#war against coronavirus

[liberalsarecool]

I owe my Trump-supporting friends an apology. I’ve been critical of the Trump presidency and am still exhausted from the experience.

But to be fair, President Trump wasn’t that bad, other than:

• when he incited an insurrection against the government,

• mismanaged a pandemic that killed over a million Americans

• separated children from their families

• lost those children in the bureaucracy

• tear-gassed peaceful protesters on Lafayette Square so he could hold a photo op holding a Bible in front of a church

• tried to block all Muslims from entering the country

• got impeached

• got impeached again

• had the worst jobs record of any president in modern history

• pressured Ukraine to dig dirt on Joe Biden

• fired the FBI director for investigating his ties to Russia

• bragged about firing the FBI director on TV

• took Vladimir Putin’s word over the US intelligence community

• diverted military funding to build his wall

• caused the longest government shutdown in US history

• called Black Lives Matter a “symbol of hate”

• lied nearly 40,000 times

• banned transgender people from serving in the military

• ejected reporters from the White House briefing room who asked tough questions

• vetoed the defense funding bill because it renamed military bases named for Confederate soldiers

• refused to release his tax returns

• increased the national debt by nearly $8 trillion

• had three of the highest annual trade deficits in U.S. history

• called veterans and soldiers who died in combat losers and suckers

• coddled the leader of Saudi Arabia after he ordered the execution and dismembering of a US-based journalist

• refused to concede the 2020 election

• hired his unqualified daughter and son-in-law to work in the White House

• walked out of an interview with Lesley Stahl

• called neo-Nazis “very fine people”

• suggested that people should inject bleach into their bodies to fight COVID

• abandoned our allies the Kurds to Turkey

• pushed through massive tax cuts for the wealthiest but balked at helping working Americans

• incited anti-lockdown protestors in several states at the height of the pandemic

• withdrew the US from the Paris climate accords

• withdrew the US from the Iranian nuclear deal

• withdrew the US from the Trans Pacific Partnership which was designed to block China’s advances

• insulted his own Cabinet members on Twitter

• pushed the leader of Montenegro out of the way during a photo op

• failed to reiterate US commitment to defending NATO allies

• called Haiti and African nations “shithole” countries

• called the city of Baltimore the “worst in the nation”

• claimed that he single-handedly brought back the phrase “Merry Christmas” even though it hadn’t gone anywhere

• forced his Cabinet members to praise him publicly like some cult leader

• believed he should be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize

• berated and belittled his hand-picked Attorney General when he recused himself from the Russia probe

• suggested the US should buy Greenland

• colluded with Mitch McConnell to push through federal judges and two Supreme Court justices after supporting efforts to prevent his predecessor from appointing judges

• repeatedly called the media “enemies of the people”

• claimed that if we tested fewer people for COVID we’d have fewer cases

• violated the emoluments clause

• thought that Nambia was a country

• told Bob Woodward in private that the coronavirus was a big deal but then downplayed it in public

• called his exceedingly faithful vice president a “p---y” for following the Constitution

• nearly got us into a war with Iran after threatening them by tweet

• nominated a corrupt head of the EPA

• nominated a corrupt head of HHS

• nominated a corrupt head of the Interior Department

• nominated a corrupt head of the USDA

• praised dictators and authoritarians around the world while criticizing allies

• refused to allow the presidential transition to begin

• insulted war hero John McCain – even after his death

• spent an obscene amount of time playing golf after criticizing Barack Obama for playing (far less) golf while president

• falsely claimed that he won the 2016 popular vote

• called the Muslim mayor of London a “stone cold loser”

• falsely claimed that he turned down being Time’s Man of the Year

• considered firing special counsel Robert Mueller on several occasions

• mocked wearing face masks to guard against transmitting COVID

• locked Congress out of its constitutional duty to confirm Cabinet officials by hiring acting ones

• used a racist dog whistle by calling COVID the “China virus”

• hired and associated with numerous shady figures that were eventually convicted of federal offenses including his campaign manager and national security adviser

• pardoned several of his shady associates

• gave the Presidential Medal of Freedom to two congressman who amplified his batshit crazy conspiracy theories

• got into telephone fight with the leader of Australia(!)

• had a Secretary of State who called him a moron

• forced his press secretary to claim without merit that his was the largest inauguration crowd in history

• botched the COVID vaccine rollout

• tweeted so much dangerous propaganda that Twitter eventually banned him

• charged the Secret Service jacked-up rates at his properties

• constantly interrupted Joe Biden in their first presidential debate

• claimed that COVID would “magically” disappear

• called a U.S. Senator “Pocahontas”

• used his Twitter account to blast Nordstrom when it stopped selling Ivanka’s merchandise

• opened up millions of pristine federal lands to development and drilling

• got into a losing tariff war with China that forced US taxpayers to bail out farmers

• claimed that his losing tariff war was a win for the US

• ignored or didn’t even take part in daily intelligence briefings

• blew off honoring American war dead in France because it was raining

• redesigned Air Force One to look like the Trump Shuttle

• got played by Kim Jung Un and his “love letters”

• threatened to go after social media companies in clear violation of the Constitution

• botched the response to Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico

• threw paper towels at Puerto Ricans when he finally visited them

• pressured the governor and secretary of state of Georgia to “find” him votes

• thought that the Virgin islands had a President

• drew on a map with a Sharpie to justify his inaccurate tweet that Alabama was threatened by a hurricane

• allowed White House staff to use personal email accounts for official businesses after blasting Hillary Clinton for doing the same thing

• rolled back regulations that protected the public from mercury and asbestos

• pushed regulators to waste time studying snake-oil remedies for COVID

• rolled back regulations that stopped coal companies from dumping waste into rivers

• held blatant campaign rallies at the White House

• tried to take away millions of Americans’ health insurance because the law was named for a Black man

• refused to attend his successors’ inauguration

• nominated the worst Education Secretary in history

• threatened judges who didn’t do what he wanted

• attacked Dr. Anthony Fauci

• promised that Mexico would pay for the wall (it didn’t)

• allowed political hacks to overrule government scientists on major reports on climate change and other issues

• struggled navigating a ramp after claiming his opponent was feeble

• called an African-American Congresswoman “low IQ”

• threatened to withhold federal aid from states and cities with Democratic leaders

• went ahead with rallies filled with maskless supporters in the middle of a pandemic

• claimed that legitimate investigations of his wrongdoing were “witch hunts,”

• seemed to demonstrate a belief that there were airports during the American Revolution

• demanded “total loyalty” from the FBI director

• praised a conspiracy theory that Democrats are Satanic pedophiles

• completely gutted the Voice of America

• placed a political hack in charge of the Postal Service

• claimed without evidence that the Obama administration bugged Trump Tower

• suggested that the US should allow more people from places like Norway into the country

• suggested that COVID wasn’t that bad because he recovered with the help of top government doctors and treatments not available to the public

• overturned energy conservation standards that even industry supported

• reduced the number of refugees the US accepts

• insulted various members of Congress and the media with infantile nicknames

• gave Rush Limbaugh a Presidential medal of Freedom at the State of the Union address

• named as head of federal personnel a 29-year old who’d previously been fired from the White House for allegations of financial improprieties

• eliminated the White House office of pandemic response

• used soldiers as campaign props

• fired any advisor who made the mistake of disagreeing with him

• demanded the Pentagon throw him a Soviet-style military parade

• hired a shit ton of white nationalists

• politicized the civil service

• did absolutely nothing after Russia hacked the U.S. government

• falsely said the Boy Scouts called him to say his bizarre Jamboree speech was the best speech ever given to the Scouts

• claimed that Black people would overrun the suburbs if Biden won

• insulted reporters of color

• insulted women reporters

• insulted women reporters of color

• suggested he was fine with China’s oppression of the Uighurs

• attacked the Supreme Court when it ruled against him

• summoned Pennsylvania state legislative leaders to the White House to pressure them to overturn the election

• spent countless hours every day watching Fox News

• refused to allow his administration to comply with Congressional subpoenas

• hired Rudy Giuliani as his lawyer

• tried to punish Amazon because the Jeff Bezos-owned Washington Post wrote negative stories about him

• acted as if the Attorney General of the United States was his personal attorney

• attempted to get the federal government to defend him in a libel lawsuit from a women who accused him of sexual assault

• held private meetings with Vladimir Putin without staff present

• didn’t disclose his private meetings with Vladimir Putin so that the US had to find out via Russian media

• stopped holding press briefings for months at a time

• “ordered” US companies to leave China even though he has no such power

• led a political party that couldn’t even be bothered to draft a policy platform

• claimed preposterously that Article II of the Constitution gave him absolute powers

• tried to pressure the U.K. to hold the British Open at his golf course

• suggested that the government nuke hurricanes

• suggested that wind turbines cause cancer

• said that he had a special aptitude for science

• fired the head of election cyber security after he said that the 2020 election was secure

• blurted out classified information to Russian officials

• tried to force the G7 to hold their meeting at his failing golf resort in Florida

• fired the acting attorney general when she refused to go along with his unconstitutional Muslim travel ban

• hired Stephen Miller

• openly discussed national security issues in the dining room at Mar-a-Lago where everyone could hear them

• interfered with plans to relocate the FBI because a new development there might compete with his hotel

• abandoned Iraqi refugees who’d helped the U.S. during the war

• tried to get Russia back into the G7

• held a COVID super spreader event in the Rose Garden

• seemed to believe that Frederick Douglass is still alive

• lost 60 election fraud cases in court including before judges he had nominated

• falsely claimed that factories were reopening when they weren’t

• shamelessly exploited terror attacks in Europe to justify his anti-immigrant policies

• still hasn’t come up with a healthcare plan

• still hasn’t come up with an infrastructure plan despite repeated “Infrastructure Weeks"

• forced Secret Service agents to drive him around Walter Reed while contagious with COVID

• told the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by”

• fucked up the Census

• withdrew the U.S. from the World Health Organization in the middle of a pandemic

• did so few of his duties that his press staff were forced to state on his daily schedule “President Trump will work from early in the morning until late in the evening. He will make many calls and have many meetings,” allowed his staff to repeatedly violate the Hatch Act

• seemed not to know that Abraham Lincoln was a Republican

• stood before sacred CIA wall of heroes and bragged about his election win

• constantly claimed he was treated worse than any president which presumably includes four that were assassinated and his predecessor whose legitimacy and birthplace were challenged by a racist reality TV show star named Donald Trump

• claimed Andrew Jackson could’ve stopped the Civil War even though he died 16 years before it happened

• said that any opinion poll showing him behind was fake

• claimed that other countries laughed at us before he became president when several world leaders were literally laughing at him

• claimed that the military was out of ammunition before he became President

• created a commission to whitewash American history

• retweeted anti-Islam videos from one of the most racist people in Britain

• claimed ludicrously that the Pulse nightclub shooting wouldn’t have happened if someone there had a gun even though there was an armed security guard there

• hired a senior staffer who cited the non-existent Bowling Green Massacre as a reason to ban Muslims

• had a press secretary who claimed that Nazi Germany never used chemical weapons even though every sane human being knows they used gas to kill millions of Jews and others

