Apr 262022
 


Andy Warhol Ingrid Bergman 1983

 

Tucker: You Just Became A Little More Powerful (CTH)
Taking It Back From Wall Street Is the Correct First Step: Jack Dorsey (Var.)
Media/Politics Collusion Destroyed Trust in Public Health: Dr. Ben Carson (ET)
Shocks to the System (Kunstler)
US A ‘Co-belligerent’ In Ukraine War (Carden)
Kremlin Condemns Blinken Visit To Ukraine & US Arms Shipments (ZH)
The Ukraine War is a Racket (Ron Paul)
The Moskva Riddle (Escobar)
Vaccine Effectiveness Falls To MINUS-391% (DE)
Heart Inflammation More Prevalent Among Vaccinated Than Unvaccinated (ET)
The CDC’s Mask Mandate Is Dead and Won’t Be Back (TH)
Most Young Adults Say US Has A ‘Mental Health Crisis’ (Hill)
Durham Has Hundreds Of E-mails Between Fusion GPS And Reporters (TFog)
Assange’s Fate Can’t Be Left In The Hands Of Priti Patel (John Rees)

 

 

Everyone has an opinion on Elon Musk buying Twitter. I’ll add mine: he couldn’t make it any worse than it is.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mass graves

 

 

 

 

“There is opportunity for much more understanding of how the social media platforms operate just by permitting increased transparency.”

Tucker: You Just Became A Little More Powerful (CTH)

There is an angle to this move which looms. If the doomsday predictions of Twitter’s Thursday anticipated first quarter financial earnings are correct, it is entirely possible that Musk is about to take a massive financial hit. Some, including myself, who understand the financial black hole that Twitter’s business model represents, have suspicions that Twitter may be hung around Musk’s neck like a millstone as he’s thrown into the deep state sea of social media. It will be interesting to see how quickly Musk responds to those Q1 financials. [NOTE: I foresee be a small user fee in the future]


News Release – “Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated,” said Mr. Musk. “I also want to make Twitter better than ever by enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots, and authenticating all humans. Twitter has tremendous potential – I look forward to working with the company and the community of users to unlock it.” Tucker Carlson outlined the political ramifications surrounding breaking one of the big social media platforms away from the deep state control agents.

President Donald Trump will not be returning to Twitter, he is sticking with TruthSocial which is nearing completion. “I am not going on Twitter, I am going to stay on TRUTH,” Trump told Fox News. “I hope Elon buys Twitter because he’ll make improvements to it and he is a good man, but I am going to be staying on TRUTH.” There are a lot of downstream ramifications that have yet to surface as a result of the Musk-Twitter purchase. Will users find out what the rules are for the specific network containers they have been assigned to? Will the scale of simultaneous user data-processing be made public along with the algorithms that Twitter uses once you have been given a specific container assignment?


There is opportunity for much more understanding of how the social media platforms operate just by permitting increased transparency. There’s a possibility once the container assignment process is made public, people will then start to inquire about Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and other Big Tech platform processes that divide people based on arbitrarily determined viewpoints. Most social media users do not understand the technology behind the platform they are using, although a greater awareness is ongoing.

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@jack was running the joint when Trump et al were banned, and all the “non-compliant” Covid doctors.

Taking It Back From Wall Street Is the Correct First Step: Jack Dorsey (Var.)

Twitter co-founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey commented on Elon Musk’s acquisition of the social media platform on Monday night, kicking off his thread with Radiohead’s song “Everything In Its Right Place.” “I love Twitter. Twitter is the closest thing we have to a global consciousness,” he wrote. After stepping down from Twitter in November 2021, Dorsey continued to sit on the company’s board of directors. The board approved Musk’s $44 billion acquisition Monday morning. “The idea and service is all that matters to me, and I will do whatever it takes to protect both. Twitter as a company has always been my sole issue and my biggest regret. It has been owned by Wall Street and the ad model. Taking it back from Wall Street is the correct first step,” his Twitter thread continued.


“In principle, I don’t believe anyone should own or run Twitter. It wants to be a public good at a protocol level, not a company. Solving for the problem of it being a company however, Elon is the singular solution I trust. I trust his mission to extend the light of consciousness,” Dorsey wrote. “Elon’s goal of creating a platform that is “maximally trusted and broadly inclusive” is the right one. This is also @paraga’s goal, and why I chose him. Thank you both for getting the company out of an impossible situation. This is the right path…I believe it with all my heart. “I’m so happy Twitter will continue to serve the public conversation. Around the world, and into the stars!,” Dorsey wrote.

Musk: Asphyxiation of society

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“..we’ve gotten into a system where we have the media in cahoots with the executive branch, sort of overlooking all the other safeguards that we have in our system..”

Media/Politics Collusion Destroyed Trust in Public Health: Dr. Ben Carson (ET)

In the wake of a court decision to end federal mask mandates, Dr. Ben Carson, former U.S. secretary of the Housing and Urban Development and chief of pediatric neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital, said he is glad there are checks and balances in our system of government but in order to truly restore trust in public health agencies, the mainstream media needs to be held accountable for colluding with the executive branch. “What we’ve done is we’ve gotten into a system where we have the media in cahoots with the executive branch, sort of overlooking all the other safeguards that we have in our system,” Carson told The Epoch Times. “And as a result of that, what we’ve done has completely destroyed the trust of the people in the CDC, the NIH, the government health system. It’s going to take a very long time to get that trust back.”

A Trump-appointed district judge struck down federal mask mandates in a ruling on Monday, saying that the CDC exceeded its authority with the mask mandate and inappropriately did not seek public comment before imposing the order. In addition, Carson said the Biden administration’s decision to end the CDC health rule, Title 42—which limits the entry of illegal immigrants into the country during the pandemic—but at the same time having its health agency heads calling to keep mask mandates for U.S. citizens doesn’t make sense and is divergent thinking. “There is no justification for getting rid of Title 42 on the one hand, and telling us we need to extend the mask mandates,” said Carson, adding that the public has to push back for agencies to actually follow the science, instead of ideology.

“If you have an executive branch that just begins to dictate, without any pushback, we’ve got to a very bad place. It’s too bad that a federal court system had to come in and bring some common sense into the discussion,” said Carson. “But the fact of the matter is, we all know, from multitudinous data, that the masks aren’t doing very much, particularly in things like airplanes that already have HEPA filters.” The neurosurgeon said common sense and scientific data should drive public health policies, including a broad range of treatments for COVID-19 and not just vaccinations.

“[Hydroxychloroquine] was roundly criticized by our government officials. So was ivermectin and some other therapeutics that work perfectly fine in other parts of the world. Why would they work in other parts of the world and not work here?” said Carson. “Why is it, in Western Africa, there’s almost no COVID? Because they take hydroxychloroquine as an anti-malarial. Why in southern India is there almost no COVID? Because they take ivermectin. Maybe they’re not taking it specifically for COVID, but look at the results.

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“My guess: they tried to persuade Mr. Zelenskyy to throw in the towel. He may be too desperate and crazy to listen, but it’s truly game-over.”

Shocks to the System (Kunstler)

There is something about being detached from reality that makes it hard to go about your everyday business. In the quaint asylums of yore, it was understood that a few shocks to the system could bring lunatics out of a fugue state of derangement — a cold water plunge… an insulin hot-shot to induce convulsions… some electrodes placed artfully on select regions of the brain…. It looks like America is about to be treated to some shocks. Will they break the mass formation psychosis that styles itself unironically as “progressive politics?”

The first shock will be the painful recognition that Ukraine is not prevailing against Russia’s Operation Z, despite the combined efforts of the US news media and the Intel Community to put over that narrative. True, it took Russia more than a few days to overcome Ukraine’s NATO-fortified defenses, but now most of that has been neutralized, and we’re into the final weeks heading towards resolution — which will be a Ukraine that is unable to make any more trouble in that corner of the world. That’s right, hard as it is to accept, Operation Z came down on Ukraine because it misbehaved badly, egged-on by delusional war-gamers in Washington, who could only pretend to support Ukraine once the real action started.

No amount of chanting Putin-Putin-Putin availed to stop the grinding Russian advance. State’s Antony Blinken and DoD’s General Austin were in Kiev over the weekend on a face-saving mission. My guess: they tried to persuade Mr. Zelenskyy to throw in the towel. He may be too desperate and crazy to listen, but it’s truly game-over. The Russians will treat him with kid gloves, perhaps give him leave to settle in Miami and enjoy the American dream with the fortune he has squirreled away. There will be changes in the map. Ukraine will sink back into peaceful obscurity while the US and Europe have to struggle with the impoverishing blowback from wrecking the global trade settlement system.

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“likely we have a limited footprint on the ground in Ukraine, but under Title 50, not Title 10..”

US A ‘Co-belligerent’ In Ukraine War (Carden)

Conversations over the past week with current and former US officials about whether, to their knowledge, there is any real debate inside President Joe Biden’s administration over the approach it is taking in Ukraine has produced only slight variations of the same answer: “Not really.” As of now, what the Biden policy amounts to is a replay along the lines of president Franklin D Roosevelt’s policy toward the war in Europe from 1939 to December 1941, during which the US was a co-belligerent all but in name. In their public statements, Biden and his Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin seem intent on obfuscating the true extent of American involvement. A story in the defense-industry-sponsored Politico quoted unnamed US officials as saying “military options in Ukraine aren’t on the table – echoing Biden’s repeated position of not wanting to spark World War III.”

If taken at face value, Biden’s policy would seem to be at odds with itself. Not wanting to start a third World War is a prudent, appropriate policy objective, but if that’s the goal, the administration is taking the long way around, because whether they admit it or not, the US is, and has been for some time, a co-belligerent in the war. [..] The open spigot of funding has naturally attracted the attention of the defense industry, and last week, the chief executives of Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, General Dynamics and L3Harris Technologies met at the Pentagon with Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks. But US involvement goes deeper than arms sales and intelligence sharing.

A Pentagon official who requested anonymity told me it is “likely we have a limited footprint on the ground in Ukraine, but under Title 50, not Title 10,” meaning US intelligence operatives and paramilitaries – but not regular military. Bruce Fein, a constitutional expert and former associate attorney general in the Ronald Reagan administration, told me this week that in his view, “the United States and several NATO members have become co-belligerents with Ukraine against Russia by systematic and massive assistance to its military forces to defeat Russia.” According to Fein, the US and its NATO allies are now vulnerable to attack by “an enemy belligerent,” meaning Russia, because of their “systematic or substantial violations of a neutral’s duties of impartiality and non-participation in the conflict.”

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“The Kremlin has also said it views any Western military aid entering the country as a “legitimate target”.

Kremlin Condemns Blinken Visit To Ukraine & US Arms Shipments (ZH)

Moscow has reacted to the Sunday visit of top US officials to Kiev where they met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in which Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin discussed specific weapons systems to soon be transferred into Ukraine, also as Zelensky and his team reportedly requested heavier weaponry and in larger quantities. “What the Americans are doing is pouring oil on the flames,” Russia’s ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov told Rossiya 24 TV channel. “I see only an attempt to raise the stakes, to aggravate the situation, to see more losses.” Antonov confirmed that the Kremlin recently delivered another diplomatic note of protest to the US condemning the arms shipments and formally requesting their cessation, but said no response has been given.

Instead, the “response” came in the form of the Pentagon chief meeting face-to-face to Zelensky while saying “we have the mindset that we want to help them win.” And specifying further the purpose of the hundreds of millions of dollars in approved military aid making its way to Ukraine: “We believe that they can win if they have the right equipment,” Defense Secretary Austin said, and added: “the right support, and we’re going to do everything we can … to ensure that gets to them.” Austin in statements given to the press after the Zelensky meeting went so far as to say Washington’s strategy is to see a “weakened” Russia.

“We want to see Russia weakened to the degree that it can’t do the kinds of things that it has done in invading Ukraine,” the Pentagon chief said. “It has already lost a lot of military capability, and a lot of its troops quite frankly” – he added, speaking of the Russian military. But Antonov in his Monday statements emphasized further: “We stressed the unacceptability of this situation when the United States of America pours weapons into Ukraine, and we demanded an end to this practice.” The Kremlin has also said it views any Western military aid entering the country as a “legitimate target”.

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“By many accounts these shipments of weapons like the Javelin anti-tank missile (jointly manufactured by Raytheon and Lockheed Martin) are getting blown up as soon as they arrive in Ukraine. This doesn’t bother Raytheon at all”

The Ukraine War is a Racket (Ron Paul)

“War is a racket, wrote US Maj. General Smedley Butler in 1935. He explained: “A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small ‘inside’ group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes.” Gen. Butler’s observation describes the US/NATO response to the Ukraine war perfectly. The propaganda continues to portray the war in Ukraine as that of an unprovoked Goliath out to decimate an innocent David unless we in the US and NATO contribute massive amounts of military equipment to Ukraine to defeat Russia. As is always the case with propaganda, this version of events is manipulated to bring an emotional response to the benefit of special interests.

One group of special interests profiting massively on the war is the US military-industrial complex. Raytheon CEO Greg Hayes recently told a meeting of shareholders that, “Everything that ‘s being shipped into Ukraine today, of course, is coming out of stockpiles, either at DOD or from our NATO allies, and that’s all great news. Eventually we’ll have to replenish it and we will see a benefit to the business.” He wasn’t lying. Raytheon, along with Lockheed Martin and countless other weapons manufacturers are enjoying a windfall they have not seen in years. The US has committed more than three billion dollars in military aid to Ukraine. They call it aid, but it is actually corporate welfare: Washington sending billions to arms manufacturers for weapons sent overseas.

By many accounts these shipments of weapons like the Javelin anti-tank missile (jointly manufactured by Raytheon and Lockheed Martin) are getting blown up as soon as they arrive in Ukraine. This doesn’t bother Raytheon at all. The more weapons blown up by Russia in Ukraine, the more new orders come from the Pentagon. Former Warsaw Pact countries now members of NATO are in on the scam as well. They’ve discovered how to dispose of their 30-year-old Soviet-made weapons and receive modern replacements from the US and other western NATO countries. While many who sympathize with Ukraine are cheering, this multi-billion dollar weapons package will make little difference. As former US Marine intelligence officer Scott Ritter said on the Ron Paul Liberty Report last week, “I can say with absolute certainty that even if this aid makes it to the battlefield, it will have zero impact on the battle. And Joe Biden knows it.”

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“..If the Russian Ministry of Defense finds out that NATO did it, they will let loose all the dogs from Hell on NATO, as in “asymmetrical, lethal and fast”.

The Moskva Riddle (Escobar)

Neither NATO nor Russia is telling us what really happened with the Moskva, the legendary admiral ship of the Black Sea fleet. NATO because in theory, they know. Moscow, for its part, made it clear they are not saying anything until they can be sure what happened. One thing is certain. If the Russian Ministry of Defense finds out that NATO did it, they will let loose all the dogs from Hell on NATO, as in “asymmetrical, lethal and fast”. [..] it’s hard to believe the Neptune/Bayraktar fairytale angle. After all, as we’ve seen, the Russian fleet had established a multidimensional surveillance/defense layer in the direction of Odessa. The Moskva was near Odessa, closer to Romania.

A year ago, the source maintains, a new phased array locator was installed on it: the illumination range is 500 km. According to the standard Ukrainian narrative, first the Moskva was hit by a drone, and the locators and antennas were smashed. The Moskva was half blind. Then – according to the Ukrainian narrative – they launched two Neptune cruise missiles from the shore. Guidance was carried out by NATO’s Orion, which was hanging over Romania. The missiles zoomed in on the ship with the homing heads turned off, so that the radiation beam would not be detected. So we have guidance by NATO’s Orion, transmitting the exact coordinates, leading to two hits, and subsequent detonation of ammunition (that’s the part acknowledged by the Russian Ministry of Defense).

The Moskva was on combat duty 100-120 km away from Odessa – controlling the airspace within a radius of 250-300 km. So in fact it was ensuring the overlap of the southern half of Moldova, the space from Izmail to Odessa and part of Romania (including the port of Constanta). Its positioning could not be more strategic. Moskva was interfering with NATO’s covert transfer of military aircraft (helicopters and fighter jets) from Romania to Ukraine. It was being watched 24/7. NATO air reconnaissance was totally on it. As the Moskva “killer”, NATO may have not chosen the Neptune, as spread by Ukrainian propaganda; the source points to the fifth-generation NSM PKR (Naval Strike Missile, with a range of 185 km, developed by Norway and the Americans.)

He describes the NSM as “able to reach the target along a programmed route thanks to the GPS-adjusted INS, independently find the target by flying up to it at an altitude of 3-5 meters. When reaching the target, the NSM maneuvers and deploys electronic interference. A highly sensitive thermal imager is used as a homing system, which independently determines the most vulnerable places of the target ship.” As a direct consequence of hitting the Moskva, NATO managed to reopen an air corridor for the transfer of aircraft to the airfields of Chernivtsi, Transcarpathian and Ivano-Frankivsk regions.

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Go get yer booster…

Vaccine Effectiveness Falls To MINUS-391% (DE)

Official data published by the UK Health Security Agency confirms Covid-19 vaccine effectiveness against infection has fallen to minus-391% among triple jabbed 60-69-year-olds, and between minus-298% and minus-324% among those aged 30 to 59. All other age groups have also suffered a significant drop in vaccine effectiveness with figures showing all triple vaccinated adults now between 3 and 5 times more likely to be infected with Covid-19 than unvaccinated adults. The following chart shows the total number of Covid-19 cases by vaccination status in England between 3rd Jan and 27th March 2022, separated by age group and week. The data has been extracted from the the Week 5, (page 43), Week 9 (page 41) and Week 13 (page 41) UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) Covid-19 Vaccine Surveillance reports –

[..] cases have been highest among all age groups who are triple vaccinated since at least the turn of the year. This data on its own at least shows the Covid-19 injections clearly do not prevent infection. But the UKHSA also provide us with further figures that indicate something is seriously wrong, and those figures are the Covid-19 case-rate per 100,000 individuals by vaccination status. [..] Here’s a chart showing the real-world Covid-19 vaccine effectiveness among the triple vaccinated population by age-group and week in England between 3rd January and 27th March 2022.

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This is old news treated as new. We’re standing still.

Heart Inflammation More Prevalent Among Vaccinated Than Unvaccinated (ET)

Heart inflammation requiring hospital care was more common among people who received COVID-19 vaccines than those who did not, according to a new study of tens of millions of Europeans. Rates of myocarditis or pericarditis, two types of heart inflammation, are above the levels in an unvaccinated cohort, pegged at 38 per 100,000 after receipt of a second dose of a vaccine built on messenger RNA (mRNA) technology in males aged 16 to 24—the group studies have shown are most at risk of the post-vaccination condition—researchers with health agencies in Finland, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway found.

“These extra cases among men aged 16–24 correspond to a 5 times increased risk after Comirnaty and 15 times increased risk after Spikevax compared to unvaccinated,” Dr. Rickard Ljung, a professor and physician at the Swedish Medical Products Agency and one of the principal investigators of the study, told The Epoch Times in an email. Comirnaty is the brand name for Pfizer’s vaccine while Spikevax is the brand name for Moderna’s jab. Rates were also higher among the age group for those who received any dose of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines, both of which utilize mRNA technology. And rates were elevated among vaccinated males of all ages after the first or second dose, except for the first dose of Moderna’s shot for those 40 or older, and females 12- to 15-years-old.

Researchers pulled data from national health registers, analyzing 23.1 million people aged 12 or older. The analysis was of data from Dec. 27, 2020, to incidence of myocarditis or pericarditis, or the end of the study time period, which was Oct. 5, 2021. “The risks of myocarditis and pericarditis were highest within the first 7 days of being vaccinated, were increased for all combinations of mRNA vaccines, and were more pronounced after the second dose,” researchers wrote in the study, which was published by the Journal of the American Medical Association following peer review.

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“Federal Judge Kathryn Mizelle did what a federal judge is supposed to do—she reined in the CDC when it went too far.”

The CDC’s Mask Mandate Is Dead and Won’t Be Back (TH)

Federal Judge Kathryn Mizelle did what a federal judge is supposed to do—she reined in the CDC when it went too far. She struck down the mask mandate for mass transit. Most travelers rejoiced and said goodbye to masks, perhaps for good. But not everyone was happy. The ruling sent COVID doomsdayers into panic mode. There was a flurry of claims that Mizelle made an improper decision because TheScience™ is not for the courts – or so they say. Doctor “TheScience™” Anthony Fauci himself was quick to condemn the ruling while exposing his legal ignorance at the same time. “We are concerned…about courts getting involved in things that are unequivocally public health decisions…This is a CDC issue. It should not have been a court issue.”

Fauci is wrong. He exposed his ignorance of how American government works. This was not a ruling based on science. Judge Mizelle did not issue a public health order – she issued a legal order. And as much as Fauci may dislike it, Mizelle got it exactly right! Fauci and TheExperts™ will not want to hear that her ruling is ironclad and will hold on appeal. Public health policies made by government agencies are not merely scientific actions. They’re government actions. Government actions are subject to review by courts when they violate federal law. Federal agencies are creatures of statute and are bound by law to operate within the law imposed by Congress. Agencies are not separate entities that may act as they wish. Their authority is limited to what Congress grants them.

So the CDC is governed by Congress – not by any President – and certainly not by career bureaucrats like Fauci. Judge Mizelle made that expressly clear in her ruling. Specifically, she addressed how the CDC and government officials violated the Administrative Procedures Act (APA) in issuing this mandate. The issue was not whether masks work to prevent the spread of Covid-19. Nor is the issue whether it is wise policy to order millions of traveling Americans to strap a piece of cloth over their breathing and talking holes (except when chomping Biscoff cookies or chugging chardonnay.) The real issue was whether the CDC had legal authority to issue such an edict in the first place – and if so, did it issue the rule as prescribed by law. The answer to both questions is: no.

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“..63 percent of young adults experienced symptoms of depression or anxiety in June 2020..”

Most Young Adults Say US Has A ‘Mental Health Crisis’ (Hill)

Nearly three-quarters of young adults across the country believe “the United States has a mental health crisis,” according to a new poll. A survey released Tuesday by the Institute for Politics at Harvard Kennedy School found that only six percent of survey respondents disagreed with the idea that the U.S. is undergoing a mental health crisis. 52% of young adults surveyed reported experiencing feelings of depression and hopelessness, and nearly a quarter said they had thought about self-harm. The latter represents a four percent decline from a year earlier when 28 percent of survey respondents said they thought about harming themselves. More than a quarter said they know someone who has committed suicide. The Spring 2022 survey measured the responses of more than 2,000 U.S. adults between the ages of 18 and 29 from March 15-20.


The Harvard poll adds to a growing body of research regarding the decline of mental health in the U.S. during the coronavirus pandemic. A recent study revealed that nearly half of young adults experienced mental health symptoms during the pandemic’s second year. Researchers at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) used a sample of 2,809 adults ages 18-25 years from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey data to evaluate the scope of anxiety and depression symptoms from June through early July 2021. They found 48 percent of young adults reported mental health symptoms. Meanwhile, 39 percent of the population with symptoms said they used prescription medications, although more than a third reported being unable to receive needed counseling treatment. The teams’ findings showed a decline from a year prior. A study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found 63 percent of young adults experienced symptoms of depression or anxiety in June 2020.

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What must the pressure on him be like?

Durham Has Hundreds Of E-mails Between Fusion GPS And Reporters (TFog)

Durham also destroys the declarations of John Podesta and Robby Mook on behalf of Hillary for America, stating Mook has stated Perkins Coie was to handle and oversee “international” opposition research. Mook also received “general updates concerning” these findings though he says he was unaware who had been specifically retained. As to Joffe’s privilege arguments? They fail because “Perkins Coie hired Fusion GPS to assist HFA and the DNC, not [Joffe].” Today’s filing follows a series of interesting developments disclosed in these last few days. On Friday, April 22, attorneys for Michael Sussmann filed this motion relating to evidentiary issues. I’ll spare you the long and boring legal arguments (your humble author favors brevity) and get to the good stuff: the Special Counsel has issued trial subpoenas to the Clinton Campaign and the Democratic National Committee.

The reason for calling the Clinton Campaign and DNC as trial witnesses is to get them to testify to their assertion of attorney-client privilege under oath. As you might recall, the Clinton Campaign, the DNC, Fusion GPS, Perkins Coie, and Rodney Joffe have all made appearances in this case in order to fight against the production of records to Durham. We reported on that story here, stating Durham requested the court require production of records that included “emails and attachments between and among” Perkins Coie, Rodney Joffe, and Fusion GPS.” On behalf of the Clinton Campaign, Robby Mook (Hillary’s campaign manager) and John Podesta (the Clinton Campaign chair, who has already been interviewed by Durham) submitted declarations in support of the position that Fusion GPS was assisting with “legal services and legal advice to [Hillary for America].”

One would rightly assume, then, that those trial subpoenas were issued to Robby Mook and John Podesta. Last Friday also saw this filing by Special Counsel Durham which also addressed evidentiary issues. It explained a “joint venture” starting in June 2016 by Rodney Joffe and his team of researchers to collect derogatory information on Trump and his associates. Durham described the goal of the joint venture to be: “to gather and disseminate derogatory non-public information regarding the internet activities of [Trump] and his associates.

This “joint venture” – what is also called a conspiracy – continued into August 2016, where: Sussmann, Rodney Joffe, and “agents of the Clinton Campaign” met at the Perkins Coie office of Mark Elias where they discussed the same Alfa Bank allegations that Sussmann would give to the FBI. “The evidence will show that at the meeting, the parties agreed to conduct work in the hope that it would benefit the Clinton Campaign, namely, gathering and disseminating purportedly derogatory data regarding Trump and his associates’ internet activities.”

