Nov 132024
 
 November 13, 2024  Posted by at 9:45 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,  92 Responses »


Wilhelm Trübner A Gorgon‘s head 1891

 

Did US Deep State Allow Trump to Win? (Sp.)
Trump Builds No-Nonsense Team (JTN)
Musk And Vivek Ramaswamy To Head Department Of Government Efficiency (ZH)
Can Trump Succeed? (Paul Craig Roberts)
Gorka Urges Trump To Intervene In Senate Leader Race, Endorse Rick Scott (JTN)
Marco Rubio Emerges As Finalist For Trump’s Secretary Of State (JTN)
Trump Names John Ratcliffe As CIA Director (ZH)
Florida Surgeon General Ladapo Ready To Serve Trump Admin (Attkisson)
Judge Merchan Delays Decision On Trump Guilty Verdict In Hush Money Case (JTN)
MSNBC, CNN Ratings Collapse After Election While Fox News Flourishes (ZH)
Zelensky Tries to Woo Trump With Revised ‘Victory Plan’ (Sp.)
UK Could Send Troops To Ukraine – Boris Johnson (RT)
Trump Will Abandon Two Key Principles Of US Foreign Policy (Gevorg Mirzayan)
What Rough Beast? (Juan Cole)
A 1984 Conference Forged Israel’s Influence Over US Media (Klarenberg)

 

 

 

 

Senate
https://twitter.com/i/status/1856400926937846131

Bannon

Sachs

Kamala broke

Voter ID
https://twitter.com/i/status/1855955650687246392

 

 

 

 

“They [the US establishment] need a charismatic, populist firebrand to boost recruitment and spearhead the rush to war..”

Did US Deep State Allow Trump to Win? (Sp.)

On election day Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton suggested that the vote count might take days as in 2020, triggering election rigging suspicions among X users. However, Donald Trump was declared the winner the day after the election. Amid pre-election claims from conservative commentators that the US establishment would not allow Donald Trump to win, some American commentators have suggested that Trump voter enthusiasm was “too big to rig” while others speculated that the purported vote-rigging mechanisms in place had been stopped by the ruling elites. According to this argument, the elites reasoned that Trump could be maneuvered into pro-war positions and would be more successful in marshaling public support than Democratic candidate Kamala Harris and, as such, the deep state ‘allowed Trump to win.’

Some commentators presume that the US establishment sees Trump and his popularity as a convenient vehicle for new overseas campaigns as part of his efforts to “make America great again”. Patriots often think of greatness in terms of military dominance, they say. “They [the US establishment] need a charismatic, populist firebrand to boost recruitment and spearhead the rush to war. Harris can’t do that. Harris had trouble attracting even a hundred supporters to her rallies,” wrote US political commentator Mike Whitney, suggesting Iran could be the next target. The fact that Trump has appointed Elise Stefanik, a firebrand for Israel, as US ambassador to the UN lends credibility to Whitney’s suspicion. It would be easy to seduce Americans into a new military adventure if they are led by a popular leader, warned former Ronald Reagan official Dr. Paul Craig Roberts on his website.

“MAGA Americans are tired of losing wars,” wrote Dr. Roberts. “They want to win. The military/security complex will have Trump supporters in the streets waving the flag. They will wave the flag and expect Trump to win. It is all part of making America great again. It is a war recipe for disaster.” Transparency website OpenSecrets and financial tech startup Quiver Quantitative have shown that US defense contractors funded the Trump campaign generously. Similarly, during his first term, Trump supported what at the time was seen as the largest military budget in US history in 2018. In 2020, the US press called him one of the military-industrial complex’s “biggest boosters”. Likewise, the Big Three financial powers – Wall Street giants BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street – weren’t disturbed by Trump’s possible victory. Their post-election prognoses were largely positive, foreseeing a rise in the US market, growth for tech and crypto and the dollar strengthening under Trump.

“I’m tired of hearing this is the biggest election in your lifetime,” BlackRock CEO Larry Fink stated at an October 21 conference, as quoted by The Financial Times. “The reality is, over time it doesn’t matter.” He stressed that the world’s largest asset management firm “work[s] with both administrations and are having conversations with both candidates”, signaling that Trump will be fine for Wall Street. Moreover, there appeared to be one instance in which Trump surpassed his contender Harris in the eyes of BlackRock. The firm has been making headlines this year for its aggressive accumulation of crypto-currency assets. It launched its iShares Bitcoin ETF (IBIT) on January 11, whose trust quickly grew into the world’s largest fund. Trump appears to be on the same page as BlackRock concerning crypto-currency even though he was previously skeptical about it.

While on the campaign trail, Trump promised to turn the US into “the crypto capital of the world”. He also announced plans to change some areas of government about crypto and suggested creating a strategic Bitcoin stockpile. In contrast, his contender Harris sounded less enthusiastic about crypto and advocated a “regulatory framework” for it, much in the vein of Joe Biden’s financial oversight approach which placed certain limits on their use. It’s hardly surprising, then, that crypto-currencies, especially Bitcoin, shot up in value on the news that Trump won. Needless to say, BlackRock benefitted from the development. The deep state is entrenched and institutionalized and has many ways to maneuver Trump to its purpose or block his efforts altogether, according to Dr. Roberts. During Trump’s first term, dissent from the intelligence community, the military, the State Department and media disrupted his plans.

The American media is already working hand-in-glove with the ruling establishment to position Trump contrary to his intentions, both in his appointments and in foreign policy. Trump has had to deny that he is going to appoint former colleagues Mike Pompeo and Nikki Haley to his administration in order to assure his supporters that the mistakes of his first term will not be repeated. However, other reports that Trump allies Elon Musk and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. are being pushed aside into advisory positions without executive authority lead some to wonder if the Trump administration is over before it begins. The deep state’s policy of revolving doors connects the government, intelligence agencies, academia, Wall Street and big industries. A majority of Republican members of Congress are themselves part of the establishment.

Meanwhile, Trump supporters, including General Michael Flynn and Infowars host Alex Jones, warn about a possible new attempt on the president-elect’s life. In some sense, one could say that the deep state is now holding a metaphorical gun to Trump’s head. Time will tell whether Trump will manage to outplay the establishment.

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“Trump has already filled early positions on his team with get-it-done leaders who are more interested in execution than limelight.”

Trump Builds No-Nonsense Team (JTN)

Donald Trump sent an unmistakable message with his first few personnel choices for his second term, dispatching to the halls of power players like Elise Stefanik, Tom Homan, Lee Zeldin and Stephen Miller who take a no-nonsense approach to their jobs and will focus on everyday Americans’ wants and needs rather than those of global elitists and Washington special interests. And if the president-elect’s new team can stay focused on making America affordable again by defeating inflation, making the country secure again by fixing the border and rounding up criminals and restoring common sense to public policies from energy to transgenderism, one of the nation’s top pollsters believes he can cement a lofty place in history. “Donald Trump now has the opportunity to become the most influential president since Ronald Reagan,” pollster Scott Rasmussen wrote Monday in a private report to clients of his Napolitan Institute.

“If over the next four years he and the Republican Congress can achieve the three main priorities established by the American people, he will have presided over a fundamental political realignment and paved the way for ongoing GOP success.” [..] Rasmussen cautioned, however, that Trump’s legacy of impact will be determined by how well he can align a Congress that often finds excuses not to act behind executing his agenda. “Trump’s lasting influence and the potential realignment are far from assured,” Rasmussen wrote. “They depend entirely upon whether or not the incoming administration can do what voters are hoping for: making the economy work, securing the border, and returning to common sense about gender identity. If they fail, voters will move on, and the Trump era will be just a blip in the nation’s history.”

The need for a GOP Congress to act in convincing ways in 2025 led one of Trump’s former advisers to urge the president-elect to intervene in Wednesday’s battle for Senate majority leader, which pits establishment Sens. John Thune and John Cornyn against Florida’s Rick Scott, who has increasingly become a MAGA favorite. “I would like to see President Trump full throatedly say who he wants,” former White House aide Seb Gorka told the Just the News, No Noise television show Monday night. “And I would like that to be Scott because otherwise the swamp has that magnetic, huge, sucking vacuum power, and they’ll do what they normally do. So a public, you know, pro Scott action from the president is what we’ve got to see. That’s my humble request, Mr. President.” No matter how the Senate leader race ends, Trump has already filled early positions on his team with get-it-done leaders who are more interested in execution than limelight.

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“75% headcount reduction across the board in the federal bureaucracy, send them home packing, shut down agencies that shouldn’t exist..”

Musk And Vivek Ramaswamy To Head Department Of Government Efficiency (ZH)

Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy have been selected by President-elect Donald Trump to head the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), where they will “slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure Federal Agencies,” according to an official release from the Trump-Vance transition team, which called this “potentially, the “Manhattan Project” of our time.” According to the statement, “Their work will conclude no later than July 4, 2026” – the nation’s 250th anniversary. Musk previously predicted he could cut at least $2 trillion from the US federal budget, while Ramaswamy suggested firing federal workers based on their social security numbers. “Here’s how: if your [Social Security number] ends in an odd number, you’re fired,” he wrote on X.

In September, Ramaswamy told podcaster Lex Fridman: “Get in there on day one, say that anybody in the federal bureaucracy who is not elected, elected representatives obviously were elected by the people, but the people who are not elected, if your social security number ends in an odd number, you’re out, if it ends in an even number, you’re in. There’s a 50% cut right there. Of those who remain, if your social security number starts in an even number, you’re in and if it starts with an odd number, you’re out. Boom. That’s a 75% reduction done. Literally, stochastically, okay, one of the virtues of that, it’s a thought experiment, not a policy prescription, but one of the virtues of that thought experiment is that you don’t have a bunch of lawsuits you’re dealing with about gender discrimination or racial discrimination or political viewpoint discrimination.”

He also said: So the way I would do it, 75% headcount reduction across the board in the federal bureaucracy, send them home packing, shut down agencies that shouldn’t exist, rescind every unconstitutional regulation that Congress never passed. In a true self-governing democracy, it should be our elected representatives that make the laws and the rules not unelected bureaucrats. And that is the single greatest form of economic stimulus we could have in this country, but it is also the single most effective way to restore self-governance in our country as well. And it is the blueprint for, I think, how we save this country.[..] …most people who have run a company, especially larger companies know this, it’s 25% of the people who do 80 to 90% of the useful work, these government agencies are no different. And how many government workers do we have?

“This will send shockwaves through the system, and anyone involved in Government waste, which is a lot of people,” Musk said on Tuesday in a statement provided by the Trump transition team. Earlier in the day, Trump said the new government efficiency effort would develop a plan to eliminate “fraud and improper payments,” conducting a “complete financial and performance audit” of the federal government. Trump also said that the panel would partner with the White House’s Office of Management and Budget. In the last fiscal year, the federal government spent more than $6.75 trillion – of which more than $5.3 trillion was spent on Social Security, health care, defense and veterans’ benefits.

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“A weak appointment as Attorney General and the Trump administration is finished before it begins..”

Can Trump Succeed? (Paul Craig Roberts)

I have been speaking with MAGA Americans and, as I suspected, there is little comprehension of the vast impediments to renewal. The swamp that Trump is to drain is entrenched and institutionalized, but Trump supporters think that with Trump elected and the Senate and House in Republican hands the job is done. Nothing could be further from the truth. The majority of Republicans in the Senate and House are RINOs, not Trump supporters. They are part of the establishment and comfortable in it. Mitch McConnell is forever as he is in the process of demonstrating. This Wednesday McConnell is holding the election of the Senate Majority Leader. His two candidates, chosen without any input from Trump, are John Thune and John Cornyn, neither being MAGAs. Senator Rick Scott, more likely to be helpful to Trump, is running against the establishment’s candidates.

If the establishment prevails, Trump’s strong appointments are likely to be blocked or to languish unconfirmed. The prospect of being blocked can discourage an appointee from accepting the appointment. The establishment can also hamstring Trump by rushing through many unfriendly judicial appointments. Trump Americans need to understand that the enemy has not folded its tents and left the field. Here is Trump himself warning: President-elect Donald Trump on Nov. 10 publicly mentioned one condition for the next leader of the Senate Republican Conference: He or she must clear the way for recess appointments for Trump administration officials. “Any Republican Senator seeking the coveted LEADERSHIP position in the United States Senate must agree to Recess Appointments (in the Senate!), without which we will not be able to get people confirmed in a timely manner,” Trump wrote on social media platform Truth Social on Nov. 10, addressing the upcoming Senate leadership vote.

He noted that such votes can take “two years or more,” which is “what they did four years ago, and we cannot let it happen again.” “We need positions filled IMMEDIATELY!” he wrote. Aside from the request, Trump also said that Republicans should not confirm any judges in the coming months before his inauguration “because the Democrats are looking to ram through their Judges as the Republicans fight over Leadership,” adding, “THIS IS NOT ACCEPTABLE.” I know from experience that there are many ways in which things can go wrong. [..] The euphoria that Trump and his supporters are experiencing can easily lead to deadly mistakes. Appointments that face confirmation challenges can be avoided in the interest of not having a defeat before the new administration is underway. Consequently, when the new administration is underway, it will lack the strength it needs to succeed.

The Biden regime can enter into Ukraine and Middle East agreements that lock-in the Trump administration. A weak appointment as Attorney General and the Trump administration is finished before it begins. In order to succeed, Trump will have to bring the power of the people against the establishment. This means he will have to fight. With the wrong appointments the fight will never begin. Compromise for the sake of unity will be the weapon of the establishment and the presstitutes. Trump said he was going to unify the country. How does one unify with enemies who tried to kill you and who are opposed to the Constitution of the United States? Perhaps Trump should have thought about this before he handed the unity weapon to his enemies. Trump and his supporters must not forget that Trump is leading an insurrection against the establishment.

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“Hours after Donald Trump wins the most conclusive mandate in 40 years, Mitch McConnell engineers a coup against his agenda by calling early leadership elections in the senate. Two of the three candidates hate Trump and what he ran on.”

Gorka Urges Trump To Intervene In Senate Leader Race, Endorse Rick Scott (JTN)

One of Donald Trump’s former first-term advisers urged the President-elect on Monday night to directly intervene in the race for the next Senate Majority Leader by endorsing Florida Sen. Rick Scott. Sebastian Gorka, who currently has a popular show on Salem Radio Network after serving as a deputy assistant to the president for security affairs in 2017, became the latest prominent conservative to throw his weight behind Scott’s bid. But Gorka went further by personally appeals for Trump to get involved in the race. “I would like to see President Trump full throatedly say who he wants,” Gorka told the Just the News, No Noise television show Monday night. “And I would like that to be Scott because otherwise the swamp has that magnetic, huge, sucking vacuum power, and they’ll do what they normally do. “So a public, you know, pro-Scott action from the president is what we got to see. That’s my humble request, Mr. President,” Gorka added.

The Senate GOP Leader’s job, which is being vacated at the end of the year by Sen. Mitch McConnell after two decades, is expected to be decided Wednesday by a secret ballot. The race pits establishment Sens. John Thune and John Cornyn against Scott, who has increasingly become a MAGA favorite and easily won re-election to his Florida seat last week. Leaked “whip” head counts of senators’ preferences have shown Thune in the lead, followed by Cornyn and Scott. That has kicked many Trump supporters into action in a bid to increase Scott’s chances. “I will be supporting Rick Scott for Senate Majority Leader,” Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., wrote on X. “The status quo of $2 Trillion annual deficits is unsustainable.” Billionaire Elon Musk joined the chorus over the weekend, endorsing Scott. Many others have followed suit.

