The outcome of former President Donald Trump’s New York records-falsification trial is most likely to influence undecided voters—a sliver of the electorate that could exert an outsized impact on the Nov. 5 presidential election.
“This is a pivotal moment in the 2024 race,” American political history professor Jeff Bloodworth told The Epoch Times as jurors began deliberations on May 29.
Mr. Bloodworth, who teaches at Gannon University in Erie, Pennsylvania, said suburban college-educated voters probably would allow the trial’s outcome to influence their votes.
The former president was convicted of 34 business-records falsification charges; an appeal is almost certain, legal experts said.
Polls have shown that a conviction was poised to sway some voters away from President Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee. Trump campaign pollsters predict the effect on votes will be minimal.
However, it appears that the verdict is having a big immediate effect on fundraising. Several online commenters said they made donations to the former president, but many visitors overwhelmed the website, causing it to crash temporarily and having to be restored several times.
Yet a small percentage of voters could make the difference between winning and losing the 2024 election. Polling consistently has shown a razor-thin margin separating the two major candidates: President Trump and the incumbent Democrat President Joe Biden.
Many voters are unwilling to change their declared allegiance to President Trump, President Biden, or a third-party candidate, such as Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Still, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released on May 22, about one-fifth of voters say they are open to reconsidering.
Many of those people are “double-haters,” Mr. Bloodworth’s term for voters who dislike both President Trump and President Biden. These voters care deeply about the outcome of the New York case, and they’re very likely to turn out and cast their ballots, he said.
He predicted that a guilty verdict against President Trump would drive those people “back into the Biden camp, like they were in 2020.” That election “was decided on the margins,” Mr. Bloodworth said, resulting in President Trump’s ouster. Now in the thick of his third run at the presidency, President Trump still says he believes he was the rightful winner—a claim that mainstream media and many Democrats reject.
In a statement accompanying the Quinnipiac poll, polling analyst Tim Malloy characterized Kennedy voters as “particularly swayable,” with 52 percent reporting they were likely to change their minds. President Trump’s supporters were “less-inclined to bail on their candidate,” Mr. Malloy said, with only 8 percent somewhat likely to defect. Almost double that number said they could drop their support of President Biden.
The Quinnipiac poll found that 70 percent of voters were following the New York trial closely, with 46 percent of respondents believing President Trump “did something illegal.”
About 6 percent of President Trump’s supporters say a conviction would make them less likely to vote for him—a number that “could tip the balance” in a very tight race, Mr. Malloy said.
Seven States May Matter Most
But the Trump campaign’s pollsters, Tony Fabrizio and Travis Tunis, reported that several weekly surveys found the New York trial would have a “negligible” effect on voters in seven swing states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
Their research found that large percentages of Democrats and President Biden’s voters were following reports about the New York trial.
But voter segments that the Trump campaign is targeting—independents, undecideds, and “persuadables”—were “much less likely” to stay abreast of the trial, “with almost none following it ’very’ closely,” the pollsters said in a May 29 memo that the Trump campaign released.
“Voters in our key target states have already made up their minds on this trial. Most voters, especially our supporters, believe the case is politically motivated and a conviction would be [the] result of a biased show trial. Biden’s voters will believe President Trump is guilty no matter what,“ the memo said. ”And those in the middle are largely unconcerned, and their votes aren’t going to hinge on the results of the trial.”
Recent nationwide polling, including Quinnipiac’s, has shown the two candidates in a statistical dead heat. President Trump, however, has pulled ahead of President Biden in battleground states and has been chipping away at the incumbent’s lead in some states considered to be Democrat strongholds.
Several surveys show minority voters, such as blacks and Hispanics, drifting away from President Biden, whom they blame for inflated prices of groceries, fuel, and other necessities.
The Trump camp’s pollsters said the seven states they are focused on are most likely to decide the election, “not the national data the media would like us to focus on.”
They predicted national polls, “especially those conducted by the media,” will probably “show exaggerated shifts.”
Pollster Rich Baris doubts that polls can accurately gauge how voters will respond to the New York verdict.
When pollsters ask such a “bias-tainted question,” the results are skewed, Mr. Baris told The Epoch Times. That’s because “voters know the ‘right’ answer they are expected to give, even though they would never vote for Biden, regardless.”
Pollsters produced inaccurate results in 2020 when they found that President Trump’s impeachments would adversely affect his vote totals, Mr. Baris said.
“He ended up setting the record for the most votes ever received by an incumbent president,” Mr. Baris said.
A guilty verdict in any of President Trump’s legal cases may have little effect on voting behavior, Mr. Baris said. A conviction “is already baked into the cake, meaning voters expect it and believe it’s politically motivated,” Mr. Baris said.
Houthis Report 16 Dead In Biggest Joint US-UK Airstrikes Since Gaza War Began
Early on Friday Yemen’s Houthis announced what appears to be the biggest mass casualty attack by the Western coalition since Red Sea hostilities began in the wake of Oct.7.
The joint British-U.S. airstrikes happened Thursday, and killed at least 16 people and wounded 35 others, according to Houthis statement. “We confirm this brutal aggression against Yemen as punishment for its position in support of Gaza, in support of Israel to continue its crimes of genocide against the wounded, besieged and steadfast Gaza Strip,” Houthi spokesman Mohammed Abdulsalam said.
The strikes primarily focused on the port city of Hodeida, and the Houthis say that all killed there were civilians. According to a Yemeni account:
But the Houthis focused Friday morning on a strike they said struck a building housing Hodeida Radio and civilian homes in the port city on the Red Sea. Their Al Masirah satellite news channel aired images of one bloodied man being carried down stairs and others in the hospital, receiving aid. It said all the dead and nearly all the wounded from the strikes came from there.
The graphic footage of the attack aftermath can be viewed here.
While not acknowledging the death toll offered by the Houthis, the Pentagon confirmed that US F/A-18 fighter jets were involved in the operation over Yemen, having taken off from the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower aircraft carrier in the Red Sea.