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And don’t you forget it:

“The fact that there is currently no ongoing court case means that Patel has a purely political decision to make.”

Assange’s Fate Can’t Be Left In The Hands Of Priti Patel (John Rees)

Priti Patel, the uber-conservative Home Secretary, is about to make a life-or-death decision: whether or not to send Julian Assange to the United States to face charges of espionage. If found guilty, he could be sentenced to a maximum of 175 years in jail. It is not an exaggeration to say that, even if he served a small fraction of that time, he would likely die in prison. The fact that there is currently no ongoing court case means that Patel has a purely political decision to make. Should she sanction an application for extradition when the charges being brought equate investigative journalism with spying? Should she allow that the US 1917 Espionage Act, under which the charges are being made, can for the very first time be used against a journalist?

Should the US be allowed to extend the reach of its archaic spying laws to other countries and to a journalist who is not a US citizen? These are far from the only fundamental questions that Patel should consider. She might want to consider the irregularities of the trial. These include the fact that the lead prosecution witness has admitted that he lied in court, the discovery that that the CIA spied on the defendant and his lawyers, and that the CIA also discussed kidnapping and assassinating Assange in London. She might also want to consider whether an Extradition Treaty that has allowed 200 individuals to be taken from the UK to the US but only allowed eleven to pass the other way is fit for purpose.

In any normal case any, let alone all, of these issues might be enough for a Home Secretary to declare the extradition request void. But this is no ordinary case and no ordinary Home Secretary, even by the House of Horror standards of previous Tory Home Secretaries. This case is above all a political revenge attack on Julian Assange for revealing material which the US government found embarrassing about the Afghan and Iraq wars, about Guantanamo Bay prison, and about US diplomatic manoeuvres. And this is the crux of the matter: should journalists only be allowed to report government press hand-outs and corporate PR statements, the news the rich and powerful want to be heard, or should they have the freedom to report matters which are otherwise hidden from the public gaze?

No harm was suffered by any individual as a result of WikiLeaks publications. That much was admitted in court by the US lawyers. No foreign state supplied or was given privileged access to material published by WikiLeaks. The sole beneficiaries were the public who learned facts of the gravest importance which they would otherwise not have known. It is for that public service that Julian Assange is spending his fourth year in Belmarsh High Security Prison and now faces extradition to the US. Priti Patel is an ultra-hawk and a devotional worshipper of US power. She is currently engaged in attempting to send desperate refugees seeking asylum to Rwanda, and is highly unlikely to do anything but sign the extradition order.

But she can, and has been, politically embarrassed in the past. Both her off-piste illegal lobbying of Israel and the bullying of staff in her own department have damaged her and the government. Mass lobbying of Patel now can have the same effect and prepare the ground for the next stage in the legal battle. This is essential because Patel does not yet have the final say. Even if she signs the extradition order Julian Assange’s lawyers have one more chance to reverse the extradition in the UK courts. They can and will appeal the elements of the original Magistrates Court ruling which turned down their original case against extradition.

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Safety profile

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Real nazis
https://twitter.com/i/status/1518707848863264770

 

 

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Apr 202022
 
 April 20, 2022  Posted by at 8:47 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  74 Responses »


Andy Warhol Grace Kelly 1984

 

There Has Been No Talk Of Peace, Only War (Celente)
Putin ‘Will Go Nuclear’ Says CIA Boss in Regime Change Set Up (Ransom)
Yet Another Huge Ukraine Arms Package As Total Military Aid Nears $3BN (ZH)
Watch Out, Vlad! Here Comes the British Invasion (Tracey)
Russia Must Prepare For “Possible Aggressive Action” From NATO – Medvedev (ZH)
Two Cheers for Realism (Lee)
Telling the COVID Good Guys from the Bad Guys (Hope)
Wall Street Now Paying Attention to the ‘Trust the Science’ Fraud – Dowd (Wolf)
New CDC Center to Predict Pandemics, Provide ‘Outbreak Analytics’ (CSN)
DOJ To Appeal Court Decision to Overturn Mask Mandate, if CDC Asks (CTH)
CDC Removes All Countries From COVID-19 ‘Do Not Travel’ List (Reason)
Treasury Bond Massacre, Mortgage Rates Hit 5.35%, and it’s Only April (WS)
Clinton Campaign: Fusion GPS Provided Legal Advice (TechnoFog)
Taylor Lorenz Is Simply Following The New Rules Of Journalism (Miller)

 

 

Number of days Julian Assange has been in Belmarsh prison, never charged with anything.

Today, another decision is due in his extradition case.

 

 

 

 

Zelensky’s statements influenced by what he drinks or smokes – Lavrov

 

 

 

 

Musk

 

 

The only thing you need to know, really.

There Has Been No Talk Of Peace, Only War (Celente)

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Monday that the Western sanctions that were intended to punish Moscow into submission and end its war with Ukraine have failed and, instead, hurt the very countries who imposed them. Putin used a televised address to tell Russians the sanctions were “expected to quickly upset the financial-economic situation, provoke panic in the markets, the collapse of the banking system and shortages in stores.” But said the West’s “economic blitz” failed and backfired. He said they instead led to a “deterioration of the economy in the West.” Last month, President Joe Biden told reporters that the sanctions imposed on Russia were not intended to prevent the 24 February invasion, but were intended instead to unite Europe and show its resolve.

“That’s the important thing. If you’re Putin and you think that Europe is going to crack in a month or six weeks or two months, [that] they can take anything for another month…We have to stay fully, totally, thoroughly united,” he said. When the White House announced a ban on Russian oil imports, oil prices in the U.S. hit their highest levels since 2008. The Russian central bank on Monday announced that consumer prices were about 16.7 percent higher than the same time period last year. The New York Times, citing international financial organizations, reported that economists believe that the Russian economy will contract up to 15 percent.

Biden, who has called Putin a war criminal, killer, and a brute, has discussed additional sanctions against Russia with European allies on Tuesday, Reuters reported. They also discusses arming Ukrainians with even more weapons. Canada announced Tuesday a new round of sanctions against Russians, including Putin’s two adult daughters, the report said. The repot said: “Among those on the call were Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, as well as the leaders of Poland, Japan and Italy.” There has been no talk of peace, only war.

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The narrative needs a new chapter every day, lest people start questioning yesterday’s tale.

Putin ‘Will Go Nuclear’ Says CIA Boss in Regime Change Set Up (Ransom)

Democrats have invented their own WMD story to support regime change, as the head of the CIA warned about taking Russia’s nuclear capability too “lightly.” Speaking at Georgia Tech in Atlanta, CIA Director William Burns has said that in desperation Russian President Vladimir Putin could use a tactical or low-yield nuclear weapon in Ukraine in order to try to reverse his battlefield mistakes. “Given the potential desperation of President Putin and the Russian leadership, given the setbacks that they’ve faced so far, militarily, none of us can take lightly the threat posed by a potential resort to tactical nuclear weapons or low-yield nuclear weapons,” said Burns, according to Voice of America. Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has also warned about potential Putin use of nuclear weapons in Ukraine.


Nina Khrushcheva, the great granddaughter to former Soviet dictator Nikita Khrushchev, echoed the comments but said it wasn’t a prediction of the use of nukes, but was just noting the potential is there for Putin to use nuclear weapons, said Newsweek. “Since there are questions about how far Russia can go to create victory, and nuclear weapons have been part of the conversation on both sides, Russian and the West, the tactical atomic option is potentially imaginable,” said Khrushcheva, a professor of International Affairs at The New School in New York City, a progressive hotbed.

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Let’s make it an even $30 billion. $3 billion is hardly enough to pay the bonuses at Raytheon this Christmas

Yet Another Huge Ukraine Arms Package As Total Military Aid Nears $3BN (ZH)

Coming off last week’s approved gargantuan $800 million military package for Ukraine, which the broader public and media seemed to not even bat an eye about (but quite the opposite: positively cheering it), what more is there for Biden to do except sign off on another massive weapons package for Kiev… “The Biden administration is preparing to announce another substantial military aid package for Ukraine this week,” NBC News cited five US officials to report Tuesday evening. “Three officials said the package is expected to be similar in size to the $800 million one the administration announced last week.” Biden previewed the new aid package by answering a simple “yes” when asked by a reporter whether Washington will send more artillery to Ukraine.

The new transfers are expected to include “tens of thousands more artillery rounds” – notes Bloomberg, and likely along with more anti-tank missiles, as has been consistently shipped stretching back even before Russia’s late February invasion kicked off. It appears to be the administration’s response to Moscow launching a ‘new phase’ in the war: a major force buildup and push to take the Donbas region from Ukraine, which the Kremlin reportedly wants to see fully accomplished by May 9, Victory Day, which commemorates the Soviet defeat of Nazi Germany. Without doubt these continual major weapons packages pledged to Ukraine will only push Russia and NATO into increasingly direct confrontation, given the Kremlin’s standing warning that it will target any inbound Western arms transfers.

Meanwhile, on Monday a senior Pentagon official told Reuters of plans to begin training Ukrainian forces on how to use American-supplied howitzers. It was described, however, that the training would occur outside Ukraine, likely in a neighboring friendly country like Poland. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki confirmed this week that so far the United States has successfully delivered new weapons to the Ukrainians on four flights – this as overall US aid pledged to Ukraine since Feb.24 has totaled about $2.6 billion and counting.

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“..the article was published at 10pm local time on the Friday of Easter weekend..”

Watch Out, Vlad! Here Comes the British Invasion (Tracey)

“You heard it here first”? Within less than 48 hours of publishing my previous article — aptly titled “The UK is Trying to Drag the US into World War III” — the most decisive evidence yet for the thesis conveniently emerged. This was thanks to The Times newspaper, which reported that British “boots on the ground” have been deployed to Ukraine. It’s the first time that the armed forces of any NATO member state were confirmed to be physically present inside Ukraine since the war started on February 24. If the UK Government really does aim to position itself at the “vanguard” of an escalating military intervention, in hopes that it can cajole the US into hotter and hotter warfare — as I reported in the previous article — then this seems like a pretty plausible way of going about it.


Is the US content to just sit around and let itself be one-upped by the British, who have now demonstrated their willingness to boldly send “boots on the ground” in defense of freedom and democracy? While the mighty US dithers impotently on the sidelines? Oddly, the response to the Times revelation has been conspicuously muted. At least from my vantage point here in London. And maybe that’s by design: the article was published at 10pm local time on the Friday of Easter weekend, and as I recently discovered, Easter weekend in England a big four-day Bank Holiday bash. So maybe the article was intentionally “buried” to dampen its effect — or maybe the timing was just an innocent coincidence. Either way, there’s been a curious lack of followup or even significant discussion in the days since the news broke. Maybe some inscrutable code of omertà reigns within the UK press corps? For all the problems with US media, it’s not quite as weirdly incestuous and insular as media in the UK.

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“We are talking primarily about an attempt to expand NATO’s presence near our borders.”

Russia Must Prepare For “Possible Aggressive Action” From NATO – Medvedev (ZH)

Following earlier this month both Finland and Sweden signaling their intent to join NATO, close Putin ally and former president Dmitry Medvedev, who serves as deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, has warned that the Western military alliance is engaged in a military buildup along Russia’s borders. “A senior Russian official said on Tuesday that NATO’s reinforcement of its borders with Russia was no longer a figure of speech and Moscow should be prepared for possible aggressive action, Russia’s TASS news agency reported,” according to Reuters. “NATO’s expansion near Russia’s borders is no longer a figure of speech or a set of threats, we must be prepared for aggressive action,” he said according to a translation. The fresh words follow Medvedev’s prior threats to position nuclear and hypersonic missiles along Russian’s western border in the scenario that Finland and Sweden join NATO.

The prospect of Finland, which is said to be studying the issue, joining the alliance is especially alarming for the Kremlin, given Russian and its Scandinavian neighbor share a 810-mile border. Sweden, though a little less important geographically, has already announced its intent to join the alliance. “There can be no more talk of any nuclear–free status for the Baltic – the balance must be restored,” Medvedev said previously. But now on Tuesday, he’s heightened the rhetoric further by saying, “We are talking primarily about an attempt to expand NATO’s presence near our borders.” Medvedev stated further according to state-run TASS, based on a rush translation: “And this is no longer a figure of speech today, this is not a set of standard threats. We must be prepared for those aggressive actions that may happen.”

The thrust of his words were toward encouraging the rapid technological advance of the country’s defense capabilities amid the new ‘NATO threat’ – given the remarks were delivered before a national conference on science and education. He stressed that “it is important to build up, among other things, a system that allows you to provide the country with the most modern weapons.” “And this requires reliable, high-tech, powerful equipment – both military and dual-use,” the deputy head of the Security Council added, explaining that the situation did “not arise by itself, especially in those conditions when sanctions have been imposed on the country.”

Cement

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Westphalian Treaty, 1648.

“Russia, China have legitimate spheres of influence and this should be respected. This will involve an end to the gross provocations in the South China Sea and in Poland, Romania, and the Baltics, not to mention the ongoing series of colour revolutions.”

Two Cheers for Realism (Lee)

As the US and its vassals therefore prepare for war, its populations must be conditioned to believe and accept such an inevitable outcome. The propaganda machine has been stepped up to unprecedented levels. The message is simple. Our side = good, Their side = bad. Our side does good things, their side does bad things. Thus, the media – now an asset of the deep state – plays an essential role of propagating this political construction among the populations of the Anglo-Zionist heartlands. All of which is very reminiscent of Orwell’s short novel Animal Farm. After the Animal Revolution and the eviction of Jones the Farmer, the sheep were instructed by the ruling group – the pigs – into reciting the goodness of the animals and the badness of humans. The short and endless bleat of the sheep went as follows: ‘’Four legs good, two legs bad,’’ repeated endlessly.

That is about the level of western foreign policy. Good guys, bad guys, white hats, black hats, no compromise, no surrender. Result war. The question we must now ask is has this menacing process gone too far to go into reverse? This of course remains an open question. But the thrust of neo-conservative foreign policy would suggest this war would be a logical outcome. Either that or the whole thing is a bluff. Up to this point the US performance in attacking recalcitrant weak states has not been a roaring success. The same goes for Israel. Bombing countries with no air defence or shooting Palestinian kids with sniper rifles is easy-peasy. Taking on Iran is a different matter entirely. The irresistible force seems to be meeting its immovable object.

From a realist as opposed to a neo-conservative foreign policy the idea of an American world empire is frankly deranged. Pursuit of this pipedream can only result in mutually assured destruction; yes, M.A.D. still applies. The United States and its minions might not like it, but it will have to learn to live with other great powers. Russia, China have legitimate spheres of influence and this should be respected. This will involve an end to the gross provocations in the South China Sea and in Poland, Romania, and the Baltics, not to mention the ongoing series of colour revolutions.

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“These sociopathic characteristics include superficial charm, untruthfulness, absence of neurosis or anxiety, poverty of emotion, and a lack of remorse or shame. ”

Telling the COVID Good Guys from the Bad Guys (Hope)

Most recently, Elon Musk has stepped forward, offering to purchase Twitter and remove the censorship from the platform. This move would turn the tables on the Great Reset and restore the voice of the American public. Some are conflicted and see Musk as a potential bad guy due to his billionaire status and work developing technologies that could be used against the populace. However, upon closer inspection, one notices that Musk has been consistent in his views over the last two years. Musk was among the first to tweet about the potential benefits of using HCQ in early 2020. Musk’s position has not changed, while the opposition lies, waffles, and double talks.

In his first interview with Joe Rogan in May of 2020, Musk questioned the lockdowns’ wisdom and insisted that our freedoms should come first. He noted that our liberty and democracy had come at significant cost, and we should not allow them to be eroded so easily. Looking deeper at Musk, one realizes he is not a sociopath like so many other billionaires. Sixteen factors help identify a sociopath – according to the Cleckley Profile as set forth by Dr. Hervey M. Cleckley, the expert considered to be the Father of Psychopathy. He discussed these in his treatise, The Mask of Sanity. These sociopathic characteristics include superficial charm, untruthfulness, absence of neurosis or anxiety, poverty of emotion, and a lack of remorse or shame.

In short, they have cold, reptilian personalities and no conscience. Sociopaths have no anxiety and can often beat lie detector tests because their heart rates and blood pressure can remain stable under questioning that would phase most of us. While our leading health authorities and top vaccine billionaires easily qualify as sociopaths, Musk’s personality does not fit. He tears up at interviews to the extent the cameraman must stop filming; he exhibits great emotion when speaking about his childhood or challenges with his businesses.

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There goes the CDC.

Wall Street Now Paying Attention to the ‘Trust the Science’ Fraud – Dowd (Wolf)

As Pfizer try to ‘pump their stock’ Hedge Fund guru Dowd, takes us inside what he calls the third great fraud in his lifetime, in this new bombshell interview with Dr Naomi Wolf.

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Except, they’re giving the CDC more powers, no matter how badly it failed.

New CDC Center to Predict Pandemics, Provide ‘Outbreak Analytics’ (CSN)

On Tuesday, the Biden Administration announced the launch of the CDC’s new Center for Forecasting and Analysis (CFA) to predict future pandemics and guide the government’s efforts to address such anticipated infectious disease threats. A center of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the CFA will use “infectious disease modeling and analytics and to provide support to leaders at the federal, state, and local levels,” the CDC explains in its announcement. As “the equivalent of the National Weather Service for infectious diseases,” the CFA will “predict trends and guide decision-making,” the CDC says:

“CFA’s work will be focused into three main pillars: to predict, inform, and innovate. CFA has begun to build a world-class outbreak analytics team with experts across several disciplines to develop faster, richer evidence to predict trends and guide decision-making during emergencies.” According to the CFA website, the new center will also predict the future course of ongoing pandemics, in order to help public health officials to take preemptive measures: “The goal of the Center for Forecasting and Outbreak Analytics (CFA) is to enable timely, effective decision-making to improve outbreak response using data, modeling, and analytics.

“To do so, CFA will produce models and forecasts to characterize the state of an outbreak and its course, inform public health decision makers on potential consequences of deploying control measures, and support innovation to continuously improve the science of outbreak analytics and modeling.” CFA Science Director Marc Lipsitch, hopes to employ regular population sampling, by means like blood draws and swab tests, in order to collect data, the AP reports: “[T]he United Kingdom uses regular population sampling with swab tests and blood draws to get a clearer picture of who’s been infected, said Marc Lipsitch, the new center’s science director. He said similar sampling should be considered in the U.S.”

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“..a political DOJ has to wait for a political CDC to determine whether they still have any currency of influence..”

DOJ To Appeal Court Decision to Overturn Mask Mandate, if CDC Asks (CTH)

On one hand, Joe Biden needs to appease the base of his Covidians who identify themselves through the prism of COVID. On the other hand, the overwhelming majority of Americans are done with the COVID fear mongering. What to do, what to do? Trying to split the baby, Biden’s DOJ announces it will appeal the federal court ruling that overturned the federal Transporation covid mask mandate, but only if the CDC tells them to. “DOJ PRESS RELEASE – […] “The Department of Justice and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) disagree with the district court’s decision and will appeal, subject to CDC’s conclusion that the order remains necessary for public health.” “If CDC concludes that a mandatory order remains necessary for the public’s health after that assessment, the Department of Justice will appeal the district court’s decision.”


Keep in mind, the federal court ruling specifically centered around the arbitrary nature of the original mandate, which exceeded the scope of CDC legal authority, compounded by the CDC breaking its own rules for public feedback in the implementation.The mandate created by Joe Biden did not have legal structure. It was a dictatorial fiat that exceeded the capacity of the executive branch to create. Congress could easily write a law authorizing mechanisms for the CDC and TSA to use in enforcement of a federal Transportation mask mandate; but they won’t – because the public would never support it. So now, a political DOJ has to wait for a political CDC to determine whether they still have any currency of influence amid the politics of COVID.

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Just demolish it.

CDC Removes All Countries From COVID-19 ‘Do Not Travel’ List (Reason)

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) updated its international travel recommendations on Monday, relaxing previous COVID-19 risk assessments.Previously, the CDC’s “Level 4” risk designation applied to destinations with “very high” levels of COVID-19 transmission. On Sunday, 89 countries and territories were listed in this category, with the CDC advising, “Avoid travel to these destinations. If you must travel to these destinations, make sure you are fully vaccinated before travel.” The agency has since named its highest risk category “Level 4: Special Circumstances/Do Not Travel” and removed all countries from it. In a statement last week, the CDC indicated it would reserve this designation for “special circumstances, such as rapidly escalating case trajectory or extremely high case counts, emergence of a new variant of concern, or healthcare infrastructure collapse.”

The CDC’s next highest designation, “Level 3: COVID-19 High,” now includes 122 destinations and advises that travelers are up to date with their COVID-19 vaccinations, but does not advise the fully vaccinated to avoid travel wholesale. Given that there are few places in the world where COVID-19 has not spread widely, it is becoming necessary for the individual traveler to determine his own risk tolerance. Safety does not simply depend on picking the country with no active COVID-19 cases, but rather on taking stock of your vaccination status, your preexisting conditions, and the medical infrastructure at your destination.

The CDC’s new advisory structure makes the point that not all areas with high COVID-19 transmission are irreconcilably dangerous to visit. As recently as Sunday, the CDC advised travelers to exercise the same level of COVID-related caution when visiting Norway and the Central African Republic; South Korea and Papua New Guinea; and Australia and Vietnam. It makes little sense to advise the same level of extreme medical caution across each of these nations, considering how vastly each country’s health capacities may differ. Denmark, Switzerland, and Sweden are said to have some of the best health care in the world, but in terms of COVID contagion, the CDC considered them as risky to visit as Somalia, a country with only one surgeon for every 1 million people and a full COVID vaccination rate of just 8.5 percent.

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You will own nothing and you will be happy.

Treasury Bond Massacre, Mortgage Rates Hit 5.35%, and it’s Only April (WS)

The interesting thing is that no one at the Fed is trying to talk down those spikes in Treasury yields and mortgage rates. It shows that those yields are going where the Fed wants them to go, and that the Treasury market is coming around to the Fed’s rate-hike plan, and that those yields have a long ways to go, given that CPI inflation is 8.5%, a gigantic mess that has unfolded over the past 15 months, finally, after 12 years of money-printing. The two-year Treasury yield spiked by 15 basis points today to 2.61%, the highest since January 2019. This has been a huge move in just seven months. When the two-year yield goes over 2.83%, it will be in territory not seen since 2007, as the Treasury market begins to price in the Fed’s coming policy action to crack down on inflation:

Even the biggest doves at the Fed are now fully on board the rate-hike train, and it’s only a question of how fast and how long. Chicago Fed President Charles Evans, one of the biggest doves, is “comfortable” with 25-basis-point hikes at every meeting this year (there are seven more), and even he is “open” to 50-basis-point hikes: “we want to be humble and nimble, and get to neutral before too long – maybe 50 helps, I’m open to that,” he said. The 10-year Treasury yield rose by 8 basis points to 2.93% at the close today, the highest since December 2018. The magic number there is 3.24%, beyond which yields are back in 2011 territory:

When yields rise, it means prices of those bonds fall, and prices fall the hardest of bonds with the longest remaining maturities. And it’s a massacre for people who invested in what they thought was a very conservative and prudent instrument, namely a bond fund tracking long-term Treasury securities, when in fact it turned out to be a highly risky wager on long-term Treasury yields always going lower forevermore. The iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF [TLT], which tracks an index of Treasury securities with at least 20 years of remaining maturities, dropped another 0.75% today, is down 19.5% year-to-date, and has plunged by 30.6% from the peak in August 2020, which was when long-term Treasury yields had hit historic lows, and which was – with hindsight – the moment the greatest bond-market bubble in US history began to implode:

Holy moly Mortgage rates. The average 30-year fixed mortgage rate spiked to 5.35% today, the highest since 2009! This daily measure of mortgage rates by Mortgage News Daily had briefly hit 5.05% in November 2018, with inflation at or below the Fed’s target, and with markets tanking left and right, before the Fed made its infamous U-Turn, and mortgage rates dove. Now the Fed is just getting started, with inflation at 8.5%. There is no one that can persuade me that this jump in mortgage rates isn’t going to have a serious impact on the housing market. It’s the Fed’s way of getting the housing bubble under control before it tears up the financial system again:

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They’re getting lost in their own narratives.

Clinton Campaign: Fusion GPS Provided Legal Advice (Techno Fog)

The battle over documents and e-mails in the Michael Sussmann case just got hotter. Back in August 2017, Fusion GPS co-founder Glenn Simpson testified to the Senate Judiciary Committee, explaining how his firm was retained to gather “lots of facts about Donald Trump.” He admitted that Fusion GPS met with reporters leading up to the 2016 election to spread opposition research against then-candidate Trump. The context of Perkins Coie’s retention of Fusion GPS was further explained in a book co-authored by Simpson and Fusion GPS co-founder Peter Fritsch. They documented an April 20, 2016 meeting with Mark Elias (Perkins Coie partner and counsel for the DNC/Clinton Campaign), where Elias requested their services for opposition research.

