Saturday, October 9, 2021

The Unforgivable Sin!

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Guest Post by Geert Vanden Bossche

One wonders how it is possible that while it has now been reported that vaccinated shed and transmit as much virus as unvaccinated people, the vaccinated are still protected against severe disease, whereas the unvaccinated are said to be unprotected. So, how can one explain that viral shedding and transmission and hence, viral replication no longer seem to be impacted by the vaccine, whereas the opposite still applies to the occurrence of (severe) disease?

Based on their study results, the authors from the above-mentioned report conclude that there is no significant difference in viral load between groups of vaccinated and unvaccinated, asymptomatic and symptomatic people who became infected with SARS-CoV-2 Delta variant. So, again: Considering that the vaccinated shed and transmit as much virus as unvaccinated people, how could one even postulate that unvaccinated people are susceptible to severe disease whereas vaccinees are still largely protected from severe disease?

Frankly speaking, this doesn’t make any sense at all. So there must be a ‘small’ detail the current ‘narrative’ overlooked.

Wait a minute … Does the above-mentioned comparison of viral load between the vaccinated and the unvaccinated include people who contracted SEVERE disease? It didn’t!  So, could it be that the unvaccinated are only susceptible to severe disease when their first (i.e., innate) line of immune defense is weakened because of a lowered functional capacity of their innate, poly-reactive antibodies (Abs)? Hmmm, this could explain why elderly people, those who are immune-suppressed or have underlying diseases, are susceptible to severe Covid-19 disease.

But what about our healthy youngsters and children as these age groups are thought to have excellent innate, pre-existing immune effector cells but are now also increasingly contracting severe Covid-19 disease. Could this be due to spike(S)-specific Abs that young and healthy children may harbor for up to 8 weeks after they contracted asymptomatic infection and that outcompete their innate protective Abs? If this is true, this would imply that only a small part of young and unvaccinated people are susceptible to severe disease (i.e., those who get quite rapidly re-exposed to Sars-CoV-2 after previous infection) but that the vast majority of them are still protected from severe disease, regardless of which Sars-CoV-2 lineage is predominant in the circulating viral population.

This seems, indeed, to be the case! Or do some of our ‘experts’ believe that the unvaccinated children and youngsters who don’t get Covid-19 disease have simply not been exposed to the virus at all? But how could that happen given the fact that in most countries, the pandemic started over 1.5 years ago and that we’re now dealing with highly infectious variants, and that infection prevention measures have largely been relaxed?

So, maybe we should not compare the functional immune capacity of unvaccinated youngsters who get severe disease with that of those who only get mild or moderate disease or don’t develop symptoms at all. However, it is viral transmission and shedding in the latter that has been compared to that in vaccinees. Does anybody realize that protection from (severe) disease in healthy children and youngsters is due to innate Abs, even regardless of the possible short-term presence of poorly functional S-directed Abs (which may even contribute to diminishing rather than strengthening their immune defence)?

Does anybody realize that this mechanism of protection is fundamentally different from the one protecting vaccinees from severe disease?  When present in sufficient concentration, high affinity, antigen-specific Abs readily outcompete low affinity, multi-specific Abs for binding to the same antigen. It is, therefore, reasonable to assume that vaccinees experience long-lived functional suppression of their protective, CoV-recognizing innate Abs and are thereby left to rely on their vaccinal S-specific Abs for protection against severe disease.

As the mechanism of immune defense in vaccinees is totally different from the one at play in unvaccinated individuals, the mantra of mass vaccination stakeholders that vaccination of youngsters and children will provide them with improved protection from contracting severe disease is a textbook example of scientific nonsense. Their irrational, erroneous extrapolations lead people to believe that they should get their children vaccinated, whereas there is barely any more catastrophic immune intervention one could think of.

In line with the intrinsic functional properties of innate, multi-specific Abs, healthy children and youngsters are NOT ‘naturally’ susceptible to any Sars-CoV-2 lineage but exclusively acquire such susceptibility as a direct consequence of functional suppression of their well-established innate immune capacity due to a rapid re-exposure event or, even much worse and long-lived,  due to vaccination. The likelihood of rapid re-exposure to Sars-CoV-2 after previous infection dramatically increases when highly infectious variants expand in prevalence. Such an expansion in prevalence directly results from mass vaccination campaigns as mass vaccination turns vaccinees into an excellent breeding ground for naturally selected S-directed immune escape variants.

So, unless there is any contradiction in the above reasoning and unless somebody could explain how similar viral replication and transmission dynamics in vaccinated as compared to unvaccinated individuals could lead to dissimilar clinical manifestations of infection, we can only conclude that the scenario is the following: Vaccination of children and youngsters is turning off their broadly protective innate immunity in exchange for S-specific vaccinal Abs that are becoming increasingly useless since their neutralizing capacity becomes more and more eroded as a result of enhanced escape of Sars-CoV-2 from neutralizing Abs [NAbs](a trend that has been clearly confirmed by molecular epidemiologists). Resistance to the neutralizing effect of vaccinal Abs that are nevertheless still able to bind Sars-CoV-2 virions and thereby outcompete protective innate Abs is likely to enhance the susceptibility of vaccinees to ADE (Ab-dependent enhancement of disease).

Unless virology and immunology are being rewritten, I cannot imagine how mass vaccination of our youngsters and children will not lead to an even more disastrous outcome of all the scientifically irrational and unjustifiable vaccination efforts. Not only will these dramatically increase the children’s risk to succumb to (accelerated) Covid-19 disease, but it will also take away the highly efficient capacity of healthy, unvaccinated people to diminish the dangerous, ever-rising viral infectious pressure in the population. By vaccinating our youngsters, children, and, even more generally, all people in excellent health, we deprive an important part of the population from its ‘anti-viral’ capacity and instead turn them into a breeding ground for more infectious and increasingly NAb-resistant variants.

In other words, mass vaccination of children will inevitably obstruct the process of building herd immunity in the population. While unvaccinated children who contract Covid-19 disease in the vast majority of cases don’t suffer severe disease and contribute to the buildup of herd immunity in the population, mass vaccination campaigns in children will prevent them from contributing to herd immunity because more infectious viral variants are increasingly escaping from neutralization by vaccinal anti-S Abs and gaining a significant fitness advantage in such an immunological environment.

There can be no doubt that large-scale immune interventions which ignore the immune pathogenesis of the disease are recipes for massive disasters.

It cannot be that highly knowledgeable vaccinologists don’t understand this clear-cut message. I can only shout at all of them, no matter their international reputation, the number of awards and recognitions they’ve gotten, the number of books they’ve written, or high-ranked papers they’ve published in peer-reviewed journals: SHAME ON YOU FOR NOT STANDING UP!



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Is The Small Business Sector Being Deliberately Targeted For Destruction?

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Is The Small Business Sector Being Deliberately Targeted For Destruction?

Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.us,

The past 18 months have not been kind to small businesses. If you were unfortunate enough to live in a blue state during the onset of the covid lockdowns and you own a brick-and-mortar business then you have probably spent a large part of that 18 months closed, or struggling to stay open with a skeleton crew of employees. If you did manage to get a PPP loan from the government during shutdown you are now realizing that the 24-week grace period is running out and you will probably have to pay most if not all of that money back soon. Many who tried to get a PPP loan failed because the money was quickly chewed up by major corporations instead of being reserved for small businesses.

And this isn’t even the beginning of the list of troubles for small companies. I have to say, unless a large part of your business is handled online your chances of staying solvent are slim. This is not the fault of most business owners, though, it is a consequence of artificially created conditions and restrictions.

What do I mean by this? Well let’s look at some factors that many people might not be aware of…

Here’s why small businesses are suffering

For example, both state and federal governments have been offering some level of covid unemployment stimulus. In the case of federal programs this could amount to $300 extra a week on top of a person’s existing unemployment checks, even more if their state has a separate program. This has created a massive drought in the employee pool. No one wants to work when they can stay home, do nothing and make more money than they ever were before the pandemic. The reality is that there are jobs everywhere right now, but almost no one is applying.