Officials said additional warships also participated, which included attacks on “underground facilities, missile launchers, command and control sites, a Houthi vessel and other facilities.”
The UK Defense Ministry also revealed its involvement, with a statement saying Royal Air Force Typhoon FGR4s conducted strikes on Hodeida and locations south in Ghulayfiqah.
UK’s military said it targeted “buildings identified as housing drone ground control facilities and providing storage for very long-range drones, as well as surface-to-air weapons.”
“The strikes were taken in self-defense in the face of an ongoing threat that the Houthis pose,” British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced. “There’s an ongoing threat that the Houthis pose.”
This, for what it is worth, is Grant Shapps’ excuse for the bombing.
Retaliation for a cargo ship (Rubymar) that was hit more than 2 months ago, and avenging the deaths of Filipino and Vietnamese mariners (which apparently is now the RAF’s remit)https://t.co/cfRm8mr26y
But instead of deterring the Houthis, the Shia rebel groups immediately announced a retaliatory operation against the US nuclear-powered carrier from which the US fighters were deployed, as we reported earlier.
However, the Pentagon denied that the carrier was attacked. Politico’s Lara Seligman quoted an unnamed Department of Defense official who told her the Houthi’s claim about a missile attack on the USS Harry S. Truman in the Red Sea is “false information — there was no hit on the Ike or any attacks in its vicinity.”
Actor Dennis Quaid, who stars in the forthcoming biopic “Reagan,” out Aug. 30, has expressed his admiration of former President Donald Trump ahead of the 2024 presidential election.
“I think I’m gonna vote for him,” the 70-year-old said during a recent appearance on Piers Morgan Uncensored on May 28, adding that a vote for the presumptive GOP nominee “just makes sense.”
Mr. Quaid explained that he wasn’t initially planning on voting for President Trump. However, he said the politician’s “hush money” trial in Manhattan, which commenced on April 15 and is currently being deliberated on by jurors, ultimately swayed his decision in favor of the business magnate.
President Trump was indicted in April of last year on 34 counts of allegedly falsifying New York business records. The case, which marks the first-ever criminal trial of a former president in United States history, is just one of a handful of legal battles that President Trump is embroiled in. In total, the 77-year-old faces 88 charges across four criminal cases, all of which he has pleaded not guilty to.
“I see a weaponization of our justice system and, uh, a challenge to our constitution,” Mr. Quaid shared. “Trump is the most investigated person, probably in the history of the world, and they haven’t been able to really get him on anything.”
“What is the crime?” he inquired. “I still can’t figure it out.”
When asked by the British broadcaster if he likes President Trump on a personal level, “The Right Stuff” star admitted that there were moments during the politician’s previous presidential campaigns that he wasn’t especially fond of.
“In the last campaign, and in 16 and, you know, and in 20, uh, I found myself going, ‘Oh please don’t do that; please don’t say that.’ You know, it’s like these things have come out of his mouth,” he explained.
However, Mr. Quaid said he liked “everything” the businessman did throughout his presidency.
“What he did with [North] Korea with [Kim Jong Un]; the way he defeated ISIS in three weeks. You know, people don’t even remember it happened so, so fast,” he shared. “He stood up for us overseas and … the way he responded to China. He stands up to people, and that’s what makes him a leader.”
Mr. Quaid continued: “I tell you one true thing about him is that I really feel that he is working for the American people. That’s what he’s all about. And I do believe that to be true and sincere.”
‘We All Live in the Same Country’
Elsewhere in the 45-minute-long conversation, Mr. Quaid gave his thoughts on President Biden, telling Mr. Morgan that he didn’t feel like the president was in control of his administration.
“I don’t feel he’s at the helm; I don’t feel he’s there,” the actor candidly shared. “I feel that he says things to get votes not that he truly believes in them. And now I’m really going to get some blowback, but that’s the way I feel.”
Although Mr. Quaid conveyed his praise for President Trump’s achievements, “The Day After Tomorrow” star said he wished Americans weren’t so divided by politics.
“I hope … we can all learn to have a conversation about, you know, where we are as Americans,” he said. “We all live in the same country, and it doesn’t have to be the end of the world whoever is elected.”
Mr. Morgan agreed, sharing an anecdote about some of the disagreements he and his friends would have while drinking at a local pub when he was younger.
“We would all have huge arguments after a few pints but the idea we‘d fall out with each other over it never crossed our minds. We would just argue about what was in the news, you know, and then we’d have a few more pints and we go home and we’d shake each other or give each other a hug,” the 59-year-old television personality explained.
“That ability to respect someone’s opinion—even when you don’t agree with them—just seems to have disappeared from this generation. It’s like you either agree with me or I have to, not just ostracize you, I have to destroy you, you must be canceled.”
Earlier in the conversation, Mr. Quaid offered his thoughts on the political polarization across the country, sharing his belief that people aren’t as informed about pressing issues as they were 30 to 40 years ago.
“Our own point of view, our own beliefs, are getting coughed back at us,” he said, referencing the types of information commonly shared by mainstream media and via social media platforms.
“We really need to … learn to work together and disagree but have a civil conversation about it [because] 30, 40 years ago, we had liberal Republicans, we had conservative Democrats, and there was much more across the aisle,” Mr. Quaid said.
Fed F**kery Turns $98BN (NSA) Large Bank Deposit Outflow Into $2BN Inflow
After a small inflow last week, total US bank deposits dropped a modest $4.7BN last week on a seasonally-adjusted basis…
Source: Bloomberg
But, on a non-seasonally-adjusted basis, US total bank deposits tumbled almost $110BN…
Source: Bloomberg
This decline happened as money market funds saw modest inflows, pushing back near record highs…
Source: Bloomberg
Exclduing foreign deposits, US domestic deposits fell $2.2BN on a seasonally-adjusted basis (large bank +$2.1BN, small bank -$4.3BN), while on a non-seasonally-adjusted basis, domestic deposits puked $121BN (large banks -$98BN, small banks -$23BN)…
Source: Bloomberg
On the other side of the ledger, Small banks saw loan volumes shrink by $10.6BN while Large banks saw loan volumes grow by $8.6BN…
Source: Bloomberg
Finally, US equity market cap remains dramatically decoupled from its historical tight relationship with US bank reserves at The Fed…
“The hour is much later than you think…on multiple fronts: Financial, political, medical and geopolitical.”
