The following fictional story may or may not bear resemblance to events in real life.
Imagine, if you will, that you are a first-generation high tech gazillionaire. In fact, at one time you were said to be the richest man on earth, although that is no longer the case. Nevertheless, you remain unimaginably wealthy, with all the responsibilities and burdens that such wealth brings. (Given the extremely unusual circumstances of this tale, to make it more relatable, we will assign you a fictional name.) Your birth certificate reads Gilbert Harvey Bates III, but the world knows you as Gil Bates.
Gil Bates’s erstwhile net-worth preeminence (stolen as it was by an upstart online retailer named Biff Jezos) is not the only important loss he has suffered. Also in the rearview mirror is his youth, his marriage, and his position as CEO of the behemoth tech company he created, MacroHardTM.
After Gil Bates stepped down as CEO of MacroHardTM, he focused on his philanthropic work. The centerpiece of this work is the immensely well-funded (and therefore immensely influential) Bates Foundation. The Foundation’s scope may be mind-bogglingly broad, but one problem especially consumed Bates: there are far too many people on the planet.
In his youth, Gil Bates read a controversial book called The Overpopulation Bomb, written by a visionary scientist named Saul Derelicht. That alarming book, a huge bestseller in its day, described a neo-Malthusian hell on earth resulting from human overpopulation, and proposed mass sterilization and other aggressive population reduction techniques as the solution.
Gil Bates became convinced, and remains convinced – especially as the worldwide human population has soared beyond 8 billion units – that Homo sapiens have obscenely overpopulated the planet. Once Bates had sold software packages to the great majority of them, he vowed that this existential threat to the planet must be addressed.
But what was to be done? How could this great affront to Gaia be reconciled? When it comes to a responsibility so great, a task so immense, no single man – not even Gil Bates – could hope to accomplish it alone.
Fortunately for the future of Earth, Bates knew a host of like-minded, enlightened elites, pre-eminent individuals of great wealth, power, and worldwide influence. Among the most important:
- A dour Teutonic economist named Kraut Schlob. The son of an ambitious industrialist who built flamethrowers for the Third Reich, Schlob is the founder and chairman of the World Enslavement Forum. The Forum has become the premier worldwide gathering of hyper-elites who wish to discuss globalist policies, and enjoy the company of high-end prostitutes, free from the prying eyes of commoners.
- An immensely powerful – if embarrassingly vertically challenged – American health bureaucrat named Dr. Fantoni Auci. For decades, Dr. Auci controlled the overwhelming majority of US Government medical research funding. As such, no one in the vast American network of hospitals, research institutes, or universities dares to cross Dr. Auci, and he wields similar influence internationally. In fact, he oversees funding for multiple secret virology research laboratories, as far away as China.
- A mysterious veterinarian named Adalbert Ghoula. Ghoula is the CEO of Kaiser, Inc., the world’s largest and most rapacious pharmaceutical company, which Ghoula has grown into a veritable modern day IG Farben. In his earlier days, Ghoula oversaw the development of a vaccine that successfully induces the chemical castration and sterilization of swine.
The consensus, reached after lengthy consultations with these men and other luminaries, was that the worldwide human population must be reduced from 8 billion to 500 million units.
But how? Several possible avenues were proposed.
- War has been used for millennia to reduce populations, and while highly effective locally or regionally, it would be entirely ineffective at removing the necessary fifteen-sixteenths of people on Earth. After all, the deadliest war in history, World War II, resulted in a mere 80 million deaths, just 3 percent of the world’s population at the time.
- The use of a bomb was considered a special kind of bomb, reminiscent of the “neutron bomb” of yore, which would supposedly reduce populations while sparing infrastructure. This seemed closer to the mark than all-out war, but ultimately it was determined that setting off bombs would be both impractical and far too obvious. After all, even herd animals will not consent to being openly and massively slaughtered, no matter how necessary the culling may be. The herd must be kept forever in the dark.
- A plague, a pestilence, a pandemic seemed more promising. Past naturally occurring pandemics had reduced human populations much more successfully than wars. The Black Death of 1346-53 may have reduced the world population by as much as 25 percent, a much more encouraging number than the measly 3 percent from World War II. As an added economic bonus, the Black Death served as a very effective concentrator of wealth for the survivors, as it caused minimal collateral property loss.
However, a more detailed review of historical worldwide population estimates demonstrated that a pandemic alone could only serve as a temporizing measure at best. Most estimates show that by 1400, the worldwide population had unfortunately returned to its pre-plague total.
Clearly, the necessary 94 percent reduction in population could not be achieved by culling the herd alone. Sterilization would be needed as well. But how to achieve such mass sterilization? Many H. sapiens possess an intense desire to procreate – that’s the source of the problem, after all. Unfortunately, prior historical initiatives for mandatory sterilization – even those of limited scale and scope, such as those targeting the mentally deficient – have met great opposition, at least in the so-called “free” nations.
- However, a vaccine could be used for mass sterilization. Ghoula’s earlier work at Kaiser was proof of this. But a fundamental problem remained: how to get the unsuspecting population – specifically, its children and young adults – to take the stealth-sterilizing inoculation?
The solution, when it came, was a thing of beauty, sublimely subtle and symmetrical. The answer was a two-step process: a pandemic and a vaccine. One population reduction device would be released, presented as a worldwide plague. It would be followed by a second population reduction device, presented as the cure.
And the technology was already in place to make it happen. It merely had to be perfected, then enacted.
Employing the Black Magic of gain-of-function virology research, an animal respiratory virus, previously never infecting humans, was genetically engineered to readily infect and spread amongst humans. At a key moment in political history, when a particularly bothersome populist American President named T. Ronald Dump was running for reelection, the virus was released from a Chinese laboratory into the human population.
As the new virus spread, reports of the death and devastation it wrought were spread as well. In actuality, the virus had been engineered so that it was deadly only to the frail, chronically ill, and very old. It was cleverly propagandized, however, as a threat to persons of all ages, a modern day Black Death of sorts.
The US deep state, desperate to disrupt the Dump presidency and remove him from office, were willing partners to manage the control and manipulation of the population through propaganda, and to enforce unprecedented, prolonged lockdowns of society. Remarkably, they even convinced President Dump to sanction the lockdowns, and to fund the development of the vaccine. Most other countries followed suit.
The new virus rapidly killed off many of the oldest and sickest members of society, as would be expected of a novel respiratory virus. However, the locked-down and isolated populations were barraged with media messages that stirred up mass terror of the virus. Businesses were closed, save for those deemed “essential.” Schools were closed, though children were already known to be at statistically zero risk of death. Dissenters were harassed, scapegoated, and punished.
Then, a solution to the pandemic was presented: the vaccine. The vaccine was the savior, the only way out of this crisis.
A few irritating, contrarian dissenters fought back. They protested for civil rights. They stressed the near impossibility of producing an effective vaccine against a rapidly mutating respiratory virus. They identified numerous “safety signals” found in the vaccine trials, and tried to expose these as best they could. But the mainstream media drowned them out, the social media companies (controlled by the deep state) censored them ruthlessly, and after all, once the vaccines were mandated, most people took at least a couple of doses.
And the joke was on the dissenters in another, more important respect. These meddlesome do-gooders were indeed intelligent enough to identify the toxicities inherent in the vaccines. But they decried them as “safety signals.” The fatal toxicities they identified still seemed to them to be flaws, mistakes, and the unfortunate results of a hasty and mad rush to make money off of the pandemic.
Imagine the naïvete.
Early in the vaccine “rollout,” young women reported abnormal vaginal bleeding and other menstrual problems after receiving the vaccines, raising concerns about potential unintended consequences to female reproduction. Pathologists found ovaries infiltrated with multiple toxins from the vaccines, both the dreaded “spoke” protein of the virus and “lucid nanoparticles” from the vaccine’s delivery system. Even occluded Fallopian tubes were identified.
Soon thereafter, reports appeared in the alternative media of dramatically increased numbers of sudden deaths, primarily in young men, after receiving the vaccine. It often visibly occurred in athletes while on the playing field. This caused considerable alarm, impossible as it was to hide.
In a masterful demonstration of the “limited hangout,” officials acknowledged the sudden death phenomenon, but would not even allow mention of the vaccine as a possible cause within the mainstream medical community. Instead, protocols and clinics for this sudden epidemic of heart disease in the young were established, but strangely without any official curiosity as to the cause. All they knew for sure was that it couldn’t be the vaccine.