This has led to major corporations and retailers offering unheard of sign-on bonuses in the range of $300 to $500. Some companies are offering to pay people just to put in an application. Many are offering incredible wage increases in the range of $15 an hour for unskilled labor.

But guess who can’t make offers like that? The majority of small businesses. Large corporate chains have enjoyed endless stimulus packages from the federal government and the central bank and as long as this continues they will always be able to outbid small businesses for employees. And though the federal covid checks are slowly winding down, there are still millions of people receiving regular unemployment for many months to come. In a bizarre twist, the jobless are now flush with cash and are in no hurry to rejoin the workforce. Small companies simply cannot compete and lure these workers from their covid vacations.

On top of this, we are now witnessing a dynamic which I have been warning would happen for years now – a stagflationary grind. That’s right, the debate that has been raging for a decade among alternative economists is finally over: It’s not a deflationary depression or a Weimar-style hyperinflationary collapse that is bringing America down, but a crippling stagflationary malaise. This means that U.S. GDP will continue to decline and certain sectors of the economy will continue to decline while prices on many products (primarily necessities) will continue to increase or remain very high.

This creates a conundrum for small business owners – Their overhead is rising and this is shrinking their profit margins. But, if they raise prices it makes it even harder to compete with large corporations that are able to keep prices lower for longer because they have government stimulus backing them up. So, not only are brick and mortar businesses unable to compete for employees, they also can’t compete in terms of prices as the cost of materials and goods spikes. It’s inevitable, they will have to close down. There were over 200,000 extra small business closures in the past year alone due to covid and the lockdowns.

With small businesses being hit with a perfect storm leading to mass closures, the end result will be that only major corporations will be left to offer services in the near future, and I’ve been wondering for the past several months now if this is not part of the plan…

Re-engineering the Great Depression

I am reminded of the situation that took place during the Great Depression involving small banks. In the 1920s there were thousands of small town and county banks across the country that were unaffiliated with major banks like J.P. Morgan or Chase National. It might sound strange to hear it but before the Depression many banks used to be small mom and pop businesses. By the end of the 1930s over 9000 small banks had failed, and the primary beneficiaries were the major corporate banks that absorbed all the assets into their portfolios for pennies on the dollar.

In other words, the banking industry and the massive power it holds today was consolidated in the wake of the economic collapse of the 1930s, and nothing was ever the same again. This beneficial crisis was helped along by the Federal Reserve, which had artificially lowered rates through the 1920s, only to rip rates higher in the late 1920s and the early 1930s. In an address to economist Milton Friedman on his birthday, former Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke admitted that the Fed was essentially responsible for the disaster of the Great Depression, stating:

“In short, according to Friedman and Schwartz, because of institutional changes and misguided doctrines, the banking panics of the Great Contraction were much more severe and widespread than would have normally occurred during a downturn.

Let me end my talk by abusing slightly my status as an official representative of the Federal Reserve. I would like to say to Milton and Anna: Regarding the Great Depression. You’re right, we did it. We’re very sorry. But thanks to you, we won’t do it again.”

It’s interesting to me that the collapse that the Federal Reserve “accidentally” caused just happened to be the same collapse that allowed their good friends in corporate banking to centralize financial power for decades to come.

Today, we may be seeing a similar scenario unfolding. Look at it this way – The lockdowns were completely unnecessary. They didn’t stop infection rates and thus they didn’t save any lives anyway. In fact, the states with the harshest lockdowns and strictest mask mandates also had the worst infection spikes.

The covid unemployment programs are mostly unnecessary and only justified by the pointless lockdowns. And the stagflationary conditions have been mainly inflamed by the trillions in stimulus that the federal government and the Federal Reserve printed from thin air to pay for the unnecessary covid response programs and unemployment. The covid checks and loans have conjured a workforce calamity, but they have also fueled a retail buying spree which is mostly enriching manufacturing hubs like China, triggering exploding shipping demand and shipping costs, straining the supply chain, jamming up cargo ports and raising overall prices by leaps and bounds.

Every single element of this crisis has been engineered. And I would suggest the possibility that, like in the Great Depression, major corporations are once again in a convenient position to devour the small business sector and become the only game in town for all retail and services.

Not only do corporations benefit from the death of small business, but so does the Biden Administration in its relentless pursuit of covid vaccine mandates. Consider for a moment that small businesses are the antithesis to covid controls. Why? Because they offer people who refuse to take the experimental vaccines an alternative to major retailers that might demand to see their vax passports. Small businesses are much more likely to defy the draconian mandates, so Biden also wins by removing competition to the corporate oligarchy that support his controls.

Even if a small business complies with the passport mandates it will not save them, because the amount of extra costs involved in enforcement will be too much for most of them. Constantly policing customers and employees for up-to-date vaccine cards will become a full time job. Any slip up could mean a $70,000 to $700,000 fine, and because they have already submitted to the passports those businesses will have no backup from the community if they try to refuse to pay. They will ultimately close down anyway.

Without liberty minded small businesses, the only options left for the unvaxxed will be self employment (which will also be made more difficult over time), or barter and black markets.

Ironically, it is this threat that also creates an opportunity for small business owners. If they band together within their communities and let their communities know that they absolutely will not enforce the vaccine passports on employees or customers, then they could actually have a way to compete with and defeat the big box stores. They would have far more potential workers applying for jobs so their employee pool would grow at this critical time, and, they would gain all the customers in their area that also refuse to comply with the jab. Unless they are operating in a blue county, they will likely gain considerable business.

All the incentives are there. Small businesses will succeed and local communities will have options for defiance of medical tyranny. Will it anger the overlords? Yes, but who cares. They want to put you out of business anyway, so why not take a risk and fight back? The choice is to make a stand now, or live under the heel of a boot for the rest of your days. That’s all there is.

However, these measures need to be taken now before it’s too late. I also expect that as stagflationary pressures mount smaller businesses and the communities around them will have to start considering alternatives to the U.S. dollar. Precious metals are one option, along with barter and trade or local scrip as long as it is backed by commodities. There is much to be done. It is time for small businesses to accept the possibility that they have been targeted for destruction; they can do nothing and wait for the hammer to fall, or they can take measures to protect themselves. I suggest the latter.

*  *  *

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Tyler Durden Sat, 10/09/2021 - 21:00

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GoFundMe takes down $180,000 fundraiser for anti-mandate lawsuit, saying it violates their policy against vaccine 'misinformation'



The online fundraising platform GoFundMe has removed a campaign started by a nurse in Texas who sought to overturn a COVID-19 vaccine mandate, telling Insider that upon further review the fundraiser — which had brought in more than $180,000 — ran afoul of its policy against misinformation.

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COVID-19 Cases, Hospitalizations Plummet in Southern US, Rise in Northern States



COVID-19 metrics in southern states like Florida have plummeted in recent weeks while rising in many northern states, including heavily vaccinated ones. Confirmed COVID-19 cases in Mississippi, for instance, have plunged some 95 percent from the peak of 5,018 on Aug. 19 to just 268 on Oct. 7.

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Age-Adjusted Mortality Is at 2004 Levels. Yet They Tell Us Covid Is Worse Than the 1918 Flu.

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Last week, the media again tried to ratchet up the public’s fear over covid-19 by labeling it more deadly than the 1918 flu epidemic. “COVID-19 Is Now the Deadliest Disease in U.S. History,” reads one headline from an NBC TV affiliate. Considering the realities of cancer and heart disease, that headline is absurdly false. Perhaps the author meant “communicable disease.” A TIME headline was at least arguably factual, declaring, “COVID-19 Is Now the Deadliest Pandemic in American History.”