– Edward Dowd
In the pre-gloat hours before the verdict in Judge Juan Merchan’s courtroom, Lawfare caporegime Andrew Weissmann (“Mueller’s Pitbull”) confessed Valley Girl style from his MSNBC clubhouse perch, “. . . I mean, I am, like, now I have a man-crush on him, he is such a great judge!” Bromance on, looks like! If the two happen to frequent the same athletic club in downtown Manhattan, Judge Merchan better be careful in the post-workout shower when he bends over to pick up the soap. The Pitbull cometh!
Credit: Joshua Lisec on “X”
Of course, the Alvin Bragg victory in the artfully constructed “Stormy Daniels Payoff Case” decided late Thursday calls to question how come the Mueller Special Counsel Probe into 2016 election interference (actually run by Mr. Weissmann, due to Mr. Mueller’s declining cognitive ability) failed to spot the same web of evidence – hard as they toiled, and they had a good two years and millions of taxpayer dollars to git’er done?
My guess: too many white lawyers on the Mueller staff. Everybody knows now from watching the latest crop of television commercials that white people are unusually stupid and helpless and cannot cope with common problems without assistance from helpful people of color (POCs). So, God bless Alvin Bragg for finally fixing what Bob Mueller’s fifteen bloodhounds led by a pitbull somehow botched.
The former president is now convicted on thirty-four counts of book-keeping errors in furtherance of an alleged 2016 federal election violation that the Federal Election Commission declined to charge — that is, paying a porn star to sign a non-disclosure agreement about a sexual liaison — because it is not a crime under federal election law, and about which the head of the FEC, James E. “Trey” Trainor III, was barred by Judge Merchan from testifying on during the course of the trial for reasons yet unknown.
Of course, that is but one of a great many points of law that will merit appeal in what everybody — even some white people (people of non-color, PONCs) — knows was a case so crookedly contrived that it is fated to get tossed in the higher courts, and probably with harsh remonstrance to the degenerate officers of the court who brought it and adjudicated it. But you will have to wait on that because the mills of the law grind slowly.
Now, in the radiance of the full Woke gloat, we await Judge Merchan’s sentence, to be announced a mere few days before the Republican Convention in Milwaukee in early July. Jail time at Rikers? Home confinement (with ankle bracelet)? Severe travel restrictions? Reporting to a parole officer? Drug tests? Hey, No one is above the law! It is hard to imagine that the judge will demur from inflicting maximum humiliation on this wanton repeat violator (thirty-four times!) of book-keeping errors. It would tend to interfere with the presidential candidate’s campaign schedule, but so what? Where does it say in the Constitution that an election must be fair?
Or Judge Merchan could suspend all that pending appeal and just allow Mr. Trump to go about his election business free on bail. But why would he? After all the trouble he went to. And all the glory he’s reaping for it. “Joe Biden’s” party has Mr. Trump exactly where they want him, they think: pinned down like a moth in a shadow-box, inert and pathetic. (But, in reality, more like King Kong, chained in the rank basement below the stage of a Broadway theater before busting loose in midtown and upending subway cars so as to devour the little humans tumbling out like so many tic-tacs.)
Expect Mr. Trump’s lawyers to file writs to the SCOTUS requesting expedited attention to the denial of due process issues and the election interference question. The situation is comparable to the year 2000 presidential race, where the SCOTUS stepped in on probable cause that the lower court (in Florida that time) had violated the Equal Protection clause of the constitution.
In the meantime, through the luminescent fog of gloat, perhaps you did not notice that “Joe Biden” took a giant step yesterday toward commencing World War Three. The move was framed as the US gives Ukraine permission to use American missiles to strike deep within Russia. That was a bit disingenuous, you see, because Ukraine’s military lacks the know-how to actually launch the missiles, so American military “advisors” will have to be on hand to do it, meaning US military personnel will commit an act of aggression upon Russia.
Voila! That world war you’ve all been clamoring for. . .? The perfect climax to “Joe Biden’s” catastrophic, fraudulently-acquired term in office. I scent the acrid, burnt-flesh odor of miscalculation here, as of a bunch of American cities get turned into radioactive bonfires that will blot out that sublime luminosity of gloat.
Apparently, the “Joe Biden” team has never seen a Clint Eastwood movie — too lowbrow, I’m sure — and they don’t grok the role of the underdog in the American psyche. They have succeeded in making Donald Trump the greatest underdog in US history under the direst circumstances the nation may have ever faced — worse than Valley Forge, Bull Run, or the Ardennes Forest. Sinister forces are driving the country straight into a communo-fascist despotism alien to our nation’s very soul, demonic forces bent on depriving Americans of their rights, their property, and their liberty.
This is the “all-in-lost” moment in that movie. This is where the hero comes back from the edge of eternal darkness, raging like Kali the Destroyer to smite the cowards arrayed against him, against the country’s honor, against the people. You asked for it. Now you’re going to get it.
In the past six months, bird flu has surprised scientists at least twice.
Bird flu viruses have circulated mainly in birds for a long time. However, in early December 2023, an outbreak occurred in U.S. dairy cows, even though cattle are not typically susceptible to avian influenza A, the bird flu virus.
Since bird flu infections in humans are rare, these incidents have raised significant concern among scientists.
Why is this happening, and how concerned should we be?
This article aims to avoid unnecessary fear about a potential future pandemic. Instead, we encourage people to think rationally and make appropriate adjustments for the future.
Rapid Spread in Birds
The history of the H5N1 virus family can be traced back to 1996 when it was first discovered in a sick goose in the Guangdong province of China.
H5N1 has evolved, resulting in different genetic lineages (clades) as they mutate, similar to a typical pattern of behavior for RNA viruses such as the ever-emerging COVID-19 variants. In 2013, the H5N1 clade 2.3.4.4b emerged. Since then, it has spread rapidly to nearly 100 countries across Asia, Europe, Africa, and America, becoming the most dominant clade and causing significant losses to the poultry industry.
