Joe Biden: I Do Not Want a National Shutdown; I Just Want a National Shutdown.
By Adam Dick | Ron Paul Institute | November 20, 2020
During the 2020 presidential campaign, Joe Biden declared that he would be ready and willing as president to follow the recommendation of scientists to shut down the country in the name of countering coronavirus. Then, on Thursday, Biden insisted he would not, as president, impose a national shutdown.
But, it turns out Biden, in his Thursday comments, was just playing a word game. He defined “shutdown” such that it describes something no government has undertaken in the name of countering coronavirus and something very different from what most people understand the term “shutdown” to mean in this context. Then Biden proceeded to describe the actions he wants to take that fall right in line with shutdowns governments have imposed and with what people generally understand as a coronavirus-related shutdown.
On Thursday, when a reporter had just begun asking a question by restating Biden’s earlier declaration about shutting down the country, Biden interrupted, insisting that his previous declaration was just a hypothetical. He then stated:
I am not gonna shut down the economy, period. I am gonna shut down the virus. That’s what I’m gonna shut down. I’ll say it again: No national shutdown; no national shutdown.
That sounds like a rather emphatic 360 reversal from Biden, except that talk of “gonna shut down the virus” instead of shutting down the economy sounds like the use of a euphemism to paper over an actual national shutdown. Think of it like America’s “war on drugs.” The war is really on people who are surveilled, searched, arrested, imprisoned, and otherwise acted upon harshly by government. Yet, politicians can claim the war is on drugs, not people.
Biden then proceeded, in his comments interrupting the reporter’s question, to discuss his plan for a national shutdown, all the while stating that it would not be a national shutdown:
[E]very region, every area, every community can be different and so there’s no circumstance which I can see that would require total national shutdown. I think that would be counterproductive. But, there are constraints in which the degree to which businesses can be open. For example, it’s one thing to say that you can have, in a state where the infection rate is not as high, you can have a gymnasium open. It’s another thing to say it can only be open four hours a day with X number of people. The church I go to — my Catholic church — they don’t allow more than 40 percent of the people to come into the church. Those are rational decisions. It’s not shutting down everything. It’s calibrating based on what the threat is.
Biden declares he opposes a “total” shutdown where the government shuts down “everything.” The fact is that no local, state, or national government in the world has imposed such a shutdown. While shutdowns in America and across the world have imposed major restraints on economic activities and people’s freedom of movement, they have never shut down everything. For example, people have not been required to starve to death in their homes. Grocery stores have remained open. Also remaining open, in many cases, were restaurants for drive through, take out, and delivery. In shutdowns, restrictions were placed on these and other businesses deemed “essential” by government, but they were not shut down. Similarly, shutdowns across the world have imposed extreme mandates on what people do and where people may go, but such restrictions have never been “total.”
Shutdowns in the name of countering coronavirus have been largely defined by governments taking it upon themselves to determine what businesses can be open and to dictate how businesses allowed to remain open can operate. Shutdowns also tend to come with various other government rules including prohibiting the assembling of more than a certain number of people, mandating mask wearing, and imposing limitations on people’s activities outside of home.
Biden on Thursday just said he does not intend to impose a “straw man” national shutdown — a type of action nobody is talking about and that has not been imposed by any governments — and then proceeded to describe how he desires to implement exactly what in common parlance would be called a national shutdown. When Biden says he or the United States government should decide, based on looking at coronavirus information, whether any particular gym in America may be open and, if it is decided the gym is allowed to be open, how many hours a day the gym is allowed to operate and how many people are allowed to be in it, he is saying he supports a national shutdown.
In shutdowns, some stores are closed entirely. Others have mandates placed on them, such as occupancy and hours limits. These are exactly the kind of restraints on businesses that Biden says he wants to impose while claiming he opposes a national shutdown. To us Biden’s language, though he denies it, Biden is in fact supporting a national shutdown, “period.”
Copyright © 2020 by RonPaul Institute.
We need to protect the free speech of dissident doctors
By The Covid Physician | The Critic | November 18, 2020
Liberty. The right to be free from torture, inhumane and ill treatment; the prohibition of servitude; the right to liberty and security of person; the right to a fair trial; freedom of expression; freedom of thought, conscience, and religion; the right to privacy and a family life; freedom of association; freedom from discrimination; and policing by consent are all so pre-Covid-19. The governmental response to the coronavirus pandemic has massacred these fundamental human rights.
Weaselly Covid marshals in hi-vis vests now bark aggressively at me, telling me to “stand back!” and “cover your nose!”. I have stopped resisting or trying to placate them with reason. I have stopped trying to reassure them that I am a doctor. Their brows furrow: a dissident doctor is either not really a doctor, or is the worst kind of scum.
