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Taxpayers not manufacturers made to pay compensation to patients

The Hughes Report: Options for redress released by the Patient Safety Commissioner

Health Advisory & Recovery Team | February 8, 2024

Many patients have been fighting for years for compensation after birth defects and developmental disorders were caused by the epilepsy drug Valproate; pain and tissue erosions caused by synthetic mesh used in incontinence operations or the reproductive and fetal developmental problems caused by Primodos. Dr Henrietta Hughes, the Patient Safety Commissioner (PSC), has released her recommendations for compensation for Valproate and mesh victims: £100k for Valproate, £20k for mesh and zero for Primodos!

Whilst proposed compensation payments are a start, the amounts are insufficient for people whose lives have been ruined; recommended mesh payments are less than an average year’s salary despite years of lost employment for many. And why has the hormone pregnancy test, Primodos, been forgotten again?

It is also shocking that the government is putting their hands in their (our) pockets for payments, rather than making the pharmaceutical industry pay. The industry will not improve safety until there is a financial benefit for them to do so – there is no incentive if governments keep paying for their mistakes.

If there is sufficient evidence to justify government funds to compensate victims, why isn’t there sufficient evidence to demand this compensation comes from the manufacturers?

Why is the PSC’s remit so narrow, on one medicine and one medical device? What about the dozens of other medicines and devices that have caused harm over the past few decades?

How can systemic failures be identified if only looking at a fraction of the medicines and devices that have caused harm?

The tunnel vision on only 2 products helps drive the divide and rule, which encourages those harmed by medicines to work in silos, focused on their own legal battles and compensation claims, rather than working together in a single coordinated effort.

The elephant in the room however is why neither the report nor the media coverage address the regulatory failures that allowed Mesh and Valproate to harm for so long?

Whilst redress is important, what is  critical is how we prevent future scandals from other medicines?

Looking back to Dr Henrietta Hughes 100 day report published a year ago, her proposed strategy to prevent future harm is Priority 1 “Culture change”. Whilst good in intent, culture change is difficult to measure and even more difficult to implement. Anyone with experience trying to change culture in even a small company will know the challenge, how do you achieve that across the diverse range of medical services providers in the UK?

Emma Muphy’s statement ‘I got fobbed off. I was told I was reading into things’ reflects how many have been treated. My own mum was told for many years there was no link between the HRT and breast cancer that killed her, was told off for “internet research” and was told the symptoms of her brain tumour had psychological rather than physical causes. The culture of playing down harm is systemic.

Nearly all of the victims I speak to tell the same story with different words: changing this culture could take decades, the PSC only has 3 years.

Dr Henrietta Huges clearly listens to patients and has done a great job to outline the harm to patients in their own words, share their requested outcomes and she makes some great recommendations for improvements, for example:

  • mandatory Yellow Card reporting,
  • having a named patient voice on all boards and
  • working with policy teams to improve conflict of interest declarations.

But a year on we see little progress on these actions – does the PSC have the teeth to implement these ideas?

Given systemic failure of MHRA that was identified in The Cumberlege report, First Do No Harm (FDNH) that resulted in the PSC role, why isn’t “regulatory reform” Priority 1?

Surely it’s simpler to reform a single regulator, than change the culture across the entire health service?

If the PSC won’t call for regulatory reform, then we have no choice but to demand this ourselves.

Please sign my petition demanding the reform of MHRA.

Thank you to guest author: Alex Hicks @hicksyalex

February 9, 2024 Posted by | Aletho News | | 1 Comment

Jim Jordan and 44 Other Members of Congress Submit Brief to the Supreme Court in Major Big Tech Censorship Case

By Dan Frieth | Reclaim The Net | February 9, 2024

Representative Jim Jordan, along with 44 other Congressional members, joined forces with America First Legal (AFL) to submit a crucial brief to the US Supreme Court. This brief supports Missouri, Louisiana, and private plaintiffs in the significant case of Murthy v. Missouri. The case centers on allegations of the federal government’s unconstitutional suppression of free speech on social media platforms.

We obtained a copy of the brief for you here.

The AFL, in collaboration with co-counsel Christopher Mills, has been actively combating what they perceive as a growing censorship crisis. The brief presented to the Supreme Court contends that the federal government has been exerting undue influence on private tech companies. This influence, the brief argues, has led to the suppression of First Amendment-protected speech concerning COVID-19, the Biden family’s alleged influence peddling, and various election-related issues.

These arguments were previously raised in the Fifth Circuit, where AFL represented Representative Jordan and other members of the House Judiciary Committee and the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government.

The involvement of these bodies stemmed from their investigative work, which unearthed the extent of federal pressure on private entities, compelling them to censor speech. This was notably highlighted through disclosures in The Facebook Files and The Twitter Files.

“The First Amendment is first for a reason,” Rep. Jim Jordan said in a statement. “Through our constitutional oversight, we have uncovered evidence that the Biden Administration directed and coerced Big Tech companies to censor content online and even books. With the Supreme Court set to hear one of the most important free speech cases in years, 45 Senators and Representatives filed this brief to share Congress’s findings and urge the Court to uphold the free speech rights of American citizens.”

February 9, 2024 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , | Leave a comment

Israel targets Red Crescent headquarters in Gaza

MEMO | February 9, 2024

The headquarters of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society in the Gaza Strip have been damaged due to incessant bombings by the Israeli army.