In December 2021, this particular clade 2.3.4.4b, was first identified in wild birds in the United States.
The clade quickly mixed with other circulating influenza A viruses in wild birds in North America. This resulted in viral reassortment and recombination of genes and exhibiting diverse characteristics. Many of these variants cause severe illnesses in mammals, significantly affecting their nervous system.
The Jump to Cows
The avian influenza virus, commonly called the bird flu virus, belongs to the flu virus family. Flu viruses have many natural hosts, including ducks, geese, swans, gulls, terns, waders, pigs, and horses.
Certain types of flu viruses typically infect specific hosts and do not usually jump from one host to another.
There is a wide variety of bird flu viruses, ranging from H1 to H19, but they have mostly remained in birds and animals, rarely affecting humans.
This clade became concerning because of their frequent spillover events. A spillover event occurs when a virus from one normal host reservoir jumps into a new or different host species, for example, jumping from a bird to a horse or cattle.
From early this year, some cows have been producing less milk and eating less. It was later confirmed that the H5Nx clade 2.3.4.4b viruses were present in both the cows’ milk and nasal samples. The USDA reported an outbreak in this clade in cows for the first time.
The December USDA preprint reveals that the same viral strain was found in dairy cows that have no known connection to the infected herds. This suggests that the transmission in cows has already started quietly, and asymptomatic cows likely contributed to the rapid spread of the virus.
As of May 28, there were 67 herds infected by the H5N1 virus in nine states. Despite the low number of infected herds, this could indicate that it is no longer just a spillover event, but rather a significant expansion of host tropism. The concern is when a large-scale outbreak might occur.
Furthermore, as dairy cows often live in close proximity to humans, infections in cows may also impact human health.
The Likely Jump to Humans
Although bird flu infections in humans have been rare, they can happen.
In the past 20 years, there have been sporadic human infections with the H5N1 virus. There have been 888 infected patients, resulting in 463 deaths reported across 23 countries. The majority of cases have occurred in Egypt, Indonesia, and Vietnam. These cases have resulted in a cumulative case fatality rate of more than 50 percent, based on data collected by the World Health Organization.
Since these cases are mostly scattered throughout Asia, they haven’t received much public attention in Western countries until recently.
In April 2022, a case was confirmed in a Colorado poultry worker who has since recovered. This was the first known case of H5N1 infection transmitted from poultry to a human in the United States.
The second human case in the United States didn’t occur until late March. A dairy farm worker in Texas showed symptoms of hemorrhagic conjunctivitis in both eyes and was confirmed to be infected by the H5N1 clade 2.3.4.4b. He had no respiratory symptoms and fully recovered within a few days.
However, this person reported no contact with sick or dead birds but had close exposure to sick dairy cows. The cows showed decreased milk production, reduced appetite, fever, and dehydration, suggesting H5N1 infection.
This was the first report in the United States of the highly pathogenic avian influenza H5N1 virus suspected of transmitting from a mammalian animal species to a human.
These cases have alerted scientists, as they suggest that the virus may have acquired the ability to spread between mammals and potentially infect humans.
If a highly pathogenic H5N1 virus were to develop the ability to spread easily among humans, including through human-to-human transmission, it could have a significant impact on the human population, given the high mortality rate observed in previous cases.
Since these are the only two confirmed U.S. cases of cow-to-human transmission, the full extent of similar infections and the mortality rate remain unknown.
The spillover from one species to another typically happens naturally through the food chain. For instance, it can happen when infected birds are eaten by another species. These events generally occur on a small scale, unlike the widespread occurrences seen in U.S. cattle.
What caused the recent jump to cows from another species? Was it a natural, random event as in the past, or were other factors involved?
Gained the Ability to Spread via Aerosols
The original avian H5N1 viruses were not easily transmissible between mammals.
About a decade ago, two virologists,Yoshihiro Kawaoka from the University of Wisconsin in Madison and Ron Fouchier of Erasmus Medical Center in the Netherlands, alarmed the world by conducting high-risk gain-of-function studies on H5N1.
The process was complex. For example, a mutant H5N1 virus was created carrying the specific gene mutation PB2 E627K. It was then passed through ferrets 10 times. After gaining a total of five mutations, the mutant H5N1 virus gained the ability to be transmitted via aerosols or respiratory droplets.
These mutations had only been found in nature, but never all within the same strain. Moreover, their lab manipulation and enhanced ability to transmit via aerosol has resulted in pandemic potential.
In 2011, Paul Keim, a microbial geneticist who chaired the U.S. National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity (NSABB), expressed concern after reviewing their publications. “I can’t think of another pathogenic organism that is as scary as this one,” he told Science. Having worked on anthrax for many years, he added, “I don’t think that anthrax is scary at all compared to this.”
Publishing these key mutations enables others to replicate the work in their own labs and marks the beginning of the unsettling H5N1 narrative.
On April 1, 2021, a three-party project was initiated between the United States, the UK, and China that included the USDA, the U.S. National Poultry Research Center, the Southeast Poultry Research Laboratory (SEPRL) in Georgia, the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), and the Roslin Institute in the UK.
The USDA is sponsoring a grant of $1 million for this project. The SEPRL and Roslin Institute provide expertise in avian immunology genomics and viral transcriptomics analysis.
The actual experiments are conducted in China’s CAS lab. There might be a specific reason for choosing this location.
The project, as we’ll explain later, is also a gain-of-function (GOF) study.
GOF studies on the bird flu virus have triggered broad criticism by the U.S. scientific community since 2011. Richard Ebright, a molecular biologist and laboratory director at the Waksman Institute of Microbiology, also told Science, “This work should never have been done.” From a biosafety perspective, scientists have expressed concern that a new virus generated through research could escape from the lab or that bioterrorists could leverage the published results into a bioweapon for malignant purposes.