“The people who just gave Donald Trump a sweeping mandate do not want Thune or Cornyn to lead the US Senate,” Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA and conservative grassroots leader who helped the Trump campaign win all seven swing states, wrote on X. “They want Rick Scott. It’s very clear.” Talk show host Tucker Carlson made a blisering attack on Thune and Cornyn. “What the hell is going on in the US Senate?” Carlson wrote on X. “Hours after Donald Trump wins the most conclusive mandate in 40 years, Mitch McConnell engineers a coup against his agenda by calling early leadership elections in the senate. Two of the three candidates hate Trump and what he ran on.

“One of them, John Cornyn, is an angry liberal whose politics are indistinguishable from Liz Cheney’s. The election is Wednesday, it’s by secret ballot, and it will determine whether or not the new administration succeeds. “Rick Scott of Florida is the only candidate who agrees with Donald Trump,” Carlson added. “Call your senator and demand a public endorsement of Rick Scott. Don’t let McConnell get away with it again.” Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a lifelong Democrat who turned Trump supporter this election, also expressed support for Scott, who is viewed as more conservative than Cornyn and Thune. “Without Rick Scott, the entire Trump reform agenda wobbly,” Kennedy wrote on X.

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“Little Marco.”

Marco Rubio Emerges As Finalist For Trump’s Secretary Of State (JTN)

Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, a hawk on China and Iraq, has emerged as the finalist to be President-elect Donald Trump’s Secretary of State in his second term and his nomination could be announced as early as Tuesday, according directly familiar with the deliberations The New York Times, CNN and other legacy news outlets first reported Monday night that Trump had settled on Rubio. Just the News independently confirmed Trump had settled on the Florida senator. Rubio, a Cuban-American, would be the first Latino to serve as the nation’s top diplomat if nominated and confimed by the Senate. He has large experience on the foreign stage and ran unsuccessfully against Trump during the 2016 primaries, where his future boss humorously named him “Little Marco.”

But Rubio was an ally as Trump began his remarkable comeback to win the presidency in 2024. Trump has been filling out his national security team, on Monday formally naming Rep. Elise Stefanik as UN ambassador and Rep. Mike Waltz of Florida as his national security adviser. Advisors told Just the News on Monday night that Trump also was closing in on naming Scott Bessent as his Treasury Secretary nominee. Bessent, a 62-year-old hedge fund manager who once worked with liberal philanthropist George Soros, emerged in recent years as a top Trump adviser on the economy.

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Can you spell hornet’s nest?

Kash Patel was supposed to get this.

Trump Names John Ratcliffe As CIA Director (ZH)

President-elect Donald Trump has announced he has selected John Ratcliffe as director of the CIA. “John Ratcliffe has always been a warrior for Truth and Honesty with the American Public,” Trump wrote in a message sent on the evening of Nov. 12, the latest in a flurry of Tuesday evening appointments. “I look forward to John being the first person ever to serve in both of our Nation’s highest Intelligence positions. He will be a fearless fighter for the Constitutional Rights of all Americans, while ensuring the Highest Levels of National Security, and PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH.” Ratcliffe, an attorney, served as director of national intelligence during the first Trump term. As Nathan Worcester reports, via The Epoch Times, Ratcliffe was previously a Republican congressman from Texas and an anti-terrorism and national security chief for Eastern Texas.

Originally from Illinois, Ratcliffe earned his undergraduate degree from the University of Notre Dame before obtaining a law degree from Southern Methodist University. He was later U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Texas and, from 2004 until 2012, mayor of Heath, Texas, a community in metro Dallas-Fort Worth. While in Congress, he was a member of the House Intelligence Committee and the House Judiciary Committee. During Trump’s first term, Ratcliffe made a name for himself as a staunch Trump loyalist. Trump dropped an early attempt to elevate Ratcliffe to the director of national intelligence position in 2019. But the following year, he renewed the effort, nominating him in May against the backdrop of the COVID-19 response.

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Kennedy, Malhotra, Bhattacharya, Ladapo. Not a bad start.

Florida Surgeon General Ladapo Ready To Serve Trump Admin (Attkisson)

The 2024 campaign is the first since the end of the COVID-19 emergency. And important figures who turned from mainstream to maverick as a result may play crucial roles in an effort to transform the medical establishment. One key player is Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo, who spoke with me a few weeks before the Nov. 5 election about what he’d like to do in the next Trump administration. “I actually would like to be secretary of HHS,” he said. “And the reason I would like to do that is because I’m in it for impact. Like, if I can’t have impact, I’m not in it.” Dr. Ladapo’s desire to have impact became clear during the pandemic. When Covid hit, he was a professor of medicine at the University of California, researching heart health. He became one of the mainstream figures to break away and speak out early against what they considered the disastrous shutdowns, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention mandates and government misinformation.

“The pandemic was really just something remarkable,” he said, “because … somehow you got so many people with good intentions to engage and really enroll in things that are obviously very clearly immoral and badly intended. And so that’s a remarkable thing.” Born in Nigeria, Ladapo earned his medical degree and a doctorate in health policy at Harvard University. In September 2021, he was tapped by Florida GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis to be his state’s surgeon general. “I felt very clearly that my objective, my role, was to reset the tone,” he said. “And the tone was ‘fear, fear, fear, fear, fear.’ You know, ‘Must do this, must do this, must do this. Everyone get in line, everyone get in line, everyone get in line,’ And I just wanted to rip that all apart and remind people that people and individuals are what matter, and their will matters and their preferences matter and good health matters.”

That includes, he says, safety of the controversial Covid vaccines. In January, he said the Food and Drug Administration had failed to examine unique risks, and he concluded that “these vaccines are not appropriate for use in human beings.” Dr. Ladapo isn’t the only esteemed medical figure who bucked the establishment over Covid and is now allied with now President -elect Donald Trump. Others who’ve been speaking with Trump officials about taking a role in the new administration include Stanford’s Dr. Jay Bhattacharya. He was among the first to formally organize opposition to the shutdowns. He also co-authored The Great Barrington Declaration, a petition that raised concerns about establishment Covid response strategies and was signed by over 63,000 scientists and medical practitioners.

Also, Dr. Aseem Malhotra, a top British cardiologist. He became an activist on Covid vaccine safety after he says his father, also a cardiologist, died from the vaccine. Another person who stands to factor in, in a big way, is attorney and children’s health advocate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. He joined the Trump campaign with a “Make America Healthy Again” mantra. He may take on a new role to oversee an end to corruption in public health agencies.

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“.. the hush money trial was “tainted” by evidence that should be protected under presidential immunity…”

Judge Merchan Delays Decision On Trump Guilty Verdict In Hush Money Case (JTN)

Judge Juan Merchan on Tuesday agreed to delay issuing a decision on whether to toss out President-elect Donald Trump’s guilty verdict on state charges of falsifying business records until Nov. 19. This pause in the proceedings to consider what effects Trump’s victory in the presidential election means for the case moving forward was requested by Trump’s legal team, which wants Merchan to dismiss the guilty verdict. Trump was found guilty in May after a six-week trial on 34 counts of falsifying business records during the 2016 presidential election to hide a hush money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels so that she would stay quiet about an alleged sexual encounter. The former president pleaded not guilty to the charges. The chargers were brought by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg last year.

In July, after a landmark Supreme Court ruling outlining presidential immunity, Trump asked Judge Merchan to toss out the guilty verdict. The Supreme Court ruled in a 6-3 opinion earlier that month that presidents have presidential immunity for some “official acts,” but not unofficial ones. The high court did not specified what would constitute official versus unofficial acts, leaving Merchan to parse the evidence cited in the case. Trump attorneys Todd Blanche and Emil Bove argued that the hush money trial was “tainted” by evidence that should be protected under presidential immunity.

“Because of the implications for the institution of the Presidency, the use of official-acts evidence was a structural error under the federal Constitution that tainted [the District Attorney’s] grand jury proceedings as well as the trial,” the lawyers wrote. The lawyers argued specifically that testimony from former White House Communications Director Hope Hicks and former Special Assistant to the President Madeleine Westerhout as well as other testimony about the inner workings of the executive branch should not have been admitted under the high court’s ruling. Merchan was originally set to rule in September, but delayed the decision to “avoid any appearance” that he was attempting to influence the election.

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“Though the networks could try to manufacture another phony scandal, who would believe them?”

MSNBC, CNN Ratings Collapse After Election While Fox News Flourishes (ZH)

Mainstream propaganda outlets MSNBC and CNN have seen an absolute collapse in viewership following the 2024 presidential election. According to Neilsen data, last Thursday’s total views on Fox News came in at 2.6 million – of which 375,000 were in the coveted 25-54 age demographic, Mediaite reports. In comparison, MSNBC only had 596,000/71,000 25-54 viewers and CNN brought in 419,000 / 91,000 25-54. Fox News was up some 60 percent year over year for the day, while MSNBC and CNN were down 23 and 40 percent – respectively. In prime time the news was even more bleak for CNN and MSNBC as they shed 30 percent and 54 percent of their viewers, respectively, compared to the same day last year.

MSNBC host Alex Wagner had her lowest-rated show ever in terms of total viewers, while Chris Hayes’s show brought in its worst numbers since May of 2016. On Friday, seven MSNBC shows recorded their lowest Friday ratings for the year. While Fox averaged 4.4M viewers Wed-Fri in prime time and 701,000 in that key demographic, MSNBC had just 808,000 total viewers for the same period (90k in demo), and CNN had 611,000 total average prime time viewers (159k in demo). No wonder CNN’s Chris Wallace is about to explore podcasting. Fox’s Elizabeth MacDonald breaks down the carnage at MSNBC by time slot between Oct. 30 and Nov. 8:

Morning Joe 1st hour – down 39.6%
Morning Joe 2d hour – down 36.9%
Andrea Mitchell – down 39.7%
Ari Melber – down 49.6%
Joy Reid’s Reidout – down 54.6%
All-in w Chris Hayes – down 47.2%
Alex Wagner Tonight- down 53.6%
Lawrence O’Donnell – down 60.6%
Stephanie Ruhle – down 67%

Three weeks ago Axios, citing Gallup, pointed out that Americans’ trust in media has plummeted to a historic low… What’s interesting is that Democrats have the highest trust in mass media, yet their networks are ghost towns. As Outkick.com reports further; CNN and MSNBC’s futures are bleak. The two networks maintained relevancy during Trump’s first term by aggressively promoting the Russia hoax. Though the networks could try to manufacture another phony scandal, who would believe them? Trump’s decisive victory demonstrated that the left-wing cable news networks have lost their influence. CNN and MSNBC exhausted every resource at their disposal to stop Donald Trump from achieving victory, eventually stooping to a plot to depict him as the second coming of Adolf Hitler, the most ruthless dictator in modern world history. It didn’t work. The lies, the hysteria, and the besmirchment only made Trump more popular and sunk CNN and MSNBC deeper. Here is how race lady Joy Reid is handling the results:

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“..the Ukrainian leader proposes inviting Ukraine to NATO, lifting restrictions on strikes deep into Russian territory, and deploying a “comprehensive non-nuclear deterrence package” in Ukraine.”

Zelensky Tries to Woo Trump With Revised ‘Victory Plan’ (Sp.)

Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky showed his “victory plan” to Donald Trump back in September, with two clauses designed specifically to spark the US president-elect’s interest in potential resource-related deals, Financial Times reported on Tuesday, citing several European and Ukrainian sources. According to the newspaper, Ukraine is adjusting its “victory plan” for the future Trump administration, emphasizing potential business deals, access to raw materials and the deployment of troops in an attempt to secure his support. According to the sources, Ukraine’s allies in Europe and the US, including leading representatives of the Republican Party, gave advice on how best to formulate proposals that would stimulate close cooperation with Kiev, rather than stop critically important assistance to the country.

One of the two tailored clauses suggested replacing part of the US’s contingent in Europe with Ukrainian troops after the end of the conflict. The other, which was first developed by Republican Senator Lindsey Graham (listed in Russia as a terrorist and extremist), involves the sharing of Ukraine’s most important natural resources with Western partners. Zelensky unveiled his “victory plan” in mid-October, insisting that it could help end the conflict in Ukraine no later than 2025. The document includes five clauses and three secret addendums. In particular, the Ukrainian leader proposes inviting Ukraine to NATO, lifting restrictions on strikes deep into Russian territory, and deploying a “comprehensive non-nuclear deterrence package” in Ukraine.

Zelensky’s plan drew criticism in the EU and NATO for outlining in detail the multiple obligations of Ukraine’s Western allies but not assigning any to Kiev itself. Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova slammed it as a set of incoherent slogans that pushed NATO into a direct conflict with Russia, while Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that the real peace plan for Kiev would be to realize the futility of the Ukrainian policy. He said that Kiev should “wake up” and understand the reasons that led it to the conflict.

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“Donald Trump has lots of different voices in his ears and there’s a front of the Republican Party, quite a lot of them actually, who take the wrong line on Ukraine..”

UK Could Send Troops To Ukraine – Boris Johnson (RT)

The UK cannot let Ukraine suffer a defeat in its ongoing conflict with Russia, former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson told GB News in an interview published on Tuesday. London could go as far as sending in troops if Kiev “goes down,” he warned. According to Johnson, Russia’s success in Ukraine would spark a security crisis for the US and its allies on a multitude of fronts. “It’ll be the Baltic states. It’ll be in Georgia. You’ll see the impact of a Ukrainian defeat in the Pacific theater. You’ll see it in the South China Sea,” the politician said, without specifying what exactly could happen in those regions. He also described military and financial assistance to Kiev as a “sensible investment” and a “good” way to spend public funds, arguing that the UK would supposedly have to pay much more otherwise because “our collective security will be really degraded by a resurgent Russia threatening all sorts of parts of Europe.”

The former prime minister also pointed to the prospect of the US cutting aid to Kiev as a potential risk, claiming some people with “wrong” views on the issue were in president-elect Donald Trump’s inner circle. “Donald Trump has lots of different voices in his ears and there’s a front of the Republican Party, quite a lot of them actually, who take the wrong line on Ukraine,” he said. If aid to Ukraine is reduced and Kiev starts losing, London could be forced to deploy troops to the region, Johnson claimed. “We will then have to pay to send British troops to help defend Ukraine,” the politician stated.

Russia has repeatedly stated that it had no plans to attack NATO or any of its members. At the same time, Moscow has also warned on multiple occasions that by providing military aid to Kiev, the bloc increases the risk of a direct clash, specifying that it would treat the provision of long-range missiles for Ukrainian attacks deep inside Russian territory as a direct assault by the countries which had supplied the weapons. Earlier, Putin ordered changes to the nation’s nuclear doctrine that listed attacks by a non-nuclear state supported by a nuclear power as a reason for a nuclear response on Russia’s part, among other things. Last week, The Telegraph reported that the UK, together with France, could push for further escalation of the Ukraine conflict by attempting to convince Washington to allow Kiev strike targets deep inside Russia with Western weapons, including Storm Shadow/Scalp cruise missiles.

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“First, the United States will refuse to export liberal democracy.”

