have group life insurance plans through OneAmerica. “And what we saw just in third quarter, we’re seeing it continue into fourth quarter, is that death rates are up 40% over what they were pre-pandemic,” he said. “Just to give you an idea of how bad that is, a three-sigma or a one-in-200-year catastrophe would be 10% increase over pre-pandemic,” he said. “So 40% is just unheard of.” Davison was one of several business leaders who spoke during the virtual news conference on Dec. 30 that was organized by the Indiana Chamber of Commerce.

Most of the claims for deaths being filed are not classified as COVID-19 deaths, Davison said. “What the data is showing to us is that the deaths that are being reported as COVID deaths greatly understate the actual death losses among working-age people from the pandemic. It may not all be COVID on their death certificate, but deaths are up just huge, huge numbers.” He said at the same time, the company is seeing an “uptick” in disability claims, saying at first it was short-term disability claims, and now the increase is in long-term disability claims. “For OneAmerica, we expect the costs of this are going to be well over $100 million, and this is our smallest business. So it’s having a huge impact on that,” he said.

[..] The number of hospitalizations in the state is now higher than before the COVID-19 vaccine was introduced a year ago, and in fact is higher than it’s been in the past five years, Dr. Lindsay Weaver, Indiana’s chief medical officer, said at a news conference with Gov. Eric Holcomb on Wednesday. Just 8.9% of ICU beds are available at hospitals in the state, a low for the year, and lower than at any time during the pandemic. But the majority of ICU beds are not taken up by COVID-19 patients – just 37% are, while 54% of the ICU beds are being occupied by people with other illnesses or conditions.

Read more …

Bizarre.

New York Woman Arrested For Giving Teen Covid-19 Vaccine At Her Home (RT)

A woman in New York state was arrested after she was accused of administering a Covid-19 vaccine to a teenager while lacking a medical license. The teen’s mother later told the police she was unaware of the injection. Laura Parker Russo, a 54-year-old Long Island woman, allegedly gave the teenager what the investigators believe was a Covid-19 vaccine at her home on Friday, police told local media. It’s unclear what the teenager was doing at Russo’s home and whether they are related. While the boy’s attitude to the procedure is unknown, it did not sit well with his mother, who wasted no time in notifying the police.


The mother told detectives that she had not given Russo permission to inject her son with the substance. However, the lack of parental consent turned out to be only the tip of the iceberg, with police later discovering that Russo had no right to perform medical procedures. The woman was neither a medical professional, nor was she authorized to carry out vaccination. Russo was charged with practicing without a proper qualification, and is set to appear before court on January, 21. Children as young as 5 are eligible for the Covid-19 vaccine in the US. Currently, there is only one vaccine – the Pfizer-BioTech Covid-19 jab – that is available to those aged from 5 to 17. It’s unclear what brand the woman used to vaccinate the teen.

Read more …

The Guardian with an alternative view?! Oh my…

Britain Got It Wrong On Covid: Long Lockdown Did More Harm Than Good, (G.)

There was a distinctive moment, at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, that neatly encapsulated the mistakes and confusion of Britain’s early efforts to tackle the disease, says Mark Woolhouse. At a No 10 briefing in March 2020, cabinet minister Michael Gove warned the virus did not discriminate. “Everyone is at risk,” he announced. And nothing could be further from the truth, argues Professor Woolhouse, an expert on infectious diseases at Edinburgh University. “I am afraid Gove’s statement was simply not true,” he says. “In fact, this is a very discriminatory virus. Some people are much more at risk from it than others. People over 75 are an astonishing 10,000 times more at risk than those who are under 15.”

And it was this failure to understand the wide variations in individual responses to Covid-19 that led to Britain’s flawed responses to the disease’s appearance, he argues – errors that included the imposition of a long-lasting, national lockdown. This is a strategy that Woolhouse – one of the country’s leading epidemiologists – describes as morally wrong and highly damaging in his forthcoming book, The Year the World Went Mad: A Scientific Memoir. “We did serious harm to our children and young adults who were robbed of their education, jobs and normal existence, as well as suffering damage to their future prospects, while they were left to inherit a record-breaking mountain of public debt,” he argues. “All this to protect the NHS from a disease that is a far, far greater threat to the elderly, frail and infirm than to the young and healthy.

“We were mesmerised by the once-in-a-century scale of the emergency and succeeded only in making a crisis even worse. In short, we panicked. This was an epidemic crying out for a precision public health approach and it got the opposite.” Rather than imposing blanket lockdowns across the nation, the government should have adopted measures designed to make contacts safe, Woolhouse maintains. “You can see from the UK data that people were reducing their contacts with each other as cases rose and before lockdown was imposed. That, coupled with Covid-safe measures, such as masks and testing, would have been sufficient to control spread.”

Largely voluntary behaviour change worked in Sweden and it should have been allowed to progress in the UK, argues Woolhouse. Instead, we plumped for an enforced national lockdown, in part because, for the first time in history, we could. Enough business is now done online to allow large parts of society to function fairly well – through video conferences and online shopping. “But it was a lazy solution to a novel coronavirus epidemic, as well as a hugely damaging one,” he adds.

Read more …

Not sure what to make of this. Looks like prion disease? But it predates the vaccines.

Bizarre Neurological Illness Plagues Young Canadians

Dozens of young people with no preexisting conditions are developing symptoms of a new disease as activists and families suspect a cover-up on the part of the local government. A whistleblower with Vitalité Health Network in New Brunswick told The Guardian on Sunday that symptoms include hallucinations, difficulty thinking, limited mobility, insomnia, and rapid weight loss. Local government has reportedly struggled to dismiss the growing number of cases as Alzheimer’s or other neurological diseases uncommon outside the elderly. While the official number of cases recorded since the mystery illness was first publicly acknowledged in early spring has not budged upward from 48, multiple sources told The Guardian that as many as 150 people may have contracted the fast-moving illness.