In the United States, gain-of-function experiments involving influenza, Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus, and severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus were banned from October 2014 through December 2017. The moratorium was lifted by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) on Dec. 19, 2017.
Chinese labs often have sufficient technical capacity but face a major challenge due to relatively loose biosecurity regulations.
Former CDC director, Dr. Robert Redfield, recently stated, “Bird flu, I think, is going to be the cause of a great pandemic—where they are teaching these viruses how to be more infectious for humans.”
A Severe, Rapidly Spreading Virus
Chinese scientists are not opposed to doing risky gain-of-function studies on bird flu viruses.
For example, in a study published in Science in May 2013, scientists led by Chen Hualan at Harbin Veterinary Research Institute in Harbin, China, combined the highly lethal but not easily transmissible H5N1 virus with the highly contagious H1N1 swine flu strain, which infected millions of people in 2009.
At least three aspects of the three-party collaborative project study design strongly indicate its gain-of-function nature. However, these may be difficult to discern without reading between the lines.
One significant issue is the experimental approach known as “serial passage.” The process of serial passage research is widely acknowledged by scientists as a tool for gain-of-function studies.
Serial passage involves growing and reproducing the virus from one cell to another or from one animal to another. These studies have high risks of generating mutations that can lead to greater transmissibility, pathogenicity, and zoonotic transmission. The more potent mutants can be selected for the next passage.
As written in their proposal, CAS scientists are responsible for measuring “fitness,” which indicates the outcome of a viral infection—whether it develops faster or slower and whether it results in a severe or mild illness. Samples are collected before and after each round of passages to identify patterns of transmission and pathogenicity. This increases the likelihood of creating mutant H5N1 strains that can cause more severe diseases with faster transmission.
The second clue is linked to the animal models they carefully selected to reproduce the virus—mallard ducks, Chinese geese, and Japanese quail.
The mallard duck is the most abundant migratory and wide-ranging duck on Earth and can crossbreed with 63 other species. It is an asymptomatic carrier harboring many bird flu viruses, potentially allowing more mutated viruses to recombine.
Flu viruses are large, single-stranded RNA viruses comprising an eight-segmented genome. This unique feature of the virus genome implies that it is easy to reassort to one another, resulting in different combinations of genomes, especially when given a perfect condition of many different types of viruses residing in one host.
Furthermore, the Japanese quail has a dual expression of two bird flu virus receptors on both avian and mammalian species. It is such an ideal host that after a series of passage trials, people can identify those strains that are more adaptive to mammalian receptors but not bird receptors.
Therefore, this study design favors the selection of a mutated H5N1 virus that has enhanced tropism for mammalian hosts with a higher pathogenicity or transmissibility.
This is a technologically well-designed study setting to achieve the gain-of-function purpose, in which the study objective appears to be about enhanced surveillance, monitoring, fitness, and vaccine studies.
In addition, this study plans to use live viruses to challenge mallard ducks with low-pathogenic bird flu viruses first, followed by a high-pathogenic virus.
Because the bird flu virus is highly prone to recombination, a genome reassortment among high- and low-pathogenic bird flu viruses could generate new recombinant influenza viruses with unpredictable host tropism or pathogenicity.
Therefore, this creates an even higher potential of generating new gain-of-function mutants.
Since 2021, the bird flu virus H5N1 of clade 2.3.4.4b has had an explosive geographic expansion among wild birds and domestic poultry across Asia, Europe, and Africa, and spread to America at the end of 2021.
Response to Criticism
There has been longstanding criticism of gain-of-function research. Several members of the U.S. Congress have also expressed serious concern about collaborating with the Chinese on bird flu research.
“We are disturbed by recent reports about the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) collaboration with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)-linked Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) on bird flu research,” they wrote in an April 12 letter.
“This research, funded by American taxpayers, could potentially generate dangerous new lab-created virus strains that threaten our national security and public health,” they added.
When interviewed by the Science journal in February, the lead investigator denied that they planned to do gain-of-function studies. However, the experimental approach includes “in vivo passage of viruses through mallard ducks and Chinese goose species to predict evolution in natural hosts.”
The lead scientist at CAS involved in this study, Wenjun Liu, emphasized that the Chinese government has strict regulations for lab safety. However, this argument is far from convincing since even a biosafety level 4 lab—the highest safety level—can have serious safety compliance issues, as demonstrated with the Wuhan Institute of Virology and COVID-19.
The recent suspension of funding for scientist Peter Daszak, president of EcoHealth Alliance, sends a clear signal that people distrust virological studies linked to Chinese government-controlled labs.
Increased Pathogenicity
The pathogenicity of H5N1 in animals has increased.
In a 2023 study published in Cell, researchers at the University of Pittsburgh and the Vaccine Research Center of the NIH, used their existing model of cynomolgus macaques to test the effectiveness of the H5N1 vaccine.
In this study, an inhaled aerosol dose of 5.1 log10 plaque-forming units (PFU) caused a strong fever and acute respiratory disease in four out of six macaques, resulting in their deaths. PFU is a method of measuring the amount of the virus.
In comparison, in studies conducted from 2001 to 2014 with cynomolgus macaques, when these monkeys were given high doses of H5N1 (6.5–7.8 log10 PFU) through various routes (nose, throat, mouth, and eyes), they usually developed mild illness, and only 2 out of 49 monkeys died from the infection, based on previous reports.
Compared to the studies done 10 to 23 years ago, a much lower dose used in the 2023 study caused a much higher percentage (half) of the monkeys’ deaths. This indicates that the pathogenicity of the H5N1 virus has dramatically increased.
History Repeated?
While we retrospectively reviewed the timing of the GOF studies in 2012 and 2021 and the outbreaks of H5N1 bird flu viruses in birds and mammals in 2013 and 2021, it is clear that there is a close temporal relationship between them.
This research on the bird flu viruses and current outbreaks in birds and cows should also remind us of the fiercely debated origin of SARS-CoV-2.
A widely discussed, evidence-based viewpoint on the origin of the SARS-CoV-2 virus suggests that bat-derived coronaviruses, previously harmless to humans, gained the ability to infect humans through lab manipulation.
