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“There are numbers like over 61,000 reported COVID inoculation injuries, over 6,000 deaths as a result of the jab.
That’s horrific.
That should make every person shutter. But those are just numbers, right?”
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I hope this letter finds you and your families well. I hope you will continue in good health to perform your important work.
Thank you for all you do to make the world a better place for our children. I write to you both as World Leaders to ask for your advice and help in these challenging times. I would like to know what I can do, together with my friends, to help avert a Third World War, and prevent further suffering and death for millions for my brothers and sisters around the world. I have been reading the news about military build-up in Europe and South East Asia, etc., and the rhetoric being used by many of our World Leaders (words cut deeper than swords and often can never be taken back!) and wonder ‘what’s to be done to make peace and prevent violence and war’?
I know in your hearts you are both good men. You both know the pain of suffering and loss in your own lives and deep inside you don’t wish others to undergo pain and suffering.You both know that violence, no matter where it comes from, brings with it unbearable suffering into lives, often already crushed by the crosses, toils and disappointments ofliving not to mention pandemics, (such as your own countries, but particularly India) famines, poverty, climate crisis, etc. You both have the power to change things by working together. Please join NOW and exercise your leadership on behalf of a suffering humanity.
Having visited Russia and the USA and having met your peoples, I know they are good, who feel love for each other and humanity. I, believe your people are not, nor do they wish to be, enemies.For myself, I have no enemies only brothers and sisters. Yes, there is fear and anxiety about difference, but this should not divide and separate us, the human family.
The artificial enmity between Russia and the USA has gone on too long already, and the world asks you to end this by becoming friends and peacemakers not only for your own people, but for the entire world, especially the children, who deserve your help to survive violence, hunger, pandemics, wars, climate changes. Language is so very important and the tongue is mightier than the sword. Please, put away a rhetoric of insult and abuse and start a dialogue of respect for each other and your countries.
The war games being practiced in Europe are dangerous because something may happen that will trigger a waras evidenced by the two last World wars. We the Peoples of the World, do not want war, we want peace and disarmament, to feed the hungry and provide a better life for all children.
Please, President Putin and President Biden: Make peace not war, start to disarm and give the world some hope. It will become solid and reliable if you will create a joint scientific Peace Academy to replace violence with reason, primarily between Arabs and Israelis. This would be your joint immortal peacemaking contribution to history. We have the fundamental proposals of this Academy for your consideration.
Thank you! Love and Peace,
Mairead Maguire, Nobel Peace Laureate – 1976
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At the Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee (VRBPAC) on October 22, 2020 Meeting, Steve Anderson, PhD, MPP, Director, Office of Biostatistics & Epidemiology, Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER) gave a presentation on CBER “Plans for Monitoring COVID-19 Vaccine Safety and Effectiveness”.
His presentation included a slide, below, about COVID-19 vaccine adverse event outcomes (injuries and deaths) which the FDA and CDC would be specifically monitoring. But he did not show the slide to VRBPAC, or the viewing public. He clicked right by it.
These side effect choices were not random. He explained they were based on evidence from the clinical trial data and from known science on the vaccine platform and components. This is from the transcript of the meeting.
These vaccine adverse event outcomes are being reported to VAERS in unprecedented numbers.
In the presentation, Anderson says that “Tom” also has information about adverse outcomes. By “Tom” he means Tom Shimabukuro of the CDC, and his presentation started at about 1:59 in the video — before Anderson — but Shimabukuro didn’t talk about the information at all and he also clicked right through two slides without pausing. One was a list of vaccine adverse event outcomes they would be looking for in the passive Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS).
The other was a list of vaccine adverse event outcomes they would be looking for in CDC’s Vaccine Safety Datalink System (VSD). The public and most independent researchers have no access to this data for independent review.
The FDA has a new system launched in 2017 (a full decade after FDA Amendments Act of 2007 that required them to create an active postmarket risk and analysis system covering at least 100 million persons) called Biologics Effectiveness and Safety (BEST) System. The BEST system is now being used to try to establish background rates for the COVID-19 vaccine “Adverse Events of Special Interest” that the CDC and FDA will be monitoring with their systems.
To estimate incidence rates of AESIs in special populations of interest stratified by calendar year, sex, age group, and race/ethnicity (where reliably available) in each data source over the period 2017–2020. These populations will include:
o Older adults(i.e.,65 years old and abovea tcohort entry)
o Pediatric population(i.e.,0–17 years old at cohort entry)
o Pregnant women
o Individuals who received a seasonal influenza vaccine in the previous calendar year
During this COVID-19 crisis, both the FDA and CDC have made decisions that have not been in the best interest of the population or individuals. They have approved investigational products without sufficient safety or efficacy data, and they have actively censored or ignored existing treatments and natural immunity. They are actively partnering with the COVID-19 vaccine makers.
There are two important aspects of establishing whether reported adverse events are related to receipt of a vaccine. One is epidemiological. The rates of certain health issues in the general population are compared to the rates in people getting vaccinated. That’s what the FDA’s BEST study is about. Obviously, this information alone cannot rule causation in or out. Biological studies are also needed. Can the product cause the outcome seen? Ever since the 1986 National Vaccine Injury Act passed, removing from vaccine makers liability for injury or death for products recommended to children and pregnant women, the CDC has been in charge of vaccine safety and utterly failed in their duties. Biological studies are almost non-existent. The CDC prefers to use weaker epidemiological studies that are easily manipulated to desired outcome, to try to claim reported events are not associated.
Will they do the same for the COVID-19 vaccines? If so, will they get away with it?
Fortunately during COVID, researchers around the world have been awakened to the capture and corruption of public health agencies and they are beginning to do their own, independent studies. They are starting their own journals that have no ties to governments or the drug industry. A revolution is beginning within the ranks of doctors and scientists who believe in honest and ethical science and medicine.
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The European Union database of suspected drug reaction reports is EudraVigilance, which also tracks reports of injuries and deaths following the experimental COVID-19 “vaccines.”
A Health Impact News subscriber from Europe reminded us that this database maintained at EudraVigilance is only for countries in Europe who are part of the European Union (EU), which comprises 27 countries.
The total number of countries in Europe is much higher, almost twice as many, numbering around 50. (There are some differences of opinion as to which countries are technically part of Europe.)
So as high as these numbers are, they do NOT reflect all of Europe. The actual number in Europe who are reported dead or injured due to COVID-19 shots would be much higher than what we are reporting here.
The EudraVigilance database reports that through July 3, 2021 there are 17,503 deaths and 1,687,527 injuries reported following injections of four experimental COVID-19 shots:
From the total of injuries recorded, half of them (837,588 ) are serious injuries.
“Seriousness provides information on the suspected undesirable effect; it can be classified as ‘serious’ if it corresponds to a medical occurrence that results in death, is life-threatening, requires inpatient hospitalisation, results in another medically important condition, or prolongation of existing hospitalisation, results in persistent or significant disability or incapacity, or is a congenital anomaly/birth defect.”
One subscriber from the UK commented on the article and stated that the same thing was happening there:
It is exactly the same in Scotland and England.
My vaccinated friends are not getting appointments with their family doctors who are avoiding them post vaccination even although there are no patients in the GP surgery waiting rooms when they have tried to get appointments. It is utterly cruel given they talked them into getting the vaccinations and accepted 10 UK pounds from the Scottish and English governments per person vaccinated on their patient list and did not disclose the risk of these vaccinations to the patients.
A friend nearly passed out close to the GP surgery, a kind stranger wheeled her up to the GP surgery and she was not allowed to be seen by her GP because she did not have an appointment. The nurse refused to take bloods because they are not allowed to do so until management confirms they can do this so they cannot even do exploratory bloods to investigate what has gone wrong with these patients post vaccination.
Another friend’s hospital consultant phoned a friend’s GP insisting her family doctor see her given she had had heart procedures and no appointments for 2 years. She told me after first Pfizer shot “it was like acid going into my veins” and the queen did not get the same vaccine asshe did which will be completely true. Her GP treated her with disdain and was not pleased to see her and my friend also tells me that every time she walks now post vaccination her heart races and her son has been unwell post vaccination too.
All my friends who got the vaccination have had severe worsening of their pre-existing medical conditions and some have got heart conditions they did not previously have or chronic obstructive airways disease.
I have noticed most have became irritable and short-tempered as they are becoming unwell not realising the vaccine is harming them and they are lashing out at others for no good reason.
In UK, NHS contributions are deducted from people’s salaries and the retired paid these all their working life and now are getting refused service but they will still take these NHS contributions regardless. It is wicked and cruel. Though it is the governments who are instructing the GP and hospital management to treat the patients in this abysmal manner.
I am quite sure this will be happening in most if not all countries.
God be with us all.
A Health Impact News subscriber in Europe ran the reports for each of the four COVID-19 shots we are including here. This subscriber has volunteered to do this, and it is a lot of work to tabulate each reaction with injuries and fatalities, since there is no place on the EudraVigilance system we have found that tabulates all the results.
Since we have started publishing this, others from Europe have also calculated the numbers and confirmed the totals.[1]
Here is the summary data through July 3, 2021.
Total reactions for the experimental mRNA vaccine Tozinameran (code BNT162b2,Comirnaty) from BioNTech/ Pfizer: 8,426 deaths and 632,623 injuries to 03/07/2021
17,754 Blood and lymphatic system disorders incl. 99 deaths
14,858 Cardiac disorders incl. 1,165 deaths
126 Congenital, familial and genetic disorders incl. 12 deaths
42,716 General disorders and administration site conditions incl. 1,928 deaths
269 Hepatobiliary disorders incl. 17 deaths
1,349 Immune system disorders incl. 5 deaths
4,793 Infections and infestations incl. 259 deaths
3,378 Injury, poisoning and procedural complications incl. 92 deaths
3,359 Investigations incl. 93 deaths
1,616 Metabolism and nutrition disorders incl. 94 deaths
19,416 Musculoskeletal and connective tissue disorders incl. 88 deaths
175 Neoplasms benign, malignant and unspecified (incl. cysts and polyps) incl. 18 deaths
28,239 Nervous system disorders incl. 465 deaths
338 Pregnancy, puerperium and perinatal conditions incl. 2 deaths
24 Product issues
3,193 Psychiatric disorders incl. 75 deaths
1,061 Renal and urinary disorders incl. 66 deaths
723 Reproductive system and breast disorders incl. 2 death
7,268 Respiratory, thoracic and mediastinal disorders incl. 438 deaths
8,400 Skin and subcutaneous tissue disorders incl. 32 deaths
690 Social circumstances incl. 16 deaths
540 Surgical and medical procedures incl. 42 deaths
4,602 Vascular disorders incl. 160 deaths
Total reactions for the experimental vaccine AZD1222/VAXZEVRIA (CHADOX1 NCOV-19) from Oxford/AstraZeneca: 3,871 deaths and 852,616 injuries to 03/07/2021
9,950 Blood and lymphatic system disorders incl. 160 deaths
13,336 Cardiac disorders incl. 454 deaths
115 Congenital, familial and genetic disorders incl. 3 deaths
227,408 General disorders and administration site conditions incl. 1,009 deaths
607 Hepatobiliary disorders incl. 32 deaths
3,359 Immune system disorders incl. 14 deaths
19,508 Infections and infestations incl. 247 deaths
8,912 Injury, poisoning and procedural complications incl. 94 deaths
18,352 Investigations incl. 88 deaths
10,315 Metabolism and nutrition disorders incl. 50 deaths
131,547 Musculoskeletal and connective tissue disorders incl. 50 deaths
379 Neoplasms benign, malignant and unspecified (incl. cysts and polyps) incl. 9 deaths
180,575 Nervous system disorders incl. 612 deaths
279 Pregnancy, puerperium and perinatal conditions incl. 5 deaths
117 Product issues
16,000 Psychiatric disorders incl. 33 deaths
3,045 Renal and urinary disorders incl. 33 deaths
8,593 Reproductive system and breast disorders
28,994 Respiratory, thoracic and mediastinal disorders incl. 447 deaths
39,173 Skin and subcutaneous tissue disorders incl. 25 deaths
866 Social circumstances incl. 5 deaths
754 Surgical and medical procedures incl. 16 deaths
19,209 Vascular disorders incl. 283 deaths
Total reactions for the experimental COVID-19 vaccine JANSSEN (AD26.COV2.S) from Johnson & Johnson: 601 deaths and 44,486 injuries to 03/07/2021
405 Blood and lymphatic system disorders incl. 18 deaths
659 Cardiac disorders incl. 73 deaths
16 Congenital, familial and genetic disorders
250 Ear and labyrinth disorders
10 Endocrine disorders incl. 1 death
518 Eye disorders incl. 3 deaths
4,283 Gastrointestinal disorders incl. 25 deaths
11,832 General disorders and administration site conditions incl. 150 deaths
58 Hepatobiliary disorders incl. 4 deaths
161 Immune system disorders incl. 1 death
598 Infections and infestations incl. 16 deaths
413 Injury, poisoning and procedural complications incl. 8 deaths
2,420 Investigations incl. 39 deaths
225 Metabolism and nutrition disorders incl. 11 deaths
7,687 Musculoskeletal and connective tissue disorders incl. 17 deaths
18 Neoplasms benign, malignant and unspecified (incl. cysts and polyps)
9,547 Nervous system disorders incl. 76 deaths
15 Pregnancy, puerperium and perinatal conditions incl. 1 death
11 Product issues
459 Psychiatric disorders incl. 5 deaths
150 Renal and urinary disorders incl. 8 deaths
166 Reproductive system and breast disorders incl. 1 death
1,453 Respiratory, thoracic and mediastinal disorders incl. 47 deaths
1,125 Skin and subcutaneous tissue disorders incl. 2 deaths
91 Social circumstances incl. 3 deaths
393 Surgical and medical procedures incl. 27 deaths
1,523 Vascular disorders incl. 65 deaths
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Notes
[1] These totals are estimates based on reports submitted to EudraVigilance. Totals may be much higher based on percentage of adverse reactions that are reported. Some of these reports may also be reported to the individual country’s adverse reaction databases, such as the U.S. VAERS database and the UK Yellow Card system. The fatalities are grouped by symptoms, and some fatalities may have resulted from multiple symptoms.
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United States warmakers have become so skilled at propaganda that not only can they wage a war of aggression without arousing protest; they can also compel liberals to denounce peace activists using language reminiscent of the McCarthy era.
Take the case of Syria. The people and groups one would normally count on to oppose wars have been the ones largely defending it. They have also often been the ones to label war opponents as “Assad apologists” or “genocide deniers”—causing them to be blacklisted.