Still more young people require assessment, and several have died. “I’m truly concerned about these cases because they seem to evolve so fast,” the source told the outlet, acknowledging that “we owe them some kind of explanation.” One of the more disturbing elements of the condition is how little is known regarding transmission. In at least nine cases, caretakers and others in close contact with sick individuals have developed similar symptoms to the ailing party, suggesting the illness not only spreads readily between unrelated individuals but that there may be environmental factors involved. Some have compared the illness to Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, a fatal brain disease caused by misshapen proteins called prions, though screening reportedly produced no confirmed CJD cases.

The province has struggled to keep the cases under wraps – the case cluster only became public last year when a memo was leaked to the media, and the government has insisted the “cluster” itself is merely the result of “misdiagnoses” grouping unrelated illnesses together. Officials declared in October that eight fatal cases were due to “known and unrelated pathologies,” rather than a shared and unknown illness. An epidemiological report released in October supposedly ruled out any food, behavioral, or environmental exposure that could explain the problem.

Read more …

Preprinted template.

Navy, Air Force Issue Blanket Denials Of Religious Exemptions (JTN)

The Navy and Air Force are allegedly issuing predetermined blanket denials of requests for religious exemptions from the military’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate, in violation of federal law and regulations. Vice Admiral John Nowell, deputy chief of naval operations for manpower, personnel, training, and education, created a 50-step standard operating procedure streamlining the denials of these requests, known as religious accommodation requests (RARs). The military is required by law to evaluate RARs on an individual basis to ensure due process under the Fifth Amendment and protect service members’ First Amendment right to religious freedom. The 50-step process is separated into six phases. In phase 1, before an individual service member’s RAR is reviewed, a denial template letter is added to the package of documentation included with the request.


The screenshot provided in steps 15 and 27 shows that highlighted portions of the letter to be edited include the service member’s and supervisor’s names and processing dates. But the section that says “your request for religious accommodation through waiver of immunization requirements is disapproved” is already written and not highlighted for editing. There’s no mention of an approval template letter. In phase 4, a reviewing officer is instructed to examine the RAR in step 35. “THIS IS THE MOST CRITICAL STEP IN THE ENTIRE PROCESS AND THE [Chief of Naval Operations] AND [Chief of Naval Personnel] ARE RELYING ON YOU TO ENSURE THAT YOUR REVIEW IS THOUROUGH [sic] AND ACCURATE,” the instructions emphasize in all caps. “DO NOT RUSH THIS PROCESS AND ENSURE THAT YOU UNDERSTAND BEFORE MOVING FORWARD.”

Read more …

1000s stuck in an airport is a great way to prevent the spread.

How many unvaccinated pilots, and how many with adverse effects?

More Than 2,500 US Flights Canceled Sunday Citing Covid (JTN)

More than 2,500 United States flights have been canceled as of Sunday afternoon as airlines face inclement weather and increasing numbers of COVID-19 cases. Globally, 4,188 flights have been canceled, 2,510 of them within, into, or out of the United States alone, according to FlightAware. More than 13,700 flights globally are facing delays, affecting 6,202 U.S. flights. Thousands of flights have faced issues during the holiday season in the United States, largely due to COVID-19 cases as the new omicron variant sweeps the nation. Chicago’s O’Hare Airport was ranked highest on FlightAware’s Misery Map Sunday. More than five inches of snow hit some parts of the Chicago area in a New Year’s winter storm, and 47% of all O’Hare flights have been canceled or delayed.


The previous day, 70% of all flights leaving O’Hare were canceled or delayed. Southwest is one of the worst-hit airlines with more than 420 flights canceled as of Sunday afternoon. Over the last 10 days, more than 14,000 flights have been canceled according to a CNN tally of FlightAware data. Allegiant spokeswoman Hilarie Grey told CNN: “As you’ve noted, we continue to have an unusual number of cancellations this week — some have been due to severe weather, and some due to other factors — including the type of unanticipated staff impacts from COVID experienced by other airlines and partners in places where we fly.”

Read more …

Sanders should comment on Fauci’s holdings.

Biden Pick for FDA Chief Holds Millions in Big Pharma Investments (CHD)

Sen. Bernie Sanders last week said he would oppose President Joe Biden’s nomination of Dr. Robert Califf to lead the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the second time, citing the cardiologist’s multimillion-dollar ties to Big Pharma. Califf — who served as FDA commissioner during the final 11 months of the Obama administration — mostly skated through a congenial Senate confirmation hearing Tuesday. According to STAT, his only stumble occurred when he was pressed about the FDA’s role and failings in the opioid crisis. The Associated Press reports Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee Chair Patty Murray (D-Wash.) and the ranking Republican member, Sen. Richard Burr of North Carolina, both said they would vote to confirm Califf.

Sanders (I-Vt.), however, reprised his 2015 confirmation grilling of Califf over his lucrative ties to Big Pharma. “One of the major reasons the pharmaceutical industry, among many others, is so powerful is its close relationship with the FDA and other regulators in Washington,” the democratic socialist, who twice ran for president on a Medicare for All platform, said during the hearing. “What kind of comfort can you give to the American people when you have been so closely tied to the pharmaceutical industry yourself?” Califf — who has made millions of dollars as a consultant for more than a dozen pharmaceutical corporations and who holds millions more in Big Pharma investments — replied that he was “totally with” Sanders, agreeing that “the price of pharmaceuticals is way too high in this country.”

Sanders said he would once again vote to reject Califf’s nomination. “At a time when the American people pay the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs and as drug companies continue to be the most powerful special interest in Washington, we need leadership at the FDA that is finally willing to stand up to the greed and power of the pharmaceutical industry,” Sanders said in a statement. “Not only have the drug companies spent over $4.5 billion on lobbying and hundreds of millions of dollars in campaign contributions over the past 20 years, they also have created a revolving door between the FDA and the industry,” he continued. “Shockingly, nine out of the last 10 FDA commissioners went on to work for the pharmaceutical industry or to serve on a prescription drug company’s board of directors.”

Read more …

Once more, all I can see is how little the USD has come down.

