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Blinken’s blinkered vision of Russia

By Scott Ritter | RT | January 12, 2022

“One lesson of recent history is that once Russians are in your house, it’s sometimes very difficult to get them to leave.”

The level of hubris-laced ignorance it would take an ostensibly intelligent, well-informed individual to make such a statement, in public, in an official capacity, goes beyond political parody.

And yet, there was the American Secretary of State, Tony Blinken, uttering those words at the tail end of a press statement where he questioned the legitimacy of Russia’s dispatch of military forces to Kazakhstan. The Russian actions took place in the wake of widespread violence that prompted the Kazakh President to request help from the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), which Russia leads.

It should be noted that Russia was invited to send troops to Kazakhstan. Russia was also invited to send troops to Syria. As Blinken was speaking, the US had between 900 and 1,200 troops inside Syria, none of whom were there at the request of the Syrian government. Likewise, the US continues to maintain a force of some 2,500 troops in Iraq, even though the Iraqi parliament has called for their withdrawal for more than a year.

When it comes to understanding what an “unwanted houseguest” looks and acts like, Tony Blinken need only look in the mirror for the perfect illustration.

The US is scrambling to seize the moral high ground when it comes to the issue of military intervention, seeking to exploit the 2008 Russian-Georgian War, the 2014 reabsorption of Crimea, and the 2015 military intervention in Syria to illustrate its position.

While the issue of Russo-Georgian relations is a difficult one, dating to before the dissolution of the Soviet Union, it is an undisputed fact – indeed, one backed up by the European Union’s inquiry into the incident – that the 2008 conflict was triggered by a Georgian military incursion into South Ossetia, including an unprovoked attack on Russian peacekeeping forces stationed there. Subsequent Russian actions are attributable to Georgian aggression.

Likewise, Russia’s actions vis-à-vis Crimea and the Donbass region, where Moscow supports ethnically Russian separatists, all derive from the so-called ‘Maidan Revolution’, a US and EU-backed insurrection that overthrew Viktor Yanukovich, the duly elected president of Ukraine, and replaced him with a more Washington-friendly government.

And, lastly, the Russian intervention in Syria came at the request of the legitimate government in Damascus, which was under siege from foreign-funded and trained terrorists and insurrectionists. Russia’s actions were decisive, helping shift the military balance in favor of the Syrian government, and leading to the defeat of most of the anti-government fighters. The irony behind the Russian intervention is that it exposed the hypocrisy of the US, in so far as several of the terrorist groups Russia helped defeat were not only affiliates of Al-Qaeda but were also being funded by the US and its allies.

The US presence in Iraq and Syria, however, is the direct consequence of the illegal US-led invasion and occupation of Iraq in 2003. Between the US and Russia, only one nation has violated international law when it comes to disregarding the sovereignty of others – and it is not Russia.

Tony Blinken did not limit his Russo-phobic commentary simply to the issue of unwanted houseguests. When asked during an interview on a Sunday morning talk show on January 9 whether he agreed that Russian President Vladimir Putin was seeking to restore the Soviet Union, Blinken answered: “I think that’s right… I think that’s one of President Putin’s objectives, and it is to re-exert a sphere of influence over countries that previously were part of the Soviet Union,” something that, Blinken added, was “unacceptable.”

First and foremost, as Russia has been making clear during its ongoing European security framework discussions with the US, NATO, and the OSCE this week, the issue of what is or isn’t acceptable when it comes to defining the scope and scale of Russian national security and related spheres of interest, is not something Moscow is willing to subordinate to Washington or its allies. Rather, it is a matter for Russia alone to decide.

It is the US, not Russia, which is seeking to continuously breathe life into the Cold War relic that is the NATO alliance. The history of broken American promises when it comes to the issue of NATO expansion – “not one inch east” has a different meaning in Brussels than anywhere else, it seems.

The ostensibly “defensive” NATO alliance has been, since the end of the Cold War, used for almost exclusively offensive military action, much of which has taken place outside the geographic boundaries defined by the treaty. Whether it be intervention in the former Yugoslavia, the dismemberment of Serbia, intervention in Libya, supporting the US invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, or sustaining the illegal presence of US forces in Syria, NATO has made itself an unwanted houseguest across the globe.

Truth be told, if it were not for NATO actively seeking to attract both Georgia and Ukraine to its roster, the events of 2008 and 2014 might have unfolded completely differently.

Tony Blinken’s comments about the suitability of Russia as a houseguest are as fact-free as any made by senior international statesmen in modern times. The reality is the US is the unwanted houseguest, habitually overstaying its welcome, sowing chaos, death, and destruction in its path.

Using this analogy, Russia could be seen as the emergency clean-up crew tasked with trying to clean up the mess that accrues in the wake of America’s foreign policy tornado. Tony Blinken and his boss, President Joe Biden, seem to have difficulty focusing on the real consequences of their words and deeds, as their gaze is constantly fixed on an artificial horizon that only they can see.

Unfortunately for Washington, the rest of the world knows the truth, and who is to blame for what. Blinken can continue uttering nonsense about Russia but, from such ignorance, does not sound policy come. This should be a lesson for any nation, especially those in Europe, who are looking to the US for sound guidance and leadership when it comes to solving the world’s problems.

January 13, 2022 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Progressive Hypocrite, Russophobia | , | Leave a comment

Biden calls for tighter censorship of Covid-19 content

RT | January 13, 2022

US President Joe Biden’s latest “surge response” to fight the spread of Covid-19 includes an appeal for Big Tech and media companies to block allegedly false pandemic-related claims.

“I make a special appeal to social media companies and media outlets,” Biden said on Thursday. “Please deal with the misinformation and disinformation that’s on your shows. It has to stop.”

Biden made the comment as he announced a series of new measures to mitigate the spread of Covid-19, including plans for free masks, more free tests, and additional deployments of military medical teams to help hospitals cope with rising patient loads. He didn’t specify what constitutes misinformation or disinformation in the pandemic age.

Biden urged a crackdown immediately after chiding people who have chosen not to get vaccinated by saying they were “standing in the way” of the fight against the virus.

Twitter, Facebook, and other platforms already have strict policies on commentary about Covid-19 if it clashes with the currently mainstream approach to dealing with the virus. Social media giants have also employed teams of fact-checkers, vigorously working to enforce those policies. But Biden’s administration is scrambling to find more ways to fight Covid “misinformation” after the fast-spreading Omicron variant pushed new infections and hospitalizations to record highs.

Biden’s apparent censorship appeal quickly sparked backlash on social media. This included claims that the president is among those spreading misinformation. Biden falsely said last month that “almost all” Covid-19 deaths were among unvaccinated people, and he claimed last July that “you’re not going to get Covid if you have these vaccinations.”

Other critics blasted Biden’s statement on principle. “Imagine calling for censorship of your own nation as the POTUS when you’ve taken an oath to uphold the Constitution, and the FIRST Amendment is freedom of speech,” podcast host Barrington Martin II said on Twitter.

Many observers questioned the wisdom of letting gatekeepers decide which speech is misinformation, thereby blocking open discussion and independent truth-seeking. Still others suggested that Biden is trying to do damage-control after his failure to meet campaign promises on Covid-19 contributed to a downward spiral in his approval ratings.

January 13, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Science and Pseudo-Science | , , , | Leave a comment

Biden admin flip-flops on tracking Covid jab refusers

RT | January 13, 2022

A US government agency in Washington, DC has said it will make a list of those who refuse to get vaccinated against Covid-19 for religious reasons. The move goes against earlier promises by the Biden administration.

The Pretrial Services Agency (PSA) for the District of Columbia announced its intention to create what it called the “Employee Religious Exception Request Information System” in a notice on Tuesday.

According to the agency, which assists officers in DC with formulating release recommendations and supervising defendants awaiting trial, the new system will store the names and “personal religious information” of employees who file “religious accommodation requests for religious exception from the federally mandated vaccination requirement.”

The PSA didn’t specify the reasons for compiling such a list, or how the personal data on it would be used.

It only said vaguely that the system would “assist the Agency in the collecting, storing, dissemination, and disposal of employee religious exemption request information collected and maintained by the Agency.”

The PSA is a small local agency, but conservative outlet the Daly Signal suggested that “likely, the Biden administration is using it to stealth test a policy it intends to roll out across the whole government.”