Now the stories have changed. Fusion GPS is no longer an opposition research firm, and they weren’t hired to dig-up dirt against Trump. Instead, they would have you believe, after the phony dossier and the Alfa Bank hoax, that Fusion GPS was retained to provide legal advice to the Hillary Clinton Campaign. Remarkable. On April 6, Durham filed [a] motion to compel in the Michael Sussmann case, requesting the court require the production of “emails and attachments between and among” Perkins Coie, Rodney Joffe, and Fusion GPS. These emails and documents, according to Durham, “appear or involve or relate to” Fusion GPS’s provision of research and media services to Hillary for America, the DNC, and Perkins Coie. (Some documents had been produced pursuant to grand jury subpoenas dating back to the 2021.)

Faced with this pressure, today there was a flurry of filings from interested entities in the Sussmann case, seeking to intervene to petition the court to keep these emails and documents secret. The DNC, Rodney Joffe, Perkins Coie, and Hillary for America all filed motions to intervene and memorandums in opposition to Durham’s motion to compel. Notably, we saw arguments to the court that Fusion GPS wasn’t retained for opposition research. Hillary for America, for example, asserted “attorney-client privilege and work product protection over communications and work product of its attorneys (at Perkins Coie) and their consultant (Fusion GPS).” In support of that motion, Hillary for America included declarations from John Podesta, Robby Mook, and their attorney, Marc Elias. Declarations which contradict the public record.

To prove my point, John Podesta declared that to his knowledge, Perkins Coie has “consistently maintained” confidentiality, despite the fact that Perkins Coie (Sussmann in particular) assisted in distributing to the press the materials and allegations prepared by Fusion GPS and other researchers. Not to be outdone, Robby Mook (Hillary’s campaign manager) told the court that he believed that contractors for Perkins Coie – which would include Fusion GPS – were providing “legal services and legal advice” to the Clinton campaign. Unfortunately for Hillary for America, Mook’s belief is insufficient for the purposes of privilege. Clinton lawyer Mark Elias also submitted a declaration, stating the role of Fusion GPS was to “provide consulting services in support of the legal advice” Perkins Coie and Elias were providing their clients. This contradicts the Elias’s own statements cited above.

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“Taylor Lorenz is not the ultimate problem. The problem is news outlets and infotainment companies using their outsize power and vast budgets to harass and doxx private citizens they disagree with. ”

Taylor Lorenz Is Simply Following The New Rules Of Journalism (Miller)

Much has been said about Taylor Lorenz, the 30-something-year-old journalist for the Washington Post and former New York Times Slack channel gossipmonger. Still, her lack of media ethics is now unambiguous. On Tuesday, we learned about Lorenz’s doxxing of those behind a viral social media account she personally dislikes. Lorenz published a story on the popular “LibsofTikTok” Twitter account. This account curates and highlights content from the extreme fringes of the cultural and political Left on TikTok and other platforms. The account isn’t much different from the “Right Wing Watch” account on Twitter, which does mostly the same thing from a politically left perspective. The difference is simply who is protected by most of the media and who isn’t. That’s what much of the discourse around the public revealing of the person behind the LibsofTikTok account is missing.

Taylor Lorenz is what the media are now. In 2017, CNN’s Andrew Kaczynski tracked down an anonymous Reddit user who had created a gif of President Donald Trump clotheslining a wrestler at a WWE event, with the CNN logo replacing the opposing wrestler’s head. CNN found this to be doxx-worthy simply because it was retweeted by Trump. In 2019, when a joke video of a “drunk” Nancy Pelosi (the creator simply reduced the speed of the video) spread around, Kevin Poulsen of the Daily Beast tracked down and doxxed the person who did it, revealing he is an ex-con living in the Bronx who was working as a forklift operator. These details were not newsworthy. The video itself was not newsworthy. But the Daily Beast published his name and employment anyway.

In 2018, HuffPost writer Luke O’Brien doxxed and revealed the identity of a pro-Trump Twitter user, including information regarding a popular Brooklyn deli that her siblings owned and was not related to her social media posts. The deli was soon threatened with boycotts and negative Yelp reviews. These are just three examples of what has become an industry standard. It’s a standard that now has some reporters comparing LibsofTikTok to Harvey Weinstein and the Watergate scandal. However, in singling out Taylor Lorenz, what the political Right doesn’t understand is this is about politics and shutting down opposing speech. That is to say, speech that Lorenz or Kaczynski or the Daily Beast are ideologically opposed to. Of course, this is also about media power.

CNN is a multibillion-dollar media conglomerate that used the full weight of its corporate power to threaten a private individual with a Reddit account. In a newspaper owned by Jeff Bezos, Lorenz publishes a story with an individual’s name, professional license, and address information. It’s a struggle between one of the richest, most powerful men on the Earth and someone behind a Twitter account with less than a million followers (although that follower count is almost certainly about to increase). Taylor Lorenz is not the ultimate problem. The problem is news outlets and infotainment companies using their outsize power and vast budgets to harass and doxx private citizens they disagree with. It’s a new journalistic model for an industry that sees its grip loosening on what news it can control and create (see the media freak-out over Elon Musk buying their favorite toy). Taylor Lorenz, for all her theatrics, is simply leading the charge.

Tucker Libs of TikTok

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Gates Nov 2019
https://twitter.com/CovidMemo/status/1516444224622927882

 

 

 

 

Ships waiting to dock in Shanghai.

 

 

NATO ad

 

 

 

 

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Mar 162022
 
 March 16, 2022  Posted by at 9:42 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  35 Responses »


Henri Rousseau The sleeping gypsy 1897

 

Ukraine Will Not Join NATO, Says Zelenskiy (G.)
Zelenskiy Says Russia’s Position In Negotiations Becoming ‘More Realistic’ (G.)
West Made A ‘Terrible Mistake’ Letting Putin Annex Crimea: Boris Johnson (F.)
Thirsty Macron Jealous of International Media Fawning Over Zelenskyy (CTH)
World Economy Braces For Supply Chain Chaos As COVID Closes China (ZH)
Saudi Arabia May Accept Yuan Instead Of Dollars For Chinese Oil Sales (JTN)
Safe and Effective? (Malone)
Senate Votes To Repeal CDC’s Mask Mandate For Airline Passengers (JTN)
Several States Mulling Lawsuit To End Biden Mask Mandate On Airlines (JTN)
Dr. Flavio Cadegiani On How Pfizer Corrupts Science (Kirsch)
These 6 Republicans Voted Against Ousting Fauci (DW)
From 15 Days to Two Years (Kelly)
A Closer Look at the Gatekeepers of Medical Research (NBW)

 

 

 

 

Alexa

 

 

The two most powerful people in US politics are well past their best before date. How is that not scary? These shaky fingers are on red hot buttons.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1503798141669285895

 

 

One demand down, two to go. No. 2 is recognition that Crimea is Russian territory. Since Crimeans have voted on this, why contest it? Third is the status of the Donbass. That’s tricky, Putin won’t want to leave any questions over this. And allegedly, Ukraine was planning large scale bloodshed there in early March. Zelensky will have to sell out the Azov batallion. But that could cost him his life.

Ukraine Will Not Join NATO, Says Zelenskiy (G.)

Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy has acknowledged that Ukraine will not become a Nato member, in a significant concession on a day when Kyiv was pounded by Russian shells and missiles and the invading force tightened its grip on the capital. At least five people were killed in the latest artillery barrage on Kyiv, prompting its city hall to impose a 35-hour curfew from Tuesday night amid further signs that the focus of the Russian campaign has shifted to the destruction of residential areas and civilian infrastructure. Zelenskiy made his remarks about Nato while addressing leaders from the new Joint Expeditionary Force, a UK-led initiative bringing together 10 north Atlantic countries to create a capability for responding rapidly to crises.

“It is clear that Ukraine is not a member of Nato; we understand this,” the Ukrainian president said. “For years we heard about the apparently open door, but have already also heard that we will not enter there, and these are truths and must be acknowledged.” One of Vladimir Putin’s demands before unleashing his offensive on Ukraine was that its membership of Nato should be ruled out indefinitely. However, the size of the invasion force Putin amassed and his own justifications for the attack, have been widely seen as evidence he would have settled for nothing less than regime change and Russia’s unchallenged dominance of its smaller neighbour.

The White House announced on Tuesday that Joe Biden would travel to Europe next week to attend an extraordinary Nato summit on 24 March “to discuss ongoing deterrence and defence efforts” in the face of the Russian invasion, and also join a scheduled European Council summit. There were reports Biden would also visit eastern Europe on the same trip.

 

 

Children Donbass
https://twitter.com/i/status/1503696563230724097

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Zelesky preparing the world for the concessions he’s about to make. Carefully chosen wording.

Zelenskiy Says Russia’s Position In Negotiations Becoming ‘More Realistic’ (G.)

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said he sees possible room for compromise in talks with Russia ahead of a fresh round of discussions, despite Moscow’s stepped up bombardment Kyiv and as fears for the port city of Mariupol deepened. “The meetings continue, and, I am informed, the positions during the negotiations already sound more realistic. But time is still needed for the decisions to be in the interests of Ukraine,” Zelenskiy said in a video address early on Wednesday. “Efforts are still needed, patience is needed,” he said. “Any war ends with an agreement.” Top Ukrainian negotiator, presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak, said there were “fundamental contradictions” between the two sides but added that “there is certainly room for compromise.”


Another aide to Zelenskiy, Ihor Zhovkva, said the negotiations had become “more constructive” and that Russia had softened its stand by no longer airing its demands that Ukraine surrender. Talks were set to resume via video link on Wednesday. As the war approached its third week and heavy shelling of Ukraine’s cities continued, US president Joe Biden signed off on $13.6bn in aid. Zelenskiy thanked president Joe Biden and “all the friends of Ukraine” for the new support. An update from the Ukraine ministry of defence on Wednesday said the “worst situation remains in the area of Mariupol, where the opponent tries to block the city in the western and eastern outskirts of the city.” It came as the Associated Press reported Russian troops had seized a hospital in Mariupol and took about 500 people hostage during another assault on the southern port city late Tuesday, regional leader Pavlo Kyrylenko said.

 

 

Refugees Donbass
https://twitter.com/i/status/1503765994547855367

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Boris trying to be relevant.

West Made A ‘Terrible Mistake’ Letting Putin Annex Crimea: Boris Johnson (F.)

The West made a “terrible mistake” by letting Russian President Vladimir Putin “get away” with invading Ukraine and annexing Crimea in 2014, wrote the U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson in the Telegraph newspaper Monday. He added the West “intensified” economic ties with Russia afterwards and took “more Russian gas than ever before,” leaving it dependent on the “goodwill of Putin” and more exposed to fluctuations in global gas and oil price. Johnson said the West must break its “addiction” to Russian hydrocarbons, which has “emboldened” Putin to invade Ukraine and subject the world to “continuous blackmail.” Johnson acknowledged that it will be “painful” for the world to give up Russia’s vast fossil fuel reserves but said it is the “only way to force Putin to cease his aggression.”


The U.K. has pledged to phase out Russian oil imports by 2023 and the U.S. has banned Russian oil and gas. The European Union, which imports a significant amount of fuel from Russia, has vowed to end its use of Russian hydrocarbons as soon as possible. Green, renewable energy sources “are the quickest and cheapest route to greater energy independence,” Johnson said. “They are invulnerable to Putin’s manipulations.”

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Macron acting a comedian. And it’s actually funny.

Thirsty Macron Jealous of International Media Fawning Over Zelenskyy (CTH)

As the international media fawn over their latest social media star, the “Churchill in a T-shirt”, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the former darling of EU media, French President Emmanuel Macron is apparently feeling slighted. Western PR teams have been working diligently to maintain the “better story,” as they advance the beatification of pop star Zelenskyy. The producers and directors for Volodymyr’s scruff and edgy leadership have kept his fans updated on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter, as Ride of The Valkyries echos as a background theme while team-Z dodge cruise missiles on their way to the local Starbucks. However, all of this unilaterally focused adoration does not sit well with King Macron of Paris.

In an effort to combat the rugged warlike appeal of St. Zelenskyy of Kyiv, the thirsty French president called for immediate poses of him in a series of similarly scruffy press shots. Thanks to social media adoration, Zelenskyy, the modern EU trendsetter, is making beatnik great again. There are already rumors of a run on vintage jeans, sneakers and T-shirts within Brussels, as several NATO leaders dispatch their aides looking for the hot, new and modern authentic war look. A daily series of live-streamed war summits are likely in the works as NATO leadership start catching up to the pop-optics by organizing burning barrels of diesel fuel in the background of their zoom calls. With resources allocated, thirsty Macron is going to climb back on top.

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Ukraine will soon be a small problem. Because this will not.

World Economy Braces For Supply Chain Chaos As COVID Closes China (ZH)

The global economy is in disarray as the war in Ukraine unleashed a commodity shock with increasing risks of stagflation. Adding to the turmoil is an outbreak of COVID-19 in China that may unleash another supply chain crisis. News from China over the last day shows a new outbreak of the highly contagious omicron variant has infected more than 5,000 people, the most since the early days of the pandemic in early 2020. China’s zero-tolerance approach has shuttered factories and placed some 51 million people into some form of lockdown. Lockdowns have forced factories to idle production and risk snarling production from Apple iPhones to Amazon Echo & Alexa devices to Toyota SUVs to smart television to all sorts of other electronic devices. Disruptions to exports may induce shortages and drive up inflation, just as the Federal Reserve embarks on hiking interest rates to control inflation at four-decade highs.

A Bank of America Corp. survey of fund managers published on Tuesday showed confidence in global growth this year is the lowest since July 2008, and stagflation expectations have jumped to a whopping 62% of respondents. “You take all these little paper cuts and you start to add them up and you could be looking at a potential significant slowing of the global economy,” said Jay Bryson, chief economist at Wells Fargo & Co. China’s zero-tolerance policy has reminded us that supply chains are still subjected to massive disruptions. The lockdowns couldn’t come at a worse time, as spring tends to be one of the busiest shipping seasons of the year.

Shenzhen’s 17.5 million residents were placed under lockdown on Sunday. The city resides in Guangdong, a coastal province of southeast China known for its manufacturing hub and ports, which account for about 11% of China’s economy. The province accounted for 23% of China’s shipments in 2021. Bloomberg Economics warns that a prolonged lockdown in Shenzhen could unleash supply chain disruptions worldwide. “The forceful action to contain the worst COVID-19 outbreak since early March will deal a direct hit to the production and consumption sides of a province that accounts for 11% of GDP. Previous steps to contain virus flareups left manufacturing unscathed for the most part. This lockdown will hit output in key industries such as tech and machinery that feed into global supply chains,” Chang Shu, chief economist for Asia, said.

“Given that China is a major global manufacturing hub and one of the most important links in global supply chains, the country’s Covid policy can have notable spillovers to its trading partners’ activity and the global economy,” said Tuuli McCully, head of Asia-Pacific economics at Scotiabank. According to Stephanie Loomis, vice president of International Procurement, the global impact of lockdowns could roil supply chains once more. “If they don’t let any of these guys go to factories and produce goods, then nothing will move,” Loomis said. “It’ll just stop.”

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Biden really pissed off MBS.

Saudi Arabia May Accept Yuan Instead Of Dollars For Chinese Oil Sales (JTN)

Saudi Arabia and China are in discussions to price some oil sales in yuan instead of U.S. dollars in a slap to the Biden administration that would decrease the dominance of the American currency in the international petroleum market, sources told The Wall Street Journal. While Beijing and Riyadh have been in discussions on and off for several years about yuan-priced oil contracts, talks have accelerated recently due to U.S. security policies under President Joe Biden, people familiar with the issue told the newspaper. The Saudis are angry with the United States for not assisting in their intervention in Yemen’s civil war, started by Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in 2014. The Kingdom is also upset over the Biden administration’s efforts to enter a nuclear deal with Iran.


Saudi officials also have expressed disapproval over Biden’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021. “I don’t know which word to use, whether incompetence, carelessness, bad management — it was all a combination of those things,” Saudi Prince Turki Al-Faisal told CNBC last year. Saudi Arabia exports 6.2 million barrels of crude oil a day and has traded in dollars exclusively since 1974 when President Richard Nixon struck a deal with the kingdom by guaranteeing security. China buys more than a quarter of all Saudi oil exports, according to the WSJ. If the sales are priced in yuan, it would be a major boost to China’s currency as 80% of all global oil sales are done in dollars. Beijing introduced yuan-priced oil contracts in 2018, but has been unable to successfully beat the dollar in the global oil market.

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“warm base manufacturing”

Safe and Effective? (Malone)

There is another important element in the national vaccine program, which is the requirement to keep the vaccine production facilities up and running. These facilities are producing a biological product; they must be kept in production or the process for re-licensure is onerous, if not impossible. In the case of seasonal flu, one of the justifications for the yearly vaccine is to keep the manufacturing plants running and ready for business in case of a truly severe strain of flu or some other, unknown pathogen become a threat. If those facilities are moth-balled, they can’t be brought back on line quickly. Bet you did not know that. One major reason for pushing annual influenza vaccines is to maintain influenza vaccine manufacturing capacity.

The industry term used is “warm base manufacturing”. Of course, this results in a very nice annual “cash cow” for the vaccine industry, one which gets annually milked for a tidy guaranteed profit. The term “rent seeking behavior” applies. The same is true of the various “biodefense” vaccines and products which are maintained in the “strategic national stockpile”. In the context of Smallpox, these include ACAM2000. These products have half lives, which is to say that even though they are (hopefully) not used, they still have to be replaced every few years. Again, nice predictable profit. The corporation “Emergent Biololutions” has become particularly adept at exploiting this “market opportunity”, and has managed to monopolize many of the biodefense-related vaccines and products which the US Government purchases for the Strategic National Stockpile, including ACAM2000.

So, there is more than one reason to vaccinate the entire population on a regular basis, and the government basically props up the entire vaccine industry with what are functionally major annual subsidies. Once a policy decision is made to acquire a vaccine product or establish a “standard of care” involving a vaccine, it is never re-evaluated. Any politician or government administrator that even considers rethinking whether a vaccine policy makes good sense is confronted by the specter of being blamed for any outbreak or cases of that disease that may arise – regardless of how (in)effective or risky that vaccine product may be.

[..] To bring this topic home: Is avoiding COVID-19/Omicron worth taking the known and unknown risks of serious adverse events? In some age categories, it might be. In most age categories, it is not worth much risk. For young people, it is not worth any risk, and for children, the risks of the Covid vaccine far outweigh the risks of Covid. The US Government had relentlessly promoted that “The vaccines are safe and effective,” the same words used for the modern smallpox vaccine. In both cases, safety is a matter of opinion and semantics – not science. Clearly, safety is relative, such as the precautions one might take when skydiving or riding a motorcycle (e.g., having a second parachute, wearing a helmet) – in order to reach the point that an activity is acceptably safe, all the while knowing it’s safer to just skip the activity.

If I proposed a person drink some potion, and said “This potion is safe, unless you are from a family with a history of heart problems,” few people would want the drink. If I added “Oh yeah, and the Mayo Clinic says the risk of side effects from this potion are too high to justify you drinking it, I’d have even fewer takers. Mandates, which are rigid by definition, seem a bad match for assessments of personal safety, which are, by our nature, flexible and variable. Since the word safe and the idea of safety means different things to different people, such decisions are best left to those who would be most affected by, in this case, vaccination.

The smallpox vaccine shows us what the CDC means when they say something is “safe,” and it isn’t what most people using the word would mean. With risk must come choice. This is the bedrock foundation of modern bioethics and medicine. After all that we have been through over the last two years, and the admission the the CDC has been withholding data from all of us for political reasons and to avoid “vaccine hesitancy” (which is another way of saying if you knew what the data really show you would not accept the product), who are you going to trust? Your own lying eyes and brain, or what the CDC, HHS, legacy media and the “factchecking” industry tell you?

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“House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., may not even allow the House to vote on the measure.”

Senate Votes To Repeal CDC’s Mask Mandate For Airline Passengers (JTN)

The Senate voted Tuesday to repeal the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s COVID-19 mandate requiring masks on public transportation, including airplanes. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., introduced the resolution that received bipartisan support with a 57 to 40 vote. Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, was the only Republican to vote against the measure. Eight Democratic senators voted in support of the resolution: Michael Bennet, Jacky Rosen, Catherine Cortez-Masto, Maggie Hassan, Mark Kelly, Joe Manchin, Kristen Sinema and Jon Tester. The resolution, which was first introduced in February, expresses disapproval of the CDC’s mask mandate.

The resolution still faces significant challenges to become law. It did not receive enough votes to override the veto that President Joe Biden has threatened to do. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., may not even allow the House to vote on the measure. “Today, the Senate said enough is enough, and sent a message to unelected government bureaucrats to stop the anti-science, nanny state requirement of travel mask mandates,” Sen. Paul wrote in a press release after the vote. “Since March 2020, unelected bureaucrats have incessantly declared that we should ‘follow the science.’ But the same bureaucrats continue to defy science by imposing an ineffective and restrictive mask mandate for individuals travelling on public transit and airplanes,” the senator, who is also a doctor, wrote.

Sen. Paul has fought against what he sees as an abuse of power from White House medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci. “As the entire world is learning to live with COVID, the federal government still uses fear mongering to stubbornly perpetuate its mandates, rather than giving clear-eyed, rational advice on how to best protect yourself from illness,” Paul said. “That is why, I forced this vote, and I applaud the Senate for rejecting this nonsense.”

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“There are a lot of boxes you have to check before you jump on a lawsuit..”

Several States Mulling Lawsuit To End Biden Mask Mandate On Airlines (JTN)

Several states are considering a lawsuit to end one of the Biden administration’s last COVID-19 mandates requiring airline passengers to wear masks, Indiana Republican Attorney General Todd Rokita told Just the News. “We are having discussions about that right now,” Rokita told the Just the News TV show on Real America’s Voice on Tuesday night, saying Florida is taking the lead on the idea. The Transportation Security Administration last Thursday extended its mask mandate on public transportation through April 18 after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced relaxed mask guidance at the end of last month.


“I know that several states may be filing very, very soon, maybe being led by the state of Florida,” Rokita told Just the News Editor-in-Chief John Solomon and co-host Amanda Head. Indiana is currently “examining” if they can join the lawsuit, Rokita said. “It’s just not as easy as when I was in Congress, just to jump on a lawsuit like we’re jumping on a bill,” the former congressman said. States must show that they have legal standing and actual injury before joining a lawsuit, the Rokita explained. “There are a lot of boxes you have to check before you jump on a lawsuit,” he added. A group of 16 Republican lawmakers on Monday filed a lawsuit against the CDC for what they said was an “illegal mask mandate for individuals traveling on commercial airlines,” Newsweek reported.

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Flavio Cadegiani is a doctor in Brasilia, capital of Brazil.

“Dr. Cadegiani reveals an astonishing statistic on the number of vaccine injured: 85%.”

Dr. Flavio Cadegiani On How Pfizer Corrupts Science (Kirsch)

Dr. Cadegiani just published a new research paper (“Pfizergate 2.0 – Active actions against competitive anti- COVID drugs? The case of the anti-androgens.”) that shows that there is no rational explanation for the corruption of clinical trial results other than deliberate sabotage by Pfizer to ensure that there are no viable competitors to Pfizer’s products. I interviewed him just minutes before he published the paper. In the video, he talks about Proxalutimide, an anti-androgen drug he tested that is effective against variants prior to Omicron. But his main issue is in the trials of enzalutamide (another anti-androgen) and how it was conducted. At the very end, Dr. Cadegiani reveals an astonishing statistic on the number of vaccine injured: 85%.

 

 

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Rand Paul keeps pushing.

These 6 Republicans Voted Against Ousting Fauci (DW)

Six Republican senators voted against an amendment Tuesday that would eliminate the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) position, which is held by Dr. Anthony Fauci. Senators voted on Kentucky Republican Rand Paul’s amendment to replace the NIAID with three separate national research institutes on Tuesday morning in Washington, D.C. Republican Senators Richard Burr of North Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, and Jerry Moran of Kansas each voted against the amendment. “We’ve learned a lot over the past two years, but one lesson in particular is that no one person should be deemed ‘dictator-in-chief,’” said Paul when he introduced the amendment Monday, adding, “No one person should have unilateral authority to make decisions for millions of Americans.”


“This will create accountability and oversight into a taxpayer funded position that has largely abused its power, and has been responsible for many failures and misinformation during the COVID-19 pandemic,” the senator continued. Paul and Fauci have repeatedly sparred in Senate hearings over Fauci’s insistence on restricting the American public throughout the coronavirus pandemic, and the Kentucky Republican has called many times for Fauci to be ousted from his position. When Fauci suggested on “CBS This Morning” that Republicans — and former President Donald Trump — have a “misplaced perception about people’s individual right to make a decision that supersedes the societal safety,” Paul said that his comments showed a “casual disregard for what this country was founded upon.”

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“They want people stripped of wealth, isolated, and terrified.”

From 15 Days to Two Years (Kelly)

On Saturday morning, my daughter in college texted me: “I got sent home two years ago today. Feels like a dream.” After I responded, she sent an uncharacteristically brief reply: “Sad.” To say the least. In March 2020, once-free citizens around the world surrendered their liberty and livelihoods in a futile attempt to “stop” a virus. The most technologically advanced civilization in the history of mankind quickly adopted medieval fixes that bordered on quackery, sold by snake oil salesmen in the credentialied class and news media, codified through executive fiat by elected leaders of both parties. “Just 15 days,” we were told on March 16, 2020, “to slow the spread.” Do your part to promote the “common good”—the historical rallying cry of every wannabe despot—or be branded a heartless heretic.