Trump Will Abandon Two Key Principles Of US Foreign Policy (Gevorg Mirzayan)

The return of Donald Trump to the White House portends significant changes in American foreign policy. Experts name at least two US foreign policy features that Trump will be forced to abandon. Why from them and who personally in the immediate circle of the US president will embody this new approach? A two–month period of political fortune–telling begins in the United States before Trump takes office. American experts and journalists are trying to figure out who will join the new administration of the President-elect. And in particular, who will lead his foreign policy – who, that is, will take the posts of Secretary of State, National Security Adviser, and head of the Pentagon. Various candidates have been named, including former Defense Secretary Mike Pompeo and U.S. representative to the United Nations Nikki Haley. However, Trump has made it clear: he will not rely massively on his ex-officials, even those who served under him during his first term.

And this has its own logic – after all, the classic Washington establishment is unlikely to fit into Donald Trump’s new foreign policy strategy. A strategy that will not comply with a number of principles of classical American diplomacy. First, the United States will refuse to export liberal democracy. “We have built our foreign policy on intimidation, moralizing and lecturing countries that seek to avoid cooperation with us. In contrast, China’s foreign policy is focused on building roads and bridges, as well as providing food for the poor. And I think we should follow a foreign policy based on respect… and the national interests of the United States,” U.S. Vice President–elect J.D. Vance said a year and a half ago when he criticized the appointment of the “moralizing Stephanie Sullivan” as the American ambassador to the African Union.

And Trump fully shares this approach. “The new Trump administration will try to implement a realistic foreign policy course and abandon the liberal hegemonic traditions that were characteristic of American foreign policy throughout the period after the end of the Cold War. They will try to make American policy more pragmatic and more successfully counter American rivals,” Dmitry Suslov, the Deputy Director of the Higher School of Economics Center for Integrated European and International Studies, explains to Vzglyad. That is, to China, Russia and their global projects (like the BRICS). This approach has actually been overdue for a long time – after all, moralizing no longer works. Not only because the United States has ceased to be a moral beacon, but also because many countries (including a number of American allies) have begun to pay increasing attention to their own sovereignty; and, accordingly, to resist the imposition of any values destructive to their societies from the outside.

Under Trump, moralizing is generally impossible. After all, it implies demonstrative loyalty in exchange for the material benefits provided by America – in particular, access to the American market. And Trump is not going to hand out economic carrots. “The new administration will pursue a more protectionist and self-seeking foreign policy line. We strive to ensure that investments go to the United States, and not from the United States to third world countries,” Dmitry Suslov explains. Following moralizing, another important principle of Western globalist diplomacy will be thrown into the trash: “whoever is not with us is against us.”

Unlike Russia, which professed the principle of “we work with those who are not against us” (allowing states to pursue a multi-vector policy), the West has rigidly forced Third World countries to make a choice between it and its opponents. For example, the West has forced Ukraine to cooperate with either the EU or Russia in 2013. And then it forced Ukraine to turn into an anti-Russian springboard within the framework of “who is with us”. Perhaps eleven years ago, this strategy was effective – then the collective West was strong and had a reputation as a player who should not be messed with. However, the situation has changed now. And just in recent years the strategy “who is not with us is against us” has produced at least five misfires.

With Turkey, which, while remaining in NATO, has continued to cooperate with the Russian Federation. With India, which the United States unsuccessfully tried to force to stop working with Iran and Russia (in particular, to buy Russian hydrocarbons). With Saudi Arabia, which is establishing relations with China and has even transferred oil trade with it to the yuan. Washington’s attempts to train the Saudi leadership only led to a humiliating hours-long wait for US Secretary of State Antony Blinken to have an audience with the head of Saudi Arabia, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. With Hungary, whose Prime Minister Viktor Orban has refused to follow the pan-European policy of isolating Russia. He is betting on national interests – and as part of this bet, he is blocking Brussels’ initiatives on new sanctions, He even flies to Moscow. And also, with Georgia where the local leadership has defiantly refused to open a second front against Russia, participate in anti–Russian sanctions, or accept Western LGBT values.

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“..Biden’s hardline policy toward Tehran ultimately harmed his major foreign policy initiative, of defeating Moscow..”

What Rough Beast? (Juan Cole)

President Joe Biden has now joined the ranks of Jimmy Carter and George W. Bush as a president whose Middle East policy crashed and burned spectacularly. Unlike Carter, who was stymied by the Iranian hostage crisis, or Bush, who faced a popular Iraqi resistance movement, Biden’s woes weren’t inflicted by an enemy. Quite the opposite, it was this country’s putative partner, the Israeli government, that implicated the president in its still ongoing genocide in Gaza, as well as its disproportionate attacks on Lebanon and Iran, for which Biden steadfastly declined to impose the slightest penalties. Instead, he’s continued to arm the Israelis to the teeth. Israel’s total war on Palestinian civilians, in turn, significantly reduced enthusiasm for Biden among youth and minorities at home, helping usher him out of office. It also created electoral obstacles for Kamala Harris’s presidential bid.

By his insistence on impunity for the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Biden has left the Middle East in flames and the U.S. and the world distinctly in peril. During his first three years in office, his administration wielded the tools of diplomacy in the Middle East. Donald Trump’s sanctions against the Houthis in Yemen had imperiled the civilian population there by denying them humanitarian aid and gasoline to drive to the market for food. Biden lifted those sanctions and sponsored continued negotiations between those in power in the Yemeni capital of Sanaa and in the neighboring Saudi Arabian capital of Riyadh. Only relatively small contingents of American troops remained in Syria and Iraq to help with the mopping-up operations against the so-called Islamic State terrorist organization.

Danger signals nonetheless soon began flashing bright red among friend and foe alike in the region, as Biden’s team quickly squandered an opportunity to restore the 2015 “Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action,” or JCPOA, between the U.N. Security Council and the Iranian regime in Tehran, which Trump had so tellingly trashed. Between 2015 and 2019, that deal had successfully kept Iran’s civilian nuclear enrichment program purely civilian, closing off the four most plausible pathways to a nuclear weapon. In those years, the Iranians had, in fact, mothballed 80% of their nuclear program in return for sanctions relief. While the U.N. Security Council lifted economic sanctions on that country, Republicans in Congress refused to halt unilateral American sanctions, which applied to third parties as well. European investors had to jump through hoops to invest in Iran while avoiding Treasury Department fines. As a result, a disappointed Iranian leadership went unrewarded for its careful compliance with the JCPOA.

Then, in May 2018, Trump stabbed the Iranians in the back, withdrawing the U.S. from the JCPOA and slapping the most severe economic sanctions ever applied by one country to another in peacetime on Iran. It essentially added up to an invisible blockade of the Iranian economy, even interfering with ordinary commerce like that country’s oil sales. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu boasted of having convinced the gullible Trump to take such a step, which led Iran’s petroleum exports to plummet over the next three years. Trump even designated the Iranian National Bank a terrorist organization, again with potentially crippling consequences for the entire economy. In revenge, Iran went back to enriching uranium to high levels and building more centrifuges, though without actually producing weapons-grade material. To this day, its civilian nuclear program remains a form of “the Japan option,” an attempt at deterrence by making it clear that it does not want a bomb but that, if it feels sufficiently threatened, it can build a nuclear weapon relatively quickly.

As soon as Joe Biden defeated Trump in 2020, the centrist Iranian President Hassan Rouhani declared that the JCPOA could be restored by the two leaders virtually by fiat. And Biden’s foreign policy team initially appeared to consider negotiations to reinstate the treaty, only to ultimately retain Trump’s outrageous sanctions as “leverage,” demanding that Iran return to compliance with the JCPOA before the two sides could talk. Perhaps the Iranian public got the message that Biden was determined to be as hostile as Trump. Certainly, in the next round of voting in the summer of 2021, they swung behind hardliner Ebrahim Raisi. And despite occasional modest diplomatic forays since then, relations have been in a dumpster for the remainder of Biden’s term, with most of Trump’s “maximum pressure” sanctions still in place. And once again, as in the Trump years, the Israeli government of Benjamin Netanyahu has lobbied Biden hard to cease all negotiations with Tehran.

Iran, which might have been drawn into the Western camp, has instead become a hostage to Beijing. Starting in 2019, China accepted smuggled Iranian petroleum at a substantial price discount. Then, when the Ukraine War broke out and Biden imposed maximum sanctions on the Russian Federation, Moscow and Tehran found themselves pushed ever closer. Now, the two countries plan to sign a “strategic partnership agreement,” while, in July 2023, Iran joined the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, cementing the alliances with both China and Russia into which it had been so vigorously pushed by Washington. Iran also became a definite asset for Russia in its Ukraine War, providing Vladimir Putin with crucial weaponry. In short, Biden’s hardline policy toward Tehran ultimately harmed his major foreign policy initiative, of defeating Moscow.

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“What in the world is going on? Israel’s security problem, on its border, is 50 miles to the south. What’s an Israeli army doing here in Beirut?”

A 1984 Conference Forged Israel’s Influence Over US Media (Klarenberg)

The story of how Western media was transformed into Israel’s doting, servile propaganda appendage is not only a fascinating and sordid hidden chronicle. It is a deeply educational lesson in how imperial power can easily subordinate supposed arbiters of truth to its will. Comprehending how we got to this point equips us with the tools to assess, identify, and deconstruct lies large and small – and effectively challenge and counter not only Israel’s falsehoods but the entire settler colonial endeavor.

On June 6, 1982, Israel invaded Lebanon. The effort was ostensibly intended to drive Palestinian Liberation Organization freedom fighters away from their positions on Israel’s northern border. But, as the IDF savagely pushed ever-deeper into the country, including Beirut, it became clear that ethnic cleansing, massacres, and land theft were – as in Palestine – the true goal. Throughout the Lebanese capital, news crews from major networks and reporters from the West’s biggest newspapers were waiting. Israel’s rapacious bloodlust and casual contempt for Arab lives had hitherto been, by and large, successfully concealed from the outside world. Suddenly, though, scenes of deliberate IDF airstrikes on residential housing blocks, Tel Aviv’s trigger-happy soldiers running amok in Beirut’s streets, and hospitals overflowing with civilians suffering from grave injuries, including chemical burns due to Israel’s use of phosphorus shells, were broadcast the world over, to nigh-universal outcry.

As veteran NBC news anchor John Chancellor contemporarily explained to Western viewers: “What in the world is going on? Israel’s security problem, on its border, is 50 miles to the south. What’s an Israeli army doing here in Beirut? The answer is we are now dealing with an imperial Israel, which is solving its problems in someone else’s country, world opinion be damned.” Global shock and repulsion at Israel’s conduct would only ratchet during the IDF’s resultant illegal military occupation of swaths of Lebanon. In September 1982, an Israel-backed armed Christian militia, Phalange, entered Sabra, a Beirut neighborhood home to many Palestinians displaced by the 1948 Nakba. Over a two-day span, they slaughtered up to 3,500 people while mutilating and raping countless others. Again, unfortunately for Tel Aviv, mainstream journalists were on hand to document these heinous crimes first-hand.

To say the least, Israel had an international PR disaster of historic proportions on its blood-soaked hands. The risk that further exposure of its genocidal nature might decisively and permanently shift global opinion in favor of the Palestinians and the Arab world more generally was significant. The attack on Lebanon had already spurred Western news outlets to critically reassess other illegal annexations and occupations in which Israel was and remains engaged. As ABC News reporter Richard Threlkeld commented at the time: “Israel was always that gallant little underdog democracy fighting for survival against all the odds. Now, the Israelis have annexed East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights, settled down more or less permanently on the West Bank, and occupied close to half of Lebanon. In the interests of self-defense, that gallant little underdog, Israel, has suddenly started behaving like the neighborhood bully.”

So it was that in the summer of 1984, the American Jewish Congress – a major Zionist lobby organization – convened a conference in Jerusalem, Israel’s Public Image: Problems and Remedies. It was chaired by U.S. advertising supremo Carl Spielgovel, who a decade earlier provided pro bono advice to the Israeli government on strategies for publicly communicating why Tel Aviv refused to adhere to the terms of the Henry Kissinger-brokered 1973 Sinai Accords. Spielgovel later recalled: “It occurred to me then that the Israelis were doing a good job at training their military people, and they were doing a relatively good job at training their diplomatic corps. But they weren’t spending any time training information officers, people who could present Israel’s case to embassies and TV anchormen around the world. Over the years, I made this a personal cause celebre.”

The 1984 Jerusalem conference offered Spielgovel and a welter of Western advertising and public relations executives, media specialists, editors, journalists, and leaders of major Zionist advocacy groups an opportunity to achieve that malign objective. Together, they hammered out a dedicated strategy for ensuring the “crisis” caused by news reporting on the invasion of Lebanon two years earlier would never be repeated. Their antidote? Ceaseless, methodical, and wide-ranging “Hasbara” – Hebrew for propaganda – for “changing people’s minds [and] making them think differently.”

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Roman precision
https://twitter.com/i/status/1856294347643199665

 

 

Feed fish

 

 

Tesla Berlin

 

 

Madre

 

 

Tuck in horse

 

 

SOS

 

 

Dog

 

 

2 points

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Oct 202022
 
 October 20, 2022  Posted by at 8:25 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,  68 Responses »


Paul Gauguin Schooner and three masters 1886

 

American Advisor To Ukraine’s Military Reveals War Goals (RT)
Ukraine Tries To Capture Zaporozhye Nuclear Plant (RT)
US Lifts Ban On Funding ‘Neo-nazi’ Ukrainian Militia (JPost)
Europe’s Ultimate Choices On Ukraine (OR)
Bill Ackman Proposes Peace Plan For Ukraine And Russia (RT)
A Few Updates About The NATO Crusade Against Russia (Saker)
Europe Compensated All Gas Volumes Cut By Russia – Ursula Von Der Leyen (Az.)
EU Countries Urged To Share Gas (RT)
Hungary Opposes ‘Dangerous’ EU Gas Plan (RT)
Europe To Face Worse Gas Crisis In 2023 – Qatar (RT)
Ukraine’s Most Nationalist Region Once A Pro-Russian Hotbed (Plotnikov)
Biden Family Got $5 Million Interest-free, Forgivable Loan From China (JTN)
Net Zero: Doubling Down On Stupid (TT)
Ladapo Dismisses CDC Adding COVID Vaccine to Childhood Schedule (FV)
Ladapo: mRNA COVID-19 Vaccines Shouldn’t Be Given to Young Men (ET)

 

 

 

 

Under the seabed

 

 

 

 

Covid implants

 

 

 

 

Kari Lake

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Ukraine will refuse to negotiate with Russia and fight to return to its 1991 borders..”

Russia will refuse to go back even to 2014.

The US is aiming for forever war.

American Advisor To Ukraine’s Military Reveals War Goals (RT)

Ukraine will refuse to negotiate with Russia and fight to return to its 1991 borders – established following an independence vote ahead of the collapse of the Soviet Union – according to Dan Rice, an American citizen advising the commander in chief of Kiev’s armed forces. Speaking to CNN’s Erin Burnett for an interview on Tuesday, Rice appealed to Western states for additional arms shipments to Ukraine, adding that while the country desperately needs air defense systems and aircraft, it has no interest in diplomacy with Moscow. “[Russia is] trying, in my opinion, to get to the negotiating table, to try to go back to the 2014 lines,” Rice claimed. “Ukraine won’t have it. Ukraine wants all of their land back, back to the ‘91 lines.”