There is no proof to support this assumption. However, the White House had previously promised that would not store data on the vaccination status of Americans at a federal level.

In August, President Joe Biden’s Covid-19 Response Coordinator Jeff Zients assured during a briefing that “there will be no federal vaccination database. As with all other vaccines, the information gets held at the state and local level.” Zients was replying to a question about ways to deal with the rise in counterfeited jab cards, after more businesses and education institutions across the US began demanding proof of vaccination.

On Monday, the Biden administration’s vaccine or test mandate for private employers entered into force despite still being contested in the US Supreme Court.

The White House, which had previously told millions of federal employees and contractors to be fully vaccinated, now demands that those working for companies with more than 100 employees receive two shots of a coronavirus vaccine or get tested at least once a week.

More than 60% of the population has been fully vaccinated against Covid-19 in the US, which has become the world’s worst-hit country, with more than 63 million infections and over 843,000 deaths related to the virus.

January 13, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception | , , | Leave a comment

More humiliation for Anthony Fauci and MSM vaccine advocates

By Alex Berenson | Unreported Truths | January 12, 2022

They promised a booster would work – despite obvious evidence it wouldn’t. Not years ago. Months ago. Sometimes WEEKS ago. Don’t let them gaslight you. Don’t let them forget.

In August, when Israel became the first country to push Covid vaccine boosters, I warned that the evidence for them verged on nonexistent and they were unlikely to last more than a few months.

This was, to say the least, not the consensus view in the elite media or the public health establishment.

Lots of vaccines required boosters, they said! A third dose several months out simply fixed the rushed scheduling of the second dose, they said!

And no one pushed this view more aggressively than Dr. Anthony Fauci – who went so far as to promise that the third dose would do what the first two had not and confer long-lasting immunity:

….


Those stories are from early September.

And America’s Doctor (TM) got his way. Within weeks regulators had approved boosters – and as the fall went on they opened the spigots ever-wider.

Needless to say the media asked its usual critical questions. (Have a barf bag handy as you scroll.)

The NY Times :

January 13, 2022 Posted by | Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

The Mad Perceptions Driving our Covid Policies

BY WILLY FORSYTH | BROWNSTONE INSTITUTE | JANUARY 12, 2022

When I quit my job working for the National Science Foundation (NSF) under the United States Antarctic Program, I largely did so due to this premise espoused by McMurdo Station’s NSF representative:

“I appreciate that the impacts of COVID, and the mitigations being taken by the program, are challenging. I also appreciate that the risks are perceived differently by each of us depending on our backgrounds and our varying levels of ownership of that risk.”

We have allowed subjective “perceptions” rather than quantifiable risk analysis – one of the primary functions of public health – to control our lives. I hoped I had left the insanity of misguided Covid policies behind me in Antarctica, I was wrong.

I have been reflecting on how policies still abound in the United States that are solely driven by perceptions rather than empiricism and considering whether we are moving away from this erroneous way of thinking. There are some promising signs for such a return to reason, particularly when remembering early policies of the pandemic contrasted with today. But we are still moving at a snail’s pace.

Looking back on my final week living in New York City – the first week after lockdowns commenced – I remember bicycling and driving for the first (and I hope only) time through empty streets. Soon after, beaches began to close in my home state of California. These policies were based on nothing but the perception that moving about would kill people, when in reality, the outdoors is the best environment to avoid SARS-CoV-2 transmission. Like many of our Covid polices, these had quite the opposite of their intended effect, driving people to spend weeks indoors – an environment highly more amenable to transmission.

Thankfully almost no American would now accept the closure of outdoor environments as viable. Unfortunately, another unfounded closure is still being debated in the US – the closure of schools. Europe quickly did all they could to get and keep children back in school with only 14% not in-person opposed to 65% in the US. But panicked American parents, teachers, and news outlets have perpetuated a narrative that SARS-CoV-2 is harmful to children, when the data have always told a vastly different story. The New York Times finally published a penitent article recognizing the harms that we have caused our children, again, far too late.

Europe also followed comprehensive scientific reasoning to limit the masking of children. They recognize the minimal benefits and the immense harms of such policies. Yet, children continue to cover their faces on campuses across America.

The United States have vast global influence, and setting such terrible precedents based on perception alone gives license to others, like President Yoweri Musevini, of Uganda – a country with a much lower Covid risk profile than aging western populations – to justify horrific school closures and other infringements on human rights in the name of public health with little scrutiny or accountability. And that is only one of many detrimental burdens wealthy nations have exported to the global poor during the pandemic. Our current hoarding of vaccines for unnecessary boosters is another.

Fortunately, recognition of the lack of evidence for some policies, such as population wide protection from masks, is growing. This is particularly important when paired against the amazing protection from immunity. Unfortunately, while Covid vaccines provide excellent individual protection, there are overwhelming data at this point showing they do little to nothing to prevent transmission.

Yet, policy makers are still pushing for further vaccine and booster mandates flying against the face of the evidence. Boosters are being advocated for everyone 16 and older despite a greater risk of myocarditis in males under 40 following just a 2nd dose, than from SARS-CoV-2 infection itself. Evidence continues to be ignored and perceptions continue to drive the premises for closing schools, mandating masks, mandating vaccines, and even burdensome testing protocols for our school children and others.

Dr. Vinay Prasad has made a great case for the limited usefulness and immense uselessness of Covid tests. A primary concern in my mind here is that tests for keeping kids in schools will again result in the opposite outcome. They will mostly provide information of mild or asymptomatic infection that will inevitably keep them out of school in the name of protecting them from a disease that doesn’t harm them. We are conflating the noise of tests with their signal and hindering the healthy. This is harmful enough, but the bigger sin of such obsessive testing protocols is the misallocation of tests away from use cases for protecting the vulnerable.

For example, a friend tells me much of film industry – made up of largely young and heathy and vaccinated adults – is requiring tests every day, leading to frequent staffing shortages (much like those we are seeing amongst health care workers) and massive demand for tests. Repeat these test hoarding protocols across multiple industries of mostly healthy and vaccinated individuals and you are left with the widespread testing shortages we are seeing now.

Might these tests be better used for those who have frequent access to vulnerable individuals such as my 90-year-old grandmother who recently moved into an assisted living home? Last week my brother was not allowed to visit her because he is not vaccinated (even though he has had Covid and has immunity to the virus – something else Europe has recognized that we have not).

My grandmother is also vaccinated, but we know that this protection only goes so far for 90-year-olds, who, even vaccinated, still have extremely higher risks of severe Covid outcomes than the school aged children whose parents are hoarding tests. My brother and myself (I had Covid after 2 vaccine doses) would do much better to protect our grandmother and her cohabitants if we could access rapid Covid tests to ensure we are not carrying the virus into her communal home. But rapid tests across Southern California pharmacies are sold out.

Fortunately, discourse has improved surrounding our mistakes during the pandemic, the negative outcomes of our own policies, and even the psychological pitfalls that allow such errors to perpetuate.

Even Biden’s top advisers are now urging him to adopt the strategy of living with the virus. Whether or not there is enough consensus on this way of thinking (known as rationality) for us to move past the hysteria that has crippled our way of life while providing little to no protection from an inevitable pandemic is critical for our future.

Will we live with illogical fear and behaviors for years? Or will we use facts to take back the lives we value?

January 13, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties | , , | Leave a comment

Dr. Henry Kissinger: The Myth of the Great Statesman

By Walter L. Hixson –Washington Report on Middle East Affairs – January/February 2022, pp. 34-35

History’s Shadows

AMONG MANY widely embraced illusions about the history of the Middle East and American diplomacy in general is that Dr. Henry A. Kissinger is or ever was a brilliant statesman.

What Kissinger has always been, and remains at age 98, is a brilliant self-promoter. His more than 3,000 pages of self-aggrandizing published memoirs—a record unmatched in the annals of American diplomacy—reflect an ego trip befitting a man famous for his “shuttle diplomacy.”