But even the TIME headline is only arguably true if stripped of all context. If we actually look at disease mortality proportionally to the population, the 1918 epidemic was far worse than covid. Considering that the US population in 1918 was one-third its current size, we find that deaths per million from the flu epidemic totaled about sixty-five hundred per million. Covid, by comparison currently comes in—in the official numbers—around twenty-two hundred per million.

But this is all part of a larger pattern—one well embraced by the media—of presenting information with as little context as possible. One such example was the reporting on suicide rates in 2018, which ignored everything but the most recent trend.

A current example—and one very much related to the attempts to compare covid to the 1918 flu—is the failure to look at covid mortality—and mortality in general—in light of an aging population.

Rising Mortality and an Aging Population

After all, the fact that the American population is rapidly aging is going to increase total mortality over time. We see that in the total mortality data over the past twenty years. For example, from 2001 to 2020, total deaths increased in every year but four. It’s unlikely this was because the United States was becoming a more deadly place to live for children or the middle aged. Rather, over that time, the US population became increasingly elderly—and also larger in general—and more people were dying.

This trend appears to have accelerated after 2011, with total annual deaths increasing by 33 percent. Moreover, even if we create a death rate and thus account for increases in total population size, we still find that the death rate has increased in every single year since 2009. Again, we have to wonder if this is because life is more deadly for the general population.

mort1
Source: US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; National Center for Health Statistics.

And, of course, there is the larger increase in mortality that occurred in 2020, thanks—in part—to covid deaths. But this increase occurred in a context of total deaths that was already in an upward trend.

We can get a better perspective on this if we adjust for the aging population. Since the makeup of the population is changing over time, it makes more sense to make comparisons over time using “age-adjusted” total deaths.

Using the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s official age-adjusted numbers for total deaths, the trend naturally looks different. Age-adjusted death rates have generally declined for the past twenty years. Indeed, the overall trend has been mostly downward for the past 120 years. (A notable exception was from 1914 to 1918, when the rate increased 18 percent.)

mort
Source: Historical data through 2018 obtained from National Center for Health Statistics Data Visualization Gallery (Mortality Trends in the United States, 1900–2018). Age-adjusted death rates for 2020 obtained from Farida B. Ahmad, Jodi A. Cisewski, Arialdi Miniño, and Robert N. Anderson, Provisional Mortality Data—United States, 2020, Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report 70, no. 14 (Apr. 9, 2021): 519–22. The report notes: "In 2020, approximately 3,358,814 deaths occurred in the United States (Table). The age-adjusted rate was 828.7 deaths per 100,000 population, an increase of 15.9% from 715.2 in 2019."­­

So what does this added context tell us?

For one, it tells us the comparisons to 1918 are quite inappropriate. Age-adjusted deaths increased by more than 265 per hundred thousand from 1917 to 1918. The same rate increased by 113 per hundred thousand from 2019 to 2020.

Moreover, looking more closely at the past twenty years, we find that the increase from 2019 to 2020 takes us back only to somewhere between 2003 and 2004 in terms of comparable rates. Anyone over the age of twenty-five who remembers those days may recall that the period was not considered to be a time of unprecedented health crises.

mort
Source: Centers for Disease Control. Historical data through 2018 obtained from National Center for Health Statistics Data Visualization Gallery (Mortality Trends in the United States, 1900–2018). Age-adjusted death rates for 2020 obtained from Farida B. Ahmad, Jodi A. Cisewski, Arialdi Miniño, and Robert N. Anderson, Provisional Mortality Data—United States, 2020 Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report 70, no. 14 (Apr. 9, 2021) 519–22.

The point here, of course, is not that covid deaths over the past eighteen months are insignificant. Indeed, even if we make no distinction between covid deaths and noncovid deaths since early 2020, it’s clear more Americans have indeed been dying from all causes. And that’s hardly something to celebrate or ignore. Nevertheless, it remains important to obtain some much-needed context when examining a disease which is being used to justify unprecedented increases in state power and violations of human rights.

American citizens are nowadays subjected to a nonstop drumbeat of claims about "unprecedented" levels of mortality. We’re even told covid is just like the flu of 1918. And to what end? Apparently, to rob people of their livelihoods if they refuse to receive a vaccine. It’s to attempt to make pariahs of anyone who makes health decisions of which the regime does not approve. It’s to continue to justify 2020’s ineffectual lockdowns. It’s to justify government spending at levels unprecedented in peacetime. It’s to deny that natural immunity provides meaningful resistance to the disease. Yet all this rhetoric occurs at a time when age-adjusted mortality is not exactly panic inducing if we look beyond the confines of just the last few years.



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Ontario doctor resigns over forced vaccines, says 80% of ER patients with mysterious issues had both shots

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Dr. Rochagné Kilian asked a hospital system CEO some tough questions about unethical behaviour and he deferred to the government.

The post Ontario doctor resigns over forced vaccines, says 80% of ER patients with mysterious issues had both shots first appeared on SAGACIOUS NEWS.



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Iceland Bans Moderna Vaccine Use Due To Heart Inflammation Risk

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Iceland Bans Moderna Vaccine Use Due To Heart Inflammation Risk

Authored by Ivan Pentchoukov via The Epoch Times,

Iceland on Oct. 8 halted the use of the Moderna vaccine against the CCP virus due to reports from Nordic countries of “increased incidence” of inflammation of heart muscle and tissues triggered by the injection.

Sweden, Finland, Denmark, and Norway have already limited the use of the Moderna vaccine over the same concerns. Iceland went further than its neighbors and stopped using the vaccine entirely.

“In recent days, there has been data from the Nordic countries on the increased incidence of myocarditis and pericarditis after vaccination with Moderna vaccine in addition to vaccination with Pfizer/BioNTech (Comirnaty),” an announcement from Iceland’s Directorate of Health stated.

“As there is a sufficient supply of Pfizer vaccine in Iceland for both the pre-vaccine activation vaccines and the primary vaccinations of those who have not yet been vaccinated, the epidemiologist has decided not to use the Moderna vaccine in Iceland, while providing further information on the safety of the Moderna vaccine.”

Sweden limited the use of the Moderna shot on Oct. 6 to those born before 1991. The Swedish health agency said at the time that new data from Swedish and other Nordic sources “indicate that the connection is especially clear” between Moderna’s vaccine and side effects “especially after the second dose.”

“Both myocarditis and pericarditis often go away on their own, without causing any lasting problems, but suspicious symptoms should be assessed by a doctor at … a health center or emergency room,” the agency stated, noting that “medical treatment and monitoring in hospital may be needed in established cases.”

Norway and Denmark have recommended the Pfizer vaccine for children aged 12-17. In Iceland, only the Pfizer vaccine has been recommended for the 12-17 age group.

Finland on Oct. 7 discontinued the use of the Moderna shot for men under the age of 30.

That decision came one day after Sweden and Denmark halted the use of the vaccine for the younger age groups.

Iceland had been using the Moderna vaccine almost exclusively as a booster shot for those who received the Johnson&Johnson vaccine, according to the Health Directorate. The Nordic nation had also been using the Moderna vaccine as a booster for two-dose vaccinations of the elderly and immunocompromised.

According to the World Health Organization, more than 75 percent of Iceland’s population has been fully vaccinated against the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, commonly known as the novel coronavirus, which causes COVID-19.

A total of 33 people died from COVID-19 in Iceland since the start of the pandemic.

Tyler Durden Sat, 10/09/2021 - 12:10

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Letter to a Colluder: Stop Enabling Tyranny



“A few hundred at the top, to plan and direct at every level; a few thousand to supervise and control (without a voice in policy) at every level; a few score thousand specialists (teachers, lawyers, journalists, scientists, artists, actors, athletes, and social workers) eager to serve or at least

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Stucky QOTD: Colluders

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Another excellent piece from a new (to me) author, Margaret Anna Alice.  Source:  margaretannaalice.substack.com  The question is inspired  from her article  “Letter to a Colluder: Stop Enabling Tyranny”

—– If you want to answer the question, please read the article first.  It is especially important regarding the question — because there are all types of colluders, from casual to severe, they are everywhere … and unbeknownst to you, YOU might be one.