Protest against bombing of Syria in Newark, New Jersey, in April 2017. Most protests against the war in Syria have been small like this, and protesters have been susceptible to ridicule as Assad lovers or apologists. [Source: northjersey.com]
In April, The Nation magazine published an essay by Gilbert Achcar, a professor of international relations at the University of London and co-author with Noam Chomsky of a book critical of U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East, entitled “How to Avoid the Anti-Imperialism of Fools.”
Achcar divides the Left into two factions—one which “opposes all forms of imperialism and oppression,” and one which “supports any regime or force that is the object of Washington’s hostility.” The latter includes “Russia’s thuggish capitalist and imperialist government, or Iran’s theocratic regime or the likes of Slobodan Milošević and Saddam Hussein.”[1]
The binary Achcar paints is misleading because it does not take into account war critics’ attempts to present more nuanced portraits of American targets for regime change like Putin or Milošević or even Hussein that would account for their domestic popularity. Nor the value placed on the principle of national self-determination and sovereignty, and identification of the double standards of U.S. human rights concerns.
He quotes favorably in his Nation article from a 2019 statement signed by several prominent figures on the American Left—including Judith Butler, Noam Chomsky, the late David Graeber and David Harvey—demanding that the United States “continue military support for the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Force,” in the face of Donald Trump’s announced withdrawal.
This position was based on fear that if the U.S. withdrew, the Kurds would be slaughtered by Turkey, the Islamic State in the Levant (ISIS) or the “murderous Assad regime,” as Achcar termed it.
The Kurds, however, were being used as a proxy force by the U.S. in a regime-change operation that would enable foreign exploitation of Syria’s oil and military domination of the Middle East—and would inevitably be abandoned.
Western empires had used the pretext of human rights many times before to justify colonization, and recruited disaffected minority groups, which was no different in this case.
Voices from Syria
Mark Taliano and Basma Qaddour’s book, Voices from Syria—now out in its second edition—offers a strong rebuttal to Achcar and others who consider opponents of U.S. military intervention in Syria to be foolish.
The authors—one a Montreal based teacher, the other a Syrian journalist—point out that the majority of Syrians consider Assad an authentic nationalist who has saved Syria from jihadist terrorists sponsored by the U.S., NATO, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Israel and Gulf Arab states like Qatar.
The terrorists have killed an estimated 150,000 civilians and another 260,000 fighters and kidnapped thousands more, some of whom were used for illegal organ harvesting.
Their goal is to impose a theocratic regime and to divide, plunder and exploit Syria and open it up to predatory foreign corporations.
Taliano and Qaddour write that “Syria’s stand against the Western agencies of death and destruction is a stand for all humanity against the dark forces that fester beneath our politicians’ empty words and the courtesan media’s toxic lies.”
These lies have ensured that few in the U.S. or West have acknowledged Syria’s heroic victory against colonial aggression—a modern-day equivalent to Vietnam’s victory over the French at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu in 1954.
Long-Standing Plan for Regime Change
Two weeks after the September 11th attacks, General Wesley Clark was visited by a senior general who told him that the U.S. was going to attack Iraq: “The decision has basically been made.”
The key to the success of these latter operations was to convince the U.S. public that wars of aggression were military interventions carried out for humanitarian purposes. The way to do that was to give off the illusion that the targeted leaders were brutal dictators intent on waging a campaign of genocide against their own people.
Assad’s Accomplishments
Syria was a main target on Rumsfeld’s list because its leader, Bashar al-Assad, was a secular nationalist like Saddam Hussein and Muammar Qaddafi of Libya, who was defiant of the West.
In 2000, Bashar succeeded his father Hafez al-Assad, who had long been a thorn in the side of the West. He had allied Syria with the Soviet Union during the Cold War, and in 1971 allowed the Russians to establish a naval base at Tartus.
Though vilified in the West, Bashar retains support of the majority of Syrians because he has advanced free health care and education for Syrians and retained Syrian control over most of its economy while rallying the people against foreign aggression.
Syrian city of Aleppo before and after U.S.-backed war of aggression on Syria. [Source: petapixel.com]
While certainly there are brutal aspects to his rule like with his father, Assad’s accomplishments before the war, according to Taliano and Qaddour, included: a) construction and restoration of 10,000 mosques and 500 churches; b) construction of 8,000 schools; and c) construction of 600,000 apartment units for young people and 6,000 hospitals and clinics.
Further, salaries increased by 300 percent under Assad’s rule, thousands of new businesses sprung up, agricultural and industrial capacity increased, the illiteracy rate was kept low, and the unemployment rate declined from 28 to 12 percent.
Assad family in 1980s. Hafez in lower right and Bashar on left. [Source: newrepublic.com]
These facts are at odds with the depiction of Assad as a genocidal tyrant.
The latter is part of a demonization campaign initiated by intelligence agencies and embraced by factions of the Left that have unwittingly helped to advance the agenda of the U.S. empire.
“Your Obama Leading Proxy War”
In March 2011, Americans were led to believe that idealistic pro-democracy demonstrations erupted in the southern city of Daraa—inspired by Arab Spring protests in Egypt and Tunisia, and following an incident of police brutality.
Seven police were killed by the demonstrators in the very first protests, and 60 security forces were massacred two weeks later. The plan of the mob was to provoke a police response that would make it seem like the security forces were reacting harshly, which would discredit Assad’s regime.
For the first three weeks, police and security personnel were under orders, though, not to carry guns.
As the protests spread, foreign terrorists began descending on Syria and were paid $300-$400 per month. Although Syrian soldiers were paid only one-tenth of that amount, they remained mostly loyal to the Syrian government.
Majd al-Zaim, a Syrian, stated that what had happened in Syria was “not a revolution or civil war [as has been depicted in the Western media]. The terrorists are sent by your government [the U.S.]. They are Al-Qaeda, Jabhat al-Nusra, Wahhabi, Salafist, Talibans and the extremist jihadists are sent by the West, Saudis, Qataris, Turkey…. Your Obama and whoever is behind him or above him are supporting Al-Qaeda and leading a proxy war on my country.”
Historical Background
Historically, Syria faced divisions between secular nationalist and Shia Alawites and Sunni fundamentalists who allied with the Muslim Brotherhood.
In 1982, Hafez al-Assad crushed an Islamic rebellion (the Hama massacre), foreshadowing his son’s actions 30 years later.
Voices from Syria tells the stories of the victims of U.S. policy like Ammar, whose sister was killed by a Wahhabi suicide bomber while she was on her way to the local university.
Ammar said that, after the first blast, another suicide bomber blew himself up in the same place, taking advantage of the gathering of people and ambulance teams. At the hospital, Ammar saw many burned and charred bodies, including his sister, who was now a “body without a soul”—like so many others.
Lilly Martin, an American living in Syria, is quoted in Voices from Syria as stating that she could not vote for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election because Clinton had overseen “the transfer of weapons from Libya to Turkey to be used specifically by the American-backed terrorists.”
These terrorists destroyed Martin’s home on March 21, 2014, beheaded her Christian neighbors and kidnapped and raped the old ladies.
Image on the right: Lilly Martin [Source: muckrack.com]
Dr. Declan Hayes described an attack by al-Nusra (U.S.-backed jihadi group) on the village of Kesab where the terrorists swarmed across the border on motorbikes, pick-up trucks, and Western ambulances, and proceeded to desecrate all of Kesab’s churches, loot the village graves and strip the houses of anything of value.
Pepken Djourian and his wife saw their only son executed in front of them, after which his body was left to rot in the sun before being thrown into the ground like a dog.
In another case, terrorists beheaded and executed a captured soldier while he was speaking to his father on the phone so he could hear his son being killed.
The terrorists further roasted bakery workers in a town loyal to Assad in an oven and slaughtered staff at a medical clinic and displayed their severed heads in the marketplace for intimidation.
Operation Timber Sycamore
Some of the head choppers were trained by U.S. military advisers at terrorist training camps in Jordan under the CIA’s $1 billion Operation Sycamore, the largest covert operation since the arming of the mujahadin fighters in Afghanistan to fight the Soviet Union in the 1980s.
Turkish helicopters could be seen overhead during armed terrorist invasions of towns while the Syrian Arab Army was fighting insurgents who wore Turkish military uniforms and carried Turkish military identification.
The Israelis allowed Al Qaeda militants, Jabhat al-Nusra, to use the occupied Golan Heights to fight against the Syrian Army, while the Israeli Air Force repeatedly bombed Syria.
Many Syrians, however, laud the Russians for helping to save their country.
Ammar told Taliano and Qaddour that “the Russians provided the biggest humanitarian aid by supporting the Syrian Armed Forces against Western backed barbarian terrorism,” and that Russian aid—including food and medical supplies—was distributed directly to needy people.
Lilly Martin stated that Russia had “saved the Syrian Coast”—along with Syrian towns like Kesab that were on the verge of destruction by the CIA-backed terrorists.
Cruel Economic War
The cruelty of Western policy is exemplified by its economic war on Syria, about which Achcar and his associates have been silent.
The goal of the economic war has been to weaken Syria and demoralize its people so as to pave the way for Syria’s conquest.
Militias affiliated with both the U.S. and Turkey blocked the sale by Syrian peasants of wheat and barley east of the Euphrates, thus exacerbating the food shortage in the country.
They have sold oil illegally in northern Iraq and set fires in an attempt to decimate Syria’s yield of strategic crops. Many of the fires have targeted olive trees, which are used to produce olive oil—a source of livelihood for many Syrians.
The economic sanctions have further prevented needed medical supplies and equipment from getting into Syria and caused milk shortages resulting in the deaths of children.
Fraudulent Pretexts
These sanctions have been legitimated by false propaganda.
The Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act, which was signed into law in December 2019 by President Donald Trump, was named after a government defector, Caesar, who leaked thousands of photographs alleging torture of civilians by Assad’s security forces.
CNN show discussing Caesar’s “torture” report that was a basis for extending sanctions. [Source: mondialisation.ca]
Caesar’s identity was also unclear and he was suspected of being in the employ of the CIA.
More Bright Shining Lies
American-educated opinion about the Syria conflict has been forged by numerous other deceptions.
These include allegations of chemical weapons attacks by Assad—which most Syrians believe were “staged by the terrorists helped by the USA and UK.”
Image below: James Le Mesurier, who led the White Helmets, was a suspected British MI6 agent who died under suspicious circumstances in November 2019. [Source: rt.com]
Another deception surrounds the White Helmets—a group of Western-funded humanitarian aid workers that received endorsement from A-list celebrities like George Clooney.
They staged scenes for public relations purposes, assisted in public executions, and functioned as an Al Qaeda affiliate, according to Taliano and Qaddour, which occupied and destroyed more than 7,000 schools.
The War on Terror Is a Fraud
The Syrian War exemplifies that the War on Terror is a fraud.
The U.S. government has claimed for the last two decades to be fighting the scourge of terrorism, but has armed, trained, and supported Islamic terrorists in Syria as part of an imperial strategy designed to control the country’s oil wealth and dominate the entire region.
U.S. policy in Syria is no anomaly as the U.S. has supported Islamic fundamentalists in Libya, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Chechnya, Azerbaijan, Turkey, and Gulf Arab states like Qatar, which allows terrorist financiers to operate in its borders.
Only a very limited number of Americans have recognized the dangers of this strategy—owing in large part to the sophisticated propaganda that has effectively brainwashed many of those who would traditionally identify themselves as antiwar.
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Jeremy Kuzmarov is Managing Editor of CovertAction Magazine. He is the author of four books on U.S. foreign policy, including Obama’s Unending Wars (Clarity Press, 2019) and The Russians Are Coming, Again, with John Marciano (Monthly Review Press, 2018). He can be reached at: [email protected].
Notes
[1] Declassified British documents obtained by The Grayzone Project showed that Achcar trained British Cultural Defense Units who played a key role in the British war in Afghanistan. The Units have also advised the military on how to operate in other countries, including those that were at one time colonized by Great Britain. See Ben Norton, “Elite UK military unit secretly trained by leftist regime-change advocate Gibert Achcar and other academics,” The Grayzone Project, October 3, 2019, https://thegrayzone.com/2019/10/03/leftist-regime-change-activist-gilbert-achcar-academics-train-uk-military/
Featured image is from The Greanville Post
Order Mark Taliano’s Book “Voices from Syria” directly from Global Research.
Mark Taliano combines years of research with on-the-ground observations to present an informed and well-documented analysis that refutes the mainstream media narratives on Syria.
Comments Off on The Syria Deception: The Public Has Been Hoodwinked Yet Again into Supporting a Criminal War of Aggression—and One that Has Been Effectively Lost
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Dr. Dietrich Klinghardt, born in Berlin in 1950, is a German medical doctor, a scientist and teacher. He practices foremost in the US, but also gives regular seminars in Germany (See this).
In the following one-and-a-half-minute video, Dr. Klinghardt says it all. What to do to totally control, dumb and eventually kill people: You spray their food with Glyphosate (Bayer/Monsanto), contaminate the air with aluminum dust from chemtrails (see this), and add some more aluminum to vaccines, for example Covid-19 injections, actually they are not vaccines.
The US CDC has only granted manufacturers of the mRNA-type inoculations temporary permissions to call them “experimental gene therapy”. They are not to be named vaccines. If governments, the media and the medical community at large does it anyway, they are lying to you.
What is further needed, Dr. Klinghardt says, are certain electromagnetic frequencies (5G), to kill the detox enzymes in your body. And precisely these frequencies are brought to us via our cell-phones, to which 99% of people living in western societies are virtually “married”.
In conclusion, he observes, that behind such a diabolical plan, there must be evil scientists and evil politicians. See the video (in German with English translation) below or here.
What to do? Abstain from taking PCR tests which have nothing to do with actually detecting the never isolated SARS-CoV-2 virus. They are based – unnecessarily – on taking slime samples from way up in your nose, touching the thin membrane that separates your sinuses from the brain. You may bet that the tests have another agenda. The “tests” potentially could introduce chemicals into your brain which dull your Pineal gland, so as to diminish and eventually kill your sensibility and sensitivities.
What these non-vaxxes also do, is they have a strong sterilizing effect on women and drastically reduce men’s sperm count. It all fits in with the eugenists agenda of massive depopulation.
What to do? Simple. Abstain and don’t let yourself be coerced into taking PCR tests and mRNA-type experimental gene therapy jabs.
Yes, you may be temporarily confronted with many restrictions for travel and attending public events. Stick it out. This crime of epic proportions is in the process of being laid open. Lawyer Dr. Reiner Fuellmich, and his team of the international-German Corona Investigative Committee has already begun filing class-action suits in Canada and the US, and is suing institutions and individuals in Germany and in Europe at large.