We live in a strange world where minority activists campaign for commercial euthanasia: a world in which a select number of elected and unelected individuals dictate that 100 per cent of us are not allowed the liberty of taking the 0.06 per cent risk of a cost-free, natural death from a respiratory illness (a very common terminal event) at an average age of 82 years old. This is utter insanity while younger, fitter people commit suicide at rising rates under repressive lockdown restrictions, economies collapse, and other debilitating diseases continue to crush, kill and incapacitate the other 99.94 per cent.
Matt Hancock currently champions the right of a small minority of the terminally ill to travel abroad for a Dignitas death, while denying everyone else the right to face the small risk of death by Covid-19 in order to live with dignity and freedom in the UK. How does this make any sense?
Two Elephants in the Room
(1) How did we get here?
(2) How to prevent it happening again?
These are the two questions that surviving mainstream investigative journalists and parliament seem unable to address. Our masters have consistently turned focus to a question that has preoccupied us for months: How do we get out? With this emphasis, they made haste to our perpetual imprisonment. How can we be certain that the question being asked in private is not, rather, how can we capitalise on this situation?
How did we get here?
First it is worth asking from where did the virus originate? Evidence from the scientific community supports the hypothesis it may have been genetically engineered in a laboratory. In May 2020 Professor Luc Montagnier, the virologist who won the Nobel prize for discovering the HIV virus, has corroborated Indian scientists’ concerns from January 2020 that there are four distinct regions of the SARS-CoV-2 genome which appear to have been spliced in from HIV genomes.
Dr Limeng Yan goes further to say that Covid-19 was intentionally developed as a bioweapon. What further intrigues is Dr. Robert Gallo, an Anthony Fauci contemporary at the National Institute of Health (NIH) and another heavyweight from the 1980s race to isolate the HIV virus, appears to have briefly weighed in against Limeng’s previous September 2020 paper on a lab chimaera theory. So, who are we meant to believe in this tangled web?
Did you know that following serious scientific concern, there was a US government moratorium on the NIH conducting dangerous and unethical virus “gain of function” (GOF) research inside the US? However, the US continued to fund coronavirus research at the Wuhan BSL-4 lab in that moratorium period of 2014 to 2017. GOF research increases the danger of – and weaponises – viruses. Were you aware that funding for this comes from Professor Anthony Fauci’s National Institute of Health and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease? Are you aware that the US has funded and supported virological research with inter alia China for over 15 years? Indeed, Sino-American GOF research sponsored by Fauci’s NIH and NIAID, involving Wuhan BSL-4 lab’s “bat-woman”, Zhengli-Li Shi, was allowed to continue during this moratorium.
How toprevent it happening again?
To answer the second question of prevention, one must to again ask how we got to this point of global paralysis where the WHO, a largely unaccountable, undemocratic, sprawling supranational entity under the private influence of the Gates Foundation and Pharma calls the shots, strips us of our human rights and God-given liberty. In this brave new world, the technological knowledge of biological weapons and their antidotes is in the select hands of a few private individuals, corporations and military facilities.
How is it that civilian, state-owned scientific apparatuses to protect the population are either non-existent or wholly inadequate? So much so that our governments must jump into the lap of the profiteering pharma-cartels and their sponsored universities. Why do our chief scientific advisor, chief medical advisor, and chief mathematic remodeller seem to have cartel tattoos on their CVs? Would you trust Big Pharma hitmen to advise and cure you?
Wouldn’t it be better to have independent, accountable state-funded experts who would be less prone to the politicisation and profit motives that are destroying our way of life? Is this not preferable to the collusive, corrupt, and clandestine public-private partnerships such as SAGE? Even the establishment BMJ’s Executive Editor has belatedly come round to express serious concern about the “politicisation, corruption, and suppression of science.” As Michael Gove said (and subsequently retracted), “I think the people are fed up of experts in organisations with acronyms, saying they know what is best and getting it consistently wrong.”
As for pandemic preparedness, the government (presumably in conjunction with the same global non-state actors) is said to have organised for a public health crisis such as the one we currently find ourselves in, yet it seems to want to keep the findings of the Operation Cygnus report under lock and key. Why?
What did Sir Simon Stevens, CEO of NHSE say at a press conference on 5 May 2020? This shifty, career pen-pusher said he was quoting from ICU consultant, Dr Alison Pittard. This, in practice, means he was absolving himself of all accountability and responsibility for the statement. He said he had spoken to her the day before and she had said, “In the here and now we cannot stop cancer developing, in the here and now we can’t immediately prevent heart attacks or strokes … but we can reduce the spread of coronavirus in the community.”