• bilked the Secret Service for higher than market rates when they had to stay at Trump properties

• apparently sold pardons on his way out of the White House

• stripped protective status from 59,000 Haitians

• falsely claimed Biden wanted to defund the police

• said that the head of the CDC didn’t know what he was talking about

• tried to rescind protection from DREAMers

• gave himself an A+ for his handling of the pandemic

• tried to start a boycott of Goodyear tires due to an Internet hoax

• said U.S. rates of COVID would be lower if you didn’t count blue states

• deported U.S. veterans who served their country but were undocumented

• claimed he did more for African Americans than any president since Lincoln

• touted a “super-duper” secret “hydrosonic” missile which may or may not be a new “hypersonic” missile or may not exist at all

• retweeted a gif calling Biden a pedophile

• forced through security clearances for his family

• suggested that police officers should rough up suspects

• suggested that Biden was on performance-enhancing drugs

• tried to stop transgender students from being able to use school bathrooms in line with their gender

• suggested the US not accept COVID patients from a cruise ship because it would make US numbers look higher

• nominated a climate change skeptic to chair the committee advising the White House on environmental policy

• retweeted a video doctored to look like Biden had played a song called “Fuck tha Police” at a campaign event

• hugged a disturbingly large number of U.S. flags

• accused Democrats of “treason” for not applauding his State of the Union address

• claimed that the FBI failed to capture the Parkland school shooter because they were “spending too much time” on Russia

• mocked the testimony of Dr Christine Blasey Ford when she accused Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault

• obsessed over low-flow toilets

• ordered the re-release of more COVID vaccines when there weren’t any to release

• called for the construction of a bizarre garden of heroes with statutes of famous dead Americans as well as at least one Canadian (Alex Trebek)

• hijacked Washington’s July 4th celebrations to give a partisan speech

• took advice from the MyPillow guy

• claimed that migrants seeking a better life in the US were dangerous caravans of drug dealers and rapists

• said nothing when Vladimir Putin poisoned a leading opposition figure

• never seemed to heed the advice of his wife’s “Be Best” campaign

• falsely claimed that mail-in voting is fraudulent

• announced a precipitous withdrawal of troops from Syria which not only handed Russia and ISIS a win but also prompted his defense secretary to resign in protest

• insulted the leader of Canada

• insulted the leader of France

• insulted the leader of Britain

• insulted the leader of Germany

• insulted the leader of Sweden (Sweden!!)

• falsely claimed credit for getting NATO members to increase their share of dues

• blew off two Asia summits even though they were held virtually

• continued lying about spending lots of time at Ground Zero with 9/11 responders,

• said that the Japanese would sit back and watch their “Sony televisions” if the US were ever attacked

• left a NATO summit early in a huff

• stared directly into an eclipse even though everyone over the age of five knows not to do that

• called himself a very stable genius despite significant evidence to the contrary

• refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power and kept his promise

And a whole bunch of other things I can’t remember .

[beauty-funny-trippy]

Reasons why we know there's something wrong with Grandpa:

• believes immigrants are eating their neighbors pets because he heard someone say it on TV (without any evidence) • thinks injecting disinfectant into our veins might be a good idea. (It's definitely not, don't try it.) • claims America's F35 fighter jet is completely invisible, even if you're right next to it (like Wonder Woman's plane)

• praises white supremacists and KKK members who were chanting antisemitic hate speech, calling them "very fine people" • focuses on imaginary issues like preventing children from changing gender while at school, but ignores real problems like school shootings • thought it was a good idea to give away our desperately needed Covid test machines to our adversary ("Grandpa, what have you done?" — he can't be left alone for a minute) • decided to believe Putin's lies, but dismiss findings from America's intelligence agencies • claims America had airplanes during the Revolutionary War

• believes in the Nazi ideology that immigrants are "poisoning the blood of our country," and says some migrants are actually subhuman "animals" • insisted that the U.S. would have fewer coronavirus cases if it conducted less testing (yes, a U.S. president in charge of controlling the crisis, actually said something this inept, repeatedly) • due to his incompetence and lies during the Covid crisis, the U.S. had one of the highest rates of Covid deaths in the world • thinks windmills cause cancer and kill whales • speaks endlessly about his concerns re: dying by electrocution from a boat battery or being eaten by a shark

• thinks he's above the law and, as president, should be able to commit as many crimes as he wants • is a billionaire who whines about how badly he's been treated, then he's chauffeured to his private jet • likes to discuss Arnold Palmer's penis • after NINE years of repeatedly promising to unveil his Healthcare Plan "very soon," he admits he still has no real plan —only "concepts of a plan" • has a bizarre attraction to the fictional cannibal and serial killer, Hannibal Lector (why? no one knows —and everyone's afraid to ask)

• advocates dangerous plots, like using the military against Americans who disagree with him, or using the DOJ to arrest them, or just telling people to "beat the crap out of them" and he'll pay their legal fees • thinks having a national day of violence is a good idea (we should never have let Grandpa watch "The Purge") • wants to be the "law and order president," yet this 34 time convicted felon incites people to riot and to commit criminal acts of violence • unable to take the loss of an election like a man, he had a temper tantrum like a toddler, that culminated in a treasonous insurrection

⠀This guy is so delusional, he claims he's a genius because he often speaks incoherently in something he calls "the Weave." Here are two examples: • "How disgusted were all when we see all of us are when we see three days ago when we viewed their parade." Asheboro, NC, 8/21/24 • When asked, "What specific legislation will you commit to, to make child care affordable?" He responded, “Well, I would do that, and we’re sitting down, you know; I was, somebody, we had Senator Marco Rubio and my daughter, Ivanka, who was so impactful on that issue. ...But I think when you talk about the kind of numbers that I’m talking about that because the childcare is childcare, couldn’t, you know, there’s something you have to have it, in this country you have to have it.” New York, NY, 9/5/24 ⠀If this was anybody else's Grandpa, the family would be having discussions about who's going to go with Grandpa to the doctor to find out what's wrong with him, and who's going to be in charge of finding him a nice convalescent home to live in. ⠀My suggestion is that it might be a good idea to elect a president who has no cognitive impairment and can tell the difference between reality and delusions. Personally, I think that's a rather important quality in a president.

[covid-safer-hotties]

The next pandemic is inevitable. Australia isn’t ready - Published Sept 23, 2024

(Before you Americans yell at me, It's already the 23rd in Australia. This is very late-breaking)

I thought this was a really good breakdown of the current situation given the government-approved covid denial we live in. Long, but worth a read.

By Kate Aubusson and Mary Ward

Top infectious disease and public health veterans at the nerve centre of the state’s war against COVID-19 are sounding the alarm.

NSW is less prepared today to fend off a deadly pandemic despite the lessons of COVID-19, say top infectious disease and public health veterans at the nerve centre of the state’s war against the virus.

And we won’t have another hundred years to wait.

NSW’s gold standard Test-Trace-Isolate-Quarantine and vaccination strategies will be useless if a distrusting population rejects directives, refuses to give up its freedoms again, and the goodwill of shell-shocked public health workers dries up.

A panel of experts convened by The Sydney Morning Herald called for a pandemic combat agency akin to the armed forces or fire brigades to commit to greater transparency or risk being caught off guard by the next virulent pathogen and misinformation with the potential to spread faster than any virus.

“It’s inevitable,” says Professor Eddie Holmes of the next pandemic. A world-leading authority on the emergence of infectious diseases at the University of Sydney, Holmes predicts: “We’ll have less than 100 years [before the next pandemic].

“We’re seeing a lot of new coronaviruses that are spilling over into animals that humans are interacting with,” said Holmes, the first person to publish the coronavirus genome sequence for the world to see.

“People are exposed all the time, and each time we are rolling the dice.”

The independent review of NSW Health’s response to COVID-19 opened with the same warning: “No health system or community will have the luxury of 100 years of downtime.”

Pandemic preparedness needs to be a “permanent priority”, wrote the report’s author, Robyn Kruk, a former NSW Health secretary, “rather than following the path of those that have adopted a ‘panic and forget strategy,’ allowing system preparedness to wane”.

Why we don’t have 100 years to wait for the next pandemic The World Health Organisation has declared seven public health emergencies of international concern since 2014, including the current mpox outbreak.

Climate change is turbocharging the factors that coalesce to create the perfect breeding ground for a pandemic-causing virus, including population increases, bigger cities, and better-connected global markets and migration.

“Animals will be forced into more constrained environments, and humans that rely on those environments will be again constrained in the same environments. There will be more wet markets, more live animal trade that will just increase exposure,” Holmes said.

“It was clear that we weren’t ready [for COVID],” said Jennie Musto, who, after seven years working for the World Health Organisation overseas, became NSW Health’s operations manager for the Public Health Emergency Operations Centre, the team responsible for NSW’s COVID-19 contact tracing and containment.

“Everyone had preparedness plans gathering dust on a shelf, but no one was actually ready to respond, and so everyone was on the back foot,” Musto said. “Perhaps none of us really thought this was going to happen. We were waiting 500 years.”

Who would willingly become the next doomed whistleblower? Eddie Holmes, known for his repeated assertion that SARS-CoV-2 did not come from a lab, is deeply concerned that when the next pandemic-causing virus emerges, chances are it will be covered up.

“My worry is that if the virus appeared in a small population, say, somewhere in Southeast Asia, the people involved wouldn’t blow the whistle now, given the fact that you would get blamed,” he said.

Li Wenliang, the Wuhan doctor who tried to raise the alarm about a virulent new virus, was reportedly reprimanded by police for spreading rumours and later died of COVID-19.

The global blame game, culminating in a deep distrust of China and accusations that the virus was grown in a Wuhan lab, is why Holmes believes “we’re in no better place than we were before COVID started, if not worse”.

“I work with a lot of people in China trying to keep the lines of communication open, and they’re scared, I think, or nervous about saying things that are perceived to counter national interest.”

From a vaccine perspective, our defences look strong. There have been monumental advancements in vaccine development globally, driven by mRNA technology. In Sydney this month, construction began on an RNA vaccine research and manufacturing facility.

“But the way I see it is that nothing has been done in terms of animal surveillance of outbreaks or data sharing. The [global] politics has got much, much worse,” Holmes said.

Combat force Conjoint Associate Professor Craig Dalton, a leading public health physician and clinical epidemiologist, called for a dramatic expansion of the public health workforce and the establishment of a pandemic combat force that would routinely run real-time pandemic simulations during “peacetime”.

“No one is upset with fire brigades spending most of the time not fighting fires. They train. A lot. And that’s probably how we need to move,” he said.

“We need exercise training units so that every major player in pandemic response is involved in a real-time, three to four-day pandemic response every three to five years at national, state and local [levels].”

The federal Department of Health and Aged Care recently ran a health emergency exercise focused on governance arrangements involving chief health officers and senior health emergency management officials, a spokeswoman for Health Minister Mark Butler said. The outcomes of this exercise will be tested later this year.

Dalton said desktop simulations and high-level exercises involving a handful of chiefs didn’t cut it, considering the thousands of people working across regions and states. He instead suggested an intensive training program run in the Hunter New England region before the 2009 H1N1 pandemic provided a good model.