And it worked, far better than the original architects probably anticipated. On the same day my daughter left her college dormitory in upstate New York, not to return to a normal campus life for two years, I posted this on Twitter: This is what the Left wants. They want people stripped of wealth, isolated, and terrified. They want sources of joy—church, sporting events, vacations, large social gatherings—eliminated. This is how they get control. And it’s far scarier than any virus. To say that was a very unpopular view at the time would be an understatement. But having covered the climate change movement for years, I recognized a familiar approach to the spread of COVID-19 hysteria: use flawed data to whip up a public frenzy and shut down all debate in fealty to “science!”

Any disagreement over the data, no matter how unreliable or untested the data happened to be—and in the early months, the only available data came from China—made you a “science denier,” or worse. This time around, sadly, the hysteria wasn’t pushed solely by lefty environmental activists but also by President Donald Trump, Republican governors, and “conservative” influencers throughout the media. Once that buy-in was made, all hope was lost. Trump’s catastrophic decision to acquiesce to the demands of Drs. Anthony Fauci and Deborah Birx—the former a charlatan, the latter a dunce—and shut down the country two years ago this week was by far the worst moment in his presidency and rivals the worst moment in any presidency. As usual, however, Trump’s first instinct (the one he suppressed to appease those demanding we honor The Science™) was the right one.

The cure should not be worse than the disease, he fretted. He knew it, but he listened to the quacks anyway. The cure, of course, got worse. Emboldened by their success in forcing Trump to authorize the first 15-day shutdown, the then-adored Fauci and Birx took it a step further. With two dubious projection models in hand, the pair went to the White House at the end of March 2020 and convinced Trump to extend the lockdowns another month. The decision sealed his electoral fate; the booming economy he helped build entered a death spiral.

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“..viruses are worth A LOT of money (and will continue to appreciate exponentially for obvious reasons).”

A Closer Look at the Gatekeepers of Medical Research (NBW)

First, it is necessary to understand where the majority of funds go for health research. For this, we’ll rely on an article published in Health Research Policy and Systems titled The 10 largest public and philanthropic funders of health research in the world: what they fund and how they distribute their funds. According to the researchers, in 2013, the National Institute of Health (NIH) granted $4.8 billion dollars towards infectious disease research (including $113 million towards respiratory infections and $2.8 billion to HIV/AIDS research). They also gave grants to research involving cardiovascular disease ($1.9 billion), lung cancer ($208 million) and mental health ($2.1 billion). The European Commission, Medical Research Council (MRC) and Wellcome Trust also direct the majority of their grants towards research involving infectious diseases.

A paper published in The Lancet, titled UK investments in global infectious disease research 1997–2010: a case study found that between 1997-2010, virology was the highest funded category of infectious disease research and the largest funders of such research in the UK were the Wellcome Trust (£688 million) and the MRC (£673 million). The Bill and Melinda Gates foundation also direct the majority of their “philanthropical” efforts towards combating infectious diseases, with less than 3% of their budget being directed towards non-communicable disease. So what does all this mean? Well, it means that viruses are worth A LOT of money (and will continue to appreciate exponentially for obvious reasons).

Perhaps this explains why the claim that Sars-Cov-2 doesn’t exist is treated with such ardent censorship and disdain compared to the germ-friendly “lab-leak” theory which has now wormed its way into the mainstream narrative, supported even by those on the more alternative side. Whether true or untrue, what many people fail to consider is the extent to which this theory favours the pharmaceutical industry. In fact, not only does it favour Big Pharma, it favours the WEF hoaxsters by strengthening the “deadly virus” narrative, it favours vaccine manufacturers, it favours virologists, it favours the Western powers, it favours the bankers, it favours Hollywood, it favours the CDC, and it favours the WHO!

The “lab-leak” hypothesis favours just about every organization or group associated with the Covid scamdemic. And let’s not forget that theories of mutant viruses escaping from laboratories certainly favour any researcher who could benefit from the massive amounts of money sloshing around in the kitties of the world’s medical gatekeepers. But who are these gatekeepers who control, direct and manipulate medical research for control and profit? That is the main subject of this article.

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Most of the time they do.

 

 

US biolabs and pathogens
https://twitter.com/i/status/1503682999887581191

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2015

 

 

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

 

 

 

Jan 252022
 


Pablo Picasso Female bust 1922

 

A Real American Hero (Jim Kunstler)
‘Obscene’ COVID Policies Serve Big Pharma Not People, Experts Say (CHD)
Nervous System Disorders After The Jab – A Case Study (Beck)
BA2 Omicron Variant is Worth Discussing (Chudov)
Omicron Variant Breaks The Evolutionary Lineage Of SARS-COV2 Variants (GHA)
Omicron Showing Merits of Targeted Protection, Great Barrington Signers (NW)
Covid Still ‘Full Of Nasty And Cunning’ Surprises – WHO Official (RT)
Unvaccinated Staff Are Holding NHS Together Amid Staff Shortages (GBN)
New York Judge Strikes Down State Mask Mandate (R.)
“They Can Have [Joe] Rogan or [Neil] Young. Not Both.” (RS)
The Globalist American Empire (Revolver)
Russia Planning “Lightning War” To Take Out Ukraine’s Capital: UK’s Johnson (ZH)
Assange Granted Permission To Take Extradition Case To UK Supreme Court (Haddad)

 

 

 

 

Malone at hearing

 

 

 

 

Ryan Cole

 

 

 

 

Hodkins

 

 

 

 

“..poisoned hundreds of millions of Americans in a medical experiment that has only begun to kill possibly more people than the Nazis ever dreamed of murdering..”

You can try and make someone look bad for wearing a Star of David or using the word Nazis, but then there is a Jewish commentator.

A Real American Hero (Jim Kunstler)

Sunday, at the March Against Mandates in our nation’s capital, the resistance to Covid vaccine tyranny laid it out, none with plainer eloquence than Bobby Kennedy: “We love the United States Constitution. And we have witnessed over the past 20 months a coup d’etat against democracy and the demolition, the controlled demolition of the United States Constitution and the Bill of Rights. And starting with the censorship. James Madison, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson all said the same thing: we put freedom of speech in the first amendment because all of the other rights that we were trying to protect relied on that right. If you give government the license to silence its critics, you have given them the capacity to commit any atrocity they want, and to obliterate all the amendments and rights in the constitution.”

The message is getting through and the tyrants are running scared. They are perhaps having bad dreams involving torches and pitchforks. Naturally CNN took the lead in attempting to defame Mr. Kennedy as an anti-Semite for mentioning the name of Anne Frank in alluding to the Nazi insanity of the last century and people’s desperate efforts to escape it. CNN said: “The son of former Attorney General and presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy has a long history of spreading vaccine misinformation…. Sunday’s event, billed as a protest against vaccine mandates, featured speakers repeatedly spreading misinformation about vaccines and showcased several bigoted comparisons to the Holocaust. At least one man was seen displaying a yellow Star of David, which Jews were required by law to wear as an identifier in Nazi Germany.”

So, wearing a Star of David now makes you an insurrectionist in the twisted logic of Wokery. How stupid and confused are they? Anyway, heroes emerge out of adversity. Let them pile it on, insulting history and reality. In fact, Bobby Kennedy stood in the cold at the Lincoln Memorial as a heroic figure for these times, giving a speech that carefully and succinctly denoted the stupendous criminality of the US public health bureaucracy and the corporate-government fascist partnership with Pharma Inc. that has poisoned hundreds of millions of Americans in a medical experiment that has only begun to kill possibly more people than the Nazis ever dreamed of murdering. There has not been a more important public utterance in this land than RFK Jr.’s since this century began.

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Long write-up of Ron Johnson Senate hearing yesterday.

‘Obscene’ COVID Policies Serve Big Pharma Not People, Experts Say (CHD)

Dr. Pierre Kory, pulmonary and critical care specialist and president and chief medical officer of the Front-Line Covid-19 Critical Care Alliance, called out the policies of U.S. health systems and their “failed response to this pandemic.” Kory said: “Some of the policies are “so obscene, absurd, illogical and nonscientific that they’re unscientific that they’re almost unspeakable — things like not testing the vaccinated, not recommending vitamin D, not checking vitamin D levels, things that are so fundamentally basic about science and medicine and that they’ve avoided. “If you look at these failed policies, there’s only one way to understand them. They are literally written by pharmaceutical companies. Almost every single policy serves the interest of a pharmaceutical company.”

Kory said there have been numerous successes outside the U.S. using a number of compounds he and his colleagues have identified for effective early treatment of COVID, almost all of which are repurposed or generic drugs, including ivermectin. Yet, in the U.S., ivermectin is regarded as a horse dewormer, horse paste, and is only used by the illiterate, ignorant or unvaccinated, Kory said. Kory pointed to many studies and locations around the world where hospitalizations and deaths were prevented by large percentages through the mass distribution of ivermectin. He said the inexpensive drug eradicated the virus entirely in Uttar Pradesh, India.


Information on ivermectin was buried and suppressed, Kory said. “U.S. health agencies’ structures and policies created over the last 50 years have tightly intertwined the pharmaceutical industry with public health institutions, resulting in repeated policies placing pharmaceutical industry interests ahead of the welfare of U.S. citizens,” he explained. Kory said the industry’s “capture of our health agencies combined with their increasing financial control of most major media, social media and medical journals has led to an ability to widely suppress and/or distort any information which supports the efficacy of repurposed low-cost off-patent medicines.”This “decades-long war on repurposed drugs waged with the ever-pressing goal of protecting the market for novel, patented, obscenely profitable and often barely tested and toxic medications has reached a pinnacle with COVID-19, its an absurdity, its an obscenity and its a crime,” Kory said. “It has to stop.”

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Scary.

Nervous System Disorders After The Jab – A Case Study (Beck)

NERVOUS system disorders following Covid vaccination are being recorded in shocking numbers, with reports to the UK’s Yellow Card Scheme of almost 300,000 injuries and 300 deaths. Despite this, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), who run the Yellow Card scheme and review all suspected injuries, are sticking with their mantra that Covid vaccines are ‘safe and effective’. Their message infuriates music manager Georgia-Rose Segal, 34, from Hertfordshire, a previously active fitness fan. Supremely healthy, and at low risk of contracting Covid-19, she was worried about getting the experimental jab, but decided to take it after being reassured by three GPs. She could then travel abroad for her job, about once a quarter, and visit family in Israel to celebrate Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year.

It is a decision she bitterly regrets as she is now a statistic, one of the 100,000 victims suffering with 300,000 neurological injuries reported up to January 5, 2022, which we have analysed in our special report below. After her adverse jab reaction, Georgia, who is articulate, down-to-earth and had clearly made the effort to be well informed, was admitted to Stoke Mandeville Hospital in Buckinghamshire – a spinal injury specialist – with symptoms which included lack of balance, dizzy spells, tremors, tics, short-term memory loss and brain fog. Georgia had her first dose of Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccination on May 13, 2021 at Hemel Hempstead pop-up vaccine centre. It wiped her out. ‘I felt like I could have slept for a year. I felt like that for a couple of days,’ she said. She had her second dose on June 29.

“Within four hours I felt dizzy and light-headed. I fainted that evening, then over the following days, I began fainting up to three times a day. ‘After ten days I developed neurological symptoms. My legs didn’t feel right. I was struggling to move them, and they felt heavy. ‘I was in Tesco, got to the checkout and couldn’t move my legs. My boyfriend Luke [boxing coach Luke Groves, 29] was outside. I went to phone him, but my brain wouldn’t engage with my hand. ‘I realised then I had a bit of a problem.’ Despite this, on Monday July 12 Georgia attended a wedding in Dorset, and realised there was something seriously wrong. ‘The day before the wedding I collapsed in my hotel room. Luke brought me round by splashing me with cold water and I got into bed, then my body went into its first tremor,’ she said.

‘I managed to go to the wedding the next day and got back to the hotel room. I fainted again and hit my head on the floor. My head began to tremor, and my body followed.‘Luke thought I might need food, so we went to the pub. When we got there my legs gave way underneath me for the first time, and that became my new normal.’ At 5am on the Wednesday morning Luke drove her to Stoke Mandeville hospital, where she spent ten days having ‘every test going including MRI and CT scans and blood tests’. They all came back clear, and doctors were sceptical when she told them she thought it was the vaccine. ‘We’re not sure. We don’t have enough information about it,’ they said.

Thomas Renz

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“..calling BA.2 a sub-variant of Omicron may be factually and genealogically incorrect and their relationship may be more sibling-like than parent-like.”

BA2 Omicron Variant is Worth Discussing (Chudov)

This post offers some news on what will be very important in the coming months. Like many other things, Omicron BA.2 is not on most busy people’s radar, but soon will be the only thing that people talk about. I made a decision to start writing about Omicron very early in the game, and want to write about BA.2 also to keep my readers abreast. Denmark, which was weeks ahead of the UK and US with its Omicron outbreak. Unlike the US and the UK, however, Denmark’s infections are not decreasing, but conversely are shooting up to the sky. The slowdown in Denmark that appeared around Jan 5-8, was quickly overtaken by a rapid rise that offers no signs of slowing down. The same thing happened in France 5 days later. A small drop, quickly overridden by another crazy and relentless case growth.

On a cases-per-million-people, Denmark and France are 2.5 times higher than the US and 3 times higher than the UK. What is going on? A new “variant”, called somewhat incorrectly “Omicron BA.2”, appeared around Christmas and is out-competing, out-infecting, and overall somehow generating even more cases than the original Omicron. In Denmark, Omicron BA2 is already over 50% of all cases, and rising. [..]

BA.2 is considered a sub-lineage of original Omicron (which is now referred to as Omicron BA.1), however these two genetic variants seem to have diverged months BEFORE Omicron actually appeared. BA.2 has 28 more mutations, than Omicron, with no intermediate variants seen between them. This is certainly a genetic oddity, just as Omicron is a genetic oddity with the ancestor that disappeared 1.5 years before Omicron appeared. Both of these oddities raise a possibility that both Omicron BA.1 and BA.2 do not have a natural origin. I said that Omicron (now known as BA.1) may be lab-made on December 2. As they diverged before either of them was introduced, calling BA.2 a sub-variant of Omicron may be factually and genealogically incorrect and their relationship may be more sibling-like than parent-like.

[..] The most disturbing issue here is that even by the time before BA.2 took off in Denmark a week ago, Denmark was likely running out of Covid-naive, uninfected people. What this means is that possibly, BA2 is especially good at REINFECTING Danes and Frenchmen. Not sure if the vaccinated people are more susceptible to reinfection, but it is possible and always seemed to be the case even before Omicron.

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Jean Claude Perez, Valère Lounnas, Pr Luc Montagnier.

Omicron Variant Breaks The Evolutionary Lineage Of SARS-COV2 Variants (GHA)

We analyzed 15 genomes and Spikes of the new OMICRON variant, on the one hand 7 from the very first 21K lineage (South Africa, USA, Belgium, Canada), on the other hand 8 from the later second sister-clade 21L (USA, Switzerland, UK). We applied, at the scale of the whole genome and the spike gene, the biomathematics method of Fibonacci meta-structure fractal analysis applied to the UA / CG proportions. There appears a total rupture of this variant with respect to all the previous variants, and a strong differentiation between these 2 OMICRON lines.We have evidenced the RUPTURE of OMICRON with respect to ALL the previous variants: D614G, ALPHA, BETA, GAMMA, DELTA. In particular, we suggest that the mRNA stabilizing secondary structure (“hairpin” conformation) in the spike of all variants is degraded in OMICRON, probably making its mRNA more fragile.

The loss of long-range fractal meta-structures in the OMICRON spike gene are in line with common knowledge on the mechanisms of epidemic ending, involving recombination of heavily mutated RNA fragments of the virus, with the possible inference of a distinct helper virus. This would indicate that the SARS-CoV2 is under very strong evolutionary pressure, possibly marking the end of the pandemic.Remarkably, it is observed that the density of OMICRON mutations in the SPIKE PRION region is more than 8 times that of the rest of the Spike protein. This high density of mutations of the Prion region in OMICRON appears to completely suppress this possible Prion function, unlike the Spikes of the various variants and mRNAs vaccines where this Prion function is observed.

“Science doesn’t tell us where we’re going – that’s the role of art -; it tells us where we are.” Alan TURING

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“The illusion was that to protect the vulnerable, we needed to control disease spread. The disease spread anyway and the vulnerable were exposed because we didn’t protect them.”

Omicron Showing Merits of Targeted Protection, Great Barrington Signers (NW)

After it was dismissed as a dangerous theory with deadly consequences, the co-authors of the Great Barrington Declaration believe officials are coming around to the idea of targeted protection now that it’s clear stopping COVID from spreading is an unrealistic goal.Omicron, a highly infectious variant, is spreading rapidly throughout the United States, causing more than 10 million infections in less than a month. While vaccines are extraordinarily helpful at preventing COVID-19 deaths, the assumption that vaccines would make a significant dent in infections has been proven wrong and Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, believes Omicron will find “just about everybody.” But officials have bucked a return to lockdowns.

Since the world has missed its opportunity to completely suppress COVID-19 transmission, the co-authors of the Great Barrington Declaration said policymakers are realizing they have to shift tactics away from population-wide measures. “There’s no question there’s been a sea change in thinking about this,” one of the declaration’s co-authors, Dr. Jayanta Bhattacharya, a professor of medicine at Stanford University, told Newsweek. “The illusion was that to protect the vulnerable, we needed to control disease spread. The disease spread anyway and the vulnerable were exposed because we didn’t protect them.”

The Great Barrington Declaration, which was signed in October 2020, called for a lifting of lockdowns to allow those who were at a lower risk of getting seriously ill from COVID-19, the young and healthy, to resume life as normal. Keeping the restrictions in place, the co-authors argued, would cause “irreparable harm” particularly with regard to the underprivileged. Many of those reentering the world would likely get infected with COVID-19, but being young and healthy, they were less likely to get seriously ill. Their infections would thereby lower the risk of infection to all, including the vulnerable, according to the declaration.

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A cunning virus?!

Covid Still ‘Full Of Nasty And Cunning’ Surprises – WHO Official (RT)

Speaking to Sky News on Monday, the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Covid-19 special envoy, Dr David Nabarro, warned that the pandemic could still throw up “challenges and surprises” despite the progress that has been made in some parts of the world in tackling the coronavirus. Criticizing politicians who are playing down the threat still posed by the virus, Nabarro said they “should not suggest” that Covid be treated like the flu or that it “has suddenly got incredibly weak.”“We must go on treating it as though it is full of surprises, very nasty and rather cunning,” Nabarro stated, claiming that while “the end is in sight,” it is not known how long it is “going to take to get there” or “what sort of difficulties” will emerge along the way out of the pandemic.


“I do want everybody to do one thing, and that is to go on treating this virus with respect. It has not changed. It’s absolutely not suddenly become a soft thing – it is still very serious,” Nabarro added. Directly addressing UK Health Secretary Sajid Javid’s recent comments that Covid should be treated like flu, Nabarro said it is “amazing” that officials keep making predictions that “the WHO don’t know,” as “we know there are more [variants] not far away.”The comments appear to directly contradict the WHO’s Europe director, Hans Kluge, who claimed on Monday that the continent is “moving towards a kind of pandemic endgame,” as Omicron is milder than previous strains. Addressing the potential emergence of new Covid variants, Kluge expressed a different view to his colleague, arguing that, while fresh strains might emerge “towards the end of the year,” it won’t necessarily mean “the pandemic coming back.”

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British humor.

Unvaccinated Staff Are Holding NHS Together Amid Staff Shortages (GBN)

Dr Kate Goodman told Michelle Dewberry for GB News that after “talking to friends and colleagues around the country, it seems it’s the unvaccinated [NHS] staff that are holding services together” as staff shortages continue to plague the health service. On the evening that Michelle Dewberry launched the #OutdateTheMandate campaign against mandatory vaccinations for health care staff that have face-to-face contact with patients, Dr Goodman said that it was “a shame” that a viewer said they would not want an unvaccinated member of staff caring for their elderly relatives. She said: “I’m a very good doctor, I’m an elder care specialist.”


Dr Goodman went on: “I can understand that people are concerned about their loved ones.”But actually we need to talk more about this.” From 1 April 2022, all health and social care workers in England who have face-to-face contact with patients, will need to provide proof they have been fully-vaccinated, unless they are exempt. The policy applies to those working within the private sector as well as the NHS, and affects workers including doctors, nurses, dentists, porters and receptionists.The deadline for the first vaccination is February 1st 2022.

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The judge literally called it “null, void and unenforceable.” But Reuters doesn’t use that quote.

New York Judge Strikes Down State Mask Mandate (R.)

A New York judge struck down the state’s mask mandate on Monday, one week before it was due to expire, ruling the governor overstepped her authority in imposing a rule that needed to have been passed by the state legislature. Judge Thomas Rademaker of New York State Supreme Court on Long Island found that the state legislature last year curbed any governor’s ability to issue decrees, such as a mask mandate, amid a declared state of emergency. It was latest setback for executive branch officials at state and federal levels. Earlier this month, the U.S. Supreme Court blocked President Joe Biden’s vaccination-or-testing mandate for large businesses. A judge in Texas last week ruled that Biden could not require federal employees to be vaccinated.

Governor Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, vowed to fight back, saying in a statement, “We strongly disagree with this ruling, and we are pursuing every option to reverse this immediately.” “My responsibility as Governor is to protect New Yorkers throughout this public health crisis, and these measures help prevent the spread of COVID-19 and save lives,” Hochul said. Disagreements and court action over mandates in a number of states have become a flashpoint of the pandemic response in the United States, often dividing Democrats and Republicans. The requirements in New York state, home to around 20 million people, include wearing masks in schools, on public transit and other public indoor spaces.

Hochul declared a state of emergency almost immediately after the World Health Organization named Omicron as a variant of concern on Nov. 26. At the time, New York state’s seven-day average of new daily cases was around 6,400. That number rapidly rose until peaking at 73,815 on Jan. 10. It has since fallen to about a third of that.

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Easiest choice Spotify ever made.

“They Can Have [Joe] Rogan or [Neil] Young. Not Both.” (RS)

Neil Young posted a since-deleted letter to his management team and record label demanding that they remove his music from Spotify. “I am doing this because Spotify is spreading fake information about vaccines – potentially causing death to those who believe the disinformation being spread by them,” he wrote. “Please act on this immediately today and keep me informed of the time schedule.” “I want you to let Spotify know immediately TODAY that I want all my music off their platform,” he continued. “They can have [Joe] Rogan or Young. Not both.” Young is referencing the steady stream of misinformation about vaccines that Joe Rogan has peddled on The Joe Rogan Experience. Last month, 270 doctors, physicians, and science educators signed an open letter asking Spotify to stop spreading Rogan’s baseless claims.

“With an estimated 11 million listeners per episode, JRE, which is hosted exclusively on Spotify, is the world’s largest podcast and has tremendous influence,” the letter reads. “Spotify has a responsibility to mitigate the spread of misinformation on its platform, though the company presently has no misinformation policy.” Young removed most of his music from Spotify several years ago because he felt the sound quality on the service was too low, but he ultimately relented. “That’s where people get music,” he told Rolling Stone in 2019. “I want people to hear my music no matter what they have to get through to do it. I’m just trying to make it so they hear a lot more and enjoy it a lot more, but sell it for the same price because music is music.”

Young’s letter was addressed to his manager and a Warner executive. At press time, Spotify hadn’t responded to a request from Rolling Stone asking if they planned to remove Young’s music. It’s still available, but it might be smart to listen to Zuma and Rust Never Sleeps while you still can. They could disappear at any moment.

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“Russia’s population is half of what the USSR’s was 30 years ago.”

The Globalist American Empire (Revolver)

The NATO question is the only one that Russia has repeatedly insisted upon. If America were inclined to negotiate, it could. Instead, America has taken the position that Ukraine’s eligibility for NATO is entirely non-negotiable. In fact, basically everything about Ukraine is non-negotiable from the perspective of the State Department. The US State Department also insists it will “never” acknowledge Russian annexation of Crimea, even though Western media outlets admit the local population overwhelmingly supports union with Russia. America’s demand, in essence, is that Russia acknowledge a violent revolution (in the name of “democracy”), return Crimea to Ukraine against its will (again, in the name of “democracy”), and let Ukraine become a military satellite of the United States (in the name of of “peace”).

This is deranged. Adding Ukraine to NATO does nothing to improve the security of the United States, or any of its key allies. Even if Russia literally did conquer and annex all of Ukraine (something it has shown no interest in doing), America’s security interests would remain unchanged. Ukraine doesn’t supply the United States with any irreplaceable natural resources. It doesn’t sit alongside a critical trade route or geographical position. It isn’t physically proximate to the United States. Ukraine matters to America’s domestic security as much as Iraq, Syria, Libya, or Venezuela; i.e. not at all. Just like all four of those other countries, a war over Ukraine would have nothing to do with protecting America’s safety, its prosperity, or its values. Instead, it would be a product of a cloistered foreign policy elite that is not content with controlling one country and instead seeks to boss around the entire planet.

“B-but if we don’t stop him in Donetsk, Putin will drive all the way to the English Channel!” Bullshit. No, he won’t. Russia’s population is half of what the USSR’s was 30 years ago. Its military is smaller. Its economy is only the size of that of Texas. Russia’s frontline in any hypothetical war has shifted hundreds of miles to the east. Russia invading and occupying Europe is as plausible as Canada invading and occupying the United States. The idea of Vladimir Putin steamrolling all of Europe like Hitler or Napoleon would be absurd, even if he aspired to do that. But importantly, there is absolutely zero evidence Putin wants to invade. Putin’s Russia has no desire to ideologically control Western Europe. Its external interests have consistently focused on its immediate neighbors, and regions with Russian minorities. Crimea was Russia’s only land grab, and it only happened when the West sought to make Ukraine a satellite.

