“A Global Digital Compact” – UN promoting censorship, social credit & much more
By Kit Knightly | OffGuardian | June 20, 2023
Late last month the office of the United Nation’s Secretary General published a policy document on aims for the future of the internet.
A follow-up to the 2021 report “Our Common Agenda”, the new report’s title says it all really, “A Global Digital Compact”. That’s the goal, international legislation that would seek to control and enforce the use of digital technology.
The proposed clauses promote everything you’d expect them to promote.
Digital identities linked with financial access:
Digital IDs linked with bank or mobile money accounts can improve the delivery of social protection coverage and serve to better reach eligible beneficiaries. Digital technologies may help to reduce leakage, errors and costs in the design of social protection programmes
Environmental or climate change-based social credit systems:
Sensors and monitors connected to the Internet of things, cloud-based data platforms, blockchain-enabled tracking systems and digital product passports unlock new capabilities for the measurement and tracking of environmental and social impacts across value chains.”
Public-Private Partnership:
Partnerships between States, private sector and civil society leverage the capacity of digital tools to provide solutions for development across the Sustainable Development Goals. Examples include the Digital Public Infrastructure Alliance, the Coalition for Digital Environmental Sustainability and public-private partnerships for disaster response.”
Countering online “harm”:
Disinformation, hate speech and malicious and criminal activity in cyberspace raise the risks and costs for everyone online […] we must strengthen accountability for harmful and malicious acts online.
Those are the obvious ones, there’s also more sneaky, insidious language regarding “equity” and “access”. The report is concerned there are many people in the world (mostly the developing world) who don’t have regular access to the Internet.
This concern would be more honestly expressed in the language of control – people who don’t consume digital media can’t be hypnotised, people who don’t communicate online can’t be censored, and people who don’t rely on digital banking can’t be controlled.
To sum up, the Digital Global Compact is a piece of globalist legislation serving the final aim of globalist policy: Control of all aspects of life, achieved by inserting a digital filter between people and reality.
Banking, communication, media consumption, shopping. Every interaction you have will be through a digital membrane which can both monitor your exchanges with the world and – if deemed necessary – deny you access to that world.
An interesting final point to note is the words the report doesn’t use. “Globalist” and “globalism” do not appear once, “vaccine passports” or “vaccine certificates” are likewise not mentioned. Neither are “social credit” or “central-bank digital currency”. They are discussed, but not mentioned.
They seem to be avoiding buzzwords they know will trigger resistance or set off alarm bells. Would they have done that before the skeptics started winning the Covid conversation? I don’t think so.
You don’t have to take my word for any of this, of course, you can read the whole report yourself.
There’s nothing surprising in there at all, obviously. But it’s definitely a “quiet part out loud moment”, and a link to send to those people who still dismiss you as a conspiracy theorist.
Switzerland Votes to Keep Covid Laws & Vaccine Passes
Also voted for the Climate Protection Act
NAKEDEMPEROR | JUNE 19, 2023
Often, the narrative put forth suggests that the restrictions and mandates related to Covid-19 were enforced upon citizens by their governments. This viewpoint could seemingly imply that if left to the discretion of the masses, these lockdowns, social distancing protocols, and mandatory vaccinations might never have seen the light of day.
However, one nation stands as a testament against this theory – a control country allowing us to examine the public sentiment more closely – Switzerland.
Switzerland distinguished itself as one of the few nations globally that entrusted its citizens with the power to vote on measures concerning Covid-19. The first referendum took place in June 2021. It was a time when only approximately a third of the populace was vaccinated, yet the poll results exhibited a significant majority support for the Covid laws with a staggering 60.2% favouring them.
Not long afterwards, in November 2021, Switzerland’s second referendum took place. This vote was particularly contentious as it encompassed an array of substantial measures like stricter restrictions, comprehensive contact tracing, and the issuance of vaccination certificates. Despite the divisive nature of these policies, an even greater number of people endorsed them, with a 62% majority, which interestingly, was also the fourth-highest voter turnout in Swiss history, standing at 65.7%.
Surely, in 2023, the outcome would be different? Nobody is talking about Covid anymore. With the global narrative having largely moved on from Covid, would the Swiss people continue to support these laws?
Yes they would and no, in 2023 the outcome is no different. Yesterday, a rare third referendum was held. At the end of 2022, the Swiss parliament decided to extend some aspects of the Covid laws, including the vaccine certificates, until summer 2024. The reason given was that a dangerous new Covid variant may emerge and the authorities would have to react quickly. Due to the extension, opponents of the policies obtained enough signatures to force a new referendum.
Despite the ongoing contention, a significant majority of 61.9% voted in favour of these laws.
59% of voters also agreed to pass a climate change law which aims to reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Opponents said the plan would drive up electricity use and prove too costly for consumers but authorities plan to incentivise households and businesses to be more climate-friendly.
It seems people never learn and Covid restrictions & vaccine passes could return tomorrow if a new health panic were to emerge.