“We were ringing people, actors were getting injections, just like a real pandemic,” said Dalton, who once ordered a burrito in a last-ditch effort to contact a restaurant exposed to COVID-19.

Our heroes have had it The expert panel was emphatic that our pandemic response cannot once again rely on the goodwill of the public health and healthcare workforce.

According to the Kruk review, what began as an emergency response ultimately morphed from a sprint into an ultra marathon and “an admirable (yet unsustainable) ‘whatever it takes’ mindset”.

They were hailed as heroes, but the toll of COVID-19 on healthcare workers was brutal. Workloads were untenable, the risk of transmission was constant, and the risk of violence and aggression (for simply wearing their scrubs on public transport in some cases) was terrifying.

“We got through this pandemic through a lot of people working ridiculous hours,” Dalton said.

“You talk to a lot of people who did that and say they could not do it again.”

Tellingly, several expert personnel who worked at the front lines or in the control centre of NSW’s pandemic defences were invited to join the Herald’s forum but declined. Revisiting this period of intense public scrutiny, culminating in online attacks and physical threats, was just too painful.

So long, solidarity Arguably, the biggest threat to our pandemic defences will be the absence of our greatest strength during COVID: the population’s solidarity and willingness to follow public health orders even when it meant forfeiting fundamental freedoms.

The public largely complied with statewide public health orders, including the stay-at-home directive that became the 107-day Delta lockdown, and other severe restrictions prevented many from being at the bedside of their dying loved ones, visiting relatives in aged care homes and attending funerals.

“My worry is that next time around when those sorts of rules come out, people may say, ‘Well, don’t worry about it.’ They relax it in the future. Why don’t we just not stick to the rules?” said Professor Nicholas Wood, associate director of clinical research and services at the National Centre for Immunisation Research and Surveillance.

“I’m not sure we quite understand whether people [will be] happy with those rules again,” he said.

Dalton was more strident.

“I tend to agree with Michael Osterholm … an eminent US epidemiologist [who] recently said the US is probably less prepared for a pandemic now than it was in 2019, mostly because the learnings by health departments in the COVID pandemic may not make a material difference if faced with a community that distrusts its public health agencies,” he said.

“If H1N1 or something else were to spill over in the next couple of years, things like masks, social distancing and lockdowns would not be acceptable. Vaccination would be rejected by a huge part of the population, and politicians might be shy about putting mandates in.”

As for the total shutdown of major industries, people will struggle to accept it unless the next pandemic poses a greater threat than COVID, said UNSW applied mathematician Professor James Wood.

The risk of the virus to individuals and their families will be weighed against the negative effects of restrictions, which are much better understood today, said Wood, whose modelling of the impact of cases and vaccination rates was used by NSW Health.

“Something like school closure would be a much tougher argument with a similar pathogen,” he said.

A previous panel of education experts convened by the Herald to interrogate pandemic decision-making in that sector was highly critical of the decision to close schools for months during NSW’s Delta lockdown.

Greg Dore, professor of infectious diseases and epidemiology at the Kirby Institute, said the public’s reluctance to adhere to restrictions again may, in part, be appropriate.

“Some of the restrictions on people leaving the country were a bit feudal and too punitive,” he said. “Other restrictions were plain stupid, [for instance] limitations on time exercising outside.”

Meanwhile, the delays to publicly recognise the benefits of face masks and the threat of airborne transmission “ate away at trust”, Dalton said.

“We shouldn’t make those mistakes again,” he said.

Transparent transgressions Uncertainty is not something politicians are adept at communicating, but uncertainty is the only constant during a pandemic of a novel virus.

Vaccines that offered potent protection against early iterations of the COVID virus were less effective against Omicron variants.

“[The public], unfortunately, got hit by a rapid sequence of changes of what was ‘true’ in the pandemic,” James Wood said.

Political distrust can be deadly if governments give the public reason to suspect they are obfuscating.

The expert panel urged NSW’s political leaders to be far more transparent about the public health advice they were given before unilaterally enforcing restrictions.

There was a clear line between public health advice and political decision-making in Victoria. The Victorian chief health officer’s written advice was routinely published online.

In NSW, that line was blurred as Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant stood beside political leaders, most notably former premier Gladys Berejiklian, at the daily press conferences.

Public health experts said that they looked for subtle cues to determine the distinction between the expert advice and the political messaging during press conferences, paying attention to body language, who spoke when and who stayed silent.

“It is fine for public health personnel to have a different view to politicians. They have different jobs. What is not OK is to have politicians saying they are acting on public health advice [when they are not],” he said.

The ‘whys’ behind the decisions being made were missing from the daily press conferences, which created “a vacuum for misinformation”, said social scientist and public health expert Professor Julie Leask at the University of Sydney.

“The communication about what you need to do came out, and it was pretty good … but the ‘why we’re doing this’ and ‘what trade-offs we’ve considered’ and ‘what dilemmas we’ve faced in making this decision’; that was not shared,” Leask said.

The infodemic In the absence of transparency, misinformation and disinformation fill the vacuum.

“We had an ‘infodemic’ during the pandemic,” said Dr Jocelyne Basseal, who worked on the COVID-19 response for WHO in the Western Pacific and leads strategic development at the Sydney Infectious Diseases Institute, University of Sydney.

“The public has been so confused. Where do we go for trusted information [when] everyone can now write absolutely anything, whether on Twitter [now called X] or [elsewhere] on the web?” Basseal said.

A systematic review conducted by WHO found misinformation on social media accounted for up to 51 per cent of posts about vaccines, 29 per cent of posts about COVID-19 and 60 per cent of posts about pandemics.

Basseal’s teenage children recently asked whether they were going into lockdown after TikTok videos about the mpox outbreak.

“There is a lot of work to be done now, in ‘peacetime’ … to get ahead of misinformation,” Basseal said, including fortifying relationships with community groups and teaching scientists – trusted and credible sources of information – how to work with media.

In addition to the Kruk review’s six recommendations to improve its pandemic preparedness, NSW Health undertook a second inquiry into its public health response to COVID-19, which made 104 recommendations.

NSW Health Minister Ryan Park said: “We are working hard to ensure the findings and recommendations from those reports are being implemented as quickly as possible.”

The expert panellists spoke in their capacity as academics and not on behalf of NSW Health or WHO.

The ‘As One System’ review into NSW Health’s COVID-19 response made six recommendations 1. Make governance and decision-making structures clearer, inclusive, and more widely understood 2. Strengthen co-ordination, communication, engagement, and collaboration 3. Enhance the speed, transparency, accuracy, and practicality of data and information sharing 4. Prioritise the needs of vulnerable people and communities most at risk, impacted and in need from day one 5. Put communities at the centre of emergency governance, planning, preparedness, and response 6. Recognise, develop and sustain workforce health, wellbeing, capability and agility.

[mariacallous]

For Sander van der Linden, misinformation is personal.

As a child in the Netherlands, the University of Cambridge social psychologist discovered that almost all of his mother’s family had been executed by the Nazis during the Second World War. He became absorbed by the question of how so many people came to support the ideas of someone like Adolf Hitler, and how they might be taught to resist such influence.

While studying psychology at graduate school in the mid-2010s, van der Linden came across the work of American researcher William McGuire. In the 1960s, stories of brainwashed prisoners-of-war during the Korean War had captured the zeitgeist, and McGuire developed a theory of how such indoctrination might be prevented. He wondered whether exposing soldiers to a weaker form of propaganda might have equipped them to fight off a full attack once they’d been captured. In the same way that army drills prepared them for combat, a pre-exposure to an attack on their beliefs could have prepared them against mind control. It would work, McGuire argued, as a cognitive immunizing agent against propaganda—a vaccine against brainwashing.

Traditional vaccines protect us by feeding us a weaker dose of pathogen, enabling our bodies’ immune defenses to take note of its appearance so we’re better equipped to fight the real thing when we encounter it. A psychological vaccine works much the same way: Give the brain a weakened hit of a misinformation-shaped virus, and the next time it encounters it in fully-fledged form, its “mental antibodies” remember it and can launch a defense.

Van der Linden wanted to build on McGuire’s theories and test the idea of psychological inoculation in the real world. His first study looked at how to combat climate change misinformation. At the time, a bogus petition was circulating on Facebook claiming there wasn’t enough scientific evidence to conclude that global warming was human-made, and boasting the signatures of 30,000 American scientists (on closer inspection, fake signatories included Geri Halliwell and the cast of M*A*S*H). Van der Linden and his team took a group of participants and warned them that there were politically motivated actors trying to deceive them—the phony petition in this case. Then they gave them a detailed takedown of the claims of the petition; they pointed out, for example, Geri Halliwell’s appearance on the list. When the participants were later exposed to the petition, van der Linden and his group found that people knew not to believe it.

The approach hinges on the idea that by the time we’ve been exposed to misinformation, it’s too late for debunking and fact-checking to have any meaningful effect, so you have to prepare people in advance—what van der Linden calls “prebunking.” An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

When he published the findings in 2016, van der Linden hadn’t anticipated that his work would be landing in the era of Donald Trump’s election, fake news, and post-truth; attention on his research from the media and governments exploded. Everyone wanted to know, how do you scale this up?

Van der Linden worked with game developers to create an online choose-your-own-adventure game called Bad News, where players can try their hand at writing and spreading misinformation. Much like a broadly protective vaccine, if you show people the tactics used to spread fake news, it fortifies their inbuilt bullshit detectors.

But social media companies were still hesitant to get on board; correcting misinformation and being the arbiters of truth is not part of their core business model. Then people in China started getting sick with a mysterious flulike illness.

The coronavirus pandemic propelled the threat of misinformation to dizzying new heights. Van der Linden began working with the British government and bodies like the World Health Organization and the United Nations to create a more streamlined version of the game specifically revolving around Covid, which they called GoViral! They created more versions, including one for the 2020 US presidential election, and another to prevent extremist recruitment in the Middle East. Slowly, Silicon Valley came around.

A collaboration with Google has resulted in a campaign on YouTube in which the platform plays clips in the ad section before the video starts, warning viewers about misinformation tropes like scapegoating and false dichotomies and drawing examples from Family Guy and Star Wars. A study with 20,000 participants found that people who viewed the ads were better able to spot manipulation tactics; the feature is now being rolled out to hundreds of millions of people in Europe.

Van der Linden understands that working with social media companies, who have historically been reluctant to censor disinformation, is a double-edged sword. But, at the same time, they’re the de facto guardians of the online flow of information, he says, “and so if we’re going to scale the solution, we need their cooperation.” (A downside is that they often work in unpredictable ways. Elon Musk fired the entire team who was working on pre-bunking at Twitter when he became CEO, for instance.)