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Peter Koenig is a geopolitical analyst and a former Senior Economist at the World Bank and the World Health Organization (WHO), where he has worked for over 30 years on water and environment around the world. He lectures at universities in the US, Europe and South America. He writes regularly for online journals and is the author of Implosion – An Economic Thriller about War, Environmental Destruction and Corporate Greed; and co-author of Cynthia McKinney’s book “When China Sneezes: From the Coronavirus Lockdown to the Global Politico-Economic Crisis” (Clarity Press – November 1, 2020).
He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization.
All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the “Translate Website” drop down menu on the top banner of our home page (Desktop version).
The Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) would do well to coordinate its members’ efforts to contain Afghan-emanating regional terrorist threats such as ISIS-K, encourage a political compromise between Kabul and the Taliban, and devise a plan for developing the war-torn country’s connectivity potential so as to ensure its long-term stability.
The future of Afghanistan is more uncertain than ever before against the backdrop of the Taliban’s rapid advance throughout the country in the wake of America’s impending military withdrawal by 31 August. Most observers predict an intensified period of civil war if the group, which is still regarded as terrorists by most countries such as Russia despite Moscow pragmatically hosting them on several occasions over the years for peace talks, isn’t able to take Afghanistan’s main cities that still remain under government control. The resultant chaos might create a dangerous opportunity for ISIS-K to expand its presence in the country and even become a major security threat to Central and South Asia. With the US practically abandoning its anti-terrorist commitments, perhaps for what some suspect might be Machiavellian reasons related to provoking this very scenario, it therefore falls on the SCO to ensure regional security instead.
This group comprises most of the Central Asian Republics (CARs, with the exception of Turkmenistan), China, India, Pakistan, and Russia.
Afghanistan, Belarus, Iran, and Mongolia are observers while Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Turkey are dialogue partners.
One of the SCO’s mandates is to jointly confront the threats of terrorism, separatism, and extremism as well as enhance economic cooperation between its members. Considering the fast-moving events described in the first paragraph of this analysis, it therefore follows that they have a natural interest in working together when it comes to Afghanistan. This can take security, political, and economic forms. The first concerns supporting the two member states bordering Afghanistan, especially highly fragile and formerly civil war-torn Tajikistan, while the second involves facilitating dialogue between the warring parties. The third, meanwhile, concerns Afghanistan’s connectivity potential.
To elaborate a bit more, nearly 1,600 Afghan troops reportedly fled to Tajikistan in recent weeks in order to escape the Taliban’s rapid advance in Northern Afghanistan. Sputnik reported that the group has allowed a major border crossing to continue operating unimpeded, and it’s widely known that the Taliban doesn’t harbor any regional expansionist plans. It’s therefore highly unlikely that they’d pose a threat to Tajikistan or any other CAR. Even so, the prevailing uncertainty over Afghanistan’s future might result in large-scale refugee influxes, especially if ISIS-K exploits the situation. For this reason, President Putin recently promised his Tajikistani counterpart full support for ensuring its border security. There should be no doubt that the Russian military base in that country is more than capable of fulfilling this mission if requested to do so, but it nevertheless provides an excellent opportunity for the SCO’s members to cooperate more closely on the security front.
Thus far, its Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure (RATS) hasn’t seen any real action. The SCO is comprised of very diverse members who lack meaningful security coordination apart from largely symbolic drills that are held every now and then. It would immensely boost the organization’s effectiveness if Tajikistan requested its assistance, even if only for the purpose of functioning as a so-called “live action exercise” in support of the Russian-led mission. That doesn’t imply the prolonged dispatch of their servicemen under the SCO banner either since this could also be accomplished by more intelligence sharing through this structure as well as the provisioning of relevant material support. Although India is in a rivalry with China and Pakistan, they all might put their differences aside in the interests of pragmatism so as to obtain the multilateral security experience that could be put to use during future regional crises, whether concerning Afghanistan or elsewhere.
The second dimension of the SCO’s game plan for Afghanistan should involve all members doing their utmost to encourage a political compromise between Kabul and the Taliban. Reuters reported earlier this week that the latter intends to present a peace plan during talks sometime next month, which might in effect function as an ultimatum for preventing their speculatively planned move on the capital. The Taliban denies that it’s seriously considering any such attack, but observers fear that it might become an inevitability if Kabul refuses to submit to their demands. In order to avoid the pronounced instability that would likely follow that battle, it’s in the SCO’s interests to see to it that the Taliban and Kabul reach a deal during the next round of talks. The Afghan government is already largely demoralized by the US’ withdrawal and its official American ally will soon be less capable of defending it than ever before following its September withdrawal, so this scenario is indeed possible.
Therein lies the third part of what the SCO should do to help Afghanistan and that’s present the basics of a comprehensive regional economic integration proposal for showing all domestic stakeholders that peace would veritably be in everyone’s best interests. February’s agreement between Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Uzbekistan to construct a trilateral railway (casually referred to as PAKAFUZ after the first letters of each participating country’s name) could unlock the war-torn country’s supercontinental integration potential by finally bringing together Central and South Asia. That could in turn lead to the establishment of a new economic axis stretching from Russia in Eastern Europe all the way down to India in South Asia that could tentatively be referred to as the SCO Corridor. This ambitious proposal should ideally be presented to Kabul and the Taliban by the SCO as a whole with the assistance of all its members during the next round of peace talks in August.
There isn’t enough time to flesh out the exact details, but each country could still generally commit something or another to this plan, even if only broad promises of financial assistance (whether grants and/or loans) as well as technical expertise. What’s most important is that both warring parties (but especially obstinate Kabul) realize that coming to a pragmatic compromise would suit all of Eurasia’s interests, not just their own, and that the supercontinent’s most promising multipolar body has a direct stake in that outcome. The SCO must walk the walk instead of just talk the talk, so to speak, hence the need to put aside some of its rival members’ differences in order to jointly present a credible plan to this end (whatever its lack of detail for the moment considering the short time frame). The much-needed goodwill and trust that could facilitate this could be greatly advanced through the earlier proposal of providing multilateral security assistance to Tajikistan.
To bring everything together, the SCO has the responsibility to take the lead in ensuring that the situation in Afghanistan doesn’t soon spiral out of control and create fertile ground for ISIS-K’s regional expansion. The bloc can only accomplish this by jointly containing such terrorist threats to the neighboring CARs like Tajikistan, encouraging Kabul and the Taliban to pragmatically reach a political compromise during the next round of peace talks in August so as to prevent the feared intensification of the Afghan Civil War, and greatly assisting the aforementioned by devising a credible plan for transforming Afghanistan into the centerpiece of the proposed SCO Corridor from Eastern Europe to South Asia. This is admittedly a lot to ask for an organization that hasn’t yet ever been confronted with a real crisis, let alone one that’s as urgent as the Afghan Civil War, but it’s still possible to accomplish even some of what’s been suggested so long as the political will is present.
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This article was originally published on OneWorld.
Andrew Korybko is an American Moscow-based political analyst specializing in the relationship between the US strategy in Afro-Eurasia, China’s One Belt One Road global vision of New Silk Road connectivity, and Hybrid Warfare. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.
All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the “Translate Website” drop down menu on the top banner of our home page (Desktop version).
The settlements removed the pharmaceutical company from a jury trial that started Tuesday, June 29, on Long Island, New York. Several big opioid makers and distributors are also defendants in the case.
Johnson & Johnson did not admit liability or wrongdoing in settling with New York state and with Nassau and Suffolk counties, but the $229.9 million settlement with the state also called for the company to stop selling the painkillers nationwide.
Johnson & Johnson fuels opioid epidemic
New York Attorney General Letitia James said in a statement that “the opioid epidemic has wreaked havoc” across the nation and that “Johnson & Johnson helped fuel this fire.” James said her focus remains “getting funds into communities devastated by opioids as quickly as possible.”
Johnson & Johnson said the settlements were consistent with its prior agreement to pay $5 billion to settle opioid claims by states, cities, counties and tribal governments nationwide. The company and the largest U.S. drug distributors – AmerisourceBergen Corp., Cardinal Health Inc. and McKesson Corp. – have proposed paying a combined $26 billion to end thousands of opioid lawsuits.
Tuesday’s opioids trial was one of several scheduled for this year, with others underway in California and West Virginia. Drugmakers AbbVie Inc. and Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. and several distributors are among the defendants. Pharmacy chain Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc. is also a defendant, though it was sued only by the counties. (Related: Kentucky sues WALGREENS for promoting opioid epidemic.)
Walmart Inc., Rite Aid Corp. and CVS Health Corp. were detached from the trial during jury selection. CVS reportedly settled with Nassau and Suffolk counties although terms of the settlement have not been disclosed.
Johnson & Johnson has also been appealing an Oklahoma judge’s 2019 ruling that the New Jersey-based company pay that state $465 million for its deceptive marketing of opioids. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has said nearly 500,000 people died from opioid overdoses from 1999 to 2019.
Johnson & Johnson causes all sorts of health problems
The pharmaceutical giant knew for decades that its baby powder was tainted with carcinogenic asbestos and chose to keep that information from regulators and the public. A government-funded study from the mid-1990s found that Johnson’s baby powder caused cancer in rats and other studies have found an increased risk of cancer in women who used the company’s talc-based products.
In 2018, the company was ordered to pay $4.7 billion to thousands of victims who reportedly developed cancer from using Johnson & Johnson’s products. In that case, 22 women alleged the company’s talc-based products, including its baby powder, contained the known carcinogen, asbestos, which caused them to develop cancer. According to reports, there are over 9,000 similar talc lawsuits against the company.
These cases may have contributed to the hesitancy of many Americans to take the coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccine manufactured by Johnson & Johnson – one of the three COVID-19 vaccines to receive emergency use authorization (EUA) from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The other two were manufactured by Pfizer and Moderna.
Pfizer has long history of misleading public about its drugs
Pfizer also had a long history of misleading the public about its drugs.
In 2000, the Washington Post published a major exposé accusing Pfizer of testing a dangerous new antibiotic called Trovan on children in Nigeria without receiving proper consent from their parents. The experiment occurred during a 1996 meningitis epidemic in the West African country.
Interestingly, the Washington Post is now defending the same company in regards to COVID-19 vaccine.
Pfizer pays $2.3B in largest health care fraud settlement
The pharmaceutical giant also paid out $2.3 billion in 2009 to resolve criminal and civil liability arising from the illegal promotion of certain pharmaceutical products. It was the largest health care fraud settlement in the history of the Department of Justice.
Pharmacia & Upjohn Company Inc., a subsidiary of Pfizer, has agreed to plead guilty to a felony violation of the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act for misbranding Bextra with the intent to defraud or mislead. Bextra is an anti-inflammatory drug that Pfizer pulled from the market in 2005.
The company agreed to pay a criminal fine of $1.195 billion, the largest criminal fine ever imposed in the U.S. for any matter. Pharmacia & Upjohn also forfeited $105 million, for a total criminal resolution of $1.3 billion.
In addition, Pfizer has agreed to pay $1 billion to resolve allegations under the civil False Claims Act that the company illegally promoted four drugs – Bextra; Geodon, an anti-psychotic drug; Zyvox, an antibiotic; and Lyrica, an anti-epileptic drug.
The federal share of the civil settlement is $668,514,830 and the state Medicaid share of the civil settlement is $331,485,170. Pfizer has gotten all those money back and more as its COVID-19 vaccine became the first to get EUA from the FDA.
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A Maryland healthcare worker who had just accepted a job with the prestigious Johns Hopkins Hospital reportedly died after receiving a Covid-19 vaccine required for employment.
Appearing skeptical, 45-year-old mom Robin Spring Saunders wrote on social media that she received her first jab on June 21 and that it was mandated by her place of work.
“I never thought I’d get a Covid shot but I got my first one today,” a post from Saunders stated. “Unfortunately my job requires it.”
In a Facebook update, Robin’s mom asked for prayers for her daughter after she suffered a reaction to the vaccine and was in the hospital ICU.
“Johns Hopkins told her she had to have the shot to start her new job,” her mom wrote.
Robin’s cousin Crystal wrote on Facebook that Robin had had her “2nd covid shot,” which would have spaced the two doses out by mere days, and that she was “in the ICU with brain swelling and heart issues.”
“She is currently on a ventilator,” Crystal wrote. “She was also told she had to have this shot in order to start her new job.”
Other family members also desperately asked for prayers, and noted that she may have had her “2nd covid shot.”
Posts did not note whether Robin received either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine.
According to a post later that day from Saunders’ daughter, however, her condition took a turn for the worst and she died in the ICU.
An obituary at the Connelly Funeral Home of Essex in Baltimore shows a memorial for Robin.
At least one commenter on Facebook advised the family to seek legal help, as it remains to be seen if the hospital will be held liable.
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Former Pfizer Vice President and Chief Science Officer Michael Yeadon today told America’s Frontline Doctors (AFLDS) that a Reuters“fact checker” article calling his statements “misinformation” is “a mixture of straw men and sheer invention,” saying the Reutersarticle was “well worth rebutting”.
This is not the first timeReuters has tried to discredit Yeadon by “fact checker” obfuscation, although past attempts have been less half-hearted. This time, Reuters called Yeadon an “anti-vax proponent” who “has made unfounded claims”. Relying on an entity that calls itself “Meedan’s Health Desk, a group of public health scientists working to tackle medical misinformation online,” the Reuters“fact check” addresses Yeadon statements on asymptomatic spread, variants, the COVID-19 vaccine, and its use in pregnancy.
The article’s concluding “verdict” tries to claim that “infected but symptom-free people can spread the coronavirus; vaccinated people are better protected but not 100% immune; research shows COVID-19 vaccines are safe and effective for adults and pregnant women.”
Relating to the article, Yeadon said: “The narrative statements that have repeatedly been claimed by the authorities which are a pack of lies are:
“1. Asymptomatic transmission. It’s definitely a lie. Have you seen that video where Fauci states that ‘it’s always a symptomatic person who drives an epidemic and never people without symptoms’?
“There’s also a terrific peer-reviewed journal article showing that domestic transmission in asymptomatic cases was effectively zero.
“All marries up with the statements I’ve made, and with biological logic.
“2. Variants. They’re just being idiotic. I can show several good quality papers demonstrating that T-cells from a convalescent person or an immunized person each recognize all the then-available variants, again, as anticipated by fundamentals of immunology. The weak twaddle in their piece about antibodies is risible.
“3. Vaccines. The bastards are actually claiming they’re safe. Got them. We have VAERS, Yellow Card, and EMA monitoring. We have mechanism of toxicity. We have multiple open letters to EMA (warning of blood clots) which were immediately followed by vaccine withdrawals (for blood clots).
“4. Pregnancy/fertility. No one in their right mind thinks giving experimental treatments to pregnant women is other than reckless. Especially when reproductive toxicity testing is incomplete.”