This is a problematic and fatally misleading statement. Stevens should be ashamed of himself for making a political soundbite out of Dr Pittard’s words; particularly when citing her name for added authenticity and protection. First of all, if my colleague said this, please understand she operates in a very compartmentalised, specialist ICU cocoon, at the sharpest end of a chronically under-resourced and stymied NHS service. She will be traumatised, sensitised and conditioned by Simon Stevens’ under-funding of her service and the clear excess deaths of March and April.
Second, know that we can prevent cancer developing, and stop heart attacks and strokes. This is called screening, early diagnosis, early intervention and timely surgery; such things were normal daily phenomena before March. Drug companies devoted billions to tell us it was possible. Now, Simon Stevens, Dr Alison Pittard and Pharma tell us it is not possible and squander 2.4 billion pounds daily to a National Covid Service which is six times the daily budget of the entire NHS.
Third, how can an ICU consultant’s well-meaning soundbite be the final word in community medicine? Is lockdown actually an effective way to stop the spread of this disease? That’s debatable, and not absolute. I agree we could suppress it and keep kicking the can down the road, culminating in higher periodic and seasonal spikes. But how and when (if ever) do we exit from her strategy – a snake oil vaccine? Alternatively, we could have been like Sweden and got it over and done with. I doubt the lay fact-checkers will bother analysing Simon Stevens’ parroted wisdom.
A few days later in The Sunday Times, Chris Hopson, the chief executive of NHS Providers, aped mindlessly:
You can’t stop someone having a heart attack or a stroke, but you can control the volume of Covid-19 patients by using lockdowns to reduce the infection rate… the NHS will certainly be arguing that the Government should be very cautious about coming out of lockdown.
Covid-19 and Chicken Pox
Now, imagine if a novel Chicken Pox descended on earth as if from nowhere, for that is how SARS-CoV-2 appears to have arrived. This parallel may help facilitate a common perspective. It could well have been far more damaging and certainly more terrifying than SARS-CoV-2. Imagine: no prior immunity, no prior sharing a lollipop at a pox party with a friend’s child to ensure broad, safe, and natural immunity before adulthood. Young adults, adults and the elderly would be dying en masse of multi-system pathologies. The pox marks would strike psychological terror; there would be no cure, no vaccine. Gradually, we would learn to cope with it, embrace it as a child, a rite of passage that you would rather have.
As for me, I had unknowingly acquired immunity at some point in my life. I discovered this because I required serological proof to work on a hospital paediatric ward in my thirties. So, I am relieved my child has possibly had Covid-19 as probably have I. To see hundreds of schools and their young teachers refuse the low risk of opening shop and returning to work seemed to me a dangerous folly: no immunity, no education, no jobs, no future, no life. We desperately need a reservoir of resilient, naturally immune people to shield the non-immune, vulnerable and elderly. More chance of suppressing the virus this way than with a rushed vaccine. I may as well say it now before it becomes criminal to do so. The world has lost its mind.
Dissident doctors, Thought Crimes & Arbitrary Injustice
Many have asked why more doctors and nurses are not coming forward with an alternative truth, and why they are not openly doing so. First, understand the state apparatus (including the regulatory body for doctors, the GMC) which has set its immovable stall: Catastrophic Pandemic (no such thing), Philanthropic Lockdown, Wonder Vaccine.
Then, take the extraordinary GMC assault on senior consultant surgeon’s right to free speech. Dr. Mohammed Adil was metaphorically lynched; swinging ominously off the GMC entrance from his redundant stethoscope – a gangland warning from the drug cabal to the rest of us. Then, recall what happens to an NHS whistle-blower, in spite of so-called whistle blowing protection laws, by familiarising oneself with the unbelievable scapegoating, cover-up, injustice and judicial “incompetence” doled out to Dr. Chris Day over 6 years and counting.
Now appreciate that in 2016, for the first time since at least 2006 according to cases compiled by the GMC, a doctor, consultant eye surgeon John Brookes walked scot free from his disciplinary tribunal without any sanction at all, even though the tribunal found he was guilty of misconduct. His offence? A 15-month sexual affair with a current patient. Not even a one-month nominal suspension was suitable: he was deemed too “unique” in his surgical talents and too valuable to his patients. The GMC tribunal made an “exceptional circumstance” of his case. The tribunal went further in its sympathies and commented that this was a consensual and mutually supportive sexual affair – that was until the jilted patient tweeted his affront to Brookes’ hospital CEO.
The GMC doesn’t do human rights for all, nor morals, ethics and Hippocrates per se anymore. It does duties. Duties are done for employers. No more egregious example of this was the GMC case of Dr. John Brookes. His case is paradigmatic of the damage, demoralisation and destabilisation of the medical profession. Ten years ago, it is likely he would have been removed from the GMC register for such an offence.