Ukraine’s 1991 borders would include four formerly Ukrainian provinces – Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson and Zaporozhye – as well as Crimea, all of which have voted to join the Russian Federation in a series of referendums. Crimea’s was held in 2014 soon after the ‘EuroMaidan’ revolution ousted Ukrainian President Victor Yanukovich, while the other provinces voted to leave Ukraine last month. Despite Rice’s assessment of Moscow’s position, the Kremlin has made clear that it has no intention of reversing the referendums, with Russian President Vladimir Putin recently stating that while he is prepared to negotiate with Kiev, “the choice of the people in Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson will not be discussed.”

Russia’s most recent call for negotiations came last week, when Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov suggested Moscow’s goals could be achieved diplomatically and that it remains “open” to talks. However, he added that “it takes two sides to have a dialogue,” saying negotiations are unlikely given the “very, very hostile stance” toward Russia by Ukraine’s Western backers. A US Marine combat veteran and West Point graduate who now runs the consulting firm Thayer Leadership, Rice went on to voice hopes that Poland would provide its “old Russian fighters”to Ukraine in exchange for American F-16 jets, claiming the aircraft are currently “mothballed” and would come at no cost to the US taxpayer.

“The biggest thing they need right now is air defense systems – both missiles and aircraft. We really need the Ukrainian Air Force to be restocked,” he continued. “We [the United States] are putting in a lot of air defenses, they are just getting there though.” Rice was tapped to serve as a special advisor to Valeriy Zaluzhnyi, the commander in chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, back in June, reportedly at the general’s “personal invitation.” His own LinkedIn page notes that he works in an “unpaid/voluntary role,” and says he will use his official access to “research the Ukrainian military leader development and learning, and how the culture changed between 2014-2022.”

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”Russia formally included the plant in its civilian atomic energy infrastructure earlier this month.”

Ukraine Tries To Capture Zaporozhye Nuclear Plant (RT)

Kiev launched an amphibious operation against the Russian city of Energodar in Zaporozhye Region, a senior local official has reported. Ukrainian commandos used around 30 speed boats overnight to cross the Dnepr River, targeting the city, Vladimir Rogov said, as cited on Wednesday morning by Russian media. “After artillery shelling of the city, they attempted to land, including to capture the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant. The fighting continued for several hours, at least three or three and a half. The assault was fended off,” he said. Earlier in the day the city administration reported Ukrainian artillery attacks on several key facilities in Energodar, including the city administration building, an access road, and a transformer station crucial for its power supply. The latter was disabled, causing a blackout, the head of the city administration, Aleksandr Volga, said.


Energodar is located in Zaporozhye Region, one of four former Ukrainian regions that voted to become part of Russia last month. Energodar has been under Russian control since March. The Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, the largest facility of its kind in Europe, is located on the shore of the Dnepr just outside the city. The site was the focus of a diplomatic spat between Russia and Ukraine, with both sides accusing each other of attacking it and risking a nuclear disaster. Kiev also claimed that Russia was stationing heavy weapons at the facility, which Moscow denies. Russia formally included the plant in its civilian atomic energy infrastructure earlier this month. The provincial capital, the city of Zaporozhye, remains under Ukrainian control and served as the staging ground for the amphibious operation, according to Rogov.

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It takes the Jerusalem Post to report on this. Everyone else has re-defined neo nazis.

US Lifts Ban On Funding ‘Neo-nazi’ Ukrainian Militia (JPost)

Congress is reported to have recently repealed its ban on a Ukrainian militia accused of being neo-Nazi, opening the way for American military assistance. Last June, Congress passed a resolution intended to block American military funding for Ukraine from being used to provide training or weaponry for the Azov Battalion, an independent unit that had been integrated into the former Soviet Republic’s national guard and was taking part in operations against Russian- backed rebels. Called a “neo-Nazi paramilitary militia” by Congressmen John Conyers Jr. and Ted Yoho, who cosponsored the bipartisan amendment, the battalion has been a source of controversy since its inception.

With the neo-Nazi Wolfsangel symbol on its unit flash – which resembles a black swastika on a yellow background – and founders drawn from the ranks of the paramilitary national socialist group called “Patriot of Ukraine,” the group would have been a fringe phenomenon in any Western nation, but with its army unequipped to face the separatist threat in the east, Kiev actually integrated Azov into its military forces. According to a report in The Nation, the Pentagon lobbied the House Defense Appropriations Committee to remove the Conyers-Yoho amendment from the 2016 defense budget, claiming it was unnecessary as such funding was already prohibited under another law. However, The Nation asserted that the law in question, known as the Leahy Law, only prohibits funding to groups that have “committed a gross violation of human rights,” which would not apply in this case.

The news that the Azov Battalion is now legally able to receive American aid has enraged the Simon Wiesenthal Center, which last week successfully blocked the battalion from holding a recruitment meeting in Nantes, France. “This step is hardly surprising to anyone who has been following the growing danger of Holocaust distortion in post-Communist Europe, and especially in the Baltics, Ukraine and Hungary,” said Wiesenthal Center Jerusalem office head Efraim Zuroff. “In recent years, the United States has purposely ignored the glorification of Nazi collaborators, the granting of financial benefits to those who fought alongside the Nazis, and the systematic promotion of the canard of equivalency between Communist and Nazi crimes by these countries because of various political interests.”

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“By refusing to take a balanced approach, the EU is disqualifying itself to be an honest broker on peace negotiations that sooner rather than latter will need to start in the conflict.”

Europe’s Ultimate Choices On Ukraine (OR)

EU’s decisions in support of Ukraine have purportedly been taken in the name of democracy, the rule of law and western values and against a military action by Russia considered unprovoked and illegal. The EU appears to have been also concerned about the unsettling of post-World War II borders – or rather the national frontiers that followed the end of the Cold War – and has expressed unfounded fears that Russia’s actions in Ukraine are the prelude for further aggression in Europe. Deep down, through its actions against Russia the European leadership psyche seems to have had a cathartic release, unleashing an old Russophobia manifested in Europe over decades if not centuries, melting together Czarist Russia, the Soviet Union and the Russian Federation in an effort to portray and convince the average European about an inherent Russian malignity that needs to be rooted out once and for all.

In its one-sided defence of Ukraine, the EU has been unwilling to recognize and accept the civil war character of the Ukraine conflict, Russia’s legitimate security concerns and its ongoing warnings about it over years, the historical background of a conflict rooted on the mistreatment of Ukraine’s Russian-speaking population that worsened since the US sponsored Ukraine coup in 2014 and its failure to support a diplomatic settlement in 2015 – i.e. the Minsk agreements -, in which they played a mayor facilitating role. The EU ignores the deep flaws of the current Ukraine government and the society it has tried to create, both defined now by blatant corruption, political persecution of opposition and an ultra-nationalist ideology, all this hardly reflecting so-called European values.

Sadly, the EU has been incapable to develop an autonomous and justly self-serving European alternative in the conflict and has become hostage of the US hegemonistic agenda. By refusing to take a balanced approach, the EU is disqualifying itself to be an honest broker on peace negotiations that sooner rather than latter will need to start in the conflict. Non-European countries like Turkey and Saudi Arabia are now taking the lead, reflected for instance in the recent Russo-Ukrainian prisoner exchange, a prominent role unthinkable only a few months ago which is embarrassing for Europe given its traditional place in diplomacy.

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“It just saddens me to see death and destruction with no apparent end date or opportunity for resolution.”

Bill Ackman Proposes Peace Plan For Ukraine And Russia (RT)

Ukraine should recognize Crimea as part of Russia and renounce its bid to join NATO for the sake of peace, US billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman has said. Just like SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk before him, Ackman was immediately criticized online for suggesting that Kiev should be ready to make concessions in order to end the hostilities. “Crimea was part of Russia until 1954 and is largely comprised of ethnic Russians, which was apparently why the world did little when Russia annexed it back in 2014,” Ackman, the CEO of Pershing Square Capital Management, tweeted on Monday. He added that the borders should return to where they were prior to February 24, when Russia launched its military operation in the neighboring country and before four former Ukrainian regions voted to join Russia.

He added that the West should then help Kiev with its recovery, while the country should stay outside of NATO. “Thousands of lives will be saved and resources can be invested to rebuild [Ukraine] rather than in a war that will only lead to more destruction and death,” the billionaire wrote. “If there is a viable path to peace, we should pursue it. Each day the conflict continues, the risk to the world rises.” After receiving criticism online, Ackman clarified his stance on Tuesday. “Yesterday, I suggested that a reasonable peace settlement might be a return to the borders as of [February 24], a Marshall Plan to rebuild [Ukraine], and [Ukraine’s] decision to not join NATO. Then the knives came out. I was accused of being an appeaser and worse,” he wrote.

I ask: is [Ukraine] better off in a continued prolonged war that leads to 1,000s more [Ukrainian] deaths and the leveling of the country or does some kind of negotiated settlement make sense? … I am by no means an expert. It just saddens me to see death and destruction with no apparent end date or opportunity for resolution. “In a negotiated settlement, both parties must concede something or there is no opportunity for resolution. What is the least that both parties can concede that is acceptable for both? What am I missing in my analysis? What better ideas do you have?” Ackman argued.

Ackman’s comments came as more public figures in the West have been making suggestions for a possible peace deal between Russia and Ukraine. Venture capitalist and tech entrepreneur David Sacks tweeted on Sunday that the US should propose a ceasefire based on the February 23 lines and guarantee that Ukraine will not join NATO. Musk offered his own vision of a peace settlement this month, which includes Ukraine recognizing Crimea as Russian territory. Kiev and Western officials quickly blasted Musk for what they considered to be a plan that heavily favors Moscow.

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“..while most of the US and NATO forces are a sad joke, the US nuclear triad and the USN’s submarine force are both still world class and extremely dangerous and capable..”

A Few Updates About The NATO Crusade Against Russia (Saker)

What we are seeing is the creation of two parts of our planet: the AngloZionist Hegemony (in which only the USA and Israel have agency, the rest are colonies, occupied countries, volunteer slaves, etc.) and the Multipolar Free World. While the two blocks are not technically at war with each other, in reality they already very much are. Russia and Iran are bearing most of the military burden while other free countries quietly try to either stay out and keep a low profile or, even more quietly, assist China and rest of the Multipolar Free World to prevail economically. Of course, the AngloZionist Hegemony is using every means it has to subvert not only Russia, but also China, Iran and any other country daring to declare even a modicum of sovereignty.

The eventual and inevitable outcome of this confrontation is not in doubt, at least not to those who are aware of reality. It is not the outcome which I fear (in fact I await it with great anticipation!) but the potentially enormous costs of defeating the West’s last Crusade (last time Russia lost 27 million people, most of them innocent civilians, and that did not even do the full job – hence today’s war). I will never stop repeating that while most of the US and NATO forces are a sad joke, the US nuclear triad and the USN’s submarine force are both still world class and extremely dangerous and capable (and US SSNs come with not only anti-submarine and anti-surface capabilities, but also with land-attack missiles).

This is why it is absolutely crucial for Russia to turn up the pain dial steadily but SLOWLY. Those dimwits who constantly advocate for “firm Russian actions” and simply “hit them hard!” are clueless civilians from countries who never won a real war adn who have no idea whatsoever about modern warfare or about the immense risks their warmongering hysterics create for our entire planet. I can sincerely say that I thank God that Putin is a very careful type who fully understands that there are no “quickfix solutions” to denazifying and demilitarizing the AngloZionist Hegemony. And yes, Russia will continue to unilaterally and gradually rotating up the pain dial, and Russia will do so without feeling the need to seek approval from those who have never won a war but who believe that wars are won by “showing toughness”.

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Ursula counts on your gullibility. Just look at this nonsense: “the market has really changed, from a pipeline gas market to a LNG market.”

The EU has cut itself off from pipeline gas. Now all it has is LNG. But that hasn’t changed “the market”, only the EU.

And now the US is talking about a export ban….

Europe Compensated All Gas Volumes Cut By Russia – Ursula Von Der Leyen (Az.)

Compared to September 2021, in September 2022, Russia has cut 80 percent of its pipeline gas supplies, said President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen at the European Parliament Plenary on the preparation of the European Council meeting of 20-21 October 2022, according to the Commission. “But Europe has been able to compensate all that. We have diversified towards our trusted partners, like for example Norway and the United States. We have increased the savings. And it is good, we achieved in September a reduction of 15 percent. We have filled our storages up to 92 percent. We did not give in to this blackmail. We made it. And I think we can be proud of that. We resisted. That is important. But we also see that resisting Russian energy coercion comes at a price. European families have seen their gas bills skyrocketing. And our companies are struggling to keep up competitiveness. It is not only about the competitiveness in the Single Market – that is also important. But it is also about the global competitiveness that our companies are fighting for,” she said.


Ursula von der Leyen recalled that in March, the Commission proposed to the Council the option to cap gas prices. “At that time, this did not gain any traction. But today, we are coming back to this. So what is the model? The current benchmark determining gas prices is TTF. TTF is only focused on pipeline gas. What we see now is that the market has really changed, from a pipeline gas market to a LNG market. So we need a new, a specific price benchmark for LNG. The Commission will now develop this complementary benchmark together with the European regulator. But this takes time. So in the meantime, as a stop-gap measure, we will limit prices at TTF. We call this the market correction mechanism. Yesterday, we proposed guiding principles as a first step. On this basis, we will prepare the operational mechanism in a second step. This is concerning the price cap at wholesale level,” she said.

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“According to von der Leyen, the EU has managed to reduce its “huge dependency on Russian gas” by two thirds in eight months..”

EU Countries Urged To Share Gas (RT)

European Commission (EC) President Ursula von der Leyen has called on EU member states to jointly purchase gas in order to avoid competition that could push prices even higher. “Instead of outbidding each other, Europeans should buy gas together. For this, we will purchase together gas at {the} EU level… We do this because we have learnt the lesson. We literally saw in August, at the height of the filling season, how member states were outbidding each other and prices were spiking. We definitely can be smarter than this. So pooling our demand is a must,” Leyen said on Wednesday at the European Parliament session in Strasbourg. Her comments come a day after the EC announced a new emergency package of measures aimed at lowering gas prices and ensuring the EU’s winter energy supply.


Joint gas purchases are part of the plan, as is the introduction of binding “default rules” for member states to share gas in the case of an emergency. “We know that some member states are more directly exposed than others to Russian gas. The situation is especially challenging for landlocked countries in Central Europe. But in the end, in our single market with highly integrated supply chains, a disruption in one member state has a massive impact on all member states. So, sharing gas in a crisis is critical,” she stated. According to von der Leyen, the EU has managed to reduce its “huge dependency on Russian gas” by two thirds in eight months, and also to diversify supplies. However, she noted that this has come “at a high price” and urged the bloc to invest in “home-grown sources of energy” in order to maintain competitiveness.

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“Hungary has a long-term contract for gas supplies with Russia’s Gazprom, and the country “is guaranteed to receive 4.5 billion cubic meters of natural gas a year from Russia.”

Hungary Opposes ‘Dangerous’ EU Gas Plan (RT)

The European Commission’s proposal on joint gas purchases by EU member states is a risky move, Hungary’s Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto warned on Wednesday. “The European Commission’s proposal is unsuitable and even dangerous… threatens to further cut gas supplies to Europe,” he stated in a video address posted to his Facebook page. The minister urged Hungary not to accept the “risky” proposal, which could only lead to a drop in supplies and an increase in energy prices. He stressed once more that Hungary opposes another “dangerous” notion – a price cap on Russian gas, which “would mean that the Russians would stop supplying natural gas to Europe.”