If you do not  want to answer the question, at least please read the article anyway, and comment  … it is an excellent and well documented article. 

Q:  ARE YOU A COLLUDER?

======================================= =

ME?  Yes, I am a colluder.  How so?  These two quotes from the article explain it better than I can.

1)-  She writes;  “It is time to redirect your aggression from the people to the powers-that-shouldn’t-be.”

—–  Getting into shit-fests with TPBers who disagree with my views, and hating the vaxxed!  I wonder — am I fighting the right enemy??  Probably NOT!

2)-  She writes;  “You don’t have to be any of those abominable scoundrels to be an enabler of tyranny. You simply need to hold your tongue. You simply need to look the other way. You simply need to turn a deaf ear. You simply need to stifle your gut feeling that something is profoundly, irrevocably wrong about every venomous lie, absurd policy, and malignant mandate that has bombarded the public since spring 2020.”

—–  I talk a mean game … “blah blah blah blowme BLAH BLAH fuckenBlah!”  Other than that, fact is, and I am loathe to admit it …. I REALLY HAVEN’T DONE JACK OR SHIT TO STOP THE TYRANNY. People like me should me ashamed of themselves.

======================================= =

[Stucky Note: Margaret Anna Alice’s article follows.]

Letter to a Colluder: Stop Enabling Tyranny

Stand Down … So You Can Stand Up

 

Letter to a Colluder: Stop Enabling Tyranny (Series of Turnkey Toys Turning Each Other's Keys from Larges to Smallest)

 

“A few hundred at the top, to plan and direct at every level; a few thousand to supervise and control (without a voice in policy) at every level; a few score thousand specialists (teachers, lawyers, journalists, scientists, artists, actors, athletes, and social workers) eager to serve or at least unwilling to pass up a job or to revolt; a million of the Pöbel, which sounds like ‘people’ and means ‘riffraff,’ to do what we would call the dirty work, ranging from murder, torture, robbery, and arson to the effort which probably employed more Germans in inhumanity than any other in Nazi history, the standing of ‘sentry’ in front of Jewish shops and offices in the boycott of April, 1933.”

—Milton Mayer, They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933–45 (paperbackKindleaudiobook)

I’m willing to die to defend my liberty. Are you willing to die to take my liberty?

No? Good. Then stop enforcing totalitarian measures against your neighbors on behalf of the tyrants, who wouldn’t hesitate to annihilate you. Stop planning, directing, supervising, controlling, and performing their dirty work. Become part of the resistance instead of an enabler of democidal despots.

Whether you are a law enforcement officer, public health official, psychologist, scientist, medical professional, educator, employer, censor, propagandist, or any other agent of complicity in this war against the people, you are what makes dictatorships possible. You are what makes enslavement possible. You are what makes genocide possible. You are what makes the Biggest Lie in history possible.

You may not be one of the Gestapo agents beating individuals entering a public space without their vaxxport; wrenching children away from their vaxx criminal parents; pummeling anti-injection protesters; stripping and needle-raping resisters; reverting Australia to a penal colony; or restraining and forcibly injecting the elderly and mentally disabled (otherwise known as “useless eaters” by your predecessors).

You may not be one of the public health officials instituting ineffectual and deleterious mask guidelines and lockdowns based on fraudulent PCR tests; testing wastewater to justify iron-fisted measures; or falsifying the numbers to magnify a fabricated threat and conceal the deadly factual consequences and statistically astronomical number of adverse reactions to the injection.

You may not be one of the psychologists devising the mass persuasion campaign that has hypnotized the obedient, the gullible, and the ignorant around the globe.

You may not be one of the scientists too frightened of losing your career, credibility, grant funding, and future to denounce the fraud being perpetrated under the cloak of Science™.

You may not be one of the physicians violating the Hippocratic Oath and Nuremberg Code as you deny potentially life-saving medications, deploy murderous injections, administer lethal drugs such as Remdesivir, inflict ventilator-associated lung injuries, apply high-risk interventions like intubation, gang-inject patients, coerce pregnant mothers into risking miscarriage, refuse to treat non-GMO humans, and contemplate prioritizing ICU beds for the injected.

You may not be one of the nurses flouting the nursing code of ethics while pinning down screaming children as you plunge in the poison death jab.

You may not be one of the daycare employees torturing toddlers into wearing a mask.

You may not be one of the fascist institutions complying with the merciless edicts to fire the rational dissidents in your organization.

You may not be one of the censors suppressing evidence of all of the above atrocities while simultaneously silencing and smearing the honorable scientists, medical experts, whistleblowers, and other truth-tellers valiant enough to refute the preposterous narrative you have swindled so many into believing.

You may not be one of the propagandists blaring the Biggest Lie talking points over the loudspeakers through every conceivable mechanism 24/7/365 until the feeble-minded succumb to your relentless coercion from exhaustion, peer pressure, menticide, and Orwellian doublethink.

You don’t have to be any of those abominable scoundrels to be an enabler of tyranny.

You simply need to hold your tongue. You simply need to look the other way. You simply need to turn a deaf ear. You simply need to stifle your gut feeling that something is profoundly, irrevocably wrong about every venomous lie, absurd policy, and malignant mandate that has bombarded the public since spring 2020.

You simply need to live in fear. You simply need to cling to your ignorance. You simply need to follow the leader. You simply need to surrender to cowardice.

See if you recognize your present or potential future self in any of the following scenes from these dystopian phantasmagorias our own world is increasingly coming to resemble:

THX-1138 (Prime Video, blu-ray, DVD)

.

Brazil (Prime Video, blu-ray, DVD)

.

Fahrenheit 451 (blu-ray, DVD)

.

A Clockwork Orange (Prime Video, blu-ray, DVD)

Every act of collusion, every stain on your conscience, every bureaucratic compromise of your values etches an ineradicable scar into your soul.

As a philologist colleague of Milton Mayer’s explains in They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933–45:

“‘And one day, too late, your principles, if you were ever sensible of them, all rush in upon you. The burden of self-deception has grown too heavy, and some minor incident, in my case my little boy, hardly more than a baby, saying “Jew swine,” collapses it all at once, and you see that everything, everything, has changed and changed completely under your nose. The world you live in—your nation, your people—is not the world you were born in at all. The forms are all there, all untouched, all reassuring, the houses, the shops, the jobs, the mealtimes, the visits, the concerts, the cinema, the holidays. But the spirit, which you never noticed because you made the lifelong mistake of identifying it with the forms, is changed. Now you live in a world of hate and fear, and the people who hate and fear do not even know it themselves; when everyone is transformed, no one is transformed. Now you live in a system which rules without responsibility even to God. The system itself could not have intended this in the beginning, but in order to sustain itself it was compelled to go all the way.

“‘You have gone almost all the way yourself. Life is a continuing process, a flow, not a succession of acts and events at all. It has flowed to a new level, carrying you with it, without any effort on your part. On this new level you live, you have been living more comfortably every day, with new morals, new principles.

“‘You have accepted things you would not have accepted five years ago, a year ago, things that your father, even in Germany, could not have imagined.

“‘Suddenly it all comes down, all at once. You see what you are, what you have done, or, more accurately, what you haven’t done (for that was all that was required of most of us: that we do nothing). You remember those early meetings of your department in the university when, if one had stood, others would have stood, perhaps, but no one stood. A small matter, a matter of hiring this man or that, and you hired this one rather than that. You remember everything now, and your heart breaks. Too late. You are compromised beyond repair.’”

In Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland1 (paperback, Kindle, audiobook), Christopher R. Browning ponders why only twelve men out of a battalion of nearly 500 kindled the courage to decline participation in the Józefów massacre of Polish Jews when Major Wilhelm Trapp (who himself “wept bitterly” at the command but ultimately complied, saying, “But orders are orders”)—offered to excuse anyone who asked.

Browning lists such factors as “the pressure for conformity”; Himmler’s “exalting obedience as one of the key virtues of all SS men”; “wartime brutalization, racism, segmentation and routinization of the task, special selection of the perpetrators, careerism, obedience to orders, deference to authority, ideological indoctrination”; and fear of “isolation, rejection, and ostracism.”

Thanks to the “growing callousness” that comes from habituation, the soldiers discovered “killing was something one could get used to.”

Browning found Zygmunt Bauman’s explanation especially compelling, noting:

“For Bauman ‘cruelty is social in its origin much more than it is characterological.’ Bauman argues that most people ‘slip’ into the roles society provides them, and he is very critical of any implication that ‘faulty personalities’ are the cause of human cruelty.”

What set those twelve brave men apart? Browning summarizes Bauman’s observation:

“The exception—the real ‘sleeper’—is the rare individual who has the capacity to resist authority and assert moral autonomy but who is seldom aware of this hidden strength until put to the test.”

Browning goes on to cite the conclusion Philip Zimbardo drew from his notorious Stanford Prison Experiment:

“‘Most dramatic and distressing to us was the observation of the ease with which sadistic behavior could be elicited in individuals who were not “sadistic types.”’ The prison situation alone, Zimbardo concluded, was ‘a sufficient condition to produce aberrant, anti-social behavior.’”

He then recaps the findings of another famous experiment, Obedience to Authority conducted by Stanley Milgram:

“Milgram adduced a number of factors to account for such an unexpectedly high degree of potentially murderous obedience to a noncoercive authority.… Socialization through family, school, and military service, as well as a whole array of rewards and punishments within society generally, reinforces and internalizes a tendency toward obedience. A seemingly voluntary entry into an authority system ‘perceived’ as legitimate creates a strong sense of obligation. Those within the hierarchy adopt the authority’s perspective or ‘definition of the situation’ (in this case, as an important scientific experiment rather than the infliction of physical torture). The notions of ‘loyalty, duty, discipline,’ requiring competent performance in the eyes of authority, become moral imperatives overriding any identification with the victim. Normal individuals enter an ‘agentic state’ in which they are the instrument of another’s will. In such a state, they no longer feel personally responsible for the content of their actions but only for how well they perform.

“Once entangled, people encounter a series of ‘binding factors’ or ‘cementing mechanisms’ that make disobedience or refusal even more difficult. The momentum of the process discourages any new or contrary initiative. The ‘situational obligation’ or etiquette makes refusal appear improper, rude, or even an immoral breach of obligation. And a socialized anxiety over potential punishment for disobedience acts as a further deterrent.”

.

But Browning doesn’t solely focus on those who pulled the triggers. He also addresses the “desk murderers,” for whom homicidal acts were almost mundane thanks to “the desensitizing effects of division of labor.” He describes Raul Hilberg’s emphasis on “the bureaucratic and administrative aspects of the destruction process”:

“This approach emphasizes the degree to which modern bureaucratic life fosters a functional and physical distancing in the same way that war and negative racial stereotyping promote a psychological distancing between perpetrator and victim. Indeed, many of the perpetrators of the Holocaust were so-called desk murderers whose role in the mass extermination was greatly facilitated by the bureaucratic nature of their participation. Their jobs frequently consisted of tiny steps in the overall killing process, and they performed them in a routine manner, never seeing the victims their actions affected. Segmented, routinized, and depersonalized, the job of the bureaucrat or specialist—whether it involved confiscating property, scheduling trains, drafting legislation, sending telegrams, or compiling lists—could be performed without confronting the reality of mass murder. Such a luxury, of course, was not enjoyed by the men of Reserve Police Battalion 101, who were quite literally saturated in the blood of victims shot at point-blank range.”

Soldiers and bureaucrats weren’t the only ones responsible for executing enemies of the Third Reich. Medical personnel were also enlisted, as revealed in the REMI Platinum Award–winning documentary Caring Corrupted: The Killing Nurses of the Third Reich:

Few of the individuals who slaughtered their fellow human beings were psychopaths initially. They were average folks just like you. They were simply doing their jobs, which required increasing levels of savagery over time. That is the process by which well-meaning individuals metamorphose into barbarous sociopaths.

The only way to keep yourself from transmogrifying into a monstrous sadist is to alchemize your cowardice into courage NOW.

Instead of being a tread in the panzer that is razing humanity, you can become a wrench in the gears.

You have the power to fell the Goliaths. You have the power to expose the corrupt. You have the power to subvert the technocrats. You have the power to uncloak the transhumanists. You have the power to bring to justice the self-installed oppressors demolishing and reconstructing the world in their own malevolent image.

You have the power NOT TO FOLLOW ORDERS.

When I snap my fingers, you will awaken from your hypnosis.

SNAP!

It is time to wake up. It is time to redirect your aggression from the people to the powers-that-shouldn’t-be. It is time to recognize you are one of the targets of this fiendish agenda, too.

Eventually, you will be replaced by robots. Then you will become one of the plebeians you presently persecute—and the few of us who survive the democide will be equally disempowered, dependent, divested of possessions, and enslaved to a totalitarian technocracy. Mass surveillance will monitor our every twitch, tallying credits and demerits to our social credit score in accordance with the autocratic algorithms.

There will be no humans left to administer mercy. There will be no halfway decent enforcer to let this one slide. There will be no compassionate official to consider mitigating circumstances.

All grays will be washed into an unending, unflinching, unsparing blackness from which the dawn never emerges.

The totality of this New World Tyranny is unprecedented in human history. Indeed, it may signal the end of all human history, now and forevermore.

Unless you stop colluding. Unless you stop enforcing. Unless you stop enabling.

Will you be one of the intrepid dozen to defy orders, setting an example for other colluders to follow while tipping the dominoes in favor of the people over the parasitic patriciate?

Stand up for truth. Stand up for freedom. Stand up for justice. Stand up for humanity—before you ensure our mutual destruction.

Take courage from the letter written by Police Constable Adrienne Gilvesy, in which she denies her consent to the illegal Mandatory Vaccination Requirement for Toronto Police Service Members.

Draw inspiration from Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, who has chosen to protect the rights of his employees rather than comply with the vaccine mandate.

Look to the Massachusetts State Troopers Union, which filed a lawsuit requesting that a hold be put on Governor Baker’s spike mandate.

Listen to Irish physician Dr. Anne McCloskey, who was suspended for bearing witness to the perils associated with the injection.

Take a lesson from Dr. Julie Ponesse, who was terminated from her position as professor of ethics at the University of Western Ontario for not consenting to a coercive and unethical decree:

Consider the example of the nineteen United States governors refusing to comply with the mandate—or Oregon State Senators Kim Thatcher and Dennis Linthicum, who have filed a formal petition for a federal grand jury investigation into the CDC and FDA for willful misconduct.

Join the heroic whistleblowers such as this ICU nurse, this senior NHS nurse, and the following nurses who stepped forward to expose the corrupt and toxic practices at their institutions:

Follow in the footsteps of the Niagara Police Department, whose members formed the Niagara Regional Police United for Human Rights group, issuing the following statement in response to vaccine mandates:

“Niagara: We stand behind you. We stand beside you. And if you need us to, we will stand in front of you. Discrimination has no place in Niagara, Ontario, or Canada. We took an oath to uphold the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and respect everyone in this Country which thrives in diversity and inclusivity. We hear you, and we are here for ALL of you.”

We CAN break the tyrannical spell that has been cast over the world—but we need you to stand behind us, stand beside us, and, if needed, stand in front of us.