Of course, the infamous “spoke” protein, the same viral antigen chosen by the vaccine’s designers to induce the vaccinated patient’s body to produce in quantity, just happens to be the most toxic part of the virus. The “spoke” protein deposits itself in tissues throughout the body, wreaking havoc wherever it goes. It has a particular affinity for the heart muscle, causing the inflammatory process known as myocarditis that leads to cardiac arrests.
“Spoke” doesn’t stop with the heart, however. It is a remarkably versatile toxin, a sort of Swiss Army monkey wrench in the human body. It causes gigantic, gruesome, rubbery blood clots in the vasculature, seizures in the central nervous system, the aforementioned deposits in ovaries and Fallopian tubes (and testes, for that matter), etcetera, etcetera. What a stroke of genius to choose “spoke” as the antigen the vaccines induce replication of!
The vaccines held another nasty little secret, which even the pathetic, naïve resistance only recognized much later. The vaccines were “contaminated” with plasmids containing MV-40 and MV-40-like DNA sequences. Yes, that MV-40, the monkey virus known to cause cancer in multiple animal species.
Could the appearance of so-called “turbo cancers” in vaccinated persons somehow be related to this “contamination?” Well, another limited hangout, this time courtesy of Healthcare Canada, took care of that.
Excess death rates rose dramatically after the vaccine rollout. Birth rates plummeted. To the do-gooders, refuseniks, and dissidents, this was a scandal.
But what did they know? To use a phrase all-too-familiar to the seasoned software developer, these toxicities were not bugs, but features. The vaccines were working exactly as they were supposed to work.
Silly plebes! The “vaccines” were actually a deliberate, multi-pronged, population reduction device. They were designed to kill a percentage of young people – mostly male – outright, to poison and disable the female reproductive system at multiple points, and to insert teratogenic plasmids into recipients’ cells, to pick off others at undisclosed, later dates. They were merely packaged and marketed as a vaccine against a (lab-manufactured) flu-like illness.
As successful as they have been, there remains so much more work yet to be done.
A definite lull occurred in the population’s acceptance of repeated injections of the vaccine. The dissidents may be naïve, but they are persistent, and sometimes effective to a degree. But ultimately they will fail.
The general population is lazy, uneducated, and easily terrified. (Some say they are being done a favor by being culled.) They are accustomed to the precedents set by other vaccines. Their reluctance will be worn down with time. Of course respiratory viruses are imperfect targets for vaccines. Once again, that’s not a bug, it’s a feature! It only means that a new booster of the vaccine will be needed every year – at least.
With each new round of boosters, a new population of girls and young women will be rendered infertile. A new group of boys and young men will suffer cardiac arrest – a very quick and painless way to die, really.
Countless others will contract cancers – turbo cancer, to use the current term for these rapidly progressing and deadly malignancies, often of unusual types – bone cancers, muscle cancers, and other former rarities. Not an easy way to die, admittedly. But these tumors mercifully progress to end stage very swiftly, and their value as a population reduction device is undeniable.
Have no fear. It is only a matter of time; only a matter of lather, rinse, repeat. As long as the herd allows itself to be sent through the sheep dip whenever and however often the shepherds proclaim is necessary, H. sapiens will get to 500 million. All courtesy of a type of bomb after all, but in this case a microscopic bomb that is released in each person via a tiny little injection: The Depopulation Bomb.
Happy Halloween!
C.J. Baker, M.D. is an internal medicine physician with a quarter century in clinical practice. He has held numerous academic medical appointments, and his work has appeared in many journals, including the Journal of the American Medical Association and the New England Journal of Medicine. From 2012 to 2018 he was Clinical Associate Professor of Medical Humanities and Bioethics at the University of Rochester.
October 31, 2023
Posted by aletho |
Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity, Timeless or most popular | Covid-19, COVID-19 Vaccine |
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Consider Manhattan Contrarian as your go-to source for the latest on New York’s progress toward green energy utopia.
Can you remember all the way back to December 19, 2022? That’s the day that New York’s Climate Action Council officially adopted its “Scoping Plan,” telling us all how we are going to achieve, among other goals, 70% of statewide electricity from renewable energy sources by 2030 and a zero-emissions electricity system by 2040. The biggest part of the grand plan consists of some 9,000 MW (nameplate capacity) of offshore wind turbines to be built by 2035. As of the time of the Scoping Plan, the state claimed that some 4,300 MW out of the 9,000 MW of upcoming offshore wind projects were under “active development.”
On the very day that the Scoping Plan got finalized, I had a post titled “On To The Great Future Of Offshore Wind Power.” That post noted that even of the 4.300 MW of offshore wind supposedly under “active development,” not one turbine was operating, or even under construction. Several developers had made bids that had been accepted by the state, and some of those developers were getting kind of close to applying for permits. My prediction was: “Expect long delays and demands for lots more money before anything gets built.” Boy, can I call these things.
Shall we check back in for the latest information?
Just ten days ago, on October 5, I had an update on offshore wind developments throughout the Mid-Atlantic and New England. For New York, the news was that in September essentially all the developers of the New York projects in “active development” had demanded massive price increases, ranging from about 30% at the low end to almost 65% at the high end. The new prices being demanded by the developers would now be between $140-190 per MWh, which would be at least double to more than triple the prices charged by new natural gas plants.
So how did that go over? To its credit, the state Public Service Commission wasted no time in rejecting the price hike demands of the developers. On October 12 the Commission issued its decision on the Petitions of the developers for price relief. Excerpt from the press release:
The New York State Public Service Commission (Commission) today denied petitions filed by a group of offshore wind developers and a state renewable energy trade association seeking billions of dollars in additional funding from consumers for four proposed offshore wind projects and 86 land-based renewable projects. In denying financial relief, the Commission opted to preserve the robust competitive bidding process that provides critically needed renewable energy resources to New York in the fairest and most cost-effective manner that protects consumers.
OK then, what happens next? The New York Times has a write-up on October 12. The Times quotes the Chair of the PSC, one Rory Christian, as standing up for the sanctity of the public bidding process:
Rory Christian, the chairman of the Public Service Commission, the state’s utility regulator, said that providing relief to the winning bidders would set an untenable precedent. “Taking exception today almost guarantees that we will be asked to do this again in the future,” he said. Mr. Christian added that the state’s ratepayers, who would have borne the cost, could not serve as an “unlimited piggy bank” for companies to tap. “We have a deal,” he said to the developers, calling on them to stand by the terms they agreed to.
Well, Rory, I’ve got news for you: the developers aren’t going to honor the deal. You’re going to have to hold a new auction. And the prices that will be bid will be as high or higher than those just demanded by these developers.
Oh, and then don’t expect any new round of accepted bids to stick either. The developers will come back again and again for new rounds of price increases. What’s to stop them? After all, they have you over a barrel. You have a “Climate Act” and a “Scoping Plan” that basically require you to build out a grid powered by “renewables,” whether that is feasible or not, and then limit your options to mostly offshore wind.
And meanwhile, until the next round of bids is held, we’re back to square one. We have a statutory requirement of 70% of our electricity from “renewables” by 2030, and a “Scoping Plan” that sees that goal being achieved largely through offshore wind turbines. And we have not one single operating offshore wind turbine, nor any under construction, nor, after the recent contract repudiations, any actively moving through the permitting process. At least for now, the whole thing is dead in the water.
The Times quotes a guy named Fred Zalcman, director of the New York Offshore Wind Alliance:
[T]he commission’s decision “puts these projects in serious jeopardy and deals a potentially fatal blow to the progress these projects have made. . . .”
By the way, the prices recently demanded by the offshore wind developers, in the range of $140-190/MWh, do not include anything for the transmission upgrades needed to deliver this power into the grid, nor anything for the storage or back-up needed to transform intermittent wind power into a useful 24/7 resource. The sooner we pull the plug on this whole endeavor, the better. But we are now only in the first phases of the collapse.
UPDATE, October 16, 2023: Meanwhile, I should have mentioned that New York City apartment buildings remain under a mandate from “Local Law 97” to convert to electric heat by 2030 or face large fines. The electricity is supposed to come from the offshore wind farms that, for the time being, are completely suspended. Go to the link in the sidebar to listen to Jane’s podcast on this subject.
October 26, 2023
Posted by aletho |
Economics, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity | New York, United States |
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Industrial meat giant Tyson Foods is teaming up with Dutch insect ingredient producer Protix to construct an insect ingredient manufacturing facility in the U.S.