“According to simple economic principles, if we increase the quantity of a given product in a market, its price will decrease, but if we decrease the quantity of the product, the price will increase. Therefore, the amount of natural gas on the European market should be increased. It would be necessary for as much natural gas as possible to arrive in Europe from as many sources as possible,” he added. The minister said that Hungarian gas storages are currently 50% full, which means that the country has enough gas reserves for six months. He called this an “outstanding” result compared with other EU countries. Reuters, citing Aurora Energy Research analysts, recently reported that even a 100% gas storage level would only sustain the bloc for about three months.

Hungary has a long-term contract for gas supplies with Russia’s Gazprom, and the country “is guaranteed to receive 4.5 billion cubic meters of natural gas a year from Russia.” Also, at the end of August Hungary signed an additional two-month contract for the supply of up to 5.8 million cubic meters of Russian gas per day starting on September 1.

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“You just don’t have enough volume to bring [in] to replace that gas for the long term, unless you’re saying ‘I’m going to be building huge nuclear [plants], I’m going to allow coal, I’m going to burn fuel oils’”

Europe To Face Worse Gas Crisis In 2023 – Qatar (RT)

Europe is facing a shortage of natural gas over the next several years due to the break-up of trade with Russia, the energy minister of Qatar, a leading global exporter of liquefied natural gas (LNG), has said. Replacing all Russian gas with other sources doesn’t seem like a viable strategy, Saad al-Kaabi told the Financial Times in an interview published on Tuesday. If “zero Russian gas” flowed in to the EU, as Brussels intends, “I think the problem is going to be huge and for a very long time,” he said. “You just don’t have enough volume to bring [in] to replace that gas for the long term, unless you’re saying ‘I’m going to be building huge nuclear [plants], I’m going to allow coal, I’m going to burn fuel oils’,” the minister explained. The EU leadership prides itself on having reduced the share of Russian gas in the bloc’s mix from some 40% to just 7.5% in seven months.

Brussels hopes to massively ramp up supplies of LNG and increase piped imports from Norway and Algeria to fully eliminate reliance on Russian energy. The surge in demand from Europe is meeting some resistance from traditional markets for LNG in Asia. China has reportedly ordered its state importer not to re-export excess gas due to concerns over a possible deficit in the winter. Kaabi warned in the interview that while European nations had accumulated enough gas in storage facilities to make it through the upcoming winter relatively unscathed, there is no certainty that this will be the case in future seasons. The energy crisis may be “much worse next year,” unless Russian gas is imported, he said. “This coming winter, because of the storage capacity being full, it’s fine,” the Qatari official stated.

“It’s really replenishing the reserves, or the storage, for next year that’s going to be the issue.” Next year and the following year, even up to 2025, are going to be the issue. Commenting on the challenges that the Europeans are having in securing supplies from his nation, the minister said Doha was concerned about losing the EU market in the future because of its larger goal of moving away from fossil fuels. Europe needs to “get off the discussion that gas is not needed for a long time,” he suggested, “because everybody who’s going to invest in the gas sector, they’re looking at 25, 30, 40-year horizons to invest and to get reasonable returns on the investments.” QatarEnergy, the state-owned company that Kaabi also heads, prefers long-term contracts for 15-20 years in foreign trade.

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Love good history lessons.

Ukraine’s Most Nationalist Region Once A Pro-Russian Hotbed (Plotnikov)

“In the last decade of the 19th century, despite all its own difficulties in terms of national and economic life, Galicia became the center of the Ukrainian movement. In Russia’s Ukrainian lands, it played the role of a cultural arsenal with respect to Russia’s Ukrainian lands, where the means to bring about a cultural and socio-political revival of the Ukrainian people were created and improved,” Mikhail Grushevsky, a historian who was one of the first ideologists of Ukrainian nationalism, wrote in an article entitled Ukrainian Piedmont, back in 1906. Today, it is difficult to dispute his assertions. During the 20th century, western Ukraine, which Galicia is part of, was the main center of Ukrainian identity and the engine driving Ukrainization in the rest of the country’s regions.

But the history of the Galician lands does not begin at the end of the 19th century. It has roots in the deep past, tracing back to the very origins of Russia. After the first partition of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1772, Galicia came under the rule of Austria. Vienna needed to build an administrative system for the region, most of which was inhabited by Slavs. To do this, the Austrian authorities skillfully played on the incongruities between the Catholic Polish population (mainly townspeople and nobles) and the Orthodox peasantry. Seeing the latter as possible agents of Russian influence, a campaign was launched to Polonize them.

The effect, however, turned out to be exactly the opposite. Galician Russophilism was born amidst the Polonization drive in the first half to the middle of the 19th century, when Poles played the dominant role in the cultural and social life of the region. The local Rusyn population gave up hope of finding a way to integrate into the Austrian Empire without losing their traditions and culture, so they began to look for new meaning in the East. Moreover, in the period between the Congress of Vienna (1814-1815) and the Crimean War (1853-1856), Russia really was the hegemon of continental Europe. Austria itself called on Russian troops to help suppress a Hungarian uprising. For the Rusyns, the power of the neighboring empire was obvious, and they perceived Russia as a place where they could occupy a privileged position as part of the national majority, and not be second-class subjects.

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Lending a whole new meaning to the term ‘conflict of interest’.

“..assisting them with potential business deals and investments while Joe Biden was Vice President; however, that work remained intentionally uncompensated while Joe Biden was Vice President..”

Biden Family Got $5 Million Interest-free, Forgivable Loan From China (JTN)

President Joe Biden has made waves this fall with his plan to forgive hundreds of billions of dollars of student loans, shifting the burden to taxpayers. Five years earlier, his family cashed in on a zero-interest, forgivable loan of its own from an energy company in communist China, according to evidence in the possession of the FBI. The loan arrangement, confirmed in documents obtained by Just the News and also new information released by Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), shows the Chinese energy firm CEFC Beijing International Energy Company Limited understood the transaction would benefit Joe Biden’s family (referred to as “BD family” in the emails), but it also was creating heartburn with its own compliance/risk management officers.

The Chinese company’s leaders “fully support the framework of establishing the JV (joint venture), based on their trust on BD family,” stated a July 26, 2017 email from a CEFC official to Tony Bobulinski, a Hunter Biden business partner at the time. The email was written in part to explain why there had been a delay in getting the money to a firm called SinoHawk associated with the future president’s son and brother, Hunter Biden and James Biden, respectively. “The delay of wire is caused by the details on the JV building, as follows: 1) the positioning and strategy of the JV are not made fully clear to CEFC 2) 5 million is lent to BD family in the 10 million charter capital. How will this 5 million be used (or the 10 million as a whole)? This 5 million loan to BD family is interest-free,” the email stated.

“But if the 5 M is used up, should CEFC keep lending more to the family?” the email inquired. “If CEFC lends more, they need to know the interest rate for the subsequent loan(s).” The CEFC official went on to explain the nebulous transaction was raising worries with the company’s compliance officers. “Because of the reasons above, the risk management department of CEFC is showing concerns on the operation of SinoHawk, hence the delay of the wire,” CEFC’s Raymond Zhao wrote. At the time of the transaction, Joe Biden had already left the White House as vice president, was a private citizen and was planning for his eventual 2020 presidential run. Bobulinski has said in media interviews that Joe Biden was a silent partner in the Chinese transaction, identified in internal documents as “the big guy” who might get 10% of the deal.

Grassley on Monday released a letter he sent to the FBI that contained a summary of an October 2020 interview Bobulinski gave to the FBI concerning the Chinese loan transaction. According to Grassley, the $5 million Chinese transaction was paid to a Hunter Biden-connected firm in August 2017, one month after the email obtained by Just the News. Bobulinski told the FBI that some of the Chinese money paid in 2017 was actually deferred compensation for work Hunter and James Biden had done while Joe Biden was still vice president, Grassley wrote. Grassley and Sen. Ron Johnson previously have said some $6 million paid in spring 2017 was appeared to be for pre-2017 work.

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“..gas power stations are doing the heavy lifting of grid balancing and wind backup. It wasn’t cheap before the war in Ukraine and it’s not cheap now.”

Net Zero: Doubling Down On Stupid (TT)

Most of my thinking lately dwells on the impossibility of Net Zero. Green energy lobbyists have ramped up the propaganda in recent months, doing all they can to obscure the reality of Net Zero. There are now endless debates as to the true cost of wind energy. Carbon Brief is pushing the line that wind energy is “nine times cheaper”. Andrew Montford of Net Zero Watch has a crack at this dodgy number. Montford’s analysis is often quite good. Personally I think the argument needs to be reframed. Costing energy is an imprecise science because it’s fraught with complexity. The slam dunk argument against wind energy is when we frame it as intermittent versus dispatchable energy. I argue that the cost of building and operating windmills is not a standalone figure.

We must also consider the cost of grid balancing and the various energy storage technologies. Energy storage is in its infancy. It is not cheap. It is not going to get cheaper any time soon. In all probability it’s going to remain a pricey affair for decades to come. There will be shortages of lithium and battery grade nickel in the next five to ten years, leading to production and supply chain problems. In the interim gas power stations are doing the heavy lifting of grid balancing and wind backup. It wasn’t cheap before the war in Ukraine and it’s not cheap now. Moreover, as we’ve dismantled our conventional power generation, we’ve lost a great deal of spinning reserve for short term grid balancing so we’re now having to build standalone flywheels – simulating the spinning metal mass of a power station turbine.

The demonstrator is set to cost £25m. The more intermittent energy we add the more it destabilises the grid so we could end up needing dozens of these contraptions. Elsewhere the renewables sector is looking at conversion of surplus wind energy (at times of low demand) into hydrogen which would then be piped to gas stations and converted into methane. Again, this is not past the demonstrator phase, so we have no real world data on costs and conversion losses. One analysis has it that the technology to convert power to hydrogen and back to power has a round-trip efficiency of 18%-46%, In comparison, two mature long-duration technologies, pumped-storage hydropower and compressed air energy storage, boast round-trip efficiencies of 70%-85% and 42%-67%, respectively.

A more technical paper, assessing German research, concludes that the balancing of fluctuations of renewable energy though green hydrogen seems feasible only up to a level of several GWh per day. “However, the German government’s idea of replacing a significant share of conventionally produced electric energy in the order of TWh with hydrogen does not stand up to scientific analysis”. In short, there is no current cost effective technology capable of mitigating intermittency caused by wind and solar.

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“The CDC panel voted 15-0 to add the Covid “vaccinations” to the Vaccines For Children program. Tomorrow they vote to move to the childhood schedule. ”

Ladapo Dismisses CDC Adding COVID Vaccine to Childhood Schedule (FV)

Amidst the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) upcoming vote to add the COVID-19 vaccine to the Vaccine for Kids program along with being on the childhood vaccine schedule, Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo declared any decision will have minimal, if any, impact on the Sunshine State. The CDC is set to meet with the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) to vote. “Regardless of what [CDC] votes [Wednesday] on whether COVID-19 vax are added to routine child immunizations – nothing changes in FL,” Ladapo declared. “Thanks to [Gov. Ron DeSantis], COVID mandates are NOT allowed in FL, NOT pushed into schools, & I continue to recommend against them for healthy kids.

Ladapo recently recommended against men aged 18-39 receiving the mRNA COVID vaccines, citing a rise in cardiac risk to the tune of 84%. “Results from the stratified analysis for cardiac-related death following vaccination suggests mRNA vaccination may be driving the increased risk in males, especially among males aged 18 – 39,” the review from the Florida Department of Health says. “As such, the State Surgeon General recommends against males aged 18 to 39 from receiving mRNA COVID-19 vaccines. Those with preexisting cardiac conditions, such as myocarditis and pericarditis, should take particular caution when making this decision,” Ladapo’s office announced.

“Studying the safety and efficacy of any medications, including vaccines, is an important component of public health,” Ladapo said. “Far less attention has been paid to safety and the concerns of many individuals have been dismissed – these are important findings that should be communicated to Floridians.” Shortly after the surgeon general tweeted the announcement, Twitter blocked users from seeing it before restoring it. Ladapo took to social media Monday morning to combat critics and skeptics of the new release. “I love the discussion that we’ve stimulated. Isn’t it great when we discuss science transparently instead of trying to cancel one another?” he said. “I’m going to respond to the more substantive critiques.”

Tucker CDC

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Only the state can mandate. But most will follow the CDC criminals.

Ladapo: mRNA COVID-19 Vaccines Shouldn’t Be Given to Young Men (ET)

Studies and other data show that the Moderna and Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines should not be given to young men, Florida’s surgeon general says. Florida health officials recently analyzed data on vaccinated state residents and detected a sharp increase in heart-related deaths among males aged 18 to 39 after vaccination. The state is now recommending that population, with exceptions, should not get one of the messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccines. “In young men, from 18 to 39, it clearly was a signal for increased risk,” Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo told EpochTV’s “American Thought Leaders” program. “That was the main finding.” [..]

Taken together with other research that has found young vaccinated males experiencing heart inflammation at higher rates than unvaccinated young males—including studies from Scandinavia, England, and the United States—Florida officials decided to issue the new recommendation, which contradicts guidance from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). “There are a number of studies that are indicating that these vaccines, mRNA COVID-19 vaccines, increase the risk of adverse cardiovascular and cardiac events. And we just added to that with another one,” Ladapo said.

“While our study is not definitive—and we never claimed it was—the fact that there is so much evidence that is consistent with our findings very obviously means that you need to consider whether doing … COVID-19, mRNA COVID-19 vaccinations, including them in a strategy, a public health strategy for young men at this point in the pandemic, makes sense. … It doesn’t make any sense. And obviously, should not be giving mRNA COVID-19 vaccines to young men at this point in the pandemic,” he added later. The official statement communicating the updated Florida guidance says that the benefit of vaccination for young males is likely outweighed by the “abnormally high risk of cardiac-related death.” It noted that the other available COVID-19 vaccines were not linked with the risk.

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Baby Bear Tree

 

 

 

 

 

 


Saturn the Moon Jupiter and its moons

 

 

Reindeer cyclone

 

 

 

 

Fever

 

 

 

 

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Jan 062022
 
 January 6, 2022  Posted by at 10:06 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  81 Responses »


Caravaggio Nativity with St. Francis and St. Lawrence 1600

 

Omicron Spreads Faster Than Delta Within Vaccinated Individuals (ET)
Illegal Refusal to Fill Prescriptions, Civil Rights Violations, Negligence
If You Have No Symptoms, Please Don’t Get Tested (ET)
Dr. Robert Malone, After Twitter Ban, Has ‘No Choice but to Carry On’ (ET)
Covid-19 Medicine Kits’ Distribution Begins In Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh (HT)
More Bad News On Covid Vaccines And Myocarditis In Men Under 40 (Berenson)
Fauci Says ‘Fully Vaccinated’ Now Includes “Up To Date” Boosters (ZH)
‘Falling Over In A Screaming Heap’ (G.)
Tomorrowland Has Fallen (Greer)
White House Puts Port Envoy on Podium to Discuss Supply Chain Issues (CTH)
FBI To Host First Annual Jan 6 Reunion (BBee)

 

 

 

 

 

 

BBC truther
https://twitter.com/i/status/1478685527251599361

 

 

 

 

 

 

And even faster with a booster.