This year, van der Linden wrote a book on his research, titled Foolproof: Why We Fall for Misinformation and How to Build Immunity. Ultimately, he hopes this isn’t a tool that stays under the thumb of third-party companies; his dream is for people to inoculate one another. It could go like this: You see a false narrative gaining traction on social media, you then warn your parents or your neighbor about it, and they’ll be pre-bunked when they encounter it. “This should be a tool that’s for the people, by the people,” van der Linden says.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Joan E Greve at The Guardian:

Just one month after making the historic choice to withdraw from the presidential race, Joe Biden took the stage at the Democratic national convention on Monday to deliver a reflective and optimistic address, urging the nation to elect Kamala Harris to protect American democracy. Looking back on his one and only presidential term, Biden reminded Americans that he took office just two weeks after the January 6 attack on the US Capitol, when the country was still in the early grips of the coronavirus pandemic. “Yet, I believe then and I believe now, that progress was and is possible. Justice is achievable, and our best days are not behind us. They’re before us,” Biden said. “With a grateful heart, I stand before you now on this August night to report that democracy has prevailed. Democracy has delivered, and now democracy must be preserved.”

Only a few weeks ago, Biden was expected to be on the convention stage this week to accept his party’s nomination for the second time. Instead, the speech came a month after Biden shocked the nation with his decision to not seek re-election. After weeks of mounting doubts about his ability to effectively campaign following a devastating debate performance, Biden announced that he would step aside. He immediately endorsed Harris.

[...]

On Monday, Biden described selecting Harris as his vice-president as “the best decision I made my whole career”, and he drew a sharp contrast between her and Donald Trump. Mocking Trump over his recent conviction on 34 felony counts, Biden said: “Violent crime has dropped to the lowest level of more than 50 years, and crime will keep coming down when we put a prosecutor in the Oval Office instead of a convicted felon.”

Biden landed other punches against Trump as well, attacking the Republican nominee for describing America as a “failing nation”. “When he talks about America being a failing nation, he says, we’re losing. He’s the loser. He’s dead wrong,” Biden said to loud cheers. Even as he promoted Harris’ candidacy, Biden took a victory lap of sorts to celebrate his own legislative achievements over his four years in office. He reminded viewers of the major bills he signed, including the bipartisan infrastructure law and the Inflation Reduction Act. “We’ve had one of the most extraordinary four years of progress ever, period,” Biden said. “Just think about it. Covid no longer controls our lives. We’ve gone from economic crisis to the strongest economy in the entire world.”

Still, Biden made a point to credit Harris with helping to deliver change. When discussing his administration’s efforts to lower prescription drug prices, Biden said, “Guess who cast the tie-breaking vote? Vice-president, soon-to-be-president, Kamala Harris.” And when audience members repeatedly broke out in chants of “Thank you, Joe,” the president responded, “Thank you, Kamala!”

The speech was not without its moments of conflict. One group of pro-Palestinian demonstrators displayed a banner reading, “Stop arming Israel!” Other convention attendees attempted to rip the banner away from them, and the lights were then dimmed over that section in the United Center. There appeared to be isolated shouts attacking Biden over his response to the war in Gaza, but those protesters were drowned out by the president’s supporters chanting, “We love Joe!” However, the president did not shy away from discussing the war in Gaza. Nodding to the pro-ceasefire protests unfolding in Chicago this week, Biden said: “A lot of innocent people are being killed on both sides.” Of the recent ceasefire negotiations, Biden said, “We’re working around the clock, my secretary of state, [to] prevent a wider war, reunite hostages with their families and surge humanitarian, health and food assistance into Gaza now to end the civilian suffering of the Palestinian people and finally, finally, finally, deliver a ceasefire and end this war.”

On the DNC stage Monday night, President Joe Biden (D) gave a barnburner of a speech that detailed his achievements over his Presidency and his pre-Presidency tenure while passing the torch onto a new generation with VP Kamala Harris leading the Democratic ticket.

[dosesofcommonsense]

From BioClandestine on Telegram

If Trump wins 2024, he will halt all funding for Ukraine, negotiate an end to conflict with Putin, thus preventing WW3.

The reason Biden and the Deep State cannot negotiate with Putin, is because Putin wants their heads for crimes against humanity, namely for manufacturing C19.

This is not speculation on my part. Russian MIL literally listed Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and George Soros, as being the main ideologists behind the plot to manufacture coronavirus strains in Ukraine, with US DoD funding, and there is an open source paper trail to back it up. You can debate on whether or not you believe them, but the reality is, Putin wants the “Western Elites” and Xi agrees with him.

It’s not hyperbolic to say that this is life or death for the Deep State actors. If Trump wins and negotiates a settlement with Putin, Russian MIL have already been demanding for activation of Articles V and VI of the Biological Weapons Treaty, which would result in a Security Council investigation and international military tribunals. That’s what Russian MIL have been demanding at the UN for nearly 2 years now. And that’s just the biological stuff, not even accounting for the whole 2014 coup, shelling the Donbas, funding and supporting Ukraine in 2022, Nord Stream, etc.

What do you think Trump is going to say? No? Trump wants to prosecute the exact same people for crimes against humanity! Putin is literally demanding that all of Trump’s enemies trying to imprison him, must be prosecuted by military tribunal… How could Trump say no to that?! He’d be killing multiple birds with one stone. And Trump’s DOJ wouldn’t have to do the prosecuting. It would be a coalition of military judges from different countries around the world. It would be far more legitimate and no way could the Dems cry “partisanship”. It’s international law.

Y’all might think it’s crazy, but this is the trajectory we are headed on if Trump wins, which is why the Biden regime are going to do everything in their power to prevent Trump from winning. If they fail, they will be treated as international war criminals, and will face the ultimate penalty.

Extinction Level Event (for the deep state, for globalism, for all their synvophants in levels of government and the MSM).

Let’s say Russia and China are lying, and the US did not manufacture C19.

Then why would Fauci, Collins, and the US government, put so much effort into covering up the lab origins?

Why are the US and their allies the only ones NOT interested in who caused a global pandemic?

Why did government health agencies and Big Tech censor scientists and journalists who pointed out its lab origins? If someone else created this virus, why are the US government so invested in covering up who is responsible? Over a million Americans died, shouldn’t they be tirelessly trying to find out who killed all those people?

Who benefited from the pandemic? American Pharmaceutical companies, that began the vaccine development BEFORE the pandemic. Who funds the MSM and Deep State politicians? Big Pharma.

If Russia and China are lying, why is it that the US veto every request at the UN Security Council for a joint investigation into the origins of C19?

There are two options. Elements within the US are responsible, or, a different entity is responsible and the US government went out of their way to cover it up.

The paper trail confirms it’s the former, but either way, heads must roll.

[erik-even-wordier]

I really don’t owe my Trump-supporting friends an apology. I’ve been critical of Trump these last several years, and am still exhausted from the experience.

But to be fair, Trump wasn’t that bad…………..other than when:

1. he incited an insurrection against the government,

2. mismanaged a pandemic that killed a million Americans,

3. separated children from their families, lost those children in the bureaucracy,

4. tear-gassed peaceful protesters on Lafayette Square so he could hold a photo op holding a Bible in front of a church,

5. tried to block all Muslims from entering the country,

6. got impeached,

7. got impeached again,

8. had the worst jobs record of any president in modern history,

9. pressured Ukraine to dig dirt on Joe Biden,

10. fired the FBI director for investigating his ties to Russia,

11. bragged about firing the FBI director on TV,

12. took Vladimir Putin’s word over the US intelligence community,

13. diverted military funding to build his wall,

14. caused the longest government shutdown in US history,

15. called Black Lives Matter a “symbol of hate,”

16. lied nearly 30,000 times,

17. banned transgender people from serving in the military,

18. ejected reporters from the White House briefing room who asked tough questions,

19. vetoed the defense funding bill because it renamed military bases named for Confederate soldiers,

20. refused to release his tax returns,

21. increased the national debt by nearly $8 trillion,

22. had three of the highest annual trade deficits in U.S. history,

23. called veterans and soldiers who died in combat losers and suckers,

24. coddled the leader of Saudi Arabia after he ordered the execution and dismembering of a US-based journalist,

25. refused to concede the 2020 election,

26. hired his unqualified daughter and son-in-law to work in the White House,

27. walked out of an interview with Lesley Stahl,

28. called neo-Nazis “very fine people,”

29. suggested that people should inject bleach into their bodies to fight COVID,

30. abandoned our allies the Kurds to Turkey,

31. pushed through massive tax cuts for the wealthiest but balked at helping working Americans,

32. incited anti-lockdown protestors in several states at the height of the pandemic,

33. withdrew the US from the Paris climate accords,

34. withdrew the US from the Iranian nuclear deal,

35. withdrew the US from the Trans Pacific Partnership which was designed to block China’s advances,

36. insulted his own Cabinet members on Twitter,

37. pushed the leader of Montenegro out of the way during a photo op,

38. failed to reiterate US commitment to defending NATO allies,

39. called Haiti and African nations “shithole” countries,

40. called the city of Baltimore the “worst in the nation,”

41. claimed that he single handedly brought back the phrase “Merry Christmas” even though it hadn’t gone anywhere,

42. forced his Cabinet members to praise him publicly like some cult leader,

43. believed he should be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize,

44. berated and belittled his hand-picked Attorney General when he recused himself from the Russia probe,

45. suggested the US should buy Greenland,

46. colluded with Mitch McConnell to push through federal judges and two Supreme Court justices after supporting efforts to prevent his predecessor from appointing judges,

47. repeatedly called the media “enemies of the people,”

48. claimed that if we tested fewer people for COVID we’d have fewer cases,

49. violated the emoluments clause,

50. thought that Nambia was a country,

51. told Bob Woodward in private that the coronavirus was a big deal but then downplayed it in public,

52. called his exceedingly faithful vice president a “p---y” for following the Constitution,

53. nearly got us into a war with Iran after threatening them by tweet,

54. nominated a corrupt head of the EPA,

55. nominated a corrupt head of HHS,

56. nominated a corrupt head of the Interior Department,

57. nominated a corrupt head of the USDA,

58. praised dictators and authoritarians around the world while criticizing allies,

59. refused to allow the presidential transition to begin,

60. insulted war hero John McCain – even after his death,

61. spent an obscene amount of time playing golf after criticizing Barack Obama for playing (far less) golf while president,

62. falsely claimed that he won the 2016 popular vote,

63. called the Muslim mayor of London a “stone cold loser,”

64. falsely claimed that he turned down being Time’s Man of the Year,

65. considered firing special counsel Robert Mueller on several occasions,

66. mocked wearing face masks to guard against transmitting COVID,

67. locked Congress out of its constitutional duty to confirm Cabinet officials by hiring acting ones,

68. used a racist dog whistle by calling COVID the “China virus,”

69. hired and associated with numerous shady figures that were eventually convicted of federal offenses including his campaign manager and national security adviser,

70. pardoned several of his shady associates,

71. gave the Presidential Medal of Freedom to two congressmen who amplified his batshit crazy conspiracy theories,

72. got into telephone fight with the leader of Australia(!),

73. had a Secretary of State who called him a moron,

74. forced his press secretary to claim without merit that his was the largest inauguration crowd in history,

75. botched the COVID vaccine rollout,

76. tweeted so much dangerous propaganda that Twitter eventually banned him,

77. charged the Secret Service jacked-up rates at his properties,

78. constantly interrupted Joe Biden in their first presidential debate,

79. claimed that COVID would “magically” disappear,

80. called a U.S. Senator “Pocahontas,”

