Month: August 2024

Ukraine has issued a formal request for Mexico to arrest Russian President Vladimir Putin if he travels to Mexican soil for the inauguration of the country’s new president Claudia Sheinbaum.

The request comes after on Tuesday it was widely reported that the Mexican embassy in Moscow confirmed that Putin has been issued an invitation to attend the swearing in events. 

“The Russian President will decide whether he will participate in the ceremony himself or appoint another high-ranking official to do so on his behalf,” the embassy was quoted in Reuters as saying.

The invitation went out despite the Hague-based International Criminal Court (ICC) having issued an arrest warrant against Putin in 2023. Interestingly, Mexico is a signatory to the Rome Statute, which requires member states to enforce the rulings of the ICC.

To be expected, Ukraine is livid, with the Embassy of Ukraine in Mexico emphasizing that Putin is a “war criminal” and that Mexico must pursue his arrest. The embassy issued a fresh statement calling Putin and the whole spectacle of the invitation “shameful”:

“This shameful crime will be one of the many reasons why Putin, along with the rest of the Russian military-political leadership, will one day have to stand trial for launching a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, sanctioning shelling, shooting, torture, rape and robbery of the Ukrainian people. And for now, we believe that the Mexican government will in any case fulfill the international arrest warrant by handing it over to the UN judicial body in The Hague.”

However, Mexico’s foreign ministry has defended its actions by telling Reuters that “the government had sent diplomatic notes to all nations with which it had relations, as well as international organizations of which it is a member, inviting them to Sheinbaum’s inauguration.”

The inauguration of President-elect Sheinbaum will take place on October 1, and the Russian Embassy in Mexico has confirmed that it had received the invitation. Upon Sheinbaum’s victory in the June 2nd election, President Putin congratulated her and said he looks forward to more years to come of positive and cooperative relations between Moscow and Mexico City.

It didn’t take long for Mexico to respond to the Embassy of Ukraine:

Outgoing Mexican president, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, told reporters at a press conference on Thursday that the country would not arrest Putin if he did visit, adding: “We can’t do that. It’s not up to us.”

While it is unlikely that Putin will travel to Mexico given everything that’s happening related to the Ukraine war, he’s likely to make Western officials sweat a bit by not announcing his intentions until just before the event.

Authored by Charlotte Gill via The Critic,

Did you know that the UK defeated fascism on Wednesday? Blink and you might have missed it, but newspapers were swift to record The Battle of Britain, August 7, 2024 — history ready to be clipped and filed away, handed to the grandkids one day. 

“Night anti-hate marchers faced down the thugs”, ran The Daily Mail’s front page, The Times’ equivalent reading “Thousands take to street to confront far right”. Lisa Nandy, the Culture Secretary, took to X to proclaim:

“The history of our town is working class people who have driven the far right out of town over and over again for 100 years. Our community sent that message again last night.”

But where was this “far right”? The existential threat that had been so valiantly “driven out” by groups such as “Grannies Against Fascism” and the legions of millennial hipsters that had gathered in Walthamstow? 

Earlier that day the borough’s MP Stella Creasy delivered a video message on X. Sporting large shades — perhaps hiding weary eyes; the sort Churchill might have had ahead of D-Day — she updated locals on “how to get home safely tonight”. In spite of the hazardous conditions, probably not dissimilar to those experienced by Londoners during the Blitz, Walthamstow’s warriors later braved the outdoors to show fascism what for. 

Their fortitude was all the more commendable given the endless stream of TV broadcasts about tens of far right units deployed to different parts of the UK. ITV’s Paul Brand spoke of 6,000 police officers “on standby”, while shops boarded up their windows. Taking to X, one brave soldier, by the name of “Paddy Tofu”, wrote “The last time I actively stood against the fash was in my 20s”. He confessed that, now in his 50s, he felt less confident in his combat skills. “Still going tho”, he ended. That’s the spirit! As Vera Lynn put it,  “we’ll meet again”!

But as Paddy Tofu stood on the frontlines, shoulder to shoulder with his courageous comrades, the Far Right appeared to have gone mysteriously AWOL — and with it, reality too. To anyone with fully-functioning eyesight, there were, at most, handfuls of unsavoury souls dotted around the country. Some of the Far Right — “four or five”, reported Pink News — reared their fascistic heads in Brighton. Photos of them being confronted by “anti-fascists” didn’t exactly look like the Allies (hypothetically) storming into Hitler’s bunker. The Far Right Four (or five?) gave the impression that one or other of them might say “Tommy Robinson tells it as it is!” after a few pints and own a Princess Diana mug. But was this “the Far Right” aka members of a growing and vast network of fascists? Going on headlines alone, you might believe Wednesday saw the thwarting of the “Brighton Anschluss”.

These days I do tend to wonder how many modern “anti-fascists”, some sporting balaclavas (the surefire sign of being on the right side of history), know about World War II and other periods they invoke. We are warned more about history than ever before — yet almost always with the effect of minimising it. The meaning of words — fascism, Nazi, far right — have been totally rewritten.

At the helm of this revisionism is the Establishment — the media and a Government that lied and continues to lie to Brits about how big the far right threat is. The Labour Party is quite prepared to conflate teenage boys smashing the window of Greggs (as happened in some of the riots) with the few extreme ideological right-wing nutters Britain has, should it help boost “far right” numbers.

Exaggerations around the size of the far right are hardly new. In 2023, a report commissioned by the Conservative government warned that Prevent (the UK’s counter terrorism service) “has a double standard when dealing with the Extreme Right-Wing and Islamism. Prevent takes an extensive approach to the Extreme Right-Wing, capturing a variety of influences that, at times, has been so broad it has included mildly controversial or provocative forms of mainstream, right-wing leaning commentary that have no meaningful connection to terrorism or radicalisation”, whereas it has increased the threshold for Islamist extremism. It’s noteworthy that, in 2021, referrals for Extreme Right-Wing ideology were higher than Islamist referrals (25 per cent and 22 per cent, respectively), even though Islamist extremism is still the UK’s largest threat — by far.

Often it feels as if the diversity paradigm has been embedded into counter-terror strategy; as though, in trying to seem inclusive and determined to combat “Islamophobia”, the authorities, media and politicians “overcompensate” by exaggerating Far Right numbers (“LOOK HOW MUCH WE CALL OUT THEM TOO!”).