US Dollar’s Status as Dominant “Global Reserve Currency” at 25-Year Low (WS)

The global share of US-dollar-denominated exchange reserves declined to 59.15% in the third quarter, from 59.23% in the second quarter, hobbling along a 26-year low for the past four quarters, according to the IMF’s COFER data released today. Dollar-denominated foreign exchange reserves are Treasury securities, US corporate bonds, US mortgage-backed securities, and other USD-denominated assets that are held by foreign central banks.

In 2001 – the moment just before the euro officially arrived as bank notes and coins – the dollar’s share was 71.5%. Since then, it has dropped by 12.3 percentage points. In 1977, when inflation was raging in the US, the dollar’s share was 85%. And when it looked like the Fed wasn’t doing anything about inflation that was threatening to spiral out of control, foreign central banks began dumping USD-denominated assets, and the dollar’s share collapsed. The plunge of the dollar’s share bottomed out in 1991, after the inflation crackdown in the early 1980s caused inflation to abate. As confidence grew that the Fed would keep inflation more or less under control, the dollar’s share then surged by 25 percentage points until 2000 when the euro arrived. Since then, over those 20 years, other central banks have been gradually diversifying away from US dollar holdings (year-end data, except for 2021 = Q3):

When the euro was formed, local-currency debt and equity instruments, previously issued in local currency, were converted to euro-denominated assets, and coupon interest and dividends were then paid in euros, etc. The currencies that went into the euro, such as the Deutsche mark, had already been reserve currencies. As these assets were converted to euros, so were central-bank holdings of German government bonds and the like. So as a reserve currency, the euro didn’t start from zero. It picked up where the members’ currencies left off. Since the Euro Debt Crisis, the euro’s share of global reserve currencies has been stuck at around 20%, and the dream of “dollar parity” has vanished. But it is the undisputed second largest reserve currency. The rest of the reserve currencies are minor entries at the bottom in the chart, including the Chinese renminbi, the bold red line:

Read more …

The lying neocon.

Preparing for the limelight of Jan 6.

Adam Schiff Says Russian Invasion Of Ukraine ‘Very Likely’ (JTN)

Representative Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) on Sunday said he fears that Russia is “very likely” to invade Ukraine – the same day President Joe Biden spoke on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. “I think that it would require enormous sanctions on Russia to deter what appears to be a very likely Russian invasion of Ukraine again,” Schiff, House Intelligence Committee chairman, told Margaret Brennan on CBS’s “Face the Nation.” Russia has already illegally annexed Crimea, a portion of Ukraine, in 2014. Schiff added that if Russia invades Ukraine, “That we will move more NATO’s assets closer to Russia.


“That it will have the opposite impact of what [Russian President Vladimir] Putin is trying to achieve,” as the assets can be deployed against Russia. Schiff’s comments also come just days after Biden had a phone call with Putin. Several times throughout the interview, Schiff emphasized the importance of sanctions. Zelensky said last month that unless sanctions preceded an invasion, they “won’t matter to anyone.” Schiff said he does not understand Putin’s motivations for invasion, but added, “I think nothing other than a level of sanctions that Russia has never seen will deter him, and that’s exactly what we need to do with our allies.”

Read more …

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Support the Automatic Earth in virustime with Paypal, Bitcoin and Patreon.

 

Oct 192021
 


René Magritte The song of love 1948

 

 

Just this morning, Russia, Ukraine, Poland, Bulgaria, Czechia, UK and New Zealand announced record or near-record numbers of positive Covid numbers and/or deaths. Yes, here we go again. Sadly, all of it is completely preventable, and all of us choose to not prevent it, because most have never been told this. Once again, an overview.

 

 

In the UK, a report came out last week about the country’s Covid approach, written by politicians, from the government’s own party nonetheless. It’s titled “Coronavirus: Lessons learned to date”, which is kind of ironic, because the one thing WE learn, at least from the press coverage of it, is that not a single lesson has been learned. BBC:

Covid: UK’s Early Response Worst Public Health Failure Ever

The 150-page document, “Coronavirus: Lessons learned to date”, is from the Health and Social Care Committee and the Science and Technology Committee, and MPs from all parties.


[..] Conservative MPs Jeremy Hunt and Greg Clark, who chair the committees, said the nature of the pandemic meant it was “impossible to get everything right”. “The UK has combined some big achievements with some big mistakes. It is vital to learn from both,” they said. Cabinet Office minister Stephen Barclay said scientific advice had been followed and the government had made “difficult judgements” to protect the NHS. He said the government took responsibility for everything that happened – saying the government would not shy away from any lessons to be learned at the full statutory public inquiry, expected next year.

What were those big mistakes, according to those 150 pages? These:

[..] the UK was not as open to different approaches on earlier lockdowns, border controls and test and trace as it should have been.

And the “big achievements”?

But their report highlighted successes too, including the vaccination rollout. It described the approach to vaccination – from the research and development through to the rollout of the jabs – as “one of the most effective initiatives in UK history”.

I kid you not, the biggest mistakes these politicians could come up with was that the UK should have locked down, shut its borders and start testing and tracing healthy people earlier. That’s it. But none of those come close to being the biggest mistakes. And that after 20 months they all still don’t appear to understand that is a sad, saddening and deadly “mistake” all by itself.

The real biggest mistake is the complete denial, and ignoring, of the crucial role prophylactics and early treatment could and should have played. And since neither plays such a role even today, yes, it will continue to be very deadly. The pharmaceutical industry prevents the use of -most- pharmaceuticals, and allows only the use of some of the newest and -therefore- most profitable ones. The promised “full statutory public inquiry” won’t change that.

 

But first, let’s look at the “big achievements”. Vaccination, “one of the most effective initiatives in UK history”, has resulted in the following picture:

 

“Cases” are, let’s say, “stubbornly high” again (they average about 45,000 recently, and on Monday reached almost 50,000):

 

Hospitalizations are high too, compared to other countries. Which is odd, since the vaccines were supposed to stop severe cases in every country, we were told. After the claims that they stop infection and transmission became untenable:

 

Deaths appear to have normalized a little more in the UK, but what’s worrisome in this graph is the “Other excess deaths”. What are they? Are they vaccine deaths? Hard not to think they may very well be. But also hard to know because information on this is so scarce. In any case, they appear to outnumber Covid deaths. Which is no surprise, but still “good” to see in a graph:

 

 

 

The UK is presently about 65% vaccinated, according to Our World In Data, after “one of the most effective initiatives in UK history”. 65%? How effective have other “initiatives” been? On the bright side, the unvaccinated 35% may well turn out to be the lucky ones.