81. used his Twitter account to blast Nordstrom when it stopped selling Ivanka’s merchandise,

82. opened up millions of pristine federal lands to development and drilling,

83. got into a losing tariff war with China that forced US taxpayers to bail out farmers,

84. claimed that his losing tariff war was a win for the US,

85. ignored or didn’t even take part in daily intelligence briefings,

86. blew off honoring American war dead in France because it was raining,

87. redesigned Air Force One to look like the Trump Shuttle,

88. got played by Kim Jung Un and his “love letters,”

89. threatened to go after social media companies in clear violation of the Constitution,

90. botched the response to Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico,

91. threw paper towels at Puerto Ricans when he finally visited them,

92. pressured the governor and secretary of state of Georgia to “find” him votes,

93. thought that the Virgin islands had a President,

94. drew on a map with a Sharpie to justify his inaccurate tweet that Alabama was threatened by a hurricane,

95. allowed White House staff to use personal email accounts for official businesses after blasting Hillary Clinton for doing the same thing,

96. rolled back regulations that protected the public from mercury and asbestos,

97. pushed regulators to waste time studying snake-oil remedies for COVID,

98. rolled back regulations that stopped coal companies from dumping waste into rivers,

99. held blatant campaign rallies at the White House,

100. tried to take away millions of Americans’ health insurance because the law was named for a Black man,

101. refused to attend his successors’ inauguration,

102. nominated the worst Education Secretary in history,

103. threatened judges who didn’t do what he wanted,

104. attacked Dr. Anthony Fauci,

105. promised that Mexico would pay for the wall (it didn’t),

106. allowed political hacks to overrule government scientists on major reports on climate change and other issues,

107. struggled navigating a ramp after claiming his opponent was feeble,

108. called an African-American Congresswoman “low IQ,”

109. threatened to withhold federal aid from states and cities with Democratic leaders,

110. went ahead with rallies filled with maskless supporters in the middle of a pandemic,

111. claimed that legitimate investigations of his wrongdoing were “witch hunts,”

112. seemed to demonstrate a belief that there were airports during the American Revolution,

113. demanded “total loyalty” from the FBI director,

114. praised a conspiracy theory that Democrats are Satanic pedophiles,

115. completely gutted the Voice of America,

116. placed a political hack in charge of the Postal Service,

117. claimed without evidence that the Obama administration bugged Trump Tower,

118. suggested that the US should allow more people from places like Norway into the country,

119. suggested that COVID wasn’t that bad because he recovered with the help of top government doctors and treatments not available to the public,

120. overturned energy conservation standards that even industry supported,

121. reduced the number of refugees the US accepts,

122. insulted various members of Congress and the media with infantile nicknames,

123. gave Rush Limbaugh a Presidential medal of Freedom at the State of the Union address,

124. named as head of federal personnel a 29-year old who’d previously been fired from the White House for allegations of financial improprieties,

125. eliminated the White House office of pandemic response,

126. used soldiers as campaign props,

127. fired any advisor who made the mistake of disagreeing with him,

128. demanded the Pentagon throw him a Soviet-style military parade,

129. hired a shit ton of white nationalists,

130. politicized the civil service,

131. did absolutely nothing after Russia hacked the U.S. government,

132. falsely said the Boy Scouts called him to say his bizarre Jamboree speech was the best speech ever given to the Scouts,

133. claimed that Black people would overrun the suburbs if Biden won,

134. insulted reporters of color,

135. insulted women reporters,

136. insulted women reporters of color,

137. suggested he was fine with China’s oppression of the Uighurs,

138. attacked the Supreme Court when it ruled against him,

139. summoned Pennsylvania state legislative leaders to the White House to pressure them to overturn the election,

140. spent countless hours every day watching Fox News,

141. refused to allow his administration to comply with Congressional subpoenas,

142. hired Rudy Giuliani as his lawyer,

143. tried to punish Amazon because the Jeff Bezos-owned Washington Post wrote negative stories about him,

144. acted as if the Attorney General of the United States was his personal attorney,

145. attempted to get the federal government to defend him in a libel lawsuit from a prominent lady who accused him of sexual assault,

146. held private meetings with Vladimir Putin without staff present,

147. didn’t disclose his private meetings with Vladimir Putin so that the US had to find out via Russian media,

148. stopped holding press briefings for months at a time,

149. “ordered” US companies to leave China even though he has no such power,

150. led a political party that couldn’t even be bothered to draft a policy platform,

151. claimed preposterously that Article II of the Constitution gave him absolute powers,

152. tried to pressure the U.K. to hold the British Open at his golf course,

153. suggested that the government nuke hurricanes,

154. suggested that wind turbines cause cancer,

155. said that he had a special aptitude for science,

156. fired the head of election cyber security after he said that the 2020 election was secure,

157. blurted out classified information to Russian officials,

158. tried to force the G7 to hold their meeting at his failing golf resort in Florida,

159. fired the acting attorney general when she refused to go along with his unconstitutional Muslim travel ban,

160. hired notorious racist Stephen Miller,

161. openly discussed national security issues in the dining room at Mar-a-Lago where everyone could hear them,

162. interfered with plans to relocate the FBI because a new development there might compete with his hotel,

163. abandoned Iraqi refugees who’d helped the U.S. during the war,

164. tried to get Russia back into the G7,

165. held a COVID super spreader event in the Rose Garden,

166. seemed to believe that Frederick Douglass is still alive,

167. lost 60 election fraud cases in court including before judges he had nominated,

168. falsely claimed that factories were reopening when they weren’t,

169. shamelessly exploited terror attacks in Europe to justify his anti-immigrant policies,

170. still hasn’t come up with a healthcare plan,

171. still hasn’t come up with an infrastructure plan despite repeated “Infrastructure Weeks,”

172. forced Secret Service agents to drive him around Walter Reed while contagious with COVID,

173. told the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by,”

174. fucked up the Census,

175. withdrew the U.S. from the World Health Organization in the middle of a pandemic,

176. did so few of his duties that his press staff were forced to state on his daily schedule “President Trump will work from early in the morning until late in the evening. He will make many calls and have many meetings,”

177. allowed his staff to repeatedly violate the Hatch Act,

178. seemed not to know that Abraham Lincoln was a Republican,

179. stood before sacred CIA wall of heroes and bragged about his election win,

180. constantly claimed he was treated worse than any president which presumably includes four that were assassinated and his predecessor whose legitimacy and birthplace were challenged by a racist reality TV show star named Donald Trump,

181. claimed Andrew Jackson could’ve stopped the Civil War even though he died 16 years before it happened,

182. said that any opinion poll showing him behind was fake,

183. claimed that other countries laughed at us before he became president when several world leaders were literally laughing at him,

184. claimed that the military was out of ammunition before he became President,

185. created a commission to whitewash American history,

186. retweeted anti-Islam videos from one of the most racist people in Britain,

187. claimed ludicrously that the Pulse nightclub shooting wouldn’t have happened if someone there had a gun even though there was an armed security guard there,

188. hired a senior staffer who cited the non-existent Bowling Green Massacre as a reason to ban Muslims,

189. had a press secretary who claimed that Nazi Germany never used chemical weapons even though every sane human being knows they used gas to kill millions of Jews and others,

190. bilked the Secret Service for higher than market rates when they had to stay at Trump properties,

191. apparently sold pardons on his way out of the White House,

192. stripped protective status from 59,000 Haitians,

193. falsely claimed Biden wanted to defund the police,

194. said that the head of the CDC didn’t know what he was talking about,

195. tried to rescind protection from DREAMers,

196. gave himself an A+ for his handling of the pandemic,

197. tried to start a boycott of Goodyear tires due to an Internet hoax,

198. said U.S. rates of COVID would be lower if you didn’t count blue states,

199. deported U.S. veterans who served their country but were undocumented,

200. claimed he did more for African Americans than any president since Lincoln,

201. touted a “super-duper” secret “hydrosonic” missile which may or may not be a new “hypersonic” missile or may not exist at all,

202. retweeted a gif calling Biden a pedophile,

203. forced through security clearances for his family,

204. suggested that police officers should rough up suspects,

205. suggested that Biden was on performance-enhancing drugs,

206. tried to stop transgender students from being able to use school bathrooms in line with their gender,

207. suggested the US not accept COVID patients from a cruise ship because it would make US numbers look higher,

208. nominated a climate change sceptic to chair the committee advising the White House on environmental policy,

209. retweeted a video doctored to look like Biden

210. had played a song called “Fuck tha Police” at a campaign event,

211. hugged a disturbingly large number of U.S. flags,

212. accused Democrats of “treason” for not applauding his State of the Union address,

213. claimed that the FBI failed to capture the Parkland school shooter because they were “spending too much time” on Russia,

214. mocked the testimony of Dr Christine Blasey Ford when she accused Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault,

215. obsessed over low-flow toilets,

216. ordered the rerelease of more COVID vaccines when there weren’t any to release,

217. called for the construction of a bizarre garden of heroes with statutes of famous dead Americans as well as at least one Canadian (Alex Trebek),

218. hijacked Washington’s July 4th celebrations to give a partisan speech,

219. took advice from the MyPillow guy,

220. claimed that migrants seeking a better life in the US were dangerous caravans of drug dealers and rapists,

221. said nothing when Vladimir Putin poisoned a leading opposition figure,

222. never seemed to heed the advice of his wife’s “Be Best” campaign,

223. falsely claimed that mail-in voting is fraudulent,

224. announced a precipitous withdrawal of troops from Syria which not only handed Russia and ISIS a win but also prompted his defense secretary to resign in protest,

225. insulted the leader of Canada,

226. insulted the leader of France,

227. insulted the leader of Britain,

228. insulted the leader of Germany,

229. insulted the leader of Sweden (Sweden!!),

230. falsely claimed credit for getting NATO members to increase their share of dues,

231. blew off two Asia summits even though they were held virtually,

232. continued lying about spending lots of time at Ground Zero with 9/11 responders,

233. said that the Japanese would sit back and watch their “Sony televisions” if the US were ever attacked,

234. left a NATO summit early in a huff,

235. stared directly into an eclipse even though everyone over the age of 5 knows not to do that,

236. called himself a very stable genius despite significant evidence to the contrary,

237. refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power and kept his promise.

238. Don’t forget that he took many classified & top secret documents with him when he left the White House, many of which have not been recovered & may have been compromised.

I’m sure there are a whole bunch of other things I can’t remember at the moment.

Plz copy and paste. Whoever wrote this deserves credit but I don't know who it is.

[bringthekaos]

Kaos are you alive? Did u saw the trailer? Did u saw the poster? Are you okay and safe and still have your phone?? You dont have to answer thiz i just Love you and hope youre okay <3333

Yesss I’m alive, I’m just more active on Twitter these days. Just… irl keeps piling shit on, and I’m so monumentally stressed out that the 2-sentence freak-out format over there has been easier for me.

That said, I AM STILL REELING FROM THAT TRAILER. Jayce’s wrist… with the gemstone burned into it, what the fuck?!?! I have a feeling the gemstone is going to have activated during the attack, possibly to create a shield or protect him in some way. Cuz if it was burned in by natural means, aka fire/extremely high heat, he would have a LOT more scarring/burns.