But where was the Far Right yesterday, and in general? Does this neo-Nazi collective have a name or lair? A “Far Right Caliphate”? Could members be deradicalised from whatever it is they’ve been programmed into? These are the questions that won’t be asked, never mind answered, by the Establishment, desperate to have its “big, bad wolf”, even though lack of one should surely be a cause for celebration.

The Establishment’s hyping up of “the far right” is not only a type of “misinformation”, but dangerous on multiple fronts — not least as a pretext for mission creep, whereby anyone guilty of mildly conservative sentiment could be next in line for Starmer, who needs to prove a “Far Right” collective, soaring in size. 

Inaccuracy also affects how counter-terrorism resources are allocated, leading to blindspots in what people the security services decide to monitor. It could mean an intelligence agent was taken off a research project about, say, the extremist Islamic militia Ansar al- Sharia, to study men who follow Tommy Robinson on X. 

I mention this militia specifically because, in 2012, Khairi Saadallah, a Libyan asylum seeker who “was trained to fight and fought (for a period of at least 8 months), as a member of the now-proscribed group, went on to murder three men who’d met in a Reading park (2020). The swift manner in which he executed his victims, indicative of the fact he had been trained to kill, was commented upon in sentencing remarks.

Saadallah was referred to Prevent four times and known by intelligence services, but never deported back to “unsafe” Libya. Cases like his are surely most pressing for the political class to consider. But Starmer is preoccupied creating 500 new prison spaces for rioters.

In any normal era, politicians and the media would admit that Wednesday was the product of hype — understandably among normal people, who had witnessed the riots over the weekend, but with suspicious credulity among our political and media classes. Yet in any normal era news outlets/ MPs wouldn’t have been so misleading about the scale of the Far Right in the first place. Thugs, however violent, racist and mad, are not the same thing as the fascistic collective they spoke of — as though its size and strategy were parallel to Daesh’s.

Instead, a new narrative was spun about Wednesday. It was a victory for the anti-fascists, said a media apparently modelling itself on North Korean broadcasting. Nothing was said about a “fake list” of rioters nor HOPE not Hate’s Nick Lowles spreading unfounded rumours of an acid attack on a Muslim woman. Meanwhile the country has been locking up “the far right” while releasing people convicted of crimes up to and including manslaughter.

A real confrontation with authoritarians may be sooner than we think.

Authored by Chris Morrison via DailySceptic.org,

Massive increases in coral across the Australian Great Barrier Reef (GBR) have been reported for 2023-24 making it the third record year in a row of heavy growth. Across almost all parts of the 1,500 mile long reef, from the warmer northern waters to the cooler conditions in the south, coral is now at its highest level since detailed observations began. The inconvenient news has been ignored in mainstream media which, curiously, have focused on a non-story in Nature that claimed “climate change” poses an “existential threat” to the GBR.

“The science tells us that the GBR is in danger – and we should be guided by the science,” Professor Helen McGregor from the University of Wollongong told Victoria Gill of BBC News. 

The existential threat is “now realised” reported the Guardian.

Travelling back from the reality inhabited by the Guardian, it can be reported that last year’s gains were eye-catchingly large. On the Northern GBR, hard coral cover leapt from 35.8% to 39.5%, in the central area it rose from 30.7% to 34%, while in the south it went from 34% to 39.1%. The report is the result of monitoring of hard coral cover reefs from August 2023 to June 2024 by the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS). The percentage of hard coral cover is a standard measurement of reef conditions used by scientists and is said to provide a simple and robust measure of reef health. Similar reports have been published by the AIMS over the last 38 years.

For the first two years of record coral growth, the narrative-driven mainstream media ignored the recovery story. But this year, the suspicious might contend, something had to be done to blunt the sensational news of the stonking rises. Help has come in the form of a paper just published in Nature which uses proxy temperature measurements and climate models to suggest temperatures around the vast reef area are the highest recorded in 400 years. This time period is the blink of an ecological eye-lid given that coral has been around for hundreds of millions of years during periods when temperatures and atmospheric carbon dioxide have been markedly different. Nevertheless, this is said to pose an existential threat despite it being known that sub-tropical corals thrive between 24°C-32°C, and in fact seem to grow faster in warmer waters.

Natural bleaching, when the coral expels algae and turns white, can occur with temporary local temperature changes, but evidence from many years of scientific observation suggests the corals often and quickly recover. Long term changes in water temperature – tiny compared to coral’s optimum conditions – pose no threat, but alarmists concentrate on the bleaching events to warn of possible ecological collapse. The Guardian noted a recent fifth mass bleaching in eight years across the reef, driven, it claimed, by “global heating”. So far, its readers are in the dark as to how this squares with the recent record growth.

A decade of mass bleaching, relentlessly catastrophised in the interests of Net Zero by activists in the media, academia and politics, does not appear to have done much harm to the recent growth in the Northern GBR.

Or the central area.

Or even in the south where the water temperatures are slightly cooler.

To read the latest AIMS report is to read the best possible spin on the story that the reef is heading for disaster. And, of course, it is all down to the unproven changes in climate that are said to be caused by human activity. It is claimed this will cause more frequent and long-lasting marine ‘heatwaves’, a product no doubt of a climate model. It is generally suggested that these heatwaves and mass bleaching were rare prior to the 1990s, although how anyone can know this is a mystery. Detailed GBR observations and temperature recordings barely stretch back a few decades.

As is often the case with publicly-funded operations, the political message is never far from the surface. Thus we learn that “enabling coral reefs to survive these stressful conditions requires a combination of a reduction in global greenhouse emissions to stabilise temperatures… and the development of interventions to help reefs adapt to and recover from the effects of climate change”. No doubt this last proposal requires large amounts of money from the taxpayer to cover the costs of such worthy work.

Not everyone goes along with the coral fear-mongering. The distinguished scientist Dr. Peter Ridd has studied the GBR for 40 years and notes that coral numbers have “exploded” in recent years. He says that all 3,000 reefs in the world’s largest system have excellent coral. “Not a single reef or even a single species of reef life has been lost since British settlement,” he reports. The impact of bleaching is “routinely exaggerated by the media and some scientific organisations”. In his view, the public is being deceived about the reef. “How this occurred is a serious issue for the reef-science community which has embraced emotion, ideology and raw self-interest to maintain funding,” he observes.