It’s particularly important to consider the current focus of scientific research after experiencing an unprecedented, challenging period due to COVID-19. Some Chinese government-controlled labs are still creating more dangerous viruses and enabling them to spread on a large scale in the name of pandemic preparedness. This raises the question of whether they are truly helping people or creating more diseases.
These alarming facts and circumstances should prompt immediate, thorough investigations into Chinese labs and their potential connection to the H5N1 bird flu outbreak.
In the pursuit of advancing science and researching more effective ways to protect people, such as developing vaccines, the underlying driving force behind such endeavors is often technological competition. However, scientists may have created more problems than solutions for humanity.
Editing the virus to enhance its transmissibility and pathogenicity, and researching its pandemic potential, only fuels more fear, rather than resolving the issue.
Ironically, some modern technology can have an extensive negative impact on society. The ability of scientists to conduct GOF research does not justify its necessity.
It’s time for people to wake up.
More About Bird Flu Viruses
There are four types of flu viruses: A, B, C, and D. Based on our current knowledge, only type A can cause global pandemics. A pandemic can occur when an influenza virus has the ability to create long-lasting human-to-human transmission in a population with limited immunity against the virus. In history, three type A flu viruses have triggered human pandemics: H1N1 (1918), H2N2 (1957), and H3N2 (1968).
Influenza A viruses are classified into dozens of subtypes according to two types of glycoproteins on the surface of the virus.
The first glycoprotein, hemagglutinin (H), allows the virus to bind to a celluar surface receptor known as sialic acid and enter the cell. Its name comes from its ability to cause red blood cells to clump together into masses. The second one, neuraminidase (N), is a receptor-destroying protein and enzyme that cleaves the glycosidic bonds of the neuraminic acid, which helps release new viral particles from infected cells. The balance between the H and N function has potential implications for transmission, host adaptation, and pathogenicity between species.
A total of 19 H proteins (H1–H19) and 11 N proteins (N1–N11) have been identified. Different combinations of H and N can be used to name a flu virus. H5N1 has a type 5 H and a type 1 N, so its name is H5N1.
The “H5Nx” nomenclature indicates different neuraminidase types (such as N1, N2, N6, N8) are paired with the H5 protein.
A “clade” is like a branch on a family tree. In a virus family, a clade refers to a group of viruses from a common ancestor with similar characteristics. Clade 2.3.4.4b includes various viruses from H5N1, H5N2, H5N5, H5N6, and H5N8.
Five subtypes of avian influenza A viruses, H5, H6, H7, H9, and H10 are known to have caused human infections.
Bird flu viruses are classified as either low or highly pathogenic avian influenza based on the disease severity they trigger.
The H5 and H7 subtypes are highly pathogenic. Specifically, A(H5N1) and A(H7N9) viruses have caused most of the avian influenza A viral infections reported in people.
HPAI A(H5N6) and LPAI A(H9N2) viruses have also caused human infections in recent years.
Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times or ZeroHedge.
The Chinese Defense Ministry on Thursday strongly condemned the US deployment of an intermediate-range missile system to the Philippines during military drills that were conducted in April and the first half of May.
During Washington and Manila’s annual Balikatan exercises, the US deployed a Typhon launcher, a covert system that is concealed in a 40-foot shipping container and fires Tomahawk and SM-6 missiles.
The Typhon system would have been banned under the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, a treaty between the US and Russia that the US scrapped in 2019. It prohibited land-based missile systems with a range between 310 and 3,400 miles.
Tomahawk missiles can hit targets up to about 1,150 miles away, making any land-based variant banned under the INF. The SM-6 missiles have a range of 290 miles, and US officials believe they could be effective against Chinese ships.
US officials previously told The New York Times that the purpose of developing and deploying the Typhon launcher is to prepare for a war with China, whether over Taiwan or the South China Sea.
Chinese Defense Ministry spokesman Wu Qian said the deployment of the Typhon system increased the risk of conflict.
“The United States and Philippine practices put the entire region under the fire of the United States (and) brought huge risks of war into the region,” Wu said, according to Reuters.
“Intermediate-range missiles are strategic and offensive weapons with a strong Cold War color,” the statement added.
In an economic climate of high inflation, Walmart has emerged as the retail victor, offering cheap goods to cost-conscious consumers. As millions of shoppers grapple with rising prices, the retail titan has managed to attract a wide range of customers, from low-income to high-net-worth households.
Since Walmart shares helped the Dow Jones Industrial Average march toward a record high of 40,000 on May 17, Wall Street has been delving into the company’s success story, concluding that its strong earnings have been supported by consumers hunting for bargains.
The retail titan’s shares rose by 22 percent year to date and 33 percent since last year, outperforming both the Dow Jones and S&P 500. But why has Walmart become the darling of Wall Street while other retailers, such as Target, are flatlining?
It’s all in the numbers.
Investors cheered after Walmart’s latest quarterly earnings report. Revenues advanced 6 percent year-on-year thanks to higher spending by wealthier customers and a 22 percent surge in online sales. Additionally, profits more than tripled to $5.1 billion in the three months ending on April 30.
Walmart CEO Doug McMillon attributed the company’s excellent performance to unit sales, transaction counts, and market share gains, not to price increases.
“These are not inflation-driven results,” he said during the company’s earnings call.
In addition to generating more transactions, Walmart has been trimming the fat to keep costs down, such as a 4.2 percent drop in inventory levels.
During the pandemic-era supply chain crisis, retailers scrambled to buy as much as possible to satisfy consumer demand and prevent further trade disruptions. Now that supply chains have largely normalized, backroom stock does not need to be as immense.
Looking ahead, shoppers may notice lower store prices for various merchandise. The company noted that it has bolstered “rollbacks” on thousands of specific items in both brick-and-mortar locations and the website.
“Our rollback count is up and customers are responding to our price leadership,” Mr. McMillon said.
All of these trends helped the Arkansas-based retailer lift its market cap above $500 billion and bring the share price to around $65.