Major damage was caused to the society’s headquarters in the Tal Al-Hawa neighbourhood in Gaza City and the Al-Amal neighbourhood in the city of Khan Younis, eyewitnesses told Anadolu.

The Israeli army also targeted vehicles belonging to the humanitarian aid group, an Anadolu correspondent reported.

The Society’s Al-Quds Hospital in Tal Al-Hawa was also subjected to significant damage as a result of being targeted by Israeli tanks.

“The Israeli army deliberately targeted the society’s headquarters and vehicles to put them out of service,” Red Crescent spokesman Raed Al-Nims said.

“The most severe Israeli attacks against the society were those in northern Gaza, which caused a health and humanitarian crisis, especially after hospitals and medical centres went out of service there,” he added.

Nims said only one medical centre affiliated with the society is now operating in northern Gaza to provide first aid services.

He added that Israel has cut off medical, relief and food supplies to the northern Gaza Strip, which has exacerbated the humanitarian situation for hundreds of thousands of Palestinians living there.

“The Israeli army is still besieging the society’s Al-Amal Hospital, west of Khan Younis, from all sides, depriving Palestinians sheltering there of food, water, medical supplies, basic needs, and oxygen.”

“The hospital houses more than 200 patients, medical and administrative staff,” the spokesman added.

On 7 February, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) reported an alarming spread of diseases due to the lack of sanitation and clean water.

Recent results of malnutrition screenings conducted by partner organisations indicate a significant increase in the overall acute malnutrition rate among children.

Overall acute malnutrition in the Gaza Strip reached 16.2 per cent, a rate that exceeds the critical threshold set by the World Health Organisation set at 15 per cent.

Despite the International Court of Justice’s provisional ruling, Israel continues its onslaught on the Gaza Strip where at least 27,947 Palestinians have been killed, mostly women and children, and 67,459 injured since 7 October, according to Palestinian health authorities.

The Israeli offensive has left 85 per cent of Gaza’s population internally displaced amid acute shortages of food, clean water and medicine, while 60 per cent of the enclave’s infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.

February 9, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

Netanyahu orders ‘evacuation’ of over one million Gazans from Rafah

Displaced Palestinians who fled Khan Younis set up camp in Rafah further south near the Gaza Strip’s border with Egypt, on 6 December 2023. (Photo credit: Getty)
The Cradle | February 9, 2024

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed on 9 February that the over one million Palestinian civilians who have taken refuge in the southern Gaza city of Rafah will be able to evacuate before the Israeli army begins a ground operation there.

Netanyahu’s office said in a statement that he had instructed the army to prepare plans for both the evacuation of the Palestinian civilian population from the southern Gaza Strip and the dismantlement of any battalions of Hamas’ armed wing, the Qassam Brigades, in the Rafah area.

“It is impossible to achieve the war goal of eliminating Hamas and leave four Hamas battalions in Rafah,” the statement said.

“On the other hand, it is clear that a massive operation in Rafah requires the evacuation of the civilian population from the combat zones,” it added.

But such a plan to evacuate over 1 million people is likely impossible. UN chief Antonio Guterres says half of Gaza’s 2.3 million population “is now crammed into Rafah with nowhere to go,” warning the displaced “have no homes” and “no hope.”

Israel’s previous warnings to Palestinians to flee northern Gaza and take refuge in the south did not provide safety to civilians, as Israel bombed the proposed evacuation routes and alleged safe zones.

Expressions of concern for civilians in Gaza by Prime Minister Netanyahu have come amid other calls he has made to exterminate the millions of Palestinians in the besieged enclave.

“You must remember what Amalek has done to you, says our Holy Bible — we do remember,” Netanyahu has said on several occasions. According to the New York Times he was referring to the “ancient enemy of the Israelites, in scripture interpreted by scholars as a call to exterminate their ‘men and women, children and infants.’”

Last month, the UK aid group Oxfam said that the Israeli military is killing 250 Palestinians per day, with many more lives at risk from hunger, disease, and cold.

Any plan to evacuate civilians is also likely to be superficial, given that as of Sunday, no such plan was being prepared. CNN reported that Brig. Gen. Dan Goldfuss, who oversees the army’s 98th Division, said that he would work on such a plan “if and when” he receives the order to send his forces into the area and that as of Sunday, the order had not been issued yet.

February 9, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

Irish team refuses handshake with Israeli opponents

RT | February 9, 2024

The Irish women’s basketball team have refused to shake hands with their Israeli opponents at a game in Latvia, after Israeli player Dor Saar accused their counterparts of being “quite anti-Semitic.”

Ireland met Israel at a EuroBasket 2025 qualifying game in Riga on Thursday. In a break with normal protocol, Basketball Ireland announced before the match that its team would not participate in the “exchanging of gifts, [or] formal handshakes before or after the game, while our players will line up for the Irish national anthem by our bench, rather than the center court.”

The statement came after the Israeli Basketball Association published an interview with Saar on Tuesday, during which the player accused her Irish counterparts of anti-Semitism.

“It’s known that they are quite anti-Semitic and it’s no secret, and maybe that’s why a strong game is expected,” Saar said. “We talk about it among ourselves, we know they don’t like us and we will always leave everything on the field and in this game especially.”

Basketball Ireland reported Saar’s comments to the International Basketball Federation (FIBA), calling them “inflammatory and wholly inaccurate.”