In an announcement last week, Tyson said it is acquiring an ownership stake in Protix, and forming a joint venture to construct “the first at-scale facility of its kind to upcycle food manufacturing byproducts into high-quality insect proteins and lipids which will primarily be used in the pet food, aquaculture, and livestock industries,” Tyson Foods stated.
In a statement, Protix said, “The strategic investment will support the growth of the emerging insect ingredient industry and expand the use of insect ingredient solutions to create more efficient sustainable proteins and lipids for use in the global food system.”
Tyson Foods, Protix and proponents of insect-based foods argue that the production of such food products is more sustainable than rearing conventional livestock.
But food safety experts who spoke with The Defender said companies like Tyson are motivated by financial and other incentives, not sustainability. Citing scientific studies to back their claims, they also questioned the safety of insect ingredients.
“This is not about public health or even environmental health,” Nina Teicholz, science journalist and founder of The Nutrition Coalition, said. “The food industry likes bugs, because producing them involves multiple, patent-protected steps that enable companies to make a profit and control our food sources.”
Dutch journalist Elza van Hamelen, who has investigated Protix, told The Defender, “The takeover and transformation of our food system — toward synthetic lab-grown meat, GMO [genetically modified organism] vertical farming and insect farms — is an attack from many fronts.”
“Venture capital is investing in this, even though there is not a clear business case,” she said. “Governments are setting up ‘ecosystems’ in which government representatives, NGOs [nongovernmental organizations], academia and business join hands to get ‘alternative proteins’ off the ground.”
Science communicator Dr. Kevin Stillwagon, a retired chiropractor and airline pilot who investigates health issues on his Substack page, said, “There are already efforts underway to convince us that the way we raise food for human consumption is harming the environment by using up too much land and water and emitting excess greenhouse gasses.” He added, “They will try to convince us that even by using insects as animal feed, the environmental problem is not going to get solved.”
Howard Vlieger, a member of the board of advisers of GMO/Toxin Free USA, told The Defender that Tyson could leverage its market power and its entry into the insect ingredient market to place further financial pressure on cattle suppliers.
“Tyson is one of just four large companies that livestock producers rely on to market their cattle,” he said. “Tyson could potentially leverage its alternative foods interests against cattle purchases, thus lowering the demand and price for the cattle they buy.”
Tyson’s deal with Protix move marks the latest instance in a recent trend that has seen several prominent food producers, including Cargill, invest in insect ingredient manufacturers.
‘Stomach contents of cattle’ to be used as ‘a viable feed source for insects’
John R. Tyson, chief financial officer of Tyson Foods, told Food Ingredients First his company will use its own “by-products,” including “the stomach contents of processed cattle,” to produce “a viable feed source for insects.”
In Tyson Foods’ press release, Kees Aarts, CEO of Protix, said, “Tyson Foods’ and Protix’s strategic partnership advances our joint work towards creating high-quality, more sustainable protein using innovative technology and solutions. Moreover, we can immediately use their existing byproducts as feedstock for our insects.”
According to CNN, “Byproducts like animal fats, hides and inedible proteins, if not used or reduced, can end up in landfills. In this case, Tyson can send what’s in the stomach of cattle it has processed to a Protix facility, where it’s fed to insects.”
“For the company, creating a larger market for this type of waste can not only reduce waste but offer a larger revenue stream,” CNN reported.
The Tyson Foods statement said, “Protix contributes to a circular food chain by using waste from the food industry as feed for the black soldier fly (BSF). In turn, the insects are processed into valuable nutrients such as proteins and lipids.”
“Protix’s customers use these proteins and lipids as high-quality ingredients for feed and food” while “residual streams from the insects are used as organic fertilizer,” it added.
Aarts told CNN the black soldier fly “can grow on almost every type of food waste and byproduct you can imagine,” while according to Food Ingredients First, the flies “can eat up to twice their body weight daily, which can be used to enable a closed-loop recycling system,” creating a reusable protein source while using less water and land.
When completed, the Tyson Foods-Protix facility will “centre on all aspects of production, from breeding and incubating to the hatching of insect larvae,” Just Food reported, quoting a Tyson Foods spokesperson as saying the two companies are currently looking to “identify” the location where their plant will be constructed.
The joint-venture facility is expected “to be ready for ramping up operations towards the end of 2025,” according to Feed Navigator, which also reported that “The facility’s capacity will be three to four times the output of [Protix’s] existing plant” in The Netherlands. It will be able to produce “up to 70,000 tons of live larvae equivalent annually.”
According to Just Food, the precise size and cost of the minority stake Tyson Foods acquired in Protix has not been disclosed, but according to Feed Navigator, “When asked to disclose how much the U.S. company has invested, a spokesperson for Protix [said] funding from existing backers along with Tyson Foods” totaled $58 million.
Tyson’s insects not headed for human food supply — yet
The companies claim that the insect-based products they will manufacture will not enter the human food supply — for now. Tyson told CNN “Today, we’re focused on more of [an] ingredient application with insect protein than we are a consumer application.”
But a Tyson Foods spokesperson told Just Food that “Human food compositions exist, and Protix is leading the development of high-quality proteins from animal and fish feeds to consumer-level products.”
“While consumer adoption is very low and human-food applications are not the focus of this joint venture, opportunities exist in the long term to create more sustainable protein products,” the Tyson Foods spokesperson added.
Tyson told Food Ingredients First that he views his company as a “catalyst” that can create a more sustainable and equitable food system, and that “Partnerships with those across industries are an important part of that journey, working together to advance our collective sustainability ambitions and transform the global food system.”
According to Stillwagon, inserting insects into the human food supply is the goal of major food producers.
“Livestock and fish that are fed with insect-based proteins and lipids will most definitely enter the human food supply. This may change the taste of these foods to some degree,” he said.
“Also, the fish and livestock may need to be genetically modified so they will grow to sizes necessary for harvesting since they would be consuming something that is not natural to them,” Stillwagon added.
Not ‘adequately tested for safety’
According to CNN, “The meat industry places a large burden on the planet, in part because of the land, water and energy it takes to grow crops that feed the animals we eat,” adding that “Some experts say that reducing the environmental footprint of animal feed can help make the system more sustainable.”
“Making food out of insects is one way to do that: Bugs take up less space and subsist on waste that would otherwise be discarded,” CNN reported.
According to Food Dive, “Insect protein has grown in prominence in recent years with companies debuting cricket-based snacks and powders,” citing claims by cricket ingredient brand Exo that crickets are 20 times more efficient to grow than cattle.
CNN quoted Reza Ovissipour, Ph.D., professor in sustainable food systems at Texas A&M University, who said that flies operate as “mini bioreactors” that can convert animal waste into “the protein or fat from the insects,” which can then be used as animal feed.
“And these mini bioreactors, they are very inexpensive,” he said. “You don’t need to apply that much energy. It’s very sustainable,” he said.
Experts who spoke with The Defender expressed a different view.
“Due to the insect exoskeletons, which humans are not adapted to eat, it’s not clear that this new ‘foodstuff’ is safe for humans — or pets,” Teicholz said. “Insects and bugs have not been adequately tested for safety.”
“We know that meat, eggs and fish are sources of complete, whole proteins that humans (and dogs) have evolved to eat over millions of years,” she added. “We should be trying to figure out how to make these natural proteins more sustainable rather than shift to new, potentially dangerous food sources.”
Along similar lines, Alexis Baden-Mayer, political director for the Organic Consumers Association, said, “We don’t need to replace meat, milk or eggs with anything, we just have to raise animals on pasture. This is incredibly beneficial to the environment, really productive and produces the most nutrient-dense food possible.”
Baden-Mayer also said there are several risks that insects, when consumed as food, pose for human health, noting that insects contain allergens known as chitins and toxins known as mycotoxins — which also cause mold to be toxic to humans.
Stillwagon said insects pose other risks to human health.
“Since allergies to insect proteins, known as entomophagy allergies, have been reported, food producers must label insect-based products accurately to provide allergen information,” he said.
“The second risk is the microbiome and virome of the insect itself,” Stillwagon said. “It is possible that in some people with weakened immune systems, the consumption of bacteria and viruses that are naturally part of the insect could become pathogenic,” he added.