But, what of Dr. Adil, chairman of the World Doctors Alliance? He is a colleague of Dr Heiko Schöning, the German medic arrested at Speaker’s Corner in Hyde Park on 26 September 2020. What did Adil do to warrant his arrest? After several months of witnessing global and local healthcare go down the chute and members of the public suffer, he courageously (some would say extremely inexpediently) spoke out on YouTube with admirable passion about the global assault on civil liberties, public health, the NHS and his own patients’ health by disproportionate government measures. He referred to the pandemic as a hoax. You may find the video here.
Dr. Heiko Schöning being arrested for speaking at Speakers Corner, Hyde Park, 26 September 2020.
The GMC didn’t like it. It suspended him from his patients and his 30-year-long NHS career for 12 months, pending tribunal. No unique attributes, no “magic fingers”, no “consensual and mutually supportive” sexual relationship with a patient to help him avoid interim suspension nor the charge of exercising his legal right to free speech.
I am not saying I agree with him. “Hoax” may not be the most appropriate word to use in this situation. Dr Limeng Yan uses “fraud”. But how do we know for sure? Perhaps it is a hoax in the sense that in our collective hysteria we are leading ourselves to fatal self-deception? How does the GMC know? It does not. It has blind faith in the state-pharma-media sponsored narrative. Remember, lone voices have spoken out before when Tony Blair asserted to the world that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. History proved those lone, renegade voices to be right. Look at what then became of the middle east, then Europe and now the world. We believed in our politicians and not the experts. Recall the strange, horrid fate that befell principled weapons inspector, Dr. David Kelly.
The GMC seems not to care if Dr. Adil is correct. Might is right. He stepped out of line and spoke his truth. He must be silenced and professionally ruined before another doctor speaks. His was not speech riddled with hate, but by an honest concern that the government’s response to this pandemic is not medically or scientifically sound.
The GMC’s primary concern is its statutory responsibility and overarching objective as set out in the Medical Act 1983 (as amended), in particular the need:
- To protect, promote and maintain the health, safety and wellbeing of the public;
- To maintain public confidence in the profession;
- To promote and maintain proper professional standards and conduct for members of the profession.
As the BMJ reported:
A GMC spokesperson said: ‘The interim orders tribunal imposed an interim suspension on Dr Adil’s registration, following our referral, to protect patients and public confidence. This interim suspension remains in place while we consider concerns about Dr Adil’s fitness to practise.’
Well, who says it protects patients and maintains public confidence to see the GMC violate the lawful free speech of a senior doctor? Thousands of the people have turned out to support him. He is only one among a quarter of a million registered doctors. Why is there so much concern over his influence? Let him speak and be heard. Surely, he must have something important to say to risk his life’s calling? However, that is why the GMC is concerned, he speaks with repute and authority, and therefore the GMC must undermine him.
By denying him his democratic right to political, personal and professional expression, the GMC colludes to deny his right to be heard, and the right of the public to hear him. It denies him the right to seek the truth in open, democratic discourse, and the right to scrutinise the government and hold it to account. It denies diversity and equality of opinion. It denies him his livelihood, and needlessly detaches him from his life’s work and patients who rely on him.
Orwell once said, “If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear”. Well, welcome to a very veterinary Animal Farm.
Violation and criminalisation of human rights is becoming quite the corona-craze for official and charitable bodies. The British Academy, the Royal Society, the GMC, the government, the police… who next? Jonathan Sumption in retirement from judicial office is now able to speak with an impunity and candour not afforded to Dr Adil. Like Adil, he is a lone renegade. He pointedly called out the indifference of so-called civil rights organisations such as Liberty – which has a history of intervening for the partisan rights of Remainers – when it comes to defending everyone else’s human rights.
We now have the Labour party wishing to criminalise and censor our free speech. This time their leverage is “anti-vaxxers”, but even that term is problematic. I would imagine it is a defamatory slur designed by the corporate mandatory vaccine pushers who wish to smokescreen the fact that most objectors are manifestly not anti-vax. They are simply and reasonably against useless, unsafe, rushed and unproven pharmaceuticals where the profit-centric corporations are given state immunity from civil and criminal prosecution should the pharmaceutical be dangerous.
This is aside from the very serious issues of common assault, treatment without consent, and the violation of patient choice. In the context of what we know about the risks of the virus, none of this is appropriate, nor proportionate. What we now have is a mainstream principal of discretionary free speech at the behest of one ideological blob. If you do not worship at that altar, your god does not necessarily get to be heard, and may as well not exist.
Dr. Adil is not the first nor only doctor to accuse the WHO, Pharma and governments of a hoax pandemic. Did you know we had a relatively dry practice run of the orchestration of the apparatus to inflict terror on the world and fill the coffers of Big Pharma in 2009-2010 with swine flu? A German doctor and politician, Dr. Wolfgang Wodarg, accused the WHO of conspiring with Pharma to redefine and lower the threshold of declaring a pandemic.