Media Attacks Spotify For Allowing Robert F Kennedy Jr. Joe Rogan Episode
By Cindy Harper | Reclaim The Net | June 18, 2023
Spotify, the audio streaming giant, is once again in the crosshairs of media critics for allowing an episode of “The Joe Rogan Experience” that featured Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The episode is accused of spreading vaccine “misinformation” and “conspiracy theories” without sufficient censorship by the platform, and the media is questioning Spotify’s decision to host it.
Joe Rogan, a major podcasting force in the US, hosted the three-hour long show that touched on vaccine skepticism, 5G technology, and alternative COVID-19 treatments. This comes as part of a broader scrutiny from media outlets urging platforms to put a lid on content that challenges mainstream narratives and contradicts the stances of global health organizations.
Media outlets including Vice and The Verge point fingers at Robert F. Kennedy Jr., known for his criticism of vaccines and pharmaceutical companies, for allegedly making several false claims during the podcast. These include the claim linking vaccines to autism and an assertion regarding vaccines containing harmful forms of mercury. The media’s bone to pick with Spotify is its decision to not clamp down on Kennedy’s suggestion that “Wi-Fi radiation” could play a role in various chronic illnesses.
Peter Hotez, Baylor microbiology professor and public health advocate, threw the spotlight on the issue by sharing a critical article via Twitter. Not one to back down, Rogan threw down the gauntlet to Hotez for a debate with Kennedy, sweetening the pot with a $100,000 donation to charity if Hotez agreed. He didn’t.
Despite the uproar and calls for censorship, Spotify defended its position. A spokesperson from the company maintained that neither Rogan nor Kennedy crossed the line in terms of the platform’s policies.
Spotify’s history with attacks from the media is somewhat checkered. Flashback to early 2022, when artists including Neil Young and Joni Mitchell yanked their music from Spotify as a show of protest against Rogan’s questioning of Covid vaccine efficacy, including his statement that vaccines don’t halt infection spread.
The Great Debate that won’t happen
Kennedy vs. Hotez might be a narrative-changer.
BY BILL RICE, JR. | JUNE 18, 2023
In south Alabama we have an expression: “If you’re scared, say you’re scared.”
Well, Dr. Peter Hotez – one of the best-known vaccine advocates and defenders of all the Covid mitigation measures – is obviously scared to death. He just needs to come out and admit it.
What scares Dr. Hotez is an invitation for him (Hotez) to debate presidential candidate and contrarian Covid expert Robert Kennedy, Jr. on Joe Rogan’s ultra-popular podcast show.
Apparently, Hotez kept bad-mouthing “disinformation super-spreader” Kennedy and Rogan finally had enough.
Rogan offered to donate $100,000 to Hotez’s favorite charity if Hotez would just come on his show and, in a debate with no time-table, debate Kennedy on vaccine effectiveness, safety and all the other allegedly “settled” Covid science.
As I write, the debate invitation has gone viral on Twitter with plenty of other wealthy people (like Steve Kirsch) ponying up money to make the debate happen. At last look, Dr. Hotez could net $1.5 million for his favorite charity by simply talking to Kennedy and Rogan for two or so hours.
Talk about easy money.
Needless to say, Kennedy is game for a “cordial” debate and, needless to say, he doesn’t need to be bribed to participate. He’ll do it for free and pay his own expenses to show up in the studio.
Truth be told (there’s that word – “truth”) … Nobody is surprised that Dr. Hotez is running from a genuine debate on Covid topics. This is because no expert in America has participated in a genuine debate on Covid topics in 40 months.
Apparently, one new feature of our “New Normal” “scientific method” is that real debates are no longer necessary.
In fact, they are strongly discouraged, which is exactly why Facebook, Google, YouTube, the CDC, “Joe Biden’s” White House and the corporate press have been pushing for censorship on steroids for so long.
For those who haven’t picked up on this yet, censorship also precludes real debates.
Hotez and every “expert” and authority of his ilk has been saying for almost four years that people like Kennedy who are spreading “disinformation” and “misinformation” are potentially killing and harming massive numbers of people with their false Covid claims.
According to the experts, the claims made by Kennedy, Kirsch (and Bill Rice Jr.!) are ridiculous, preposterous, obviously false, easily discredited, etc.
Such claims are interesting as they suggest that any debate with a Covid skeptic would be a lay-up or gimme to win. Even a cave man could humiliate RFK, Jr. in a debate about real science.
So, if victory would be so easy – and if one can make a couple million for his favorite charity – why not do this?
Speaking for myself, I’m tired of acting like I’m obtuse when I’m not. We all know the answer: The Dr. Hotez’s of the world are scared to death of a real debate.
If this isn’t a giant “tell” about these frauds and charlatans nothing is.
Also, every one of them are pro-censorship.
Facebook has been censoring content left and right for three-plus years, but Hotez’s cabal of “influencers” are demanding that Congress and the White House make social media companies censor even more content/speech that they don’t like.
The entire justification for North Korea-style censorship is that the disinformation spreaders are harming people. Presumably, Hotez’s noble goal is to save lives and shut up all the “disinformation” spreaders.