Omicron Spreads Faster Than Delta Within Vaccinated Individuals (ET)

A Danish study of nearly 12,000 households has discovered that Omicron spreads faster than Delta among those who are fully vaccinated, and even higher between those who have received booster shots, demonstrating strong evidence of the variant’s immune evasiveness. The Omicron variant was found to evade the immunity of vaccinated individuals at a much faster pace compared to Delta, and at a higher rate than the unvaccinated, according to the study conducted by researchers at the University of Copenhagen, Statistics Denmark, and Statens Serum Institut. “Comparing households infected with the Omicron to Delta VOC, we found an 1.17 times higher SAR for unvaccinated, 2.61 times higher for fully vaccinated and 3.66 times higher for booster-vaccinated individuals, demonstrating strong evidence of immune evasiveness of the Omicron VOC,” said the preprint of the study. SAR refers to secondary attack rate.

However, the study also discovered that unvaccinated individuals spread the virus more easily than those who are fully vaccinated, while there was reduced transmission between people who received booster shots. There were altogether 11,937 households involved in the study, out of which 2,225 already had Omicron. After one to 7 days, the team followed up with the households and found 6,397 secondary infections. The SAR was found to be 31 percent with the Omicron, and 21 percent with the Delta variant. Omicron has spread to 90 countries worldwide and has become the dominant variant in the United States. However, the strain has proven to cause mild symptoms compared to earlier variants like Delta, and results in fewer hospitalizations.

“The Omicron VOC (variant of concern) has been reported to be three to six times as infectious as previous variants, with a short doubling time, including early estimates from countries with a high vaccination coverage indicating doubling times of 1.8 days (UK), 1.6 days (Denmark), 2.4 days (Scotland) and 2.0 days (United States),” from the study. The researchers also suggested considering alternate methods for combating the infection. “Our data indicate that the non-pharmaceutical interventions that were used to control the previous variants of SARS-CoV-2 are also likely to be effective against the Omicron VOC.”

Seventy-eight percent of Danish citizens are fully vaccinated with two doses, while almost half have received a booster shot. More than 80 percent have received Pfizer-BioNTech’s vaccine. The effectiveness of vaccines is reduced to around 40 percent for symptoms and 80 percent for severe disease with the Omicron variant. Numbers were better with booster shots as the effectiveness was reduced only to 86 percent for symptoms and 98 percent respectively for those suffering from severe infection.

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Dr. Brian Tyson had his lawyer write a letter to the pharmacy that refused to fill his ivermection prescriptions. He no longer has that problem.

Illegal Refusal to Fill Prescriptions, Civil Rights Violations, Negligence

CVS Pharmacy #16937, NPI 1366464968
Garfield Beach CVS LLC
CVS Health Corporation
2295 N. Imperial Avenue
El Centro, California 92243-1335
Re: Illegal Refusal to Fill Prescriptions, Civil Rights Violations, Negligence

Dear Managers and Owners:
It has come to my attention that your pharmacy has refused to fill valid prescriptions for ivermectin. Your pharmacy manager told one customer that the refusal was because ivermectin was not FDA-approved for use in treatment of COVID-19. This same manager told the prescribing physician that she was “not comfortable” dispensing a prescription for ivermectin to treat COVID-19 and that there was “no indication” for the prescription. The FDA does not “approve” uses at all. The FDA merely determines whether to approve or clear products for marketing and labelling of the “intended use” submitted to it. To be marketed, a product need only have a single intended use.

All treatments beyond such intended use are a matter of discretionary medical practice by licensed physicians. New “off-label” uses for drugs are often discovered after the FDA approves a package insert. Off-label use is legal and widely accepted practice. A manufacturer’s label is not proscriptive, and does not prohibit use for a longer period, or in any other manner not described in the labeling. The FDA cannot and does not prohibit physicians from prescribing off-label use. Any assertion that a prescription is invalid because it is off-label is utterly devoid of basis in law or fact. It is for the professional judgment of a licensed physician – and not a pharmacist or the FDA – to determine that an off-label prescription is appropriate treatment for a patient.

Ivermectin is an antiparasitic medication approved by the FDA for use in humans. Ivermectin is on the World Health Organization’s Model List of Essential Medicines, and ivermectin oral tablets are used worldwide for treatment of certain parasitic infections. SARS-CoV-2 (which causes COVID-19) is such a parasitic infection. SARS-CoV-2 exhibits bacteriophage-like behavior as it replicates in bacterial growth medium such as are found in the human intestines. In vitro studies have shown that ivermectin inhibits the replication of SARS-CoV-2. And Dr. Anthony Fauci’s National Institutes of Health (NIH) publishes:

“In 2015, the Nobel Committee for Physiology or Medicine, in its only award for treatments of infectious diseases since six decades prior, honoured the discovery of ivermectin (IVM), a multifaceted drug deployed against some of the world’s most devastating tropical diseases. Since March 2020, when IVM was first used against a new global scourge, COVID-19, more than 20 randomized clinical trials (RCTs) have tracked such inpatient and outpatient treatments. Six of seven meta-analyses of IVM treatment RCTs reporting in 2021 found notable reductions in COVID-19 fatalities, with a mean 31% relative risk of mortality vs. controls. During mass IVM treatments in Peru, excess deaths fell by a mean of 74% over 30 days in its ten states with the most extensive treatments. Reductions in deaths correlated with the extent of IVM distributions in all 25 states with p < 0.002. Sharp reductions in morbidity using IVM were also observed in two animal models, of SARS-CoV-2 and a related betacoronavirus. The indicated biological mechanism of IVM, competitive binding with SARSCoV-2 spike protein, is likely non-epitope specific, possibly yielding full efficacy against emerging viral mutant strains.”3

Moreover, Dr. Brian Tyson (no relation to yours truly) is the prescribing physician for the prescriptions at issue. Dr. Tyson is a world-renowned expert on the treatment of COVID-19. Dr. Tyson has testified nationally and internationally on topic, and he has successfully treated more than 6,500 COVID-19 patients. Dr. Tyson’s professional judgment to prescribe ivermectin for a patient to treat COVID-19 is completely supported by the science, the law, and his extensive experience.

Curiously, CVS had been filling ivermectin prescriptions for patients of Dr. Tyson for roughly two years, and only suddenly decided to stop. That decision is illegal, violates the civil rights of Dr. Tyson’s patients, interferes with Dr. Tyson’s ability to practice medicine, and constitutes the unlicensed and negligent practice of medicine by CVS. This letter is a courtesy request that you immediately resume the longstanding practice of filling Dr. Tyson’s prescriptions for ivermectin. Fail not at your peril, as the next letter will be a formal notice of intent to sue. Thank you.

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Ladapo is fresh air.

If You Have No Symptoms, Please Don’t Get Tested (ET)

Florida’s Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo issued new guidance for COVID-19 tests on Jan. 4 in a bid to reduce the strain on the state’s testing centers. So many people are using the centers the availability of tests is under pressure. “We are going to scale back,” Ladapo told reporters at a press conference. “We’re coming back to something sensible.” People have been flooding Florida testing sites, leading to long lines, he said. Instead of restricting testing, however, Ladapo said he would place a new emphasis on “high-value” testing against those of “low-value” in order to give priority to tests that would “likely change outcomes” based on a positive or negative result.

For example, someone who is elderly with pre-existing medical conditions and is having symptoms he regards as high value. Someone who is otherwise healthy with no pre-existing medical issues and with no symptoms is low value, he explained. Ladapo said people need to get back to a “sense of normalcy” in society. “We need to unwind this sort of planning and living one’s life around testing,” Ladapo said. “It’s really time for people to be living; to make the decisions they want regarding vaccination; to enjoy the fact that many people have natural immunity; and to unwind this preoccupation with only COVID as determining the boundaries and constraints and possibilities of life. “And we’re going to start that in Florida.”

[..] He said that Florida has seen a rapid increase in cases and hospitalizations, but added it is not comparable to the case rise. “A substantial share, based on the data we have from some of our hospitals of the patients in hospitals with COVID, are there in the hospital with COVID rather than for COVID.” In other words, people who go to the hospital are there for other reasons and then test positive for COVID-19 because hospitals test everyone who comes for treatment, Ladapo said. The surgeon general said that federal leadership had “created a monster” in public health. “What’s happened in the country is that people have forgotten, or abandoned basic public health principles,” he said. “Instead, they have opted for things that are anti-public health.”

He said anti-public health is “taking away people’s options” and “ability to choose.” “Anti-health tends to be mandates,” he continued. “Anti-public health is losing touch with sensibility.” The Surgeon General’s office wants to educate and provide people with the ability to make “better decisions.”

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“I don’t want to tell people what to think I want to help them think and give them the tools to do it.”

Dr. Robert Malone, After Twitter Ban, Has ‘No Choice but to Carry On’ (ET)

Dr. Robert Malone, a virologist and immunologist who has worked on the development of mRNA vaccines, reacted to recent bans handed down by Twitter and LinkedIn. “I felt compelled by my own ethics, that I needed to speak about what I was observing,” Malone told EpochTV’s “American Thought Leaders” program on Wednesday in reference to comments he’s made about vaccine mandates. “I may be one of the very few that has this depth of understanding of the technology that doesn’t have a direct financial conflict of interest,” Malone told The Epoch Times. “If I’m not allowed to speak about my concerns, whether they’re right or wrong … who is a valid person to participate in the dialogue?” Malone said due to his publicly vocal opposition to COVID-19 vaccine requirements and mandatory vaccinations in children, he and Dr. Peter McCullough—a cardiologist who recently argued that COVID-19 vaccine mandates should be repealed—have been “shut down, attacked, [and] had purposeful attacks” against their medical licenses or freedom to practice medicine.

Last week, Twitter suspended Malone’s account without warning for alleged violations of the platform’s policies around COVID-19. Malone also reiterated during Wednesday’s interview that LinkedIn suspended his account. “We have no choice but to carry on,” Malone said, adding that if he were “go back to my farm, and hang out with my wife, which is what I would far prefer to do,” he would be “abdicating the responsibility that I now hold as … one of the identified leaders of this globally.” Malone noted during the interview that during his podcast with Joe Rogan about a week ago, he made reference to a theory known as “mass formation psychosis,” also known as mass hysteria.

“I mean, it has been amazing watching it, and what it demonstrates is the lack of self-awareness by Big Tech,” he said in reference to reports of Google allegedly manipulating search results about the term. “They are caught up in the mass formation themselves, or they are intentionally manipulating” results, he added. “It’s more important to me to help people to get access to the data and learn to think for themselves and make their own opinion,” Malone also said. “I don’t want to tell people what to think I want to help them think and give them the tools to do it.”

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The kits double as protection against the vaccine, which they also roll out. Modi is the vaxx man.

Covid-19 Medicine Kits’ Distribution Begins In Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh (HT)

With the help of monitoring committees, the distribution of Covid-19 medicine kits began in Varanasi on Saturday as a preventive measure to check the third wave of Covid-19, said additional chief medical officer (ACMO), Dr Sanjay Rai. District magistrate (DM) Kaushal Raj Sharma had procured a large quantity of Covid medicines for the city from the government and monitoring committees had been roped in to distribute the medicine kits, he said. “A total of 874 committees will distribute the kits in rural areas under eight primary health centers (PHCs) in developmental block areas of Varanasi. Likewise, monitoring committees of all 90 wards will distribute the Covid medicine kits in urban areas under 24 PHCs. These committees will also distribute the kits in Ramnagar and Gangapur areas,” Dr Rai said.

Apart from this, the Covid medicine kits would also be available at five other identified places, including seven Covid hospitals, railway stations, bus stands and jail in the city. Dr Rai said, “The Covid medicine kits comprise different medicines for different age group of people. The kits for children from birth to 1 year, and 1-5 years contain paracetamol drops, ORS and multivitamin drops. While for 5-12 years, it has paracetamol tablets, Ivermectin 6 mg and Vitamin B complex. Azithromycin 500, Ivermectin 12 mg, Vitamin D3, Vitamin C, Zinc, Vitamin B complex and paracetamol tablets are available for those above 12 years.” The total number of Covid-19 active cases in Varanasi increased to 46 on Saturday, with 21 more people testing positive for the virus in the district during the day.

District magistrate Kaushal Raj Sharma has appealed to the people to follow Covid protocol, including wearing face masks, sanitising hands frequently and maintaining physical distancing of two yards. Chief medical officer Dr Sandip Chaudhary said, “Vaccination will be done at 529 centers in the district on January 3. This facility will be available for people between 15 and 18 years of age.” He said that slots had been opened for a week from 8pm on Saturday and beneficiaries would be able to get vaccination from 10am. “Now, six people can be registered on the CoWin portal with one mobile number. Day/night special vaccination center at Sigra Stadium and LT College, Orderly Bazar, will also be operational from 7am to 10pm,” he added.

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“For the Moderna vaccine, the risks were even higher, reaching 16-fold after the second shot.”

More Bad News On Covid Vaccines And Myocarditis In Men Under 40 (Berenson)

A huge new study has found the risk of serious heart problems called myocarditis in men under 40 soars with each dose of a Covid mRNA vaccine – and is sharply higher than the risk from a coronavirus infection itself. The findings call into sharp question the efforts by American colleges and universities to make their students receive booster shots before returning to school this January – especially since other studies have shown that the risk of post-vaccine myocarditis is concentrated not merely in men under 40 but in those aged 16-25. The study, which British researchers released in late December, showed that the risk of myocarditis almost doubled after the first Pfizer shot in men under 40.

Then it doubled again after the second and doubled again after the third – to almost eight times the baseline risk. For the Moderna vaccine, the risks were even higher, reaching 16-fold after the second shot. (The risk of a third Moderna shot could not be calculated because too few people received it.) Because each Moderna shot contains 100 micrograms of mRNA, while each Pfizer shot contains 30, the findings suggest strongly that the heart risks are dose-related and likely to continue to rise with each additional shot. The study also contained some evidence that post-vaccine myocarditis might be more dangerous than other forms of myocarditis. It showed a trend towards higher death rates in people hospitalized for myocarditis after vaccination compared to other myocarditis cases.

Both myocarditis and pericarditis are forms of heart inflammation that can be very serious, even deadly. In an appendix, the researchers reported that 263 Britons were hospitalized for myocarditis within four weeks of receiving a Pfizer shot; of those, 38, or 14 percent, died. Only about 9 percent of people hospitalized for myocarditis that did not follow an mRNA vaccination died.

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Bit of a battle emerging between Fauci and Walensky?

Fauci Says ‘Fully Vaccinated’ Now Includes “Up To Date” Boosters (ZH)

A few weeks ago, Dr. Anthony Fauci hinted that the federal government would soon change its definition of “fully vaccinated” to include not just the two original shots but at least one booster dose as well.But in the latest indication that Dr. Fauci has succeeded in pushing this scheme, the good doctor said Tuesday during a lecture at the National Institutes of Health that new terminology would be used in place of the “fully vaccinated” language. Instead of referring to somebody as “fully vaccinated”, they will be referred to as having their vaccinations “up to date” to reflect the notion that they have gotten their booster shots.”We’re using the terminology now ‘keeping your vaccinations up to date,’ rather than what ‘fully vaccinated’ means,” Fauci said during a National Institutes of Health lecture Tuesday. “Right now, optimal protection is with a third shot of an mRNA or a second shot of a J&J.”