“Chemicals that are used to kill bacteria and viruses during the processing of insects on a massive scale for food may be harmful to humans,” Stillwagon said. “Also, the plants that the insects feed on may have been treated with chemicals like glyphosate or pesticides that will be absorbed into the insects and be consumed by humans.”
A February 2017 article in eBioMedicine, published by The Lancet, states that “Infections with viruses, bacteria and parasites have been recognized for years to be associated with human carcinogenicity.”
And an article published in July in the Nutrients journal stated that “Insect protein is an adequate protein source with promising health benefits” but noted that “further research is needed to fully understand its potential and optimise its inclusion into the human diet.”
WEF, WHO, major banks and investment firms promoting insect-based food
Yet, CNN reports that “interest in insects as ingredients for animal food has been growing” even if it “hasn’t caught on in the mainstream.”
CNN cited a 2021 report by the Netherlands-based Rabobank, claiming that “the demand for insect protein, mainly as an animal feed and pet food ingredient, could reach half a million metric tons by 2030, up from today’s market of approximately 10,000 metric tons.” Rabobank and Rabo Investments are investors in Protix.
A report by Grand View Research says the global insect protein market is expected to expand by an annual compound growth rate of 27.4% by 2028.
Protix says it aims to increase its “global gross revenue to around €1bn [$1.06 billion] by 2035 through international partnerships.”
Tyson Foods is an investor in Upside Foods, a company that recently won approval from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to produce lab-grown chicken. Upside has attracted more than $600 million in research and development investments, including from Bill Gates, Richard Branson, Elon Musk’s brother Kimbal Musk and Cargill.
Tyson Foods has also invested in Future Meat Technologies, another company seeking to develop cultivated meat products.
According to Food Ingredients First, “Earlier this year, Tyson Foods felt the impact of high inflation and low meat demand, which plunged its stocks by 45.36% from a year ago,” leading the company to close two of its U.S. chicken plants in March.
Yet, last year, Tyson Foods invested $355 million in a bacon production facility in Kentucky, “to meet rising retail and foodservice demand for bacon products.”
Other “Big Food” players have also made significant investments in this space, including Cargill, which in 2022, expanded a partnership with Innovafeed for the production of “sustainable” insect-based fertilizer and animal food, from three to 10 years.
ADM (Archer-Daniels-Midland) has also partnered with Innovafeed to commercialize insect protein for pet food sold in the U.S. and for the construction and operation of an insect production facility in Illinois, adjacent to an ADM corn processing complex.
In 2017, PepsiCo said it was researching insect-based snacks and their potential for future products, while in 2021, Mars launched a line of 100% insect-based cat food.
According to van Hamelen, “There is a lot of financial and policy support to get these ‘foods’ off the ground. Corporations are steered towards moving their portfolios into ‘novel foods’ as part of ESG investment rating criteria,” adding that “It may be interesting to review the ownership of these corporations and the agenda they pursue.”
Notably, Vanguard and BlackRock, the world’s two largest institutional investment firms, are also the two top institutional holders of Tyson Foods shares. BlackRock, and its CEO, Larry Fink, have been strong proponents of “sustainable” corporate practices.
Governments have also gotten into the act, van Hamelen told The Defender.
“The legislative framework is being prepared to approve these ‘foods’ as ‘novel food’ — in the EU, U.S. and also at the U.N. [United Nations] level under the Codex Alimentarius,” she said. “In addition, ‘behavioral government’ approaches, a.k.a. social engineering, used to steer people towards alternative protein choices, are part of government policy.”
For instance, in June, the EU authorized yellow mealworm powder to be used in bread, cakes, mashed potatoes, pasta and vegetables, following a novel food application French firm Nutriearth submitted in 2019. According to Food Ingredients First, “Final authorization on this is expected later this year or early 2024.”
In May, the U.K. Edible Insect Association declared that the house cricket was deemed “within the scope of novel foods regime and valid.”
The European Commission has found that consumers are already aware of insects as an ingredient in foods, and has called on food manufacturers to display the Latin names of the insects contained in the food on the packaging for the product.
Baden-Meyer said that companies like Tyson Foods are looking to the future — and to applications of insect-based products going beyond just food.
“As we saw with the COVID-19 vaccines, cells are the new factories. Maybe that’s the bacterial cells used in ‘precision fermentation,’ maybe it’s the cells living within our own bodies,” she said. “Vaccines are first, but I expect all drugs to be delivered via mRNA or DNA ‘gene therapy’ instructions for the cell to produce a protein.”
“Maybe that will be the way ‘food’ will eventually be ‘delivered’ too,” Baden-Meyer said, citing the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency’s “Living Foundries” program, which seeks to program “the fundamental metabolic processes of biological systems to generate a vast number of complex molecules that are not otherwise accessible.”
Stillwagon identified a danger stemming from insects consuming byproducts of animals that had previously received mRNA vaccines. He said:
“Another danger is the potential use of mRNA encapsulated in lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) as ‘vaccines’ in the animals or insects to try to prevent diseases. The animals would most likely be injected. The insects and aquaculture would ingest them.
“The use of ingested mRNA encapsulated in LNPs has already been investigated in some insects, shrimp and fish. The possibility of these encapsulated mRNA particles entering the human food supply is very real.”
Last month, the U.S. House of Representatives passed an amendment ending government funding to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the USDA during fiscal year 2024 for the development of transgenic edible vaccines, that would deliver mRNA “vaccines” through foods such as lettuce.
“My guess is this is what the ‘Great Resetters’ plan to feed us with and make everything else out of, too,” Baden-Meter said, referring to the “Great Reset” promoted by the World Economic Forum (WEF). “Bacteria is the new petroleum, the ‘plastics’ of our generation, but it’s going to take a while to make this shift,” she added.
Notably, Aarts is a member of the WEF and a member of the WEF’s Future Council on Food Security and Agriculture. In 2015, Protix was one of the recipients of the WEF’s “Technology Pioneer” award, for its work in agrifood technologies.
A 2019 paper by the WEF, “Alternative Proteins,” published as part of the “Meat: the Future” series, says such proteins can meet “the nutritional needs and food demands of a predicted mid‑century population of 10 billion, in a healthy and sustainable manner.”
“The benefits of these products is not sufficient for consumers to adopt them,” the report states. “A much wider set of interventions will be required to accelerate uptake,” including the development of “narratives.”
The report also notes that “it is unlikely that alternative proteins will achieve scale unless use is made of the production and marketing expertise of the traditional protein sector.”
The WEF stated “We need to fundamentally transform our food systems to provide all humanity with affordable, nutritious and healthy food within the limits of nature by 2030,” in accordance with the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Stillwagon said that organizations like the WEF and the World Health Organization (WHO) will seek to sway public opinion in favor of insect consumption.
“The possibility exists for the WHO to declare a climate emergency over this, and force countries to change food production. They will show that insects have been consumed by many cultures in various parts of the world for centuries, opening the door for cultural acceptance in the U.S.,” he said.
“Overcoming the ‘yuck’ factor is a significant challenge, which is why I think a declaration of a climate emergency and promoting the idea that ‘it’s for the common good” will be necessary,” Stillwagon added.
According to van Hamelen, Dutch state entities, including Dutch public investment fund Invest-NL, have invested in Protix, despite official denials from the Dutch government.
The European Circular Bioeconomy Fund, funded by the EU’s European Investment Bank, and firms connected to Belgium (10.3%), Luxembourg (1.0%) and Monaco (via Monaco Asset Management), are also investors in Protix, van Hamelen said.
A 2021 memorandum of understanding between the Dutch government and the WEF, representative of close ties between the two, foresees the development of a “food innovation hub” in The Netherlands, with agrifood as one of its focus areas.
Last year, Dutch farmers protested government plans to “drastically” reduce nitrogen pollution from livestock farming by buying out or otherwise expropriating farmland.
Michael Nevradakis, Ph.D., based in Athens, Greece, is a senior reporter for The Defender and part of the rotation of hosts for CHD.TV’s “Good Morning CHD.”
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.
October 26, 2023
Posted by aletho |
Environmentalism, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity | European Union, UK, United States, WEF |
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Just Stop Oil funder Dale Vince is pressing ahead with plans to flood British primary schools with environmental and Net Zero societal propaganda. Children aged 11 and under are being taught that they face an unprecedented global climate emergency, with the possibility that the planet is entering a sixth mass extinction. The solution of course is “sustainability” and green energy, a matter that is dear to the heart of multi-millionaire Vince. His ageing onshore wind farm company Ecotricity has collected £110 million in green taxpayer subsidies over the last 20 years, at a time when he has pocketed at least £43 million in various corporate payments.