Millions of Americans have been taken in by Kissinger’s Harvard credentials, his deft manipulation of the news media and his gravelly Old World-accent that supposedly resonates the wisdom of the ages. The latest of Kissinger’s easily duped admirers is the Israeli apologist Martin Indyk, the author of the recent book Master of the Game: Henry Kissinger and the Art of Middle East Diplomacy. In this astonishingly shallow book, as well as a recent webinar sponsored by the Middle East Institute, Indyk lauds Kissinger for his step-by-step approach to Middle East diplomacy, which he credits with giving rise to the Oslo “peace process.” The Oslo framework—a fraud that has enabled the ongoing and illegal settler occupation of Palestine—has been thoroughly discredited, yet Indyk argues with a straight face that it offers the only viable path to peace. None of this is a surprise, as Indyk, a former U.S. ambassador to Israel, has long been a member in good standing of the Israel lobby and a cheerleader for Zionist state aggression and the repression of Palestinians. One can expect nothing less—he was first executive director of AIPAC’s think tank, the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP).

Even Indyk admits that when Kissinger entered the Nixon White House, he was a Eurocentric “Orientalist” who “didn’t know anything about the Arab world by his own admission.” On the other hand, Kissinger was a dedicated Zionist, which had led him to visit Israel six times prior to his executive appointment. Kissinger—like Indyk and a series of U.S. diplomats, from Dennis Ross to Secretary of State Antony Blinken today—sided unequivocally with Israel and against justice for Palestinians.

Indyk showers credit on Kissinger for bailing out Israel in the October 1973 war and for his subsequent much glorified shuttle diplomacy, while glossing over the fact that Kissinger had sabotaged Secretary of State William Rogers’ peace plan based on U.N. Resolution 242, in the aftermath of the June 1967 war. By pushing Rogers aside, the ever-opportunistic Kissinger took over his job in the Nixon and later Ford White Houses.

Indyk chides Kissinger for not pursuing a “Jordanian solution” to the Palestine conflict, but Kissinger had no interest in Palestine, which, as he explained in 1974, was “not an American interest, because we don’t care if Israel keeps the West Bank if it can get away with it. So, we won’t push it.” Here we see the real Kissinger—utterly disdainful of the U.N., the Palestinian quest for peace, justice and human rights, just as he disdained the cause of other dark-skinned peoples across the world, including millions of Asians, Latin Americans and Africans.

In 1975, Kissinger expressed regret albeit privately, explaining, “I am sorry that I did not support the Rogers effort” to forge a peace accord. He acknowledged that a diplomatic agreement with Egypt could have been negotiated that “would have prevented the 1973 war.” Kissinger thus admitted that his ignorance and disdain for the Arab and Palestinian position had precluded a peace accord and brought on a major war. Failing to prevent war and further militarizing the Middle East conflict were the hallmarks of Kissinger’s failed statesmanship.

Both Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford made sporadic attempts to act as honest brokers in the Middle East, occurrences that left Kissinger caught between the administrations and Israel. When Israel and the lobby publicly criticized Kissinger amid a dispute over military resupply during the short-lived Ford administration, Kissinger in a “crying voice” prostrated himself before the Israeli ambassador to the United States, Simcha Dinitz, pleading that he “was a Jew before I was an American and now you are making me the scapegoat.” He added—in a vivid example of the extent of Israeli influence over American diplomacy—“I showed you messages, telegrams and wires from the Soviet Union and Egypt,” only to be criticized publicly in return.

In addition to his bungling Middle East diplomacy, Kissinger infamously green-lighted the undermining of Chilean, Argentinian and other Latin American democracies; bolstered apartheid in southern Africa; signed off on a murderous Indonesian assault on East Timor; and gave a thumbs up to Pakistan’s genocidal attack on Bangladesh. Even the much ballyhooed and long overdue détente with Russia and China, for which Kissinger has claimed enormous credit, stemmed from a misguided hope that the great powers could compel the North Vietnamese to grant the United States “peace with honor” amid the massive, failed Indochina intervention. Nixon and Kissinger prolonged the Vietnam War for four years, achieving nothing but a wider degree of death and destruction in the process.

Upon his death, Kissinger no doubt will be lauded, his mythical overseas accomplishments celebrated for days on end. But beneath the veneer of statesmanship the actual historical record reveals the true Kissinger: a deeply flawed diplomat who nurtured utter contempt for justice, human rights and peace. (Even Indyk admitted Kissinger had “quite a jaundiced view of peace,” but so does Indyk, so that wasn’t a big problem for him.)

So, Henry, when the time comes, may you rest in peace—despite the utter disregard you showed for it throughout your life.

History’s Shadows, a regular column by contributing editor Walter L. Hixson, seeks to place various aspects of Middle East politics and diplomacy in historical perspective. Hixson is the author of Architects of Repression: How Israel and Its Lobby Put Racism, Violence and Injustice at the Center of US Middle East Policy and Israel’s Armor: The Israel Lobby and the First Generation of the Palestine Conflict (available from Middle East Books and More), along with several other books and journal articles. He has been a professor of history for 36 years, achieving the rank of distinguished professor.

January 13, 2022 Posted by | Book Review, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular | , , , , | Leave a comment

Media Fakes First Omicron Death Story

By Dr. Joseph Mercola | January 12, 2022

Ever since the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant emerged in December 2021, all the signs indicated that it was the mildest and least lethal variant yet. Not a single death has been attributed to it in South Africa,1 for example, where it was initially detected.2

Despite that, U.S. health authorities kept issuing warnings as if Omicron were the worst threat yet. The World Health Organization declared it a “variant of concern,” and countries around the world responded by reinstating lockdowns and other draconian measures.3

The Omicron Death That Wasn’t

Then, December 20, 2021, the death of a Houston, Texas, man was labeled an “Omicron variant-related” death,4 and Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo announced that “The Omicron variant of COVID-19 has arrived in full force,”5 necessitating raising the county’s COVID-19 threat level to “Level-2 Orange.”

As you can see in the video above, within hours, the U.S. press widely reported that the first death from the Omicron variant had occurred amid surging COVID cases. Senior contributor to Forbes, Bruce Y. Lee, and MSNBC senior producer Kyle Griffin reported the death as a “reinfection” of “an unvaccinated man who previously had COVID-19.”6

“Naturally, this case makes you wonder how much protection ‘natural immunity’ will even offer against the Omicron variant,” Lee wrote. “Important note for the unvaccinated who believe in ‘natural immunity,’” Griffin tweeted.7

There was only one problem. The man didn’t die “from” Omicron infection. He died having tested positive for the Omicron variant. Journalist Dan Cohen confirmed this December 21, 2021, in a phone conversation with Martha Marquez, who works with the Harris County Public Health department. Marquez confirmed that the man died WITH COVID, not from it — amazing the difference one simple word makes.

If the man had previously recovered from COVID-19, then one wonders whether it was a false positive. The video above, which includes Cohen’s recorded phone call, illustrates how this singular unverified case was blown out of all proportion and used to refuel waning fears.

Omicron Poses Greatest Threat to the COVID-Jabbed

Authorities also wasted no time to use the fake Omicron death to scare the unvaccinated into getting the jab. Again and again, we were told that the unvaccinated were at greatest risk for this new variant, but this too has turned out to be 180 degrees from the truth.

Research8,9 out of Denmark shows that compared to the Delta variant, Omicron is far more likely to infect people who are “fully vaccinated” and boosted than those who are unvaccinated. The study looked at 11,937 Danish households during the month of December 2021.

In all, 2,225 people were identified as being infected with Omicron. During a seven-day follow-up period, they also identified 6,397 secondary infections. Interestingly, infection with Omicron was more likely to result in a secondary infection than the Delta strain, and the COVID-jabbed were far more likely to get these secondary infections. As reported by the authors:10

“The SAR [secondary attack rate] was 31% and 21% in households with the Omicron and Delta VOC [variant of concern], respectively. We found an increased transmission for unvaccinated individuals, and a reduced transmission for booster-vaccinated individuals, compared to fully vaccinated individuals.

Comparing households infected with the Omicron to Delta VOC, we found a 1.17 (95%-CI: 0.99-1.38) times higher SAR for unvaccinated, 2.61 times (95%-CI: 2.34-2.90) higher for fully vaccinated and 3.66 (95%-CI: 2.65-5.05) times higher for booster-vaccinated individuals, demonstrating strong evidence of immune evasiveness of the Omicron VOC.

Our findings confirm that the rapid spread of the Omicron VOC primarily can be ascribed to the immune evasiveness rather than an inherent increase in the basic transmissibility.”