This follows a decision by the CDC on Tuesday to shorten the time frame for Pfizer-BioNTech’s COVID booster jab, which can now be administered within five months of the initial two-shot series, instead of six. Meanwhile, a CDC advisory panel is expected to recommend boosters for teenagers during a meeting on Wednesday. According to certain research studies, Pfizer’s vaccine provides a 25x increase in neutralizing antibodies that fight the variant while Moderna’s booster produces a 37x increase in antibodies. Meanwhile, two doses of Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine cut hospitalizations in South Africa by 85%. “We are continuing to follow that science and it is literally evolving daily. And as that science evolves, we will continue to review the data and update our recommendations as necessary,” CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said at a White House briefing Dec. 15.

Fauci 2009

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Read this whole thing and then tell me you’re blaming the unvaccinated. Two years into a pandemic, hospital has no staff, no equipment, nada.

‘Falling Over In A Screaming Heap’ (G.)

One of New South Wales’ major regional hospitals had to source its own triage tent, is sending Covid tests six hours away due to a lack of space for its own diagnosis machine, and has had positive patients wait 30 hours to be transferred to a designated hospital for those with the virus. Doctors at the Tweed hospital, which is 1km from the Queensland border in northern NSW and serves a hinterland that includes Byron Bay, are even donning personal protective equipment to drive home, in their own cars, asymptomatic Covid-positive patients because taxis won’t take them. Kristin Ryan-Agnew, president of the local branch of the Nurses and Midwives Association and a senior nurse at the hospital, said local Covid cases were tripling daily, much faster than the 5o% growth in new cases reported for NSW as a whole on Wednesday.

As a result of increased presentations to Tweed’s emergency department, nurses were doing “double shifts every day” with one day off before resuming the toil. “They’re going to fall over in a screaming heap,” she said. “They will not be able to manage.” Eighteen staff, many of them senior, have resigned since December out of a roster of about 150, citing burn-out and the better conditions offered over the border. Queensland offers $1,800 a year for nurses’ education, a Covid bonus – both absent in NSW – and higher wages, Ryan-Agnew said. “They were really top-notch, really good quality staff, and they can walk up to the Gold Coast and they’ll just completely snaffle them.” As Guardian Australia reported on Wednesday, nurses at Lismore Base hospital – the destination for Tweed’s Covid patients needing treatment – are also struggling to cope with a surge in medical needs.

The Tweed hospital is buckling under spiking demand for care and a lack of trained staff and appropriate equipment. A senior manager, for instance, had to phone around themselves and then purchase the triage tent prior to Christmas after months of pleading to the health department, Ryan-Agnew said. The tent, though, remains far from adequate, with no toilet, forcing potentially Covid-positive patients – and anyone waiting for PCR testing to cross the border – to traipse through the main hospital lobby. “You can have people with heart conditions, sick kids, elderly, frail, all sitting there waiting to be seen, and you’ve got a potential Covid patient walking through the waiting room,” Ryan-Agnew said.

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“People couldn’t do anything about the plague, but they could burn witches, and so they did.”

Tomorrowland Has Fallen (Greer)

Watch the way that the people who are shrieking about the Omicron variant fixate on case numbers and go out of their way to avoid talking about how few people have been killed or made seriously ill by it. Watch the way that these same people pounce, with something that looks unsettlingly like delight, on any suggestion that some other microbe is about to spring out of hiding and kill us all. For that matter, the overreaction to the Covid-19 phenomenon is really rather odd, when you think about it. If you subtract all the people who died with rather than of Covid-19 from the statistics, it’s pretty clear that what we’ve dealt with is an ordinary respiratory epidemic like the 1958 and 1967 influenza outbreaks.

Those had comparable fatality rates, and were dealt with by throwing the available resources into protecting the old and vulnerable—not by shutting down whole economies, shredding civil rights, and shoving inadequately tested experimental drugs on entire populations. What we’ve seen over the last two years doesn’t look like a constructive response to a pandemic. It looks like the desperate gyrations of control freaks who are trying to avoid dealing with their fears by piling exorbitant demands on everyone around them. Thus I’d like to suggest that something of the sort may be involved in the love affair between the managerial aristocracy and the Covid-19 virus. I think that it’s a displacement activity. If you know much about ethology—the study of animal behavior—you already know all about displacement activities.

For those who don’t have that background, I’ll summarize. Most social species have ways to deal with aggression short of killing each other. Watch two starlings who are upset at each other. They may suddenly start preening their feathers, or draw themselves up as though about to fight, or even peck suddenly and violently at some object besides each other. Human beings do the same thing: watch an angry man scratch his head in frustration, ball up his fists on his hips, or slam a fist down on a table, rather than punch the daylights out of the person who’s angered him. Those are displacement activities. Anger isn’t the only emotion that generates displacement activities in animals, or for that matter in humans. One of the more interesting details of human collective psychology is the way that fear can drive even more elaborate displacement routines, especially when there’s nothing that can be done about the actual reason for the fear.

Consider the witch hunts that followed in the wake of the Black Death. For three and a half centuries after bubonic plague first swept through Europe, new outbreaks of the disease were a constant threat, and the medical knowledge of the time offered no effective means of prevention or cure. The result? Panic over evil witches became the displacement activity du jour, and around fifty thousand people were burnt or hanged as a result. (No, it wasn’t nine million, nor were they all women; the Neopagan movement, back in its heyday, competed heavily in the Oppression Olympics, with the usual collateral damage to mere historical fact.) People couldn’t do anything about the plague, but they could burn witches, and so they did.

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Supply chains for supermarkets vs restaurants are entirely different entities.

White House Puts Port Envoy on Podium to Discuss Supply Chain Issues (CTH)

The 60/40 supply chain for food away from home (restaurants, fast-food locales, schools, cafeterias etc.), and food at home (supermarkets and grocery stores etc.), is not something you can just fiddle around with. Supply chains are challenging on their own. However, within the various supply chains, the supply chain for U.S. food distribution is the most complex supply chain in the world. There’s nothing even close. It was created by decades of free market operators following efficiencies of scale to produce the best, most wholesome and reliable food supply chain ever created. In many ways it is our best national security advantage. The free-market distribution system would eventually overcome the problem and reestablish its efficiencies.

However, given the scale of disruption -and the fact that catch up harvests are seasonal- it was obviously taking several years. Most Americans were not aware going into the COVID mitigation effort that food consumption in the U.S. was a 60/40 proposition. Approximately 60% of all food was consumed “outside the home” (or food away from home), and 40% of all food consumed was food “inside the home” (grocery shoppers). Food ‘outside the home’ includes restaurants, fast food locales, schools, corporate cafeterias, university lunchrooms, manufacturing cafeterias, hotels, food trucks, park and amusement food sellers and many more. Many of those venues are not thought about when people evaluate the overall U.S. food delivery system; however, this network was approximately 60 percent of all food consumption on a daily basis.

The ‘food away from home‘ sector has its own supply chain. Very few restaurants and venues (cited above) purchase food products from retail grocery outlets. As a result of the coronavirus mitigation effort, the ‘food away from home’ sector was reduced by 75% of daily food delivery operations. However, people still needed to eat. That meant retail food outlets, grocers, would see sales increases of 25 to 50 percent, depending on the area. The retail consumer supply chain for manufactured and processed food products includes bulk storage to compensate for seasonality. As Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue noted in 2020, “There are over 800 commercial and public warehouses in the continental 48 states that store frozen products.”

“Here is a snapshot of the food we had in storage at the end of February 2020: over 302 million pounds of frozen butter; 1.36 billion pounds of frozen cheese; 925 million pounds of frozen chicken; over 1 billion pounds of frozen fruit; nearly 2.04 billion pounds of frozen vegetables; 491 million pounds of frozen beef; and nearly 662 million pounds of frozen pork.” This bulk food storage is how the total U.S. consumer food supply ensures consistent availability even with weather impacts. As a nation, we essentially stay one harvest ahead of demand by storing it and smoothing out any peak/valley shortfalls. There are a total of 175,642 commercial facilities involved in this supply chain across the country

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Enjoy the tribunal!

FBI To Host First Annual Jan 6 Reunion (BBee)

Special agents involved in last year’s ‘January 6th Insurrection Against Democracy™’ are set to reunite as guests of honor at an extravagant gala hosted by the FBI. The event will reportedly feature live music and entertainment, with comedian James Corden acting as master of ceremonies. Numerous celebrities and public figures are expected to be in attendance, including former FBI Director James Comey. “I’m really excited to be relevant again,” he said, excitedly rubbing his hands together. According to sources, several private citizens have questioned why taxpayer money is being used to throw a lavish party for government officials.


White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki addressed these concerns during her daily press briefing. “Well, first I would say, that President Biden is committed to the Build Back Better™ bill,” Psaki reasoned. “Therefore, he cares for the American people and, as such, cares deeply about how their money is utilized. So, obviously, it’s fine.” Psaki went on to applaud the FBI for all their hard work that cannot be disclosed. The event will not be open to the public.

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Jon Stewart: Newsweek et al, may eat my ass.

 

 

Where the elements come from

 

 

 

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

 

Sep 232021
 


Hasui Kawase Moon at Megome (woodblock print) 1930

 

Early Treatment vs Stay at Home Until You Can’t Breathe (Burk)
The Lesson Of Ivermectin: Meta-analyses Based On Summary Data (Nature)
Florida Surgeon General Nominee Ladapo ‘Done With’ Vaccine ‘Fear’ (NM)
Quantum-Dot Tattoos Hold Vaccination Record (Rice)
From The Mouth Of A Front Line Nurse (Tribe)
North Carolina Hospital System Suspends 365 Unvaxxed Employees (ET)
Anti-Vaxxer Father To Stand Trial On Friday (K.)
Greek Gov’t Moves To Protect Teachers From Anti-Vaxxers, Covid Deniers (K.)
US to Donate 500 Million More COVID-19 Vaccines to Poor Countries (ET)
Covid-19 In Norway Can Now Be Compared To The Flu – Health Chief (Loc.)
The Politics of Fear and Self-Preservation (Whitney Webb)
The Hunter Biden Laptop Is Confirmed?! Color Us Shocked! (NYP Ed.)

 

 

Barnes

 

 

“Call anyone hospitalised within 14 days of jab ‘unvaccinated’. Don’t highlight that most adverse reactions to jab will happen within first 14 days. Voilà: ‘Pandemic of the Unvaccinated’.”

 

 

Croatia

 

 

3 months is all you get. And then it’s booster time.

 

 

Kulldorff

 

 

Sep 11. Should we all say Stromectol istead of ivermectin?

Early Treatment vs Stay at Home Until You Can’t Breathe (Burk)

Flavio Cadeginia, MD, PhD, is an academic endocrinologist in Brazil who took a team of researchers to the State of Amazonas in January 2021 to evaluate the situation in cities where hospitals were overcrowded with the gamma variant wave of the virus. Half his team was skeptical that early outpatient treatment could have any impact on keeping patients out of the hospital. Almost all the cities were running out of oxygen supplies including Manaus, the capital of 2.2 million. Dr. Cadeginia encountered an unexpected anomaly in Coari, a small city of 56,000 where the hospitals were empty. He asked the health director for an explanation, but she was shy to reply in front of the group and requested a private conversation. She admitted that they had been giving Stromectol to the entire population for the past 2 months, but was afraid to tell him for fear of being accused of using an unproven treatment.

His whole team became immediate believers in early treatment. Similar stories about early treatment successes with Stromectol (brand name to avoid censorship) have been reported in other countries including Peru and India. In Peru, an army-led mass early treatment program, Mega-Operación Tayta (MOT), in the fall of 2020 resulted in a 14-fold decrease in excess deaths. When the MOT was canceled and a restrictive treatment program was instituted by a new president in November, there was a 13-fold increase in excess deaths over the next 2 months. In India, Uttar Pradesh is a state of 241 million, 2/3 the size of the United States. A wave of the delta variant in the summer of 2021 resulted in 414,000 cases and 4,000 deaths per day. Five weeks after adding Stromectol to their treatment protocol there was a dramatic drop on August 5th to 26 new cases and 3 deaths.

On that same day in the US there were 127,108 new cases and 574 new deaths where the use of Stromectol has been actively discouraged by the FDA and Tony Fauci at the NIH. Following the lead of the US rather than Uttar Pradesh, the State of Tamil Nadu rejected Stromectol in May going on to lead India in death rate. This fateful decision was influenced by a Tweet from WHO Chief Scientist Dr. Soumya Swaminathan against the use of Stromectol resulting in her being sued by the Indian Bar Association and threatened with criminal prosecution for each death. They accused her of furthering the agenda of the drug companies in protecting the EUA for their profitable vaccines. More than 10 successful lawsuits have been won against US hospitals by Ralph Lorigo for prohibiting prescription of Stromectol to dying patients in the ICU.

In January 2021 a judge ordered Rochester General Hospital to give it to Sue Dickinson, a 65-year old woman on a ventilator, who improved within 12 hours and was later released from the hospital. Eight other patients, including 81-year old John Swanson and 80-year old Judith Smentkiewicz, also made similar court-ordered miraculous recoveries. Why would the CDC aggressively block the compassionate off label use of a “wonder” drug with anti-viral properties taken safely by billions of people around the world for the treatment of parasitic diseases and meriting the Nobel Prize in 2015 for its discoverers? According to Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., the CDC is considered a “captured agency,” a sock puppet for the industry it is supposed to regulate. Half of their budget comes from buying and selling vaccines making it the biggest vaccine distributor in the country.

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Nature Magazine cannot call it a horse dewormer anymore, that’s what they have the rest of the press for.

But they can ask for a (long-term) “meta-analysis” for a proven safe drug, while propagating substances for which no such analysis or safety profile exists.

The Lesson Of Ivermectin: Meta-analyses Based On Summary Data (Nature)

Relying on low-quality or questionable studies in the current global climate presents severe and immediate harms. The enormous impact of COVID-19 and the consequent urgent need to demonstrate the clinical efficacy of new therapeutic options provides fertile ground for even poorly evidenced claims of efficacy to be amplified, both in the scientific literature and on social media. This context can lead to the rapid translation of almost any apparently favorable conclusion from a relatively weak trial or set of trials into widespread clinical practice and public policy. We believe that this situation requires immediate remediation. The most salient change required is a change in perspective on the part of both primary researchers and those who bring together the results of individual studies to draw wider conclusions.

Specifically, we propose that clinical research should be seen as a contribution of data toward a larger omnibus question rather than an assemblage of summary statistics. Most, if not all, of the flaws described above would have been immediately detected if meta-analyses were performed on an individual patient data (IPD) basis. In particular, irregularities such as extreme terminal digit bias and the duplication of blocks of patient records would have been both obvious and immediately interrogable from raw data if provided.

We recommend that meta-analysts who study interventions for COVID-19 should request and personally review IPD in all cases, even if IPD synthesis techniques are not used. In a similar vein, all clinical trials published on COVID-19 should immediately follow best-practice guidelines and upload anonymized IPD so that this type of analysis can occur. Any study for which authors are not able or not willing to provide suitably anonymized IPD should be considered at high risk of bias for incomplete reporting and/or excluded entirely from meta-syntheses.

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“The state will approach policymaking, he said, in a manner that is “very explicit about the differences between ‘the science’ and our opinions.”