Since the last presidential election in the United States, four states have implemented strict photo ID laws at the polls, bringing the count of places with these types of laws to 10. Additionally, three more states have made their ID laws stricter and in one state, such a change was blocked by courts.

Around 29 million Americans of voting age live in states where voter ID laws were tightened, while the number of those living under strict photo ID requirements rose from fewer than 30 million to more than 50 million. Research by the University of Maryland shows that as of the fall of 2023, almost 50 million Americans or around 20 percent of adults citizens were estimated to not have a valid driver’s license or at least not one with their current name or address on it, among them 23 million Democrats, 15.7 million Republicans and 10.5 million Independents.

As Statista’s Katharina Buchholz details below, combining these numbers means that around 10 million voting-age adults could be negatively affected by photo ID laws in November 2024. 

You will find more infographics at Statista

Other research, however, shows that party mobilization and outreach have successfully compensated for these negative effects on voter turnout in the past.

Voter ID laws, specifically those strictly requiring photo ID, are a contentious topic. 

While proponents say that bringing official and easy-to-verify identification on election day should be a no-brainer, the lack of a uniform national ID system in the U.S. means that some people do not have a photo ID. This most often affects poor and otherwise marginalized people as well as people of color, which has led to the topic of voter ID having become a partisan one in the country.

Most states that currently have strict photo ID law for voting are in the Southern United States or the Midwest. New laws were passed in the last four years in Nebraska, Arkansas, North Carolina and Ohio, while they have existed for longer in Georgia, Mississippi and Tennessee, among other. A bigger group of states requests photo ID at the polls, but voters without it can use a workaround, for example signing a sworn affidavit or other document or have their signature matched by a clerk. Even states with strict photo ID laws mostly allow voting a provisional ballot and bringing in ID by a specific deadline as well as some exception in case voters have specific impairments, objections on religious grounds or others.

In Texas and South Carolina, this line between exception and workaround has been increasingly blurred, showing the tug-of-war that surrounds U.S. voter ID laws. Voters in both states who do not have photo ID can fill out a reasonable impediment declaration. While this sounds like voters will need to prove that they qualify for an exception, the cause can be any “obstacle you find reasonable”, the South Carolina Election Commission informs. In Texas, the situation is similar.

Authored by Randall Block via The Brownstone Institute,

Dr. Anthony Fauci often claims a “DNA of caring” yet his actions reveal a stark contrast. Avoiding direct patient care, Dr. Fauci focused on populations—effecting a mindset aligned with abstract compassion for humanity that nonetheless neglects individual rights. His so-called ‘DNA of caring’ has most recently doubly stranded those subjected to it: first, by amplifying fear about Covid-19 while burying mitigating data; second, by pushing a vaccine in a draconian, methodical, and threatening manner, taking away liberty and jobs to an extreme never seen before in the history of mankind. 

Additionally, by fast-tracking and strong-arming an mRNA vaccine-platform technology heretofore devoid of Phase II or III safety studies, Dr. Fauci prioritized hypothetical scientific advancement over actual current health, medical knowledge, and personal liberties—effectively double-crossing both the public’s trust and violating his own integrity: contradicting medically foundational principles he had spent his career enunciating—perhaps influenced by pharmaceutical interests.

Introduction: From Public Health to Panic: The Motivations Behind Dr. Fauci’s Pandemic Pivot

In early 2020, Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of NIAID, initially approached the coronavirus with standard public health strategies. By late February, Dr. Fauci had become the deciding influencer for the New York Times’ Donald McNeil’s decision to go “up to eleven,” announcing: “To Take On the Coronavirus, Go Medieval on It.” This article heightened panic in New York City, soon to be America’s pandemic landfall—and marked a shift from a century of public health’s more measured responses BACKWARDS to draconian measures. Remember: “lockdowns” emanate literally from 1970s prisons.

Several theories potentially explain this pivot. One suggests Fauci’s involvement with NIAID grants to the Wuhan lab pushed him to deflect accountability. Another points to political motivations, aiming to undermine an adversary, Donald Trump—by destabilizing the economy, and influencing the election through lockdown-necessitated mail-in ballots.

A deeper, but not necessarily mutually exclusive motive may lie in Fauci’s support for mRNA vaccine technology. Previously, mRNA treatments had only reached Phase I trials. The pandemic allowed for emergency-use authorization, fast-tracking this experimental platform and breaking regulatory barriers—likely saving a decade by creating a precedent for future mRNA treatments. He did this knowing systemic vaccines may not be appropriate for respiratory illnesses, and having observed close hand China’s failure to create an effective Coronavirus vaccine in the 2000s after SARS.

And this wasn’t the first time: his persistence in pushing for mRNA technology was evident during the previous decade’s Zika Microcephaly pandemic response. Even as Zika had fizzled to zero (microcephaly-) cases, Fauci persisted in pushing for Zika (DNA-and mRNA-) vaccines. He dangled ~$100 million in front of Brazil in 2018, but it refused—whereupon he pivoted in the 2020s to Johns Hopkins to inject and infect women with Zika to test the vaccine. This is a man who will not let a public health emergency go to waste—even if it involves aggrandizing it.

Despite his self-assessment as having a “DNA of caring,” Fauci’s actions suggest a focus more on institutional goals and the advancement of mRNA technology than on the people themselves—via corporatism: merging governmental authority with big business interests. Treating populations with a one-size-fits-all approach, stripping away individual rights, and using people as means to societal ends evokes an antidemocratic utilitarianism.

A Self-Professed “DNA of Caring”

A Google search for “Dr. Anthony Fauci’s promotion of the mRNA vaccine” performed today (helpfully for the otherwise beleaguered Dr. Fauci) funnels towards his On Call: A Doctor’s Journey in Public Service book tour—including this ironic and self-titled fluff piece: ‘I had that DNA of caring for people‘ sweetly afforded by PBS’ uncritical, team player Geoff Bennett. 

Nearly comically—this June 2024 video, intending to polish his legacy, inadvertently highlights his dictatorial tendencies, tin ear, and inability to learn from mistakes. Despite his mea culpa about failing to listen to stakeholders during the 1980s’ HIV/AIDS crisis and promising to have learned from that experience, merely a few sentences later Fauci lashes out at his contemporary Covid-19 critics. 