Yeadon continued:
“But on top of this stupidity, are two recent public disclosures: (I) the distribution of vaccine to tissues in mice shows a very disturbing concentration into ovaries. No one has followed it up, so the assumption has to be this is happening in humans too, and (II) our concern expressed in the December 2020 petition to EMA about immune cross-reactivity between spike protein and human syncytin-1 has been confirmed. A paper was very recently published showing young women making antibodies to syncytin-1 within days of vaccination.”
Summarizing, Yeadon concluded:
“Of course this is wholly fraud. Imagine that the number of people in U.K. who’d actually been killed by the virus, instead of dying with it, was just a couple of thousand; you’d been on the streets with torches and pitchforks.
“You should be. Governments everywhere have lied and lied and lied about every one of the central narrative points about this virus.
“The effect of compliance with their ludicrous policy responses has been to hollow out and arguably to have destroyed economically several G20 counties, and actually increased the number of avoidable deaths, not least by deprivation of healthcare.
“These people all need locking up in that new high-security facility being built at speed at Wellingborough, Northants. The prima faciecase against a dozen or so people in U.K. warrants their arrest pending criminal prosecutions.
“If these figures are of the same order of magnitude for other countries as well, and there is no reason to assume otherwise, then the plague is a deception of unprecedented proportions, and crimes committed against humanity on a huge scale have been committed here.”
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Featured image is from America’s Frontline Doctors
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From its headquarters just blocks from the White House, a small, high-powered team of former ambassadors, lawyers, and Obama appointees has spent the past few years solving problems for the world’s biggest companies.
Less than six months into the Biden administration, more than 15 consultants from the firm WestExec Advisors have fanned out across the White House, its foreign policy apparatus, and its law enforcement institutions. Five, some of whom already have jobs with the administration, have been nominated for high-ranking posts, and four others served on the Biden-Harris transition team. Even by Washington standards, it’s a remarkable march through the revolving door, especially for a firm that only launched in 2017. The pipeline has produced a dominance of WestExec alums throughout the administration, installed in senior roles as influential as director of national intelligence and secretary of state. WestExec clients, meanwhile, have controversial interests in tech and defense that intersect with the policies their former consultants are now in a position to set and execute.
The arrival of each new WestExec adviser at the administration has been met with varying degrees of press coverage — headlines for the secretary of state, blurbs in trade publications for the head of cybersecurity — but the creeping monopolization of foreign policymaking by a single boutique consulting firm has gone largely unnoticed. The insularity of this network of policymakers poses concerns about the potential for groupthink, conflicts of interest, and what can only be called, however oxymoronically, legalized corruption.
WestExec does not affirmatively share its clients, and public financial disclosure forms only offer broad outlines. Kathleen Clark, a law professor at Washington University in St. Louis, says that government ethics laws written decades ago aren’t equipped to handle a situation in which a single firm launches 15 senior officials. “Yes, they’re employed by the government, I’ll grant you that. But are they actually working for the American people or not? Where does their loyalty lie?” said Clark. “The private sector can in essence co-opt the public sector.”
“These White House officials are experienced government leaders whose prior private sector experience is part of a broad and diverse skill set they bring to government service,” said a White House spokesperson in a statement. WestExec did not reply to a detailed list of questions for this story.
The firm describes one of its chief selling points as its “unparalleled geopolitical risk analysis,” now confirmed by the saturation of its employees in positions of power. WestExec has also succeeded in getting tech startups into defense contracts and helped defense corporations modernize with tech; it worked to help multinational companies break into China. One of its collaborators is the defense-centered investment group Pine Island Capital Partners, which launched a SPAC, or “blank check” company,” last year. Tony Blinken advised Pine Island and was a part owner. (Michèle Flournoy, another WestExec co-founder, had her nomination to be secretary of defense nixed. President Joe Biden instead nominated Lloyd Austin, himself a former Pine Island partner but not a WestExec consultant.)
What makes WestExec “boutique” is the promise that its executives would have face time with its seasoned policymakers. “We felt other firms brought people in for big names and never got to see the big names,” said one WestExec co-founder in 2020. “Tony is on client calls.”
The WestExec to Biden administration pipeline, part one. Graphic: Soohee Cho/The Intercept
Blinken, now Secretary of State, advised household names like telecommunications giant AT&T, defense contractor Boeing, shipping magnate FedEx, and the media company Discovery as a WestExec founding partner. He worked for Big Tech pillars Facebook, LinkedIn, Microsoft, and Uber. He helped niche companies like speakers bureau GLG, art seller Sotheby’s, and biopharmaceutical company Gilead Sciences. Blinken also lists clients that are global investment firms and asset managers, like Blackstone, Lazard, Royal Bank of Canada, and the multinational conglomerate SoftBank — which does extensive business with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. He even advised the consulting group McKinsey & Company. Though Blinken left WestExec in July 2020 — after The American Prospect inquired about the relationship — each of these businesses has an international profile that may impact his calculations as he implements Biden’s foreign policy.
Blinken also brought several of his key staff members at the State Department with him from WestExec. His senior adviser Julianne Smith, who listed Boeing and SoftBank as clients, earned $34,000 as a WestExec consultant while holding down a full-time role at the think tank German Marshall Fund. Smith has been nominated to be permanent representative to NATO. (Blinken also brought WestExec executive assistant Sarah McCool to the State Department as his director of scheduling.) Barbara Leaf, a former ambassador to the United Arab Emirates, worked for the firm and advised the National Basketball Association. She went on to serve as Biden’s senior director for the Middle East at the National Security Council. Leaf awaits a vote to be the State Department’s assistant secretary for Near Eastern affairs. Meanwhile, consultant Daniel B. Shapiro, Obama’s ambassador to Israel and a “very busy” early member of the firm, according to his colleague, is being floated as a Middle East envoy. The Prospect revealed last summer that one of WestExec’s clients was Windward, an Israeli artificial intelligence company that specializes in ship tracking.
The firm also provided a comfortable place for Biden’s most powerful intelligence chiefs to wait out the Trump administration. Director of National IntelligenceAvril Haines had her name scrubbed from WestExec’s website early on, but she worked with the firm from October 2017 to July 2020, when she joined Biden’s transition team as foreign policy lead. According to a questionnaire completed before her confirmation hearing, she delivered “strategic advice” on “cyber norms; national security threats; and testing, evaluation, validation and verification of machine learning systems by the Department of Defense” to clients like Facebook, JPMorgan Chase, Microsoft, and Open Philanthropy. Deputy Director of the CIA David S. Cohenwas an early member of WestExec’s “core team” alongside Haines and Blinken. But it’s impossible to know who his clients were, because an exemption for the spy agencies’ officials means that his disclosure is not publicly available.
“That exempts them from public accountability,” said Clark, the ethics expert at Washington University, “and that’s a problem because we can’t necessarily rely on internal controls and external, public disclosure.” A CIA spokesperson declined to share the companies Cohen worked for at WestExec.
Then there’s Chris Inglis, who the Senate recently approved as national cyber director. He earned $15,000 from the firm and worked for internet security outfit CrowdStrike and email encryption company Virtru.
Since its founding in 2017, WestExec’s focus has been to enhance the capabilities of defense, intelligence, and law enforcement agencies. It partners with the Silicon Valley venture firm Ridgeline, which describes itself as “mission-driven” — meaning that unlike some tech investors, which avoid working with the military, Ridgeline seeks out military products. Both Cohen and Inglis appeared on Ridgeline’s website, and through that partnership, Blinken invested in the venture group’s many portfolio companies. The obscure startups have kooky names (Agolo, Doodle, Wallaroo, etc.) but are innovating advanced technologies like drones, artificial intelligence, and robots. The alumni of WestExec are deeply engaged in emerging tech, which could lead to conflicts of interest as they take on policymaking roles that affect the contracts the government greenlights.
One of the administration’s most visible faces also worked at the firm. Jen Psaki, now the White House press secretary, was a senior adviser to WestExec, where she did crisis communications for the Israeli facial recognition software company AnyVision and advised the nonprofit Spirit of America.
The WestExec to Biden administration pipeline, part two. Not pictured: senior adviser to the domestic policy adviser Erin Pelton; director of scheduling for the secretary of state Sarah McCool; nominee for assistant secretary of defense Celeste Wallander; Biden-Harris transition team advisers Andrea Kendall-Taylor, Cristina Killingsworth, Jay Shambaugh, and Puneet Talwar; deputy director for the U.S. Cyberspace Solarium Commission John Costello; and vice chair of the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence Robert O. Work. Graphic: Soohee Cho/The Intercept
As companies faced the Covid-19 pandemic’s massive challenges,Lisa Monaco joined Blinken on client calls. As a WestExec adviser, she worked for Boeing and SoftBank. Now Monaco is the U.S. deputy attorney general. Before Matt Olsen earned millions of dollars as a senior official at Uber, he worked early on as a principal for the firm. Biden has nominated Olsen to be assistant attorney general in the National Security Division.
Ely Ratner is developing China policy for the Defense Department as assistant secretary for Indo-Pacific security affairs. At WestExec, according to his Office of Government Ethics forms, “Billable hours were for background white papers without identified clients and most income was passive retainer.” Though he only earned $11,450 at WestExec, he did so while making more than $400,000 at the think tank Center for a New American Security.
Gabrielle Chefitz, a senior associate of WestExec, joined the Pentagon as special assistant to the under secretary of defense for policy. In June, Biden nominated WestExec senior adviser Celeste Wallander to be assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs.
WestExec’s consultants are so connected and pedigreed that they often hold down multiple jobs, appointments, and titles. That’s how someone like Elizabeth Rosenberg, a former WestExec senior adviser, can join the Treasury Department as a senior official without much notice. At the end of May, Biden nominated Rosenberg to be Treasury’s assistant secretary for terrorism financing. In her LinkedIn profile, she says she has managed federal initiatives to “promote financial transparency.” Her role at WestExec fell off the bio that the White House released publicizing the nomination.
The U.S. Agency for International Development administrator’s office is also full of the firm’s consultants. Colin Thomas-Jensen “advised WestExec and its clients on due diligence and navigating political risk in Sub-Saharan Africa,” and those clients included Boeing, SoftBank, and Delta Capital Management, a venture capital firm that specializes in financing litigation. In April, Thomas-Jensen joined USAID as national security director. That month, WestExec’s Latin America expert Michael Camilleribegan serving as senior adviser to Administrator Samantha Power and as executive director of the agency’s Northern Triangle Task Force. As a WestExec consultant, he advised Blackstone, SoftBank, the Intel founder’s multibillion-dollar nonprofit Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, and the mineral extraction company Rio Tinto.
And it’s not just international policy that will be shaped by the firm. Erin Pelton, who works in the White House as a senior adviser on domestic policy, provided advisory services to WestExec. And the nominee to be the Department of Commerce’s assistant secretary for industry and analysis, Grant Harris, has a connection to the firm. His personal consulting firm Connect Frontier, which advises companies and organizations working in developing markets, hired WestExec.
“West Exec’s advisors have worked together at the highest levels of government, navigating and anticipating the impact of international crises on decision making — we can provide the same insights and strategies to business leaders around the world,” Blinken said in an early pamphlet advertising the firm.
A half-year after Blinken’s return to government, the pamphlet is still featured on WestExec co-founder and managing partner Nitin Chadda’s LinkedIn profile. It’s a reminder to potential clients about the firm’s enduring proximity to power.
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” It counts napalm and counts nuclear warheads and armored cars for the police to fight the riots in our cities. It counts Whitman’s rifle and Speck’s knife, and the television programs which glorify violence in order to sell toys to our children. Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play.
It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country, it measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.”
It is really quite amazing to reflect on the series of events that unfolded in the 1960s.
At the start of the decade, the U.S. State stood continuing to defend segregation based on race. A few years later, a generation of Americans saw themselves in many jurisdictions embracing more freedom and equity. In the first few years, America’s war campaign in south-east Asia was hardly questioned. Good men upon leaving high school suited up to be dispatched to a mission of battle with little regard to the patriotic necessity of the task. In the later years, the popular opposition to the war in Vietnam grew to the point of abandoning their country as a draft dodger rather than participate in a questionable horror.
With the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, so also ended the dream of the 1960s.
In 1968, Kennedy was running to replace as president his older brother John F Kennedy shot while in office under suspicious circumstances. Following a successful result in the California primaries, he finished speaking in the Embassy Room ballroom at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, and headed down a passageway to the kitchen, the pantry, and the press room where reporters were waiting. Along the way, a young man named Sirhan Sirhan popped in front of him where over a dozen witnesses saw him, and fired at Kennedy. Several people tackled Sirhan, but in the process, Kennedy went down and several other people present were shot as well, though none had died. [2]
Kennedy was rushed to hospital. Twenty six hours after the incident, Kennedy passed away. All at once, hopes for a future with increased promise, health, education and peace as opposed to war pretty much died as well in the public imagination. [3]
His was the fourth assassination in less than five years of a mighty leader guiding the populace towards a more just and prosperous future. The other three, of course, were John F. Kennedy, Malcolm X, and Martin Luther King. In one sense, the deaths of those four people in such a limited span of time may have been enough to throw dark clouds over the sunshine chasing away the despairing evils nesting in the tarnished nation.
Over the next four weeks, the Global Research News Hour spends time looking into each and every one of these shocking crimes. It assesses what might have been different had the murders not been successful. It examines the various holes in the official stories revealing truths that are hidden, and arrives in the end at how those in power operate, control and cover-up the crimes affecting us all.
This week’s instalment focuses on the last of the four deaths: Robert F. Kennedy. Not only is it the most visibly provable crime committed by someone other than Sirhan Sirhan, but the individual in question is facing a parole hearing at the end of march.
The investigator who will be playing a role directing us through the 60s assassinations is a remarkable chronicler of every single one of these cases. He has even been referred to as the guru of the probers into the assassinations. His name is James DiEugenio.
CIXX 106.9 FM, broadcasting from Fanshawe College in London, Ontario. It airs Sundays at 6am.
WZBC 90.3 FM in Newton Massachusetts is Boston College Radio and broadcasts to the greater Boston area. The Global Research News Hour airs during Truth and Justice Radio which starts Sunday at 6am.
Campus and community radio CFMH 107.3fm in Saint John, N.B. airs the Global Research News Hour Fridays at 7pm.
CJMP 90.1 FM, Powell River Community Radio, airs the Global Research News Hour every Saturday at 8am.
Caper Radio CJBU 107.3FM in Sydney, Cape Breton, Nova Scotia airs the Global Research News Hour starting Wednesday afternoon from 3-4pm.
Robert F. Kennedy speaking at the University of Kansas (March 18, 1968); www.jfklibrary.org/learn/about-jfk/the-kennedy-family/robert-f-kennedy/robert-f-kennedy-speeches/remarks-at-the-university-of-kansas-march-18-1968
Lisa Pease (2018), ‘A Lie to Big to Fail: The Real History of the Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy’, Feral House; www.amazon.ca/-/fr/Lisa-Pease-ebook/dp/B07J5RSBN1/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=
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The reign of the country’s longest serving Prime-Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has officially come to an end after 12 years. He is now standing trial facing widespread corruption charges.