And still no Viktor but… Viktor adjacent crumbs?? Like, those people with runes carved into them?! Is that the start of the glorious evolved?!?! One of them had a foot just like his! And that Coronavirus lookin ass orb, that HAS to be the Hexcore! But it has obviously evolved (haha) even further… V, what did you do???

And finally, this.

There’s some discussion over on Twit on whether or not this is the Hexgate, but I think it 100% is. Cuz we’ve all pretty much come to the conclusion that this, whatever it is, is Viktor’s base, for lack of a better word, and those huts are the shimmer addicts/Glorious Evolved. And like… Piltover is at war with Zaun. And Piltover has the means to crush them, but the only reason they do is because A) they are a prosperous and wealthy city that can afford just about whatever they want/need to crush a rebellion, and it’s all because of those Hexgates, and B) they can ship armies in within a nanosecond. So what’s the fastest way to cripple them right out of the gate? To level the playing field?

Take out the Hexgate. And there’s one person who knows intimately how to do that. And I truly think he will. Whether it’s a strategic move in the war effort or a broken-hearted act of aggression against Jayce (or a bit of both) remains to be seen. But my personal opinion is that Viktor will take out the Hexgate. He won’t be alone when he does it, it’s too ambitious of a task. So who will he ally with? A chem-baron? (Renataaaaaaaaaa plzzzzz), an army of cultists? Jinx and the people who have rallied behind her as a symbol for Zaun’s rebellion? Idk, but I’m freakin out over here.

Anyhoo, thanks for checking in on me, I know I’ve dropped off the map a little. Just need life to fuckin CHILL with the major life changes, it’s killing me. Until then, I’m clinging to Arcane s2 like a lifeline 😩

[vote-democrat-president-congress]

Trump secretly sent covid tests to Putin during 2020 shortage, new book says

“War,” by Bob Woodward, traces how Trump and Biden responded to international crisis and concludes that Trump is worse than Nixon, the president exiled by the Watergate scandal.

By Isaac Stanley-Becker October 8, 2024 at 8:56 a.m. EDT As the coronavirus tore through the world in 2020, and the United States and other countries confronted a shortage of tests designed to detect the illness, then-President Donald Trump secretly sent coveted tests to Russian President Vladimir Putin for his personal use.

Cut through the 2024 election noise. Get The Campaign Moment newsletter. Putin, petrified of the virus, accepted the supplies but took pains to prevent political fallout — not for him, but for his American counterpart. He cautioned Trump not to reveal that he had dispatched the scarce medical equipment to Moscow, according to a new book by Washington Post associate editor Bob Woodward.

Putin, according to the book, told Trump, “I don’t want you to tell anybody because people will get mad at you, not me.”

Four years later, the personal relationship between the two men appears to have persisted, Woodward reports, as Trump campaigns to return to the White House and Putin orchestrates his bloody assault on Ukraine. In early 2024, the former president ordered an aide away from his office at Mar-a-Lago, his private club and residence in Florida, so he could conduct a private phone call with the Russian leader, according to Woodward’s account.

The book does not describe what the two men purportedly discussed, and it quotes a Trump campaign official casting doubt on the supposed contact. But the unnamed Trump aide cited in the book indicated that the GOP standard-bearer may have spoken to Putin as many as seven times since Trump left the White House in 2021.

These interactions between Trump and the authoritarian leader of a country at war with an American ally form the basis of Woodward’s conclusion that Trump is worse than Richard M. Nixon, whose presidency was undone by the Watergate scandal exposed a half-century ago by Woodward and his Washington Post colleague Carl Bernstein.

“Trump was the most reckless and impulsive president in American history and is demonstrating the very same character as a presidential candidate in 2024,” Woodward writes in the book, “War,” which is set to be released Oct. 15.

The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

With publication on the eve of the presidential election, Woodward, who has chronicled the successes and failures of U.S. presidents for 50 years, concludes that Trump is unfit for office while President Joe Biden and his team, mistakes notwithstanding, exhibited “steady and purposeful leadership.” Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, makes several appearances in the narrative, with Woodward presenting her as a shrewd and loyal No. 2 to Biden but not an influential voice in his administration’s foreign policy.

The book is Woodward’s fourth since Trump’s upset victory in 2016. It focuses principally on the twin wars consuming Biden’s national security team — Russia’s all-out war in Ukraine, which began in February 2022, and Israel’s campaign against Hamas and other Iranian-backed proxies since the Hamas attacks of Oct. 7, 2023.

The book also examines the long shadow cast by Trump over the foreign conflicts of the past four years, and over the bitter U.S. political environment in which they have unfolded. And it includes candid assessments by Biden of his own missteps, including his decision to make Merrick Garland attorney general. Reacting to the prosecution of his son Hunter — by a special prosecutor named by Garland amid partisan recriminations over the Justice Department’s prosecution of Trump — the president told an associate, “Should never have picked Garland.”

Woodward reveals how Biden weighed his fate before exiting the presidential race in July, including over lunch earlier that month with Antony Blinken, his secretary of state. Blinken, reports Woodward, warned Biden in the private dining room off the Oval Office that everyone’s legacy is reduced to a single sentence — and that, if he continued to campaign and lost to Trump, that would be his legacy.

Still, Blinken believed at the end of the meal that the president was leaning toward staying in the race, underscoring how unpredictable Biden’s decision-making remained until the final moment.

“War” illuminates the frantic, and often failed, effort by Biden’s team to prevent escalation of fighting in the Middle East — fighting that the president came to see as inseparable from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s political fortunes, and from political dynamics in the United States, too.

According to Woodward, one of Trump’s national security advisers, Keith Kellogg, secretly met with Netanyahu during a trip to Israel earlier this year. Upon his return, Kellogg publicly circulated a memo effectively blaming Biden for the Hamas-led attack on Israel, writing, “This visit reinforced that the Biden Administration’s erosion of U.S. deterrence globally and its failed policies vis-à-vis Iran have opened America up to a regional war in the Middle East with devastating consequences for our ally Israel.”

At the time, Biden advisers were pushing Israel’s leaders to agree to a cease-fire deal as part of an effort to head off an invasion of Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip. Their entreaties were futile; the Rafah offensive began in May. No one felt the limits of the administration’s ability to restrain Israel more acutely than Blinken. “It was obvious Blinken had no influence,” Woodward writes.

On Ukraine, too, Trump’s influence was pronounced, even from his home at Mar-a-Lago. The former president’s resistance to funding Kyiv’s war effort created a blockade on GOP support in the House. This past spring, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) was able to persuade Trump to soften his stance, according to Woodward, not by showing him that Ukraine’s cause was just, but by convincing him that the aid package would help the Republican conference’s electoral chances and thus benefit him personally in the run-up to the November election.

“War” offers several snapshots of Harris, always in a supporting role to Biden and hardly determining foreign policy herself.

The book recounts how Harris sought to spur French President Emmanuel Macron into action in the fall of 2021, in preparation for what the U.S. intelligence community indicated would be a significant Russian military action against Ukraine. So, too, the vice president made her case to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the Munich Security Conference in February 2022, going so far as to press him to develop a succession plan ensuring stability “if you’re captured or killed,” as she put it. And the book reveals how her forceful public tone following a meeting in July with Netanyahu — pledging that she would “not be silent” about Palestinian suffering — contrasted with her more amicable approach in private. The difference, according to Woodward, infuriated Netanyahu, who was taken aback by her public remarks.

From the Israeli viewpoint, however, Harris had little responsibility for the administration’s approach to the conflict.

“Until now, I didn’t feel that Vice President Harris had any impact on our issues,” Michael Herzog, the Israeli ambassador in Washington, is quoted as saying about the period before Harris replaced Biden on the ticket. “She was in the room, but she never had an impact.”

As for Trump’s own decision-making process on foreign affairs when he was commander in chief, the book shows how he took in a wide range of viewpoints, including from people without relevant expertise. During a high-level meeting about Afghanistan held at one point in the Situation Room, Trump went around the table to ask everyone’s opinion.

“Mr. President, I’m the notetaker,” one person deflected.

“Oh, no,” Trump replied, “if you’re in this room, you’re talking.” The notetaker briefly shared her views.

“War” presents the withdrawal from Afghanistan, in the summer of 2021, as a wound for the Biden administration that would shape its response to other international flash points. The debacle, in which U.S. intelligence failed to foresee how quickly the Taliban would seize power, elicited sympathy from the architect of the initial 2001 invasion, George W. Bush, who told Biden, according to the book: “Oh boy, I can understand what you’re going through. I got [expletive] by my intel people, too.”

Woodward contrasts the intelligence failure in Afghanistan to the remarkable insight gained by American spies into Russian plans ahead of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. U.S. capabilities, Woodward reports, included a human source inside the Kremlin.

The book shows how Biden’s early decisions, which were sometimes in conflict with the judgments of his closest advisers, shaped the course of the war. Foremost was his public vow that Washington would not commit troops to the conflict, which took a key bargaining chip off the table but laid down a marker for the American public wary of new foreign entanglements. Biden, according to Woodward, felt past Russian aggression had been badly mismanaged by his predecessors, including the one he had served, Barack Obama.

“Barack never took Putin seriously,” Biden told a close friend.

Biden’s own blunders were costly, the book reveals. In January 2022, he seemed to undercut American resolve by raising the possibility that Russia might seek only a “minor incursion.” His national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, had to do damage control with counterparts in nine NATO countries, in addition to Japan, Woodward reveals.

Woodward writes that Biden’s most delicate diplomacy, however, involved seeking to foreclose Russia’s nuclear option. In the fall of 2022, that option seemed like a live one, as U.S. intelligence agencies reported that Putin was seriously weighing use of a tactical nuclear weapon — at one point assessing the likelihood at 50 percent. An especially frantic quest to bring Moscow back from the brink came in October of that year, when Russia appeared to be laying the groundwork for escalation by accusing Ukraine of preparing to detonate a dirty bomb.

Biden’s team confronted similar hair-raising moments with the Israelis, Woodward reports, foreshadowing Netanyahu’s recent campaign against Hezbollah, the Lebanon-based militant group and Iranian proxy, in an explicit rejection of U.S. calls for a cease-fire. In a parallel of unsubstantiated Russian claims of Ukraine’s intention to use a dirty bomb, the Israelis seemed poised, in the days after Oct. 7, 2023, to launch a preemptive strike against Hezbollah based on what American experts deemed “phantom” warnings of Hezbollah mobilization along Israel’s northern border.

“The Israelis always do this,” was the reaction of Brett McGurk, Biden’s Middle East coordinator, according to the book. “They claim ‘We got the intel! You’ll see it. You’ll see it.’ But like 50 percent of the time the so-called intel doesn’t actually show up.” Apparent drones reported by the Israelis turned out to be birds.

Yet the book also shows how the Biden administration did little to alter its policy toward Israel even as senior U.S. officials abandoned their belief that the government in Jerusalem was operating in good faith. Already in the days after Oct. 7, Blinken’s impression of Defense Minister Yoav Gallant’s approach was: “It doesn’t matter how many people die. I have a mission to eradicate Hamas and it doesn’t matter how many Palestinians die. It doesn’t matter how many Israelis die.”