Well, what would shut them up more than a pay-per-view prize fight between one of the leading advocates of the Status-Quo narrative and the best known Covid skeptic in the world?
Once Dr. Hotez wipes the floor with Kennedy, every other vaccine super spreader will crawl back into a cave and keep his mouth shut from here on out.
My side will be disgraced and humiliated … and every neutral person will now know this.
In one fell swoop, the “disinformation” movement will suffer a lethal blow. Millions of lives will be saved because, in the future, everyone will know that Dr. Peter Hotez and Dr. Anthony Fauci were exactly right with everything they said about Covid.
Not only will Kennedy lose this “science” debate, his hopes of pulling an upset and winning the White House will also go down the toilet.
Dr. Hotez would be THE hero to all the groups, companies and bureaucracies who are having nightmares about Kennedy beating their chosen candidate, “Joe Biden.”
Kennedy’s Children Health Defense non-profit, which has been growing by leaps and bounds, would wither up and die.
Everyone would know that not only did the Covid vaccines save millions of lives, they’d also know that the massive spike in autism cases in recent decades had nothing to do with vaccines and the flu vaccine – which is now being questioned by more and more Americans – would once again be perceived as a must-get annual shot.
Hotez could also put to bed the claim that his side is anti-free speech because they would be allowing Kennedy and Rogan to deploy their dad-blasted free speech in said “debate.”
“See, we are NOT censors and we do believe in free speech and genuine debates in our democracy,” Hotez could show the world in this debate.
For all these reasons, it would seem Dr. Hotez and his side would achieve a panoply of positive, life-saving results, with no down-side whatsoever.
The only downside might be if, Hotez, in fact got annihilated in this debate and every American who witnessed the event started questioning all the claims the experts had made in the last four years (or decades for that matter).
But this scenario can’t be a possibility because the science is so “settled” and Kennedy is such a “wacko” and conspiracy theorist that he would have no chance of prevailing in any debate … right?
Of course, we all know Dr. Hotez knows he’d get his ass whipped in any debate with Kennedy. Fauci knows this, The New York Times knows this, Bill Gates knows this, every commentator at MSNBC and CNN knows this.
“Whatever you do, do NOT debate Robert Kennedy on Covid topics!” they are all now screaming at Dr. Hotez.
If the debate is held, it will set Internet ratings records. The fact that Hotez is running from said debate is already giving another huge boost to the presidential campaign of RFK, Jr, who is having no trouble going around the MSM “gatekeepers of the news,” who all despise and fear him.
In fact, that’s another reason the debate can’t be allowed. It’s almost a given that RFK, Jr. would go off on the captured mainstream press in said debate.
Dr. Hotez would be the one defending the credibility of The New York Times and singing the praises of Big Pharma, which has of course always been as honest as the day is long.
If enough Americans keep calling Dr. Hotez a sissy, maybe this will goad the previously cocky doctor into taking the bait and actually debating Kennedy.
If so, this might qualify as a game-changer and give the world it’s very first honest discussion of Covid policies. It might also help elect a president who genuinely wants to dismantle the Military Industrial Complex and the Science/Medicine Industrial Complex.
But my bet is Dr. Hotez won’t debate.
There’s another expression we’ve all heard: “You can run, but you can’t hide.” Well, in our surreal New-Normal times, apparently the experts and authorities CAN run and they can hide. That’s what they’ve been doing for 40 months and, as far as I can tell, they are still in power. So that strategy is working perfectly.
What’s Wrong With This Study? CDC Finds COVID Shots ‘Safe and Effective’ for Kids Under 4
By Angelo DePalma, Ph.D. | The Defender | June 16, 2023
An analysis published earlier this month in Pediatrics concluded the COVID-19 mRNA vaccines are safe and effective in preschool-age children — a conclusion trumpeted by media outlets such as Parents and Medscape.
But the study, conducted by Kaiser Permanente researchers with funding from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), raises more questions than it answers.
Researchers followed children (mostly 4 years old or younger) who collectively received more than 245,000 doses of either the Pfizer or Moderna mRNA products and “found no indications of serious side effects,” according to a Kaiser Permanente news release.
Using a form of surveillance monitoring known as rapid cycle analysis, investigators performed weekly sequential analyses for 19 safety signals, including myocarditis, pericarditis, seizures, heart attack, Bell’s palsy, neurological inflammatory conditions, anaphylaxis and several others.
The study period was from June 2022 to March 2023.
Instead of using a comparable group of unvaccinated children as the control, the authors compared adverse events occurring 1-21 days after vaccination in one group, with outcomes among children in another group who had received the shot at some point between 22 and 42 days previously.
Time since inoculation was the only distinguishing feature, and the only factor that might account for inter-group differences.
The study, therefore, boils down to the question of whether children who received an mRNA shot about 10 days previously experienced more or fewer adverse events than children who received their jab about 32 days previously.
Data were mined from the Vaccine Safety Datalink (VSD), a repository of patient data from eight private healthcare systems, which included five Kaiser Permanente regions and three other large health entities.