The irony here is stark. Fauci admits that he and his institutions were domineering and unheeding of criticism during the HIV/AIDS crisis—whereupon he retroactively wishes he had given those activists input into the process that had so directly affected them. 

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Understandably, but unacceptably, the scientific community and the regulatory community just said, “We know best for you. We’re the scientists. We’re the ones with the experience.” And they kept saying, “No, no, no. We really want a seat at the table.” When we didn’t listen, then they started becoming theatrical, iconoclastic, disruptive, and confrontative. As John Lewis used to say, ‘there’s trouble and there’s good trouble.’ They were making ‘good trouble’ in the field of health in wanting to have a seat at the table. One of the best things I think I have done in my career was to put aside the theatrics (note: an admission against interest) and listen to what they were saying, because what they were saying made absolutely perfect sense. And I remember saying to myself that, if I were in their shoes, I’d be doing exactly what they were doing.

GEOFF BENNETT: When you describe that (HIV/AIDS) experience as “enlightening,” how did it inform your approach moving forward to confront other epidemics?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: Yes. Yes, listen to the patients. Listen. And don’t think that everything comes from the top down. Listen to the community. Listen to what they’re experiencing. And you’re going to make a much better and more appropriate response to whatever the disease challenge is. That was a lesson that was very well-learned from the activists.

Volte-face and thin-skinned (a possible alternate title for his book), he shows no such sympathy for those who opposed his Covid-19 rabbit-out-of-a-hat absurdities, dismissing them outright:

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI: I think it’s important to say, because it’s the truth, that if ever there was a time when you didn’t want to have a public health crisis was at a time of profound divisiveness within our country, where you were having people making decisions about health based on political ideology. That is the worst possible circumstance.

It would have been really nice if we had a uniform message: “Masks work. Use them.” “Vaccines are good and save lives.” Let’s do it.

“No, hydroxychloroquine not only doesn’t work, but, in fact, it could harm you.” (ignoring risk/benefit ratio; “right to try,” FDA-approval, and track record—and that this is true for any treatment, cf. vaccines). 

This dismissive attitude toward dissenting voices is ironic given Fauci’s complete 180 on his own views. He refuses to engage with anyone who challenges him, yet seems blissfully unaware he’s contradicting his past self. And there is this gem uncovered by the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic from Dr. Fauci, Summer 2021—so different from his supposed HIV-lesson-learned to “Listen to the community. Listen to what they’re experiencing”—speaking more like a mob boss:

“I have to say that I don’t see a big solution, other than some sort of mandatory vaccination. I know federal officials don’t like to use that term. Once (administrators) feel empowered and protected legally, (they’ll) say, ‘you want to come to this college buddy, you’re going to get vaccinated.’ Yeah, big corporations are going to say ‘you want to work for us, you get vaccinated.’ And it’s been proven that when you make it difficult for people in their lives, they lose their ideological bullshit and they get vaccinated.”

Dr. Fauci’s actual “DNA of caring” is caring about pharmaceutical mRNA.

Fauci 1.0 Vs. Fauci 2.0

Somewhere around February 2020, there seems to have been a ‘software update’ of Dr. Fauci’s mindset, and not for the better. Generally speaking, people only turn to questionable behavior when faced with a greater agenda, threat to self, or conversion. Here’s a by-no-means complete table of Fauci Covid-era “flip-flops:”

This transformation was likely triggered by the realization of his agency NIAID’s and/or his own embarrassingly damaging complicity in the gain-of-function genesis of the “Wuhan flu” SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus threat. He aimed for self-preservation, politically maneuvering against Donald Trump to compromise him, while also greasing the skids for the mRNA vaccine. 

This necessitated performing life support for the “emergency” in the “Emergency Use Authorization/ EUA” by quashing any interim medications, aggrandizing the threat of SARS-CoV-2—when he knew, from the Diamond Princess data, that it was not that severe (zero deaths, 25 days after exposure)—and backtracking from his comments that respiratory illnesses were not best approached by vaccines; that natural immunity was preferable to vaccine immunity, and that flu shots needed to be timely for the upcoming variant. Despite his previously calling the coronavirus threat “minuscule,” Fauci’s actions followed a pattern of (mis)using the crisis to bequeath a Big Science/Big Pharma (-regulatory-capture cycle untested mRNA treatments. 

Covid-19 Pandemic: Overreach and Ignoring Early Data

During the Covid-19 pandemic, Fauci’s approach starkly contradicted the lessons he claimed to have learned from the HIV/AIDS crisis. He enforced top-down measures that often lacked scientific backing. For instance, he admitted in a January 2024 Congressional hearing (belatedly released in June) that he did not know the scientific basis for the six-foot social distancing rule and could not substantiate masking requirements for children. 

“Collectively, the four pillars of the “Covidian Cult” were lockdowns, masks, social distancing and mRNA vaccines. Dr Fauci was one of the most powerful advocates of all of these things, and he became the public face of each demand. But here we have one of the architects, without too much pushing, admitting that two of those four pillars were never set in any scientific foundation at all. Now what this admission does is utterly destroy the entire Covidian argument. Because the argument was that we should “Follow the Science.” The argument was that technocratic experts had decided the course of action to follow, and that we had no right to question that course because they were the experts and we were simply, “Tracy from Facebook.” Daniel Jupp “Fauci’s Evidence: It just sort of appeared. You know, from nowhere.”

Fauci’s stance on vaccination mandates was equally inconsistent. In 2004, he advised against flu vaccines for those who had already contracted the flu. Yet during the Covid-19 pandemic, he supported mandatory vaccinations regardless of prior infection, ignoring the virus’ evolving nature. Vaccines were administered for an outdated strain, akin to giving expired flu shots, which are typically removed from circulation once the virus mutates significantly. This inconsistency highlighted his failure to adapt his policies to the realities of the virus’ mutations.

Fauci 1.0 had said, “You seek and learn…from an experiment“ (2005). The floating coronavirus-incubation/quarantine experiment, a.k.a. Diamond Princess was an incredible serendipity for the world—if not its 3,711 captives. Trying to enlist that number of people for an unknown viral threat would’ve required a pre-payout of ~$10 billion (and could not have included this random selection of individuals)—yet, the world was the beneficiary of this experiment in a timely fashion, February 2020 for “free” (although the passengers and crew might disagree with that term).