Prior to the game with Israel, Basketball Ireland put out a statement saying it was “very concerned about the events unfolding in Gaza and… extremely sympathetic to the dreadful situation that people are having to deal with.” The organization revealed it had approached FIBA to discuss pulling out of two scheduled clashes with Israel, but was warned that the Irish team would be fined up to €180,000 ($195,000) and barred from EuroBasket 2025 and 2027.

“Basketball Ireland remains obliged to fulfill the fixture on February 8th,” the statement concluded.

Public support for the Palestinian cause runs high in Ireland, particularly among supporters of the Sinn Fein party, whose leaders maintained cordial relations with Hamas even after ceasing their armed struggle against Britain. A poll taken last month found that 71% of the Irish public view Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians as “apartheid,” while 62% supported sanctioning the Jewish state over its ongoing war in Gaza.

Israel won the game 87-57, with the Israeli Basketball Association stating that the victory came “despite the lack of sportsmanship of the visiting team.”

February 9, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Solidarity and Activism | , | 1 Comment

South Africa FM says Israel trying to ‘intimidate’ her over ICJ case

Press TV – February 9, 2024

South African Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor denounced the Israeli intelligence agency’s attempts to “intimidate” her over the Israeli genocide case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and reaffirmed Pretoria’s support for the Palestinians.

Speaking on the sidelines of President Cyril Ramaphosa’s State of the Nation address on Thursday night, Pandor said she was concerned for the safety of her family after having been targeted on social media.

Pandor said she had spoken to Police Minister Bheki Cele about beefing up her security after she received threatening messages.

“I felt that [it would] be better if we had extra security. But what I’m more concerned about is my family, because in some of the social media messages my children are mentioned and so on, but this is par for the course.

“The Israeli agents, the intelligence services, [this] is how they behave, and they seek to intimidate you, so we must not be intimidated. There is a cause that is under way,” the top South African diplomat said.

She said the government was determined to see the ICJ case through, much like the people of Palestine had been in fighting South Africa’s apartheid system.

“We can’t stand back now. We must be with them. And I think one of the things we must not allow is a failure of courage. It’s extremely important that we continue with this. We talked to the South African people; they understand why it is we have taken up this moral course,” Pandor noted.

The ICJ, also called the World Court, issued an interim ruling last month, ordering Israel to take “all measures within its power” to prevent acts that could amount to genocide against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. The Hague-based court, however, stopped short of ordering a ceasefire.

Israel waged the bloody war on Gaza on October 7 after Hamas launched Operation al-Aqsa Storm in the occupied territories in retaliation for the Tel Aviv regime’s incessant crimes against Palestinians.

Since the start of the aggression, the Tel Aviv regime has killed at least 27,947 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the health ministry in the territory.

The campaign has devastated large swathes of Gaza, destroyed hospitals and displaced most of its population of 2.4 million.

Israel has also imposed a “complete siege” on the coastal sliver, cutting off fuel, electricity, food and water as human rights bodies have warned of a major humanitarian crisis.

February 9, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

Arab world calls US top security threat, sees no prospect of peace with Israel: Poll

The Cradle | February 9, 2024

A new opinion poll conducted in 16 Arab countries shows that Washington’s continued support for Israel’s campaign of genocide in the Gaza Strip has dramatically hurt its image across West Asia and North Africa, as 94 percent of respondents describe the US position as “bad.” At the same time, more than half say the US poses the biggest threat to regional security.

Other western states fared almost as poorly, with more than three-quarters of those polled saying the position of the UK, France, and Germany in relation to Gaza is “bad” or “very bad.”

In contrast, Iran received a surge in recognition, with 48 percent of respondents expressing a positive view of the Iranian position, while 37 percent held a negative view. Despite Ankara’s increasing trade ties with Tel Aviv, Turkiye got a similar response – 47 percent perceived the country’s position positively, and 40 percent perceived it negatively.

To make matters worse for Washington, 51 percent of respondents agree that the US is currently the biggest threat to peace and stability in the region – marking a 12-point jump from 2022. Israel trails behind with 26 percent, a 15-point drop from 2022.

The survey, conducted by the Arab Center Washington DC (ACW) in cooperation with The Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies (ACRPS), also asked respondents their opinions on prospects for peace with Israel in the wake of the war in Gaza.

Fifty-nine percent answered with certainty that there can be no possibility for peace with Israel, while 14 percent reported having serious doubts, and nine percent said they did not believe in the possibility of peace with Israel in the first place.

Furthermore, 89 percent of Arab citizens say they oppose official recognition of Israel, with only four percent favoring it. This marks the lowest level of recognition since the question was first asked in 2011.

When asked what actions regional leaders must take to stop the mass murder of Palestinians in Gaza, 36 percent said governments should suspend relations or normalization agreements with Israel, 14 percent said aid must be delivered to Gaza regardless of Israeli approval, and 11 percent said oil exports should be used to put pressure on Israel and its western backers.

A large majority of respondents also agreed that the US is not serious about working to establish an independent Palestinian state under the 1967 borders with occupied Jerusalem as its capital.

“This is a historic moment in some very important ways,” Shibley Telhami, a professor at the University of Maryland, said at an event presenting the survey findings on Thursday. “The scale of what we have seen and the role the US has played in this deeply painful crisis has been so large and been perceived to be so large that it’s going to leave an imprint on the consciousness of a generation in the region that is going to outlast this administration and outlast this crisis.”