Up to three doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech product were given to 135,000 children, ages 6 months to 5 years, while 112,000 children, ages 6 months to 6 years, got the Moderna gene therapy.
Subject demographics more or less reflected the populations served by these healthcare companies.
The authors wrote that their safety surveillance over nine months “did not detect a safety signal for any outcome during the 21 days after vaccination. Importantly, no cases of myocarditis or pericarditis occurred after vaccination.”
The accompanying press release framed the conclusion even more positively. According to corresponding author Dr. Nicola Klein:
“Parents can be assured that this large study found no serious side effects from the mRNA vaccines. … Parents can protect their young children from COVID-19 in the same way they vaccinate their children to protect from other serious childhood diseases.”
Perhaps anticipating the long list of questions regarding their work, the researchers discussed the potential limitations of their analysis, which they said included:
- Reduced statistical power, particularly for rare outcomes.
- Low vaccine uptake in the evaluated age group (“only” 24.7% of the eligible population received at least one shot).
- Surveillance did not include “all potential safety concerns.”
And the kicker:
“We may have underestimated or missed potential safety concerns if the biologically plausible risk interval for an outcome differed from our specified risk interval.”
Together, the choice of control group and the time period selected almost guaranteed “reduced statistical power,” particularly when comparing the two groups.
In a 2022 paper Klein noted reports from “worldwide” sources of myocarditis/pericarditis after mRNA COVID-19 treatments “especially among younger male persons [italics mine] 0 to 7 days after receiving dose 2.”
Although the incidence of heart inflammation was low in the 0-5 age group for the Pfizer product (14.4 per million doses, mostly after the second shot), the incidence of serious cardiac events rose markedly for older groups.
No data were available in the 2022 study for the Moderna shot.
For 18- to 29-year-old males — the youngest age group for which both Pfizer and Moderna data were available — Klein reported, based on VSD numbers, a cumulative myocarditis/pericarditis incidence of 135 cases per million for children who had received the two injections plus the booster.
For the Moderna product, the incidence was 185 per million. For females, the rates were about 10 per million for both mRNA shots.
Given the serious long-term consequences of heart inflammation, and its known occurrence among vaccinated teenagers and young adults, one wonders at the wisdom of giving mRNA shots to children who are even younger than those known to get sick from the treatments.
COVID-19 itself has been blamed for the rise in heart inflammation, but a search for data from very early in the pandemic, before this storyline emerged (possibly to hide the incidence of “vaccine” injuries), shows this to be a red herring.
A 2022 Italian study comparing myocarditis/pericarditis incidence pre- and post-COVID-19 reported that the annual incidence of myocarditis was significantly higher before the pandemic than during, with a rate of about 80 per million “pre” and 60 per million “during.”
The authors made a point to emphasize that “the incidence of myocarditis was significantly lower in COVID than in PRECOVID in the class of age 18-24 years” than for their general study population, which averaged 40 years of age.
The incidence of pericarditis was unchanged between the two time periods, at about 45 per million.
Comparing data from two far-flung studies should be undertaken with caution. However, the difference between a baseline of fewer than 60 cases per million for 18- to 24-year-old adults (the Italian study) and the 185 per million for “male persons” between 18 and 29 post-mRNA treatment (Klein et al.) clearly and inconveniently shatters the “safe and effective” narrative.
The lack of statistical power in Klein’s 2023 study, despite a very large “denominator” (total patients studied), is almost certainly due to the relatively small number of cases — which is exactly what one would expect when uncommon (but serious) side effects over such short time periods are compared.
True, this is an apples-to-apples comparison — but in this case, investigators pretty much used the exact same apples and reported their similarities as somehow noteworthy.
Klein’s data source(s) raise additional questions. Although the VSD is connected to the national Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), how much of her raw data came from VAERS and how much came from VSD is unclear.
Eleven of VSD’s 13 participating commercial and academic hubs are “data reporting sites” whose contributions presumably include vaccine side effect reports.
The concern here is about motives and incentives. VAERS data are based mainly on self-reporting and are known to be gross underestimates of the actual number of incidents.
By contrast, hospitals and healthcare systems, e.g. those participating in VSD, were robustly incentivized to promote and administer the COVID-19 shots.
Along those lines, note that one author “received funding from Janssen Vaccines and Prevention for a study unrelated to coronavirus disease 2019 vaccines.” And lead investigator Klein “received grants from Pfizer for coronavirus disease 2019 vaccine clinical trials and from Merck, GSK, and Sanofi Pasteur for study work unrelated to the current study work.”
The rationale for immunizing children against COVID-19 has been hotly debated since the shots were first available to older adults in late 2020.
But by the time these treatments were authorized for children, it was already clear that kids do not get very sick from COVID-19 and are not a significant source of infection, either for the community or for “grandma” in her rocking chair at home.
As of early 2021, with the huge wave of Delta-variant fatalities in freefall, the number of U.S. pediatric COVID-19 deaths reported by the CDC was close to zero, both in terms of absolute cases and as a percentage of all deaths.