Tulsi Tucker
https://twitter.com/i/status/1485693277655343107

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No ground troops would be needed.

Russia Planning “Lightning War” To Take Out Kyiv: UK’s Johnson (ZH)

As we detailed earlier, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell during Monday statements to the press appeared to openly mock the UK and US for their dramatic announcements of embassy personnel evacuations due to threat of a Russian invasion of Ukraine. He said there’s no need to “dramatize” the situation given there’s high hopes that ongoing diplomacy will prevail. Moscow too has continued to condemn what it called “disinformation hysteria” prevailing in the West, which is fueling the crisis further. But it seems London is content to hype things further, with Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Monday citing “gloomy” intelligence from UK intel officials warning that Russia is planning a “lightning war” to take out Ukraine’s capital of Kiev.


Johnson said in a message directed at Russia that an offensive would be a “disastrous step” and “bloody business”. While confirming that some British diplomatic staff have begun to exit the embassy in Kiev and depart of the country, Johnson affirmed “We do think it prudent to make some changes now.” That’s when he said in dramatic fashion… “The intelligence is very clear that there are 60 Russian battle groups on the borders of Ukraine, the plan for a lightning war that could take out Kyiv is one that everybody can see.” “We need to make it very clear to the Kremlin, to Russia, that that would be a disastrous step.” He added during the comments that “from a Russian perspective, (it) is going to be a painful, violent and bloody business.” He concluded with: “I think it’s very important that people in Russia understand that this could be a new Chechnya.”

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The High Court bans the Supreme Court from taking a broader view?! Odd.

Assange Granted Permission To Take Extradition Case To UK Supreme Court (Haddad)

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was granted permission to take his extradition case against the United States to the Supreme Court, a court ruled on Monday. In a short hearing at the Royal Courts of Justice, also known as the High Court, Lord Chief Justice Ian Duncan Burnett refused to grant Assange leave to appeal—respecting the custom of allowing the Supreme Court to decide for itself which cases it hears—but did pave the way for the case to proceed to Britain’s highest court after “certifying” a point of law. Lord Chief Justice Burnett, Britain’s most senior judge, rejected two grounds on which Assange’s defence sought certification, but accepted that the issue of diplomatic assurances provided by the United States at a late stage of the hearing was of sufficient public importance for the upper-most court to consider.

In a written pronouncement explaining the finding, Burnett said: “The Respondent [Assange] sought certification in respect of three points of law, the first of which centred on the circumstances in which an appellate court may receive assurances from a requesting state concerning the future treatment of a requested person if extradited. “We do not consider that the second or third points raise certifiable points. So far as the first is concerned, although the law in this jurisdiction has long been settled it does not appear that the Supreme Court has considered the question. Assurances are at the heart of many extradition hearings.” Following the finding, Assange lawyers Birnberg Peirce Solicitors issued a statement in which they welcome the decision.

“The High Court found against Mr Assange in its ruling, and relied upon the late assurances, but has certified a point of law of general public importance on the question of the courts’ reception of assurances (frequently relied upon by requesting states in extradition proceedings to overcome defence evidence after it has established a bar to extradition) for the first time on appeal. “The identification by the High Court of the question above for the potential consideration of the Supreme Court, involves concepts of procedural fairness and natural justice. There has long been a general approach by the courts that requires that all relevant matters are raised before the District Judge appointed to consider the case in the Magistrates’ Court.

“What has underpinned a departure from those principles in practice is the categorisation of an assurance as an ‘issue’ as opposed to ‘evidence’ and the developing practice, potentially now consolidated in the decision in this case, whereby an assurance can be freely introduced by the requesting state and considered separately and later. “The defence argument is that despite being as demanding of close evidential scrutiny as the evidence already heard, and despite the content of the assurances being applicable to the testimony of witnesses already heard but not heard again, assurances has been afforded a different procedural position. This issue has become of considerable importance in the predictability and progression of extradition cases.

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The convoy is over 70km long.

 

 

It was reported that Biden called Doocy after calling him an SOB, but apparently that was not to apologize.

 

 

 

 

Yeah,. we had some snow. Paralysis ensues.

 

 

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

 

Dec 072021
 
 December 7, 2021  Posted by at 10:14 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,  78 Responses »


Vincent van Gogh Outskirts of Paris: Road with Peasant Shouldering a Spade 1887

 

‘Extremely Mild’ Omicron Is Rapidly Killing Off Much More Deadly Delta (CityAM)
Excess Mortality Among Children After Vaccine Rollout (Rair)
De Blasio Requiring Kids 5-11 Show Vaccine Card To Dine Out, See Movies (NYP)
Most In Critical Care Unvaccinated? – Not According To Data (Jamie)
Fact-Check #13: “ICUs Are Filled With The Unvaccinated” (OffG)
Suspended UK Doctor Unmasks Mask Mandate, Gets Reinstated (ET)
Doctor Banned For Questioning Efficacy of Masks Wins High Court Case (SN)
Supermarket Ad Showing Santa With A Vaccine Pass Cleared By Regulators
Pfizer Accused Of ‘Sabotaging’ AstraZeneca Jab (RT)
The War On A Virus Has Resulted In Colossal Failure (Schachtel)
A Brief History of Epic Mass Madness (Kunstler)
Sen. Ron Johnson Is Right About Dr. Anthony Fauci & AIDS (AS)

 

 

I have one news article today saying 62% more UK children 6-12 years old have died since their vaccinations started. And a 2nd article that says all children 5-11 in New York must be vaccinated. And I’m wondering: how is that not a completely insane world? How do we fail to connect these things?

 

 

 

 

Norman Fenton: Spike in all-cause mortality after vaccination

 

 

 

 

 

 

Back to normal then?

‘Extremely Mild’ Omicron Is Rapidly Killing Off Much More Deadly Delta (CityAM)

Excitement is growing among Coronavirus experts in Southern Africa and around the world as it increasingly seems that the new Omicron variant is rapidly replacing the much more deadly Delta mutation. Experts are so ecstatic because it seems more and more that the Omicron variant is much more contagious and dominant than Delta, but also much milder and less deadly. Some experts are therefore even urging countries to drop restrictions and let Omicron spread so the more infectious but less severe variant can kill off Delta quicker. Infections in South Africa have started to rise rapidly in recent days, a sign that displacement of the lethal Delta variant is in full swing, according to Adrian Puren, the acting executive director of South Africa’s National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD).

“What will outcompete Delta? That has always been the question, in terms of transmissibility at least, … perhaps this particular variant is the variant,” Puren told Reuters in an interview earlier this week. The World Health Organisation (WHO) has said there is early evidence to suggest Omicron has an “increased risk of reinfection” and its rapid spread in South Africa suggests it has a “growth advantage” compared to Delta. Therefore, virologist Marc van Ranst pointed out that “if the omicron variant is less pathogenic but with greater infectivity, allowing Omicron to replace Delta, this would be very positive.” In fact, Omicron could turn out to be “a storm in a teacup” and may blow over within a few weeks, according to a former head of the British government’s vaccine task force.


Clive Dix said that, if the new variant did turn out to be milder but more infectious than Delta, it would be worth easing travel restrictions so to let the milder Omicron mutation spread further. He told UK newspaper i he is “pretty calm and not really worried” about the new variant, adding that “if we look at all the facts that we know so far, none of them are heading in the direction of being a super concern.” “We’re not seeing serious disease yet and we’re not seeing death. The picture looks like it’s now a milder virus – and that’s what you expect with viruses. They mutate to become more transmissible – they’re not looking to be deadly, because otherwise they don’t get transmitted,” Dix explained.

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Insanity.

Excess Mortality Among Children After Vaccine Rollout (Rair)

Deaths of children have been on the rise since the UK started vaccinating teenagers from the age of 12 and older. The risk-benefit analysis raises serious doubts about injecting this age group with the experimental drug. On September 20, the British national health service NHS announced that the coronavirus vaccine would be rolled out for children aged 12 to 15. In part of the biggest vaccination drive in the country’s health service history, nearly three million children can receive a first dose of the Pfizer vaccine. According to the NHS, jabs started in hundreds of schools (week 38), with the injection program rolling out to others in the coming weeks.

Following the government’s vaccine rollout, the UK’s Office of National Statistics shows that the number of deaths between week 38 and week 41 of 2021 among children aged 10-14 were 62% higher than the five-year average for the number of deaths in this age group during the same period. Furthermore, the increase in deaths began when children started receiving the experimental “vaccine.” The trend of increasing deaths among children is continuing. More children in the age group 5-14 years died in week 43 of 2021 than usual. Data from the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) recently revealed that so many children died at the end of October that there was excess mortality.

The decision to jab children over twelve came after the four Chief Medical Officers (CMO’s) of the United Kingdom advised the UK Government to offer the Pfizer injection to them. The government decided to go ahead with the injection program despite the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) previously stating that they could not support universal vaccination of children. Is it just a coincidence that deaths among children have since increased by 62% (up to 400% in vulnerable children) against the five-year average? The CMO admits they do not know the adverse effects the injection will have on children stating, we “acknowledge that there is considerable uncertainty regarding the magnitude of the potential harms.”

When considering whether or not to vaccinate children of that age, the CMO states that the jab will “help prevent classroom outbreaks and further disruptions to education.” However, their reasoning has no factual basis; as the jab has shown, it continuously fails to prevent infection or transmission. Moreover, even Pfizer does not make the CMO’s claim. Therefore, the government’s argument that the benefits outweigh the risks is invalid. Furthermore, the jab is risky for children’s well-being. In May 2021, Pfizer published a 37-page “factsheet” on the safety and use of their vaccine, from which it emerges that 79% of vaccinated children over the age of 12 could expect side effects. Unfortunately, the government ignored Pfizer’s, and the media refuse to report on their admission because it does not seem to fit their current “political narrative.”

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Insanity squared.

De Blasio Requiring Kids 5-11 Show Vaccine Card To Dine Out, See Movies (NYP)

Kids will soon get carded at New York City restaurants and movies — for proof that they’ve been vaccinated against the coronavirus, Mayor Bill de Blasio said Monday. “Vaccination works and vaccine mandates work,” de Blasio said during a remote press briefing on the latest mandate from City Hall. De Blasio said he was taking the “very bold, aggressive action” in response to the lockdown in Germany and other restrictions returning across the globe amid the new Omicron variant — even though the city’s only seen seven cases of it and the overall COVID-19 infection and hospitalization rates here are among the lowest in the nation. Children ages 5 to 11 must show proof of one vaccination dose to eat out, see a show, go to a movie theater, visit a fitness facility, or attend indoor entertainment venues by Dec. 14. Kids over age 12 must have two doses by Dec. 27 unless they received the one-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine.


De Blasio first launched the “Key to NYC” vaccine mandate for adults at all public indoor venues in August. But the new mandate also applies to many school activities. Kids over 5 must now be vaccinated to attend “high risk” extracurricular activities like band, sports, orchestra and dance in schools. The policy earned quick criticism. “Public health and safety is paramount, but Mayor de Blasio’s announced expansions to the Key to NYC vaccine mandate pose additional challenges for an already beleaguered restaurant industry in need of tourism support and revenues this holiday season,” said Andrew Rigie, who heads the NYC Hospitality Alliance. “U.S. families visiting New York City for scheduled holiday vacations may not be able to meet the vaccination requirements for children or themselves in time, and children aged 5-11 across the globe aren’t universally authorized to get vaccinated.”

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Pretty obvious. You’re being fooled.

Most In Critical Care Unvaccinated? – Not According To Data (Jamie)

Each week, NHS England publishes a great deal of information on hospital activity across the country. Within this compilation is the number of patients in critical care beds. Critical care units are specialist hospital wards that treat patients who are seriously ill and need constant monitoring.

The data helpfully splits out how many patients in critical care beds have Covid-19, how many don’t, and how many beds are unoccupied. I recreate this data in the chart below and it shows that currently within England, just over 1 in 5 beds has a critical care patient who has Covid-19. Just under 3 in 5 beds are patients needing care without Covid-19 and the remaining beds are unoccupied. So non-Covid-19 patients make up the bulk of patients across critical care units in the NHS at the moment. Even if every patient with Covid was unvaccinated (more below) the claim that critical care is full of unvaccinated is not supported by the data, based on NHS England’s own data. Of course, the author may refer to a specific unit in the country, but if that was the case, I do not think it should be a headline in a national newspaper.


NHS England does not publish the vaccination status of patients within hospital, but the UK Health Agency gives a snapshot each week within a weekly surveillance report. The report only provides information on those admitted to hospital and does not provide information specific to those in critical care units. Table 4 on page 20 shows that for patients requiring an overnight admission to hospital within 28 days of a positive Covid-19 test, two-thirds were vaccinated and one-third unvaccinated. Remember, not all admissions are because of Covid-19 and NHS England data shows that 1 in 4 admissions are people with Covid but not because of it. If two-thirds of patients going into hospital are vaccinated, it would be remarkable if for those who then required critical care it was the majority unvaccinated. Even more so when most deaths are among vaccinated people.

36%
https://twitter.com/statsjamie/status/1467801344245481476

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Just to rub it in a bit more.

Fact-Check #13: “ICUs Are Filled With The Unvaccinated” (OffG)

A few days ago Dr Hillary Jones, whilst being interviewed on Lorraine Kelly, claimed: “90% of people in hospital are unvaccinated”. Similarly, last week, Kevin Maguire claimed on Jeremy Vine’s show that: “The unvaccinated are filling hospital beds, they’re in ICUs taking up precious resources – there are hospital waiting lists going up because there are so many unvaccinated people in hospitals” Television presenters and news headlines across the United Kingdom have commonly referred to hospitals being filled with unvaccinated covid19 patients. As if it could ever be considered evidence of anything, an anonymous “doctor” wrote a piece for The Guardian, which he filled with nameless anecdotal evidence, and emotively headlined: “ICU is full of the unvaccinated – my patience with them is wearing thin.”

This claim is regularly used as an argument for vaccine mandates, and/or unvaxxed-only lockdowns. But is it true? In a word, no. ICUs are not “full” of unvaccinated covid patients, they’re not even full of covid cases. In fact, they’re not even full at all. As of last week, NHS England’s own bed statistics reported that England has 4330 available critical care beds, of which 894 (21%) are being used by Covid patients, 2608 (60%) non-Covid patients and 828 (19%) were empty. So, England’s critical care beds are not even 90% full, let alone 90% full of unvaccinated covid patients. But let’s be charitable and assume these people misspoke or communicated their point badly. Let’s assume they meant 90% of covid hospitalisations are unvaccinated.


That, at least, is true right? Wrong. The actual number is 35.4% According to the UK’s Health Security Agency data (page 31 of this document) 6639 patients were admitted to hospital “with Covid” in the weeks 44-47 of this year. Of those 6639, 2355 were unvaccinated. So unvaccinated people do not even make up the majority of Covid cases, let alone the majority of ICU admissions in general. So, even going by the official statistics – which we’ve previously shown are routinely inflated to make the “pandemic” appear frightening – the claim is incorrect. And that doesn’t even account for the fact that, according to Public Health England, a “Covid hospitalisation” is anyone admitted to hospital for any reason within 28 days of a positive Covid test. This could include people who are admitted to hospital for something else and then happen to test positive while they are there. We could also discuss the tiny number of hospital beds available in this country, which has more than halved since the 1980s, whilst the population has exploded in that time.

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“Vaccination for a coronavirus has never been done successfully, so to roll it out without completion of full clinical trials, knowing full well the results of the SARs-CoV1 trials in animal studies, where they all died, was at best negligent but will in time likely be considered a far worse crime.”

Suspended UK Doctor Unmasks Mask Mandate, Gets Reinstated (ET)

Dr. Sam White, a longstanding critic of the UK government’s coronavirus measures, feels wearing a mask poses its own health risks. He told me: “Non-grade clinical masks, especially in a non-clinical setting do absolutely nothing to protect anyone. In fact, there is a plentiful supply of scientific evidence to show they cause significant harm. For me, this is especially a concern for children, their neurodevelopment and neuroplasticity.” To those who argue that, as medical professionals wear them, they must serve some purpose, White says: “In a hospital setting, a mask is used in a well-ventilated theatre to prevent mucus secretions entering into an open wound or body cavity.

The surgeon is generally not moving, unlike someone working a 12-hour shift rushing around a warehouse where the mask quickly becomes contaminated with bacteria, viruses, and germs. It’s cruel to subject workers to what is an unsafe medical intervention. What is more, COVID is an aerosolized virus not spread by mucus. It’s like using a chain-link fence to keep sand out.” When I asked White what governments can do to deal with the plethora of COVID variants that are being discovered, he told me: “Whilst it mutates, and I am cynical if true gene sequencing has actually been done in each case of a new variant, it will become more transmissible, but symptoms become milder with each variant.” He added: “It never made sense to create a vaccine for a coronavirus as you can never keep up with the mutations. The vaccines do not prevent transmission, or infection.”

At least Johnson accepts White’s last point and he told reporters: “Our scientists are learning more hour by hour, and it does appear that Omicron spreads very rapidly and can be spread between people who are double vaccinated.” White feels he has a solution: “Ivermectin and other safe, proven, effective therapeutics do keep up with variants and actually work.” The helpful benefits of ivermectin were made very clear in the case of Sun Ng, an elderly COVID-19 patient who was thought to be dying but recovered only after being treated with the therapeutic. However, as The Epoch Times recently reported, the hospital in Illinois had to first be taken to court by his relatives before it would allow the drug to be administered.

The average age of deaths from COVID still remains around 82 and White points out that many of those people were severely deficient in vitamin D. He is equally scathing about the way the vaccines were rushed out without being fully tested: “Vaccination for a coronavirus has never been done successfully, so to roll it out without completion of full clinical trials, knowing full well the results of the SARs-CoV1 trials in animal studies, where they all died, was at best negligent but will in time likely be considered a far worse crime. It also vitiates any principle of informed consent with no long-term safety data available and insufficient short-term data.”

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“The ruling concluded that the tribunal’s decision was “an error of law and a clear misdirection,” meaning the decision was “clearly wrong and cannot stand.”

Doctor Banned For Questioning Efficacy of Masks Wins High Court Case (SN)

A doctor in the UK who was banned from using social media by the General Medical Council for claiming “masks do nothing” has won his case in the High Court. Dr. Samuel White was slapped with and 18 month ban by the GMC after he posted a video to Instagram and Twitter in June questioning the efficacy of face coverings. In the video, White said why he could no longer tolerate working in his previous roles because of the “lies” around the NHS and the government’s response to the pandemic, which were “so vast” he could no longer “stomach” them. White also committed the ultimate sin of remarking, “masks do nothing” to stop the spread of COVID, despite this being the consensus medical opinion at the start of the pandemic before it mysteriously switched almost overnight.

The doctor also expressed concerns about the safety of vaccines and the reliability of COVID tests. White took his case against the GMC to the High Court on the basis of his freedom of expression “to engage in medical, scientific and political debate and discussion,” White’s barrister, Francis Hoar, told a hearing at the Royal Courts of Justice. Hoar added that White’s opinions were “supported by large bodies of scientific and medical opinion” and had been “statements of fact and opinions about pharmaceutical and non-pharmaceutical interventions in response to the pandemic.” GMC’s Alexis Hearnden claimed that White’s views were not only misinformation, but posed a “risk” to the public because they didn’t align with official pronouncements.


However, the court ruled in favor of White, asserting that the tribunal which banned him from speaking had violated the 1998 Human Rights Act. The ruling concluded that the tribunal’s decision was “an error of law and a clear misdirection,” meaning the decision was “clearly wrong and cannot stand.”

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Next up: Jesus, Joseph and Mary.

Supermarket Ad Showing Santa With A Vaccine Pass Cleared By Regulators

A supermarket advert that depicts Santa Claus only being able to enter Britain with a vaccine passport has been cleared by regulators, who insist that it doesn’t ‘break our rules’. The short for the Tesco chain of supermarkets in Britain quickly became the second most complained about advert in history as it features the threat of Christmas being cancelled and Santa being quarantined because of COVID restrictions. Over 5000 complaints were registered after the ad, titled “This Christmas, Nothing’s Stopping Us”, also showed Santa averting the crisis by flashing his vaccination status passport, showing that he is fully vaxxed against the virus. In a statement, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) in Britain announced that “Having carefully assessed the 5,000 complaints we received about the Tesco Christmas ad campaign, we have concluded it doesn’t break our rules and there are no grounds for further action.”

The statement further noted “We consider that the depiction of Santa displaying a proof of vaccine status in an airport is likely to be seen as a humorous reference to international travel rules people have experienced this year. It is unlikely to be interpreted as a message about these rules or the Covid-19 vaccine more widely.” Many of the complaints argued that the advert was overtly politicising Christmas, and that it encourages ‘medical discrimination’ against those who are not vaccinated, and promotes the need to take COVID vaccines in order for society to keep functioning.


“While we understand that some people disagree with the vaccine programme and may find the ad in poor taste, we have concluded that the ad is unlikely to be seen as irresponsible or cause serious or widespread offence on the basis suggested,” the ASA statement further noted. While some earlier had celebrated the ‘removal’ of the ad, Tesco says it has not dropped the campaign. A previous ad campaign by Ryan Air that promoted the sale of summer flights with the slogan “Jab & Go!” was later banned by the ASA after thousands of people complained it was misleading.

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“‘Dispatches’ said Pfizer’s manufacturing costs were just 76 pence ($1.01) per jab, but the company was charging the UK government £22..”

Pfizer Accused Of ‘Sabotaging’ AstraZeneca Jab (RT)

US drugsmaker Pfizer is denying any wrongdoing after a British TV documentary showed that a presentation made on its behalf had criticized a rival Covid-19 vaccine manufactured by AstraZeneca as being potentially unsafe. Teasers for a Channel 4 ‘Dispatches’ investigative program, shown on Monday, say a Pfizer presentation described AstraZeneca’s vaccine against Covid-19 as unsafe for patients with compromised immune systems and as having the potential to cause cancer. The speech was delivered in Canada sometime last year, but it was unclear whether it was a one-off event or the speaker had made the claim multiple times. The program, titled ‘Vaccine Wars: The Truth About Pfizer’, airs on Friday.

Pfizer responded to say the presentation had been “wrongly attributed” to it and had been delivered by a third party. “We refute any suggestion that Pfizer has sought to undermine others’ scientific endeavors,” a company spokesman told the Daily Mail. “Our priority has always been getting high-quality, well-tolerated and effective vaccines to patients all over the world as quickly as possible and to help put an end to this deadly pandemic.” The spokesperson explained that Pfizer had paid a third-party agency to create an educational program about vaccines in Canada, after the government in Ottawa had approved Pfizer’s product for use in the country.


‘Dispatches’ said Pfizer’s manufacturing costs were just 76 pence ($1.01) per jab, but the company was charging the UK government £22 ($29.17) per dose – a 3,000% markup. Pfizer said the estimate was “grossly inaccurate” and did not account for the cost of clinical studies, “manufacturing on a massive scale,” and global distribution. AstraZeneca, which developed its jab in cooperation with the University of Oxford, has reportedly sold its vaccine at cost for £3.60 ($4.77), losing out on £21 billion ($27.84 billion) in potential revenue, while Pfizer has seen a windfall from the vaccines. However, the AstraZeneca jab has been dogged by reports of potentially fatal blood clots in certain populations, and the UK has since ordered twice as many Pfizer vaccines instead.

Pfizer CMO

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“[..] .. and the ruling class is determined to cover up this undeniable reality..”

The War On A Virus Has Resulted In Colossal Failure (Schachtel)

The war on a virus is long lost, and the sunk costs keep piling up. Whether you believe that this was all to bring about a Great Reset or some of the actors involved genuinely wanted to stop a virus, the result is now clear. The war on COVID-19 is over and it has resulted in colossal loss. Not a single battle was won. They lost the war, they know they lost the war, and now the losing side of the war — the global “elite” — is attempting to cover up this reality by any means necessary, even if it means dragging the entirety of humanity down with them. Movement Passes for 5 year olds in New York City and San Francisco. Prison for the non compliant in Austria and Germany. Detention centers for troublesome citizens in Australia and New Zealand. What do all of these places have in common?

First and foremost, as The Dossier readers know well by now, none of these measures are backed by any legitimate scientific precedent. The global “elite” forcibly drafted billions of people into fighting a “war on a virus,” and that war has been an abysmal failure. Now, almost two years into this war, the ruling class won’t give it up. Far from surrendering this unwinnable war, the “generals” of this struggle have decided to attempt to bring us down with them into colossal defeat. The people, organizations, and governments in charge of fighting our “war on a virus” have lost in devastating fashion. Far from a successful global effort to stop a virus, these ruling factions and power centers have failed the billions of people drafted into this war without the consent of the governed.


From Los Angeles to Sydney to Moscow to Rio to New York to Paris to London and everywhere in between, almost every government on every level across the world, with very few exceptions, committed incredible harm against their populations in the name of stopping a virus. And they have absolutely nothing to show for it. They threw every “public health expert” class instrument in the book at the COVID-19 pandemic, and nothing worked. But the people in charge don’t want to be blamed for the chaos they wrought. That’s bad politics, and not an ideal situation for those who believe that they are the personification of science itself. So instead of admitting to gross, criminally negligent and now purposeful failure, these maniacal saboteurs are doubling, tripling, and quadrupling down on sunk costs for the masses. The “elites” know nothing is working, but they’d rather take everyone down with them than to admit to wholesale failure.