COVID Shots Are Simply a Miserable Failure

All of this is just more evidence that the COVID shots are an abject failure, and it’s being added to an already long list of studies11 demonstrating their suboptimal efficacy. Below is a sampling of that evidence:

  • The Lancet Infectious Diseases October 202112 — Fully “vaccinated” individuals who develop breakthrough infections have a peak viral load similar to that of unvaccinated people, and efficiently transmit the infection to unvaccinated and “vaccinated” alike in household settings.
  • The Lancet Preprint13 — Fully “vaccinated” Vietnamese health care workers who contracted breakthrough SARS-CoV-2 Delta infections had viral loads that were 251 times higher than those found in cases infected with earlier strains. So, the shots do not appear to protect against infection with the Delta strain.
  • A July 31, 2021, medRxiv preprint by Riemersma et. al.14 found no difference in viral loads between unvaccinated people and those “fully vaccinated” who developed breakthrough infections. They also found the Delta variant was capable of “partial escape from polyclonal and monoclonal antibodies.”
  • Eurosurveillance rapid communication, July 202115 — An outbreak of the Delta variant in a hospital in Finland suggested the shots did little to prevent the spread of infection, even among the “vaccinated,” and despite routine use of face masks and other protective equipment.<
  • Eurosurveillance rapid communication, September 202116 — An upsurge of Delta variant infections in Israel, at a time when more than 55% of the population were “fully vaccinated,” also showed the COVID shots were ineffective against this variant. The infection spread even to those who were fully jabbed AND wore surgical masks.
  • The Lancet Preprint, October 202117 — This Swedish study found the Pfizer injection’s effectiveness progressively waned from 89% on Days 15 to 30, post-injection, to 42% from Day 181 onward. As of day 211, no protection against infection was discernible. Moderna’s shot fared slightly better, waning to 59% as of Day 181. The AstraZeneca injection offered lower protection than Pfizer and Moderna from the start, and waned faster, reaching zero by day 121.
  • BioRxiv September 202118 — Six months after the second Pfizer shot, antibody responses and T cell immunity against the original virus and known variants was found to have substantially waned, in many cases reaching undetectable levels.
  • Journal of Infection August 202119 — When the Delta variant was the cause of the infection, neutralizing antibodies had decreased affinity for the spike protein, while antibodies that worsen infection had increased affinity.
  • The Lancet Infectious Diseases November 202120 — 26% of patients admitted to hospital with confirmed severe or critical COVID-19 were “fully vaccinated;” 46% had a positive COVID test but were asymptomatic, 7% had mild infection and 20% had moderate illness. So, among those who developed symptoms of infection, the majority ended up with severe or critical illness.
  • medRxiv August 202121 — People with no previous SARS-CoV-2 infection who got the Pfizer shot had a 5.96-fold increased risk for breakthrough infection and a 7.13-fold increased risk for symptomatic disease, compared to people who had natural immunity.

Are We Starting to See Signs of ADE?

Over the course of 2020, many published studies highlighted the risk of antibody-dependent enhancement (ADE) following the COVID shots. For example, one October 28, 2020, paper stressed that:22

“… vaccines designed empirically using the traditional approach (consisting of the unmodified or minimally modified coronavirus viral spike to elicit neutralizing antibodies), be they composed of protein, viral vector, DNA or RNA and irrespective of delivery method, may worsen COVID-19 disease via antibody-dependent enhancement (ADE).”

While we’ve not seen conclusive evidence of ADE yet, there are signs that point in that direction, including the latest finding that the double and triple jabbed have more than double the rate of secondary infections when infected with Omicron. Clearly, their immune systems are not working as efficiently as in those who are unvaccinated.

Twenty years of research have demonstrated that making a vaccine against coronaviruses is fraught with risk.23 In fact, most previous coronavirus vaccine efforts — for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV), Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV), respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) and similar viruses — have ended up triggering ADE.24,25,26,27,28,29

What that means is that, rather than enhance your immunity against the infection, the vaccine actually enhances the virus’ ability to enter and infect your cells, resulting in more severe disease than had you not been vaccinated.30

The 2014 paper,31 “Antibody-Dependent SARS Coronavirus Infection Is Mediated by Antibodies Against Spike Proteins,” concluded that monoclonal antibodies generated against SARS-CoV spike proteins actually promoted infection, and that overall, “antibodies against SARS-CoV spike proteins may trigger ADE effects,” thereby raising “questions regarding a potential SARS-CoV vaccine.”

It’s Time to Stop the Madness

Masks don’t work. Lockdowns don’t work. Shutting down small businesses and schools don’t work. Social distancing doesn’t work. The COVID shots don’t work. Yet with the emergence of Omicron, governments are reimplementing all of the same countermeasures that haven’t worked for the past two years.

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results. Yet that’s precisely what’s passing for “science” these days. The answer to this madness is mass-noncompliance. We must peacefully reject these wholly unscientific and harmful “countermeasures.”

It’s also high time to accept the fact that continuing the booster cycle is foolish in the extreme. Clearly, the odds are only getting worse for those with two or more shots, not better, and there’s absolutely no reason to believe they’ll improve their chances with four, five, six or more booster shots. It’s all downhill from here.

Our youths, in particular, must be protected from this folly. Already, data32 from the U.K. show deaths among teenagers increased 47% since they started getting COVID-19 shots. COVID-19-associated deaths also mysteriously rose among 15- to 19-year-olds after the shots were rolled out for this age group which, again, raises the suspicion that ADE may be at play.

Sources and References

January 13, 2022 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Timeless or most popular, Video | , , | Leave a comment

Parents Must Be Allowed to Decide on COVID Vaccines for Kids, Physician Tells Maine Lawmakers

The Defender | January 12, 2022

Parents must be allowed to make individualized decisions regarding the risks and benefits of COVID vaccines for their children, Dr. Meryl Nass told Maine lawmakers this week.

Nass, a Maine-based practicing physician and member of the Children’s Health Defense scientific advisory committee, submitted written testimony to the Maine Legislature’s Health and Human Services Committee in support of a bill that would ban state-mandated COVID-19 vaccinations without informed consent.

Hundreds of Maine residents on Tuesday attended a public hearing in support of the bill. Click here to listen to the entire hearing.

There are many reasons why preventing COVID vaccine mandates until adequate, sufficient safety studies have been performed is “the right decision for this committee and legislature,” Nass wrote.

Those reasons include:

  • All available COVID vaccines are experimental products.
  • Legally, recipients must be offered the right to refuse.
  • Mandates negate the right of refusal.
  • Basic safety questions regarding the vaccines have not been resolved, and some will not be answered until 2027.
  • The WHO does not recommend broad COVID vaccinations for children.
  • Parents should be permitted to make individualized decisions regarding their children’s risks and benefits from COVID vaccines.
  • Unfortunately, no one can make a fully informed decision about COVID vaccines until the public has access to complete information on safety and efficacy, which are not now available. This fact alone should negate all mandates.

The bill’s sponsor, Rep. Tracy Quint, a Republican from Hodgdon, Maine, told the committee the bill would protect “the vital right of all Mainers to informed consent” about a vaccine whose long-term effects are unknown. She called it a chance “to change course” on the controversial issue.

Quint told Newscenter Maine she’s been hearing from people, particularly concerned parents, from across the state who are fearful there will soon be a vaccine mandate in schools.

“It didn’t matter whether they were a Democrat or a Republican, just parents in general, had some concerns whether or not this would be mandated for their children,” Quint said.

Matt Landry of Greene, Maine — one of more than 280 people who testified remotely or wrote in during the three-hour hearing — told lawmakers he is “tired of these jabs being forced against the people’s will and making people sick, injured or dead. I can see it happening to people I know, and it makes my blood boil.”

Maine Gov. Janet Mills, who opposes the bill, told Newscenter Maine:

“This is the time for everybody in leadership positions, everybody in public office, everybody in roles of leadership in their community, to get the word out to make sure people understand how safe and thoroughly tested these vaccines are and how critical they are to keep you out of the hospital, keep you out of the ICU, keep you from dying.”

But Nass told lawmakers no matter what claims have been made regarding these vaccines, they are not “safe and effective.”

Nass wrote:

“‘Safe and effective’ is an [U.S. Food and Drug Administration] ‘term of art’ that may only be applied to licensed drugs and vaccines. All currently available COVID vaccines in the United States are unlicensed and experimental, a.k.a. investigational.”