Yet in her interview with her institution’s media department, lead author Klein said:
“Even as the COVID-19 emergency has ended, we know that the coronavirus poses a long-term, serious threat to all ages, including children. Vaccinating children against COVID-19 benefits them by reducing the burden of illness, avoiding spreading the virus to family and others, and mitigating the small but real risk of serious illness.”
Angelo DePalma, Ph.D., is a contributing editor for The Defender.
This article was originally published by The Defender — Children’s Health Defense’s News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Please consider subscribing to The Defender or donating to Children’s Health Defense.
Lab-Grown Meat Suffers Significant Setback With Shocking New Scientific Findings
BY CHRIS MORRISON | THE DAILY SCEPTIC | JUNE 18, 2023
Earlier this year, the Grocery Gazette reported that the UK was set to be a world-leading developer of lab-grown meat. In the recent past, Guardian climate hysteric George Monbiot claimed lab-grown food “will soon destroy farming – and save the planet”. Alas, such boosterism is being challenged by hard facts. Lab-grown meat is up to 25 times worse for the environment since it needs ‘pharmaceutical-grade’ production to make it fit for human consumption. In particular, there is a need to remove endotoxin from the cultured mix, a substance that in concentrations as low as one billionth of a gram per millilitrie can reduce human IVF pregnancy success rate by up to four fold.
These are the startling conclusions of ground-breaking work recently published by a group of chemists and food scientists from the University of California. It turns out that ‘pharma to food’ production is a significant technological challenge. The major problem with lab meat is that it uses growth organisms that have to be highly purified to help animal cells multiply. Compared with environmental savings on land, water and greenhouses gases, the whole bio-process is noted to be “orders of magnitude” higher than rearing the actual animal.
“Our findings suggest that cultured meat is not inherently better for the environment than conventional beef. It’s not a panacea,” said co-author Edward Spang, an associate professor in the Department of Food Science and Technology. The study found that even across scenarios using lower pharma standards, efficient beef production outperforms cultured meat within a range from four to 25 times. This suggests that investment to advance more ‘climate-friendly’ beef production may yield greater reductions in emissions.
The route to New Zero is littered with improbable technologies that promise much – and give endless opportunities for virtue signalling – but deliver little. While many countries press ahead with plans to destroy conventional animal husbandry, the options for new ways of actually feeding populations look thin on the ground. To be fair to Monbiot, he has picked up on the problems of lab meat, noting in a recent blog post that “the more I’ve read about cultured meat and fish, and the more I’ve come to appreciate the phenomenal complexities involved… the more I doubt this vision will come to pass”. Always the worrier, Monbiot asks, “How can mass starvation best be averted”? Not removing the 337.18 million tonnes of global meat production in favour of flaky factory solutions might be a start.
The California study could throw a major stick into the spokes of the lab-grown meat bandwagon, which to date has had a largely uncritical mainstream media ride. Grocery Gazette’s cheer-leading report noted that the sector was predicted to “rapidly increase its market share within the food industry”. Research was quoted suggesting cell cultured meat was expected to make up almost quarter of global meat consumption by 2035.
The authors in California acknowledge that lab-grown meat ventures have attracted around $2 billion of investment to date. Early reports on feasibility were bullish with some predicting a 60-70% displacement of beef by 2030-2040. But of late, sentiment has waned with more conservative estimates noting a 0.5% share of meat products by 2030. As noted, the huge problem in producing lab meat is the presence of endotoxin which is said have a variety of side effects including harm to in vitro fertilisation. In pharmaceutical labs, animal cell culture is traditional done with endotoxin having been removed. There are many ways to remove the unwanted substance, but the use of these refinement methods “contributes significantly to the economic and environmental costs associated with pharmaceutical products since they are both energy and resource intensive”.
The study also highlights concerns about past scientific consideration of lab-grown meat. There is said to be “high levels of uncertainty in their results and the lack of accounting for endotoxin removal”. It is further noted that despite researchers “clearly reporting high levels of uncertainty”, the results were often cited as clear evidence for the sustainability of lab-grown meat.
So a much-touted green Frankenstein food solution – arguably to a problem only promoted in alarmist circles – looks to be biting the dust, sweeping away a billion or two of credulous capital in the process. As the authors note, investing in scaling this technology “before solving key issues like developing an environmentally friendly method for endotoxin removal… would be counter to the environmental goals which this sector has espoused”.
Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.
Myth of Big Oil’s Funding of Climate Scepticism vs Reality of Big Green’s Billions Driving Climate Alarmism
BY CHRIS MORRISON | THE DAILY SCEPTIC | JUNE 15, 2023
In 2019 the climate activist and UCL Geography Professor Mark Maslin wrote that oil companies were spending $200 million a year promoting something he termed “climate change denial”. The ‘dark forces’ claim has been in regular use ever since. The Guardian recently reported Big Oil was “wringing humanity dry”, noting once again the annual $200m spent on climate change lobbying. Great story. Shame there is no actual evidence to back it up.