© Margaret Anna Alice, LLC

 

THE END



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Private Equity Financier, Ex-Casino Executive First Parents Convicted In "Varsity Blues" Investigation

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Private Equity Financier, Ex-Casino Executive First Parents Convicted In "Varsity Blues" Investigation

Two years after actress Felicity Huffman became the first parent to plead guilty in the "Varsity Blues" college admissions scandal, two parents who opted to take it to trial have just been convicted, becoming the first parents to be convicted since the start of the investigation.

One of those convicted is a private equity baron John Wilson; the other was former casino executive Gamal Abdelaziz.

They were the first two parents to stand trial in the investigation, which was held at the federal courthouse in Boston. More than 50 parents, coaches and exam administrators and others implicated in the scheme have been indicted. Coaches from USC, Yale and Stanford, among other schools, were forced to quit or arrested as they were exposed for taking bribes to recruit rich kids as athletes.

Many parents including Huffman have already pleaded guilty and cut a deal rather than taking their chances at trial. Of the 57 defendants arrested, 48 have either pleaded guilty, or agreed to plead guilty, including Rick Singer, the alleged mastermind of the scheme.

Abdelaziz was accused of paying $300K in 2018 to have his daughter admitted to USC as a supposedly "top-ranked basketball recruit" even though she didn't make the varsity team in high school.

Wilson was accused of paying $220K in 2014 to have his son admitted as a water polo recruit at USC. His son did play water polo, but prosecutors said he was not good enough to play at the collegiate leve.

Wilson was also accused of agreeing to pay $1.5MM in 2018 to have his twin daughters, who were good students, admitted to Harvard and Stanford via the athlete recruitment scheme.

Their defense lawyers argued that the parents were simply playing by the rules of a rigged system as they understood them. They also claimed that the parents were effectively "scammed" by Wilson, who has admitted to coming up with the scheme.

For Wilson, the private equity financier, his lawyer claims that he wasn't even aware of the scheme, even though Singer attested to sending them falsified athletic photos of their children.

They were convicted on charges of conspiring to commit bribery and fraud and Wilson was also found guilty of filing a false tax return for taking a deduction for a payment that the government called a bribe.

The two men could each face up to 20 years in federal prison on the most serious charges, though one defense attorney told the NYT that she doubts the pair would receive more than 5 years, meaning they could be out in 2.5 on good behavior.

Tyler Durden Sat, 10/09/2021 - 10:55

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What the FDA and NIH Have to Say About the Vaccine

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undefined

Fact-checkers screening for “misinformation,” please note: everything that follows are direct quotes from the FDA Authorization Letter for COMIRNATY, the FDA-approved COMIRNATY package insert, as well as direct quotes of Diana Bianchi, director of the National Institutes of Health Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

To clarify: The only approved vaccine is COMIRNATY. If this name is not on the vial of the vaccine one is being given, it’s not approved. This is important because vaccines provided under Emergency Use Authorization (EUA), including Pfizer’s non-COMIRNATY, Johnson & Johnson, and Moderna’s, have a liability shield.

The approval letter for COMIRNATY includes the following requirement for additional testing:

Effects on children under 16
Required Pediatric Studies:

Deferred pediatric Study C4591001 to evaluate the safety and effectiveness of COMIRNATY in children 12 years through 15 years of age.

Final Protocol Submission: October 7, 2020
Study Completion: May 31, 2023
Final Report Submission: October 31, 2023

Deferred pediatric Study C4591007 to evaluate the safety and effectiveness of COMIRNATY in infants and children 6 months to <12 years of age.

Final Protocol Submission: February 8, 2021
Study Completion: November 30, 2023
Final Report Submission: May 31, 2024

Deferred pediatric Study C4591023 to evaluate the safety and effectiveness of COMIRNATY in infants <6 months of age.

Final Protocol Submission: January 31, 2022
Study Completion: July 31, 2024
Final Report Submission: October 31, 2024
In other words, the safety for children will be determined over October 31, 2023 – October 31, 2024.

Risks of Myocarditis and pericarditis

Sweden and Denmark have recently banned the Moderna vaccine for those under age 30, following a rise in myocarditis and pericarditis. The FDA has expressed similar concerns of these risks from COMIRNATY, with lengthy sections in its authorization letter:
We have determined that an analysis of spontaneous postmarketing adverse events reported under section 505(k)(1) of the FDCA will not be sufficient to assess known serious risks of myocarditis and pericarditis and identify an unexpected serious risk of subclinical myocarditis.
The letter requires they conduct 6 different studies, with test results’ due dates spanning 2022 – 2027.

Risks to Pregnancies
Study C4591022, entitled “Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine Exposure during Pregnancy: A Non-Interventional Post-Approval Safety Study of Pregnancy and Infant Outcomes in the Organization of Teratology Information Specialists (OTIS)/MotherToBaby Pregnancy Registry.”

Final Protocol Submission: July 1, 2021
Study Completion: June 30, 2025
Final Report Submission: December 31, 2025
COMIRNATY Package Insert: Vaccine-associated risks to pregnancy
8.1 Pregnancy

There is a pregnancy exposure registry that monitors pregnancy outcomes in women exposed to COMIRNATY during pregnancy. Women who are vaccinated with COMIRNATY during pregnancy are encouraged to enroll in the registry by visiting https://mothertobaby.org/ongoing-study/covid19-vaccines/.

Risk Summary

All pregnancies have a risk of birth defect, loss, or other adverse outcomes. In the US general population, the estimated background risk of major birth defects and miscarriage in clinically recognized pregnancies is 2% to 4% and 15% to 20%, respectively. Available data on COMIRNATY administered to pregnant women are insufficient to inform vaccine-associated risks in pregnancy. [Emphasis added]

A developmental toxicity study has been performed in female rats administered the equivalent of a single human dose of COMIRNATY on 4 occasions; twice prior to mating and twice during gestation. These studies revealed no evidence of harm to the fetus due to the vaccine (see Animal Data).
COMIRNATY Package Insert: Vaccine-associated risks to male fertility
13.1 Carcinogenesis, Mutagenesis, Impairment of Fertility

COMIRNATY has not been evaluated for the potential to cause carcinogenicity, genotoxicity, or impairment of male fertility. In a developmental toxicity study in rats with COMIRNATY there were no vaccine-related effects on female fertility [see Use in Specific Populations (8.1)].
And, following multiple reports from women of changes in menstrual cycles following vaccination, in announcing that NIH will now at last fund studies into the issue, Diana Biachi of the NIH acknowledged: “the [FDA] emergency use authorization was really focused on critical safety issues” and “changes to your menstrual cycle is really not a life and death issue.” (Some of us might be excused for thinking that a key indicator of the functioning of the female reproductive system is actually an issue of life.)

So, it all comes down to what bureaucrats decided constitute “critical safety issues,” if “full approval” can be granted long before studies into the risks outlined above are completed, and vaccine mandates can be issued for populations for whom its safety is as yet undetermined.

Let’s regain our perspective. The original intent of vaccines was to provide protection for vulnerable populations: the elderly, obese, and those with heart and lung problems. With a 99% survival rate, the Risk: Benefit calculation for others is considerably different, and a matter to be determined by individuals in consultation with their medical professionals.

Reprinted with permission from Independence Institute.

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Friday, October 8, 2021

Hospital Goes Quiet After Deleting Tweets Featuring Nurse Who Passed Out After Getting Vaccine

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Nurse Tiffany Dover went viral last year when she passed out on live television while receiving the COVID-19 vaccine after she was selected by her hospital to receive it early. After, rumors suggesting she died circulated online, prompting statements from Dover’s family, hospital, and other officials that were then used to fact check claims of her death. The CHI Memorial Hospital in Chattanooga, Tennessee, where Dover worked, issued three tweets featuring Dover to reassure the public on December 18, 19, and 20.