The Ministry of Eco Education (MEE) was started by Vince in 2021 with the stated aim of “greening up the curriculum”. From an initial base of 15 ‘pioneer’ schools, it is working to scale this up to 1,000. MEE operates by inserting its messaging into all aspects of primary learning including transport, energy, food, nature and society. It aims to “save teachers time”, and it claims to have “rearranged the national curriculum” around what it describes as big questions. MEE also claims to be working with secondary schools to adapt its primary approach to Key Stage 3.
Although few lesson examples are available on the MEE website, it is easy to piece together some of the ideas being taught. A lesson on veganism notes that industrial farming has negative impacts on the planet, but apparently “isn’t just about food”. Most of the sources quoted are little more than promotions for veganism with a link to a Guardian article explaining why vegans don’t eat honey. There does not appear to be any discussion about the wisdom of removing all types of animal protein from the diets of very young children, something that many scientists think should be done only under strict nutritional supervision.
The education leader of MEE is Paul Turner and a video is supplied of him talking to a group of young children in the Ecotricity tent at the Womad festival. Bouncing around a giant globe, he explains that the correct level of carbon dioxide in the planet is the ‘magic’ number of 360 parts per million (ppm). Quite how he is able to point to such a precise – if magical – figure to stop the climate changing is not explained. There are many eminent scientists who think it is a little on the low side for animal and plant life to prosper. Certainly, the children are not told the dinosaurs lived in a world of plant plenty at a time when CO2 levels were much higher. Turner, who is described by MEE as a “radical geographer”, tells the children that we need to “hoover” up all the gas, and on this front Dale is making a contribution.
In fact the current level of CO2 is around 420 ppm and recent increases are believed to have led to a dramatic 14% greening of the planet. Hoover up all this extra CO2 and veganism starts to seem an ‘unsustainable’ option. Remove nitrogen fertiliser from agriculture as many eco-extremists want and the consequent massive reduction in crop yields starts to look like mass famine.
But then it isn’t just about the planet is it? In a paper published by MEE titled ‘Foundations for an Eco Curriculum’, it is said that “we are increasingly recognising that any efforts to tackle climate and ecological emergency must also respond to the structural inequalities inherent in society”. Furthermore, “any eco school curriculum must explore ideas of social structures and processes as much as they do the natural environment, as well as exploring the intersection of ideas such as gender, race and inequality. From a young age, children are aware of injustice and can apply ideas of fairness and the environment.”
In other words, children can be caught young and brainwashed with horrific, largely unsubstantiated tales of climate and ecological collapse – a process they have no intellectual ability to question – and be marched towards a collectivist society where ruling elites remove many personal freedoms and lifestyle choices. Oh, and energy can be provided by useless windmills requiring enormous public subsidies by enlightened philanthropists such as Mr. D. Vince.
Needless to say, MEE is not the only green educational propogandist operating in the U.K. As the Daily Sceptic reported earlier this year, other elite money is pouring into British schools. London-based Climate Science aims to supply free teaching materials, with children encouraged to plot implausible temperatures rises of 11°C, taught that alkaline oceans are ‘acidic’ and write letters to policymakers claiming “our house is on fire” in the style of Greta Thunberg. Among the billionaire backers are Schmidt Futures – the family foundation of former Google boss Eric Schmidt – and the Grantham Institute at Imperial, partly funded by green billionaire investor Jeremy Grantham.
MEE is also involved with the Young Green Briton Challenge, which has also attracted the ambassadorial support of TV activist Chris Packham. The new scheme operates on a Dragons’s Den format with 16 schools competing to win a £1,000 stake for a green project. Recently, Packham gave his backing to eco-protesters breaking the law and suggested that a “radical flank” could attempt to blow up oil refineries. For his part, Vince has given hundreds of thousands of pounds to Just Stop Oil, a group that engages in civil disobedience and criminal damage.
October 25, 2023
Posted by aletho |
Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity | UK |
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MP Leslyn Lewis (Haldimand-Norfolk) speaks at Save our Charities Rally on Parliament Hill, Ottawa, Nov. 24, 2021
OTTAWA, Ontario –– Conservative Party of Canada MP Leslyn Lewis has endorsed an official House of Commons petition demanding the nation’s federal government “urgently” withdraw from the United Nations and its subgroup, the World Health Organization (WHO), due to the organizations’ undermining of national “sovereignty” and the “personal autonomy” of citizens.
“We, the undersigned, Citizens and Residents of Canada, call upon the House of Commons in Parliament assembled to Urgently implement Canada’s expeditious withdrawal from the U.N. and all of its subsidiary organizations, including WHO,” reads the petition, which was initiated by Doug Porter from Burnaby, British Columbia, and then endorsed by Lewis.
As of press time, the petition, which was opened on October 10, has just over 36,000 signatures. It will remain open for signing until February 7, 2024.
The petition states that Canada’s current membership in the UN along with the WHO has resulted in “negative consequences on the people of Canada,” which far outweigh “any benefits.”
Additionally, the petition reads that the UN’s “Agenda 2030″ undermines “national sovereignty and personal autonomy.”
Many of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s federal government goals, notably its environmental ones, are in lockstep with the United Nations’ “2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.”
Agenda 2030 is a plan that was adopted by the UN General Assembly in 2015, and through its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), seeks to “transform our world for the better,” by “taking urgent action on climate change,” as well as “support[ing] the research and development of vaccines and medicines.” Some of the 17 goals also seek to expand “reproductive” services, including contraception and abortion, across the world in the name of women’s rights.
According to the UN, “all” nations working on the program “will implement this plan.”
Part of the plan includes phasing out coal-fired power plants, reducing fertilizer usage, and curbing natural gas use over the coming decades. Canada is one of the world’s largest oil and gas producers, however, Trudeau has made it one of his goals to decimate the industry.
In a blow to the globalist UN agenda, however, Canada’s oil and gas sector recently scored a huge win after the Supreme Court of Canada declared Trudeau’s government’s Impact Assessment Act, dubbed the “no-more pipelines” bill, is mostly “unconstitutional.”
As for Lewis, she is pro-life and has consistently called out the Trudeau government for pushing a globalist, anti-life agenda on Canadians.
Early this year Lewis noted that the World Economic Forum (WEF) is “not our government” and that Canadians did not “sign up” to be attached to one of its charters. Lewis herself helped expose Canadians to the fact that Trudeau’s Liberal government signed onto the WEF charter in 2020.
Petitions to Canada’s House of Commons can be started by anyone but must have the support of five Canadian citizens or residents, along with the support of a sitting MP.
Once a petition has over 500 verified signatures, it is presented to the House of Commons, where it awaits an official government response.
Petition calls out UN’s sex-ed programs, saying Canadians did not vote for these to be pushed on kids
The Lewis-backed petition states that Canada should have nothing to do with the UN’s sexual education programs as they have been pushed on the populace without the “consent” of the people.
The petition reads that Agenda 2030’s SDGs, as well as its “Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE)” program, its UN Judicial Review, and its International Health Regulations (IHR) are being “rapidly implemented,” with the absent awareness and “consent of the People or their elected representatives.”
The petition reads that SDGs have “negative impacts on potentially every aspect of life,” in Canada, including “religious and cultural values, familial relations, education, nutrition, child development, property rights, economic and agricultural productivity, transportation, travel, health, informed consent, privacy and physical autonomy.”
When it comes to the UN’s CSE, the petition states that publicly funded educational institutions have been “damaging children while concealing information from parents.”
As a result, the CSE’s “normalization” of “sexual values and activities with regard to children are endorsed and enforced, beginning at birth.”
As for the WHO, it claims that the CSE gives kids “accurate, age-appropriate information,” however it then says sexual education should start at the age of 5 as per UN guidelines.
“Learning is incremental; what is taught at the earliest ages is very different from what is taught during puberty and adolescence,” reads the CSE.
A report which was published by the UN’s Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, in collaboration with the WHO, told kids aged 5 to 8 that “people can show love for other people through touching and intimacy.”
UN’s health regulations look to violate Canadians’ charter rights, says petition
The petition notes that when it comes to Agenda 2030, many amendments to the International Health Regulations (IHR) were “secretly negotiated,” which as a result means they could “impose unacceptable, intrusive universal surveillance, violating the rights and freedoms guaranteed in the Canadian Bill of Rights and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.”