Instead of focusing on the obvious good news results: zero fatalities after three weeks’ exposure; essentially none of the children or young adults feeling much ill or even noticing infection—Fauci 2.0 sided with Chinese propaganda and extreme measures, contributing to widespread panic and economic devastation. Fauci 2.0 ignored the possibility of Chinese guile, either blithely or willfully—but in either case to our nation’s discredit, discomfort, disunion, and disinformation.

The Gates Foundation’s mRNA Finesse; Zika Emergency

In 2017, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation pledged $100 million to Moderna to develop an mRNA-platform vaccine for Zika. This investment was made despite the fact that Zika, a relatively harmless dengue variant, was not (by that time) persistently linked to the microcephaly cases it was blamed for. The Zika-microcephaly phenomenon just petered out even in the initial “pandemic” panic crisis year of 2016. This rush to develop an mRNA vaccine for a non-crisis reflects a broader trend of aggrandizing potential threats to justify rapid and untested vaccine development.

My book, Overturning Zika: The Pandemic That Never Was, points out the complete absence of any Zika-related microcephaly increase in any year, including the incipient 2015 year. Once Zika tests were developed and Brazil adopted the WHO standard for statistical microcephaly determination, the link between Zika and microcephaly was never substantiated—and effectively disappeared. “Zika-Microcephaly” had always and only been “science” by press release, political pressure, and professorial self-aggrandizement.

Dr. Fauci never stopped pushing for Zika vaccines long after it was clear there was no recurrence of Zika-related microcephaly in Latin America. In 2018, he attempted to initiate a human challenge trial (HCT) in Brazil, but the authorities refused, not wanting to introduce the Zika virus into the population through experimentation.

HCTs had fallen out of favor due to the negative outcomes of the Guatemala and Tuskegee experiments. In 2017, the NIH’s ethics panel determined that Zika did not warrant human challenge trials, but Dr. Fauci pushed for them regardless, ignoring prevailing public health wisdom. 

Why was he jonesing for a putative Zika vaccine? Fauci was a proponent of synthetic vaccinology and mRNA platforms. Conveniently ignoring Zika-Microcephaly’s fizzle, he continued over-generously funding Moderna (whose very name is a portmanteau of “modified RNA”).

When Zika’s shoddy underlying science and non-recurrence failed to sustain the necessary “emergency” for mRNA technology, an unrepentant and unpunished Fauci aggrandized Covid-19 to achieve the same goals. Had he been reprimanded for violating the NIH ethics panel’s decision, he might not have been so rash and brash in exaggerating Covid-19. It appears Fauci pursued his “fix” of stealthily introducing mRNA technology to the public and mainstreaming it through vaccines, despite the ethical breaches and potential risks involved.

mRNA Vaccines: From Never Done to Pandemic Panacea

The foundation for mRNA-vaccine technology was laid years before the pandemic. Here’s an excellent history (behind paywall) of the endeavor, beginning with Robert F. Malone’s late-1980s conceptualization—although (reminiscent of Breaking Bad’s Gray Matter Technologies: Walter White says, “It was my hard work. My research. And you and Elliott made millions off it.”) all of the financial-windfall beneficiaries currently in the field are happy to orphan whistleblower Malone who said the coronavirus “should never have been politicized.” Legacy media is happy to help discredit him: effectively always, his name is accompanied by the term, “spreading misinformation.”

The Obama Administration invested heavily in mRNA research through DARPA (via the mysterious network, “JASON”) and BARDA. By the end of the Obama era, mRNA vaccines were being tested in both animals and humans – but never beyond Phase 1. 

The Covid-19 pandemic fast-tracked the push for mRNA vaccines under Operation Warp Speed, prioritizing them over traditional vaccines like Johnson & Johnson’s adenovirus vector vaccine. Concerns about side effects, such as myocarditis in young males, were brushed aside in the rush to advance mRNA technology. This urgency overshadowed the critical need for proper safety trials, effectively using the public as guinea pigs in a massive, premature experiment.

Now, with the ice broken, a flood of new mRNA vaccines is in the pipeline for diseases like cytomegalovirus (CMV), influenza, and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). Researchers are even exploring mRNA vaccines for avian flu, hepatitis C, HIV, and more. This rapid adoption bypasses decades of proven safety from traditional vaccine platforms, raising ethical concerns about using the global population for untested innovations.

Even if mRNA vaccines prove beneficial in the long run, we deserve better than to be test subjects in this grand experiment—without getting a share of the proceeds. It’s like “My parents went to Vegas and all I got was this lousy T-shirt,” but with much higher stakes.

Profit over Safety

The profit motive may be king. Much as the ‘minor issues’ of people’s freedoms and safety (I’m joking) were completely ignored to help speed the development of mRNA vaccines, being politically favored has its benefits. Every accommodation is made for electric vehicles or climate change initiatives. One wonders, given that everyone turned a blind eye to safety and is still doing so regarding Covid’s mRNA vaccine(s), whether these newer possibilities—which are not emergencies per se—will go through proper multiphase studies over the proper length of time to check for long-term side effects. 

Studies for “long-term effects” ipso facto need a “long-term” study: eight or 10 years may not even be enough. Other vaccines have been out for decades and there are still questions circulating given that they are being given more frequently and with multiple other vaccines in combination throughout the course of tender childhood. 

Pre-NCVIA (1986 federal liability waiver for vaccine manufacturers), kids got a handful of vaccines, now we are up to 72 separate inoculations recommended through adolescence. With whispers of avian flu and other potential “emergencies,” we have to be careful that these aren’t just efforts to fan the flames and bypass safety studies once again.

The silver lining, the promise we are given is that mRNA technology may help cancer treatment, food- and environmental- allergies, genetic diseases, heart disease, stroke, heart failure, and neurodevelopmental disorders. While these advancements are promising, it is essential to balance innovation with rigorous safety protocols; to balance self-interested Big Science/Big Pharma claims with the normal skepticism, given the track record.