Questions about Washington’s alleged commitment to democracy and regional stability have been growing steadily in the Arab world for several years. According to a Gallup poll conducted in April 2023, a great majority of citizens in 13 countries across West Asia and North Africa said they did not trust US claims about “encouraging the development of democracy” or about “improving the economic lot of people.”

A few months earlier, the ACRPS revealed the results of the largest opinion survey conducted in the Arab world, showing that 84 percent of Arabs reject recognizing Israel for political and cultural reasons.

February 9, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Wars for Israel | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

‘Vassal’ Scholz Gov’t Ignoring Nord Stream Terrorism Despite ‘Colossal Damage’ Done to Germany

By Ilya Tsukanov – Sputnik – 09.02.2024

Tucker Carlson asked President Putin who he thought blew up the Nord Stream pipeline network and why, with the Russian leader offering a response which included an assessment of the competence of the current German government. Sputnik reached out to a lawmaker from Germany’s fastest growing opposition party for his take on Putin’s comments.

“Who blew up Nord Stream?” Carlson asked Putin at the midpoint of his two-hour-long interview. “You, for sure,” Putin jokingly replied. “I was busy that day. I did not blow up Nord Stream,” Carlson assured. “You personally may have an alibi, but the CIA has no such alibi,” Putin answered.

“You know, I won’t go into details, but people always say in such cases: ‘look for someone who is interested’. But in this case we should not only look for someone who is interested, but also for someone who has the capabilities. Because there may be many people interested, but not all of them are capable of going to the bottom of the Baltic Sea and carrying out this explosion,” Putin continued. “It is clear to the whole world what happened, and even American analysts talk about it directly,” Putin said, citing evidence laid out publicly about Washington’s responsibility for the Nord Stream attack.

Vladimir Putin, in an interview with Carlson, explained who blew up the Nord Stream pipeline.

“Who blew up Nord Stream?” the reporter asked.

“You for sure,” the president replied.

“I was busy that day. I did not blow up Nord Stream. Thank you though,” Carlson said.

Asked why Germany, the main economic loser from the attack, has remained silent on the terrorist incident despite essentially being targeted by its own NATO ally, Putin said he believes “today’s German leadership is guided by the interests of the collective West rather than its [own] national interests.”

“After all, it is not only about Nord Stream-1, which was blown up, and Nord Stream-2, which was damaged, but one pipe remains safe and sound, and gas can be supplied to Europe through it, but Germany does not open it,” Putin said, pointing to the energy crisis currently rocking the country, and suggesting the nation is being led by “highly incompetent people.”

Over 15 months after the Nord Stream incident, German authorities have yet to release the findings of an official investigation.

Eugen Schmidt, a Bundestag lawmaker from the opposition Alternative for Germany (German acronym AfD) Party who has made several parliamentary inquiries on the matter, told Sputnik that the lack of interest in finding the culprits of the attack is a sign of not only incompetence, but vassal status.

“Even the fact that the investigation has been classified as ‘secret’, i.e. the public is isolated as much as possible from it, despite the colossal harm done to both the German economy and the country’s prestige in general,” is concerning, Schmidt said.

Instead, the lawmaker noted, Germans have been treated to regular doses of misinformation in media reports citing intelligence officials that the Nord Stream attack was “supposedly done by some group of Ukrainian swashbucklers,” despite comments by Germany’s own investigators that only a small handful of nations have the capability to target pipelines 80 meters underwater in the Baltic Sea.

“The goal, apparently, is to divert public opinion from the real masterminds, the real perpetrators, and of course, the beneficiaries. It’s quite obvious that the beneficiary of such an act is first and foremost the United States. And technically, they could do it. That is, they are one of the few countries that could pull off something like this,” Schmidt stressed.

The politician recalled how President Biden warned publicly in February 2022, with Chancellor Scholz standing beside him, that the US would “bring an end” to Nord Stream if the Ukrainian crisis escalated.

“That is, there is a huge number of factors, plus Seymour Hersh’s investigation, all suggesting that the United States both planned and carried out this terrorist attack,” Schmidt said.

In the middle of it all, Germany’s government has not only demonstrated its “absolute incompetence,” but has “shown that they are absolutely dependent on the United States, that they are not able to pursue any sovereign policy. They’ve shown their status as a vassal. That’s why they’re hiding the results of the investigation,” the lawmaker believes.

Germany’s ruling elites are almost entirely dependent on America, Schmidt stressed. “They are actual American agents of influence here in Germany. They do not pursue their own sovereign policy. They pursue US policy in Germany. In other words, they’re not seeking to make Germany independent or to pursue policies in the interests of Germany itself. They’re absolutely dependent on the US. Therefore, the country’s entire policy does not meet its own national interests.”

The authorities’ incompetence is perfectly highlighted by its reaction to possibly the worst economic crisis in Germany’s postwar history, according to the lawmaker. “They’ve recruited ideologically-motivated people who have no idea how the economy works or how to correctly implement the country’s policies, especially in economic terms, how to protect the country’s interests so that the economy works effectively.”

Instead, Schmidt lamented, the government is filled with officials whose top priorities include the climate agenda, or accepting even more immigrants into the country. “No one is busy with the work for which they are there. They are simply carrying out their own ideological projects.”