Although muted celebrations did take place among some of those who love democracy, many progressives are still cautious about the track record of his replacement, Naftali Bennett.
Bennett has been a vocal supporter of the settlement movement for many years and has a poor record when it comes to defending basic human rights and respecting norms of international law.
Bibi (as Netanyahu is known) has vowed to return and will be doing all he can to disrupt the new government – which is united only by their desire to keep him out of power. Parties from across the spectrum of Jewish-Israeli politics are joined by the United Arab List (or “Ra’am” party), marking a huge change from the status quo. Previously, parties representing Palestinian citizens of Israel in the Knesset have done so from Opposition.
While it is the most diverse government in Israeli history, Bennett’s Yamina party won just 6.2% of the vote. This gives Bennett a dubious world record – no-one has ever won such a small amount of the popular vote and become a national Prime Minister before.
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America has an accountability problem. In fact, if the Covid-19 disaster, the January 6th Capitol attack, and the Trump years are any indication, the American lexicon has essentially dispensed with the term “accountability.”
This should come as no surprise. After all, there’s nothing particularly new about this. In the Bush years, those who created a system of indefinite offshore detention at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, those who implemented a CIA global torture program and the National Security Agency’s warrantless surveillance policy, not to mention those who purposely took us to war based on lies about nonexistent Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, were neither dismissed, sanctioned, nor punished in any way for obvious violations of the law. Nor has Congress passed significant legislation of any kind to ensure that all-encompassing abuses like these will not happen again.
Now, early in the Biden era, any determination to hold American officials responsible for such past wrongdoing, even the president who helped launch an assault on the Capitol, seems little more than a fantasy. It may be something to discuss, rail against, or even make promises about, but not actually reckon with — not if you’re either a deeply divided Congress or a Department of Justice that has compromised itself repeatedly in recent years. Under other circumstances, of course, those would be the two primary institutions with the power to pursue genuine accountability in any meaningful way for extreme and potentially illegal government acts.
Today, if thought about at all, accountability — whether in the form of punishment for misdeeds or meaningful reform — has been reduced to a talking point. With that in mind, let’s take a moment to consider the Biden administration’s approach to accountability so far.
How We Got Here
Even before Donald Trump entered the Oval Office, the country was already genuinely averse to accountability. When President Obama took office in January 2009, he faced the legacy of the George W. Bush administration’s egregious disregard for laws and norms in its extralegal post-9/11 war on terror. From day one of his presidency, Obama made clear that he found his predecessor’s policies unacceptable by both acknowledging and denouncing those crimes. But he insisted that they belonged to the past.
Fearing that the pursuit of punishment would involve potentially ugly encounters with former officials and would seem like political retribution in a country increasingly divided and on edge, he clearly decided that it wouldn’t be worth the effort. Ultimately, as he said about “interrogations, detentions, and so forth,” it was best for the nation to “look forward, as opposed to looking backward.”
True to the president’s word, the Obama administration refused to hold former officials responsible for violations of fundamental constitutional and legal issues. Among those who escaped retrospective accountability were Vice President Dick Cheney, who orchestrated the invasion of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq based on lies; the lawyer in the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, John Yoo, who, in his infamous “Torture Memos,” justified the “enhanced interrogation” of war-on-terror prisoners; and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, who created a Bermuda triangle of injustice at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. In terms of reform, Obama did ensure a degree of meaningful change, including decreeing an official end to the CIA torture of prisoners of war. But too much of what had happened remained unaddressed and lay in wait for abuse at the hands of some irresponsible future president.
As a result, many of the sins that were at the heart of the never-ending response to the 9/11 attacks have become largely forgotten history, leaving many potential crimes unaddressed. And even more sadly, the legacy of accountability’s demise only continues. Biden and his team entered office facing a brand-new list of irregularities and abuses by high-ranking officials, including President Trump.
In this case, the main events demanding accountability had occurred on the domestic front. The January 6th insurrection, the egregious mishandling of the pandemic, the interference in the 2020 presidential election, and the use of the Department of Justice for political ends all awaited investigation after inauguration day. At the outset, the new government dutifully promised that some form of accountability would indeed be forthcoming. On January 15th, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announcedthat she planned to convene an independent commission to thoroughly investigate the Capitol riots, later pledging to look into the “facts and causes” of that assault on Congress.
Attorney General nominee Merrick Garland similarly promised, “If confirmed, I will supervise the prosecution of white supremacists and others who stormed the Capitol on January 6th.” Meanwhile, signaling some appetite for holding his predecessor accountable, during the presidential campaign, Joe Biden had already ruled out the possibility of extending a pardon to Donald Trump. In that way, he ensured that, were he elected, numerous court cases against the president and his Trump Organization would be open to prosecution — even as Noah Bookbinder, the executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, recently suggested, reviving of the obstruction of justice charges that had been central to the Mueller investigation of the 2016 presidential election.
Reluctance in the Halls of Accountability
Six months after Joe Biden took office, there has been no firm movement toward accountability by his administration. On the question of making Donald Trump and his allies answer for their misdeeds, the appetite of this administration so far seems wanting, notably, for example, when it comes to the role the president may have played in instigating the Capitol attack. Sadly, Pelosi’s call for an independent commission to investigate that insurrectionary moment passed the House, but fell victim last month to the threat of a filibuster and was blocked in the Senate. (Last week, largely along party lines, the House passed a select committee to investigate the insurrection.)
Trump’s disastrous mishandling of the pandemic, potentially responsible for staggering numbers of American deaths, similarly seems to have fallen into the territory of unaccountability. The partisan divisions of Congress continue to stall a Covid-19 investigation. National security expert and journalist Peter Bergen, for instance, called for a commission to address the irresponsible way the highest levels of government dealt with the pandemic, but the idea failed to gain traction. Instead, the focus has turned to the question of whether or not there was malfeasance at a Chinese government lab in Wuhan.
It matters not at all that numerous journalists, including Lawrence Wright, Michael Lewis, and Nicholson Baker, have impressively documented the mishandling of the pandemic here. Such disastrous acts included early denials of the lethality of the disease, the disavowal of pandemic preparedness plans, the dismantling of the very government office meant to respond to pandemics, the presidential promotion of quack cures, a disregard for wearing masks early on, and so much else, all of which contributed to a generally chaotic governmental response, which ultimately cost tens of thousands of lives.
In truth, a congressional investigation into either the Capitol riots or the Trump administration’s mishandling of the pandemic might never have led to actual punitive accountability. After all, the 9/11 Commission, touted as the gold standard for such investigations, did nothing of the sort. While offering a reputable history of the terrorist threat that resulted in the attacks of September 11, 2001, and a full-scale summary of government missteps and lapses that led up to that moment, the 9/11 report did not take on the mission of pointing fingers and demanding accountability.
In a recent interview with former New York Timesreporter Philip Shenon, whose 2008 book The Commission punctured that group’s otherwise stellar reputation, Just Security editor Ryan Goodman offered this observation: “[An] important lesson from your book is the conscious tradeoff that the 9/11 Commission members made in prioritizing having a unanimous final report which sacrificed their ability to promote the interests of accountability (such as identifying and naming senior government officials whose acts or omissions were responsible for lapses in U.S. national security before the attack).”
Shenon added that the tradeoff between accountability and unanimity was acknowledged by commission staff members frustrated by the absence of what they thought should have been the report’s “most important and controversial” conclusions. In other words, when it came to accountability, the 9/11 Report proved an inadequate model at best. Still, even its version of truth-telling proved too much for congressional Republicans facing a similar commission on the events of January 6th.
Note, however, that the 9/11 Commission did lead to movement along another path of accountability: reform. In its wake came certain structural changes, including a bolstering of the interagency process for sharing information and the creation of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.
No such luck today. And signs of the difficulty of facing any kind of accountability are now evident inside the Department of Justice (DOJ), too. Despite initial rhetoric to the contrary from Attorney General Merrick Garland, the department has shown little appetite for redress when it comes to those formerly in the highest posts. And that reality should bring to mind the similar reluctance of Barack Obama, the president who originally nominated Garland unsuccessfully to the Supreme Court.
For anyone keeping a scorecard of DOJ actions regarding Trump-era excesses, the record is slim indeed. While the department did, at least, abandon any possible prosecution of former National Security Advisor John Bolton for supposedly disclosing classified information in his memoir on his time in the Trump administration, Garland also announced that he would not pursue several matters that could have brought to light information about President Trump’s abuse of power.
In May, for instance, the department appealed a court-ordered call for the release of the full version of a previously heavily redacted DOJ memo advising then-Attorney General Bill Barr that the evidence in the Mueller Report was “not sufficient to support a conclusion beyond a reasonable doubt that the President violated the obstruction-of-justice statutes.” In fact, the Mueller Report did not exonerate Trump, as Mueller himself would later testify in Congress and as hundreds of federal prosecutors would argue in a letter written in the wake of the report’s publication, saying, “Each of us believes that the conduct of President Trump described in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report would… result in multiple felony charges for obstruction of justice.”
Adding fuel to the fire of disappointment, Garland pulled back from directly assessing fault lines inside the Department of Justice when it came to its independence from partisan politics. Instead, he turned over to the DOJ inspector general any further investigation into Trump’s politicization of the department.
The Path Forward — or Not?
These are all discouraging signs, yet there’s still time to strengthen our faltering democracy by reinstating the idea that abuses of power and violations of the law — from inside the White House, no less — are not to be tolerated. Even without an independent commission looking into January 6th or the DOJ prosecuting anyone, some accountability should still be possible. (After all, it was a New York State courtthat recently suspended Rudy Giuliani’s license to practice law.)
On June 24th, Nancy Pelosi announced at a news conference that a select Congressional committee, even if not an independent 9/11-style commission, would look into the Capitol attack. That committee, she added, will “establish the truth of that day and ensure that an attack of that kind cannot happen and that we root out the causes of it all.” True, she didn’t specify whether accountability and reform would be part of that committee’s responsibilities, but neither goal is off the table.
And Pelosi’s fallback plan to convene a House select committee could still have an impact. After all, remember the Watergate committee in the Nixon era. It, too, was a select committee and it launched an investigation into abuses of power in the Watergate affair that helped bring about President Nixon’s resignation from office and helped spark or support court cases against many of his partners in crime. Similarly, the 1975 Church Commission investigation into the abuses of the intelligence community, among them the FBI’s notorious counter-intelligence program, COINTELPRO, was also a select committee project. It led to significant barriers against future abuses — including a ban on assassinations and a host of “good government” bills.
Pelosi rightly insists that she’s intent on pursuing an investigation into the Capitol attack. Adam Schiff and Jerry Nadler are similarly determined to investigate the government seizure of Internet communications. Local court cases against Trump, Giuliani, and others will, it appears, continue apace.
Through such efforts, perhaps the potentially shocking facts could see the light of day. Continuing such quests may lead to anything but perfect accountability, particularly in a country growing ever more partisan. Above and beyond the immediate importance of giving the public — and history — a reliable narrative of recent events, it’s important to let Americans know that accountability is still a crucial part of our democracy as are the laws and norms accountability aims to protect. Otherwise, this country will have to face a new reality: that we are now living in the age of impunity.
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When Alexander Parkes invented the first thermoplastic in 1856, he probably had no idea how pervasive his invention would become in the centuries that followed. Today, thanks to the invention of injection molding, plastic is used in almost any industry you can imagine, including manufacturing, packaging, construction, education, transportation, and healthcare.
The use of plastic in manufacturing has been expanding exponentially since it was introduced over one and a half centuries ago. For example, by 2018, the production of plastics on a global scale reached almost 360 metric tons. It is expected that over a billion metric tons of plastics will be produced by 2050.
From the numbers above, it’s clear that plastic will continue to be an important part of the manufacturing process. Consequently, processes like injection molding will continue to play a significant role for those who want to manufacture thousands, if not millions, of products with plastic components.
In this article, we follow the history of plastic and injection molding. We start by focusing on the events that led to the invention of plastic as we know it today. The article will then focus on the invention of the first plastic molding machine and how the technology has progressed since then.
The First Condensation Polymer
The development of the first condensation polymer produced by Jacob Berzelius in 1847 paved the way for developing artificial commercial plastic about 15 years later. The first condensation polymer was polyester, made from tartaric acid and glycerin.
Jacob Berzelius was a Swedish chemist whom Britannica.com describes as one of the founders of modern chemistry. The same source reports that Berzelius “is especially noted for his determination of atomic weights, the development of modern chemical symbols, his electrochemical theory, the discovery and isolation of several elements, the development of classical analytical techniques, and his investigation of isomerism and catalysis, phenomena that owe their names to him.”
The First Artificial Commercial Plastic
Alexander Parkes registered the patent for the first thermoplastic in 1856 in the United Kingdom. He called the material Parkesine. This transparent material was produced by treating cellulose in nitric acid and then dissolving it in alcohol. The process resulted in a flexible material that could be molded into any shape when hot and would harden as it cools down.
As Parkesine became more popular, so did its uses. Its popularity also grew because it was cheaper and easier to work with than ivory, bone, and wood, which had been the primary materials for making such items as buttons, combs, and piano keys in the past.
The Plastics Hall of Fame reports that “Parkes’ earlier work in natural rubber compounding was helpful in his later efforts to develop a plasticizer for cellulose nitrate.” The same source adds, “He used a variety of solvents as well as camphor.”
About four years after Parkes’ patent registration, John Wesley Hyatt perfected the Celluloid. The Plastic Hall of Firm suggests that “Although Parkesine and its successors were never commercially successful, Parkes’ work provided the path for Hyatt to make his breakthrough with plasticized cellulose nitrate as a substitute for ivory billiard balls and other groundbreaking applications.”
Inventing the First Plastic Molding Machine
Following his work in perfecting Celluloid, John Hyatt partnered with his brother Isaiah Hyatt to patent the first plastic molding machine in 1872. Initially, the machine was used to produce billiard balls from Celluloid. When compared to the plastic injection molding machines of today, the inaugural machine was rudimentary.
Rudimentary as the Hyatt brothers’ first molding machine was, it made the process of making things like billiard balls, hair combs, buttons, and piano keyboards much easier.
The Hyatt brothers had started working on the idea that finally came to fruition in 1868 when a billiard-making firm had requested them to come up with a way that would make it possible to create billiard balls in a way that was efficient and would result in more uniform balls.