That can be concluded from a major new work from the investigative journalist Ben Pile. He traces the Maslin claim to a Forbes article, which in turn was based on the work of InfluenceMap, an international think tank at the “cutting edge of climate and sustainability issues”. InfluenceMap claims to use a funding methodology based on “best available records”, but Pile notes the presence of a “tower of estimates”. This is largely guessing, “not the discovery of a cache of receipts”, he observes.
In more detail, Pile notes that this stack of assumptions involves defining areas of corporate activity that might be used for climate lobbying and then estimating spending associated with these activities, and then further estimating the proportion of spending directed at climate change related issues, before finally categorising as ‘lobbying’ or ‘branding’ based on whether the activity pertains to a political agenda. Overall, Pile concludes, “it is just guesses”. The work is “performative” in nature, and gives the impression of an investigation in order to make real one of green ideology’s major articles of faith.
He goes on to note: “And so the idea of an entire industry of climate denial servicing the interests of big oil companies has become the most respectable conspiracy theory at all levels of society – the online troll is as comfortable reproducing the smear as the chair of the internationally-renowned scientific organisation.”
Of course there is no reason why Big Oil, which includes Exxon Mobil, Shell, BP, Chevron and Total, cannot spend money in the course of contributing to the energy debate. Fossil fuels provide over 80% of global energy needs and make huge contributions to society, including the pumping of billions of pounds into state funds and individual pension schemes. The oil business is a lawful enterprise that has helped provide humankind with a current standard of living almost unimaginable to the vast majority of people that existed previously. But the actual evidence indicates they have been keeping a lowish profile in the current debate, possibly taking the view that when the madness of Net Zero subsides, they will still be required to provide 80% of the world’s energy.
Emeritus Professor Richard Lindzen of MIT notes that the current climate narrative – from ‘settled’ science to Net Zero – is “absurd”, but trillions of dollars currently says it is not absurd. Pile’s latest work – an excellent examination of many of the sources funding climate and Net Zero extremism – goes into great detail about many of the green billionaire foundations that bankroll everything from activist scientists, political campaigns and parts of the mainstream media, including, of course, the Guardian. The Daily Sceptic has reported on many of these activities, noting for instance the funding of green propaganda in schools and the provision of Armageddon-friendly copy for newsrooms and TV meteorologists.
To provide an insight into the vast amount of money available to fund the green agenda, Pile tabulated the information below estimating all the annual grants made by InfluenceMap’s own benefactors.
In total, InfluenceMap’s funders alone are making grants of about $1.2 billion every year to fund climate change lobbying. And these are only the funds with which InfluenceMap has a direct relationship. There are many others, including the Rockefeller family, Bezos, Bloomberg, Gates along with the Hewletts, Packards and Gettys.
Set against this, Pile goes on to note that in a small Westminster office building at 55 Tufton Street, scene of Extinction Rebellion paint-throwing and protests, is a clutch of small think tanks including the Global Warming Policy Foundation that are, as he gently puts it, “somewhat misaligned to the dominant ideologies of woke Western politics and media”. In total, Pile estimates the income of all nine campaigning organisations at just $6.7m.
Pile is able to show that billions of dollars have been poured into “manifestly false” philanthropic foundations with the money claimed to have been used to construct narratives, to found fake civil society organisations, to actively misinform the public, policymakers, governments and intergovernmental agencies, and to buy favours from or into research organisations, media companies and public institutions. Any contrary influence from Big Oil simply does not compare, he adds.
The vast sums spent by the Green Blob are noted, but Pile observes that members are confused as to why they are not living in a green Utopia. They have long felt it unnecessary to explain themselves, preferring to smear, fearmonger, block roads, use moral blackmail in place of reason – and invent conspiracy theories around oil companies. Furthermore, even after nearly two decades of lobbying, adequately effective green tech remains a distant dream. Wind power has been a failure, EVs are an expensive luxury and heat pumps cost multiples of gas boilers. As we have started to see all too clearly, nudge has now come to shove as activists demand that society must reorganise around the shortcomings of green technology and the ‘climate emergency’. This requires the construction of supranational political agencies in the form of technocratic bureaucracies with unprecedented power, beyond democratic control, populated by unaccountable wonks.
“Environmentalism is an elite ideology, and climate change fearmongering is a preoccupation only of the topmost parts of society. The rest of us find it implausible, somewhat ridiculous and manifestly self-serving,” Pile concludes.
HHS is Still Wasting Money Fighting Online Covid “Disinformation”
By Dan Frieth | Reclaim The Net | June 17, 2023
Apparently, Covid discussions are still a thing worth cracking down on. That’s at least according to The Biden administration, which is injecting $500,000 into Texas Woman’s University as part of a grant program aimed at curbing COVID-19 “misinformation” and “disinformation” allegedly aimed at Hispanics, according to funding records reviewed by the Washington Examiner. The grant aims “to expand research on mitigating the effect of misinformation and disinformation” regarding “COVID-19 prevention and treatment initiatives among Hispanics.”