Biden, according to Woodward, was cautious about setting limits on Israel’s conduct lest Netanyahu blow past them. In a one-on-one call in April, Netanyahu promised Biden that the Rafah offensive would take only three weeks, a vow the American president never took seriously. “It’ll take months,” Biden replied.

To associates, Biden complained that Netanyahu was a liar only interested in his political survival. And he concluded the same of the prime minister’s associates, saying that 18 out of 19 people who work for Netanyahu are “liars.”

At the same time, support for the Biden administration’s Middle East policy came from unexpected places, the book reveals. Before the Oct. 7 attacks, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a loyal Trump lieutenant and shape-shifter who went from an outspoken critic of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to a trusted interlocutor, had relayed information to Biden about prospects for the normalization of relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel. Graham believed normalization was best completed under Biden, arguing that congressional Democrats would be reluctant to lend support to a Trump-sponsored initiative. Graham promised he could deliver the Republican votes.

After Oct. 7, Graham continued to engage with the crown prince. During a March visit by the senator to Riyadh, which is recounted by Woodward, Graham proposed a phone call with Trump, so the crown prince pulled out a burner phone labeled “TRUMP 45.” In earlier meetings, the crown prince had brandished other such devices, including one labeled “JAKE SULLIVAN” for Biden’s national security adviser.

During the March call with Trump, conducted by the crown prince over speakerphone while Graham was present, the former president teased the senator for once calling for the Saudi royal’s ouster over the assassination of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, which the CIA concluded Mohammed had ordered. Graham brushed it off, professing to have been wrong about the autocrat.

The royal court in Riyadh, however, is not the comparison Graham uses when describing visits to Trump’s residence at Mar-a-Lago. According to Woodward, the senator invokes an even more brutal form of authoritarianism.

“Going to Mar-a-Lago is a little bit like going to North Korea,” the book quotes Graham as saying. “Everybody stands up and claps every time Trump comes in.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/10/08/bob-woodward-new-book-war-trump-putin-biden/

[covid-safer-hotties]

Also preserved on our archive

By Benjamin Mateus

The ninth wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States is finally receding, with estimated daily new infections based on wastewater data now standing at 669,000 per day, down from the August peaks of over 1.3 million. However, experts predict that the tenth wave will begin in late fall and continue through the winter holidays, as has taken place every year of the pandemic so far.

With one in 70 individuals currently infectious, the risk of coming into contact with someone in a classroom, work, or dining at a local facility with 25 to 50 people is considerable. And despite the relative lull in cases, there is more COVID-19 transmission now than during 56.1 percent of the pandemic. In other words, the “forever COVID” policy essentially means that COVID is now everywhere all the time.

Under these conditions, forced upon society by the capitalist ruling class, repeat infections act like a battering ram, taking a growing toll on the foundation of everyone’s overall wellbeing. There is a growing body of evidence that each hit weakens the organ systems, aging them biologically beyond the person’s stated age until sufficient injury begins to manifest in physically measurable symptoms.

At present, more than one billion cumulative COVID infections have occurred in the US, at a rate of around one per year per person, with somewhere between 3-4 infections on average among the entire population. Estimates place the number of Long COVID cases at over 410 million globally in just the first four years of the pandemic, while excess deaths are nearing 30 million.

Clearly, the pandemic is ongoing and remains a significant health risk for the global population. The criminality of the “forever COVID” policy is highlighted by the fact that virtually no funding is allocated to the development of next-generation mucosal vaccines, improved treatments during the acute phase of infection, or any treatments for Long COVID patients. While trillions are squandered on war and bank bailouts for the rich, nothing is provided for critical life-saving research.

Last week, results from the first clinical trial of a mucosal vaccine were released, showing remarkable levels of efficacy after a second dose.

The important study published by Chinese investigators demonstrated that an intranasally administered anti-COVID vaccine can induce robust mucosal immunity against the coronavirus in human subjects (128 healthcare workers). The study found that the vaccine provided substantial immune protection against COVID while demonstrating safety and tolerance.

Esteemed clinical researcher Dr. Eric Topol wrote on Twitter/X, “[two] doses of a COVID nasal vaccine spray led to more than a 50-fold increase in spike specific secretory IgA antibodies against 10 strains of SARS-CoV-2, indicative of potent mucosal immunity.” Furthermore, Topol added, “At least 86.2 percent of participants who completed two nasal vaccines doses maintained uninfected status, likely without even asymptomatic infection, for at least three months.”

Emergency room physician and indoor air quality proponent, Dr. Kashif Pirzada, replied, “This could potentially give a real ending to the pandemic. No more waves of illness, no more rushing for tests and antivirals if you’re elderly or vulnerable. Hope this comes out soon!”

However, large Phase 3 clinical trials are costly, requiring multiple participants to obtain statistically relevant information on clinical endpoints, not to speak of the research and development investment to identify a therapeutic that can be tested. Thus, under capitalism, there is virtually no investment in these large-scale trials and nothing is being done beyond offering boosters of the current vaccine, despite their greatly reduced efficacy in preventing transmission.

The mucosal vaccine study was conducted just as Chinese officials acquiesced to the demands of the imperialist powers to abandon their life-saving Zero-COVID public health program, resulting in the infection of virtually the entire population and the deaths of 1-2 million people. What could such a vaccine have meant to these millions that perished needlessly and the millions more globally since then?

This raises the broader question of why the international community, facing a devastating pandemic, could not bring its accumulated scientific bodies to address the need to develop a preventative treatment against COVID?

As a trigger event in world history, the COVID-19 pandemic has only accelerated and exposed the deep-seated contradictions in global capitalism, which demands the accumulation of profits at any costs. The ruling class has nothing but contempt for workers, refusing to invest in any social programs that can improve the lives of masses of people. Short sightedness, corruption, mistrust, and suspicion epitomize their actions, which are rapidly progressing to a world conflagration carrying the danger of nuclear war.

Simply put, the ruling class cares not one iota about mucosal vaccines, just as they harbor resentment against any public health policy that infringes on their ability to conduct business.

Refusing to invest in these life-saving technologies, the capitalist ruling class has condemned humanity to face a lifetime of reinfections with COVID-19. What are the implications of this criminal policy?

Multiple previous studies have highlighted the dangers posed by reinfections with SARS-CoV-2. A recent study uploaded as a pre-print publication on Research Square (under review with the journal Nature Portfolio) by the Patient-Led Collaborative has once again found similar results when attempting to characterize the association between reinfections and the chronic debilitating condition known as Long COVID.

Among 3,382 participants (22 percent never had COVID, 42 percent with one prior infection and 35 percent with two or more infections), the risk of Long COVID was 2.14 times more likely among those with two COVID infections and 3.75 times more likely among those who had three or more COVID Infections compared to just one. Limitations in physical functioning measured in their study included ability to dress, bathe, perform moderate activities like vacuuming and functioning socially. Reinfections led to poorer overall health and worse immune health, including more severe outcomes and longer recovery from other infections.

As the authors wrote:

"Relative to those who did not report infections or experienced COVID-19 once, reinfections were associated with increased likelihood of severe fatigue, post-exertional malaise, decreased physical function, poorer immune health, symptom exacerbation before menstruation, and multiple other Long COVID symptoms. While vaccinations and boosters prior to infection are associated with lower likelihood of Long COVID, reinfections diminish their protective effect. The probability of reporting Long COVID remission is generally low (11.5 percent to 6.5 percent."

Another interesting finding of the study, which underscores the complete abandonment of public health efforts regarding COVID, is that a tiny number of those infected were prescribed antivirals during their acute COVID infections. Those with reinfections were also less likely to test, as the “forever COVID” policy has inured people from taking any protective measures to prevent infections.

The current alphabet soup of COVID strains is sees KP.3.1.1 dominate across the US and Europe, accounting for nearly 60 percent of all strains. However, a new variant known as XEC that was first detected in Germany in June has spread to more than 27 countries and accounts for six percent of all recently sequenced SARS-CoV-2 viruses in the US. Virologists expect this strain, derived from JN.1 through a complex recombination event and which has nearly twice the growth advantage, to overtake KP.3.1.1 and be the dominant variant during the winter season.

In a COVID update by TACT [Together Against COVID Transmission], the authors explain the dangers posed by these evolutionary developments of the SARS-CoV-2 viruses, writing:

"These variants can evade much of the immune responses from both vaccines and recent infections. Since they can evade antibodies to earlier variants, then that raises the risk of organ damage, vascular and neurological dysfunction, brain damage, and persistent infections which often leads to Long COVID. The unmitigated spread is raising concerns about their impact in the coming months."

Hospitalization rates for those 65 years and older and children were one of the highest during the summer from COVID and remain on par with the prior year’s summer/fall wave. The number of people that died from COVID In the week ending August 31, 2024, has climbed to 1,239, four times higher than the lows seen in June. At the present rate, it is expected that at least 60,000 people will officially lose their lives from acute COVID this year, not including deaths incorrectly attributed to another cause or due to the impact on the population’s health from accumulated infections.

These are not incidental and speculative issues. In a provocative report released by the Swiss Re Group, titled “The future of excess mortality after COVID-19,” one of the world’s leading providers of reinsurance and insurance, who specialize in financing the risk of death, they said, “[If] the ongoing impact of the disease is not curtailed, excess mortality rates in the general population may remain up to three percent higher then pre-pandemic levels in the US and 2.5 percent in the UK by 2033.”

They advised their investors:

"Based on current medical trends and expected advancements, we conclude that COVID-19 is still driving excess mortality both directly and indirectly. In the long term, lifestyle factors that contribute to poor metabolic health and lead to obesity and diabetes may become another compounding factor in population excess mortality. Insurers may wish to continue to monitor excess mortality and its underlying drivers in the general population closely, as well as the differences between general and insured populations."

[thetangential]

Sociologists caution against reading too much into a society’s cultural products, be they books or banner ads, but it’s impossible not to see each year’s selection of British Arrows award-winning ads as a barometer of the masses’ mood.

When the annual parade of video spots first gained Stateside popularity through holiday season screenings at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, British humor was a principal draw. Side-splitting ads have remained part of the mix, but over the decades the program has become more wide-ranging. The internet became a major medium, digital effects became routine, and onscreen representation of the nation’s diversity increased dramatically.

There’s also been a gradual deflation of the optimism following the end of the Cold War. Hot wars, global warming, resurgent authoritarianism, and the coronavirus pandemic have all contributed to a more somber mood among consumers. In marketing circles, authenticity and transparency have become watchwords for companies hoping to convince consumers they’re committed to an open and honest relationship in these challenging times.