That brings me to another doctor who might equally be accused of “over-valued ideas” and occupying the other end of the so-called pandemic hoax spectrum. She argues for the embattled corporate propagandists Whitty, Vallance, Ferguson and Johnson. She is Dame Clare Marx, Chair of the GMC. This is what she wrote a week before Lockdown 2.0: [emphases in italics are mine].
A GMC Love Letter
27.10.20
Your wellbeing matters – a message from Dame Clare Marx
Experiences of this pandemic will not be uniform, but for sure, none of us will be left unchanged.
Doctors have found themselves working at the edge of their comfort zone. Some of you have confronted harrowing situations. Some have made difficult decisions against a backdrop of uncertainty and fear. Some have been unable to give the care you wanted to give.
Now, on top of managing rising demand, a weighty backlog of elective work and the second wave of the pandemic, doctors are bracing themselves for the much-anticipated winter storm.
We know that you and your teams are already weary. With barely time to process the events of recent months, many of you are now steeling yourselves for the inevitable challenges to come.
That commitment and resolve requires a huge physical and emotional effort, some would say it’s an act of courage.
We went into medicine to help people and to make things better. But we can’t do that without caring for ourselves too. Your wellbeing matters – to you, your patients and to us as your regulator.
We want to support you so you can keep delivering the best possible care to patients. We’ve compiled helpful resources here to help you survive and thrive over the coming months.
We all know that this will be a marathon, not a sprint.
The nature of being a doctor is to go above and beyond to deliver the care our patients require. But doing that requires doctors to take their own wellbeing seriously.
On behalf of the GMC, and as a doctor myself, I am immensely proud of the profession’s response to this crisis.
Thank you for your continued dedication and professionalism. Please look after yourselves, and each other.
Dame Clare Marx
Chair of the General Medical Council
When I received this call to arms, I had to step back in some amazement. I found it unrepresentative, patronising and inappropriate in many parts. This letter was innuendo and euphemism, wrapped up in a tissue of concern for our well-being. The problem was ill-defined – is doctors’ mental health failing due to an apocalyptic pandemic or due to the government’s lockdown and suspension of the usual NHS? Or is it the huge backlog she at least acknowledges?
Non-dissident Doctors
However, some doctors do seem immune from GMC scrutiny. Have the two doctors (Drs. Martin Landry and Peter Horby) involved in the Oxford Recovery trial been properly held to account for unusually high doses of hydroxychloroquine given to presumably vulnerable hospitalised patients with advanced Covid-19? This may have killed cheap, generic hydroxychloroquine’s early promise as a community prophylactic and early treatment in Covid-19 at low and normal doses, leaving the market wide open for expensive, novel, commercially exploitable vaccines and therapies. In fact, it may well have: watch Chief Medical Officer, Chris Whitty reject hydroxychloroquine as a result of Recovery.
It could be argued that Recovery might have hastened the demise of some of its participants. But, still, it is Dr. Adil who remains the GMC’s prime target and public enemy number one of our dysfunctional state.
How did Recovery receive ethical approval to give excessive doses to vulnerable patients in an advanced Covid-19 state with hydroxychloroquine when mainstream media was telling us hydroxychloroquine was dangerous and toxic at normal doses? The Recovery trial gave a massive 2400mg hydroxychloroquine in the first 24 hrs, and 800mg every subsequent 24 hrs for the next 9 days. Who proposed and approved these doses? The normal daily dose is 200-400mg, and it is a general pharmaceutical principle that patients with organ failure are sometimes given lower doses to avoid toxicity.
Recovery concluded hydroxychloroquine had no effect on survival, but what if it did and this was masked by its potential toxicity? Emerging data from other studies tells us that hydroxychloroquine may have an effective role to in early stage Covid-19 at low/normal doses.
Something doesn’t add up. It seems as if the Recovery trial result has caused a character assassination on hydroxychloroquine. Are none of my colleagues concerned about this? Surely, there is a case to answer for these doctors.
What would GMC scrutiny make of Drs. Pittard, Whitty, Landry, Horby and Marx? Are they merely GMC-compliant, dutiful doctors; are they ethical and competent professionals; have their actions protected patients and public confidence or caused harm and grossly negligent deaths? What about their “fitness to practise”? These are the complex and challenging questions for the GMC that only a few lone renegades are willing to ask.
What can we do? I would urge the public to make their views known to their MPs and copy in the GMC and the Free Speech Union. Submit FOIA requests to the GMC, hold it to account – it acts for you. Support the Free Speech Union, and protect yourself and others by joining it and donating to it. We live in interesting times, and I fear they are about to become more interesting.