 

But why were (and are) the “big mistakes” made? A clue is that lockdowns, closed borders, test and trace, and facemasks, are all non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPI’s). Any and all things pharmaceutical have been ignored from the get go. And not just ignored: there have even been – and still are- extensive coordinated campaigns against ivermectin (IVM), hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), and recently even aspirin.

Never has there been any advice for people to boost their vit. C and D levels, or zinc and quercetin. Aspirin and melatonin are never mentioned. Still, it’s widely known that these substances can provide protection from Covid in their various ways. So how can it be that all those highly paid medical experts and scientists that advise their governments never seem to talk about them?

Perhaps you need to look at how the field is laid out. The pharmaceutical industry has the by far largest lobbying departments in the world (and you thought it was Big Oil). In Washington alone there are hundreds of lobbyists working for Big Pharma. Who not only support the politicians’ election campaigns, they also pay huge amounts to the same medical experts that advise the same politicians. Moreover, lobbyists often even write the laws for the politicians, who are not experts. Sort of a symbiotic relationship, if you will.

 

The problem that I have with this, and these people apparently don’t, is that this has cost enormous amounts of suffering and deaths. For no apparent reason at all. The UK, and any other -western- country, could have promoted vitamin D -and C-, plus zinc and quercetin, and added on ivermectin and/or HCQ, perhaps doxycycline, and only a fraction of the present victims would have died and/or been incapacitated.

And this is not a story about the past either: it continues to this day. There are no protocols for protecting people, and none for early treatment. It’s still: go home and wait till you get so sick you need a ventilator. What doctor signs up for that? Well, most of them do. Screw Hippocrates. 95% of the deaths and misery could have been prevented with cheap, available, run-of-the-mill pharmaceuticals. And your doctors refused to provide them for you.

We’ve all seen the horse dewormer campaign against ivermectin that especially outlets like CNN, and even Rolling Stone, have put so much energy in recently. But the real story of IVM is completely different. Here are a few countries and states, and their experiences with it.

 

 

 

Puerto Rico:

 

Uttar Pradesh:

 

Tokyo:

 

And Indonesia:


Indonesia ramped up ivermectin production and the government assured national distribution and fair prices. IVM is considered by the government a COVID medicine.

 

 

Good thing we didn’t take that horse dewormer. We were smart, we listened to “The Science”, and spend billions on vaccines. It’s too early to oversee the harm these substances have done and will do, and there’s a lot of pressure not to make it public, but we can get an idea from two countries that were initially spared much of what we experienced. They were genuine Covid success stories, like New Zealand was. Until they started vaccinating. Here’s Taiwan and Singapore.

 

Taiwan:

 

And here is Singapore, bit of a strange graph because the timeline is split in two, but obvious enough:

 

And now we’re sitting here without ivermectin, because it’s been banned in many places, but with increasing pressure to get jabbed with substances that look very suspect. And increasingly without the freedom to choose what we think is best for us and our families.

But you can still choose to boost your immune system with vitamin D, without which it can’t properly function, and vitamin C. Be careful with zinc, but do consider it; it keeps the virus out of your cells. And it works better with quercetin. And do tell your doctor that you would like a prescription for ivermectin -if only to see the reaction- or HCQ. Ask about melatonin. Get some low dose aspirin. Inform yourself.

Since I am not a doctor (I just listen to them a lot), let me close with an old favorite I haven’t used in a long time: This information is for entertainment purposes only.

PS: Oh, and no, these things are not mistakes. Mistakes are not deliberate.

 

 

 

We try to run the Automatic Earth on donations. Since ad revenue has collapsed, you are now not just a reader, but an integral part of the process that builds this site. Thank you for your support.

 

 

Support the Automatic Earth in virustime. Donate with Paypal, Bitcoin and Patreon.

 

Jul 272021
 


Emil Nolde Half Moon Over The Sea 1945

 

 

This is a double list from longtime Automatic Earth regular commenter TAE Summary , posted in yesterday’s Debt Rattle thread. It’s too useful, and nice, and well-done, to leave it there, it should -and deserves to- be seen by more people. Who will all recognize something here, but not all the same. Good! Now we’re talking!

 

 

TAE Summary:

 

The Mainstream Narrative

– It is not known where Covid 19 originated but the most likely origin is the transmission from an animal to humans

– Covid 19 has killed 600K people in the US

– Trump botched the Covid 19 response costing many lives

– Many deaths were preventable if we’d tested, masked, tracked and locked down better

– Vaccines are good and have eradicated polio, measles, whooping cough and other diseases

– Vaccines against Covid 19 are safe and effective and have saved many lives with only minor, acceptable adverse reactions

– There are no effective treatments for Covid 19 besides the vaccines

– Covid is spread by droplets and aerosols from infected people, both symptomatic and asymptomatic, and can be spread through momentary casual contact both indoors and outdoors

– Children and young adults are at risk form Covid 19 and can spread the disease and should take the same precautions and measures as adults

– We need to do whatever it takes to defeat Covid 19 including frequent testing, mass vaccination, continued lockdowns and wearing masks

– The best information comes from the CDC, FDA and NIH

– The mainstream media warns us of the dangers of Covid 19 but unfortunately many do not take these warnings seriously

– As usual, conspiracy theorists and nut-jobs abound

– Antivaxxers are against all vaccines and now also against the Covid 19 vaccines

– Antivaxxers have believed phony information disseminated by scurrilous, right wing charlatans

– These people cost many lives and are the reason Covid still spreads and mutates

– They are responsible for continued lockdowns and the further decimation of the economy

– They are selfish, evil and anti-science

– The Covid 19 response is all about trying to get us back to normal as quickly as possible

 

 

The Counter Narrative

– Covid 19 was most likely created in a lab in China or the US

– Covid 19 kills people but far fewer than the official count

– Almost all officials in government have botched the Covid 19 response, costing many lives