Lastly, the petition states that the UN’s goals intend to impose “sweeping impacts on public and private life,” and only “serve the interests of UN/WHO and unelected private entities (e.g. World Economic Forum, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, International Planned Parenthood Federation, etc.), while diminishing the health rights and freedom of Canadians.”
The WHO says that the IHR is a legally binding international body to which all UN members are committed to.
Lewis has before blasted Canada’s involvement with the IHR and insisted last year that the Canadian government “defend our healthcare sovereignty” and vote against proposed U.S. amendments to the the IHR.
The WHO’s IHR provides an “overarching legal framework that defines countries’ rights and obligations in handling public health events and emergencies that have the potential to cross borders.”
“The IHR are an instrument of international law that is legally-binding on 196 countries, including the 194 WHO Member States,” notes the WHO.
So far this year, there have been more than 300 proposed amendments to the IHR when it comes to the declaration of a Public Health Emergency of International Concern.
Lewis recently called out the proposed amendments, saying that if enacted it would negatively affect how Canada deals with any future health crisis.
On September 26, she presented to the House of Commons a petition specific to the IHR, which called for “urgent” debates on the amendments.
Critics have sounded the alarm over the Trudeau government’s involvement in the WEF and other globalist groups, pointing to the socialist nature of the “Great Reset” agenda and its similarities to Communist China’s totalitarian Social Credit System.
Lewis in June of this year had asked for a full disclosure of all “contracts, transfer payments, memoranda of understanding, letters of intent, charters, accords, projects and associations between the government and the WEF since November 4, 2015.”
The outcomes from the Order Paper resulted in a 127-page response that was tabled in the House of Commons on September 18.
Lewis has in the past blasted the WEF and its Known Traveller Digital Identification (KTDI) programs as “glitching failures.”
October 22, 2023
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity | Canada, Human rights, IHR, United Nations, WHO |
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It’s all a big ‘conspiracy theory’ that by 2050 we shall be living in mud and grass huts, eating a meat-free diet and giving up most forms of personal transport. Maybe we might not believe it if global elites stopped writing copious reports detailing all these lifestyle changes, which are said to be needed to move to Net Zero. The latest such report comes from the United Nations, which sets out a collectivist global vision of primary building materials consisting of mud bricks, bamboo and forest “detritus”.
According to the UN, the world needs to move to “regenerative material practices” using “ethically produced” low carbon earth and bio-based building materials. Examples include mud bricks, timber, bamboo and agricultural and forest detritus. The report harks back to the middle of the last century when the vast majority of cultures built large buildings and cities out of indigenous earthen, stone and bio-based materials, including timber, cane, thatch and bamboo. Contrasting modern concrete, steel and glass buildings, it observes that “massive mud buildings have been maintained for centuries with their structures intact”.
The UN’s recently published report, ‘Building Materials and the Climate: Constructing a New Future,’ draws on a wide variety of international authors. Heavily involved are Yale University and the Global Alliance for Buildings and Construction, the latter operation drawing financial support from the green activist Laudes Foundation and the British Government. The report is one of a number that have appeared recently that have started to lay out the hard changes that will need to be made in less than 30 years if 80% of the world energy produced by fossil fuel is banned under Net Zero. The construction sector is said to account for 37% of human-caused emissions of gases such as carbon dioxide. Making progress on reducing this will require drastic measures with the report stating that materials such as concrete, steel and aluminium will be used only when “absolutely necessary”.
War on modern building materials has also been declared by U.K. FIRES, an academic collaboration funded with a £5 million state grant. It has called for a ruthless purge of traditional building supplies, to be replaced with materials such as “rammed earth”. In other reports, U.K. FIRES promotes a world with no flying and shipping by 2050, drastic cuts in home heating and bans on beef and lamb consumption. As we have noted in the Daily Sceptic, U.K. FIRES bases its recommendations on the brutal, and many would argue honest reality of Net Zero. It does not assume that technological processes still to be perfected, or even invented, will somehow lead to minimal disturbance in comfortable industrialised lifestyles.
The latest UN report, along with U.K. FIRES, gives a valuable insight into the fantasy thinking surrounding the belief that oil and gas can be removed from industrial society. Clever people can often be very stupid, especially when group-think takes hold and ‘high status’ opinions – in this case surrounding environmentalism – are required to join the club. Net Zero mandates the dismantling of modern industrial society and the discarding of many of the essentials of modern comfortable living. Using flawed, unproven science, these high-status elites have convinced themselves that the climate is collapsing. Those who know their religious history observe doomsday cults emerging in every era, demanding sins should be purged, and human pleasures placed on strict, supervised ration.
It will hardly be a surprise that the UN buildings report is riven with demands for legislative action and the use of other people’s money to enforce its crackpot schemes. Government “incentives, awareness campaigns and legal and regulatory frameworks” are said to have been effective in previous recycling schemes. “Recycling systems for building materials tend to require similar kinds of support across countries,” the report states. It need hardly be noted that “far more investment” is required for measures that ensure cooperation across sectors and borders. Due to the complexity of what is being proposed, “regulation and synergistic enforcement is required across all phases of the building life cycle, from extraction through to end-of-use.”
Needless to say, when re-ordering the lifestyles of eight billion people around the world, it is important to tackle gender bias wherever it is found – in this case, “formal and informal building sectors.” Gender bias is said to be prevalent across the building trade and in emerging economies. Government programmes (quelle surprise) and policies are needed to expand women’s access to new technologies, marketing information and training to sustain their participation on the ground, the report states.
The biggest muddle however arises from the use of sustainable materials, most of which are grown in the ground. That would be the planned agriculture sector that another elite body is busy arguing should be cut back for re-wilding, another group of elite idiots arguing for nitrogen fertiliser to be banned leading to a 50% reduction in crop growth, another bunch of bright sparks demanding more land for bio-fuels and plant-based diets… to be continued.
Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.
October 14, 2023
Posted by aletho |
Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity, Timeless or most popular | Human rights, UK, United Nations |
1 Comment
Well well well
Suddenly out of nowhere the population and politicians of Wales are shocked that a 20mph speed limit has been imposed across much of the country.
In fact it has been in the making for many years, since at least 2010, when the UN’s little-known Economic Commission in Europe (UNECE) held a workshop to ‘raise awareness about the important challenges that climate change impacts and adaptation requirements present for international transport networks . . . The workshop highlighted that while transport is responsible for greenhouse gas emissions it is, at the same time, heavily affected by the impacts of climate change. This workshop demonstrated the urgent need to prepare appropriate policy actions.’
In Wales it has been discussed since at least 2020 with a survey of 1,002 people which has been used to justify the policy.
The report begins: ‘The Welsh Government plans to introduce legislation in 2023 which will reduce the speed limit from 30 mph to 20 mph in residential communities across Wales.’
In July 2021 a public consultation was launched. Just over 6,000 responses were received, with 47 per cent in favour of reducing the speed limit and 53 per cent against it. Feedback from a number of organisations in Wales was submitted, with 22 out of the 25 supporting the proposed reduction in speed limit. Notice the big difference in attitude between the response from individuals and the organisations? What were these organisations? What were the responses for and against given by individuals? We don’t know.
The legislation was voted through in the Welsh Assembly/Senedd in July 2022. A Welsh Government press release trumpeted: ‘Wales becomes the first UK nation to make the move – helping to save lives, develop safer communities, improve the quality of life and encourage more people to make more sustainable and active travel choices.’ https://www.gov.wales/uk-first-welsh-senedd-gives-green-light-20mph-legislation
So were the politicians who now oppose the legislation asleep? Absent? Not paying attention? Not interested? Happy with it until the recent furore and uproar kicked off? My guess is the latter.
But there is more to it than simply the Welsh Assembly/Senedd introducing the policy. The question to ask is ‘Why are Wales and many other countries introducing a policy being pushed by the UN’s World Health Organization backed by various NGOs?’
Yes, the very same WHO trying to push through the pandemic treaties and the very same NGOs behind a lot of the turmoil in recent years. Here is the WHO’s low speed campaign launch.
To be able to see the bigger picture and not the Wales-centric small picture here is a link that show the web between the UNECE (United Nations Economic Council in Europe), the EU and the UK.