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“The catch is, they’ve given themselves until February to enforce their foolish vaccine mandates.”

A Brief History of Epic Mass Madness (Kunstler)

Remember: the Progressive-Woke-Marxist-Jacobins liked nothing better than inflicting punishment. In fact, when you swept away all their ideological bullshit and the associated hustles, the movement was strictly about coercion, about pushing other people around, making them do as the Woke commissars willed. And there was a clearly sado-masochistic edge to all that. They relished cancelling people, wrecking careers, destroying reputations, livelihoods, marriages, families. Their political leaders had no qualms about exterminating hundreds of thousands of small businesses in Covid-19 lockdowns orchestrated by Woke heroes like Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York City and Governors Gavin Newsom of California and Jay Inslee of Washington State. And, of course, their darlings of the streets, BLM and Antifa, bashed-in shopfronts, looted all the merch, and burned down the buildings with mad glee.

But, most importantly, Covid-19 gave the political Left something else to focus its angst on once Mr. Trump was finally swept off the scene in the janky election. And until just the last few weeks of 2021, the virus has furnished endless opportunity for ever greater enactments of coercion and tyranny. Except now, suddenly, it’s all falling apart. In America, the claque behind the phantom president “Joe Biden” pulled the trigger on mandating vaccinations — complete with harsh punishments for the vaxx-averse — but then two things happened: 1) Federal Judge Terry Douglas in Louisiana issued an injunction against the mandate that applies in all fifty states; and 2) the news finally started leaking out — despite every effort of the US public health officialdom to hide it — that the vaccines carried an unprecedented risk of harm for medicines enlisted so casually into emergency use among so many millions of people, in addition to their negligible efficacy in preventing illness and contagion.

The Europeans, on the other hand, slid ever-deeper into despotic measures not seen since the Gestapo terrorized the continent. The Europeans face the same primal source of anxiety that the Americans do: the running down of their techno-industrial economies, except their predicament is arguably a little bit keener than ours is, since they have hardly any oil and natural gas of their own to run things on, and suffer terrible uncertainty about who will furnish it for them. If they had not gone out of their minds over what has turned out to be a pretty punk-ass virus — when treated early with a menu of cheaply available drugs — and hadn’t deified the false savior vaccines, they might be a whole lot more concerned about how they are going to heat their homes, fertilize their crops, and produce things of value — in short, remain civilized. The catch is, they’ve given themselves until February to enforce their foolish vaccine mandates.

The Omicron variant may help, too, since it is proving so far to be a grossly over-hyped development, discrediting the paranoia ginned up in the media. Can their courts act as ours have and put a stop to the madness? Between now and then we’re likely to see the defeat of the mass formation psychosis in America, at least, as the country is forced to face the truth of what it has done to itself.

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And 40 years later he’s the head of US health care. Madness assured.

Sen. Ron Johnson Is Right About Dr. Anthony Fauci & AIDS (AS)

Dr. Anthony Fauci’s own words buttress Senator Ron Johnson’s claim that he “overhyped” AIDS during the 1980s. But decades after he issued them neither Rolling Stone nor the Hill nor the Daily Beast bother to question, let alone investigate, Johnson’s accusation. Instead, those publications just take Fauci’s 2021 words at face value and pretend he did not say what he said in 1983. “By the way, Fauci did the same exact thing with AIDS,” Senator Ron Johnson told Brian Kilmeade of Fox News last Wednesday. “He overhyped it. He created all kinds of fear, saying it could infect the entire population when it couldn’t, and he’s doing, he’s using the exact same playbook with COVID: ignoring therapy, pushing a vaccine.” To respond, Fauci retreated, for the second week in a row, to a sycophantic Sunday host.

Last week, Fauci claimed that Republicans criticize him not because of his many errors but because “I represent science.” Just as the jaw-dropping arrogance Fauci displayed on Face the Nation last week did not even raise one of Margaret Brennan’s eyebrows let alone drop her jaw, Jake Tapper seemed dismissive this week of the idea that the senator knew something that maybe a television presenter did not. Instead of digging into Johnson’s claim, he asked Fauci to respond to the senior senator from Wisconsin’s “bizarre and false assertion.” “How do you respond to something as preposterous as that?” Fauci told Tapper. “Overhyping AIDS? It’s killed over 750,000 Americans and 36 million people worldwide. How do you overhype that?”

The way people overhyped AIDS during the 1980s involved scare stories that one could contract the disease by using the wrong pay phone or public restroom. Fauci contributed to that hysteria. He knows he did this. He knows he received criticism for doing it from many quarters, including the late Randy Shilts, a voice generally friendly toward Fauci, in And the Band Played On. He knows exactly what Johnson refers to but he feigns ignorance. “The finding of AIDS in infants and children who are household contacts of patients with AIDS or persons with risks for AIDS has enormous implications with regard to ultimate transmissibility of this syndrome,” Anthony Fauci explained to the American public in 1983. “If routine close contact can spread the disease, AIDS takes on an entirely new dimension.”

But infants and children did not contract the virus that causes AIDS from “routine close contact.” A responsible doctor does not make such a public proclamation. A bureaucrat, more concerned with saving his job than lives, does. It struck as a typical, CYA pronouncement way back when. Beyond this, bureaucrats — whether in defense or health or welfare or education — tend to hype problems to engorge the coffers of their agencies. Fauci based his remarks on nothing scientific but instead on speculation. Thirty-eight years later, Fauci counted on his journalistic cheerleaders to forget what they probably never remembered in the first place. They came through for him.

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Galileo: ‘The sun doesn’t revolve around the earth.’


Twitter: ‘This claim is misleading. Learn why religious officials believe the sun revolves around the earth.’

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Diamant (activate subtitles)

 

 

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Jul 112021
 
 July 11, 2021  Posted by at 9:05 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , ,  41 Responses »


John Swope Trees in fog (Chile) 1939

 

Things To Know Before You Allow Your Child To Get The Covid-19 Vaccine (Con.)
Well-Deserved Consequences (Denninger)
Ivermectin. WHO Scientist Faces Death Penalty (Observateur)
Can Long Covid Be Cured By A Monthly Dose Of The Vaccine? (DM)
1/4-Dose Of Moderna Covid Vaccine Still Rouses A Big Immune Response (Nature)
Annexin A2 Deficiency (Lee)
Greece’s Coronavirus Predictions Show Worsening Epidemiological Picture (GR)
Don’t Fool with the Diversity of Mother Nature (McCullough)
Rand Paul To Introduce Bill To End Mask Mandate On Planes (JTN)
OPCW Report On Navalny Makes Contradictory Claims (RT)
Say Hello To The Diplo-Taliban (Escobar)
China: Fragile Giant (Jim Rickards)

 

 

 

 

Dr. Martin on DaszaK

 

 

LIES.

Things To Know Before You Allow Your Child To Get The Covid-19 Vaccine (Con.)

COVID-19 for children IS LESS THAN A FLU. This is a very well known fact among the experts, and yet, it’s been systematically hidden in mainstream Media. Still, if you follow mainstream Media, you’ll get the impression that there’s a need to get children vaccinated anyhow, based on three premises:

1) Children need to be vaccinated to help to avoid infection of adults
2) These new vaccines have no long term adverse effects
3) There is consensus in the scientific community about the safety of these new therapies

1) Children need to be vaccinated to help to avoid infection of adults IT IS A LIE that children need to take part in the effort to reduce transmission by getting inoculated, BECAUSE IT IS ADMITTED BY the manufacturers that it doesn’t prevent transmission, it only reduces symptoms. You can find that admission in the documents of the trials and on the manufacturer’s websites. Whenever you hear that “transmission is cut by these therapies”, it comes from scientists (which are really LOBBYISTS, once you take the time to research their conflicts of interest). You will never find an assertion about these vaccines granting immunity BY THE COMPANIES THEMSELVES. The simple fact is that the TRIALS WERE EXPRESSLY DESIGNED only to try to “search for” reduction of symptoms, which clearly means no immunity was found: otherwise that would have been the focus of their research. And to top all of this, the number of cases of vaccinated patients dying with COVID-19 shows, if anything, that transmission is not halted by the injections.

2)These new vaccines have no long term adverse effectsIT IS A LIE that these new “vaccines” have no long term effects, for the simple reason that it’s an assertion that’s impossible to certify without time passing by. The mere fact that somebody would guarantee that no long term effects are possible SHOULD RAISE YOUR CONCERNS regarding the trustworthiness of that official. And yet that’s what you hear from most of them. Usually you also get some of them even saying that mRNA vaccines have decades of research. EXACTLY! That doesn’t mean decades of guaranteed safety. On the contrary, mRNA vaccines had never been approved before, EXACTLY BECAUSE OF SAFETY ISSUES.

3)There is consensus in the scientific community about the safety of these new therapies IT IS A LIE that there is consensus in the scientific community around the safety of the new vaccines. You are led to think that, because the ones raising the alarms are systematically censored and not invited on TV. Find the thousands of doctors saying otherwise and you’ll easily prove that CONSENSUS IS THE BIGGEST LIE OF THEM ALL. Please, don’t take these accusations against mainstream Media lightly. Confirm by yourself that actually, for whatever reason, Media has been “protecting” the reputation of what actually are their main sponsors. As such, it is cautious to—in the very least—postpone the vaccination of your child for a year so and see how it goes. The vaccine adverse reporting systems in United States and Europe have registered several cases of heart problems developed among young people.

No matter how low the risk of this is, don’t you think that your children deserve the opportunity to decide for themselves ONCE THEY’RE ADULTS if they want to join a trial for an experimental therapy? Because YES: the manufacturers have been granted with an Emergency Use Authorization only, and it is as such that they state that their “products” are strictly on trial phase until the end of 2022. TECHNICALLY & PRACTICALLY, these vaccines, no matter how beneficial they can be, are an experiment performed on humans on the largest scale ever witnessed. We all hope the end results are good, but under no circumstance it’s reasonable to bet on that when the future health of our children is at stake. This is absolutely not about vaccine hesitancy. This is about responsible parenthood.

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Long essay by Karl.

Can’t repeat this often enough these days:

“..80% of all people had pre-existing resistance and, absent severe co-morbid issues that could kill them literally at any time were never at material risk..”

Well-Deserved Consequences (Denninger)

Going back to the start of Covid-19 there were several things that were apparent: Not everyone was susceptible to a serious or fatal outcome irrespective of age or medical status. Diamond Princess proved this conclusively. It was ignored. We later conclusively and scientifically proved that approximately 80% of all people had pre-existing resistance and, absent severe co-morbid issues that could kill them literally at any time were never at material risk. If you let the virus into nursing homes it will kill a lot of people. Kirkland proved that conclusively. We not only ignored that we called the employees of said places “heroes” and did not demand they isolate away from the general population, paying them whatever we had to in order to get them to do it, even when we had a wild excess of hotel space in which we could have as we had (foolishly) locked down basically all travel and leisure activity.

Children and young, healthy adults are at little or no risk. It’s not zero, but it’s less than the flu. We now know fewer than 400 people under age 18 have been killed by Covid in the US and virtually all of those who died had unrelated life-threatening medical issues (such as childhood cancers.) For older, more-morbid people it’s another story entirely; they have 1,000x as much danger or more. So what did we do? We closed schools and forced 60 million healthy kids to wear masks. In other words we made children pay for other people’s risk, and we did it by force, screwing all those kids out of months to a year or more of schooling and treating them as plague rats who were responsible for killing their grandmother. Most of the morbid conditions that put you at particular risk are voluntary. Specifically, Type II diabetes and obesity.

We not only lied to kids about their risk we forced children and young adults to bear the cost of voluntary adult behavior. This is particularly monstrous and massively compounds the above point. We allowed the demonization of drugs that had been used safely for decades for other conditions and in fact let them be effectively banned. Was there proof that they worked? Not early on, but so what? The so-called “right to try” that was much-ballyhooed and paraded around for over a decade disappeared instantly under force by every single social media company. Who remembers all the crying mothers in front of Congress and elsewhere begging for access to unproved but possible treatments for their children with rare diseases and the attendant and relentless GoFraudMe cry-room campaigns?

Abortion, a purely-elective procedure undertaken by millions and considered a sacred civil right with its need arising in nearly every case from voluntary adult (irrespective of age) conduct has a higher risk of death than Ivermectin. Where the hell did all those screaming for access to unproven therapies go and why did not that same principle apply here, especially for consenting adults? Lupus and RA patients have taken HCQ as a maintenance drug on a daily basis for over a decade and the safety profile and its contraindications are well-known.

[..] Why didn’t Trump’s HHS — or Biden’s — do it the other way around? You get your $13,000 bonus if the patient walks out of your hospital under his or her own power. If he or she dies the hospital gets nothing. Want to take a bet on how much Ivermectin, Budesonide and HCQ would have been used had the government done that? [..] Here’s reality whether you wish to admit it or not: If 5%, 10% or 50% of the population decides they’ve had enough of this robbery and death then it stops. One hopes the demand is enough. It should be enough, but you have to be willing to back it up just like the Minutemen were on April 19th of 1775.

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Google translation has some “woke” problems with he/she/they. Dr. Soumya Swaminathan is a woman.

Ivermectin. WHO Scientist Faces Death Penalty (Observateur)

On May 25, the Indian Bar Association (IBA) filed a lawsuit against Dr Soumya Swaminathan, WHO Chief Scientist, accusing him of causing the deaths of Indian citizens by deceiving them about the ivermectin. The WHO scientist is accused of making a misleading tweet on May 10, 2021 against the use of ivermectin which resulted in the state of Tamil Nadu removing ivermectin from the protocol the following day. He had just declared this treatment effective against Covid-19. If Dr Soumya Swaminathan is found guilty, then she could be sentenced to death or life imprisonment. Attorney Dipali Ojha, senior lawyer for the Indian Bar Association, threatened Dr Swaminathan with criminal charges “for every death” caused by his acts of commission and omission.

The brief accused Dr Swaminathan of wrongdoing in using his position as health authority to serve the special interests of the lucrative vaccine industry. Ivermectin is an inexpensive drug that is prescribed as an antiparasitic. It has gained popularity for the prevention of covid-19. The WHO and the FDA do not approve ivermectin, but many doctors and scientists believe it to be effective. Some claim that states in India that used ivermectin had much better results and significantly fewer deaths from covid than states in India that did not use ivermectin. In the regions of Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Goa cases fell by 98%, 97%, 94% and 86% respectively. In contrast, Tamil Nadu who chose not to use ivermectin, the number of cases exploded and became the highest in India. Deaths in Tamil Nadu have increased tenfold.

In a test of over 4,000 people in India (over 3,000 took ivermectin) and over 1,000 did not. The results showed that 2% of people who took ivermectin had a covid confirmed by a PCR test and that 11.7% of people who did not take ivermectin had a covid confirmed by a PCR test. The specific charges include conducting a disinformation campaign against ivermectin and posting statements on social and mainstream media to falsely influence the public against the use of ivermectin despite the existence of large amounts of ivermectin. clinical data showing its profound efficacy in the prevention and treatment of covid-19.

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First: something to take monthly doesn’t meet even the most flexible defiition of “vaccine”. Second, why not find out what the problem is before injecting more of the stuff?

Can Long Covid Be Cured By A Monthly Dose Of The Vaccine? (DM)

Even as Covid cases continue to climb, the Government’s plan to lift all remaining restrictions in a matter of days is still on track for a single reason: the vaccine has severely weakened the link between infections, hospitalisations and deaths. Yet, amid the optimism, another concern has cast a shadow – the rising diagnoses of long Covid, the debilitating condition that leaves sufferers battling symptoms for months after being infected. More than a million Britons are said to be living with lingering problems, from breathlessness to brain fog, and that figure could double by the end of the summer, say experts. With no effective drug treatments yet discovered, there has been little hope for those living with the worst difficulties – until now.

In a world first, British scientists are set to explore giving long Covid patients monthly doses of the Covid vaccine, in an effort to combat the chronic condition. The first stage of the study was given the green light on Friday: later this year, 40 long Covid sufferers will be offered at least two extra jabs. Funding has been offered by several of the major vaccine developers, and if the pilot is successful the scientists involved have been told they can recruit thousands more patients. Speaking exclusively to The Mail on Sunday, Dr David Strain, senior clinical lecturer at the University of Exeter Medical School, who will lead the trial, says the manufacturers are interested in funding the study after early research showed that long Covid symptoms were significantly reduced after patients had a jab.

Dr Strain said: ‘Many saw a dramatic improvement within days of their jab. Their fatigue disappeared, they were able to walk further without feeling breathless. ‘Some said it was the closest to normal they’d felt since they first caught Covid. ‘In an earlier study we saw this lasted for about a month after the first dose, but then symptoms return. ‘The same pattern was seen when people went for their second jab. We want to find out whether, over time, offering regular doses can make this change permanent.’

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A monthly dose of that then? ha ha.

1/4-Dose Of Moderna Covid Vaccine Still Rouses A Big Immune Response (Nature)

A little bit of coronavirus vaccine goes a long way towards generating lasting immunity. Two jabs that each contained only one-quarter of the standard dose of the Moderna COVID vaccine gave rise to long-lasting protective antibodies and virus-fighting T cells, according to tests in nearly three dozen people1. The results hint at the possibility of administering fractional doses to stretch limited vaccine supplies and accelerate the global immunization effort. Since 2016, such a dose-reduction strategy has successfully vaccinated millions of people in Africa and South America against yellow fever2. But no similar approach has been tried in response to COVID-19, despite vaccine shortages in much of the global south.

“There’s a huge status quo bias, and it’s killing people,” says Alex Tabarrok, an economist at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. “Had we done this starting in January, we could have vaccinated tens, perhaps hundreds, of millions more people.” In the earliest trial of Moderna’s mRNA-based vaccine, study participants received one of three dose levels: 25, 100 or 250 micrograms3. The top dose proved too toxic. The low dose elicited the weakest immune response. The middle dose seemed to offer the best balance: it triggered strong immunity and had acceptable side effects. That 100-microgram dose ultimately became the one authorized for mass use in dozens of countries. But Moderna scientists later showed that a half-dose seemed to be just as good as the standard dose at stimulating immune protection4.

To find out whether a low dose might offer protection, scientists analysed blood from 35 participants in the original trial. Each had received two 25-microgram jabs of vaccine 28 days apart. Six months after the second shot, nearly all of the 35 participants had ‘neutralizing’ antibodies, which block the virus from infecting cells, the researchers reported in a preprint published on 5 July1. Participants’ blood also contained an armada of different T cells, both ‘killer’ cells that can destroy infected cells and a variety of ‘helper’ cells that aid in general immune defence. Levels of both antibodies and T cells were comparable to those found in people who have recovered from COVID-19.

“It is quite remarkable — and quite promising — that you can easily detect responses for that long a time,” says Daniela Weiskopf, an immunologist at the La Jolla Institute for Immunology (LJI) in California and a co-author of the study, which has not yet been peer reviewed. Corine Geurts van Kessel, a clinical virologist at the Erasmus University Medical Center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, who was not involved in the study, agrees. “It’s rather good news,” she says. “Even with a low dose, you can prime your own immune system in quite a nice way.”

Read more …

Twitter thread.

Annexin A2 Deficiency (Lee)

Our study explaining the pathophysiology of acute COVID has been published by ERJ, the flagship scientific journal of the European Respiratory Society @ERSpublications. Here, we describe how severe COVID-19 is NOT a viral pneumonia, but a post-viral autoimmune attack of the lung. The target of this autoimmune attack is Annexin A2, a phospholipid-binding protein, which acts as a cofactor for tPA, ensuring integrity of the pulmonary vasculature and promoting lung elasticity. Antagonism of Annexin A2 would cause lung blood clots, pulmonary edema, and ARDS. In essence, anti-Annexin A2 would cause all the hallmark pulmonary pathology already identified on autopsy among severe cases of acute COVID-19. Autoantibodies to this lung protective protein were already identified among hospitalized SARS patients.

Furthermore, Annexin A2 is also expressed in the vasculature of the brain. Therefore, antagonism of Annexin A2 can cause microvascular stroke and damage to the blood-brain barrier, which would result in neuro-inflammation and long-term neurological injury. The implications for acute COVID-19 are enormous. Not only would it explain why steroids work in this disease, but it would suggest that we should be treating the disease more like other autoimmune diseases of the lung. We have misdiagnosed severe cases of acute COVID-19 as a viral pneumonia, which disregards the established evidence that shows viral load of SARS-CoV-2 is markedly diminished by the time patients develop the respiratory distress that only occurs in second stage of the disease.

We are also misdiagnosing Long COVID, which is also characterized by lung perfusion deficits, pulmonary fibrosis, and various neurologic sequelae. Our next studies will establish whether these autoantibodies are also present among patients with persistent post-COVID symptoms. While we are just beginning to establish this evidence, prothrombotic antiphospholipid antibodies have already been well described by @jasonsknight @RayZuoMD and @YogenKanthi. Anti-Annexin A2 is a known “non-criteria” APL antibody that causes thrombosis.

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“Almost everyone who is unvaccinated will catch the coronavirus

Really? As well as everyone who IS vaccinated?

Greece’s Coronavirus Predictions Show Worsening Epidemiological Picture (GR)

Experts warned the public on Friday that predictions of how the coronavirus will develop in Greece over the next couple months are very worrying. The most optimistic forecast for the month of August shows that Greece will diagnose 3,000 new cases of the coronavirus daily. A professor of pulmonology, Nikos Tzanakis, appeared on SKAI TV on Friday to warn the public of the likelihood that coronavirus cases will continue to rise sharply through August and the coming months. “In August we may have 3,000 cases of coronavirus per day in the most favorable scenario, 4,000 cases is the most probable — but there is even the possibility of 6,000 cases a day in the worst case scenario,” Tzanakis outlined, showing the full range of predictions for the development of the coronavirus in Greece.

“Almost everyone who is unvaccinated will catch the coronavirus. It is mathematically certain that a child who returns from summer camp will infect all of the relatives it comes in contact with in a matter of minutes,” continued the professor, illustrating how severe the situation is and the increased transmissibility of the delta variant of the virus. “In order for summer camps to function safely, they must be turned into social bubbles, health measures must be tightened and visits must be completely banned,” Tzanakis said of the popular children’s pastime. He continued by analyzing why it is so important that summer camps do not receive any visitors. According to pulmonologist, if a single asymptomatic adult visits and gives coronavirus to their child, 100 more children will likely come down with the virus.

This concept of a “social bubble” can and should also be applied to adult activities over the summer, said Tzanakis. If an individual visits an island and stays with their friend group, it is unlikely that they will catch the coronavirus according to the expert. By sticking to a “social bubble,” and not going large parties, people can stay safe from the virus while still having fun. The fact that Greece’s coronavirus predictions are so disheartening is likely due to the delta variant and the country’s vaccination campaign, which is slowing down despite new incentives being introduced for young people to get the vaccine.

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Novavax.

Don’t Fool with the Diversity of Mother Nature (McCullough)

In a report from Niesen and colleagues from the Mayo Clinic, a worrisome finding has been reported. Among populations that were > 25% vaccinated, there was a reduced genetic diversity of SARS-CoV-2 strains. While the authors appeared to imply this was a good finding, other experts disagree. Anytime diversity is reduced in biological systems, it leads to instability in ecological systems. It can be the breeding ground for large evolutionary changes, including large mutations and more aggressive variants. Niesen also found that there was a much greater degree of immunity or “epitopes” on B-cells and T-cells among those unvaccinated, implying that immunity was far more robust than those vaccinated.

Fears about the Niesen findings were confirmed in a paper by Acevedo from Santiago Chile, who reported on the Lambda variant outbreak in Peru, which looks like it clearly occurred as a result of indiscriminate vaccination using the whole killed SARS-CoV-2 Sinovac (Coronovac) vaccine. The Lambda variant, while causing a small outbreak, is notable for having seven mutations in the spike protein – two of which are in the receptor-binding domain and allow complete escape from vaccine immunity. These papers, in aggregate, suggest that mass vaccination into a pandemic is “fooling with mother nature” in a manner that could be catastrophic if the indiscrimination program continues to be forced on the population.

The good news is that on June 30, 2021, in the New England Journal of Medicine, Heath et al. presented the Phase III trial results from Novavax. This antigen-based vaccine does not rely on genetics and should not have the organ toxicities seen with Pfizer, Moderna, and JNJ, and appears to have ~90% vaccine efficacy rates and much better safety data than the genetic vaccines. However, the injection site pain and reactions cannot be minimized. With this as a backdrop, we continue to have a need for early multidrug treatment for COVID-19 for both the vaccine breakthrough cases and the de novo patients.

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“Enough! Time to stop this farce and let people travel in peace!”

Rand Paul To Introduce Bill To End Mask Mandate On Planes (JTN)

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul says he intends to introduce legislation to scuttle the ongoing federal mask mandate for air travel once the Senate resumes its next session. “When the Senate returns to session, I will be introducing an immediate repeal of the mask mandate on planes,” Paul wrote on Twitter this week. “Enough! Time to stop this farce and let people travel in peace!” The U.S. Transportation Security Administration is enforcing a widespread mask mandate “across all transportation networks throughout the United States, including at airports, onboard commercial aircraft, on over-the-road buses, and on commuter bus and rail systems,” at least through Sept. 13.

Read more …

OPCW is like Bellingcat: NATO fact checkers.