Timeline: Kicking off on May 10 and set to wrap up in April 2024, this grant is part of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)’s Food and Drug Administration’s portfolio. It’s part of Biden’s broader push to censor alleged disinformation by joining forces with social media platforms on content moderation – a move likened to “censorship” by some Republicans.
What GOP says: This funding allocation may prod GOP lawmakers to probe deeper into the Biden administration’s methods in countering certain types of speech. House Republicans, according to the Washington Examiner, are considering wielding the appropriations process as a tool to block federal agencies from pumping money into domestic initiatives tagged as combating “disinformation.”
What HHS did before: In 2021, HHS, spearheaded by Secretary Xavier Becerra, allegedly dabbled in misinformation tracking, by offering guidance to Twitter and Facebook on handling virus-related content. The US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy admitted in an August 2021 call with education groups, that the government was “working to combat misinformation in many ways, one being working with tech companies.”
Skeptical voices: Brian Harrison, a former HHS chief of staff under Trump and a current GOP Texas state House member, communicated his skepticism to the Washington Examiner: “I have no confidence this is anything more than Biden’s HHS spending money we don’t have on government censorship efforts.”
Inside the project: Texas Woman’s University’s venture consists of crafting a “social network analysis” to scrutinize “misinformation consumed by the Hispanic community.” It involves conducting focus groups, creating “an economic impact analysis of proposed informational strategies for Hispanics,” and establishing a “longitudinal misinformation/disinformation index.” The study, set in El Paso, Texas, is also sifting through social media content in both English and Spanish.
Deja vu?: The aforementioned “index” has set off alarm bells due to its echo of a tool from the State Department’s Global Engagement Center, which previously backed the Global Disinformation Index, a British entity that faced criticism for supposedly operating blacklists of conservative media outlets.
HHS’s stance: In response, HHS spokeswoman Anne Feldman said: “HHS does not censor speech.”
Roles of Bromelain and Curcumin in Battling Recurrent SARS-CoV-2 Spike Protein Exposures
Natural Products have Strong Rationale for Use Post-COVID-19 and Vaccine Syndromes
By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPH | Courageous Discourse | June 16, 2023
I find it interesting that a large group of post-COVID-19 acute sequalae are occurring in those who have taken failed COVID-19 vaccines. We are a long way off from definitive clinical trials of multidrug strategies for patients who have had multiple exposures to the SARS-CoV-2 Spike protein via vaccination or recurrent COVID-19.
Kritis et al point out:
“Curcumin (diferuloylmethane) is a natural phenol found in turmeric (Curcuma longa), a member of the ginger family of plants [4]. Curcumin modulates inflammation preventing the subsequent cytokine storm by inhibiting multiple transcription factors such as nuclear factor kappa B (NF-kB) and signal transducer and activator of transcription 3 (STAT-3), and downregulating the proinflammatory cytokines, as this has been demonstrated in human macrophages after influenza virus infection [4,6]. Additionally, curcumin inhibits ACE modulating angiotensin II synthesis and downregulating inflammation, while it also promotes fibrinolysis and the anticoagulation process [4,6,7] (Fig. 1). The antiviral actions of curcumin against multiple viruses (influenza and hepatitis viruses, herpes viruses, human papilloma virus, human immunodeficiency virus, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus and other coronaviruses), bacteria and fungi have been established by experimental evidence [8]. Remarkably, recent evidence from in silico studies has demonstrated that curcumin prevents SARS-CoV-2 entry into cells by blocking the viral binding sites and the cell ligands (spike protein, ACE-2 receptors and basigin), downregulating trans-membrane serine protease 2 (TMPRSS-2), and by interfering with viral replication through the interaction with various viral proteins [4]. However, the minimal absorption of curcumin following oral administration presents a major limitation in its bioavailability [6].
Bromelain is a cysteine protease, isolated from the pineapple stem (Ananas comosus) [9]. Traditionally, it has been used for its anti-inflammatory and healing effects in cases of arthritis and injury, while it has been approved in Europe for the debridement of burn wounds. Experimental studies have demonstrated that bromelain presents unique immunomodulatory actions: 1) downregulation of the pro-inflammatory prostaglandin E2 (PGE-2) through inhibition of NF-kB and cyclooxygenase 2 (COX-2); 2)upregulation of the anti-inflammatory PGE-1; 3) activation of inflammatory mediators (interleukin 1b, interleukin-6, tumor necrosis factor-a and interferon-g) as an acute response to cellular stress, but also inhibition of inflammatory mediators in states of overt cytokine production; 4) modulation of T cell responses in vitro and in vivo; and 5) enhancement of T-cell dependent antigenspecific B cell antibody responses [5,10e14]. Importantly, bromelain exerts dose-dependent anticoagulant effects: 1) downregulation of PGE-2 and thromboxane A2 (TXA2), thus leading to relative excess of prostacyclin; 2) promotion of fibrinolysis by stimulating the conversion of plasminogen to plasmin and prevention of platelet aggregation. Bromelain also hydrolyzes bradykinin and reduces kininogen and bradykinin levels in serum and tissues, improving inflammation and edema as shown in animal studies [15]. Notably, the latter action supports a potential role of bromelain in alleviating COVID-19 symptoms such as cough, fever and pain, and the more serious implications of inflammation, thrombosis and edema. The effect of bromelain on PGE-2 inhibition exceeds that of prednisone and aspirin, presenting very low toxicity and no major side effects. Interestingly, a recent experimental study demonstrated that bromelain inhibits infection of VeroE6 cells by SARS-CoV-2 through blocking the virus binding and entry into cells via downregulation of ACE-2 and TMPRSS2 expression, and cleavage of the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, presenting a novel promising therapeutic option that warrants further investigation.”