The Covid Physician is an unheroic NHS doctor. This article is a personal view and does not necessarily represent the views of the NHS. Dr. TCP tweets at @tcp_dr
Copyright © Locomotive 6960 Limited 2020
German Doctor Raided By Armed Police During Live YouTube Stream
By Paul Joseph Watson – Summit News – November 19, 2020
Shocking footage out of Germany shows Doctor Andreas Noack being raided by armed police in the middle of a YouTube stream for apparently violating coronavirus laws.
The clip shows Noack in conversation with someone during the live stream before he is distracted by noises outside his door.
Banging is then heard along with screams of “Polizei!” before armed cops are seen entering and ordering Noack to get on the floor, as he is treated like some kind of violent terrorist.
As Noack is handcuffed, a police officer in a mask then appears to try to shut down the live stream but only succeeds in diverting the camera.
Speculation raged on Twitter as to the reason for the raid, with some suggesting Noack had been active in treating injured protesters at anti-lockdown demonstrations.
Others suggested the reason was that Noack had welcomed too many people into his house, violating COVID-19 restrictions on gatherings.
“I think the guy is guilty of expressing his opinions,” said another respondent.
“They’ve turned back the clock to the 1930’s,” remarked another.
“Insanity!” commented another.
Germany has seen numerous massive anti-lockdown protests, including one yesterday in Berlin during which police hit protesters with water cannons.
As we previously highlighted, a pregnant mother in Australia received a home visit and was arrested by police for the crime of helping to organize an anti-lockdown protest on Facebook.
This is happened to doctor Andreas Noack in Germany. After the unconstitutional approval of the infection law, police broke into his house while he was having a live transmission on YouTube. Those who cried against “fascism” have created the most criminal dictatorship in history. pic.twitter.com/fLgl5JTF0i
— Cesare Sacchetti (@CesareSacchetti) November 19, 2020
Pompeo: US to Label BDS Movement as ‘Anti-Semitic’
Palestine Chronicle | November 19, 2020
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced that Washington will take measures against the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign, which seeks to isolate Israel over its treatment of the Palestinians.
Washington “will regard the global anti-Israel BDS campaign as anti-Semitic,” he said.
“We will immediately take steps to identify organizations that engage in hateful BDS conduct and withdraw US government support for such groups,” Pompeo said.
Israel sees BDS as a strategic threat and has long accused it of anti-Semitism.
Activists strongly deny the charge, comparing the boycott to the economic isolation that helped bring down apartheid in South Africa.
Last week Pompeo announced his intention to create a new process by which Washington can label organizations and NGOs as “anti-Semitic”, Politico reported on Wednesday.
Three people close to the issue confirmed the move, saying Pompeo may hold off on making an announcement.
Pompeo made the first visit by a US secretary of state to the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights on Thursday, after labeling the pro-Palestinian BDS movement an anti-Semitic “cancer”.
Doxing must not become normal political tactic, like the latest scandal around Michigan vote certification shows
By Micah Curtis | RT | November 19, 2020
A representative-elect seemingly encouraging the doxing of two people on the Wayne County Board of Canvassers, is only the latest of this sinister trend. If people don’t start calling it out, we risk it becoming the norm.
Doxing is a practice on the internet that is described as posting the personal information of an individual on a public forum. Whenever this is done, it is usually used with the intent to intimidate. If this information is easily accessible by some nut job on the internet, you could see harassment, vandalism, and many other things done to make the life of the person miserable. It’s a dirty tactic that actually falls under many states’ harassment and cyberstalking laws as illegal.
Anytime that a political figure does something of the sort it should raise eyebrows. Abraham Aiyash, a Michigan State representative elect publicly named the neighborhood in which a member of the board of canvassers in Wayne County lived. This particular action came across as encouraging people to continue to dig in to this woman’s personal information. The fact of the matter is that her neighborhood where she lives had zero things to do with the discussion at hand, and the only reason it was brought up was to try and intimidate her so that this soon to be representative could get what he wanted.
This followed Republicans on the board demanding they be allowed to rescind their votes to certify the state’s election results over concerns about voter irregularities, claiming they had been pressured into complying.
This is not the first time that someone on the left has done such a thing. Black Lives Matter activist, Shaun King, threatened to begin doxing members of a police department unless one officer who was involved in a shooting had his information personally disclosed by the police department. Years before that, CNN threatened to do something similar to someone who posted a Trump meme that showed the network’s logo superimposed onto WWE supremo Vince McMahon’s face as he was beaten up by the president at WrestleMania 23.