– Most deaths were preventable if we had investigated and deployed early treatments including vitamin D, zinc, hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin

– Vaccines are good and have eradicated polio, measles, whooping cough and other diseases

– The Covid 19 vaccines however are not actually vaccines but gene therapy and have not been adequately tested

– The Covid 19 vaccines have serious side effects including death and other as yet unknown consequences which are not being investigated and are suppressed by the media

– We need to defeat Covid 19 and the best way to do this is through early outpatient treatment with known, effective drugs and known drug protocols for hospitalized patients

– Covid 19 is primarily spread by aerosols from symptomatic and pre-symptomatic people, mostly in indoor situations with poor ventilation where peoples spend a long time together

– Children and young adults are at low risk from Covid 19 and need take fewer precautions and measures but should be treated with drug protocols if infected

– Masks, distancing and lockdowns are mostly ineffective

– The best information comes from front line doctors who actually treat patients and experienced researchers who have no financial interest in big pharma

– The CDC, FDA and NIH are largely compromised because of their association with and funding by drug companies

– The mainstream media is also compromised by their association with big pharma and the government

– The truth about Covid 19 is suppressed and labeled conspiracy theory in order to support the mainstream narrative

– People who insist that the vaccines are the only way to fight Covd 19 have believed lies told to them by the MSM from big pharma and a corrupt medical establishment

– The vaccine narrative has cost many lives and ineffective vaccines are responsible for the continued spread and mutation of Covid 19

– The fallacious mainstream narrative is responsible for all lock downs and the decimation of the economy

– The people who push the mainstream narrative are evil and anti-science; The people who believe this narrative are naive, dogmatic and anti-science

– The Covid 19 response is all about money, power and control

 

 

 

We try to run the Automatic Earth on donations. Since ad revenue has collapsed, you are now not just a reader, but an integral part of the process that builds this site. Thank you for your support.

 

 

Support the Automatic Earth in virustime. Click at the top of the sidebars to donate with Paypal and Patreon.

 

Jun 272021
 


Henri Matisse The pink studio 1911

 

Vaccines: Reasons for Concern (Alex Berenson)
European Union Reports 1.5 Million Vaccine Injuries, 15,472 Deaths (TN)
The ‘Big Lie’ Of Jabs Comes Unglued (Denninger)
Singapore’s Surprising New Plan To ‘Live With Covid’ (News.com.au)
J&J To Stop Selling Opioids In US, Reaches $230 Million Settlement (MSN)
A “Leap” toward Humanity’s Destruction (Whitney Webb)
United States Ranks Last In Media Trust (Turley)
US Food Banks Warn Soaring Prices Will Affect Distributions (ZH)
Stella Moris Says She Plans To Marry Julian Assange In Belmarsh Prison (RT)
Key Witness In Assange Case Admits To Lies In Indictment (Stundin)

 

 

 

 

McCullough: early treatment can’t be stopped

 

 

Why is the R rate highest in the most vaccinated countries?

 

 

Part 2: Why does the CDC keep calling post-Covid vaccine heart problems in young men “rare” and “mild” when they are neither?

Vaccines: Reasons for Concern (Alex Berenson)

At [Wednesday’s CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP)] meeting, CDC scientists presented horrendous data. It showed that even without accounting for underreporting, a second dose of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines could increase the risk of problems up to 200-fold in young men. But the scientists then went on to suggest the vaccines should still given – even to kids already suffering from heart problems. The CDC’s focus yesterday was on two illnesses, myocarditis and pericarditis, forms of heart inflammation that can occasionally progress to heart failure and even death. The CDC and many reporters insist on calling the cases mild. In fact 95 percent of the 300+ post-vaccination cases the CDC has reviewed have led to hospitalization.

Keep in mind cases are continuing to come in, and the agency hasn’t reviewed all the cases it has already received. This issue is part of a bigger problem, which is that the volume of side effects reports that the CDC has received on the Covid vaccines has overwhelmed its monitoring system. To give you a sense of the problem: In all of 2019, the CDC’s voluntary vaccine side effect reporting system received about 48,000 reports for ALL vaccines. So far in 2021 it has received at least seven times that many for Covid vaccines alone. Also keep in mind that heart inflammation is only ONE potential problem the vaccines may cause. The CDC and journalists generally like to compare each individual vaccine side effect to ALL the risks of Covid, a slight-of-hand that has the effect of making the vaccines seem safer. In fact, the CDC’s own data shows that for every 100,000 vaccines given to young people, more than 25,000 will have temporary side effects that prevent them from “normal activities,” 700 will require medical care and 200 will be hospitalized.

In contrast, the CDC estimates that only about 50 out of 100,000 adolescents have EVER been hospitalized for Covid-related illness.

Of course, not everyone has gotten Covid – the CDC estimates that about 1/3 of Americans have. (Most never had a positive test, and many never even knew.) Thus, if EVERYONE got Covid, it is reasonable to assume the 50 Covid hospitalizations out of 100,000 adolescents rate might be about three times as high – or 150 per 100,000. But even the 150 per 100,000 rate is LOWER than the 200 per 100,000 rate of adolescents who are hospitalized in the first week after being vaccinated. In other words, even if vaccinations stopped every case of Covid in 12-17 year olds forever, and even if they never had side effects after the first week, it is hard to see how the risk-benefit ratio supports vaccination.


That’s especially true for healthy teens. Most Covid hospitalizations occur in people with other illnesses, including diabetes or chronic lung conditions. But in its presentation Wednesday, the CDC instead claimed that the rate of hospitalization in adolescents was roughly 400 out of 14,000 cases, or close to 2,900 per 100,000 – almost 20 times what its own data shows. (Estimating three deaths out of 14,000 adolescent cases is even less credible.) And it did not look at the combined rate of all post-vaccine hospitalizations, only those related to myocarditis.

Read more …

“From the total of injuries recorded, half of them (753,657) are serious injuries..”