There are many, many more documents on the same lines. They explain HS2, SMART motorways, ANPR cameras everywhere, 20 mph speed limits and road pricing, which is mentioned frequently. Like many other policies – 15-minute cities, low traffic neighbourhoods, low emission zones, electric vehicles, renewable energy, man-made global climate change, Covid, to name a few – it’s all one big circle of politicians, civil servants, activists and the media all quoting each other.
Everything seems to be an integral part of the sustainable development and Great Reset agendas.
Surprised?
I’m not any more now I can see the Big Picture and where it leads.
It’s like one big Gordian Knot of intertwined policies that are designed to ensnare and enslave us while proclaiming it will enhance our physical and mental wellbeing, make us safer, happier, healthier and so on and on and on.
Alexander the Great solved his Gordian Knot dilemma – he chopped it in half with a sword. Time for us to do something similar to all these intertwined polices getting closer.
My substack posts on the subjects are here, here and here.
October 14, 2023
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity | Human rights, UK |
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There’s some more footage of the Luton fire, which gives a much clearer idea of just how big and explosive it was:
https://twitter.com/BabylonBulletin/status/1711879370741067949
https://twitter.com/FanHubHatter/status/1712043494598902266
https://twitter.com/omario_omari/status/1711865889295937959
https://twitter.com/CHSandhu886/status/1711875340614644195
It has been claimed by the Fire Service that the fire started on a Range Rover diesel, but experts are dismissive of this.
For instance, AA technical expert Greg Carter said the most common cause of car fires is an electrical fault with the 12-volt battery system. But he added that diesel is “much less flammable” than petrol and in a car it takes “intense pressure or sustained flame” to ignite diesel.
Regardless of the initial cause, it is difficult to see how the fire could have spread so rapidly without EVs being involved. According to Andy Hopkinson of the Bedfordshire Fire Service, within ten minutes, the fire had already spread across a “large number of vehicles and a number of floors”.
Can anyone honestly remember such a fire in a multi-storey car park before?
We should not regard it as a coincidence that Sydney Airport had its own electric car fire in its car park just a month ago:
9news.com
We’ll have to wait for the facts to emerge in due course to find out what caused the fire in the first place.
But the explosions reported, the collapse of the floor and the speed at which the fire spread certainly raise the suspicion that one or more EVs were involved.
Even if not, we do know that a car park full of EVs, which will be the case in a few short years time, would be lethal in the event of a fire.
Just imagine an underground car park beneath a block of flats.
Until the full facts emerge, EVs should be banned immediately from all multi-storey car parks.
October 14, 2023
Posted by aletho |
Economics, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity, Timeless or most popular, Video | UK |
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The penny is finally starting to drop. Current batteries cannot possibly store more than a fraction of the energy needed to keep the lights on when the wind stops blowing and the sun doesn’t shine. The learned U.K. Royal Society has recently analysed 37 years of wind patterns across Britain and concluded there is a serious underestimate of the amount of storage required. Around 50 academics and specialists led by Professor Sir Chris Llewellyn Smith of Oxford University state clearly that batteries are not the answer to the vast storage required. But like many learned people, wedded to the idea that it is possible to remove the fossil fuel source supplying 80% of the world needs in less than 30 years, they fall down at the practical level. Having lost batteries, the study goes for hydrogen, an idea only slightly less dumb than digging up the planet to produce vast quantities of limited-life batteries.
The Royal Society report envisages dissolving huge salt caverns capable of storing ‘green’ hydrogen. To keep the electricity grid functioning when renewables go off line, around two to three million tons of hydrogen would need to be stored for decades at a time. Wind not only stops for days during periods of intense cold in winter, but the Royal Society found recent periods when speeds were low for a number of years. Salt caverns are only available in a limited number of places in Britain, so a huge network of specialist pipelines would be needed to move the gas to turbines on constant standby. Over a period of time, hydrogen would leak from porous salt caverns.
The report, lacking a practical answer to wind and solar intermittency, seems to have been ignored by mainstream media. The news that batteries cannot play any significant part in the collectivist Net Zero project is unwelcome to those who have been betting the ranch on this solution for many years. Francis Menton of the Manhattan Contrarian sees the report as an “enormous improvement” on every other effort on the subject of large scale energy storage systems. But in the end, the authors’ “quasi-religious commitment” to a fossil-free future leads them to minimise and divert attention away from critical cost and feasibility issues. “As a result, the report, despite containing much valuable information, is actually useless for any public policy purpose,” he concludes.
What are the problems with hydrogen? Where to start. It is a highly explosive and flammable gas that needs careful handing. Its molecules are small and it has a low density. This means it escapes easily, while three times the volume of hydrogen is required to produce the same energy as natural gas. Kathryn Porter is an energy consultant and an associate member of the All-Party Parliamentary Group. She recently wrote an article in the Daily Telegraph about the gas and its possible role in Net Zero.
Hydrogen is also hard to move around. To get the gas to move through pipes, it has to be compressed and pushed along using compressors. This process requires energy: the losses in moving hydrogen through pipes are ten times greater for hydrogen than for methane; up to 30%. In other words you need to use up almost a third of your gas just moving it from A to B. …
The infrastructure for hydrogen does not exist, neither for the most part do the production facilities and they will cost billions to build. Then the underlying cost of storing hydrogen is probably at least four times that of storing methane. Huge amounts of energy are lost in each stage of the process due to the fundamental properties of hydrogen.
As a solution to storing renewable power, Porter is of the view that “hydrogen is one of the worst substances you could choose for this purpose”. But, she adds, because you can burn it in air without creating carbon dioxide, “it has been hailed as the answer to Net Zero dreams”. Both carbon capture and hydrogen are “square pegs” which people are desperately trying to force into round holes. It might be noted, in the light of this last comment from Porter, that the Royal Society traces its roots back to 1660, and published Sir Isaac Newton’s Principia Mathematica. Its politicised track record on Net Zero has yet to live up to the highlights of its glorious past.
Lead author Sir Chris Llewellyn Smith notes that the need for long-term energy storage in a renewable electricity system has been seriously underestimated, and work on constructing storage caverns needs to be started immediately if the Government is to have any chance of meeting its Net Zero targets. Construction of a large green hydrogen production and storage facility would appear to be a “no-regrets” option, he claims.
Someone regretting the option might be the consumer. Francis Menton observes that the Royal Society’s hydrogen plans suggest a cost “to the grid” of around £120 per MWh, a figure described as high but not stratospheric. But this is the wholesale cost, not the one charged to the consumer. In addition, Menton wants to know how much a nationwide set of new pipes will cost, plus the entire new fleet of standby turbines capable of burning 100% hydrogen and providing all the power to the grid when renewables stop working. In addition, Menton notes a “low” rate of interest for capital costs of 5%.
“The whole thing just cries out for a demonstration project to prove feasibility and cost. I’m betting that will never occur before the whole Net Zero thing falls apart from the disastrous skyrocketing electricity prices,” concludes Menton.
Menton sees some honesty in the Royal Society report. But as regular readers will probably agree, the top award for an honest Net Zero commentary goes to the U.K. Government-funded U.K. FIRES project. In looking at a 2050 Net Zero world, this group of academics ignore as speculative all non-scalable suggestions around carbon capture and hydrogen, along with all the green inventions yet to be made. They point to a future with barely a quarter of our current energy supply. There is nothing more honest than telling people that this will entail no flying or shipping, drastic cuts in home heating, limited transport, no meat, few modern building materials and houses made of “impacted” earth. Worryingly, though, there’s no indication the authors see this as a reason not to go full steam ahead.
Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.
October 4, 2023
Posted by aletho |
Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity | UK |
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Something strange happened last week: the Guardian published an article which was worth reading. It concerned the massive insurance costs owners of electric vehicles (EVs) are facing.
Here’s how the article started: ‘Driving an electric car should be a win-win, saving money and the planet. So David was shocked when the insurance on his Tesla Model Y came up for renewal, and Aviva refused to cover him again, while several other brands turned him away. When David did secure a new deal, the annual cost rocketed from £1,200 to more than £5,000.’
It went on: ‘A recent cost of living bulletin from the Office for National Statistics revealed that the price of car insurance – which for many Britons is one of their biggest household bills – is up by 52.9 per cent in the last 12 months. However, this average masks bigger increases for electric car owners, according to Confused.com. Its figures, derived from quotes, show that insurance premiums for electric vehicles are 72 per cent – or £402 – higher than this time last year, at a typical £959. Meanwhile, for petrol and diesel car drivers, the increase is 29 per cent, or £192, taking the figure to £848.’