Read Nass’ full testimony below:

January 11, 2022

Honorable Chairpersons, Members and Senators,

I write in support of LD 867. There are many reasons why preventing COVID vaccine mandates until adequate, sufficient safety studies have been performed is the right decision for this committee and legislature.

1. COVID vaccines are experimental

Let me say, first, that no matter what claims have been made regarding these vaccines, they are not “safe and effective.” “Safe and effective” is an FDA “term of art” that may only be applied to licensed drugs and vaccines. All currently available COVID vaccines in the United States are unlicensed and experimental, a.k.a. investigational.

Medicines and vaccines are either licensed products or experimental products. There is no gray area between them in US law. Whether or not research is explicitly conducted, the use of experimental products (including those issued an Emergency Use Authorization) falls under the Nuremberg Code and under US law regulating experimental drugs. As former FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn himself noted, “EUA products are still considered investigational.”

According to 21CFR Subchapter D Part 312: “an experiment is any use of a drug except for the use of a marketed drug in the course of medical practice.” Vaccines are considered a subset of drugs by FDA. And the use of unlicensed, Emergency Use Authorized vaccines is thus, by definition, experimental.

US law requires that humans receiving experimental products must provide written informed consent. However, when the PREP Act creating Emergency Use Authorizations (EUAs) was written, this requirement was loosened slightly for emergencies in which EUA products would be used. The required disclosures when using EUAs were specified below. Please note the option to accept or refuse.

21 U.S. Code § 360bbb–3 – Authorization for medical products for use in emergencies (ii) Appropriate conditions designed to ensure that individuals to whom the product is administered are informed —

(I) that the Secretary has authorized the emergency use of the product;

(II) of the significant known and potential benefits and risks of such use, and of the extent to which such benefits and risks are unknown; and

(III) of the option to accept or refuse administration of the product, of the consequences, if any, of refusing administration of the product, and of the alternatives to the product that are available and of their benefits and risks.

All Moderna, Janssen (Johnson and Johnson) and all childhood Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines are being used under EUAs. And while the adult Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is supposed to be licensed with brand name Comirnaty, in fact the Pfizer adult vaccines being used in the US today are EUA products as well.

2. While FDA licensed Comirnaty, the only approved COVID vaccine, only Emergency Use Authorized (experimental) vaccines are being used in the US

Despite claims to the contrary, the licensed and branded Comirnaty has not been made available for administration in the US. The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, which is currently available, is authorized under an Emergency Use Authorization, which provides a broad liability shield to the manufacturer, distributor, administrator, program planner, and virtually anyone else involved in the vaccination process. The branded product, on the other hand, is subject to ordinary liability claims at the present time.

Exactly three weeks after FDA issued Comirnaty a license, the National Library of Medicine, part of the NIH, posted information that Pfizer was not planning to make Comirnaty available in the US while the EUA vaccine was still available.

Pfizer received FDA BLA license for its COVID-19 vaccine

Pfizer received FDA BLA license on 8/23/2021 for its COVID-19 vaccine for use in individuals 16 and older (COMIRNATY). At that time, the FDA published a BLA package insert that included the approved new COVID-19 vaccine tradename COMIRNATY and listed 2 new NDCs (0069-1000-03, 0069-1000-02) and images of labels with the new tradename.

At present, Pfizer does not plan to produce any product with these new NDCs and labels over the next few months while EUA authorized product is still available and being made available for U.S. distribution. As such, the CDC, AMA, and drug compendia may not publish these new codes until Pfizer has determined when the product will be produced with the BLA labels.

FDA extended the vaccine’s EUA authorization on the same day it licensed the vaccine.

FDA appears to have been acceding to the White House demand that the vaccine be licensed, to allow it to be mandated for large sectors of the US population. Under an EUA, which specifies that potential recipients have the right to refuse, mandates cannot be imposed. So a license was issued, allowing the administration to inform the public that the vaccine was fully approved and licensed. But in fact, the public was unable to access the licensed vaccine.

Why was this convoluted regulatory process performed? While under EUA, Pfizer has an almost bulletproof liability shield. According to the Congressional Research Service (CRS) on September 23, 2021, “courts have characterized PREP Act immunity as ‘sweeping.’” The CRS explains, “the PREP Act immunizes a covered person from legal liability for all claims for loss related to the administration or use of a covered countermeasure.”

3. FDA instructed Pfizer-BioNTech that FDA’s Congressionally-mandated databases are inadequate to assess the danger of myocarditis (and other potential COVID vaccine side effects) and therefore Pfizer-BioNTech must perform studies to evaluate these risks over the next six years

On the day FDA issued a license for Comirnaty, August 23, 2021, FDA instructed Pfizer-BioNTech that it did NOT have sufficient information on serious potential risks of the product, and required Pfizer and BioNTech, the manufacturers, to conduct a series of studies to assess these potential risks. These studies were to be performed on both products: the licensed Comirnaty and the EUA Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. Note that they include the requirement for a safety study in pregnancy, which will not be completed until December 31, 2025.

I have reproduced part of what FDA wrote about these required safety studies below, directly from pages 6-11 of the FDA approval letter sent to BioNTech.

FDA’s admission that it cannot assess these safety risks, and that up to 6 years will be taken to study them, provides us with additional de facto evidence that the Pfizer vaccines cannot be termed safe, as many of the fundamental safety studies are only now getting started.

“POSTMARKETING REQUIREMENTS UNDER SECTION 505(o) Section 505(o) of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDCA) authorizes FDA to require holders of approved drug and biological product applications to conduct postmarketing studies and clinical trials for certain purposes, if FDA makes certain findings required by the statute (section 505(o)(3)(A), 21 U.S.C. 355(o)(3)(A)).

We have determined that an analysis of spontaneous postmarketing adverse events reported under section 505(k)(1) of the FDCA will not be sufficient to assess known serious risks of myocarditis and pericarditis and identify an unexpected serious risk of subclinical myocarditis.

Furthermore, the pharmacovigilance system that FDA is required to maintain under section 505(k)(3) of the FDCA is not sufficient to assess these serious risks. Therefore, based on appropriate scientific data, we have determined that you are required to conduct the following studies:

  1. Study C4591009, entitled “A Non-Interventional Post-Approval Safety Study of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 mRNA Vaccine in the United States,” to evaluate the occurrence of myocarditis and pericarditis following administration of COMIRNATY. We acknowledge the timetable you submitted on August 21, 2021, which states that you will conduct this study according to the following schedule: Final Protocol Submission: August 31, 2021 Monitoring Report Submission: October 31, 2022 Interim Report Submission: October 31, 2023 Study Completion: June 30, 2025 Final Report Submission: October 31, 2025
  2. Study C4591021, entitled “Post Conditional Approval [EUA] Active Surveillance Study Among Individuals in Europe Receiving the Pfizer-BioNTech Coronavirus Page 7 – STN BL 125742/0 – Elisa Harkins Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Vaccine,” to evaluate the occurrence of myocarditis and pericarditis following administration of COMIRNATY. We acknowledge the timetable you submitted on August 21, 2021, which states that you will conduct this study according to the following schedule: Final Protocol Submission: August 11, 2021 Progress Report Submission: September 30, 2021 Interim Report 1 Submission: March 31, 2022 Interim Report 2 Submission: September 30, 2022 Interim Report 3 Submission: March 31, 2023 Interim Report 4 Submission: September 30, 2023 Interim Report 5 Submission: March 31, 2024 Study Completion: March 31, 2024 Final Report Submission: September 30, 2024
  3. Study C4591021 sub-study to describe the natural history of myocarditis and pericarditis following administration of COMIRNATY. We acknowledge the timetable you submitted on August 21, 2021, which states that you will conduct this study according to the following schedule: Final Protocol Submission: January 31, 2022 Study Completion: March 31, 2024 Final Report Submission: September 30, 2024 7. Study C4591036, a prospective cohort study with at least 5 years of follow-up for potential long-term sequelae of myocarditis after vaccination (in collaboration with Pediatric Heart Network). We acknowledge the timetable you submitted on August 21, 2021, which states that you will conduct this study according to the following schedule: Final Protocol Submission: November 30, 2021 Study Completion: December 31, 2026 Page 8 – STN BL 125742/0 – Elisa Harkins Final Report Submission: May 31, 2027
  4. Study C4591007 sub-study to prospectively assess the incidence of subclinical myocarditis following administration of the second dose of COMIRNATY in a subset of participants 5 through 15 years of age. We acknowledge the timetable you submitted on August 21, 2021, which states that you will conduct this assessment according to the following schedule: Final Protocol Submission: September 30, 2021 Study Completion: November 30, 2023 Final Report Submission: May 31, 2024
  5. Study C4591031 sub-study to prospectively assess the incidence of subclinical myocarditis following administration of a third dose of COMIRNATY in a subset of participants 16 to 30 years of age. We acknowledge the timetable you submitted on August 21, 2021, which states that you will conduct this study according to the following schedule: Final Protocol Submission: November 30, 2021 Study Completion: June 30, 2022.