European Union Reports 1.5 Million Vaccine Injuries, 15,472 Deaths (TN)

A subscriber from Europe recently emailed us and reminded us that this database maintained at EudraVigilance is only for countries in Europe who are part of the European Union (EU), which comprises 27 countries. The total number of countries in Europe is much higher, almost twice as many, numbering around 50, although there are some differences of opinion as to which countries are technically part of Europe. So as high as these numbers are, they do NOT reflect all of Europe. The actual number in Europe who are reported dead or injured due to COVID-19 shots would be much higher than what we are reporting here. The EudraVigilance database reports that through June 19, 2021 there are 15,472 deaths and 1,509,266 injuries reported following injections of four experimental COVID-19 shots:
COVID-19 MRNA VACCINE MODERNA (CX-024414)
COVID-19 MRNA VACCINE PFIZER-BIONTECH
COVID-19 VACCINE ASTRAZENECA (CHADOX1 NCOV-19)
COVID-19 VACCINE JANSSEN (AD26.COV2.S)


From the total of injuries recorded, half of them (753,657) are serious injuries. “Seriousness provides information on the suspected undesirable effect; it can be classified as ‘serious’ if it corresponds to a medical occurrence that results in death, is life-threatening, requires inpatient hospitalisation, results in another medically important condition, or prolongation of existing hospitalisation, results in persistent or significant disability or incapacity, or is a congenital anomaly/birth defect.” A Health Impact News subscriber in Europe ran the reports for each of the four COVID-19 shots we are including here. This subscriber has volunteered to do this, and it is a lot of work to tabulate each reaction with injuries and fatalities, since there is no place on the EudraVigilance system we have found that tabulates all the results.

Read more …

“Fortunately there are enough un-vaccinated people that the Marek’s Disease sort of disaster will not happen so long as enough people refuse..”

The ‘Big Lie’ Of Jabs Comes Unglued (Denninger)

Here it is folks… “According to multiple sources, two unvaccinated NC State players tested positive for COVID-19 this week, prompting the NCAA to test the entire roster, including vaccinated players. Four positive tests came back from that round of testing, prompting the no-contest ruling. All four of the latest positive tests came from vaccinated individuals who were in the dugout for Friday’s game against Vanderbilt, per multiple sources.”

So in other words: 1. The team members originally subject to testing were only subject to testing because they refused to risk having their heart destroyed by the jabs (along with the risk of occlusive strokes and similar.) Thus the NCAA demanded they, and only they, have swabs shoved up their nose. 2. This shoving of swabs “disclosed” (such as it is, knowing the PCR false-positive and not-infectious-but-positive problems) two “infections”, neither of which were in obviously-ill people. 3. That prompted the testing of those who were coerced into taking the risk of heart failure via the jabs and when they were tested, all of whom were allegedly immune which is the claimed outcome of such jabs and the claimed reason to let someone give you them, it was disclosed they were in fact not immune at all and four of those people were also positive.

In other words the shots are worthless to prevent acquisition and propagation of the disease; their failure rate in doing so is enormous and their efficacy in that regard is nowhere near the percentages claimed by all the *******s involved, including Vanderbilt, the CDC, TNDOH and others. There are 35 players on a D1 roster by NCAA rules so at best the jabs failed to prevent acquisition and propagation of the virus more than 11% of the time and it likely is worse than that since the odds are high a third or more of the players had pre-existing immunity via prior infection, most without knowing it, before they got jabbed. This in turn means that the likely actual failure rate for sterilizing immunity is probably somewhere between 30-50% while the science thus far for infection-conferred sterilizing immunity (study out of the Cleveland Clinic) is nearly 100%.

IT IS NOW CONCLUSIVELY PROVED THE JABS DO NOT WORK TO PREVENT ACQUISITION AND PROPAGATION OF THE VIRUS SO SHUT THE **** UP SCREAMING KAREN. Of course nobody sequenced all six of these people to figure out whether one of them was the index. It would be wildly embarrassing to find out that one of the vaccinated players was in fact the index, so that will not be looked at, deliberately, because to find and report that would instantly destroy any and all argument of alleged “community protection” from said shots.

[..] This garbage continues today in that this incident proves that the shots do not provide sterilizing immunity even among immuno-competent individuals which is arguably presumptive in someone in good enough physical condition to be competitive in D1 collegiate baseball. It is always true that an immune-compromised person may not get sterilizing (or any) immunity for a vaccine because their immune system is not working properly but the lack of sterilizing immunity on a broad basis in immune-competent individuals is what produces recombination and ultimately mutation. Fortunately there are enough un-vaccinated people that the Marek’s Disease sort of disaster will not happen so long as enough people refuse, as if the mutation produced by all the idiots who took the jabs is more-virulent it still leads to shunning as soon as it finds an unvaccinated host and thus loses the genetic lottery.

Ivermectin in media lockdown

Read more …

“The bad news is that Covid-19 may never go away. The good news is that it is possible to live normally with it in our midst..”

Singapore’s Surprising New Plan To ‘Live With Covid’ (News.com.au)

A country that has been one of the world’s most successful at combating Covid-19 has announced it will soon fundamentally change how it manages the pandemic. The city state of Singapore has stated covid will be treated like other endemic diseases such as flu. There will be no goals of zero transmission. Quarantine will be dumped for travellers and close contact of cases will not have to isolate. It also plans to no longer announce daily case numbers. But you may need to take tests to head to the shops or go to work. Senior Singaporean ministers have said it is the “new normal” of “living with covid”.

“The bad news is that Covid-19 may never go away. The good news is that it is possible to live normally with it in our midst,” wrote Singapore’s trade Minister Gan Kim Yong, finance minister Lawrence Wong and health minister Ong Ye Kung said in an editorial in the Straits Times this week. “It means that the virus will continue to mutate, and thereby survive in our community.” Like most countries, Singapore had an initial peak of cases last year, topping out at 600 cases a day in mid-April. Following a smaller wave in August, Covid-19 hasn’t flared up since. However, the nation of 5.7 million, slightly larger than Sydney, has had a steady undercurrent of around 20-30 cases every day. The nation has recorded 35 deaths in total.