In summary, the combination of curcumin and bromelain are well positioned as supplements in people who are getting repetitive COVID-19/Spike protein exposure. Future randomized trials will elucidate the clinical benefits in specific applications.
Kritis P, Karampela I, Kokoris S, Dalamaga M. The combination of bromelain and curcumin as an immune-boosting nutraceutical in the prevention of severe COVID-19. Metabol Open. 2020 Dec;8:100066. doi: 10.1016/j.metop.2020.100066. Epub 2020 Nov 13. PMID: 33205039; PMCID: PMC7661945.
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From the Archives
Precedents for Pizzagate
Marc Dutroux, Belgian pedophile, sadist, and serial killer with friends in high places
By Aedon Cassiel | Counter – Currents | December 23, 2016
To reiterate a point that should be clear to the more astute reader, my goal in this series (part 1, part 2) has not been to defend “Pizzagate” as such. My goal has been to defend the people who want to investigate it against specific accusations levied against them by people who think Pizzagate has revealed no intriguing information at all—for a specific reason, which I will be honing in and focusing on much more directly in this closing entry.
Whereas the mainstream critics of Pizzagate would have you believe that the dividing line is between paranoid conspiracy theorist followers of “fake news” and level-headed people who follow trustworthy news sources and rely on cold, hard reason to determine the truth, my goal has been to show that—whatever is or is not happening with Pizzagate itself—this framing of the issue is arrogant, insulting, and the product of extremely narrow tunnel vision. … continue
Blog Roll
Aletho News- Trump stalls over Iran strike plan, Iran holds all the aces
- Zelensky’s Ceasefire for Elections is Strategic Gambit, Not Democratic Move
- US and Dutch pilots flying F-16s for Ukraine – Western media
- West’s Claims of Non-Involvement in Ukraine Conflict ‘Epitome of Hypocrisy’ – Expert
- Putin aide urges retaliation to ‘Western piracy’
- The Depth Charge in the Womb
- ‘Fox guarding the henhouse’: AMA, Vaccine Integrity Project to conduct their own vaccine safety and efficacy reviews
- Macron, Merz, and von der Leyen Defend Expanded Speech Controls
- Keir Starmer-tied think tank paid PR firm to target The Grayzone
- ‘Israel’ threatens to genocide Gaza if Hamas refuses disarmament
- If Americans Knew
- In Gaza, “rats run over our faces” – Not a ceasefire Day 129
- Israel-backed border guards, GHF-linked aid – Not a ceasefire Day 128
- Israel battles Palestinian right of return, one Palestinian at a time – Not a ceasefire Day 127
- Noor’s short life of unimaginable suffering
- Israel Destroyed Gaza’s Hospitals. Now It’s Banning Doctors Without Borders.
- Is Spite of What Zionists Say, It’s a Good Thing to Criticize Governments
- Palestinian mother, daughter recount strip searches, harsh conditions in Israeli detention
- Israel used weapons in Gaza that made thousands of Palestinians evaporate
- ADL’s Stats Twist Israel’s Critics Into Antisemites
- Why Is the World Silent When the Gaza Genocide Is Not Over?
- No Tricks Zone
- New Study: A 4°C Warmer Beaufort Sea Had ‘No Sea Ice’ 11,700 – 8200 Years Ago
- Unfudging The Data: Dutch Meteorological Institute Reinstates Early 20th Centruy Heat Waves It Had Erased Earlier
- German Gas Crisis…Chancellor Merz Allegedly Bans Gas Debate Ahead of Elections!
- Pollen Reconstructions Show The Last Glacial’s Warming Events Were Global, 10x Greater Than Modern
- Germany’s Natural Gas Storage Level Dwindles To Just 28%… Increasingly Critical
- New Study Rebuts The Assumption That Anthropogenic CO2 Molecules Have ‘Special’ Properties
- Climate Scientist Who Predicted End Of “Heavy Frost And Snow” Now Refuses Media Inquiries
- Polar Bear Numbers Rising And Health Improving In Areas With The Most Rapid Sea Ice Decline
- One Reason Only For Germany’s Heating Gas Crisis: Its Hardcore-Dumbass Energy Policy
- 130 Years Later: The CO2 Greenhouse Effect Is Still Only An Imaginary-World Thought Experiment
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