However, despite the tweets and videos being referenced by many fact check articles, CHI Memorial Hospital has since deleted its tweets about Dover.

Tiffany Dover, a nurse working for CHI Memorial Hospital in Chattanooga, Tennessee, went viral last December after she collapsed on live television immediately after receiving the COVID-19 vaccine. Shortly afterwards, rumors of her death spread online. This prompted fact-checks from the New York Post, fact checking website Snopes, news agency Reuters and, more recently, the left wing publication the Daily Beast with its article in February. At press, these websites still assure readers Dover is alive and well citing public statements, including those made by CHI Memorial Hospital.

Per the Daily Beast’s February 2021 article. “There are more than 22,000 comments on her last Facebook post, from people around the world—a collective grieving and outpouring of anger for the 30-year-old mother of two. But Tiffany Dover is not dead.”

“According to all official sources, she is alive and well and working as a nurse at CHI Memorial Hospital in Chattanooga. Last week, she was pictured on the front of the local newspaper caring for a north Georgia police chief who had been in the hospital for nearly 100 days,” wrote the Daily Beast. National File was unable to find this photo of Dover, which was not published by The Daily Beast. The publication also did not name local newspaper, making verification more difficult.

One news outlet at the time attributed the fall to the vaccine. In statements, Dover told the media and the public that she had a rare reaction to pain that caused the reaction, and it was not caused by the vaccine. “I have a history of having an overactive vagal response, and so with that if I have pain from anything—hangnail or if I stub my toe—I can just pass out,” the nurse later said.

The fact-checks reference comments from family members, local government officials, and hospital employees who insist Dover is alive and well, urging skeptics to abandon their efforts. “I’m honestly disgusted with people right now,” Dover’s sister-in-law told the Daily Beast, referring to those questioning whether or not she is alive. “TIFFANY IS ALIVE AND FINE.”

Karen Long, a spokesperson for CHI Memorial who National File attempted to contact, was quoted extensively in statements assuring the public Dover was fine and a police spokesman noted that the “police department isn’t involved in this at all because there’s no crime, no death, no nothing.”

Amid all the pressure from outsiders seeking proof of life of Dover, CHI Memorial Hospital issued three tweets, as well as a video on Facebook “showing hospital staff surrounding Tiffany Dover,” thus serving as evidence that she is not dead. The tweets, posted in December have since been deleted, though some were archived here.

In fact, the posts were used in separate fact checks as evidence that the situation was all an anti-vaccine conspiracy, yet all the CHI Memorial posts linked are unavailable due to the deletions: “On Monday, CHI Memorial hospital released a video of Ms. Dover standing with her co-workers, accompanied by this message: We’re pleased to share Tiffany Dover is doing well. Here’s a video of her today surrounded by her colleagues who all support her.”

In one web archive of the Daily Beast fact check from February, a tweet posted by a local newsman named Josh Roe (Twitter: @joshroe) of the Facebook post was included in the article, but has also since been removed from the piece and Roe’s Twitter account. The Daily Beast fact check also states that “Facebook has hidden many search results for her name.”

Several outlets have noted that CHI Memorial made its Twitter account private at some point during the social media storm. However, no articles note that or explain why the tweets were deleted, and archive websites suggest the tweets from the hospital were still available as recently as February of this year.

Adding further confusion, various social media posts from Dover’s family members made around the time of her collapse, and likely about Dover judging by their high engagement, were at some point either made private or deleted. One post from a family member contains no caption and simply cites another fact check article from December 29, 2020.

An Instagram page that appears to belong Dover has amassed tens of thousands of followers. Of the last three posts made on the account one was last year on December 13, and two were this year on February 25 and 26 of 2021.

The February 25 post has a location set at Vail Village, Colorado, and features people skiing. One photo included in the post appears to have a filter on it, making it unclear as to whether or not the photo was taken at the same time as the rest. Another photo in the same post appears to show Dover, though a mask covers most of her face, also containing what appears to be a filter. The post is captioned “Meet me on the other side of paradise.”

National File repeatedly contacted CHI Memorial Hospital for comment regarding why the tweets assuring users of Dover’s well being were deleted and did not receive a clear response from multiple hospital officials. National File also attempted to ask whether the social media posts were removed at the request of Dover and did not receive a response.

When National File asked one person who answered the phone whether they knew if Dover is still employed at the hospital, the person who answered replied Dover was still employed “as far as” she knew. When National File tried to verify Dover was still healthy almost a year later, we were told that “as far as” she knew, Dover was well.

Without prompting, this person assured National File that “nobody here has died from the vaccine,” and provided no definitive explanation for why the hospital deleted its tweets. After exploring several topics with the hospital representative, National File asked if Dover’s privacy might have been a factor, which seemed to make sense to the person who answered the phone. “It was probably for privacy,” the hospital representative agreed. “The vaccine hasn’t killed anyone.”

National File asked if this official knew someone who could provide further explanation regarding Dover’s current status with the hospital and was referred to Human Resources. At the same time, the original person who answered the phone on a Thursday afternoon during business hours warned us that nobody was there to answer the phone.

Human Resources did not respond until the following day when National File called a second time. During the second call, National File was unable to obtain a comment from HR, and was instead referred to the Marketing office, where National File again received no response. National File called Marketing a second time, and was referred to another office, then received no response.

In light of this, National File made several attempts to contact CHI Memorial Hospital Marketing Specialist Karen Long, who previously spoke to other outlets to get out the facts regarding Dover’s health. Long did not reply to National File in time for publication of this article.

While National File does not endorse any theory regarding Dover’s health or well being and does not condone targeted harassment against her, the lack of transparency has raised questions.

“Hey, how about an update on Tiffany Dover,” wrote former Republican candidate for U.S. House Luke Negron. “With all the questions on vaccines, having her make a public statement could set thousands at ease & save lives,” he explained, the, noted that prior to her collapse, the hospital chose Dover as its spokesperson to receive the vaccine on camera.

Hey, how about an update on Tiffany Dover?

With all the questions around vaccines, having her make a public statement could set thousands at ease & save lives.

Please don’t give us the “she asks for privacy” BS – you chose her to be a public spokesperson. Proof could save lives

— Luke Negron – Young Wolf Politics (@LukeEdison20) August 9, 2021



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Taibbi: The Cult Of The Vaccine

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Taibbi: The Cult Of The Vaccine

Authored by Matt Taibbi via TK News,

Yesterday, I ran a story that had nothing to do with vaccines, about the seeming delay of the development of a drug called molnupiravir (see the above segment with the gracious hosts of The Hill: Rising for more). In the time it took to report and write that piece, conventional wisdom turned against the drug, which is now suspected of ivermectinism and other deviationist, anti-vax tendencies, in the latest iteration of our most recent collective national mania — the Cult of the Vaccine.

The speed of the change was incredible. Just a week ago, on October 1st, the pharmaceutical giant Merck issued a terse announcement that quickly became big news. Molnupiravir, an experimental antiviral drug, “reduced the risk of hospitalization or death” of Covid-19 patients by as much as 50%, according to a study.

The stories that rushed out in the ensuing minutes and hours were almost uniformly positive. AP called the news a “potentially major advance in efforts to fight the pandemic,” while National Geographic quoted a Yale specialist saying, “Having a pill that would be easy for people to take at home would be terrific.” Another interesting early reaction came from Time:

Vaccines will be the way out of the pandemic, but not everyone around the world is immunized yet, and the shots aren’t 100% effective in protecting people from getting infected with the COVID-19 virus. So antiviral drug treatments will be key to making sure that people who do get infected don’t get severely ill.

This is what news looks like before propagandists get their hands on it. Time writer Alice Park’s lede was sensible and clear. If molnupiravir works — a big if, incidentally — it’s good news for everyone, since not everyone is immunized, and the vaccines aren’t 100% effective anyway. As even Vox put it initially, molnupiravir could “help compensate for persistent gaps in Covid-19 vaccination coverage.”