Florida Surgeon General Nominee Ladapo ‘Done With’ Vaccine ‘Fear’ (NM)

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Tuesday announced that Dr. Joseph Ladapo would be the state’s new surgeon general and secretary of its health department. “Joe has had a remarkable academic and medical career,” DeSantis, a Republican, said of the Harvard-trained M.D. and Ph.D., according to the Florida news station WJHG7. Ladapo, who is awaiting the approval of the Florida Legislature, says that “we’re done with fear,” according to Real Clear Politics. “That’s something that’s been unfortunately a centerpiece of health policy in the United States ever since the beginning of the pandemic, and it’s over here. Expiration date, it’s done.” Ladapo said that the state will approach COVID-19 openly and scientifically. The state will approach policymaking, he said, in a manner that is “very explicit about the differences between ‘the science’ and our opinions.”

“What’s been happening over the past year is that people have been taking the science, and they’ve been misrepresenting it. … It’s been unclear where the discussion about ‘the science’ ends and discussion about how you feel about the science and what you want people to do with the science begins.” According to WPTV5, when asked what he thinks about vaccination against COVID-19, Ladapo responded: “The state should be promoting good health, and vaccination isn’t the only path to that. It’s been treated almost like a religion, and that’s just senseless, right? There are lots of good pathways to health, and vaccination’s not the only one.” DeSantis, who has promoted the use of other ways to treat COVID-19, said information that suggests alternative treatments to vaccines has been suppressed by the powers that be in Washington.

Speaking about monoclonal antibodies, DeSantis said: “I do think that one of the reasons why this was not something that was put out there very publicly by the experts and by the powers [that] be in D.C. is because they feared that if you tell people there’s an effective treatment, you tell people COVID’s a treatable illness, they feared some people would say, ‘Well, you know, maybe I won’t get vaccinated. I’ll just get the treatment. ”And so they didn’t want that message out because they feared how people would behave.”

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“The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation came to us and said, ‘Hey, we have a real problem — knowing who’s vaccinated..’”

Quantum-Dot Tattoos Hold Vaccination Record (Rice)

Keeping track of a child’s shots could be so much easier with technology invented by a new Rice University professor and his colleagues. Kevin McHugh, an assistant professor of bioengineering at Rice since this summer, and a team at his previous institution, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, report in a cover story in Science Translational Medicine on their development of quantum-dot tags that fluoresce with information after they’re injected as part of a vaccination. The tags are incorporated in only some of the array of sugar-based microneedles on a patch. When the needles dissolve in about two minutes, they deliver the vaccine and leave the pattern of tags just under the skin, where they become something like a bar-code tattoo.


A pattern of 1.5-millimeter microneedles that contain vaccine and fluorescent quantum dots are applied as a patch. The needles dissolve under the skin, leaving the encapsulated quantum dots. Their pattern can be read to identify the vaccine that was administered. The project was co-led by Rice University bioengineer Kevin McHugh during his time at MIT. (Credit: Second Bay Studios)

Instead of ink, this highly specific medical record consists of copper-based quantum dots embedded in biocompatible, micron-scale capsules. Their near-infrared dye is invisible, but the pattern they set can be read and interpreted by a customized smartphone. The two-year project is aimed at the 1.5 million preventable deaths that result from a lack of vaccinations, primarily in developing nations. “The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation came to us and said, ‘Hey, we have a real problem — knowing who’s vaccinated,’” said McHugh, who was recruited to join Rice with funding from the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas. “They said, ‘We go on vaccination campaigns where people get into Hummers, drive to a rural village, set up a tent and start immunizing people, but they don’t always know who’s been immunized before and what vaccines are still needed.”

Parents often don’t know their children’s vaccination histories, McHugh said. “So our idea was to put the record on the person,” he said. “This way, later on, people can scan over the area to see what vaccines have been administered and give only the ones still needed. There are two sides to this,” he said. “First, is that you don’t administer unnecessary vaccines, which has a cost. But even bigger, you don’t leave people underimmunized and at risk of getting an infectious disease.”

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Thread. A lot of people saying this is just anecdotal. But because of all the censoring, that’s often all we have.

From The Mouth Of A Front Line Nurse (Tribe)

From the mouth of a front line nurse: So I have mentioned on here multiple times that my wife’s a nurse at a hospital. Last night she worked an extra shift in the Emergency Room(not her regular department). She found out, how they” are getting away with claiming there’s a “pandemic of the unvaccinated” While dealing with a patient who came in exhibiting symptoms of myocarditis, a FT Emergency Room nurse conveyed some very interesting information to my wife. Apparently all patients are asked whether or not they received the cv19 vax, no matter what issue it is that brought them into the ER. If the patient received the vax less than 14 days prior, they are recorded as “Un-Vaxxed”


The story the nurses are being given, is that this is done because the vax takes 14 days to start working. The FT ER nurse my wife talked to last night has a different theory: It has been her observation that most patients coming in with what appears to be vaccine injuries are coming in within 72 hours of receiving the jab. By recording these patients as “Un-Vaxxed” they can do a few things: – one, they can claim those vax injuries are a result of Covid & not the shot – two, they can bury the vaccine injury – three, they get to claim there’s a “pandemic of the unvaccinated”. It also turns out that nurses are being required to sign nondisclosure agreements, promising not to publicly discuss any procedures dealing with c.. id. My wife refused to sign this agreement, and she’s awaiting possible retaliatory response from upper management.

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Good luck with that.

North Carolina Hospital System Suspends 365 Unvaxxed Employees (ET)

A North Carolina health care system said it suspended hundreds of its employees after the firm implemented a COVID-19 vaccine mandate, adding that workers who refuse to get vaccinated after five days will be fired. “Beginning this week, approximately 375 team members—across 15 hospitals, 800 clinics and hundreds of outpatient facilities—have been confirmed to be non-compliant and are not able to report to work,” stated a press release from Novant Health, which is based in North Carolina but operates in other states. “They will have an opportunity to comply over a five day, unpaid suspension period,” the release said. “If a team member remains non-compliant after this suspension period, he or she will have their employment with Novant Health terminated.”


The firm then claimed that about 98.5 percent of its workforce are compliant with the policy, meaning they have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. Workers who started a two-dose vaccine series have until Oct. 15 to get the second shot, Novant said. Employees who have an exemption are required to get weekly COVID-19 testing, as well as wear N95 masks and eye protection, it added. In a similar move, 125 workers with Indiana University Health, the biggest hospital system in the state, parted ways with the company, according to a news release issued last week. Those workers, it said, did not comply with the firm’s vaccine mandate.

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Interesting from Greece. The guy’s been on all TV channels for three days, with the purpose of painting him as a terrible person. But many people don’t see him that way.

Anti-Vaxxer Father To Stand Trial On Friday (K.)

A 37-year-old man in Thessaloniki, northern Greece, is due to stand trial on Friday after being arrested in the act of causing a disturbance at his son’s elementary school after the boy was not allowed onto the premises because he did not comply with coronavirus safety rules. The boy’s father reportedly barged into the school grounds, shoved and yelled at the principal and prevented other pupils for entering after his son would not produce a negative self-test or wear a mask before entering the premises on Tuesday morning. The incident took place at the Second Elementary School of Thermi, southeast of Thessaloniki.


The 37-year-old was accused of disrupting the operation of a public service, among other charges, and was given until Friday to prepare his defense. Speaking to local media after his release from police custody, the 37-year-old claimed that his son transferred to the Thermi school after a similar incident at his previous school. “Our children are God’s children. I will send him back to school again tomorrow without a mask and without a self-test. Anyone who stands in my way will suffer the consequences,” he told reporters.

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And then you get this…. They just change the law..

Greek Gov’t Moves To Protect Teachers From Anti-vaxxers, Covid Deniers (K.)

Greece’s Citizen Protection Ministry, which is in charge of the police, announced on Wednesday that teachers will no longer be taken into police custody when they are sued by parents of students who oppose the health rules imposed to prevent the spread of the coronavirus in schools. Under government regulations, unvaccinated pupils have to procure negative self test results twice each week, while teachers will have to take twice weekly rapid tests. Pupils and teachers are obliged to wear masks. At the same time, the government is planning to abolish the so-called aftoforo – a law permitting a swift hearing if an arrest is made within 48 hours of an alleged crime – in cases such as these. The move follows a barrage of arrests and lawsuits against educators by parents who refuse to vaccinate their children or even wear face masks.

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500 million Trojan horses.

Dave Collum @DavidBCollum:
“Let me help you with that headline:

US Taxpayer Gives Pfizer $10 billion Dollars”

US to Donate 500 Million More COVID-19 Vaccines to Poor Countries (ET)

The United States has reached an agreement with Pfizer to buy an additional 500 million doses of its COVID-19 vaccine to donate to various countries, President Joe Biden announced Wednesday. “We know we have to act to save lives now,” Biden told a virtual COVID-19 summit that his administration convened when world leaders and business executives. The doses will be donated to low- and lower-middle-income countries around the world,” a senior administration official, who was speaking to reporters on the condition they were not identified, told reporters in a call. They’re all Pfizer doses. The tranche will be made in the United States and will start shipping out in January 2022.


The additional commitment means the United States has pledged to donate or has already donated 1.1 billion vaccine doses. That includes 500 million Pfizer doses that the United States bought over the summer and promised to send to countries the government said needed them. So far, nearly 160 million doses have been sent out to 100 countries around the world, including Peru, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Sudan, El Salvador, and Ethiopia. Most of those have gone to lower-middle-income countries, according to an analysis from the Kaiser Family Foundation. “The United States is donating 1.1 billion doses of COVID-19 vaccines to the world, free of charge, no strings attached,” the official said. “This is a huge commitment by the U.S.”

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Scandinavia seems less prone to insanity.

Covid-19 In Norway Can Now Be Compared To The Flu – Health Chief (Loc.)

Coronavirus can now be categorised as one of several respiratory illnesses with seasonal variation, Geir Bukholm, assistant director of the Norwegian Institute of Public Health (NIPH), has said. For the past year and a half, Covid-19 has been classed as a generally dangerous disease. However, this could change soon as the assistant director of the Norwegian Institute of Public Health (NIPH), Geir Bukholm, has said the coronavirus can now be put in the same category as illnesses such as flu, common colds and RS (respiratory syncytial virus). “We are now in a new phase where we must look at the coronavirus as one of several respiratory diseases with seasonal variation,” Bukholm told paper VG.


Last week the Ministry of Health and Social Care asked the NIPH to assess whether Covid-19 was still a dangerous disease. While the NIPH has yet to return its findings, its assistant director has made it clear that the danger of Covid will be downgraded. Covid could now be compared in severity with the likes of colds and flu because the vast majority of those at most risk of developing severe disease when infected are now fully vaccinated. “This is because the vast majority of those at risk are protected,” Bukholm explained. “And although the infection is still circulating, hospital numbers remain low. Thus, the coronavirus will not lead to a heavy burden on the health service. For those vaccinated who may become infected and develop symptoms, the vast majority will have mild cold-like symptoms.”

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From 9/11 to Covid. It’s a straight line.

The Politics of Fear and Self-Preservation (Whitney Webb)

Many of those who have been quick and vocal to point out the lies of the US government when it comes to the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq and other consequences of the War on Terror have been unable to even consider that the official story of 9/11 may not be legitimate and may indeed have been dealt from the same pack. This may be for a variety of reasons, including a strong desire to not be de-legitimized by their peers as bearers of the “conspiracy theorist” smear and an unwillingness to face a political reality where US government officials may have been complicit in a deadly attack on American soil. In those two examples, however, the failure of such individuals, particularly in media, to even consider that there may be more to the story boils down to a desire for self-preservation in the case of the former and preservation of a particular worldview in the case of the latter.

Yet, in both cases, the casualty is the truth and the cause is cowardice. By failing as a society to thoroughly examine the events of 9/11 and why those events occurred, the American public has shown the powers that be that their desire to preserve a “safe” worldview — and to preserve their own careers, in the case of certain professional classes — is enough to keep people from questioning world-altering events when they emerge. Those powers are well aware of this refusal and have been using it to their advantage ever since. Today, with the COVID-19 crisis still dragging on, we are similarly immersed in a situation where nuance and facts are being cast aside, militantly in some cases, in favor of the establishment narrative. Is everyone who chooses not to take this particular vaccine a “conspiracy theorist” and “anti-vaxxer”?

Does it really make sense to so dramatically divide the public into groups of vaccinated and unvaccinated through a new ID system when the vaccine claims to reduce the severity of illness but not to stop disease transmission? Should those that question the motivation of politicians, powerful pharmaceutical corporations and mainstream media “experts” be censored from expressing those views online? You do not need to agree with those who hold such views, but what is wrong with hearing what they have to say and debating their evidence with your own?

We are losing the ability to have rational public discourse about these issues — and losing it swiftly, at a speed comparable to what took place in the aftermath of 9/11, when questioning the motives of the Bush administration, US intelligence agencies and other groups, as well as their proposed responses and “solutions,” was deemed “unpatriotic” and even “treasonous” by some. Calls were made to strip an entire class of Americans of their freedom for merely sharing the same ethno-religious identities as those we were told attacked us, and many went along with it. Freedom became treated as a privilege only for certain groups, not as a right, and this insidious fallacy has reared its head yet again in recent months in relation to the COVID-19 vaccine debate and also the war on domestic terror.

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The New York Post deserves to have a say here.

The Hunter Biden Laptop Is Confirmed?! Color Us Shocked! (NYP Ed.)

In his new book, “The Bidens: Inside the First Family’s Fifty-Year Rise to Power,” Politico reporter Ben Schreckinger says that evidence points to Hunter Biden’s laptop being legit. While we appreciate the support, the truth is The Post’s reports always have been true, and it’s only because the media wants to protect Joe Biden that they keep referring to the laptop as “unsubstantiated.” Schreckinger notes that “A person who had independent access to Hunter Biden’s emails” confirms two of the e-mails the Post published, including one about a potential deal with China with the line “10 held by H for the big guy?” — that is, Joe Biden. But Hunter Biden’s former business partner Tony Bobulinski already said those e-mails were authentic — the media just ignored him.

Schreckinger adds that e-mails released by the Swedish government also match e-mails from the laptop (Hunter had gotten into a kerfuffle when he was staying in a Swedish embassy building). That’s also been reported. For those who doubt that Hunter would just forget a laptop at a repair shop, Schreckinger notes that Biden’s son abandoned another computer at the home of psychiatrist Keith Ablow. Feds seized that machine when they raided Ablow over abuse claims; Hunter eventually got it back. “I wasn’t keeping tabs on possessions very well for about a four-year period of time,” Hunter said. All of this information is out there. Yet The Times still called the laptop “unsubstantiated” last week (until they quietly corrected the story).

And even as Politico credited its reporter, it added, “While the leak contains genuine files, it remains possible that fake material has been slipped in.” What part? The pictures of Hunter smoking crack? Schreckinger called the White House to check whether, as we reported, Joe Biden met Hunter for a dinner in April 2015 that included Burisma adviser Vadym Pozharskyi. Biden’s team pointed him to a Washington Post “fact check” — which noted that Biden’s team had at first said there “no record of such a meeting,” until they finally conceded that, yes, Joe did drop in on that dinner. The fact confirmed, the writer still concludes, haughtily, that there’s “less to the story than one might imagine.” It’s the perfect example of how Democrats weaponize “fact checkers” to deflect criticism and enlist social media to censor articles. Nothing to see here! See: The Wuhan Lab theory.

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Oz apology

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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