OPCW Report On Navalny Makes Contradictory Claims (RT)

The latest OPCW report containing data on its response to the ‘poisoning’ of Russian opposition figure Alexey Navalny has glaring inconsistencies, Moscow says, adding that the chemical weapons watchdog has failed to explain them. Russia will seek clarification from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) on its findings, the country’s envoy to the chemical weapons watchdog Aleksandr Shulgin has announced. The document, presented at the 97th session of the organization’s executive council earlier this week, contains information on the body’s reaction to Navalny’s poisoning back in August 2020.

In it, the OPCW states that its secretariat “deployed a team to perform a technical assistance visit” related to the suspected poisoning of a “Russian citizen” at Germany’s request on August 20. The problem is that on that day, Navalny was only flying from the Russian Siberian city of Tomsk to Moscow. It was on that flight that he first felt ill and was then rushed to a hospital in another Siberian city, Omsk, following the plane’s emergency landing. Russia demanded that the OPCW explain “how this is even possible” and why the organization had previously told the participating states that its team was only sent to Germany in early September, Shulgin said.

“So, what do we have here? When Navalny first felt unwell while still onboard a flight from Tomsk to Moscow, the OPCW experts were already waiting for him in Berlin?” According to the Russian envoy to the OPCW, the technical secretariat of the chemical weapons watchdog has so far failed to provide any answer to these questions. According to Shulgin, Russia has “lots of questions” for the OPCW and will seek “clear answers” to every last one. The revelations also elicited a reaction from the Russian Foreign Ministry’s spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova. She said the glaring inconsistencies in the OPCW report only show that some Western nations, together with Navalny himself, are “going down” with their whole “chemical weapons poisoning story.”

Read more …

Russia’s problem now. Wonder what that will mean for the poppy trade.

Say Hello To The Diplo-Taliban (Escobar)

A very important meeting took place in Moscow last week, virtually hush-hush. Nikolai Patrushev, secretary of the Russian Security Council, received Hamdullah Mohib, Afghanistan’s national security adviser. There were no substantial leaks. A bland statement pointed to the obvious: They “focused on the security situation in Afghanistan during the pullout of Western military contingencies and the escalation of the military-political situation in the northern part of the country.” The real story is way more nuanced. Mohib, representing embattled President Ashraf Ghani, did his best to convince Patrushev that the Kabul administration represents stability. It does not – as the subsequent Taliban advances proved.

Patrushev knew Moscow could not offer any substantial measure of support to the current Kabul arrangement because doing so would burn bridges the Russians would need to cross in the process of engaging the Taliban. Patrushev knows that the continuation of Team Ghani is absolutely unacceptable to the Taliban – whatever the configuration of any future power-sharing agreement. So Patrushev, according to diplomatic sources, definitely was not impressed. This week we can all see why. A delegation from the Taliban political office went to Moscow essentially to discuss with the Russians the fast-evolving mini-chessboard in northern Afghanistan. The Taliban had been to Moscow four months earlier, along with the extended troika (Russia, US, China, Pakistan) to debate the new Afghan power equation.

On this trip, they emphatically assured their interlocutors there’s no Taliban interest in invading any territory of their Central Asia neighbors. It’s not excessive, in view of how cleverly they’ve been playing their hand, to call the Taliban desert foxes. They know well what Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has been repeating: Any turbulence coming from Afghanistan will be met with a direct response from the Collective Security Treaty Organization. In addition to stressing that the US withdrawal – actually, repositioning – represents the failure of its Afghan “mission,” Lavrov touched on the two really key points: – The Taliban is increasing its influence in the northern Afghanistan border areas; and – Kabul’s refusal to form a transitional government is “promoting a belligerent solution” to the drama. This implies Lavrov expects much more flexibility from both Kabul and the Taliban in the Sisyphean power-sharing task ahead.

And then, relieving the tension, when asked by a Russian journalist if Moscow will send troops to Afghanistan, Lavrov reverted to Mr Cool: “The answer is obvious.”

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One child comes back to bite.

China: Fragile Giant (Jim Rickards)

President Xi Jinping could quickly lose what the Chinese call, “The Mandate of Heaven.” That’s a term that describes the intangible goodwill and popular support needed by emperors to rule China for the past 3,000 years. If The Mandate of Heaven is lost, a ruler can fall quickly. Even before the crisis, China has had serious structural economic problems that are finally catching up with it. China is so heavily indebted that it’s at the point where more debt does not produce growth. Adding additional debt today slows the economy and calls into question China’s ability to service its existing debt. China also confronts an insolvent banking system and a real estate bubble. Up to half of China’s investment is a complete waste.

It does produce jobs and utilize inputs like cement, steel, copper and glass. But the finished product, whether a city, train station or sports arena, is often a white elephant that will remain unused. The Chinese landscape is littered with “ghost cities” that have resulted from China’s wasted investment and flawed development model. Essentially, China is on the horns of a dilemma with no good way out. China has driven growth with excessive credit, wasted infrastructure investment and Ponzi schemes. The Chinese leadership knows this, but they had to keep the growth machine in high gear to create jobs for millions of migrants coming from the countryside to the city and to maintain jobs for the millions more already in the cities.

The two ways to get rid of debt are deflation (which results in write-offs, bankruptcies and unemployment) or inflation (which results in theft of purchasing power, similar to a tax increase). Both alternatives are unacceptable to the Communists because they lack the political legitimacy to endure either unemployment or inflation. Either policy would cause social unrest and unleash revolutionary potential. China also has serious demographic challenges that will limit future growth… In 1980, China instituted a one-child policy in an effort to control population growth. But the 1980 announcement was really a matter of formalizing an existing policy. The Chinese have a cultural preference for boys over girls. So, when the one-child policy was implemented, the Chinese used pre-natal tests to determine sex and then aborted the girls.

At a more crude level, families kept buckets of water next to birthing beds so that if a girl was born she could be drowned immediately. It is estimated that between 20 million to 30 million baby girls were killed this way, resulting in an equivalent surplus of men over women. These excess men will never find wives in China. Since women can be selective about husbands, it follows that the 30 million excess men will be the least talented and poorest in Chinese society. This cohort is highly prone to antisocial behavior, including alcohol and drug abuse and violence. The demographic time bomb is now detonating. The missing children from thirty or forty years ago are the missing prime age workers of today.

Read more …

 

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Conspiracy
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Mar 302021
 


Edouard Manet Jeanne Duval, Baudelaire’s Mistress, Reclining (Lady with a Fan) 1862

 

Ron DeSantis Vows To Ban Vaccine Passports (Fed.)
UK Now Considering Digital Face-Scanning To Enter Pubs (SN)
CDC Director Chokes Back Tears As She Fearmongers “Impending Doom” (ZH)
Texas COVID Cases Drop to Record Low 3 Weeks After Mask Mandate Lifted (NW)
Dr. Fauci Warns Parents About Children Playing Together Without Masks (NYP)
Canada Suspends Use Of AstraZeneca Covid Vaccine For Those Under 55 (AP)
New Covid Vaccines Needed Globally Within A Year, Say Scientists (G.)
Ivermectin Prophylaxis Leads To 73% Reduction In Covid Infection (NIE)
Global Treaty Needed To Protect States From Pandemics, Say World Leaders (G.)
Dear Joe Scarborough, Let’s Debate Your Network’s Russiagate Coverage (Taibbi)
Journalists Attack the Powerless, Then Play Victim When Called Out (Greenwald)
Do You Believe in Magic? (Kunstler)
The Eurozone Weakness: Much More Than Covid (Lacalle)
Financial Capitalism: The Endgame (Ren.)

 

 

 

 

There is a move in Washington towards saying it’s the private sector that wants vaccine passports. “It’s just the markets at work”.

That way the government won’t be blamed, or so they hope. Coming soon to a country near you.

This promises to turn into an epic fight for rights and freedoms.

Ron DeSantis Vows To Ban Vaccine Passports (Fed.)

Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis denounced so-called “vaccine passports” in a Monday press conference — a policy currently being tested in New York State and one the Biden administration is reportedly developing, according to The Washington Post. Vaccine passports are digital credentials, a way of proving the carrier has received a COVID-19 immunization before frequenting a venue or traveling. DeSantis said he would take “an executive function” and “emergency function” and urged the state Republican legislature to propose legislation banning vaccine passports. “We always said we wanted to provide [the vaccine] for all but mandate it for none,” DeSantis said.

“While it was advised to take, particularly if you’re vulnerable, we were not going to force you to do it. It’s completely unacceptable for either the government or the private sector to impose upon you the requirement that you show proof of vaccine to just simply participate in normal society.” The Washington Post reported on Sunday that the Biden administration is working with Big Tech to develop vaccine passport technology. Five administration officials told the media outlet that coronavirus coordinator Jeff Zients is leading the operation. In January, 30 international airlines penned a letter to Zients urging the U.S. to implement vaccine passports for all citizens for travel. This followed an executive order by Biden instructing government agencies “to assess the feasibility” of COVID-19 documentation requirements.

[..] The Florida governor said in the press conference that by sometime this week the state will have administered the vaccine to 75 percent of seniors, or 3.5 million individuals. “You want the fox to guard the henhouse? I mean, give me a break,” DeSantis said. “I think this is something that has huge privacy implications. It is not necessary to do. It’s important to be able to do it [get the vaccine], but at the same time, we are not going to have you provide proof of this just to be able to live your life normally.”

Read more …

No other country has as many surveillance camera’s as Britain. Let’s add some more.

UK Now Considering Digital Face-Scanning To Enter Pubs (SN)

The UK government is funding companies that are producing technology which will utilize digital face scans to check people’s vaccination status and allow or block them from entering pubs, stadiums and other venues. “Britons could have their faces scanned to allow them to access pubs, gigs and sports events under one government-funded plan being drawn up for vaccine passports,” reports the London Times. Two companies – Mvine and iProov – are working together on the system after being given a £75,000 grant by the government having already worked with the NHS on facial recognition technology in the form of the contact tracing app.

The technology is being proposed as a solution to concerns that presenting vaccination status via an app on a phone will be too slow when multiple people are entering a busy venue. “Whoever is standing on the door of the pub is going to have to scan the certificate, read the name and date of birth, then ask the person for an ID document, check that the name and date of birth on the ID document are the same, squint at the photograph on the ID document and then make sure that the person in front of them is that person,” iProov CEO Andrew Bud said. “To which the answer is, that’s not going to happen.” Bud said that the facial recognition system would reduce this process to a matter of seconds, streamlining the system.

“It speeds the process up and it absolves people of what would otherwise be a very heavy responsibility,” he added. After months of promising that there would be no domestic vaccine passport, every indication is now that the government is going ahead with it. Millions of Brits will refuse to submit to digital face scans to go about their everyday business, but the vast majority are likely to accept it without question, creating a two tier society where those who resist the biosecurity surveillance state will remain in a de facto permanent state of lockdown.

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Some states are not doing well, but overall, does that graph justify panic?

CDC Director Chokes Back Tears As She Fearmongers “Impending Doom” (ZH)

In a stunningly emotional outburst during this morning’s COVID-19 Response press conference, new CDC Director Rochelle Walensky went “off-script” (though if one watches here eyes it appears she is very much reading a script) to warn the public about her “impending doom” following a rise in COVID cases and hospitalizations. The seven-day average of hospital admissions with confirmed or suspected Covid-19 increased in 25 states plus the nation’s capital and Puerto Rico last week, compared with same period a week earlier, according to U.S. Department of Health and Human Services data through Saturday.


The most dramatic surge has come in Michigan, with admissions up 50%, to an average of 379 a day. The next-worst momentum was in South Dakota, where daily admissions rose by 40% to an average of 28. “I’m going to reflect on the recurring feeling I have of impending doom,” Walensky said, appearing to hold back tears. “We do not have the luxury of inaction. For the health of our country, we must work together now to prevent a fourth surge.” “Right now, I’m scared,” Walesky exclaimed. Here is what Walensky is freaking out about… (could that simply be a rise in testing around Spring Break as responsible Americans check their health before traveling? Or is it remnants of the vaccines being picked up by the RT-PCR tests being run at 35 Ct?)


Source: Bloomberg

Of course, Fauci knows why: “I think the reason we’re seeing this plateauing and the increase that I hope doesn’t turn into a surge is because we are really doing things prematurely right now with regard to opening up.” Walensky implored Americans to mask up, socially distance, etc., etc. as she is worried about a new wave “if rules are lifted” too soon… “I’m speaking today not necessarily as your CDC director, but as a wife, as a mother, as a daughter to ask you to just please hold on a little while longer,”

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Others states do very well. Wonder why.

Texas COVID Cases Drop to Record Low 3 Weeks After Mask Mandate Lifted (NW)

Coronavirus cases have dropped to a record low in Texas roughly three weeks after the state lifted its mask mandate and reopened businesses. “Today the 7-day Covid positivity rate dropped to a new recorded low: 4.95%. Hospitalizations dropped to a 6 month low. This week we have 1 million 1st vaccines available,” Texas Governor Greg Abbott wrote in a tweet on Sunday. “Everyone now qualifies for a shot. They are highly recommended to prevent getting Covid but always voluntary.” The 4.95 percent test positivity rate is the lowest the state has seen since the start of the pandemic. According to the Texas Department of State Health Services, at least 1,900 new virus cases were reported on Sunday, which is the lowest daily number the state has seen since early June.

Data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that the seven-day moving average number of cases in Texas dropped to the lowest level since mid-June. According to the CDC, Texas was averaging 3,783 daily cases as of March 27. Abbott’s tweet also notes that hospitalizations dropped to their lowest number in the past six months. According to data from the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS), 3,104 COVID-19 patients were in hospitals across the state as of Saturday. Data shows that the state has not recorded a number this low since September 19, when there were 3,081 hospitalizations. As of Monday, Texas has reported more than 2.3 million confirmed coronavirus cases and at least 47,156 deaths.

Biden Mask Up

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Fauci on masks. Oh well.

Dr. Fauci Warns Parents About Children Playing Together Without Masks (NYP)

Dr. Anthony Fauci on Sunday warned that vaccinated parents still need to worry about their children becoming infected while playing with other kids. “The children can clearly wind up getting infected,” Fauci told CBS anchor Margaret Brennan on “Face the Nation” when asked about the risk of kids playing in groups. The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases said that while adults inoculated against COVID-19 don’t always have to wear masks around each other, children — who are not yet eligible for the jab — should wear them around each other.


“When the children go out into the community, you want them to continue to wear masks when they’re interacting with groups or multiple households,” he said. But when asked whether kids can return to camp or playgrounds this summer, Fauci said it was “conceivable that will be possible.” “We now have 3 to 3.5 million vaccinations each day. If we keep up with that pace, invariably, that’s going to drive the rate and the level of infections per day to a much, much lower level,” Fauci said, adding that lower infection rates will enable the country to have a “good degree of flexibility during the summer … with things like camps.”

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“..the fatality rate among those who develop clots is as high as 40%..”

Canada Suspends Use Of AstraZeneca Covid Vaccine For Those Under 55 (AP)

Canada on Monday suspended the use of the Oxford/AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine for people under 55 following concerns it might be linked to rare blood clots. The pause was recommended by the National Advisory Committee on Immunization for safety reasons. The Canadian provinces, which administer health in the country, announced the suspension on Monday. “There is substantial uncertainty about the benefit of providing AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccines to adults under 55 given the potential risks,” said Dr Shelley Deeks, vice-chair of the National Advisory Committee on Immunization. Deeks said the updated recommendations came amid new data from Europe that suggests the risk of blood clots is now potentially as high as one in 100,000, much higher than the one in one million risk believed before.


She said most of the patients in Europe who developed a rare blood clot after vaccination with AstraZeneca were women under age 55, and the fatality rate among those who develop clots is as high as 40%. Dr Joss Reimer of Manitoba’s vaccine implementation taskforce said despite the finding that there was no increase risk of blood clots overall related to AstraZeneca in Europe, a rare but very serious side-effect has been seen primarily in young women in Europe. Reimer said the rare type of blood clot typically happens between four and 20 days after getting the shot and the symptoms can mirror a stroke or a heart attack. “While we still believe the benefits for all ages outweigh the risks I’m not comfortable with ‘probably’. I want to see more data coming out of Europe so I know exactly what this risk-benefit analysis is,” Reimer said.

Read more …

How about ivermectin?

New Covid Vaccines Needed Globally Within A Year, Say Scientists (G.)

The planet could have a year or less before first-generation Covid-19 vaccines are ineffective and modified formulations are needed, according to a survey of epidemiologists, virologists and infectious disease specialists. Scientists have long stressed that a global vaccination effort is needed to satisfactorily neutralise the threat of Covid-19. This is due to the threat of variations of the virus – some more transmissible, deadly and less susceptible to vaccines – that are emerging and percolating. The grim forecast of a year or less comes from two-thirds of respondents, according to the People’s Vaccine Alliance, a coalition of organisations including Amnesty International, Oxfam, and UNAIDS, who carried out the survey of 77 scientists from 28 countries. Nearly one-third of the respondents indicated that the time-frame was likely nine months or less.

Persistent low vaccine coverage in many countries would make it more likely for vaccine-resistant mutations to appear, said 88% of the respondents, who work across illustrious institutions such as Johns Hopkins, Yale, Imperial College, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and the University of Edinburgh. “New mutations arise every day. Sometimes they find a niche that makes them more fit than their predecessors. These lucky variants could transmit more efficiently and potentially evade immune responses to previous strains,” said Gregg Gonsalves, associate professor of epidemiology at Yale University, in a statement. “Unless we vaccinate the world, we leave the playing field open to more and more mutations, which could churn out variants that could evade our current vaccines and require booster shots to deal with them.”

The current crop of vaccines that have received emergency authorisations in different parts of the world is a mix of old and fresh technologies. Of particular interest is the mRNA approach, employed by the companies Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna, which can be tweaked at speed (within weeks or months) to accommodate new variants – however, manufacturing hiccups are always a potential problem. But crucially, they are unlikely within reach of poorer countries, given that this set of vaccines are far more expensive and have comparatively onerous temperature storage requirements.

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I read the WHO is due to announce its guidance on the use of Ivermectin for Covid. This from India dates from November 2020.

Ivermectin Prophylaxis Leads To 73% Reduction In Covid Infection (NIE)

In a significant finding, two-dose Ivermectin prophylaxis has led to 73 per cent reduction in COVID-19 infection among healthcare workers (HCWs), who are more likely to contract the virus given their nature of job. The findings of the study conducted by AIIMS-Bhubaneswar between September 20 and October 19 is set to give a new dimension to the ongoing research on the behaviour of SARS-CoV2 and prevention and treatment of COVID-19. Ivermectin is one among several potential drugs explored for its therapeutic and preventive role in COVID-19 infection. The study conducted by 12 physicians of AIIMS-BBSR aimed at exploring the association between Ivermectin prophylaxis and development of COVID-19 infection.

The study was conducted on two sets of HCWs. While one set was administered with two doses of Ivermectin in a gap of 72 hours, the other took other prophylaxis. Corresponding author of the study and AIIMS Director Gitanjali Batmanabane said two-dose Ivermectin prophylaxis at a dose of 300 micro gram per one kg body weight with a gap of 72 hours was associated with 73 pc reduction of COVID-19 infection among the HCWs. AIIMS-BBSR has around 4,600 employees of which, over 625 have so far tested positive for novel coronavirus. As many as 372 including doctors, nurses, paramedics and sanitisation workers were considered for the month-long study. The list was prepared by the contact tracing team of the institute as per their exposure to COVID-19, based on WHO risk assessment guidelines.

“Earlier, at least 20 to 25 HCWs were getting infected with the virus daily. After the workers started taking Ivermectin, the number of infection has come down to one or two per day,” Dr Batmanabane said. As per ICMR guidelines, hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), vitamin C and other interventions were used by HCWs of AIIMS from April 11 in addition to the appropriate use PPE depending on the place they were posted. However, the uptake was not encouraging on account of known side-effect as large numbers of HCWs were getting infected. “Considering the fact that Ivermectin had been shown to have diverse mechanisms by which it successfully attacks the SARS-CoV-2, we decided to use it. The Ivermectin has a proven safety profile as a safe drug which has been used for many decades. The encouraging results of a study from Egypt prompted us to explore its role as prophylaxis for HCWs,” she said.

Read more …

All these “leaders” have failed for an entire year, despite often draconian measures, to stop the pandemic. Now they want more power.

Global Treaty Needed To Protect States From Pandemics, Say World Leaders (G.)

The world needs a global treaty for pandemics to protect states in the wake of Covid-19, akin to the settlement forged after the second world war, Boris Johnson and other world leaders have urged. In a joint article published in newspapers across the world, leaders including the UK prime minister, the French president, Emmanuel Macron, and the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, warn that a future global pandemic is an inevitability and that Covid has served as “a stark and painful reminder that nobody is safe until everyone is safe”. Escalating international tensions over vaccine supplies have led to calls for countries to abandon isolationism and nationalism, and come together to make way for a new era founded on principles like solidarity and cooperation.

The call comes from 24 world leaders, alongside the head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, and will appear in newspapers including the Telegraph in the UK, Le Monde in France and Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung in Germany. The leaders describe the pandemic as “the biggest challenge to the global community since the 1940s” and said that a settlement like the one formed after 1945 is needed to build cross-border cooperation before the next international health crisis. In the joint article, they say: “At that time, following the devastation of two world wars, political leaders came together to forge the multilateral system. The aims were clear: to bring countries together, to dispel the temptations of isolationism and nationalism, and to address the challenges that could only be achieved together in the spirit of solidarity and cooperation, namely peace, prosperity, health and security.”

A treaty on pandemics “should lead to more mutual accountability and shared responsibility, transparency and cooperation within the international system and with its rules and norms”, the leaders go on.

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Death, taxes and RussiaRussia.

Dear Joe Scarborough, Let’s Debate Your Network’s Russiagate Coverage (Taibbi)

Joe begins his rant by insinuating that those who’ve spent time documenting errors on the Russiagate story are maybe on “Russia’s payroll,” which is nothing new for this network, of course, or frankly for the press in general during this time. Implying that anyone who didn’t buy into the moral panic on Russia was a traitor was a fairly constant theme in media and politics in the last four years, with NBC’s smear of Tulsi Gabbard as a “favorite” of “Russia’s propaganda machine” being one of the ethical low points of the era. Why should Joe Scarborough be above the same tactics? The exact quote: “I’m amused by so-called reporters who — I don’t know if they’re useful idiots for Russia, or if they’re on Russia’s payroll … but there are some gifted writers who spend all night and day, trying to dig through, looking for instances where the press screwed up on Russia stories.”


He went on to say that yes, there were instances of mistakes, and some bad mistakes, but “more often than not,” the press got it right. Perhaps this could be a new slogan for the network: “MSNBC. We get it right. More often than not.” The full quote: “If you look at the totality of it, the totality of everything — I mean, yeah, the media screwed up at some points, and sometimes they screwed up badly… But more often than not, they got it right.” Obviously, I won’t presume that he’s talking about me when he mentions “some gifted writers” who may or may not be foreign spies, criticizing networks like his. He could be referring to Aaron Mate, or Glenn Greenwald, perhaps even Erik Wemple of the Washington Post, whose critique of Scarborough’s colleague Rachel Maddow’s Russia coverage was scathing enough.

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Judge and jury.

Journalists Attack the Powerless, Then Play Victim When Called Out (Greenwald)

The daily newspaper USA Today is the second-most circulated print newspaper in the United States — more than The New York Times and more than double The Washington Post. Only The Wall Street Journal has higher circulation numbers. On Sunday, the paper published and heavily promoted a repellent article complaining that “defendants accused in the Capitol riot Jan. 6 crowdfund their legal fees online, using popular payment processors and an expanding network of fundraising platforms, despite a crackdown by tech companies.” It provided a road map for snitching on how these private citizens — who are charged with serious felonies by the U.S. Justice Department but as of yet convicted of nothing — are engaged in “a game of cat-and-mouse as they spring from one fundraising tool to another” in order to avoid bans on their ability to raise desperately needed funds to pay their criminal lawyers to mount a vigorous defense.

In other words, the only purpose of the article — headlined: “Insurrection fundraiser: Capitol riot extremists, Trump supporters raise money for lawyer bills online” — was to pressure and shame tech companies to do more to block these criminal defendants from being able to raise funds for their legal fees, and to tattle to tech companies by showing them what techniques these indigent defendants are using to raise money online. The USA Today reporters went far beyond merely reporting how this fundraising was being conducted. They went so far as to tattle to PayPal and other funding sites on two of those defendants, Joe Biggs and Dominic Pezzola, and then boasted of their success in having their accounts terminated: ”

“As of Wednesday afternoon, the Biggs fundraiser was listed as having received $52,201. Pezzola had received $730. Biggs’ campaign disappeared from the site shortly after USA TODAY inquired about it…. Friday, a USA TODAY reporter donated to Pezzola’s fundraiser using Stripe. Stripe told USA TODAY it does not comment on individual users. A USA TODAY reporter was able to make a $1 donation to Pezzola’s fundraiser using Venmo, a payment app owned by PayPal. After being alerted by USA TODAY, Venmo removed the account. Soon a PayPal account took its place. PayPal caught that and removed it, too.”

Wow, what brave and intrepid journalistic work: speaking truth to power and standing up to major power centers by . . . working as little police officers for tech giants to prevent private citizens from being able to afford criminal lawyers. Clear the shelves for the imminent Pulitzer.

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“..whatever energy you actually can marshal to Build Back Better, save it for your town or your local community. ..”