Within a day, though, the tone of coverage turned. Writers began stressing a Yeah, but approach, as in, “Any new treatment is of course good, but get your fucking shot.” A CNN lede read, “A pill that could potentially treat Covid-19 is a ‘game-changer,’ but experts are emphasizing that it's not an alternative to vaccinations.” The New York Times went with, “Health officials said the drug could provide an effective way to treat Covid-19, but stressed that vaccines remained the best tool.”

If you’re thinking it was only a matter of time before the mere fact of molnupiravir’s existence would be pitched in headlines as actual bad news, you’re not wrong: Marketwatch came out with “‘It’s not a magic pill’: What Merck’s antiviral pill could mean for vaccine hesitancy” the same day Merck issued its release. The piece came out before we knew much of anything concrete about the drug’s effectiveness, let alone whether it was “magic.”

Bloomberg’s morose “No, the Merck pill won’t end the pandemic” was released on October 2nd, i.e. one whole day after the first encouraging news of a possible auxiliary treatment whose most ardent supporters never claimed would end the pandemic. This article said the pill might be cause to celebrate, but warned its emergence “shouldn’t be cause for complacency when it comes to the most effective tool to end this pandemic: vaccines.” Bloomberg randomly went on to remind readers that the unrelated drug ivermectin is a “horse de-worming agent,” before adding that if molnupiravir ends up “being viewed as a solution for those who refuse to vaccinate,” the “Covid virus will continue to persist.”

In other words, it took less than 24 hours for the drug — barely tested, let alone released yet — to be accused of prolonging the pandemic. By the third day, mentions of molnupiravir in news reports nearly all came affixed to stern reminders of its place beneath vaccines in the medical hierarchy, as in the New York Times explaining that Dr. Anthony Fauci, who initially told reporters the new drug was “impressive,” now “warned that Americans should not wait to be vaccinated because they believe they can take the pill.”

Since the start of the Trump years, we’ve been introduced to a new kind of news story, which assumes adults can’t handle multiple ideas at once, and has reporters frantically wrapping facts deemed dangerous, unorthodox, or even just insufficiently obvious in layers of disclaimers. The fear of uncontrolled audience brain-drift is now so great that even offhand references must come swaddled in these journalistic Surgeon General’s warnings, which is why whenever we read anything now, we almost always end up fighting through nests of phrases like “the debunked conspiracy theory that COVID-19 was created in a lab” in order to get to whatever the author’s main point might be.

This lunacy started with the Great Lie Debate of 2016, when reporters and editors spent months publicly anguishing over whether to use “lie” in headlines of Donald Trump stories, then loudly congratulated themselves once they decided to do it. The most histrionic offender was the New York Times, previously famous for teaching readers to digest news in code (“he claimed” for years was Times-ese for “full of shit”) but now reasoned a “more muscular terminology,” connoting “a certain moral opprobrium,” was needed to distinguish the “dissembling” of a politician like Bill Clinton from Trump’s whoppers. “I did not have sexual relations with that woman” could be mere falsehood, but “I will build a great great wall” required language that “stands apart.”

The key term was moral opprobrium. Moralizing was exactly what journalists were once trained not to do, at least outside the op-ed page, but it soon became a central part of the job. When they used they word “lie,” the Times explained, they wanted us to know that was because “from the childhood schoolyard to the grave, this is a word neither used nor taken lightly.” Put another way, the Times didn’t want people reading about something Donald Trump said, grasping that it was a lie, and, say, chuckling about how ridiculous it was. If the New York Times sent the word “lie” up the flagpole, they now expected an appropriately solemn salute.

This was the beginning of an era in which editors became convinced that all earth’s problems derived from populations failing to accept reports as Talmudic law. It couldn’t be people were just tuning out papers for a hundred different reasons, including sheer boredom. It had to be that their traditional work product was just too damned subtle. The only way to avoid the certain evil of audiences engaging in unsupervised pondering over information was to eliminate all possibility of subtext, through a new communication style that was 100% literal and didactic. Everyone would get the same news and also be instructed, often mid-sentence, on how to respond.

At first this expressed itself via regurgitation of Approved Unambiguous Phraseology™ handed down from official or law enforcement sources, like “Russia’s election interference activities,” e.g. “Page’s alleged coordination with Russia’s election interference activities.” However, it wasn’t long before the stage-direction factor in coverage went berserk, as I noted last year after this question by Anderson Cooper in a presidential debate:

COOPER: Mr. Vice President, President Trump has falsely accused your son of doing something wrong while serving on a company board in Ukraine. I want to point out there’s no evidence of wrongdoing by either one of you.

The phrase, “no evidence of wrongdoing,” was a mandatory add last year in all coverage involving Ukraine, Joe Biden, and Hunter Biden, from the Guardian (“No evidence the younger Biden did anything illegal”) to CNBC (“There is no evidence that Trump or Giuliani has produced which shows that Hunter Biden was engaged in wrongdoing”) to Newsweek (Although there is no evidence of illegal wrongdoing by the Bidens in those dealings”) to NBC (“No evidence of wrongdoing on the part of either Biden”) to AP (“There has been no evidence of wrongdoing by either the vice president or his son”) to the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Axios, and countless others.

The language was absurd on multiple levels, beginning with its incorrectness — unless they were talking purely about a legal definition, the issue of whether or not there was “wrongdoing” in Hunter Biden accepting a no-show $50,000-a-month job from a crooked Ukrainian energy firm was a matter for readers to decide, not an issue of fact. Still, a lot of people not only swallowed it, but vomited these and other terms back up again, over and over, on social media, or to their friends and family, or to anyone at all, in what became a new way for a certain kind of person to relate to the world.

As a student in the Soviet Union I noticed subscribers to what Russians called the sovok mindset talked in interminable strings of pogovorki, i.e goofball proverbs or aphorisms you’d heard a million times before (“He who takes no risk, drinks no champagne,” or “Work isn’t a wolf, it won’t run off into the woods,” etc). This was a learned defense mechanism, adopted by a people who’d found out the hard way that anyone caught not speaking nonstop nonsense could be suspected of harboring original thoughts. Voluble stupidity is a great disguise in a society where silence is suspect.

We’re similarly becoming a nation of totalitarian nitwits, speaking in a borrowed lexicon of mandatory phrases and smelling heresy in anyone who doesn’t. This cult reflex was bad during the Russiagate years, but it’s gone into overdrive since the arrival of COVID. The CNN writer who thinks it’s necessary to put a disclaimer in the lede of a story about molnupiravir, of all things, is basically claiming he or she is afraid a theoretical unvaccinated person might otherwise read the story and be encouraged to not take the vaccine.

Except, if that theoretical unvaccinated person could be convinced by anything CNN said or did, they’d have already gotten the shot, because the network runs ten million stories a day directly imploring people to get vaccinated or die. News flash: the instinct to armor-plate even unrelated news subjects with layer after layer of insistent vaccine dogma is not for the non-immunized, who mostly don’t watch outlets like CNN or read the New York Times. Outlets apply that neurotic messaging for their own target audiences, who’ve been trained to live in terror of un-contextualized content, which everyone knows leads to Trump, fascism, and death.

I’d be the last person to claim there aren’t dumb people out there in America, but at least the audiences of channels like Fox and OAN know that content has been designed for them. The people gobbling down these pieces by Bloomberg and the Times that have the journalistic equivalent of child-proof caps on every paragraph that even parenthetically mentions COVID really believe that content has been dumbed down for some other person. They think it’s someone else who can’t handle news that vaccines work and that there also might be a pill that treats the disease, without freaking out or coming to politically unsafe conclusions. So they put up with being talked to like children — demand it, even. Which is nuts. Right? It is nuts, isn’t it?

Tyler Durden Fri, 10/08/2021 - 17:40

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