Notwithstanding all the developments in plastic and injection molding in the second half of the 19thcentury, there was still a considerable challenge with the use of cellulose. It proved to be highly flammable, presenting a significant fire hazard. The fire hazard was solved by German scientists Arthur Eichengrun and Theodore Becker in 1903. Their efforts produced types of cellulose that were less flammable.
The First Truly Synthetic Plastic
As efforts continued to improve the qualities of plastic and make it safer to use, Leo Hendrik Baekeland created what is often called the first truly synthetic plastic: Bakelite. This was in 1912. Bakelite is called the first truly synthetic plastic because not a single molecule in the plastic can be found in nature.
Writing for ScientificAmerican.com, Susan Freinkel explains the conditions under which Bakelite became popular. She reports that Bakelite was invented when the demand for a scarce natural substance known as shellac started escalating because of its excellent electric insulation capabilities. At that time, the electrical industry was seeing a rapid expansion.
To show how popular Bakelite would later become, Freinkel quotes a 1924 issue of Time magazine: “Families gathered around Bakelite radios (to listen to programs sponsored by the Bakelite Corporation), drove Bakelite-accessorized cars, kept in touch with Bakelite phones, washed clothes in machines with Bakelite blades, pressed out wrinkles with Bakelite-encased irons—and, of course, styled their hair with Bakelite combs.” Adding that Bakelite was a “material of a thousand purposes.”
Many of the popular thermoplastics still in use today were invented in the 1930s and 1940s. Hundreds of polymers have been added over the years, increasing the use of plastic molding.
Spurred by the Economic Boom Following WW II
For almost seven decades after the Hyatt brothers patented Celluloid and plastic machine molding, the process remained relatively unchanged. However, by 1946, the World War II effort, which had just ended the previous year, had created an enormous demand for products that needed to be made cheaply in huge numbers. This demand fueled the economic boom that followed the war.
In response to the growing demand for cheap, mass-produced products in the post-war period, James Hendry produced the first screw injection molding machine in 1946, creating a seismic shift in the plastic industry. This made it possible to do things that would have not been possible before, like premixing and adding color before molding.
The screw injection molding machine allows the plastic material to flow under gravity onto a turning screw from the hopper. The screw supplies the mechanical energy that, together with the mechanical heaters, melts the resin. As the molten resin enters the mold, the screw retracts back in the direction of the hoper. Encyclopedia Britannica, in the diagram below, illustrates this process.
Introducing the Gas Plastic Injection Process
When Hendry invented the first extrusion screw injection machine in 1946, he did not go home to bask in the glory of his efforts. He continued his work in the plastic molding field.
In the 1970s, Hendry’s efforts resulted in the introduction of gas in plastic molding, making it possible to create more complex plastic products. The stronger products that could be made using this process led to plastic taking over many of the roles previously played by other materials like steel.
Plastic Injection Molding Today
The improvements that have taken place in the plastic injection molding industry since the 19th century continue to this day. Almost any product today can be made from plastic or has a plastic component.
Plastic injection molding has become more pervasive because improvements over the years have turned it into a quick and affordable method of creating high-quality products.
Even though plastic injection molding still uses the same fundamental principles as those introduced by the inventors of the process, like the Hyatt brothers, centuries ago, computers have vastly improved contemporary processes and made it possible to rapidly and precisely create more intricate parts.
The Future of Plastics and Injection Molding
Learning about the history of plastics and injection molding provides us with a chance to peep into the technology’s future.
Ronan Ye writes for the online digital magazine IndustryToday.com and predicts that plastic injection molding will continue to be a growing technology. This growth is spurred by industries like car manufacturing that turn to plastic because it is lighter and results in motor vehicles using less energy and, in the process, reducing the harm to the environment caused by the use of fossil fuels.
Ye also notes that the plastic molding industry will also benefit from continuous improvements in software, improving the accuracy of parts and lowering costs. He predicts a future where “the industry will continue to evolve with better technology, environmental conditions, and finer material specifications.”
For those who are not yet using plastic injection molding, Ye has a prophecy: “Knowing the advantages of technology and the latest trends as well, it shouldn’t take too much time before you implement plastic injection molding in your field of work.”
The plastic injection molding industry may have started with two men getting a brief from a billiard ball-making firm that wanted to make better and more even balls, but today it has grown into an industry where much more serious stuff than billiard balls is at play.
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“The politically initiated climate catastrophe theory is the biggest pseudo-scientific scandal of the 21st century so far,” says meteorologist David Dilley, a 20-year employee of NOAA, the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
“Climate Change: The Single Greatest Misinformation Campaign in World History” – Stephen Moore, CNS News, May 2015
“CO2 isn’t a problem. It is probably the biggest misdirection in the history of science.” “You cannot find a record of any length, of any time period in the history of the Earth where CO2 has caused temperature to increase.” – Dr Timothy Ball, environmental consultant and former climatology professor at the University of Winnipeg
“’Global Warming’ is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist.” – Prof. Hal Lewis, University of California, Santa Barbara, USA
“There is no denying that there is also in science – more often than we scientists would like – deceit and fraud, not only negligent sloppiness, but really deliberate fraud.” – Dr. Hubert Markl, former President of the Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science.
“Climate models are ‘simplistic nonsense’” – Leo Smith, WUWT on January 6, 2015
“We are hostage to a planetary scandal over climate change – a war machine whose aim is to keep us in fear.” “Top climate scientists, who often rely on state funding, have been “manipulated and politicized”. – Philippe Verdier, weather chief at France Télévision, Oct.2015
The hysteria over the alleged threat of global warming “is the biggest scientific scandal in history,” noted Japanese scientist Dr Kiminori Itoh, one of the co-authors of the IPCC report.
Professor Seitz, former president of America’s National Academy of Sciences concluded “I have never witnessed a more disturbing corruption of the peer-review process than the events that led to this IPCC report.”
“It is CO2 climate alarmism that is a lie and thus the greatest scientific, political, economic and educational scandal of our time.” – Dr Ralph D. Tscheuschner, physicist
“Climatic change has existed on this earth ever since it has existed. For the time being, the reasons for this manifold climate change have not been sufficiently researched. And there is absolutely no reason to assume that it will not continue. But to get worked up about it and to think that mankind could stop this change by a joint decision in Heiligendamm (at the G8 summit), that is pure hysteria, that is stupid stuff.” – Former German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt on 3 June 2007, interview, BILD newspaper.
“It is easier to deceive people than to convince them that they have been deceived.”-Mark Twain
“We no longer have experience in dealing with real emergencies. This leads us to fantasise about catastrophes with relish. For example, the climate catastrophe, which I consider an astonishing phenomenon of mass delusion.” – Prof. Gerhard Schulze, sociologist, Bamberg
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe foresaw the “climate catastrophe”:
“One must always repeat what is true, because error is also constantly preached around us – and not by individuals, but by the masses, in newspapers and encyclopaedias, at schools and universities. Error is on top everywhere, and it is comfortable and cozy in the feeling of the majority, which is always on its side.”
“I am a skeptic…Global warming has become a new religion.” – Nobel Prize Winner for Physics, Ivar Giaever.
“The IPCC has actually become a closed circuit; it doesn’t listen to others. It doesn’t have open minds… I am really amazed that the Nobel Peace Prize has been given on scientifically incorrect conclusions by people who are not geologists,” – Indian geologist Dr. Arun D. Ahluwalia at Punjab University and a board member of the UN-supported International Year of the Planet.
“The models and forecasts of the UN IPCC “are incorrect because they only are based on mathematical models and presented results at scenarios that do not include, for example, solar activity.” – Victor Manuel Velasco Herrera, a researcher at the Institute of Geophysics of the National Autonomous University of Mexico
“It is a blatant lie put forth in the media that makes it seem there is only a fringe of scientists who don’t buy into anthropogenic global warming.” – U.S Government Atmospheric Scientist Stanley B. Goldenberg of the Hurricane Research Division of NOAA.
“Even doubling or tripling the amount of carbon dioxide will virtually have little impact, as water vapour and water condensed on particles as clouds dominate the worldwide scene and always will.” – Geoffrey G. Duffy, a professor in the Department of Chemical and Materials Engineering of the University of Auckland, NZ.
“Many [scientists] are now searching for a way to back out quietly (from promoting warming fears), without having their professional careers ruined.” – Atmospheric physicist James A. Peden, formerly of the Space Research and Coordination Center in Pittsburgh.
“Creating an ideology pegged to carbon dioxide is a dangerous nonsense…The present alarm on climate change is an instrument of social control, a pretext for major businesses and political battle. It became an ideology, which is concerning.” – Environmental Scientist Professor Delgado Domingos of Portugal, the founder of the Numerical Weather Forecast group, has more than 150 published articles.
“CO2 emissions make absolutely no difference one way or another….Every scientist knows this, but it doesn’t pay to say so… – Dr. Takeda Kunihiko, vice-chancellor of the Institute of Science and Technology Research at Chubu University in Japan.
“The [global warming] scaremongering has its justification in the fact that it is something that generates funds.” – Award-winning Paleontologist Dr. Eduardo Tonni, of the Committee for Scientific Research in Buenos Aires and head of the Paleontology Department at the University of La Plata.
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Dr Rudolf Hänsel is a qualified psychologist and educationalist.
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The Black Alliance for Peace (BAP) condemns the arrogance and illegality of United Nations Special Envoy for Haiti Helen La Lime’s July 8 statement that Haitian Prime Minister Claude Joseph will be the new president, just one day after the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse.
The decision was announced to the press after a closed-door UN Security Council meeting had been called on Haiti. But BAP asks: Who gave the United Nations special envoy the power to make that kind of determination for the people of Haiti?
This sounds like a play right out of the old regime-change book. As BAP stated in its July 7 press release, BAP smells a rat.
BAP is concerned the political situation the United States created by supporting a dictatorship in Haiti is quickly replicating the moment when the United States swept in to colonize the predominantly African/Black country after the 1915 assassination of Haiti’s president, Vilbrun Guillaume Sam.
“The Black Alliance for Peace remains steadfast in our call against foreign intervention and occupation of Haiti,” says Jemima Pierre, BAP’s Haiti/Americas Coordinator. “We call on all anti-imperialist and Black internationalist forces to stand with the Haitian people and oppose U.S. and European interventions deployed under the guise of the ‘Responsibility to Protect.’”
What Haiti needs is authentic national sovereignty and self-determination.
“When people say Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, they fail to understand it is the Pan-European colonial powers that have kept Haiti with its hands tied behind its back,” says BAP National Organizer Ajamu Baraka. “We say time out on white Western powers causing destruction in the global South.”
Shortly after Democrats wrung their hands over the possibility of Donald Trump staying past his term in office, Biden came into office and immediately lent his support to Moïse to stay beyond the February 7 term limit. That decision sent thousands of Haitians protesting in the streets week after week.
“The Haitian people clearly understood that the United States, the United Nations, and the Organization of American States were behind this,” says Chris Bernadel, a member of BAP’s Haiti/Americas Committee. “During these massive protests, they called for all of these Western powers to exit Haiti.”
While Biden expressed support for Black Lives Matter and for democracy during his campaign for president, true support would have meant ending U.S. meddling in Haiti’s affairs. This assassination relieves the Biden-Harris administration of the embarrassment of having to reconcile the contradiction between pretending to respect Black lives and democracy and supporting a dictator who had reigned after his term had ended on February 7.
That is why for BAP, it doesn’t matter who pulled the trigger to kill Moïse because the Pan-European colonial-capitalist powers are responsible for the suffering of the Haitian people.
BAP vigorously opposes any and all foreign institutions and structures intervening in Haiti. The Haitian people must be allowed to exercise self-determination and address their internal political situation without interference, as BAP noted in its July 6 press release.
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A report released today by the Center for Biological Diversity details how pervasive and damaging offshore fracking and other extreme oil and gas extraction methods have become in the Gulf of Mexico since 2010.
Based on an analysis of federal records obtained through the Freedom of Information Act and published scientific studies, the report documents more than 3,000 instances of offshore fracking, 700 cases of acidizing offshore wells, and at least 66.3 million gallons of fracking waste dumped into the Gulf over a decade.
Chemicals used in offshore fracking and acidizing pose significant health risks to both humans and wildlife, including cancer, reproductive harm, neurotoxicity and even death. The increasing use of fracking could threaten the tourism and fishing industries, which account for about 2.85 million jobs on the Gulf Coast — or about 10 times the number of jobs in the region’s federal offshore fossil fuel industry.
“Offshore fracking threatens Gulf communities and wildlife far more than our government has acknowledged. To protect life and our climate, we should ban these extreme extraction techniques,” said Miyoko Sakashita, oceans program director at the Center. “A decade into the offshore fracking boom, officials still haven’t properly studied its public health impacts. The failure to curb this major source of pollution is astounding and unacceptable.”
Offshore fracking has become a near daily occurrence over the past decade. Fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, blasts water and chemicals into the seafloor to fracture rock and release oil and gas. Acidizing injects hydrofluoric or hydrochloric acid to etch pathways in rock walls and release the fossil fuels.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency allows companies to discharge unlimited amounts of fracking wastewater into the Gulf. An industry report to the EPA found that each frack releases about 21,480 gallons of fracking waste, including biocides, polymers and solvents, into the Gulf of Mexico.
These chemicals kill aquatic species in laboratory tests that simulate concentrations of the substances found near offshore platforms. Many chemicals used in fracking are known to harm reproduction and development, yet about 76% of the chemicals used in fracks haven’t even been studied for their impacts on human and wildlife health.
Despite the known health risks of many fracking chemicals and the lack of knowledge about many others, the federal government approves extreme well-stimulation methods at a rapid rate.
Today’s report, titled Toxic Waters: How Offshore Fracking Pollutes the Gulf of Mexico, is available here.
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Featured image: Cover of Toxic Waters report (Photo by Drew Bird Photography)
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The British newspaper Daily Telegraph did some kite-flying in the weekend that London is considering open-ended deployment of a contingent of elite special forces to Afghanistan “ to provide training to Afghan units and deploy with them on the ground as advisers.”
At the same time, the New York Times reported that White House approves Gen. Austin S. Miller, the top American commander in Afghanistan, staying on at his post for “at least a couple more weeks,” although US troop withdrawal is complete.
Connecting the dots, it appears that the US is trying hard to replace the forever war in Afghanistan with a Syria-like hybrid war. The stunning success Russia registered in ensuring the survival of the Assad regime in Syria provides a role model for the Pentagon commanders.
Thus, Miller will “help transition the American military mission” to a hybrid war. The Pentagon has worked out an “over-the-horizon capacity” whereby American warplanes and armed Reaper drones based mainly in the Persian Gulf will participate or back up the Afghan military operations against the Taliban. read more
The US still hopes to reorganise the counter-terrorism capabilities and assets in the region. Foreign Ministers of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan were recently invited to Washington for consultations to formulate backup plans that could allow the US to bank upon these two countries. Uzbekistan seems favourably inclined, prompting Afghan President Asharf Ghani to visit Tashkent to follow up. (here, here, here, here and here)
In effect, Washington is seeking to reposition some forces in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, which means that the first-tier troops, drones, bomber planes, and intelligence assets to be placed at bases or appropriate facilities in these Central Asian countries remain available in real time for intervention in the war against the Taliban.