Do You Believe in Magic? (Kunstler)

UBI is the primary feature of that because, in a command economy, production is mostly pretend, so you just have to give people money (for nothing). Remember the old basic operating system of the Soviet Union, stated succinctly as: We pretend to work and they pretend to pay us. Got that? The idea behind “Build Back Better” is to renovate the infrastructure of a hyper-tech economy that actually no longer exists because we are in the contraction phase of an historic pulsation or cycle, leaving us with lots of tech and less production, tending toward zero. Nobody flogging this slogan actually knows what it ought to mean under the circumstances, which is to go with the flow of the reality of this contraction: to downsize, downscale, and re-localize all our activities to bring them back into sync with actual productivity — that is, raising food, making real stuff, and trading it.

Again, it’s the energy dynamic, stupid. To get to that point, we’re going to shed the massive over-burden of financial game-playing that has pretended to represent our economy. That means stock valuations and bond prices will vaporize along with the derivative activities concocted for trading gainfully in these now-phantom representations of capital. If that happens sooner rather than later, we won’t even be able to pretend to Build Back Better the interstate highways, the electric grid, airports, and all the other stuff in the “infrastructure” folder. Indeed, a lot of that would be malinvestment folly now because we’re nearing the end of mass motoring and commercial aviation as we’ve known them.

If we even have electricity twenty-five years from now, it will come from much-reduced grids on a much more regional basis. The bottom line for all this is that pretty soon every corner of the country will be on its own amid quite a bit of social disorder and financial wreckage. So, whatever energy you actually can marshal to Build Back Better, save it for your town or your local community. And remember, all of the attempts by a national government to control these events, and coerce its citizens in the service of that, will only lead to a more ineffectual and impotent national government that nobody has faith in, confirming the fact that you are on your own.

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“..the European Central Bank increasing its balance sheet to 63% of the eurozone GDP vs the Fed at 36%..”

The Eurozone Weakness: Much More Than Covid (Lacalle)

The eurozone’s economic problem do not come from just a slow vaccination, but overly aggressive lockdowns. Between October and November, Europe’s leading economies decided to shut down the economy aggressively to prevent an increase in cases. Despite France’s extremely severe lockdown, one of the most aggressive in the world, daily new confirmed cases per 100 people went from 250 cases at the beginning of October to 522 as of March 26th. Daily new cases rose rapidly and fell in the month of November but have risen steadily since January. In Italy, new cases went from 70 in October to 369 by March 26th. In Germany, from 117 to 179 in the same period. In all of them, daily new cases have steadily risen since bottoming in January even with severe lockdowns.

Shutting down the economy for prolonged periods of time generates long-term side effects in jobs and growth that will likely hurt the recovery and create important social challenges. We cannot forget that the eurozone still had an unemployment rate of 8.3% and more than seven million furloughed jobs at the end of February. Massive stimulus plans have been implemented, with the European Central Bank increasing its balance sheet to 63% of the eurozone GDP vs the Fed at 36%, and money supply growing at a 12% annualized rate in the euro area. Fiscal stimulus is also enormous, with fiscal impulse and liquidity measures ranging between 10% (Spain) to 50% of GDP (Germany) in the main economies.


It is important to note that it is not just how much is spent, but where and when. A significant part of the fiscal stimulus in Spain, France, Italy, and Germany has been targeted at maintaining current government spending, and the measures to support businesses have only been decisive in Germany and France. However, large, and decisive measures to support businesses may fail as prolonged lockdowns lead to an insolvency crisis and inevitably a relevant part of those support mechanisms will zombify the economy, especially as this was an important risk that already existed in the eurozone before Covid-19, according to the Bank of International Settlements.

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“..lots of people earned a lot of money and a lot of people can’t afford living anymore.”

“We’re at the end game because it’s the final bubble. We’ve got the government bond bubble and there won’t be another bubble afterwards.”

Financial Capitalism: The Endgame (Ren.)

In 2008, we had the opportunity, collectively, to reboot a broken financial system so it became fit for purpose. But instead of reconfiguring finance to serve the real economy politicians and central bankers used quantitative easing to buy time which lulled the mainstream media into reporting that everything was back on track. Some people haven’t bought that story. Marc Friederich and Matthias Weik are two economists who didn’t succumb to groupthink after the 2008 crash and now see financial capitalism’s end game. Friedrich explained to Renegade Inc. that the authors’ intention is to help translate the complexity of a financial system by inverting it into a language that everybody understands. Having studied economics, and as children of the dot com bubble, the authors of four best-selling books in Germany, stress the important role sarcasm and dark humour play in their work in respect to making seemingly complex matters accessible to the wider public.

According to Weik, the aim behind mainstream economists’ use of convoluted language is to create a camouflage in order to prevent them from having to explain what their terminology means. “It’s like the language of law spoken in secret phrases whose purpose is to garner public trust”, said Friedrich. But what mainstream economists and politicians haven’t explained is the structural nature of a crisis that hasn’t been remedied since the 2008 crash. Instead, the metaphorical can has been kicked down the road. “We’re at the end game because it’s the final bubble. We’ve got the government bond bubble and there won’t be another bubble afterwards. It will burst because last time China and all the states rescued the world. They won’t save us anymore. We used cheap money like a drug. We just put more and more drugs into the system”, said Weik.

“Economists and politicians have learnt nothing in the last decade, rather they have merely bought time. The banks who created the last financial crisis continue to be the big winners”, says Friedrich. The losers are the working class and underclass who were encouraged to borrow recklessly. And yet it is these latter groups who the American and British press blame for the crisis. According to Friedrich, the catalyst for the crisis was low-interest rates and too much cheap money. “They tried to solve it with even lower interest rates and much more money. The debts have doubled since 2008”, said the economist. In Friedrich’s view, the Fed, ECB and other central banks will try to print more money “like they always do.” “We will definitely see negative interest rates….Since 2008 debts worldwide doubled for private people and for companies even three times more debts than 2008. So this is the final bubble. And the central banks create one bubble after the next one to keep the whole thing running. That’s it.”

“And we all know the patient is dead but nobody is ready to unplug the life support. The aim is to keep the system alive for as long as possible.” Weik added: “Over the past two years real estate prices exploded, the share prices exploded, lots of people earned a lot of money and a lot of people can’t afford living anymore.”

Read more …

 

 

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Nov 092020
 


Jean-Michel Basquiat Untitled 1982

 

COVID Risk Exaggerated, Talk Of A Second Wave Misleading – 500 Academics (DM)
Biden’s First Move As President-elect? Mask Mandate For All (Fox)
COVID Set Back Attitudes To Public Transport By Two Decades (G.)
The Bush/Cheney Administration Was Far Worse Than Trump (Greenwald)
Inside Trump’s Legal Warfare (Axios)
Kerry For Climate Chief, Buttigieg For Veterans, Yates For DOJ (ZH)
Donald Trump Jr: “Declassify Everything” (sundance)
Software That Gave Biden 1000s Of Michigan Votes Used In 28 Other States (JTN)
EHRC Report Into Labour Antisemitism Is The Real Political Interference (Cook)
NATO Says Biden Victory Will Help With ‘Assertive Russia’ (RT)

 

 

 

 

How old is the president?

 

 

“Listen to the science” becomes hollow and meaningless when scientists start contradicting each other. Because it shows there is no such thing as “the science”.

COVID Risk Exaggerated, Talk Of A Second Wave Misleading – 500 Academics (DM)

Official data is ‘exaggerating’ the risk of Covid-19 and talk of a second wave is ‘misleading’, nearly 500 academics told Boris Johnson in open letter attacking lockdown. The doctors and scientists said the Government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic has become ‘disproportionate’ and that mass testing has distorted the risk of the virus. They said tests are likely to be producing high numbers of ‘false positive’ results and the Government must do more to put infection and death rates within the context of normal seasonal rates. The letter criticised the Government’s handling of coronavirus for ‘causing more harm than good’. It comes after the UK yesterday confirmed a further 24,957 positive Covid tests, up just 13.9 per cent on last week’s total.

Top scientists suggested the UK’s second wave of coronavirus has already peaked. Professor Tim Spector, who leads the Covid Symptom Study app aiming to track the spread of Covid-19 in the UK, confirmed that there were ‘positive signs’ the country has ‘passed the peak of the second wave’. The open letter to the Prime Minister was signed by 469 medics and is titled First Do No Harm – the medical principle that a cure must never be worse than the disease itself. It is signed by immunologist Dr Charlotte R Bell, paediatrician Dr Rosamond Jones, consultant surgeon and Keith Willison, Professor of Chemical Biology at Imperial College.

The letter reads: ‘The management of the crisis has become disproportionate and is now causing more harm than good. ‘We urge policy-makers to remember that this pandemic, like all pandemics, will eventually pass but the social and psychological damage that it is causing risks becoming permanent. ‘After the initial justifiable response to Covid-19, the evidence base now shows a different picture.

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Mask mandates in the US are an invitation for unrest.

Biden’s First Move As President-elect? Mask Mandate For All (Fox)

One of Joe Biden’s first priorities as president-elect will be implementing mask mandates nationwide by working with governors. The future 46th president, however, says if they refuse than he will go to mayors and county executives and get local masking requirements in place. Fox News medical contributor Dr. Marc Siegel believes that while masks are “the icing on the physical distancing cake” and should be worn properly both indoors and outdoors, especially when people are too close together, a more punitive approach to mask wearing may have the opposite impact of what the administration intends.

“I think masks are quite useful, but they have a place and they’re not the be all and end all,” Siegel said. “I’m worried that mandating this with fines and such may actually lead to more of a rebellion against it.” He noted that the use of masks should be determined based on how much of the risk of exposure to the coronavirus is in a specific area rather than mandating it everywhere. As for social distancing, Biden’s plan says it will be used as more of a “dial” approach that will determine the risk of spread using evidence-based guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a move Siegel says is a mistake.

“I don’t think social distancing is dial. I think masks are a dial,” Siegel said. “Social distancing is something we should just be doing right now. You never know how much virus was in the community.” He believes physical distancing is actually more important to curbing the spread than masks are. “I think physical distancing is more important than masks,” Siegel argued. “If you’re 10 feet away from someone, you’re not going to get the virus. If you’re one foot away with a mask, you might.”

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But not nearly as much as the destruction of public transport did.

COVID Set Back Attitudes To Public Transport By Two Decades (G.)

The pandemic has put back attitudes to driving versus public transport by two decades, with almost two-thirds of UK car owners now considering their vehicle essential, research has found. A clear majority would now refuse to switch to a greener alternative even if better trains or buses were available, according to the RAC. The research for its annual Report on Motoring found reluctance to use public transport was now at its highest for 18 years. Compared with 2019, significantly more young drivers, and those living in the capital – around 65% of each – regard their vehicle as essential.

Although 50% reported actually using their car less overall this year, with 33% of the 3,000 respondents currently working from home, more than half, some 57%, perceived access to a car as more important now than before the coronavirus pandemic. While 54% said safety was a consideration, an increasing number now deemed a car necessary to shop or visit friends. Meanwhile, only 43% agreed they would use their cars less if there was better public transport, a sharp fall from 57% in 2019, and the lowest figure since 2002. The findings will further concern transport campaigners, with optimism dwindling that lower traffic volumes and increased cycling and walking could be maintained as a positive side-effect after the pandemic.

Cycling trips fell significantly below pre-pandemic levels in October, and people largely continued to avoid public transport. Passenger numbers were around 30% of normal demand on rail, and 60% on buses, while car use had risen to around 90% of pre-pandemic levels, according to the latest government figures up to last Monday. Other sources showed road traffic leapt in the following days before new lockdown restrictions, with data from satnav providers showing some of the worst congestion in two years on Wednesday.

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Something I’ve mentioned numerous times:

“Numerous media outlets that in 2015 were sputtering if not collapsing, and numerous television personalities about to be fired because nobody was watching them, were first rescued and then propelled into the stratosphere by The Trump Show.”

The Bush/Cheney Administration Was Far Worse Than Trump (Greenwald)

That the liberal belief in and fear of a Trump-led fascist dictatorship and violent coup is actually a fantasy — a longing, a desire, a craving — has long been obvious. The Democrats’ own actions proved that they never believed their own melodramatic and self-glorifying rhetoric about Trump as The New Hitler — from their leaders joining with the GOP to increase The Fascist Dictator’s domestic spying powers and military spending to their (correct) belief that the way to oust The Neo-Nazi Tyrant was through a peaceful and lawfully conducted democratic election in which vote totals and, if necessary, duly constituted courts would determine the next president. The motives for concocting this Wagnerian fantasy about coups, dictatorship, concentration camps and civil war are numerous.

Politics is boring, and your life unspectacular, if it’s dedicated to a goal as banal and uninspiring as empowering a septuagenarian career-politician — the centrist-authoritarian author of the 1994 Crime Bill, the credit card industry’s most loyal servant, and key Iraq War advocate — along with his tough-on-crime prosecutor-running-mate who always seems as if she just left a meeting of the Aetna Board of Directors where massive hikes in deductibles were approved. Glory is available only if one can convincingly herald oneself as a front-line warrior risking it all to courageously battle unprecedented evil and a Nazi-like menace. But working to do nothing more than elect Joe Biden, Kamala Harris and the rest of the painfully ordinary and mediocre corporatist and imperialist Democratic Party politicians through a standard American election?

There’s no glory residing in that, no courage needed for it, to put it mildly. Posturing as a courageous soldier in an existential battle for freedom, democracy and the survival of the marginalized against Nazi despotism is far more exciting and psychologically satisfying (and financially profitable) than being an obedient liberal drone marching in perfect tune to the dreary, McKinsey-scripted musical theater produced by Tom Perez and the DNC. That is therefore the delusional storyline adopted by many. Then there’s the multi-pronged profit that the Trump-as-Hitler motif has generated for virtually every institution of American authority. Numerous media outlets that in 2015 were sputtering if not collapsing, and numerous television personalities about to be fired because nobody was watching them, were first rescued and then propelled into the stratosphere by The Trump Show.

“It may not be good for America, but it’s damn good for CBS,” said the network’s then-CEO Les Moonves in 2016 about Trump TV. Of course media outlets don’t want to declare the 2020 election over: they will milk the abundant Trumpian cash cow until the very last drop has been monetized. The frightening spectre of a Dictatorial Menace also led liberal advocacy groups such as the ACLU to drown in previously unimaginable quantities of #Resistance cash, frenetically donated in the name of stopping Trump’s incomparable evil. Rotted and discredited institutions like the CIA, NSA and FBI re-branded themselves as patriotic guardians of liberal democracy and stalwart protectors of a besieged population.

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First cases to be launched today in an increasingly uphill battle. Legal costs will be phenomenal.

Inside Trump’s Legal Warfare (Axios)

President Trump plans to brandish obituaries of people who supposedly voted but are dead — plus hold campaign-style rallies — in an effort to prolong his fight against apparent insurmountable election results, four Trump advisers told me during a conference call this afternoon. Obits for those who cast ballots are part of the “specific pieces of evidence” aimed at bolstering the Trump team’s so-far unsupported claims of widespread voter fraud and corruption that they say led to Joe Biden’s victory. Fueling the effort is the expected completion of vote counting this week, allowing Republicans to file for more recounts Team Trump is ready to announce specific recount teams in key states, and it plans to hold a series of Trump rallies focused on the litigation.

In Georgia: Doug Collins, the outgoing congressman who lost to Sen. Kelly Loeffler in a special election to fill former Sen. Johnny Isakson’s seat, will be leading the campaign’s recount efforts. The team has also redeployed 92 staffers from Florida to Georgia, doubling its group on the ground In Arizona: Kory Langhofer, former counsel for Trump’s 2016 transition, will serve as lead attorney. In Pennsylvania: Porter Wright’s Ron Hicks is heading up the legal effort. Nationwide: They’re assembling additional surrogates and lawyers. “We want to make sure we have an adequate supply of manpower on the ground for man-to-man combat,” one adviser said. The group is also staffing a campaign-style media operation.

The team led by Trump communications director Tim Murtaugh is now a surrogate messaging center. It will pump out “regular press briefings, releases on legal action and obviously things like talking points and booking people strategically on television,” one adviser said. They’ll also make a big play to raise money for their legal defense fund. Trump’s formal legal team includes 2020 campaign manager Bill Stepien, lawyer Justin Clark, and senior advisers Jason Miller and David Bossie. Reps. Jim Jordan and Scott Perry, as well as former White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, are also advising.

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Meet the swamp creatures. For pete’s sake, John Kerry? Climate? Sally Yates? Wasn’t she supposed to be in jail?

Kerry For Climate Chief, Buttigieg For Veterans, Yates For DOJ (ZH)

While Trump is still far from conceding the election, whose outcome is called not by the media, but by the Electoral College on Dec 14… … Joe Biden is already busy forming his cabinet, where he need to draw a fine line between the hard-left progressive in the Democratic party (AOC has already been quite vocal in her criticism of how the Squad has been ignored) and centrist elements. Also, in addition to rolling out such new policies as fighting climate change and aggressively promoting women and minorities, Biden will focus on an economic team that will confront the surging unemployment and business slowdown touched off by the coronavirus pandemic. In total, as he builds out his economic team Biden will need to fill out the nearly two dozen cabinet-level positions in his administration.

Starting at the very top, Bloomberg reports that Biden will look for a Treasury secretary and other key officials “to negotiate with Congress on more stimulus, roll back some of President Donald Trump’s tax cuts and mend relations with U.S. trading partners.” Among the contenders that have emerged to fill the top economic-policy job are Fed Governor Lael Brainard for Treasury and economist Heather Boushey as director of the National Economic Council. Other crucial jobs include naming the secretaries of Defense, State and Homeland Security, together responsible for carrying out administration policy and overseeing a federal bureaucracy with more than 2 million civilian employees.

While Biden will be mindful of the possibility that a Republican-controlled Senate would almost certainly scuttle nominees for top posts who belong to the progressive wing of the Democratic Party, liberal groups will be policing Biden’s choices closely, fearful that he won’t reach into their ranks for top positions but will instead choose “moderate” Democrats in his own mold. Biden may try to tamp down that sentiment by putting a liberals in jobs that don’t require Senate confirmation. Most importantly, this means that “the swamp” which Trump vowed to fight – and lost – is back, because in forming his cabinet, Biden will rely on an inner circle of longtime veterans from the Obama administration as well as Wall Streeters. Finally, while Biden could make history by naming the first women to lead the Defense and Treasury departments, his key White House advisers are likely to be White men.

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Too late: “I don’t think post-election this will work, because the executive branch cabinet officers will refuse to support it. The enemies inside the gate will protect DC.”

Donald Trump Jr: “Declassify Everything” (sundance)

Amid all of the election ramifications and discussions, Donald Trump Jr. outlined a thought today that has likely been on the mind of many, myself included. I have spent a great deal of time thinking about this since the media began their insufferable onslaught and “president-elect Biden” narrative. The time has long past for President Trump to fully demand his executive cabinet members declassify the evidence outlining intrusive government surveillance upon not only himself, but all Americans. CTH has a rather unique perspective on the declassification angle. This conversation has traveled with me for over two years as I have talked to people inside the machinery.

Ultimately the discussion ends around something like this: Is the DC political surveillance state, and all of the ramifications within that reality, so fundamentally corrupt and against our nation’s interests, that no entity dare expose the scope and depth of it? And ultimately… is it the preservation of institutions that is causing so many disconnected outcomes from evidence intentionally downplayed? If we assume the scale of unconstitutional conduct has become systemic, that likely answers the questions. Personally, I believe this is the most likely scenario. “Likely” meaning the entire apparatus, DOJ, FBI, Legislative Oversight and the Intelligence Community (IC), is now so enmeshed within this corrupt out-of-control state that no-one, even the good guys, is willing to expose it because the institutional collapse would be devastating.


This is what I would call the Biggest of the Big Ugly. This catastrophic outcome, in combination with DC having made the system the primary source of their income, is what unites the Republicans and Democrats to stop anyone from exposing it. Once any elected official goes inside this system, they end up serving it. All of that said, I have previously outlined a pre-election process for President Trump to declassify information that would lay the system naked to We The People. However, I don’t think post-election this will work, because the executive branch cabinet officers will refuse to support it. The enemies inside the gate will protect DC.

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Nancy Pelosi’s Chief of Staff Is Chief Executive and Feinstein’s Husband a Major Shareholder at Dominion Ballot Counting Systems

Software That Gave Biden 1000s Of Michigan Votes Used In 28 Other States (JTN)

Election software that incorrectly awarded thousands of votes to Joe Biden in Michigan is used in a majority of U.S. states, including statewide in Georgia where it has reportedly been implicated in several voting-related “glitches” there. The Michigan Secretary of State confirmed on Friday that a software error in Antrim County, Michigan, in which Joe Biden was incorrectly awarded thousands of votes that led him to be declared the county winner, was caused by an error in which the county clerk “did not update the software used to collect voting machine data and report unofficial results.” The software is administered by the company Dominion Voting Systems. Following the correction of the error, the county flipped back to Trump, who walked away with 2,500 more votes than Biden.

Beyond Michigan, Dominion Voting System is also used in a majority of U.S. states, with the company boasting on its website of having “customers in 28 states,” including “9 of the top 20 counties” and “4 of the top 10 counties” throughout the county. The system was used for a presidential election in Georgia for the first time this year, after the state announced in July of 2019 that Dominion would be given a statewide contract to provide systems and software to the state’s 159 counties. Multiple election-related “glitches” have been reported in the state since Tuesday. In one instance, voting in two Georgia counties ground to a halt for several hours after an unknown update was applied to voting machines there.

In another county, a “software glitch” caused a delay in counting thousands of absentee ballots. Dominion reportedly received a $107 million contract last year to install 30,000 voting machines throughout the state. Georgia was moving away from its earlier election equipment provider, Election Systems & Software, after complaints following the 2018 midterm elections. Joe Biden currently leads in Georgia by about 7,000 votes.

Standard deviations

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The report says no antisemitism, so it’s used to suggest … antisemitism. Works exactly the way Russiagate does.

EHRC Report Into Labour Antisemitism Is The Real Political Interference (Cook)

I recently published in Middle East Eye a detailed analysis of last week’s report by the Equalities and Human Rights Commission into the question of whether the UK Labour party had an especial antisemitism problem. (You can read a slightly fuller version of that article on my website.) In the piece, I reached two main conclusions. First, the commission’s headline verdict – though you would never know it from reading the media’s coverage – was that no case was found that Labour suffered from “institutional antisemitism”. That, however, was precisely the claim that had been made by groups like the Jewish Labour Movement, the Campaign Against Antisemitism, the Board of Deputies and prominent rabbis such as Ephraim Mirvis.

Their claims were amplified by Jewish media outlets such as the Jewish Chronicle and individual journalists such as Jonathan Freedland of the Guardian. All are now shown to have been wrong, to have maligned the Labour party and to have irresponsibly inflamed the concerns of Britain’s wider Jewish community. Not that any of these organisations or individuals will have to apologise. The corporate media – from the Mail to the Guardian – are continuing to mislead and misdirect on this issue, as they have been doing for the best part of five years. Neither Jewish leadership groups such as the Board of Deputies nor the corporate media have an interest in highlighting the embarrassing fact that the commission’s findings exposed their campaign against Corbyn as misinformation.

What the report found instead were mainly breaches of party protocol and procedure: that complaints about antisemitism were not handled promptly and transparently. But even here the issue was not really about antisemitism, as the report indicates, even if obliquely. Delays in resolving complaints were chiefly the responsibility not of Corbyn and his staff but of a party bureaucracy that he inherited and was deeply and explicitly hostile to him. Senior officials stalled antisemitism complaints not because they were especially antisemitic but because they knew the delays would embarrass Corbyn and weaken him inside the party, as the leaked report of an Labour internal inquiry revealed in the spring.

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The swamp hasn’t had a new war in ages.

NATO Says Biden Victory Will Help With ‘Assertive Russia’ (RT)

After Joe Biden declared victory in the US presidential election on Saturday, there are fears that tensions between Russia and the West could escalate under his leadership. Congratulating the Democratic candidate on his projected win, which incumbent President Donald Trump continues to allege is the result of electoral fraud, the secretary general of NATO singled out Moscow as a priority for the incoming American leader. In a statement on the US-led military bloc’s website, Jens Stoltenberg wrote, “I warmly welcome the election of Joe Biden as the next president of the United States. I know Mr. Biden as a strong supporter of NATO and the transatlantic relationship.”

He continued: “We need this collective strength to deal with the many challenges we face, including a more assertive Russia, international terrorism, cyber and missile threats, and a shift in the global balance of power with the rise of China.” Russia’s Foreign Ministry has argued that NATO is increasingly succumbing to anti-Russian rhetoric. Spokesperson Maria Zakharova told reporters last month in a discussion about tensions with Sweden that the bloc was the source of “invented anti-Russian phobias” and “fanning tensions and the escalation of military activities in Northern Europe, one of the most stable regions in the world until recently.”

The past record of Biden, a stalwart of the US Senate’s Foreign Relations Committee, has concerned many Moscow lawmakers. The presumptive winner is unlikely to oversee an easing of tensions between the two countries, cautioned Leonid Slutsky, who heads the State Duma Committee on Foreign Affairs, which is the Russian equivalent to the body which Biden chaired, adding that he didn’t “expect essential changes for the better.” “Biden, together with President [Barack] Obama, launched the flywheel of new deterrents against Russia, with a series of sanctions at various levels,” Slutsky said.He also pointed to comments that Biden made in the past in which the Democratic candidate positioned Russia as America’s “main enemy” in his pre-election rhetoric.

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