This sort of action tends to cascade, and can snowball out of control before you know it. I saw on Twitter people threatened to dox Aiyash because of his actions. On the other side, his supporters began digging more into the background of the woman that he was trying to pressure. This cannot and should never become normal. This is political intimidation, point blank. Thankfully, the internet never forgets so these sorts of things will live on in people’s memories. However, the behavior needs to be called out for being as evil as it is.
On top of that, there needs to be legal consequences as well. Charges need to be filed, civil suits need to be filed as well and debts to society need to be paid. Political parties need to call it out, especially those who have members that are participating in this behavior. This comes across like something the Cosa Nostra would do in a mob film. Right now people in politics need to do a bit of soul searching, because the chilling effect here is incredibly frightening.
If nothing is done about this kind of behavior we are looking at a future where political intimidation will become the norm. Whether it’s a protester, a news network, or a government official, evil is still evil. Such intimidation needs to be shunned and punished or we risk our governments becoming the mob. Speaking as somebody who is originally from Chicago, trust me when I tell you that is not a line you want to be thin.
Micah Curtis is a game and tech journalist from the US. Aside from writing for RT, he hosts the podcast Micah and The Hatman, and is an independent comic book writer. Follow Micah at @MindofMicahC
UK terrorism chief calls for ‘national debate’ on criminalizing doubts about Covid-19 vaccine
RT | November 19, 2020
The UK’s top counter-terrorism cop has suggested society stop allowing people to question the wisdom of a rapid Covid-19 vaccine rollout, regarding such skepticism to be life-threatening “misinformation.”
Met Assistant Commissioner Neil Basu has pointedly questioned whether it is “the correct thing for society to allow” the sharing of “misinformation that could cost people’s lives” — demonizing all doubts about quickly developed Covid-19 vaccines whose potential long-term effects are not yet known and tying them to extremist radicalization efforts.
While he didn’t go so far as to call for a law to be passed banning such content, his suggestion of a “national debate” will presumably light a fire under ministers already mulling such legislation.
Basu also expressed worries about a “sharp increase in extremist material online in the last few years” during Wednesday’s press conference, warning of a “new and worrying trend in the UK” of young people being radicalized. Officials told UK media that Islamic extremists and far-right groups were using “false claims about coronavirus” to radicalize their followers.
Social media users already wary of the rush to roll out the vaccine were disturbed by the attendant rush to criminalize criticism of it.
Some said that there were completely legitimate reasons to criticize the jab.
Im not anti vaccine. Im anti THiS vaccine. Experimental rushed and flawed, sold to us by the self same devious creeps and liars who stand to share trillions #WiSEUP
— Ian Brown (@ianbrown) November 18, 2020
Even some in favor of taking the jab thought the decision to do so should be a “personal choice” rather than a mandate.
I will take the vaccine but believe it’s a personal choice and debate important.The establishment have other ideas:Met Assistant Commissioner Neil Basu said that there should be a discussion about whether it is “the correct thing for society to allow” https://t.co/TIv9RYeBvi
— Darren Selkus Ex PPC Epping Forest (@DarrenSelkus) November 19, 2020
Whatever happened to, ” my body, my choice”?
— alfred setian (@spats402) November 19, 2020
And others argued Basu’s suggestion should horrify anyone who believed in free speech, “no matter what [their] beliefs.”
I mean… literally the thought police. ! I don’t care if you want to marry vaccines…no matter what your beliefs this type of censorship should make your blood run cold! Without free thought, there is no freedom. Be careful what you support! https://t.co/zfhv37v9q4
— Emma Kenny (@emmakennytv) November 18, 2020
“Am I alone in finding this more worrying than the virus itself?” one user asked.
The counter-terrorism chief’s concerns have added to the growing chorus of government entities calling for the blanket censorship – or even criminalization – of vaccine scepticism. The Labour Party earlier this week demanded the government adopt emergency legislation to impose civil and criminal penalties on social media platforms that don’t immediately remove posts that question the safety of the jab and other “false” materials.
Labour’s Shadow Health Secretary Jonathan Ashworth demanded government “deal with some of the dangerous nonsense, nonsensical anti-vax stuff that we’ve seen spreading on social media, which erodes trust in the vaccine” even though no vaccine has yet passed review by UK health authorities and speculation from either “side” of the debate is fully hypothetical.
Meanwhile, Health Secretary Matt Hancock has refused to rule out making vaccination mandatory, and ministers are reportedly considering issuing QR codes to people who receive the jab that will allow them to attend sports, theatre, and other events.
In Shocking Reversal, Wayne County Election Board Republicans Rescind Certifications; Claim Family Threatened
By Tyler Durden – Zero Hedge – 11/19/2020
In a stunning development out of Wayne County, Michigan – two GOP members of the Board of Canvassers have rescinded their certifications of the Nov. 3 vote, claiming they were bullied into approving the election results in the state’s most populous county, which includes Detroit and surrounding areas.