Moreover, several insurance companies are simply refusing to insure EVs.
The problem seems to be the fragility of EV batteries and the enormous cost of replacing them if you have even just a small bump. As one reader explained:‘If I kerb bump my £4,000 diesel Renault Megane at 4mph it’s a £50 wheel re-alignment at the next service. If a £50,000 EV does the same, it’s potentially a slightly damaged battery and 100 per cent write off. They’re rubbish’.
You might think: ‘Why should I care since I don’t drive an EV?’ Well, when the politicians see that high insurance costs are putting people off buying the EV which they are determined to push on us, they’ll yet again attack petrol and diesel car owners.
A few years ago the EU insisted that young male drivers could not be charged higher car insurance premiums than young female drivers, notwithstanding the major difference in risk. The European Court of Justice ruled that taking gender into account when calculating car insurance premiums violated EU gender equality legislation. Regulations banning the practice came into effect in December 2012 and remain in force in the UK although we’ve since left the EU.
I predict that charging EV drivers more than ICE (Internal Combustion Engine) drivers, will also be outlawed. So there will be a massive rise in motor insurance costs for drivers of ICE cars. Maybe our rulers will even decide that, as EV drivers are dutifully (and expensively) saving the planet while ICE drivers are supposedly intent on destroying it, perhaps EV drivers may be relieved of paying more than a small nominal charge for insurance and therefore must be subsidised almost entirely by ICE drivers. I’m not betting against it.
October 4, 2023
Posted by aletho |
Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity | European Union, UK |
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Campaign group Net Zero Watch has condemned Government plans to move renewables levies onto gas users.
Speaking at the Conservative Party conference in Manchester, energy minister Lord Callanan announced a consultation on what he euphemistically called ‘rebalancing’, forcing gas users to pay part of the cost of the UK’s grossly inefficient renewables. The Government hopes that this will make heat pumps and other electric technologies more viable.
Net Zero Watch director Andrew Montford said:
“Trying to force up gas bills at a time when people are already struggling to heat their homes is shameful. It will cause a public health crisis. Callanan is utterly callous, but climate extremists only care about their targets, and not whether Granny is going to freeze to death in winter.”
Mr Montford says that it is not clear that moving the levies, running at around £7 billion per year, will be enough to make heat pumps viable, and secondly because if it is, it can only temporarily hide the costs: if gas boilers become a thing of the past, the cost of the levies will have to return to electricity users.
Net Zero Watch energy director Dr John Constable said:
“Using heat pumps in a wind and solar powered grid is going to be expensive; putting a surcharge on gas to deny people a cheaper and reasonably clean alternative is cruel.”
And Mr Montford warned:
“Rishi Sunak has said that successive Governments have deceived people over the cost of Net Zero, but here is the Green Blob in his own party – one of his own ministers no less – launching a shameless confidence trick on the public at large. How can the Prime Minister let them get away with it?”
The plan has been on the agenda since Boris Johnson’s time in Number 10. Net Zero Watch has repeatedly warned of the disastrous impact of moving green levies to gas bills.
Deaths from cold in winter far outnumber deaths from heat in summer, and fuel poverty is a significant contributory factor. Moving green levies to gas bills will therefore exacerbate a problem that is already serious.
October 4, 2023
Posted by aletho |
Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity | UK |
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Further devastating evidence of the toll that onshore wind turbines take on local eagle populations has emerged in Tasmania. The local Wedge-tailed eagle is thought to be down to just 1,000 individuals, but over the last 12 years at least 270 birds have been killed or injured in the vicinity of wind farms. According to a recent paper in Australian Field Ornithology, a further 49 vulnerable White-bellied sea eagles have also been killed in this period.
The scale of depredation is shocking but it could be much worse than reported. According to author Gregory Pullen, information about eagle deaths is not readily available, “nor readily made available”. His calculations arise from a number of primary sources including annual reports. He suggests that unrecorded casualties are higher since most are recorded anecdotally and are not the result of systematic survey. The Tasmanian sub-species of the Wedge-tailed eagle is listed as endangered under both federal and state threatened species legislation.
Large birds of prey such as eagles are at particular risk from giant wind turbine blades revolving at speed since they rely on air currents for sustained flight. The Daily Sceptic has covered this developing story, noting that few activists, bird conservation groups and writers seem able to rouse themselves to complain when the natural flight path of raptors stands in the way of green progress. The Australian climate journalist Jo Nova has stood out from the unquestioning crowd, noting that in Tasmania the greens are destroying nature – again. “It’s not about the environment is it,” she said. She went on to add that there are plans to build up to 10 wind turbine parks across Tasmania – “and if one tower misses, the next will get them”.
It’s not really about the environment over in California either, where America’s national bird, the bald eagle, and many other raptors face mass slaughter in the local wind farm avian graveyards. This follows the state Democrat-controlled legislature’s recent decision to relax controls on wildlife protections to allow permits to kill previously fully protected species for renewable energy and infrastructure projects. However, evidence continues to emerge that the slaughter has been going on for years. Last year, NextEra, one of America’s largest utility companies, was fined $8 million after 150 eagles were killed at its wind farms across eight states. According to the Golden Gate Audubon Society, a wind farm complex in Altamont has been killing 75-100 golden eagles every year since the 1980s.
The animal slaughter does not stop at large birds of course. A number of scientific studies have point to the destruction of millions of bats and smaller birds every year by turbine blades capable of travelling at the tip at speeds approaching 150mph.
Alas, it is not as if the deaths of these wildlife green martyrs are helping to produce much worthwhile economic activity. In the U.K., the small number of jobs being produced by green technologies is starting to be noticed. Gary Smith, the leader of Britain’s largest trade union, recently said that communities along the North Sea can see wind farms, “but they can’t point to the jobs”. Possibly exaggerating to make his point, he added that much of the green work seems to be either London-based lobbying or clearing away the animal casualties of wind farm blades. “It’s usually a man in a rowing boat, sweeping up the dead birds,” he observed.
Green activists are increasingly being caught between a rock and a hard place on these impact issues. It is becoming obvious that many of the green technology solutions proposed to replace fossil fuels come with heavy environmental costs. Whether it be open cobalt mining with child labour, or digging up vast quantities of the Earth’s crust to help construct second-rate solutions such as windmills, the terrible impact is all too obvious. At the moment the typical stance seems to be that voiced by Audubon California Policy Director Mark Lynas, who said we need renewable energy resources, and he did not want to see the eagle deaths “being used to push against clean energy”.
Another area where ecology fights are breaking out is on the east coast of America, where whales are beaching on the shores of New Jersey and New York in alarming numbers. In the first half of this year over 40 whales have died in this way. Large areas of the local ocean are being turned into industrial wind parks, with particular concern arising over 24-hour sonar soundings. The veteran environment campaigner Michael Shellenberger has said the massive offshore works are wreaking environmental damage in previously pristine waters. “It’s the biggest environmental scandal in the world,” he charges.
The waters off the U.S. east coast are important feeding and breeding grounds for large mammals such as whales and dolphins, including the rare North Atlantic right whale. Shellenberger has recently produced a documentary called Thrown to the Wind which presents evidence of whales hit by ships, and high decibel sonar that is said to separate mothers from their calves, sending them into harm’s way. The film shows environmentalists checking the sonar which is said to measure 150 dBs at sea – equivalent to about 90 dBs on land. The noise is a relentless drum beat that is said to pound across the ocean throughout the day and night. On land, the sonar noise would be equivalent to a hairdryer. For humans, prolonged noise much above 70 dBs may start to damage hearing.
The film makes the point that serious pile-driving to secure the giant turbines to the sea floor has yet to start in earnest. Once built there is a danger that the huge back wash created by the giant blades will disturb and kill off plankton, destroying the food supply for the whales.
It must be noted that many interested parties dispute the claims currently being made about wildlife in the new oceanic industrial parks springing up with generous subsidies from the Biden Administration. Both sides can marshal their arguments and evidence. But at the moment, the deck is rigged in favour of the green lobby. Fracking for oil and gas was banned in the U.K. with Friends of the Earth presenting evidence of local earthquakes similar in force to someone falling off a chair. It is more than likely that multiple eagle deaths would be enough to stop the operation of any oil and gas installation. Seemingly, it will take more than a mere rowing boat full of protected but very dead birds to stop the new Green Barons.
Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.
October 1, 2023
Posted by aletho |
Environmentalism, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity | Australia, United States |
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