Final Report Submission: December 31, 2022 …

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

Final Protocol Submission: July 1, 2021 Study Completion: June 30, 2025

Final Report Submission: December 31, 2025

4. The World Health Organization does not recommend COVID vaccines for normal children

The WHO website “WHO SHOULD GET VACCINATED” states the following:

Children and adolescents tend to have milder disease compared to adults, so unless they are part of a group at higher risk of severe COVID-19, it is less urgent to vaccinate them than older people, those with chronic health conditions and health workers.

More evidence is needed on the use of the different COVID-19 vaccines in children to be able to make general recommendations on vaccinating children against COVID-19.

WHO’s Strategic Advisory Group of Experts (SAGE) has concluded that the Pfizer/BionTech vaccine is suitable for use by people aged 12 years and above. Children aged between 12 and 15 who are at high risk may be offered this vaccine alongside other priority groups for vaccination. Vaccine trials for children are ongoing and WHO will update its recommendations when the evidence or epidemiological situation warrants a change in policy.

If the World Health Organization believes there is insufficient evidence to support general vaccination of normal children, why would this committee and the Maine Legislature think otherwise?

To sum up:

  • All available COVID vaccines are experimental products.
  • Legally, recipients must be offered the right to refuse.
  • Mandates negate the right of refusal.
  • Basic safety questions regarding the vaccines have not been resolved, and some will not be answered until 2027.
  • The WHO does not recommend broad COVID vaccinations for children.
  • Parents should be permitted to make individualized decisions regarding their children’s risks and benefits from COVID vaccines.
  • Unfortunately, no one can make a fully informed decision about COVID vaccines until the public has access to complete information on safety and efficacy, which are not now available. This fact alone should negate all mandates.

Thank you very much for your attention.

Meryl Nass, MD

© 2022 Children’s Health Defense, Inc. This work is reproduced and distributed with the permission of Children’s Health Defense, Inc. Want to learn more from Children’s Health Defense? Sign up for free news and updates from Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and the Children’s Health Defense. Your donation will help to support us in our efforts.

January 12, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , | Leave a comment

It is time to end the pandemic state of emergency

Declare the Pandemic Over! 

By Paul Elias Alexander, PhD | January 12, 2022

I begin with the end. It is time we allow policy to be made by the States as POTUS Biden has indicated. Omicron has presented the unique opportunity for the federal and local governments to declare success, that the vaccines have helped somewhat, the risk is very low for Omicron, and that COVID January 2022 is not COVID February 2020.

The vaccines have shown themselves to be ineffective now and there are reports of adverse effects and even deaths post vaccine. This is a real concern and forms part of my view that we must end this now. All of it. To the extent that vaccines were ever needed, my view remains ‘no’.

Yes, I can repeat what I have stated repeatedly and for well over a year now (AIER) and more recently (Brownstone), that the lockdowns are and were futile, and so were the school closures and mask mandates. That mass testing and isolation/quarantine of asymptomatic persons was useless and actually harmful. That you could never ever defeat a mutable respiratory virus and especially one with an animal reservoir and open borders. That the lockdown policies caused crushing harms on societies and especially those least able to afford them. That business owners and laid off employees and children self-harmed and took their own lives. That you would deny people the right to choose vaccination or not (their natural immunity), with relentless infringement on their liberties and humanity. That you would work to wrongfully and without scientific basis, separate the society on vaccine status. That you would claim success when the epidemic waves declined without any regard for seasonality and the natural behavior of the epidemic and as such, insist you do more and more of the same failed policies.

Yes, I could go on and on about the catastrophic failures of the lockdowns and near every pandemic policy and action taken, but this is not the place. We have to focus on moving forward for the society is dangerously fractured, polarized, and divided. Yes, we have plenty of time to revisit and examine what went wrong and I do not wish to be sidetracked and want to focus on ‘ending the pandemic emergency’ and ‘moving forward’ immediately given the trauma to the society.

The fact is that we know extensively more on who is at risk and how to manage and treat COVID. Omicron can allow the government to now save face and declare success. We can thus begin healing our societies. It is time we learn to manage this virus and go on with life, and start by ending the emergency, the restrictions, and mandates. Now. The nation is suffering and especially our children, and in many respects, needlessly.

It is time now. It is time we be brave as a society. It is time to end the pandemic state of emergency. It is time also to end the controls, the closures, the restrictions, the plexiglass, the social distancing stickers and exhortations, the distancing announcements, and also the vaccine mandates given the overwhelming evidence implying that the infection explosion globally that we have been experiencing – post-double vaccination and even triple vaccination in e.g. Israel, UK, US etc. – may be due to the vaccinated becoming infected and spreading Covid as much or more than the unvaccinated.

We have emerging indications (not yet affirmed) that 95% of infections in Germany are among the fully vaccinated. Additional evidence of the seeming failure of the vaccines emerged when Omicron cases spiked in Germany’s most vaccinated state. Israel is already considering a fourth vaccination for the elderly (given that the prior three shots have been largely ineffective with vaccinal immunity rapidly waning) and also whether to end vaccination in everyone except high-risk people, and thus adopting a ‘herd’ immunity policy.

The former COVID czar of Israel has now alluded that Omicron “will give Israel herd immunity without swamping ICUs.” In Israel, it is becoming increasingly clear that Omicron could lead to population-level herd immunity. Denmark is also signaling admission of Omicron’s deliverance from the COVID-19 pandemic, stating “it will impart a kind of herd immunity shielding the country from future variants.” Vaccines and mandates are increasingly being called into question in the face of Omicron with health experts saying “the highly transmissible Omicron variant could help countries reach herd immunity as cases continue to rise.”

COVID is circling the drain and this pandemic emergency can end. This will take courage and political will. Ending this is really a societal decision where the population must decide it is time to go on with usual life, making reasonable commonsense decisions and taking necessary precautions. This means we will have to come to terms with living with the pathogen and that this is reasonable and was expected. This signals a healthy society. We already have the Great Barrington Declaration and a 20-step Alexander/Brownstone Model as signposts to help us emerge.

The evidence shows that there is no marked difference between the vaccinated and unvaccinated in terms of infection risk and harboring of heavy viral load, relative to previous variants. We have accumulated evidence that appear to strongly support this (Brownstone here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here,here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

What these studies have shown are that vaccines have not protected against the Delta and Omicron variants. Importantly, they show that the vaccines cannot stop the disease from spreading and eventually infect most of us. That is, while the vaccines provide individual benefits to the vaccinee, and especially to older high-risk people, the public benefit of universal vaccination is in grave doubt.

As such, Covid vaccines should not be expected to contribute to eliminating the communal spread of the virus or the reaching of herd immunity. These vaccines cannot cut the chain of transmission and thus have no role in contributing to herd immunity. We also have accumulated evidence that the vaccines are harmful for many, and alarmingly in young persons e.g. myocarditis in males < 40 years of age (Patone et al.). What we are seeing is that the vaccines are very limited in stopping Omicron infection that now dominates. It is becoming increasingly clear that we will have to rely on natural immunity (COVID-recovered) to get us to population-level herd immunity.

This unravels the rationale for vaccine mandates and passports. “The notion that we have to vaccinate every living, walking American – and eventually every newborn – in order to control the pandemic,” writes Marty Makary, “is based on the false assumption that the risk of dying from COVID-19 is equally distributed in the population. It’s not. We have always known that it’s very hard for the virus to hurt someone who is young and healthy. And that’s still the case.”

As it currently stands, the SCOTUS seems poised to rule against POTUS Biden’s vaccine and testing mandates for businesses. We even have evidence that Omicron arrived on all 7 continents, as 36 cases were reported in Antarctica.