Lockdowns: Misguided Anachronism 

Fauci’s advocacy for lockdowns was another significant departure from standard public health practices. Historically, “lockdown” was a term used exclusively in prison settings. Before Covid-19, general population lockdowns were virtually unheard of, except in extreme cases like a tuberculosis outbreak in a South African prison and limited restrictions during the Ebola outbreak in Sierra Leone. Implementing such measures for Covid-19 ignored the relatively benign nature of the virus for most of the population. The lockdowns caused widespread economic disruption, halted education, and inflicted severe mental health consequences.

Donald McNeil of the New York Times famously espoused a “go medieval” approach to the virus, but only after the endorsement specifically of Dr. Fauci. McNeil’s article, “To Take On The Coronavirus, Go Medieval on It,” drummed up enormous fear and overreaction. In August 2020, McNeil revealed that his consultation with Dr. Fauci was pivotal in shaping the article.

Donald McNeil wrote: 

“There are two ways to fight epidemics: the medieval and the modern. The modern way is to surrender to the power of the pathogens: Acknowledge that they are unstoppable and try to soften the blow with 20th-century inventions, including new vaccines, antibiotics, hospital ventilators and thermal cameras searching for people with fevers. The medieval way, inherited from the era of the Black Death, is brutal: Close the borders, quarantine the ships, pen terrified citizens up inside their poisoned cities.” 

Mr. McNeil, writer and rhetorician (and decidedly not a scientist) is merely channeling this Fauci 2.0 bureaucrat/autocrat whose decidedly medieval methods fall into stark contrast with (erstwhile) modern public health’s. Fauci 2.0 essentially settled the issue for McNeil, who readily adopted this extreme stance.

Ironically, those advocating for a more modern public health approach, like the (genuine) experts behind the Great Barrington Declaration, were shut down. Fauci’s supposed “DNA of caring” seems to only extend to himself, his views, and his control over the narrative. His actions during Covid-19 show that he learned nothing from his self-professed enlightenment during the HIV/AIDS crisis.

He ignored and dismissed any criticism, especially from those on or above his level. Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, MD, PhD, (economics), for example, is arguably more qualified than Fauci, more of a political than medical ace. This is evident in his absurdly anachronistic “medieval” approach to the pandemic; his inability to tolerate dissent; his failure to listen to those who challenge him—in fact his censoring them, codifying a policy of “Shut Up!” to skeptics of his overreaching policies. 

Even Fauci 1.0 was not a great medical doctor. In the 1980s, during the HIV/AIDS crisis, Fauci speculated that close household contact, without sexual interaction or needle sharing, could lead to AIDS transmission. This glib and unfounded claim led to widespread fear and misinformation. As a result, AIDS patients (it is posited) were often abandoned by their families due to the fear of casual transmission.

His stubborn focus on producing a vaccine rather than therapeutics was of particular frustration to activists and other scientists. Ironically, this emphasis on vaccines over therapeutics repeated in 2020 and 2021 with the push for mRNA vaccines, despite the availability of other potential treatments. 

The government, under Fauci’s influence, went out of its way to insult and ridicule FDA-approved, off-label usage, rational treatment alternatives, such as hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) and Nobel-Prize generating ivermectin (which was FALSELY derided as mere horse medication). Many drugs used in humans are also used in animals. This dismissal and ridicule were strategic, aimed at maintaining the narrative that only a vaccine could solve the crisis, thus justifying the emergency use authorization (EUA) for the mRNA vaccines. Absent an emergency, they would not have been able to circumvent the necessary safety measures. This strategy was not only misleading but potentially criminal, as it prioritized the adoption of untested vaccines over exploring all possible treatment avenues.

Unprecedented Excess Deaths

The implications of these decisions have been far-reaching and devastating. According to researchers from Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, there have been more than three million excess deaths since 2020, with the trend continuing despite (or because of) the rollout of vaccines and containment measures. In BMJ Public Health, the authors stated, 

“excess mortality has remained high in the Western World for three consecutive years, despite the implementation of COVID-19 containment measures and COVID-19 vaccines. This is unprecedented and raises serious concerns. During the pandemic, politicians and the media emphasized daily that every COVID-19 death mattered and every life deserved protection through containment measures and COVID-19 vaccines. In the aftermath of the pandemic, the same morale should apply.”

This is the tragic outcome of Fauci’s policies. The world was promised salvation, but instead, we have worse economies, more top-down nondemocratic management, halted education, and disrupted lives. Children couldn’t see people’s faces, and the societal impacts have been profound.

We Were Betrayed by Falsehoods

Dr. Anthony Fauci’s actions during the Covid-19 pandemic mirrored the very failings he claimed to have learned from the HIV/AIDS crisis. His inability to adapt, combined with a penchant for authoritarian measures, has left a legacy of distrust and division. Fauci’s enforcement of arbitrary measures, disregard for scientific data, and contribution to economic and social disruption have caused untold harm. His tenure stands as a stark reminder of the dangers of unchecked authority.

Fauci’s role in the Covid-19 response has shown a disregard for American values of liberty and openness. His actions have inflicted deep scars on the nation, from economic devastation to the erosion of public trust. The world deserves better from its public health leaders, and Fauci’s tenure stands as a cautionary tale of what happens when power goes unchecked. The suffering caused by his decisions is a legacy not of public health triumph but of public health failure and manipulation.

As H.L. Mencken famously said, “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.” Unelected Dr. Fauci’s prison-styled lockdowns and tyrannical, unproven, mRNA-over-vaccinating within an overall disdainful, peremptory medical misgovernance made sure of that.

Since 1979, the top income earners in America have seen their real wages grow at more than double the rate of every other income group.

Given this rapid rise, income inequality in the U.S. exceeds nearly every other rich nation, driven by several complex factors. Among these, tax policy, technological change, and economic downturns have widened this gap. Diminishing bargaining power across workers has also contributed to wage disparities.

This graphic, via Visual Capitalist’s Dorothy Neufeld, shows the growth in real wages over time across income groups, based on data from the Economic Policy Institute.

Stark Differences in Real Wages Over Time

Below, we show the cumulative growth in real wages between 1979 and 2023 by wage group:

As we can see, the lowest paid workers in America have seen their real wages increase just 17% over the period—averaging a dismal 0.4% annual growth rate.