The consequences include an economy “bursting at the seams, with businesses closing and moving abroad,” and Germany being treated like “some kind of foreign policy dwarf” on the world stage, the lawmaker said. “Energy prices are breaking records. We’re paying crazy amounts of money for American liquefied natural gas at the same time that we’re imposing sanctions on [Russian] pipeline gas.”

There are still “sound political forces” in Germany, Schmidt stressed, including AfD, and these are gaining more and more public support, resulting in media smear campaigns and accusations of “Nazism,” “right-wing populism,” and of being in bed with the Kremlin, which the lawmaker has personally experienced.

“Every imaginable propaganda cliché is being used to discredit our party using all possible means. Because [the authorities] are confused and afraid of losing their warm places,” engaging in witch hunts against the opposition instead of actually earning the public’s trust, up to and including calls to ban the AfD outright.

“This is a completely ridiculous and impossible situation that harms democracy in the country,” Schmidt said, adding that unfortunately for the government, the attacks on the opposition are reflected in public opinion polling, where the ruling coalition has set records to become possibly the most unpopular government in German history.

Fresh polling by the Erfurt-based Institute for New Social Answers, one of Germany’s leading social research institutions, found the Traffic Light coalition government, which includes Chancellor Scholz’s Social Democrats, the Greens and the Free Democratic Party, collectively polling at just 32 percent support. The same poll found that the mainstream socially conservative opposition Christian Democratic Union has 30 percent support, with the AfD sitting at 20.5 percent (5.5 percent more than Scholz’s Social Democrats), and former Left Party lawmaker Sarah Wagenknecht’s new party at 7.5 support (three percent more than the Free Democrats).

Germans are set to go to the polls sometime between late August and late October of 2025, unless the Bundestag is dissolved earlier and snap elections are called.

February 9, 2024 Posted by | Economics, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity, War Crimes | , , | 1 Comment

Tucker Carlson Interviews Vladimir Putin – Key Statements

BY JOHN LEAKE | COURAGEOUS DISCOURSE | FEBRUARY 9, 2024

The first thing that jumped out at me as I listened to the Tucker Carlson-Vladimir Putin interview is that Putin is 100 times more intellectually capable than President Joe Biden. No wonder Biden won’t take his call.

It says a lot that the terrible people who run the United States wanted to prevent Carlson from conducting the interview, and then to hinder it from being made available to the American public.

Many, including Carlson himself, expressed frustration that the Russian President began with a history lesson, going back to the founding of the Kievan Rus state in 882. I suspect this was Putin’s sly way of expressing a salient point that has long struck me about we Americans—namely, while our government is ever keen to send weapons and armies all over the world to police mankind, we find it onerous to sit through a 30-minute history lesson about the people and places we wish to control.

Russia is, in Churchill’s formulation, “a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma,” and it has always been governed by an authoritarian state. Nevertheless, with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, there is plenty of evidence that Russia wished to cease living in a state of enmity with the United States.

To me, it seems clear it was the U.S. Military-Industrial Complex, and NOT Russia, that wished to maintain this state of enmity, for without it, there would be little justification for the U.S. government to spend hundreds of billions on weapons goodies such as the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II—a program that started in 1995 and (if DoD accountants are to be believed) has cost U.S. taxpayers about 500 billion.

With Bill Clinton’s NATO expansion in 1997, no less of a Cold War eminence than George Kennan characterized this decision as a Fateful Error that would likely result in precisely the instability and insecurity it was purportedly supposed to prevent.

From the beginning of the Russian crisis that developed in the autumn of 2021—shortly after the Biden Administrations’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan after a 20-year occupation that achieved nothing—I have suspected that administration and the terrible people who advise it did everything in their power to BAIT THE RUSSIAN BEAR into invading Ukraine.

The Administration did NOTHING to defuse the crisis, and it insulted the Russians by sending the imbecilic Kamala Harris to the Munich Security Conference on February 18, 2022. I suspect that an Austrian-style neutrality deal would have prevented the catastrophe that has apparently gotten hundreds of thousands killed. It has also seemed obvious to me that, since 2014, Ukraine has been the CIA’s favorite pet project.

To to this day, not a single person has been able to explain to me why Russia would consider tolerating Ukraine joining NATO. Since President Monroe outlined his foreign policy in 1823, the United States government has increasingly pursued a policy of zero tolerance of any foreign military alliances or installations in the entire Western Hemisphere.

And yet, this same United States government, which has invaded and bombed dozens of countries since 2001, claims it is perfectly reasonable to propose that Ukraine (whose northeastern border lies 370 miles from Moscow) join NATO. The distance from the Mexican border to Dallas is greater.