Their initial refusal to vote placed the Board in a 2-2 deadlock, putting in jeopardy the state’s ability to certify Joe Biden’s win. Hours later, the two flip-flopped and agreed to certify. Now, they’re taking it back.
“I rescind my prior vote to certify Wayne County elections,” wrote Monica Palmer in a sworn affidavit, who along with fellow GOP board member William C. Hartmann refused to certify the election on Tuesday. The two fell under intense pressure from the left – with Palmer claiming that her family was threatened (via Just The News ). The two were also doxxed over social media.
“The comments made accusations of racism and threatened me and members of my family,” continues Palmer’s affidavit, adding: “The Wayne County election had serious process flaws which deserve investigation. I continue to ask for information to assure Wayne County voters that these elections were conducted fairly and accurately. Despite repeated requests I have not received the requisite information and believe an additional 10 days of canvas by the State Board of canvassers will help provide the information necessary.”
Hartmann, in a similar affidavit, wrote “I voted not to certify, and I still believe this vote should not be certified.” He added that he and Palmer “were berated and ridiculed by members of the public and other Board members.”
“The public ostracism continued for hours…” he continued – next describing how he was told by Wayne County attorney, Janet Anderson-Davis, that “discrepancies [in the vote] were not a reason to reject the certification,“ and that he only voted to certify “based on her explicit legal guidance.”
“Later that evening, I was enticed to agree to certify based on a promise that a full and independent audit would take place,” he said – only to learn on Wednesday that state officials had reneged or would otherwise not honor the audit.
Affidavit of William Hartmann – interesting question on pg4 about ‘private monies directing local officials’ https://t.co/Z24g9jRNMd pic.twitter.com/cqDNj2XDEw
— Jack Posobiec 🇺🇸 (@JackPosobiec) November 19, 2020
As JustTheNews’ John Solomon notes, “It was not immediately clear whether the Tuesday night compromise was binding or could be changed, or whether the two members’ decision to announce their rescinded votes would stop Michigan state officials from proceeding to name electors.”
Trump Fires CISA Director Chris Krebs Over ‘Highly Inaccurate’ Election Statement
By Daria Bedenko – Sputnik – 18.11.2020
US President Donald Trump announced in his Twitter on Tuesday that he fired Chris Krebs from the position of the Director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency of the DHS.
According to the President, Krebs was fired because of his “highly inaccurate” statement on the security of 2020 US presidential election.
“The recent statement by Chris Krebs on the security of the 2020 Election was highly inaccurate, in that there were massive improprieties and fraud – including dead people voting, Poll Watchers not allowed into polling locations, “glitches” in the voting machines which changed votes from Trump to Biden, late voting, and many more”, Trump tweeted. “Therefore, effective immediately, Chris Krebs has been terminated as Director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency”.
In a follow-up tweet, Trump said that “the only thing secure about our 2020 Election was that it was virtually impenetrable by foreign powers”.
“On that, the Trump Administration takes great credit”, he continued. “Unfortunately, the Radical Left Democrats, Dominion, and others, were perhaps more successful!”.
Reacting to Trump’s decision to fire Krebs, Homeland Security Committee released a statement later on Tuesday.
“In firing Director Krebs for refusing to lend credibility to his baseless claims and conspiracy theories about voter fraud, the President is telling officials throghout (sic) the Administration to put his political interests ahead of their responsibilites to the American people. That is not only disturbing, it is antidemocratic”, the statement said.
Reports suggesting that Krebs was soon to be removed from his position emerged earlier in November, with Politico alleging that it could be “in part because of a website he created to debunk election-related misinformation” – webpage on CISA website named “Rumor Control”.
Krebs was reportedly expected to be fired since just after the election day.
Earlier on Tuesday, Krebs tweeted: “ICYMI [In case you missed it]: On allegations that election systems were manipulated, 59 election security experts all agree, ‘in every case of which we are aware, these claims either have been unsubstantiated or are technically incoherent'”.
Post-Election Disputes
Shortly after the election day, DHS and CISA released a joint statement regarding the election, calling it “the most secure in American history” – something that is contradictory to Trump’s opinion on the 2020 electoral process.
“There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised”, the joint statement said.
While the mainstream US media have projected the Democratic candidate Joe Biden to win the presidency in the 2020 race, Trump has been vehemently refusing to concede or accept the preliminary results, claiming that the election was “rigged”.
Falling in line with Trump’s assertions regarding the election, reports emerged saying that dead people took part in voting and postal workers were instructed to backdate mail ballots that arrived after the election day.
Recently, two men were charged with massively submitting thousands of fake voter registration applications on behalf of the homeless in California.
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