As in Syria, local Afghan militia groups can be brought into the fight against the Taliban. Afghan warlords have worked with the Pentagon and the CIA previously. Equally, the lobby of Pentagon contractors is very influential in the Beltway and the White House is all but certain to extend their contracts.
The grand strategy appears to be to: a) beef up the capacity of the Afghan forces which would prevent an outright Taliban takeover but without the US taking on any combat duties; b) copy from the Russian playbook in Syria by heavily using air power without putting boots on the ground; c) and, make the Taliban realise through a war of attrition that there is no alternative to a negotiated settlement.
In an interesting role reversal from Syria, the US will claim that its involvement in Afghanistan is at the invitation of the Kabul government.
Indeed, if the strategy is seen to be working, other NATO countries can be expected to join the fray, as had happened in Syria and Iraq, embedded in the militia groups or Afghan military units.
The strength of the Pentagon contractors is put at 18000 personnel, the bulk of whom have served in the US military previously. The activities of the Wagner Group in Libya and some African countries apparently provide an inspiring model for the Pentagon.
The American media is awash with apocalyptic visions of Afghanistan’s descent into civil war. This has helped generate domestic support in the US for the Pentagon and CIA’s continued involvement in Afghanistan, even as President Biden extracts political mileage for ending the forever war. Simply put, a hybrid war will be a “win-win” situation for the White House, Pentagon and the CIA — and NATO.
The bottom line is that for geopolitical reasons, the US and NATO are determined to remain as the dominant foreign presence on the Afghan chessboard. Washington visualises that the regional states — Russia, China, Iran or Pakistan — may have serious reservations about a long-term US / NATO presence in Afghanistan, but they will not confront the US.
Will the US strategy of hybrid war work? A definitive answer will be possible only through August, given the variables at work. But the chances are rather bleak. The humiliating defeat at the hands of the Taliban has created a profound credibility problem for the US in the region.
Besides, intrinsically, this is a high-risk strategy. The Taliban will resist and American lives may be lost. Again, the Central Asian states must agree to provide the staging posts for the hybrid war. The Taliban has sternly warned them.
Indeed, Russia and China are opposed to any American military presence in the Central Asian region. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has hit out at sections of Afghanistan’s ruling elite who are collaborating with Washington’s hybrid war plans, accusing them of trying to prolong the negotiation process and scuttle the prospects for an interim government.
“They should think about the consequences of these actions for their homeland,” Lavrov said. “Russia is already holding consultations both through bilateral channels and within the Collective Security Treaty Organization to protect its neighbours in Central Asia from any direct and serious threat,” Lavrov told reporters in Moscow last week. The remarks were obliquely referring to the US strategists.
But Moscow is not taking chances. Russia’s Southern military district (which includes facilities in Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan) will receive advanced military equipment, including the Sukhoi-34 multirole aircraft. The air defence capabilities of the Russian base in Tajikistan are being strengthened, including with deployment of the newest Verba portable anti-aircraft missile systems (MANPADS). President Vladimir Putin had a call with Tajikistan President Emomali Rahmanov last week where he pledged all Russian support to strengthen Tajik defence capabilities.
Most important, the Taliban’s success through the coming 6-8 weeks to batter, demoralise and destroy the Afghan armed forces and shift the politico-military balance in its favour will be a key factor in the shape of things to come. This is where Afghanistan is fundamentally different from Syria. The US is overlooking the big role Iran played in tandem with Russia to turn the tide of the Syrian conflict.
Meanwhile, Taliban has also shown savviness to prevent other Afghan groups from uniting behind Ghani as well as to create synergy between its political track at Doha and the military path in Afghanistan. Against the backdrop of the US’ plans to fight a hybrid war, the Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahidtold Reuters on Monday,
“The peace talks and process will be accelerated in the coming days … and they are expected to enter an important stage, naturally it will be about peace plans. Possibly it will take a month to reach that stage when both sides will share their written peace plan… Although we (Taliban) have the upper hand on the battlefield, we are very serious about talks and dialogue.”
The bottom line is that no regional state bordering Afghanistan wants the war to continue in any form. Within Afghanistan too, there is opposition to any further US military intervention. The cowardly manner in which the US troops slunk away from Bagram base will be talked about in the Afghan bazaar for a long time to come and will become folklore.read more
Former President Hamid Karzai, who remains an influential figure in Afghan politics and internationally, gave a string of interviews with the foreign media recently where his constant refrain has been that Afghanistan is done with the US interference, and Afghans should be left alone to manage their affairs.read more
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Featured image: Bagram after US military left the base, Kabul, July 5, 2021 (Source: Indian Punchline)
In my opinion, as an experienced medical doctor, there was never (and there still is not) any medical justification for the extreme measures taken worldwide in the name of a single unremarkable coronavirus (which was never novel as claimed).
Two days before the European Football Championship match between Denmark and Finland, the coach of the Danish national team had announced in the media that he was very worried because UEFA had not provided free COVID vaccines in the run-up to the European Championship and not all players of the participating teams in the European Championship had been vaccinated.
The Taliban’s lightning-fast takeover of Afghanistan in the wake of the US’ full military withdrawal by September 11th presents certain security concerns for India, but the South Asian state only has very limited options for ensuring its relevant interests, none of which credibly involve any conventional military involvement contrary to widespread speculation about this scenario.
Carlos Lazo and a small band of Cuban Americans are on a 1,300-mile pilgrimage from Miami to Washington, D.C., to end the U.S. blockade of Cuba. Despite the blistering summer heat and occasional death threats (including a trucker who tried to run them off the road), the marchers persist. Lazo’s group is called Puentes de Amor, Bridges of Love, and this grueling walkathon is certainly a labor of love.
President Joe Biden on Tuesday announced plans to ramp up the federal government’s efforts to get more Americans vaccinated against COVID under a new program that includes “literally knocking on doors,” as Biden puts it.
Yeadon, Montagnier and Zelenko all believe the COVID-19 shots could reduce life expectancy by several decades, depending on several factors, including whether you’re required to get booster shots. In fact, there may be reason to suspect that many who get the jabs and subsequent boosters could lose their lives within two to three years, as a result of pathogenic priming.
The Taliban are on a roll. Earlier this week their P.R. arm was claiming they hold 218 Afghan districts out of 421 – capturing new ones every day. Tens of districts are contested. Entire Afghan provinces are basically lost to the government in Kabul – de facto reduced to administer a few scattered cities under siege.
A major crisis is on the rise in Haiti. The poorest country in the Western Hemisphere has been going through one of the most difficult periods in its history, particularly aggravated by the end of the UN peacekeeping mission, which had kept troops in Haitian territory for more than a decade. The constant conflict between armed militias and the government resulted in another tragic episode: the assassination of President Jovenel Moise, inside his own home, on Wednesday.
After forty some years of disinflation and declining interest rates, there is some confusion about whether or not this long disinflationary decline is about to end, to be replaced with a creeping up of real wages, prices and interest rates.
There have been many such stories, both short and long. The essence of them all in western media is that Bab al Hawa must be kept open for humanitarian reasons. Many of the articles castigate Russia or any other country such as China which might vote to block a renewal of United Nations authorization of the border crossing.
In my opinion, as an experienced medical doctor, there was never (and there still is not) any medical justification for the extreme measures taken worldwide in the name of a single unremarkable coronavirus (which was never novel as claimed).
The alleged present pandemic was always purportedly a medical problem. Medical doctors are trained (or should be) to solve medical problems.
It takes many years of intense training and experience to produce competent medical doctors. The fact that medical doctors were shunted out of the picture (and that shamefully they allowed themselves to be rendered redundant) in solving a medical problem tells you all you need to know as to what has ensued.
The proper practice of Medicine was deliberately corrupted by politicians and pseudo scientists and the resultant chaos, confusion and fear generated (with the malign assistance of behavioural psychologists) is a direct result of that.
Now, the public is incapable of distinguishing between good scientists and bad scientists.
They trust politicians they once distrusted!
The only people capable of leading (and trained to lead) the public out of their Stockholm Syndrome, cognitive dissonance, post-traumatic stress disorder, severe depression (take your pick) resulting from well over a year of severe psychological torture through fear propaganda and “arbitrariness” (the deliberate creation of confusion with mixed messages etc.) are honest medical doctors.
The public is desperate for a credible lead out of this obvious pseudo-medical chaos. The public will believe medical doctors whom they perceive to be honest and they will follow their lead.
Medical doctors have an ethical duty to provide that lead and most urgently medical doctors need to stop the vaccination programme by raising the alarm –re. the huge number of deaths due to the “vaccines” and the fraud/cover-up which the absence of post-mortems so obviously constitutes.
A positive PCR test never equated with a “case” and “deaths” were fraudulently created by falsification of death certificates in order to terrify populations into taking a dangerous inadequately tested gene-based vaccine which was ineffective and which they did not need, during a purported emergency which was clearly not an emergency (Ioannidis).
And, always remember the WHO swine flu pandemic fraud of 2009. As I understand it, that particular episode of medical nonsense was stopped almost singlehandedly by a medical doctor, Dr Wolfgang Wodarg, who subsequently forced an official investigation at the Council of Europe which duly found the WHO to be guilty as charged of fraud. And, everybody forgot!!!
In the face of the glaring widespread absence of the usual safeguards and transparency and the extreme level of coercion, I think that doctors must infer (from the best figures we have at our disposal) that mass murder by the state and cover-up thereof is taking place worldwide and that it will continue.
In such fraught circumstances, we doctors have a professional and ethical duty to warn the public as a matter of urgency of ongoing extremely serious state criminality.
The onus of proof lies with the state to prove that we are wrong.
They will not be able to do that because they have with criminal intent covered up mass murder by systematically concealing and destroying evidence of mass murder.
There comes a point when the sheer volume of false exculpatory statements indicates intent to commit crime.
There is much more to be said, but these are my initial somewhat hurried thoughts.
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Dr. Stephen Frost, prominent medical doctor human rights activist and anti-war whistleblower. North Wales. Founder of Doctors for Covid Ethics. Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).
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Measured by the Christian calendar, the period of about 500 years from the fall of the Roman Empire until the end of the first millennium was a time characterized by economic, intellectual and cultural decline in the European Christian world. In retrospect, it is now referred to as ‘the Dark Age’, even as other cultures, including that of Islam but those in other parts of the world too, thrived during this period.
Since March 2020, a number of fine analysts have carefully documented the true nature of what is happening to our world under cover of what the World Health Organization has labeled the ‘Covid-19 pandemic’.
And among these fine analysts, who have investigated ‘The Great Reset’ promoted by the World Economic Forum as well as other initiatives such as those related to transhumanism, eugenics and Cyber Polygon, there is a strong consensus that does not coincide with propaganda released by elite agents in international organizations, national governments and the corporate media.
In essence, these critiques document extensive evidence of an elite coup that seeks to comprehensively restructure human society into a technocratic dystopia in which such previously fundamental concepts as human identity, human liberty, human rights (such as freedom of speech, assembly and movement), human privacy and human volition are not just notions of the past but are beyond the comprehension of the typical ‘transhuman’.
To reiterate, for the bulk of the human population left alive, concepts such as ‘free will’ and ‘freedom’ will no longer exist as ideas, let alone as aspirations or realities. You can access a number of these insightful critiques here: Resources.
So whether we label this world envisaged by the elite as a ‘brave new world’, ‘1984’, the second ‘Dark Age’, a ‘technocratic dystopia’ or, more simply, ‘slavery’ matters little because, whatever the label, what lies immediately ahead is a human future not worth living.
And so resistance is imperative. But unless this resistance is strategic it will not achieve the outcome we seek.
Why? Because this elite coup has been decades in the planning and so resistance that is not carefully designed and rigorously implemented will not succeed. The elite is too well organized for haphazard acts of resistance to have any impact. Hence, there is no point simply reiterating the need for resistance. Only a strategically-focused campaign of nonviolent resistance – such as that outlined below – has any serious prospect of succeeding.
So what does it mean to resist strategically?
Resisting strategically means that we understand the power structures and relationships in society and particularly the way in which the global elite has the power to control us. The elite has power to control us through a number of means. For example, it can control what most people fear, think and believe by ensuring that its international organizations, governments, medical establishments, pharmaceutical industry and corporate media (including corporate social media) present a particular ‘package’ of information which, in this case, focuses on the supposed danger of the SARS-Cov-2 ‘virus’ and the importance of going along with a wide range of measures (including lockdowns, business closures, social distancing, mask-wearing, contact tracing and injections) while also censoring media outlets and authors that publish the truth.
Beyond controlling the narrative, however, the global elite has many other means at its disposal to control us, many of which are being expanded with the progressive rollout of measures associated with implementation of the fourth industrial revolution (which is fundamentally what the World Economic Forum’s ‘Great Reset’ is about).
These additional means include the deployment of 5G which, apart from the horrific impact this will have on life generally as this electromagnetic radiation further contaminates the biosphere, will enable comprehensive surveillance, digital ID (possibly implanted in your brain: see ‘Beware the Transhumanists: How “Being Human” Is Being Re-Engineered by the Elite’s Coup’) linked to your bank account and health records, a social credit ID that will end up dictating every facet of your life, the digitization of money as well as robotization of the workforce and the military.
But, of course, there is more. Much more. In the words of Dr Joseph Mercola: ‘The Great Reset’ means the complete transformation of everything from ‘government, energy and finance to food, medicine, real estate, policing – even how we interact with our fellow human beings. The globalist technocracy is using the COVID-19 pandemic to bypass democratic accountability, override opposition, accelerate their agenda and to impose it on the public against our will.’ See ‘Who Pressed the Great Reset Button?’
So while these measures are being implemented and thus increasing the capacity of the global elite to control us, we do not have to cooperate. Moreover, we can resist it very effectively and encourage those we know who are also concerned about what is happening to resist effectively as well.
And, in the end, our success or failure will be determined by one simple factor: Are we able to mobilize enough people to act strategically as suggested below?
How Can We Resist Effectively?
Well, as mentioned above, effective resistance requires us to nonviolently noncooperate with those measures that give the global elite the power to control us. That is, we need to focus our resistance so that it undermines the power of the elite. Sound difficult? Believe it or not, it isn’t really.
Let me elaborate a little.