If we take out the pandemic-era’s period of strong wage growth for low-wage workers, this figure drops to 0.1% between 1979 and 2019. By contrast, real wages boomed at an annualized rate of 2.9% over the pandemic, outpacing wage growth in the previous 40 years combined.

A similar trend of slow wage growth can be seen across all other income groups apart from the highest income earners. This has contributed to the middle-class—those falling between the lowest and highest income quintiles—to shrink from 61% of the population in 1971 to 51% in 2023.

At the same time, the share of lower-income households grew by 27% in 1971 to 30% in 2023, while the share of upper-income households rose from 11% to 19% over the period.

Wage Growth During the Pandemic

As we can see in the table below, high labor demand during the pandemic led to significant wage increases, particularly for lower-income groups:

What is notable about these wage gains is that they outpaced inflation, which totaled nearly 20% over this period.

Today, a strong labor market is continuing to push real wages above inflation as price pressures have eased, but this growth has slowed considerably since pandemic peaks. In June 2024, year-over-year real wage growth was 0.8% on average, compared to 7.7% in April 2020.

Authored by Dave DeCamp via AntiWar.com,

US Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel boycotted Friday’s memorial service in Nagasaki commemorating the 79th anniversary of the US dropping a nuclear bomb on the city because Israel was not invited to attend.

Emanuel said the ceremony had become “politicized” by the decision not to invite Israel, but Russia and Belarus will also be excluded for the third year in a row, a move supported by the US.

Envoys from the US, the UK, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, and the European Union sent a letter to Nagasaki last month saying it would “become difficult for us to have high-level participation” if Israel wasn’t invited. The envoys said the decision would equate Israel with Russia and Belarus.

Nagasaki Mayor Shiro Suzuki stuck to his decision not to invite Israel despite the pressure. He said it was due to concerns that Israeli attendance could lead to demonstrators disrupting the ceremony. “I will continue to persevere and ask for understanding of the decision as often as necessary,” Suzuki said.

Suzuki said he made the decision “not for political reasons” but to ensure “a smooth ceremony in a peaceful and solemn environment.”

Israel’s ambassador to Japan was invited to Hiroshima’s ceremony on Tuesday, which was attended by Emanuel and other Western ambassadors. The ambassadors of the UK, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, and the EU are expected to boycott the Nagasaki ceremony along with Emanuel, and the Western nations will send lower-level representatives instead.

Israeli officials have pointed to the US and allied bombings of Japan and Germany during World War II to justify the mass slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza. President Biden said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pointed to the US atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which killed over 200,000 Japanese civilians, in conversations they had about Gaza.

Let me get it straight… Israel, which did not exist as a country then, wasn’t invited. So the US… which actually dropped the bomb.. is angry. https://t.co/muhnmPU8Di

— Brad Hoff (@BradRHoff) August 8, 2024

“It was pointed out to me that — by Bibi (Netanyahu) — that ‘Well, you carpet-bombed Germany. You dropped the atom bomb. A lot of civilians died,'” Biden said in December 2023.

In the latest indication that new President Jose Raul Mulino may be serious about his campaign pledge to end the country’s role as a major funnel of masses of illegal immigrants bound for the United States, Panamanian border police on Wednesday arrested 15 people linked to an illicit “VIP” migrant-smuggling operation that caters to Chinese clients, AFP reports. The detainees — who face 15 to 20 years in prison — are all Panamanian, but are accused of working for Colombian gangs. 

While the Pan-American Highway stretches some 19,000 miles through South, Central and North America, there’s a 66-mile gap that starts just inside Colombia and stretches into Panama. That means migrants have to make a harrowing journey on foot through a mountainous and marshy region called the Darien Gap. They not only have to survive dangerous natural conditions, but also criminal gangs known to rape, murder, kidnap and rob them.

The VIP service targeted this week promised a faster, easier and safer passage into Panama — but at a higher price. Migrants pay about $500 for a standard escort through the gap, but fees for this expedited trip range from $2,600 to $8,000, local prosecutor Emeldo Marquez told AFP. Given the price, most customers who can afford the first class experience are Chinese. 

The VIP trip is shortened in a variety of ways, starting with boat service that bypasses a portion of the jungle trip by departing the Colombian coast from Capurgana or Necocli and dropping migrants in Carreto or Caledonia, Panama. Smugglers then whisk them through the remaining wilderness using canoes, horses and ATVs. That helps cut the average VIP jungle jaunt down to just two days, instead of upwards of eight days or more for everyone else. 

About a half-million migrants made the Darien Gap trek in 2023, and about 200,000 so far this year. They come from many countries, but most of the recent migrants are Venezuelan. While still a small percentage, Chinese traffic has soared, with more than 55,000 Chinese crossing the Mexican border since 2023. 

On the campaign trail, President Jose Raul Mulino emphasized his intent to end Panama’s role as a critical link in a path that funnels northbound migrants into Central America. He reiterated that intention in his inaugural address, saying, “I will not allow Panama to be a path open to thousands of people who illegally enter our country supported by an entire international organization related to drug trafficking and human trafficking.”

Earlier this summer, Panama started installing concertina-wire fences inside the Darien Gap. “The patrol at the national border service has begun to block the majority of border passages,” said Frank Abrego, Panama’s minister of public security during a June 28 visit to the area.  

On July 1 — the same day that Mulino was sworn into office, Panama announced it had signed an agreement with the United States with a goal of cutting the flow of migrants through the isthmus. Under the deal, the US government has committed to covering Panama’s expenses for deporting people who enter Panama illegally, and to help with “equipment, transportation and logistics.” 

Authored by Caden Pearson via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

A California state lawmaker announced on Thursday that she’s switching affiliation to the Republican Party in a bid to save the state from heading in the wrong direction under a Democratic supermajority.

State Sen. Marie Alvarado-Gil, who represents the state’s fourth Senate district, said she joined the Senate Republican Caucus and party after deep reflection and to help “in their fight to fix California.”

“I was elected to serve the public, not a political ideology,” Alvarado-Gil said in a statement. “The status quo under a supermajority Democratic rule in the legislature is simply not working for this state.”

Democratic state Senate President Pro Tem Mike McGuire said her decision would be disappointing for voters who elected her in 2022.

“They trusted her to represent them, and she’s betrayed that trust,” he said in a statement.