“Despite the broader economic pressures of inflation, Walmart has navigated the turbulent waters with aplomb,” said Giuseppe Sette, the president of financial market research services firm Toggle AI, used by leading hedge funds and Wall Street banks.
“The broader implication here is clear: Walmart is not only a barometer for the retail sector but also for the U.S. economy at large.”
By comparison, Target has a market cap of about $67 billion and its shares are up just 3.2 percent year-to-date as of May 29.
Since its inception, Walmart has been known as a discount department store behemoth that typically appeals to low- and middle-income shoppers.
In today’s high cost-of-living climate, the retail giant confirmed it is attracting more upper-income households, too.
“Wallets are still stretched,” said Walmart CFO John David Rainey in the earnings call.
While value had been the premier objective of visiting the retailer, the corporate giant noted that consumers are searching for quality and convenience, too.
This should not be surprising news, says Carol Levenson, the director of research at Gimme Credit.
“It is the convenience as well as the value and assortment that attracts them, just as it does any shopper,” Ms. Levenson told The Epoch Times.
Walmart has been doing a lot to appeal to a wider range of customers, such as launching a new private-label grocery brand, upgrading more than 1,400 locations nationwide, and stocking shelves inside renovated stores with newer kitchen and fashion brands.
In recent years, discount retailers like Dollar General and Five Below have reported higher-income shoppers flocking to their stores, Morning Consult data show. Big Lots has said upper-income customers account for more foot traffic than in prior years.
One area that invites more consumers of all demographics is the grocery aisles.
Walmart is, by far, the largest grocery retailer in the United States. And amid soaring prices, an increasing number of Americans are flocking to Walmart for their grocery needs.
Ms. Levenson noted that Walmart dominates because of its immense grocery and essentials base, which accounted for 72 percent of its U.S. sales last year. Its feet have been firmly planted at the top of the retail mountain because of “its geographic and assortment breadth, meaning it can sail through economic cycles and consumer spending trends, aided by its scale and its financial flexibility.”
“In grocery, it has recently introduced some higher quality private brands priced and positioned more like Trader Joe’s, likely aimed at upper-income households,” she said.
Consumers are shifting their spending habits, too, especially in the realm of food.
As fast food becomes more expensive, Walmart is attracting customers who are hunting for better deals. Grocery sales were up by mid-single-digit percentages, buoyed by meat and produce, the company reported in its recent earnings report.
The latest inflation report also shows a widening gap between food-at-home prices and food-away-from-home prices. In the April consumer price index report, for example, the former was up 1.1 percent year-over-year, and the latter was up more than 4 percent compared to the same time a year ago.
On August 4, 2017, the most hated person in the world was sentenced to seven years in prison.
You may remember the case: his name is Martin Shkreli.
Shkreli had quite infamously taken over a pharmaceutical company and jacked up the price of a medication by 50x, practically overnight. Media outrage ensued, and Shkreli– an young, arrogant braggadocio with far more ego than compassion, was summoned to explain himself to angry politicians in Congress.
Shkreli smirked and insulted his way through the Congressional hearing, leading countless people to conclude he was the biggest jerk on the planet.
And, shortly thereafter, Shkreli was raided and prosecuted by the Justice Department on charges of securities fraud.
Now this guy was no Honest Abe. But he wasn’t Bernie Madoff either. And it’s worth pointing out that not a single one of Shkreli’s investors lost money.
I have no doubt that Shkreli stretched the truth with investors; the financial industry is filled with sharks who lie to investors all the time. But those people are rarely charged or prosecuted– including the vast majority of the liars and thieves from the 2008 financial crisis.
You might remember Goldman Sachs bankers referred to their customers as “muppets” and bragged about selling them “shitty deals” and terrible investments. Zero jail time for them.
Shkreli was prosecuted because people hated him… and the government put him behind bars.
I wrote at the time that Shkreli’s arrest and prosecution represented a dark day for the justice system; it proved that you can be prosecuted in the land of the free, simply because people don’t like you.
Bizarrely I received a lot of hate mail from that article from people who accused me of defending Shkreli. I wasn’t. I was arguing that the government shouldn’t put people they don’t like in jail.
Naturally, the passionate ignoramuses cling to their mantra that “no one is above the law”. But that’s complete BS.
The amount of local, state, and federal crimes on the books could fill an entire football stadium. Every single person reading this right now is guilty of violating some rule, statute, or regulation without even knowing it.
How could anybody possibly keep up with all the rules and laws that change every single day and are constantly expanding.
In fact, just last year they added 79,066 pages to the Federal Register. Yet they also claim that ” ignorance of the law is not an excuse”. It’s absurd.
There used to be sacrosanct standards of the justice system. Victims would come forward and allege a crime had taken place. The crime would be investigated, a suspect would be found, then prosecutors would bring charges.
Most importantly, the suspect would then be presumed innocent until convicted by a dispassionate prosecutor and impartial jury.
Now that system is completely distorted.
Politicians run for elected prosecutor offices (like District Attorney or state Attorney General) with the same zeal and vigor as if they were running for President.
They’re funded by fanatical leftists like George Soros, and they make campaign promises to target and prosecute political opponents.
Then, rather than investigate a crime to find an individual suspect, they investigate the individual and find a crime… even if it means inventing a new crime by stretching the law beyond reason.
Then they select the jurisdiction most suitable for their case– where the defendant is the most hated– virtually guaranteeing that there will in no way be a fair trial.
Putting Donald Trump on trial in New York City is like putting Benjamin Netanyahu on trial in Iran and expecting the Ayatollah to issue a fair and impartial judgment.
But this is the justice system now. As I wrote years ago during the Shkreli affair, “it really paints the picture when you realize that a member of the political elite can merely point his/her thumb like Caesar at the Colosseum, and then gun toting federal agents come swarming in with a laundry list of charges.”
And it was the same thing in the recent civil trial brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James– who also campaigned on convicting Trump. She claimed that he overstated the value of his real estate assets to secure favorable loans.
But there was no victim. The banks that gave the loans said they lost no money and would be happy to do business with Trump again.