This is all to say that this year’s British Arrows are a little moody, conveying the sense of a capitalist economy where we’re all holding hands but we can’t say whether it’s out of genuine attraction or sheer panic.

read more

[fruityyamenrunner]

the coming war is going to have an escalated psychological element, like the coronavirus stuff amplified. maintaining inner reserves against witchcraft will be essential to survival, all the more because i expect believing in miracles will be essential public behaviour

[sukimas]

FELIZ EL RESULTADO DEL TERRORISMO?

well, the point of terrorism is to frighten people, so if you remain cheerful and unbothered, it kind of takes away from the point of it, don't you think? if you remain bothered by <3000 people dying over two decades ago now- remember that at the height of the pandemic, ~2000 people were dying a day from the novel coronavirus- you're letting the terrorists dictate your thoughts. and you might just start a war in the middle east and end up with four and a half million people dead because you're disproportionately angry about a minute fraction of that number dying (in an attack nigh-completely unrelated to those in the middle east who perished.)

making fun of an event that happened 20 years ago and is the reason why i have to take my damn shoes off to go on domestic flights is really the least i can do to push back against nationalism and religious extremism. why don't you fly a b-2 spirit into the sunset with me?

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Joan E Greve and Helen Sullivan at The Guardian:

Joe Biden addressed the nation Wednesday to explain his historic decision to withdraw from the presidential race, delivering a reflective and hopeful message about the need to begin a new chapter in America’s story.

“I believe my record as president, my leadership in the world, my vision for America’s future all merited a second term, but nothing – nothing – can come in the way of saving our democracy. That includes personal ambition,” Biden said in the Oval Office. “So I’ve decided the best way forward is to pass the torch to a new generation. It’s the best way to unite our nation. You know, there is a time and a place for long years of experience in public life. There’s also a time and a place for new voices, fresh voices – yes, younger voices. And that time and place is now.” The speech came three days after Biden stunned the country with the announcement he would abandon his presidential campaign less than four months before election day. As he contemplated the legacy of his five decades in public life, Biden pledged to keep working to better Americans’ lives as he concludes his first – and now only – term as president. Some Republican lawmakers have suggested Biden should resign rather than finish out his term, but the president firmly rejected those calls on Wednesday.

“Over the next six months, I’ll be focused on doing my job as president,” he said. “That means I’ll continue to lower costs for hard-working families [and] grow our economy. I’ll keep defending our personal freedoms and our civil rights – from the right to vote to the right to choose.” Biden specifically vowed to “keep working to end the war in Gaza, bring home all the hostages and bring peace and security to the Middle East”. Hours before Biden’s speech, Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, delivered a divisive address to a rare joint session of Congress in which he called for “total victory” in the war. Biden cited his own leadership on foreign policy, including his staunch support for Ukraine amid its war against Russia, as one of his proudest accomplishments. He reminded voters about the legislation he has signed to tackle the climate crisis, reduce gun violence and expand healthcare access. Harkening back to the day of his inauguration in 2021, weeks after the January 6 attack on the Capitol and less than a year into the start of the coronavirus pandemic, Biden marveled at how far the country had come in such a short time.

“We were in the grip of the worst pandemic in the century, the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, the worst attack on our democracy since the civil war,” Biden said. “We came together as Americans. We got through it. We emerged stronger, more prosperous and more secure.” After withdrawing from the race on Sunday, Biden endorsed his vice-president Kamala Harris, who has already consolidated the support of enough delegates to capture the Democratic nomination next month. In his speech, Biden reiterated his praise of Harris and underscored the immense choice facing voters this November. “I’d like to thank our great vice-president, Kamala Harris,” Biden said. “She’s experienced, she’s tough, she’s capable. She’s been an incredible partner to me and a leader for our country. Now the choice is up to you, the American people.”

[...] “America is an idea, an idea stronger than any army, bigger than any ocean, more powerful than any dictator or tyrant. It’s the most powerful idea in the history of the world,” Biden said. “That idea is that we hold these truths to be self-evident. We’re all created equal, endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights: life, liberty, pursuit of happiness. We’ve never fully lived up to it, to this sacred idea, but we’ve never walked away from it either, and I do not believe the American people will walk away from it now.” It was a message that echoed Biden’s campaign slogan in 2020, which framed the election against Trump as a “battle for the soul of the nation”. That battle remains ongoing, Biden said, and it will now be up to the American people to decide how it will end. “The great thing about America is here, kings and dictators do not rule. The people do,” Biden said. “History is in your hands. The power is in your hands. The idea of America lies in your hands. You just have to keep faith – keep the faith – and remember who we are.”

President Joe Biden gave an excellent Oval Office address on the topic of ending his re-election bid and handing the baton to Vice President Kamala Harris. Biden has announced that he is staying to complete his term.

Let’s get some herstory made and elect a Momala to the White House! #Harris47 #Harris2024

See Also:

HuffPost: Joe Biden Urges Nation To Defend Democracy As He Passes Torch: ‘History Is In Your Hands’

Daily Kos: Watch: Biden addresses nation for first time since dropping reelection bid

[female-malice]

(archive)

For Sander Van der Linden, misinformation is personal.

As a child in the Netherlands, the University of Cambridge social psychologist discovered that almost all of his mother’s family had been executed by the Nazis during the Second World War. He became absorbed by the question of how so many people came to support the ideas of someone like Adolf Hitler, and how they might be taught to resist such influence.

While studying psychology at graduate school in the mid-2010s, van der Linden came across the work of American researcher William McGuire. In the 1960s, stories of brainwashed prisoners-of-war during the Korean War had captured the zeitgeist, and McGuire developed a theory of how such indoctrination might be prevented. He wondered whether exposing soldiers to a weaker form of propaganda might have equipped them to fight off a full attack once they’d been captured. In the same way that army drills prepared them for combat, a pre-exposure to an attack on their beliefs could have prepared them against mind control. It would work, McGuire argued, as a cognitive immunizing agent against propaganda—a vaccine against brainwashing.

Traditional vaccines protect us by feeding us a weaker dose of pathogen, enabling our bodies’ immune defenses to take note of its appearance so we’re better equipped to fight the real thing when we encounter it. A psychological vaccine works much the same way: Give the brain a weakened hit of a misinformation-shaped virus, and the next time it encounters it in fully-fledged form, its “mental antibodies” remember it and can launch a defense.

Van der Linden wanted to build on McGuire’s theories and test the idea of psychological inoculation in the real world. His first study looked at how to combat climate change misinformation. At the time, a bogus petition was circulating on Facebook claiming there wasn’t enough scientific evidence to conclude that global warming was human-made, and boasting the signatures of 30,000 American scientists (on closer inspection, fake signatories included Geri Halliwell and the cast of M*A*S*H).

Van der Linden and his team took a group of participants and warned them that there were politically motivated actors trying to deceive them—the phony petition in this case. Then they gave them a detailed takedown of the claims of the petition; they pointed out, for example, Geri Halliwell’s appearance on the list. When the participants were later exposed to the petition, van der Linden and his group found that people knew not to believe it.

The approach hinges on the idea that by the time we’ve been exposed to misinformation, it’s too late for debunking and fact-checking to have any meaningful effect, so you have to prepare people in advance—what van der Linden calls “prebunking.” An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

When he published the findings in 2016, van der Linden hadn’t anticipated that his work would be landing in the era of Donald Trump’s election, fake news, and post-truth; attention on his research from the media and governments exploded. Everyone wanted to know, how do you scale this up?

Van der Linden worked with game developers to create an online choose-your-own-adventure game called Bad News, where players can try their hand at writing and spreading misinformation. Much like a broadly protective vaccine, if you show people the tactics used to spread fake news, it fortifies their inbuilt bullshit detectors.

But social media companies were still hesitant to get on board; correcting misinformation and being the arbiters of truth is not part of their core business model. Then people in China started getting sick with a mysterious flulike illness.

The coronavirus pandemic propelled the threat of misinformation to dizzying new heights. Van der Linden began working with the British government and bodies like the World Health Organization and the United Nations to create a more streamlined version of the game specifically revolving around Covid, which they called GoViral! They created more versions, including one for the 2020 US presidential election, and another to prevent extremist recruitment in the Middle East. Slowly, Silicon Valley came around.

A collaboration with Google has resulted in a campaign on YouTube in which the platform plays clips in the ad section before the video starts, warning viewers about misinformation tropes like scapegoating and false dichotomies and drawing examples from Family Guy and Star Wars. A study with 20,000 participants found that people who viewed the ads were better able to spot manipulation tactics; the feature is now being rolled out to hundreds of millions of people in Europe.

Van der Linden understands that working with social media companies, who have historically been reluctant to censor disinformation, is a double-edged sword. But, at the same time, they’re the de facto guardians of the online flow of information, he says, “and so if we’re going to scale the solution, we need their cooperation.” (A downside is that they often work in unpredictable ways. Elon Musk fired the entire team who was working on pre-bunking at Twitter when he became CEO, for instance.)

This year, van der Linden wrote a book on his research, titled Foolproof: Why We Fall for Misinformation and How to Build Immunity. Ultimately, he hopes this isn’t a tool that stays under the thumb of third-party companies; his dream is for people to inoculate one another. It could go like this: You see a false narrative gaining traction on social media, you then warn your parents or your neighbor about it, and they’ll be pre-bunked when they encounter it. “This should be a tool that’s for the people, by the people,” van der Linden says.

–

Everyone needs to play this game.

[nightmare-grass]

Signs of the Apocalypse

As it pertains to The Magnus Archives

- The Lonely: the eradication of third places, the rising costs of nonessential services and recreational activities, the stagnant wages and rampant poverty forcing people to work and stay home, the way every piece of news about the suffering of our fellow man is too overwhelming and we shut down, shutting out the suffering and the people with it

- The Spiral: the rise of AI generated content mimicking human creations and human faces, the companies overwhelmingly turning to AI so they don’t have to pay real people for real work, the spread of misinformation and disinformation at rapid pace across the internet

- The Slaughter: the increasingly extremist right wing policies taking over governments across the world, violently suppressing any differences or dissent, inspiring acts of violence against the oppressed

- The Eye: increased prevalence of data collection and AI surveillance, government surveillance, targeted advertising, increasing amount of social media posts documenting the private lives of strangers and the lack of social awareness for what’s right and wrong

- The Buried: the widening wealth inequality gap, the unrelenting pressure on employees to perform when understaffed and underpayed, the humanitarian disasters that arise from global warming leaving people trapped in rubble, drowned, the mass graves

- The Corruption: the lingering effects of the Coronavirus pandemic, the Antivax movement, the resurgence of diseases, the price gouging of life saving medicine, we still haven’t cured cancer

- The Desolation: the bombings in Palestine, the destruction of Ukrainian civilian areas by Russian forces, the rampant forest fires and brush fires

- The Vast: the increasingly worrying trend of billionaires focusing on space travel while everyone else knows they’ll be left behind if they can’t afford the ticket, the fear of what may be lurking out there, the fear of everything that could go wrong, malfunction, fall apart like a Boeing plane

- The Web: the overexposure of advertising, the worry that your life is no longer your own as you live only to work, make money, buy products to get by, then work some more

- The Extinction: the way companies and governments willfully ignore global warming, the way they let catastrophic wars continue, and they let the people suffer from it

- The Stranger: AI tools taking real peoples faces, voices, and creations, only to repurpose them into mashed up semblances of whatever a user indicates they want to see

- Currently can’t find much evidence of The Dark, The Hunt, or The Flesh in our modern world but having so many of the entities at play at once is still concerning.