Key Putin statements in the interview are as follows:

  • On the negotiation process and its failure: “[Talks] reached a very high stage of coordination of positions in a complex process, but still they were almost finalized. But after we withdrew our troops from Kiev… the other side threw away all these agreements.”
  • On his last conversation with Joe Biden: “I talked to him before the special military operation, of course… I told him I believe that you are making a huge mistake of historic proportions by supporting everything that is happening there, in Ukraine, by pushing Russia away.”
  • On the possibility of global conflict: “It goes against common sense to get involved in some kind of a global war and a global war will bring all humanity to the brink of destruction.”
  • On Russia’s territorial ambitions: “We simply don’t have any interest [in Poland, Latvia, or anywhere else]. It’s just threat mongering.”
  • Commenting on US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s remark that the US has to continue to fund Ukraine or US soldier citizens could wind up fighting there, Putin said:

    This was a provocation and a cheap provocation. Don’t you have anything better to do? You have issues on the border. Issues with migration, issues with the national debt. More than $33 trillion. Wouldn’t it be better to negotiate with Russia? Make an agreement. Already understanding the situation that is developing today, realizing that Russia will fight for its interests to the end. And realizing this, actually return to common sense, start respecting our country and its interests and look for certain solutions. It seems to me that this is much smarter and more rational. I do not understand why American soldiers should fight in Ukraine. There are mercenaries from the United States. The bigger number of mercenaries comes from Poland, with mercenaries from the United States in second place and mercenaries from Georgia in third place. Well, if somebody has the desire to send regular troops, that would certainly bring humanity to the brink of a very serious global conflict. This is obvious.

See complete interview on Tucker Carlson’s website:

February 9, 2024 Posted by | Militarism, Russophobia | , , , | 1 Comment

In Carlson Interview, Putin Outlined ‘Concrete Conditions’ for Resolution of Ukrainian Crisis

By Ilya Tsukanov – Sputnik – 09.02.2024

In his two-hour-long interview with Tucker Carlson, the Russian president listed Moscow’s conditions for bringing the two-year-old NATO-Russia proxy war in Ukraine to an end. Now, the ball is in the West’s court, according to Russian international affairs expert Dmitry Suslov.

President Putin has confirmed to Tucker Carlson that Russia favors a “negotiated settlement” to the crisis in Ukraine, saying that it will be up to Kiev and its Western partners whether or not to accept it.

“We prepared a huge document in Istanbul [during peace talks in the spring of 2022, ed.] that was initialed by the head of the Ukrainian delegation. He affixed his signature to some of the provisions, but not all of them. He put his signature and then said himself ‘we were ready to sign it and the war would have been over long ago, eighteen months ago. However, [then-UK] Prime Minister [Boris] Johnson came, talked us out of it and we missed that chance’,” Putin said, referring to Ukrainian top negotiator David Arakhamia’s bombshell comments late last year about London’s role in sabotaging the Russia-Ukraine peace talks.

“Well, you missed it, you made a mistake, let them go back to that, that’s all. Why do we have to bother ourselves and correct somebody else’s mistakes?” Putin added, hinting Moscow’s readiness to return to the Istanbul format, which reportedly included non-bloc status enshrined in Ukraine’s constitution, security guarantees from world powers, restrictions on the size of the Ukrainian military, accepting Crimea and the Donbass’s status as part of Russia, etc.

Asked by Carlson whether Kiev’s NATO sponsors will be willing to accept a Russian victory in Ukraine, Putin said the alliance should “think how to do it with dignity,” noting that “there are options if there is a will.”

Unfortunately, Putin said, “up until now there has been uproar and screaming about ‘inflicting a strategic defeat on Russia’ on the battlefield. Now they are apparently coming to realize that it is difficult to achieve. If possible at all. In my opinion, it is impossible by definition, it is never going to happen.” In event case, Russia remains “ready for this dialogue,” Putin stressed.

“I think the most important message in Putin’s interview is that Russia is ready for for a political or diplomatic solution of the Ukraine conflict,” says Dmitry Suslov, deputy director of the Center for European and International Studies at Russia’s Higher School of Economics. “But it requires a political will from the United States,” the observer told Sputnik.

“Putin identified the concrete conditions on which Russia would be ready to end the conflict through diplomacy. And this is first, the recognition of the current territorial settlement. Putin bluntly said that it’s up for NATO to look for and to find a form which could be, I mean, not humiliating for them, but accepts the current territorial settlement,” the academic noted. “Putin bluntly again identified the Istanbul communique as the basis to which Russia could return. And that from the Russian perspective, the process could be resumed at any moment.”

“Thirdly, he identified in a very detailed way the condition of denazification and explained what it means, and also, mentioned that it was partly included into the Istanbul communique. So, I think that this is a very important message, that if the United States is ready for serious negotiation on the basis of these conditions, Russia would not hesitate to resume and to start those negotiations,” Suslov said.

Unfortunately, the observer noted, Putin has reason to be skeptical about Kiev’s Western sponsors’ sincerity, given the seemingly unchanging imperative of US geopolitical “hostility” against and “arrogance” toward Russia.

“Putin’s pessimism is explained by his personal experience in dealing with the United States, because [he] has been dealing with actually five American presidents since Bill Clinton. And no matter the personal relationships with those presidents, no matter the party orientation of those presidents, the fundamentals of the US foreign policy remained the same. And the reason is that the US foreign policy is run by foreign policy elites, not necessarily by the president himself. And this is likely to remain so,” Suslov said.

Nevertheless, the observer noted that if Donald Trump, who has expressed a desire to end the Ukrainian crisis and normalize relations with Russia, were to return to power and “bring fundamentally new representatives of the US elites to power…that situation could change.”

“But of course, in this interview Vladimir Putin could not say that he’s hopeful of such a scenario because he would have been immediately accused of interference into the US elections and identifying his preferences. And this is not in Russian interests,” Suslov summed up.