However, Alvarado-Gil, who represents a largely conservative-leaning rural district in northeast Central Valley, said the decision was “right for the constituents that voted me into office” and about putting them first.

California has a Democrat supermajority in both the Assembly and the Senate. After Alvarado-Gil’s defection, which gives Republicans nine votes in the 40-member Senate, Democrats will retain their veto-proof majority.

Despite Democrats having more power and ability in the state Legislature, Alvarado-Gil said that since she’s been elected, she’s had a front-row seat to watching the Democratic supermajority push California in what she characterized as a wrong direction.

Republicans’ nine votes still leaves them well under the majority they need to control the chamber. Democrats hold supermajorities in both the Assembly and Senate at the Capitol.

Alvarado-Gil is known for working with Republicans and has split from Democrats to vote on issues where she feels politics is being put over public safety.

State Senate Minority Leader Brian W. Jones, in a statement welcoming Alvarado-Gil to the GOP, said it takes courage for a lawmaker to stand up to the supermajority the way she has.

“Her record on tackling crime, protecting communities from sexually violent predators, and prioritizing her constituents speaks for itself,” said Jones, who has recently worked with Alvarado-Gil on a number of key Republican measures.

Alvarado-Gil, who is in her first term, has broken with Democrats on a number of bills, including gun legislation, caps on oil industry profits, and restrictions on homeless encampments over the last year. She was one of three state Democratic senators to co-author legislation led by Jones to restrict homeless encampments.

She said on Thursday that she will continue to aggressively advocate for fiscal responsibility, public safety, supporting veterans, tackling the homelessness crisis, and lowering living costs.

Alvarado-Gil has supported legislation addressing crime, fentanyl, human trafficking, child sex trafficking, sexual assault, and relocating sexually violent predators to rural communities.

“I look forward to collaborating with my Republican colleagues on their plan to Fix California and continuing to lead with a pragmatic approach on issues affecting my district and this great state,” she said.

California Republican Party Chairwoman Jessica Millan Patterson said, “Senator Alvarado-Gil has represented her community as an independent, fiscally-conservative voice in Sacramento, and we are honored to have her represent them going forward as a member of the Republican Party.”

Alvarado-Gil beat out a progressive Democrat by more than five points in the 2022 election. Registered Republican voters in her district have increased since 2022 to nearly 39 percent to Democrats’ 34 percent in 2024.

It’s uncommon for a member of a majority party to switch affiliation, according to California State Library legislative historian Alex Vassar.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Authored by Katabella Roberts via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

The Republican National Committee (RNC) is asking on the U.S. Supreme Court to reinstate an Arizona law requiring voters to prove their U.S. citizenship for the upcoming presidential election.

In an application for emergency relief filed on Aug. 8, the RNC asked Justice Elena Kagan to block a previous lower-court ruling that put the state law on hold.

The Committee centered much of its filing around how the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals handled the matter.

The laws at the center of the debate are H.B. 2492 and H.B. 2243—collectively known as the “Voting Laws”—which were passed by the Arizona Legislature in 2022.

Among other things, they require that people who register to vote in Arizona using a state form provide “satisfactory” proof of citizenship or residency, such as a birth certificate, to be eligible to vote.

The laws also require individuals to include their state or country of birth and mandate that counties conduct citizenship checks and remove non-citizens from the rolls.

Although a district judge partially blocked the law in 2023 after ruling that federal laws, not state, take precedence when it comes to proof of citizenship for voters, a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit later stayed the injunction.

In July, another panel of judges granted a request from Republicans to reinstate some but not all parts of the laws.

However, the same panel turned down the RNC’s bid to require election officials to check records from the Social Security Administration and other databases to ensure individuals who do not provide proof of citizenship are actually citizens.

In its Aug. 8 filing, the RNC said the Ninth Circuit’s reversal violates what’s known as the Purcell principle, which bars federal courts from enjoining the enforcement of state election laws with an election impending.

“The principle recognizes the important interests state officials have in protecting their elections and avoiding voter confusion,” the RNC wrote. “But the Ninth Circuit turned this principle against the enforcement of state election-integrity laws.”

It further argued that the district court’s injunction is an “unprecedented abrogation of the Arizona Legislature’s sovereign authority to determine the qualifications of voters and structure participation in its elections.”

Voting Rights Group Sue to Block Arizona Laws

The district court’s judgment will also “irreparably harm” the RNC, while a stay in the matter “would not inflict any countervailing harms on the plaintiffs or the public interest,” the Committee said in its filing.

Republicans are asking for the court to rule on the issue by Aug. 22.

While Arizona lawmakers have said the voting laws are needed to prevent voter fraud, voting rights groups—including the Arizona-based Mi Familia Vota and Living United for Change in Arizona—quickly filed lawsuits against both measures.

In court filings, the groups argued the measures were discriminatory, confusing, and unnecessary, among other things.

Current Arizona law states that, in order to be qualified to vote in Arizona, a person “must be a United States citizen, a resident of Arizona, and at least eighteen years of age.”

Section 2. A of the state’s election law specifically says: “No person shall be entitled to vote at any general election, or for any office that now is, or hereafter may be, elective by the people, or upon any question which may be submitted to a vote of the people, unless such person be a citizen of the United States of the age of eighteen years or over, and shall have resided in the state for the period of time preceding such election as prescribed by law, provided that qualifications for voters at a general election for the purpose of electing presidential electors shall be as prescribed by law.”

The law notes that “citizen” is defined as “persons of the male and female sex.”

In a statement, the RNC called the application for emergency relief a “critical legal step in ensuring Americans decide American elections,” and said it is important that “only citizens vote in our elections, especially by mail.”

If successful, the move will allow Arizona to “enforce proof of citizenship requirements” in the upcoming presidential election, the RNC said.

“Requiring proof of citizenship is common sense and fundamental to preserving the integrity of our elections – especially in our country’s most important presidential election,” said RNC Chairman Michael Whatley. “This application in the Supreme Court is pivotal to ensuring that Arizonans’ votes are not canceled by non-citizens. ”

“Non-citizen voting is illegal and we are taking every possible action to ensure American elections are decided solely by Americans,” Whatley added.

The Epoch Times has contacted Mi Familia Vota and Living United for Change in Arizona for comment.

Zachary Stieber contributed to this report.