Again, though he’s neither Bernie Madoff nor honest Abe, such practices are pretty standard in the industry. Bankers know this. They’re not stupid. Of course, borrowers inflate their assets.
The practice is so commonplace, in fact, that the Governor of New York had to assure other real estate developers (who were panicking and fleeing the state) that no one else would be prosecuted for those charges. Only Trump.
The outcome of the case was so lopsided that the judge had to practically invent a new form of mathematics to justify the outrageous penalty he ordered.
In 1998, then President Bill Clinton paid $850,000 to a woman who had accused him of sexual assault. They money was part of a legal settlement which included a nondisclosure agreement to keep the woman quiet. No charges were brought against him.
Hillary, course, wiped her private email servers before handing them over to FBI investigators… which is an obvious crime. She admitted to this. No charges were brought.
No charges have been brought against Joe Biden for illegally storing classified documents. No charges have been brought against anyone on the Epstein client list.
The word justice comes from the Latin word justitia, which means righteousness. And, quite amazingly, the leftists who are cheering the perversion of the justice system right now are full of their bloated sense of righteousness.
They truly believe this is justice.
But they have memories like goldfish and have completely forgotten that the left is a tribe of cannibals: sooner or later, the leftists eat their own kind.
The people cheering right now will inevitably one day say the wrong thing. They’ll use the wrong pronouns. They have the wrong thought. They’ll fail to bend the knee, raise the fist, say the name, storm the university building, or engage in whatever ritualistic virtue signaling comes next.
Then they could find themselves at the business end of the perverted justice system that they’re cheering right now.
Who knows where it goes from here. Will the political opponents on the right ‘turn the other cheek’, or will it be full blown civil lawfare?
(If so, I would humbly suggest that Tony Fauci likely has a laundry list of actual good reasons to be prosecuted.)
The US has crossed the Rubicon.
We saw the preview during the 2020 summer of love riots, and COVID hysteria. People were, canceled, fired, blacklisted, and denounce by loved ones for daring to disagree with the narrative.
But at least it didn’t leverage the full resources of the justice system.
Now, countless people on the woke left are full of bloodlust and cheering for the perversion of the justice system. They don’t realize that one day it might be used against them.
Everybody ought to recognize this is now the legal standard in America. And to think that it ends here is naive.
Children who received the AstraZeneca or Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccines faced an elevated risk of epilepsy and appendicitis, according to a new study.
Pfizer recipients were also more likely to suffer from demyelinating disease or heart inflammation, researchers found.
Dr. Julia Hippisley-Cox, a professor of clinical epidemiology at the University of Oxford’s Nuffield Department of Primary Health Care Sciences, and colleagues obtained data from a national database on COVID-19 vaccination, mortality, hospital admissions, and COVID-19 infections. They wanted to look at the link between COVID-19 vaccines from AstraZeneca, Pfizer, and Moderna with 12 outcomes, including the heart inflammation condition called myocarditis.
The population of nearly 5.2 million included 1.8 million children aged 5 to 11 and 3.3 million children aged 12 to 17.
The data examined were through Aug. 7, 2022.
In the primary analysis, researchers found 12- to 17-year-olds who received Pfizer’s vaccine were at increased risk of myocarditis, with an additional three cases per million versus the expected rate after a first dose, and an additional five cases per million after a second dose, and hospitalization with epilepsy, with an additional 12 cases per million after a second dose. Females in the age group also faced an increased risk of demyelinating disease after receiving a second dose of the vaccine.
Researchers also identified a “substantially increased risk of hospitalization with epilepsy” among females after receipt of a first dose of AstraZeneca’s shot, with 813 more hospitalizations with epilepsy than expected per million doses, and an elevated risk of appendicitis after a second dose of the vaccine, with 512 excess events per million doses.
While no excess events were found among Moderna recipients, the study lacked the power to detect statistically significant issues, due to few children in the UK receiving Moderna’s vaccine. Further, no elevated risks of the 12 issues were found among 5- to 11-year-olds.
A secondary analysis, involving matching some of the vaccine recipients to unvaccinated children, confirmed an increased risk among 12- to 17-year-olds of hospitalization with epilepsy following Pfizer vaccination, and elevated risks of severe allergic shock and appendicitis in the age group following Pfizer vaccination. No increased risks of any outcome were identified among minor Moderna or AstraZeneca recipients. But among a group of 18- to 24-year-olds studied, elevated risks of a number of conditions were found, including myocarditis, immune or idiopathic thrombocytopenia, epilepsy, and acute pancreatitis.
The study was funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research School for Primary Care Research. Multiple authors declared conflicts of interest, including funding from Moderna and AstraZeneca. Limitations included reliance on hospital admission codes and death certificates.
Pfizer, Moderna, and AstraZeneca did not respond to requests for comment.
The authors said that their findings “support a favorable safety profile of COVID-19 vaccination using mRNA vaccines in children and young people aged 5-17 years.” The Pfizer and Moderna shots utilize messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) technology.
Dr. Hippisley-Cox, the study’s corresponding author, did not return a request for comment seeking data on the position. The authors cited in part how they found unvaccinated children faced increased risks of some of the outcomes, including multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children.
Udi Qimron, a professor at Tel Aviv University’s Department of Clinical Microbiology and Immunology, said that the authors wrongly downplayed the risks associated with the vaccines.
“It’s not surprising to learn that some of the study’s authors have financial ties to Moderna and AstraZeneca and/or have served on various UK and Scottish Government COVID-19 advisory groups. One author was even a member of AstraZeneca’s Thrombotic Thrombocytopenic Taskforce and the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation. The conflict of interest in this case is significant,” Mr. Qimrom, who was not involved in the paper, told The Epoch Times via email.
“It is concerning that respected scientific platforms are being used to cover up mistakes and wrongdoing, particularly the coercion and immense societal pressure to vaccinate young children. This should never have been done,” he added. “It is disheartening to see scientific journals collaborating with such practices, which undermines public trust in scientific research, especially when it involves the health and safety of children.”