We also know that natural immunity is superior to vaccine immunity and it always was. Any suggestions otherwise by public health leaders and officials have been an effort to misinform and mislead the public into vaccinating. It is actually a scandal, outrageously so, that the natural immunity (COVID-recovered) of persons is not being recognized as equal to and even superior to vaccine immunity as it is.

It turns out that we have data to show that natural immunity is life-long, with data showing that it is robust near 100 years after exposure e.g. researchers find long-lived immunity to 1918 pandemic virus, CIDRAP, 2008 and the actual 2008 NATURE journal publication by Yu. We also know of the research that exposure to prior common cold coronavirus provides protection and that we were likely all immune at some level e.g. exposure to common cold coronaviruses can teach the immune system to recognize SARS-CoV-2, La Jolla, Crotty and Sette, 2020 and selective and cross-reactive SARS-CoV-2 T cell epitopes in unexposed humans, Mateus, 2020, as well as those who had SARS-1 in 2003 were immune to SARS-CoV-2 now e.g. SARS-CoV-2-specific T cell immunity in cases of COVID-19 and SARS, and uninfected controls, Le Bert, 2020.

It is becoming more apparent then, that the pandemic is on its last legs and Omicron has ushered this endemic (endemic equilibrium) phase in, thankfully. This variant is milder yet highly infectious. Yes, we have had approximately 1 million new cases in one day in the United States as January 2022 arrived and we have to take this seriously and be on guard as the pandemic winds down.

Importantly, while there has been an increase, the massive hospitalization has not occurred and the ICU and death curves that typically follow the infection and case curves by approximately one to two weeks, have not materialized. The deaths are about one-tenth of Delta’s. The New York Times has reported that Omicron is not more severe for children, this despite increasing hospitalizations. Dr. Fauci has also weighed in by stating “hospitals are overcounting COVID-19 cases in children because they automatically get tested.”

This is tremendous news for populations. We have been fortunate that the variants have been mild as expected (Muller’s ratchet), yet there is always a small risk that a novel variant can be pathogenic. We continue to be hopeful that the mildness and non-lethality of Omicron remains so and we have no data or evidence to suggest otherwise.

The very good news is based on the best data to date. The vaccines have served their purpose but have shown themselves to be insufficient against the Omicron variant, which by the very infectious nature of this variant, will affect virtually everyone regardless of vaccinations. Moreover, after its current steep rise, there will be a peak and decline and reduction of what is left of Covid to small endemic pockets that may recur in the fall like flu but will continue according to best evidence as mild if annoying infections.

The evidence accumulated rapidly that Omicron quickly escalated, peaked, and then declined as rapidly (here, here, here, here). “If you look at the United States, the bulk of the infections should be mid-January, and we should start seeing a decline in the second half of January,” Vespignani says. “So it’s, in a sense, very soon.”

Recent research findings out of Hong Kong give us even more good news. Researchers reported that “Omicron SARS-CoV-2 infects and multiplies 70 times faster than the Delta variant and original SARS-CoV-2 in human bronchus.” This helps account for why this variant may spread faster between humans than prior variants e.g. Delta. Their study also showed that “the Omicron infection in the lung is significantly lower than the original SARS-CoV-2, which may be an indicator of lower disease severity.”

Researchers found that “the variant replicates much faster in the bronchus, which connects the windpipe to the lungs, 24 hours after infection. Yet it reproduces more than 10 times slower in the actual human lung tissue.”

In sum, this is all great news.

Yes, there is evidence of reinfection (though the data is still to be robustly collected and expert immunologists explain this represents more of an ‘immune rechallenge’ and not pure breach of natural acquired/adaptive immunity) but by all accounts, the symptoms are mild, with reports that even the elderly require no treatment and that symptoms are short-lived. This is excellent news and we see no indications that this will change. At the same time, we should expect some modest amount of death in vulnerable persons. In effect, COVID can be considered being over and Omicron has hastened the pace of endemic transition. Omicron is being exalted as nature’s vaccine, a gift, an off-ramp, an exit strategy for governments and COVID policy decision-makers, should they have the courage and will to avail themselves of it.

In summary, it is now time to end the pandemic’s state of emergency and everything associated with it. All mandates. It is time we accept that we will live with COVID as we live with other mild common cold coronaviruses. Normal infection is the risk we accept in a free society that comes with day-to-day living. It comes with freedom to make commonsense decisions, based on one’s personal risk profile, one’s own needs, values, and preferences.

There is never ‘zero risk’ and vulnerable persons may succumb but if there is one thing COVID has taught us or reminded us, it is that we must properly and strongly protect the vulnerable (elderly) and high-risk persons among us ‘first.’ But ‘zero COVID’ or ‘stop COVID at all costs’ only destroys economies, and the collateral damage as to harms and suicides are crushing. This is particularly so for women and children and especially those poorer among us who can least afford. We must never take this path again or allow our governments the emergency powers to implement these liberty- and human rights-crushing lockdown policies. Lockdown costs (financial and otherwise) have been catastrophic and will incur millions of years of life lost to Americans.

It is time we allow policy to be made by the States as POTUS Biden has indicated. Omicron has presented the opportunity for the federal and local governments to declare success, that the vaccines have helped, the risk is very low for Omicron, and that COVID January 2022 is not COVID February 2020.

We know extensively more on who is at risk and how to manage and treat COVID. Omicron can allow the government to now save face and declare success. We can thus begin healing our societies. It is time we learn to manage this virus and go on with life, and start by ending the emergency, the restrictions, and mandates.

January 12, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Science and Pseudo-Science | , , | Leave a comment

Washington DC to combine photo ID with vaccine passport scheme

By Didi Rankovic | Reclaim The Net | January 12, 2022

The mayor of Washington DC has decided to introduce new Covid restriction to the US capital starting on January 15, when businesses and many venues will start asking for proof of vaccination and, on top, a picture ID as yet more proof – that their vaccine pass really belongs to them.

The new rules concerning ID verification will apply to everyone over 18 who wishes to enter a restaurant, bar, gym, movie theater, etc., and the mandate is being introduced by Mayor Muriel Bowser, a Democrat. Bowser announced the more stringent measures back in December.

Children aged 12 to 18 will also have to show vaccination cards if they wish to enter restaurants, concert venues, bowling alleys, and other venues. In addition, these businesses will have to put a sign in their window that notifies customers and reads, “Attention: Per Mayor’s Order 2021-48, COVID-19 Vaccination is REQUIRED to enter this business” – the Washington DC government’s site explains.

However, the inclusion of photo IDs in the vaccine mandate scheme in the District as an order coming from a Democratic mayor looks puzzling to those who recall that the party’s leaders, including President Biden, previously equated requiring photo IDs to vote to “21st century Jim Crow” – referring to historical state and local racial segregation laws in the US.

When Biden went after Georgia last summer for its new voter law that required citizens to prove their identity with an ID, he effectively accused the state and Republicans of introducing discrimination against minorities, who are most likely to lack picture IDs, saying the new legislation was “un-American” and designed to deny people their rights – in that case, the right to vote.

Biden went on to accuse his political opponents of enacting a law that was “a blatant attack on the Constitution and good conscience.”

But no such consideration seems to now be extended to Washington DC residents who will have to show their ID cards, driver’s licenses, passports, or another state-issued document to avoid getting cut off from many everyday activities.

January 12, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Progressive Hypocrite | , , | Leave a comment

US quietly ditches project to pipe ‘Israeli’ gas to Europe: Report

Press TV – January 12, 2022

The United States has abandoned a subsea pipeline designed to supply Europe with natural gas from the eastern Mediterranean, as tensions continue to grow between Greece and Turkey over gas reserves in the region.

The Middle East Eye (MEE) news portal reported on Wednesday that Washington had submitted a non-paper to Athens earlier this week, expressing its concerns over the EastMed project. The note described the project as a “primary source of tensions” and something “destabilizing” the region by putting Turkey and regional countries at loggerheads, according to the Greek media.

The non-paper also cited environmental concerns, lack of economic and commercial viability, and creating tensions in the region as reasons to explain why the US no longer supported the project, Greek public broadcaster ERT said.

Greece, Cyprus, and Israel signed an agreement in 2020 for the construction of the Eastern Mediterranean pipeline, a 1,900-kilometer (1,180-mile) undersea pipeline designed to deliver Israeli natural gas to Europe by 2025 to help Europe diversify its energy resources. The project was expected to initially carry 10 billion cubic meters of gas a year to Europe.