February 9, 2024 Posted by | Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

Infantry shortage and morale drop harming Ukraine

By Lucas Leiroz | February 9, 2024

The Western media can no longer disguise the critical situation of the Ukrainian troops. In a recent article published by the Washington Post, journalists exposed the lack of personnel in the Ukrainian infantry as well as the serious effects on military morale. The case shows once again how the Ukrainian defeat is an inevitable reality, with all attempts to change the final outcome of the conflict being absolutely futile.

On-the-ground journalists reported to the Washington Post on February 8 that Ukrainian forces are suffering from an “acute shortage” of infantry soldiers on the front lines. In interviews with reporters, Ukrainian military commanders made clear their concerns about the deficiency of troops, as without a sufficient number of fighters it is impossible to conduct operations.

According to Ukrainian military interviewed by the newspaper, the number of casualties has increased in recent times due to intense Russian attacks. With the failure of the Ukrainian counteroffensive, Moscow is said to have taken the “offensive initiative” on the battlefield, leading to high-intensity operations that are annihilating Ukrainian soldiers, inflicting massive casualties on infantry units. The article’s sources say that many of the Ukrainian combat units are working with an extremely reduced number of soldiers. In some battalions, the actual number of troops is less than half of what would be an adequate quantity.

“In interviews across the front line in recent days, nearly a dozen soldiers and commanders told the Washington Post that personnel deficits were their most critical problem now, as Russia has regained the offensive initiative on the battlefield and is stepping up its attacks. One battalion commander in a mechanized brigade fighting in eastern Ukraine said that his unit currently has fewer than 40 infantry troops — the soldiers deployed in front-line trenches who hold off Russian assaults. A fully equipped battalion would have more than 200, the commander said. Another commander in an infantry battalion of a different brigade said his unit is similarly depleted.”, the article reads.

Another worrying side effect of the constant losses is the psychological destabilization of Ukrainians. Unable to escape the conflict or end it once and for all, soldiers on the frontlines end up despairing and having their morale damaged – which obviously has terrible consequences on the battlefield.

“They need to be replaced by someone (…) There is no one to replace them, so they sit there more, their morale drops, they get sick or suffer frostbite. They are running out. There is no one to replace them. The front is cracking. The front is crumbling. Why can’t we replace them? Because we don’t have people; nobody comes to the army. Why doesn’t anyone come to the army? Because the country didn’t tell people that they should go to the army. The state failed to explain to people that they should go to the army. Those who knew that they should go, they have already all run out.”, Aleksandr, a battalion commander, told journalists.

Also, Sergey, a commander fighting in Avdiivka, said: “You can feel it; people are exhausted both morally and physically (…) It’s very hard, the weather conditions, the constant shelling. They have a great impact on the human psyche.”

In fact, the report points out some serious problems in the military situation of Ukraine. The absence of infantrymen is due to the rapid exhaustion of Kiev’s forces. Ukrainian troops have been losing soldiers since the launching of the Russian operation, with the regime imposing forced mobilization measures to try to solve the problem. However, given the prolongation of hostilities, there are fewer and fewer citizens able to be recruited – which explains the minimal number of soldiers on the frontlines.

In the same sense, the psychological effects of this “meat grinder” are many. As a large part of the current Ukrainian army is made up of elderly people and teenagers with no previous military training, conscripts tend to become desperate in the face of war, not knowing how to react and simply losing any will to fight – which leads to surrenders and desertions.

Moral-psychological defeat is a key point in military sciences. The side that manages to impose such a defeat on its enemy gains a huge advantage on the battlefield. Even strong and well-equipped armies become unable to win a battle when they are psychologically affected to the point of losing the will to fight. In the Ukrainian case, it is even more serious, since both the material and psychological situations are terrible, there being no way to escape defeat.

There seems to be a vicious cycle in which the more Kiev spends on war and mobilizes soldiers, the more deaths and psychological defeats it suffers. This impasse makes it clear that, for Kiev, there is no military solution to the war. If the regime really wants peace and the reconstruction of the country, it must surrender and sign a peaceful agreement with Russia – otherwise, the losses will be even greater and, even so, there will be no change in the final result, since Russian victory is inevitable.

Lucas Leiroz, journalist, researcher at the Center for Geostrategic Studies, geopolitical consultant.

You can follow Lucas on X (former Twitter) and Telegram.

February 9, 2024 Posted by | Militarism | | 1 Comment

Why Vaccines for Staph Infections Always Fail

By Angelo DePalma, Ph.D. | The Defender | February 7, 2024

Research into vaccines for Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus), the most common type of staph infection, has led to experimental vaccines that protect mice but fail in humans. A paper published Jan. 16 in Cell Reports Medicine explained why.

When a person first encounters staph, the bacterium fools the human immune system into releasing ineffective antibodies instead of the neutralizing antibodies typically associated with robust immunity. That “trick” allows S. aureus to colonize us, usually harmlessly.

When a colonized person’s immune system is later challenged with a staph vaccine it does not make new, effective antibodies. Instead, it calls up more of the same ineffective antibodies that allowed the bug to colonize the individual in the first place.

Vaccine developers have tried at least three different approaches to S. aureus vaccination but all were met with the same issue.

The immune system is willing …

S. aureus is one of 30 Staphylococcus species in nature and 11 that colonize humans as part of the human microbiome. It is found in the nostrils, skin and other reservoirs in healthy people and is only dangerous when it enters the bloodstream, particularly in immunocompromised individuals.