Singapore has strict border controls in place with most countries including tests on arrival, hotel quarantine and stay at home orders. It’s not dissimilar to Australia, but Singapore varies the demands on travellers depending on the risk in the location where they last visited. But all that would be eventually done away with under the plan put out by ministers Kung, Yong and Wong who make up Singapore’s Covid-19 multi-ministry task force. “Every year, many people catch the flu. The overwhelming majority recover without needing to be hospitalised, and with little or no medication. But a minority, especially the elderly and those with comorbidities, can get very ill, and some succumb.

Read more …

Will pay the settlement from vaccine profits…

J&J To Stop Selling Opioids In US, Reaches $230 Million Settlement (MSN)

Johnson & Johnson, one of the pharmaceutical giants accused of fueling the deadly US opioid crisis, has reached a settlement with the state of New York for $230 million and confirmed it will stop making or selling opioids in the United States. The agreement announced Saturday allows Johnson & Johnson to resolve litigation over its role in the epidemic, which has killed more than half a million people since 1999, according to a statement from New York attorney general Letitia James. For its part, in a separate statement J&J said the settlement allowed it to avoid a trial that was scheduled to begin Monday, and said the group had “made the business decision in 2020 to discontinue all of its prescription pain medications in the United States.”


The settlement “is not an admission of liability or wrongdoing by the company,” it said, noting that other nationwide legal proceedings are underway, including a trial in California. The prosecutor’s statement said the company would spread the payments over nine years. J&J could also pay an additional $30 million in the first year if the state enacts new legislation creating an opioid settlement fund. “The opioid epidemic has wreaked havoc on countless communities across New York state and the rest of the nation, leaving millions still addicted to dangerous and deadly opioids,” James said in the statement. “Johnson & Johnson helped fuel this fire, but today they’re committing to leaving the opioid business — not only in New York, but across the entire country,” she added.

Read more …

Medical surveillance.

A “Leap” toward Humanity’s Destruction (Whitney Webb)

The world’s richest medical research foundation, the Wellcome Trust, has teamed up with a pair of former DARPA directors who built Silicon Valley’s skunkworks to usher in an age of nightmarish surveillance, including for babies as young as three months old. Their agenda can only advance if we allow it. A UK nonprofit with ties to global corruption throughout the COVID-19 crisis as well as historical and current ties to the UK eugenics movement launched a global health-focused DARPA equivalent last year. The move went largely unnoticed by both mainstream and independent media.

The Wellcome Trust, which has arguably been second only to Bill Gates in its ability to influence events during the COVID-19 crisis and vaccination campaign, launched its own global equivalent of the Pentagon’s secretive research agency last year, officially to combat the “most pressing health challenges of our time.” Though first conceived of in 2018, this particular Wellcome Trust initiative was spun off from the Trust last May with $300 million in initial funding. It quickly attracted two former DARPA executives, who had previously served in the upper echelons of Silicon Valley, to manage and plan its portfolio of projects.

This global health DARPA, known as Wellcome Leap, seeks to achieve “breakthrough scientific and technological solutions” by or before 2030, with a focus on “complex global health challenges.” The Wellcome Trust is open about how Wellcome Leap will apply the approaches of Silicon Valley and venture capital firms to the health and life science sector. Unsurprisingly, their three current programs are poised to develop incredibly invasive tech-focused, and in some cases overtly transhumanist, medical technologies, including a program exclusively focused on using artificial intelligence (AI), mobile sensors, and wearable brain-mapping tech for children three years old and younger.

This Unlimited Hangout investigation explores not only the four current programs of Wellcome Leap but also the people behind it. The resulting picture is of an incredibly sinister project that poses not only a great threat to current society but to the future of humanity itself. An upcoming Unlimited Hangout investigation will examine the history of the Wellcome Trust along with its role in recent and current events.

Read more …

“It will not publish a column from a Republican senator on protests in the United States but it will publish columns from one of the Chinese leaders crushing protests for freedom in Hong Kong.”

United States Ranks Last In Media Trust (Turley)

For years, we have been discussing the decline of journalism values with the rise of open bias in the media. Now, a newly released report from the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at Oxford has found something that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago. The United States ranked dead last in media trust among 49 countries with just 29% saying that they trusted the media. The most tragic aspect is that it does not matter. The media has embraced the advocacy journalism and anyone questioning that trend risks instant cancellation. The result is a type of state media where journalists are bound to the government by ideology rather than law. The plunging level of trust reflects the loss of the premier news organizations to a type of woke journalism.

We have have been discussing how writers, editors, commentators, and academics have embraced rising calls for censorship and speech controls, including President-elect Joe Biden and his key advisers. Even journalists are leading attacks on free speech and the free press. This includes academics rejecting the very concept of objectivity in journalism in favor of open advocacy. Columbia Journalism Dean and New Yorker writer Steve Coll has denounced how the First Amendment right to freedom of speech was being “weaponized” to protect disinformation. Likewise, the University of North Carolina recently offered an academic chair in Journalism to New York Times’ Nikole Hannah-Jones. While Hannah-Jones was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for her writing on The 1619 Project, she has been criticized for her role in purging dissenting views from the New York Times pages and embracing absurd anti-police conspiracy theories.

Even waiting for the facts is viewed as unethical today by journalism professors who demand that reporters make political or social declarations through their coverage. One of the lowest moments came with the New York Times’ mea culpa for publishing an opinion column by a conservative senator. The New York Times was denounced by many of us for its cringing apology after publishing a column by Sen. Tom Cotton (R, Ark.). and promising not to publish future such columns. It will not publish a column from a Republican senator on protests in the United States but it will publish columns from one of the Chinese leaders crushing protests for freedom in Hong Kong. Cotton was arguing that the use of national guard troops may be necessary to quell violent riots, noting the historical use of this option in past protests. This option was used most recently after the Capitol riot.

Read more …

Now add record heat in the west.