In a statement on Sunday, the US State Department said that it no longer supported the construction of the EastMed gas pipeline project, saying Washington was shifting its focus to electricity interconnectors that can support both gas and renewable energy sources.

“We remain committed to physically interconnecting East Med energy to Europe,” the statement said, adding, “We support projects such as the planned EuroAfrica interconnector from Egypt to Crete and the Greek mainland, and the proposed EuroAsia interconnector to link the Israeli, Cypriot and European electricity grids.”

Turkish officials on Tuesday welcomed the US statement on the project.

An unnamed Turkish official told the MEE that Turkey wasn’t particularly surprised by the decision. “US officials never thought this project was feasible,” the official said. “We knew that they didn’t support it.”

A second Turkish official also said Ankara always told its neighbors that it wasn’t technically possible to carry Israeli gas through Cyprus, and the only alternative was through Turkey. “Otherwise the Israeli gas could be used for local consumption,” the second official added.

Turkey opposes the pipeline project, which passes through disputed maritime territories claimed by both Turkey and Greece. It has repeatedly said that any plans in the eastern Mediterranean that exclude Ankara are bound to fail.

January 12, 2022 Posted by | Economics, Timeless or most popular | , , , | Leave a comment

Where Are the Realists?

US foreign policy endangers Americans without delivering any benefits

BY PHILIP GIRALDI • UNZ REVIEW • JANUARY 11, 2022

Sometimes it seems that when it comes to international relations Russian president Vladimir Putin might be the only head of state who is capable of any rational proposals. His recent negotiating positions conveyed initially by Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Rybakov to step back from the brink of war between his country and the United States over Ukraine are largely eminently sensible and would defuse the possibility that Eastern Europe might become a future Sarajevo incident that would ignite a nuclear war. Per Putin, “We need long-term legally binding guarantees even if we know they cannot be trusted, as the US frequently withdraws from treaties that become uninteresting to them. But…something [more is needed], not just verbal assurances.”

Putin and President Biden discussed the Russian proposals and other issues in a phone conversation on December 30th, in which Biden called for diplomacy, and both he and Putin reportedly took steps to defuse the possible confrontation. In the phone call the two presidents agreed to initiate bilateral negotiations described as “strategic stability dialogue” relating to “mutual security guarantees” which have now begun on Sunday, January 9th, in Geneva. That will be followed by an exploratory meeting of the NATO-Russia Council on Wednesday and another meeting with the Organization for Security and Cooperation on Thursday.

Pat Buchanan, who is somewhat skeptical about Russian overreach, has summed up the Putin position, which he refers to as an ultimatum, as “Get off our front porch. Get out of our front yard. And stay out of our backyard.” Putin has demanded that NATO cease expansion into Eastern Europe, which threatens only Russia, while also scaling back planned missile emplacements in those former Warsaw Pact states that are already members of the alliance. He also has called on the US to reduce harassing incursions by warships and strategic bombers along the Russian border and to cease efforts to insert military bases in the five ‘Stans along the Russian federation’s southern border. In other words, Russia believes that it should not have hostile military forces gathering along its borders, that it should have some kind of legally guaranteed and internationally endorsed strategic security zone such as the United States enjoys behind two oceans with friendly governments to north and south.

Buchanan concludes that there is much room for negotiating a serious agreement that will satisfy both sides, observing that the US now has through NATO untenable security arrangements with 28 European countries. He notes how “The day cannot be far off when the US is going to have to review and discard Cold War commitments that date to the 1940s and 1950s, and require us to fight a nuclear power such as Russia for countries that have nothing to do with our vital interests or our national security.”

Secretary of State Tony Blinken has been openly skeptical about the Russian proposals, arguing that Moscow is a threat to Europe, though the extent that the Biden administration will play hard ball over the details is difficult to assess. Blinken and NATO have already declared that they will continue their expansion into Eastern Europe and the White House is reportedly preparing harsh new sanctions against Russia if the talks are not successful. To be sure, Administration pushback may be a debating technique to moderate or even eliminate some of the demands, or there may actually be hard liners from the Center for New American Security who have the administration’s ear who want to confront Russia. Either way, both Blinken and Biden have warned the Russians “not to make a serious mistake over Ukraine,” also stating that there would be “massive” economic consequences if there were any attack by Russian troops. After a meeting with Germany’s new Foreign Minister, Blinken asserted last week that there would be no progress in diplomatic approaches to the problem as long as there is a Russian “gun pointed at Ukraine’s head.” In reality, of course, Moscow is 5,000 miles away from Washington and the truly dangerous pointed gun has been in the hands of NATO and the US right on Russia’s doorstep.

To be sure, fighting Russia is popular in some circles, largely a result of incessant negative media coverage about Putin and his government. Opinion polls suggest that half of all Americans favor sending troops to defend the Ukrainians. The Republicans, notably Senators Ted Cruz, Tom Cotton and Marco Rubio, appear to be particularly enthusiastic regarding going to war over Ukraine as well as with China over Taiwan and openly advocate both admitting Ukraine into NATO as well as sending troops and weapons as well as providing intelligence to assist Kiev. They argue that it is necessary to defend American democracy and also to maintain the US’s “credibility,” the last refuge of a scoundrel nation, as Daniel Larison observes , since Washington frequently “goes back on its word.” And then there are the crazies like Ohio Congressman Mike Turner who says that US troops must be sent to Ukraine to defend American democracy. Or Republican Senator from Mississippi Roger Wicker who favors a possible unilateral nuclear first-strike to “rain destruction on Russian military capability,” leading to a global conflict that wouldn’t be so bad as it would only kill 10 to 20 million Americans.

Russia has a right to be worried as something is brewing in Kazakhstan right now that just might be a replay of the US-supported NGO-instigated successful overthrow of the Ukrainian government in 2014. The Collective Security Treaty Organization members Russia, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Armenia, have sent soldiers responding to the Kazakh government’s request for help. Unfortunately, US foreign policy is not only about Russia. The Taiwan issue continues to fester with a similar resonance to the Ukraine crisis. China, a rising power, increasingly wants to assert itself in its neighborhood while the US is trying to alternatively confront and contain it while also propping up relationships that evolved after the Korean War and during the Cold War. The status quo is unsustainable, but US moves to “protect” Taiwan are themselves destabilizing as they make the Chinese suspicious of American intentions and will likely lead to unnecessary armed conflict.

And let’s not ignore America’s continued devastation by sanctions and bombs of civilian populations in Venezuela, Syria, Iran, Afghanistan and Yemen to punish the governments of those countries. And, of course there, is always Israel, good old loyal ally and greatly loved by all politicians and the media, Israel, the Jewish state. Biden continues to waffle on reentry into the Iran nuclear non-proliferation agreement, which is good for the US, under pressure from Israel and its domestic “Amen chorus.” Just last month, speaking at a Zionist Organization of America Gala, former CIA Director and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo intoned that “There is no more important task of the Secretary of State than standing for Israel and there is no more important ally to the United States than Israel.” Add to that Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s unforgettable bleat about her love for Israel, “I have said to people when they ask me if this Capitol crumbled to the ground, the one thing that would remain is our commitment to our aid… and I don’t even call it aid…our cooperation with Israel. That’s fundamental to who we are.”

You might ask how any American leader could so blatantly state that US interests are subordinate to those of a foreign country, but there we are. And it is tragic that our president is willing to sacrifice American military lives in support of interests that are completely fraudulent. The truth is that we have a government that in bipartisan fashion does everything ass backwards while the American people struggle to pay the bills and watch their quality of life and even their security go downhill. Again citing Vladimir Putin’s wisdom on the subject, one might observe that as early as 2007 at the Munich Security Conference, the Russian president said that the “lawless behavior” of the United States in insisting on global dominance and leadership did not respect the vital interests of other nations and undermined both the desire for and the mechanisms established to encourage peaceful relations. He got that right. That is the crux of the matter. There is neither credibility nor humanity to American foreign policy, and everyone knows that the United States and allies like Israel are basically rogue nations that obey no rules and respect no one else’s rights. This has been somewhat true since the Second World War but it has become routine practice in nearly all of America’s international relations since 9/11 and the real losers are the American people, who have to shoulder the burden of an increasingly feckless and hopelessly corrupt political class.

Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org.

January 12, 2022 Posted by | Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

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