Up to 80% of humans harbor Staphylococcus species.

The human immune system makes antibodies against S. aureus as it does against other microbial invaders. But instead of neutralizing antibodies that fight colonization and infection, S. aureus tricks the immune system into producing ineffective antibodies that allow the bug to continue colonizing us.

When the colonized person is challenged with either S. aureus infection or vaccination, these dummy antibodies reemerge in force but do nothing to help the patient. Vaccination amplifies this effect — which is why S. aureus infections must be treated with antibiotics.

Vaccination “only works when the initial immune response to that pathogen was actually protective,” said J.R. Caldera, Ph.D., a co-author of the paper, in a news release.

Since 80% of staph infections are caused by the invasion of the same strain colonizing the individual’s nose or skin, their “initial immune response” was not protective so subsequent responses will not be either.

“What sets SA [Staphylococcus aureus] apart is that the bacteria themselves have ways of evading the immune system from the moment they encounter us, and these evasive strategies are only reinforced by vaccination,” Caldera said.

… but the antibodies are weak

Anti-staph vaccines generate strong immune responses to vaccination and infection but those responses are directed toward bacterial features that S. aureus uses to fool its host into accepting peaceful coexistence.

This is a case of vaccine-induced immune system priming or “original antigenic sin” — the process by which a vaccine locks in the response vaccinated people make when confronted with the pathogen.

This failure eventually led vaccine researchers down another dark alley, toward vaccines targeting the S. aureus toxin instead of the bacterium. So-called “toxoid” strategies are the basis of tetanus, diphtheria and DTP vaccines.

But “remarkably, both active [vaccine-based] and passive [antibody-based] platforms of immunization against SA toxins were also met with failures,” said senior author George Liu M.D., Ph.D., professor of pediatrics at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine.

For example, a 2021 AstraZeneca-funded study of suvratoxumab, a monoclonal antibody targeting the S. aureus toxin, found that progression to pneumonia in staph-infected patients was no lower in treated than in untreated subjects.

Most pathogens, especially bacteria, are complex organisms carrying several different antigens. Vaccine developers usually target the most prominent antigen to trigger the strongest, most relevant immune response.

On that basis, Liu considered a third possible S. aureus vaccine strategy: targeting minor cell wall antigens on S. aureus instead of its toxins or the main antigen.

This approach would tend to induce weaker immune responses requiring high vaccine or adjuvant doses, but it fell short as well.

Antibiotic resistance leads to ‘super-bugs’

Nostrils are the main staph reservoir in humans and a significant source of infection, but the bug also colonizes the skin, perineum, vagina, throat and gastrointestinal tract.

Staph infections occur when the bacteria enter the bloodstream, joints, heart or skin, usually when the person’s immune system is weakened. Standard antibiotics usually cure staph infections.

However, over the past 70 years, bacteria that colonize humans have found ways to counter the use or overuse of antibiotics and antimicrobials designed to kill them. Some bacteria have developed resistance to these agents, making antibiotics less effective or completely ineffective.

One type of antibiotic-resistant S. aureus, “methicillin-resistant” S. aureus or “MRSA,” is of particular concern.

The most common MRSA outcome outside of hospitals is a skin infection. But serious cases can lead to pneumonia or other serious organ infections. Untreated MRSA infections can cause sepsis — an extreme, system-wide response to an infection.

Hospitalized patients are more susceptible to severe, life-threatening outcomes since they are exposed to fellow patients’ staph strains as well as the ones they carry. Surgical site infections are a significant source of serious, systemic staph infections.

The medical and social costs, direct and indirect, of antibiotic resistance in the U.S. may be as high as $55 billion per year. More than 2.8 million Americans per year have an antibiotic-resistant infection and 35,000 die. S. aureus caused nearly 120,000 bloodstream infections — the most serious kind — and 20,000 deaths in the U.S. in 2017.

Could S. aureus be beneficial?

The negative effects of S. aureus on human health are fairly well understood.

We know staph bacteria colonize us, are tolerated by the immune system and cause disease when they enter the bloodstream or invade the skin. We also know that S. aureus antibody responses do not clear the bacterium or eliminate either colonization or infection.

But the role of S. aureus as part of a normal, healthy microbiome has not been extensively investigated.

A 2022 study on components of the skin microbiome suggested that at least one Staphylococcus species, S. hominis — the bug mostly responsible for body odor — may prevent skin infections.

Another species that mainly colonizes skin, S. epidermis, is both anti-inflammatory and antibacterial.

2015 study found that chronic S. aureus infection prevented the development of autoimmune encephalomyelitis in a rat model of multiple sclerosis. Encephalomyelitis is inflammation of the brain and spinal cord. Although infection itself caused some types of inflammatory markers to rise it reduced the severity of nerve cell and central nervous system inflammation.

“SA [S. aureus] has been with humans a long time, so it’s learned how to be part-time symbiont, part-time deadly pathogen,” Liu said. “If we’re going to develop effective vaccines against SA, we need to understand and overcome the strategies it uses to maintain this lifestyle.”


Angelo DePalma, Ph.D., is a science reporter/editor for The Defender.

This article was originally published by The Defender — Children’s Health Defense’s News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Please consider subscribing to The Defender or donating to Children’s Health Defense.

February 9, 2024 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | Leave a comment