US Food Banks Warn Soaring Prices Will Affect Distributions (ZH)

Soaring food prices aren’t just impacting financially strapped families and the working poor. They’re also affecting the mission of US food banks who are spending a lot more on food than ever before. “We’re already spending a lot more on food than we have in years past,” said Greg Trotter, a spokesman for the Greater Chicago Food Depository, a large food bank, who spoke with VOA News. “Our food purchasing budget has doubled this year.” In the coming weeks and or months, food banks across the country may experience a surge in food demand from millions of folks who are set to have their stimmy checks expire. At least 25 states are ending federal unemployment benefits.

The perfect storm of factors (soaring food costs and unemployment benefits expiring) may stress food banks even further. “The high prices are costing us more to feed a family in need,” said Alison Padget, development and outreach director at Food for Others. “We’ll have to rethink our purchasing decisions because economists say the prices are going to be high for at least a year.” In Phoenix, Arizona, Jerry Brown, director of public relations at St. Mary’s Food Bank, told VOA that food banks could face severe difficulty once federal money dries up. It seems the problem has already begun at the Community Food Bank of New Jersey, which covers a large portion of the state. Impact leader Triada Stampas said the food bank serves more people than ever because of out-of-control prices at grocery stores.

According to Father English Food Pantry officials in Paterson, New Jersey, the food bank is already experiencing financial strain. Kelly Mott, external affairs director at the Mississippi Food Network, said, “We already see the price changes will affect us soon, adding that “we are in the process of buying turkeys for the Thanksgiving holiday in November. And since they are so expensive, we won’t be able to purchase as many as we usually do, especially for the families with children who rely on us.”

Read more …

“The most likely thing is that we’ll get married in the prison and then we’ll have another kind of wedding celebration with friends and family once he’s free.”

Stella Moris Says She Plans To Marry Julian Assange In Belmarsh Prison (RT)

Stella Moris, the partner of Julian Assange, has said that she and the WikiLeaks co-founder will tie the knot while he is in Belmarsh prison, and expressed hope he will be released soon so that there can be a proper celebration. Moris, a lawyer who began her relationship with Assange during the years he spent claiming political asylum in the Ecuadorian embassy in London, told German news agency DPA that the couple has been engaged since 2016 and will press ahead with their wedding plans, even if it means getting married in the maximum-security London prison. Moris and Assange have two sons, aged four and two and a half.


She acknowledged, however, that the “bureaucratic process” to obtain permission for the ceremony would take time, and that the ceremony has been further complicated by Covid-19 restrictions. Apart from needing to obtain relevant documents from their respective home countries, there is concern that the marriage could be hampered by the fact that Assange’s UK visa has expired. It’s also unclear if any guests would be allowed to attend the prison ceremony due to the health crisis. In theory, Assange could be let out of Belmarsh for a day so that he could get married, but there is already a large backlog of delayed weddings due to the country’s lockdown. “[I]f we get married in the prison, then I don’t think that will be the only celebration,” Moris told the outlet. “The most likely thing is that we’ll get married in the prison and then we’ll have another kind of wedding celebration with friends and family once he’s free.”

Read more …

Problem is, we’ve known for years that Thordarson is a convicted pedophile and a serial liar. But his “testimony” is still there.

Edward Snowden @Snowden: “This is the end of the case against Julian Assange.”

“If Biden continues to seek the extradition of a publisher under an indictment poisoned top-to-bottom with false testimony admitted by its own star witness, the damage to the United States’ reputation on press freedom would last for a generation. It’s unavoidable.”

Key Witness In Assange Case Admits To Lies In Indictment (Stundin)

A major witness in the United States’ Department of Justice case against Julian Assange has admitted to fabricating key accusations in the indictment against the Wikileaks founder. The witness, who has a documented history with sociopathy and has received several convictions for sexual abuse of minors and wide-ranging financial fraud, made the admission in a newly published interview in Stundin where he also confessed to having continued his crime spree whilst working with the Department of Justice and FBI and receiving a promise of immunity from prosecution. The man in question, Sigurdur Ingi Thordarson, was recruited by US authorities to build a case against Assange after misleading them to believe he was previously a close associate of his.

In fact he had volunteered on a limited basis to raise money for Wikileaks in 2010 but was found to have used that opportunity to embezzle more than $50,000 from the organization. Julian Assange was visiting Thordarson’s home country of Iceland around this time due to his work with Icelandic media and members of parliament in preparing the Icelandic Modern Media Initiative, a press freedom project that produced a parliamentary resolution supporting whistleblowers and investigative journalism. [..] The court documents refer to Mr Thordarson simply as “Teenager” (a reference to his youthful appearance rather than true age, he is 28 years old) and Iceland as “NATO Country 1” but make no real effort to hide the identity of either. They purport to show that Assange instructed Thordarson to commit computer intrusions or hacking in Iceland.

The aim of this addition to the indictment was apparently to shore up and support the conspiracy charge against Assange in relation to his interactions with Chelsea Manning. Those occurred around the same time he resided in Iceland and the authors of the indictment felt they could strengthen their case by alleging he was involved in illegal activity there as well. This activity was said to include attempts to hack into the computers of members of parliament and record their conversations. In fact, Thordarson now admits to Stundin that Assange never asked him to hack or access phone recordings of MPs. His new claim is that he had in fact received some files from a third party who claimed to have recorded MPs and had offered to share them with Assange without having any idea what they actually contained.

He claims he never checked the contents of the files or even if they contained audio recordings as his third party source suggested. He further admits the claim, that Assange had instructed or asked him to access computers in order to find any such recordings, is false. Nonetheless, the tactics employed by US officials appear to have been successful as can be gleaned from the ruling of Magistrate Court Judge Vanessa Baraitser on January 4th of this year. Although she ruled against extradition, she did so purely on humanitarian grounds relating to Assange’s health concerns, suicide risk and the conditions he would face in confinement in US prisons. With regards to the actual accusations made in the indictment Baraitser sided with the arguments of the American legal team, including citing the specific samples from Iceland which are now seriously called into question.

Read more …

 

We try to run the Automatic Earth on donations. Since ad revenue has collapsed, you are now not just a reader, but an integral part of the process that builds this site. Thank you for your support.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Support the Automatic Earth in virustime. Click at the top of the sidebars to donate with Paypal and Patreon.