As I have explained on a number of occasions, for example, there is little point organizing a massive protest demonstration unless these mass mobilizations give people who attend (and/or those who hear about them) clear guidance on actions to take to effectively resist once they leave the demonstration. This is because demonstrations, no matter how large, have little impact in themselves (beyond building a sense of solidarity). For example, on 15 February 2003, the largest demonstration in human history – involving 30,000,000 people in 600 cities around the world protesting the impending US invasion of Iraq – took place. And what did it achieve? The ‘Global War on Terror’ goes on still with no evidence to suggest that resistance on that day or since has had the impact we might have hoped.
My point then is simple. We either resist The Great Reset in a way that undermines the power of the elite to conduct this coup or we enter a world in which those still living will wonder about the value of being alive.
Refuse Covid-19 tests and experimental injections: Choose Natural Health.
Don’t buy 5G upgrades: Resist the fourth industrial revolution.
Boycott Corporate & Government Media: Choose free and truthful media & social media.
Pay with Cash & Switch to Community Owned Banks.
Don’t Wear Masks or Social Distance.
Keep your small business open in lockdown. Buy from small businesses. Don’t use contact tracing QR codes.
Don’t pay Covid-19 related fines: Risk becoming a prisoner of conscience. Seek support.
You can download the posters/leaflets, each with an explanation and references, at the link above. Each leaflet explains why this particular action is important in undermining elite power so that those who receive it (whether by email, in their letterbox or as they attend or walk past a nonviolent action designed for the purpose) clearly understand the value of undertaking this action (every day, not just one day). If you are interested in organizing activities of this type locally, you can also download the ‘Campaign Overview’ at the link above which offers a simple explanation of how to get more people involved.
If you want more information (including a fuller analysis and other resources) and the complete list of the 29 strategic goals of the campaign, you can access everything at ‘We Are Human, We Are Free’.
Under cover of a non-existent ‘pandemic’, the global elite is now engaged in an elaborately planned endeavour to take complete control of human life and human society using measures clearly outlined in the literature related to ‘The Great Reset’, the fourth industrial revolution, transhumanism, eugenics and Cyber Polygon.
There is also considerable evidence that increasing numbers of people are weary of the elite-driven response over the past 18 months and that a proportion of these people are now openly sceptical about the official narrative.
But only the rarest person knows how to resist effectively.
And yet if we are to defeat this elite coup, we must mobilize millions of people to noncooperate with fundamental elements of it.
Otherwise the New Dark Age will not be an age from which transhumans will be emotionally and intellectually equipped to emerge, no matter how long they are given. Why? Because the transhumans the elite is intent on creating will not think or feel for themselves; they will have no Self-will to drive their behaviour. They will be programmed to be willing slaves for life.
The time during which human beings can still make choices is rapidly drawing to a close. We must use that time to choose resistance that makes a difference, and invite others to make that choice too.
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Robert J. Burrowes has a lifetime commitment to understanding and ending human violence. He has done extensive research since 1966 in an effort to understand why human beings are violent and has been a nonviolent activist since 1981. He is the author of ‘Why Violence?’ His email address is [email protected] and his website is here. He is a frequent contributor to ‘Global Research’.
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A major crisis is on the rise in Haiti. The poorest country in the Western Hemisphere has been going through one of the most difficult periods in its history, particularly aggravated by the end of the UN peacekeeping mission, which had kept troops in Haitian territory for more than a decade. The constant conflict between armed militias and the government resulted in another tragic episode: the assassination of President Jovenel Moise, inside his own home, on Wednesday.
In power since 2017, Jovenel Moise was brutally murdered during an attack in the early hours of Wednesday. The first lady, Martine Moise, was also shot and hospitalized. The shooting was carried out by a group of unidentified armed men, who violently broke into the presidential residence and carried out the attack. Commenting on the case, the country’s interim prime minister, Claude Joseph, said it was a “hateful, inhuman and barbaric act.”
The brutal attack was certainly motivated by political disputes, considering the country’s recent history. Popularly known as “the Banana Man” for being an entrepreneur in the export business of this fruit, Jovenel Moise had a complicated political history, accumulating enemies throughout his term. His coming to power was tense and extremely controversial. Moise defeated 26 Haitian candidates in a two-year electoral process and was accused of fraud, bribery, and persecution against opponents. With his rise to power, the UN peacekeeping mission operating in the country was concluded and, therefore, it was hoped throughout the world that Haiti would finally have a future of peace, stability, and prosperity, which, as we can see, is not happening.
Moise’s main promise was the creation of a national agricultural modernization program. His experience in the agrarian field made him believe that creating an efficient production platform would be the shortest and easiest way to develop the Haitian economy, transforming the poor Central American country into an agri-exporting nation. His government was also marked by environmental concerns, with an emphatic speech against climate change, defending agroecology as an ideal production model for Haitian agribusiness.
However, Moise did not have enough time to implement his projects and simply decided to remain in power longer than the law allowed. Then, his government took on a dictatorial aspect: he refused to call new elections, dissolved the parliament, and tried to change the Haitian constitution, replacing it with a law that allows the possibility of presidential re-election – something that has been vetoed in Haiti since 1990. This generated a strong wave of opposition to the president, marked by violent and constant protests. A scenario close to civil war emerged, with armed militias taking to the streets in protest against the government. Some of these opposition groups support new elections, while others support political factions of the dissolved parliament, and there are those who want a revolution and total regime change. There is no uniformity among the opponents – simply a national rebellion against Moise.
One of these opposition groups murdered Moise. And with that, another unhappy chapter of Haitian history is drastically concluded. The country is marked by a long tradition of coups and dictatorships, such as François “Papa Doc” Duvalier and his son Jean-Claude “Baby Doc”. Haiti’s first free election took place in 1990, but the elected president Jean-Bertrand Aristide was overthrown in a coup the following year. The absence of political stability impedes the development of any solid political or economic project, leading to chaos, mass rebellion and the emergence of armed militias and guerrillas. The Haitian problem is political, economic, and humanitarian, with no expectation of a solution in the short term.
Some suspects of involvement in the president’s assassination have already been arrested by authorities, but there is still no evidence that they are actually responsible. One of the militias most suspected of being involved in the case is the guerrilla led by Jimmy Cherizier, who is recognized as a great popular leader in Port-au-Prince. Cherizier leads the gang known as the “G9”, which consists of a coalition of the nine largest illegal Haitian militias, all of them linked to political factions and drug trafficking. Last month, Cherizier announced a “revolution” against Moise. The G9 is responsible for several crimes in Haiti, including massacres of civilians. Cherizier is internationally repudiated for his acts in guerrilla leadership, but Haiti’s weak security institutions are unable to stop the group’s violence, perpetuating G9’s chaos and fear.
This institutional vulnerability leads us to another point that needs to be highlighted: the work of the UN peacekeepers seems to have ended prematurely. Having operated in the country between 2004 and 2017, the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH in its French acronym) ensured one of the moments of greater security and political stability in the country. Several armed forces from around the world participated in the mission, which for the most part was led by Brazil. The results were positive and generated partial stability, with extensive disarmament of the militias and success in humanitarian aid policies. The decision to entrust the country’s security to the power of the local government appears to have been wrong and hasty. The UN simply withdrew its military forces and “abandoned” Haiti, which had already become dependent on the presence foreign troops for its security.
It is necessary to think of an alternative model, one that returns international aid and creates a system of cooperation where foreign forces collaborate with Haitian institutions in the long term, as this is the only way to interrupt the cycle of dictatorships and coups and generate a peaceful and stable future for Haiti.
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Comments Off on The Assassination of President Jovenel Moise: The U.N. “Peace-Keeping” Mission Has Failed to Implant Political Stability and Security in Haiti
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UPDATE: Just received this from an accomplished highly intelligent attorney I have known for many years:
“I have just spent 10 hours a day In the hospital with my son since July 2, he is now stable but essentially went into A Fib they cannot fix now because of a clot (vaccine induced I am sure) after being sick 10 days following his second Pfizer shot. It’s too much to go into now, we almost lost him. He’s 32. No history of hypertension or heart problems. Vegetarian.“
There are a huge number of cases of life-threatening reactions to the “safe” vaccine, especially among the young. Yet the social media “fact checkers”, facebook, twitter and google continue to deplatform those who give the alarm. That part of the medical profession that blindly without thought follow the Big Pharma “guidelines” issued by NIH, FDA, CDC, and WHO are accomplices to murder.
The idiot people overcome by orchestrated fear have ruined the health of a large percentage of the population.
In this 25 minute video Dr. Ryan Cole explains the adverse impact on the human body of the spike protein that is characteristic of both the Covid virus and the vaccine. Most people are not in serious danger from the virus. These people should not expose themselves to the danger of the vaccine. See this.
The failure of public health authorities to treat Covid with known safe inexpensive treatments enabled the generation of fear and panic that supported mass vaccination with an untested and unapproved experimental technology.
This primarily benefited Big Pharma’s profits and government encroachments on civil liberty and has harmed public trust in government and health authorities.
The vaccine adverse reporting system, which at best captures only 10% of vaccine-induced injuries—shows more death and injuries from the experimental Covid vaccine than from all vaccines combined over the past 30 years. Never before in history has a vaccine with such a high death and injury rate been permitted to be administered.
The facts have been kept from the people.
Big Pharma has enough scientists on its payroll and supported by its research grants that their careers force them to serve as advocates for Big Pharma’s agendas.
The presstitutes follow the hired scientists, not the independent ones. The American medical profession in general lost its independence because of Obamacare. After Obamacare hospitals bought up independent practices. One consequence has been the reliance of doctors on NIH, CDC, FDA, WHO guidelines—guidelines heavily influenced by Big Pharma’s interests—instead of thinking for themselves about how to treat patients. As so many medical practitioners are employees of large organizations, relying on official guidelines is a form of protection. In other words, Obamacare produced more bureaucratization of medicine.
It is the doctors and scientists who think for themselves who have devised the cures for Covid and who have raised the questions of the vaccine’s safety. As they are individuals and not large official organizations, they are outgunned by the material interests of the organized groups.
In place of debate and examination of the data there is the suppression of the evidence. Doctors and scientists who raise issues are censored and deplatformed.
A recent example is the resignation of scientists on the board of the professional journal Vaccines to force retraction of a peer-reviewed article that compared deaths from Covid with deaths from the vaccine.
Some who resigned were involved in the development of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine or had research grants from Big Pharma. They claimed the article was faulty because it assumed all deaths following vaccination were caused by the vaccine. Of course, these same scientists did not complain when all deaths from flu, co-morbidities, and all other causes were attributed to Covid in order to create fear in the public that would cause people to line up for the untested experimental vaccine. See this.
Even the inventor of the mRNA technology that is used in the vaccine has been erased for warning of the dangers of the technology. See this.
In the United States today there is no longer any debate or examination of evidence. In universities, in print and TV media, and among scientists funded by interest groups and government, there is no debate. There is an official narrative and everything else is off-limits.
This is how we got a Covid pandemic, which never existed, and this is how we got half the population injected with an experimental technology about which scientists were mistaken. The spike in the vaccine has not remained at the point of injection but against expectations moves throughout the body, concentrating in the ovaries, causing blood clots, spontaneous abortions, and heart inflammation and death among the young never threatened by Covid.
This message cannot get out because so many scientists are owned by Big Pharma, because there is no integrity and independence in the media, because public health authorities have a revolving door with Big Pharma and legislators’ election campaigns are dependent on Big Pharma’s contributions.
The virus is mainly dangerous to elderly people with co-morbidities and impaired immune systems.
The current push to force vaccination on children and young adults in the face of the massive evidence that the vaccine is more dangerous to them than the virus is nothing short of a conspiracy to murder. It proves beyond all doubt that the agenda being served is not a public health agenda.
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Dr. Paul Craig Roberts writes on his blog site, PCR Institute for Political Economy, where this article was originally published. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.
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Licensed to practice law in Germany and the US, trial lawyer for 26 years Reiner Fuellmich is one of four German Corona Investigative Committee members involved in documenting damages from what he calls the invented US/Western “corona crisis.”
Based on what’s already known, he renamed it the “Corona Scandal, stressing:
Responsible parties “must be criminally prosecuted and sued for civil damages.”
Along with over 1,000 lawyers and more than 10,000 medical and scientific experts, he and his team began legal proceedings against the Pharma-controlled CDC and WEF dark forces for all things related to flu/covid crimes against humanity.
Besides masks that don’t protect and risk respiratory harm, PCR tests nearly always wrong when positive, and destructive to normal interactions social distancing, Fuellmich called flu/covid jabs designed to harm health, not protect and preserve it as falsely claimed, in breach of the Geneva Conventions, the Nuremberg Code and other human rights laws.
Explaining his mission, he said he and other Corona Investigative Committee members beganlistening to (evidence presented by) a large number of international scientists and experts…to find answers to questions about” what’s gone on since early last year.
Major cases of corporate “corruption and fraud…pale in comparison (to) the extent of the damage that the corona crisis has caused and continues to cause,” he stressed, adding:
“On a political level, everything must be done to make sure that no one will ever again be in a position of such power as to be able to defraud humanity or to attempt to manipulate us with their corrupt agendas” — especially on what relates to health and well-being.
He cited “three major questions to be answered in the context of a judicial approach to the corona scandal,” as follows:
“1. Is there a corona pandemic or is there only a PCR-test pandemic?”
“(D)oes a positive PCR-test result mean that the person tested is infected with (flu/covid), or” is the test not designed to measure viral infections part of state-sponsored mass deception on all things covid?
2. Do so-called “anti-corona measures, such as the lockdown, mandatory face masks, social distancing, and quarantine regulations, serve to protect the world’s population from corona, or do these measures serve only to make people panic so that they believe – without asking any questions – that their lives are in danger, so that in the end” Pharma can cash in big on a bonanza of profits?
3. “Is it true that the German government was (heavily) lobbied” to go along with the made-in-the-USA mother of all scams?
“Germany is…particularly disciplined…and was (chosen to be) a role model for the rest of the world for its strict and…successful adherence to the corona measures.”
Answers to the above and related issues “are urgently needed” because despite claims of flu/covid hazards to health and well-being to push toxic mass-jabbing, no “excess mortality (occurred) anywhere in the world…certainly not…in Germany.”
Yet measures in place to combat an invented threat “caused the loss of innumerable human lives and have destroyed the economic existence of countless companies and individuals worldwide.”
What’s most important is “establish(ing) facts” based on science from medical and scientific experts, Fuellmich stressed.
Summarizing what he and his team seek to determine is:
“1. How dangerous is the virus really?
2. What is the significance of a positive PCR test?
3. What collateral damage has been caused by the corona measures, both with respect to the world population’s health, and with respect to the world’s economy?”
Positive PCR test results are the foundation on which the mother of all scams is based.
According to numerous “highly respected scientists” and medical experts there’s no “corona pandemic…only a PCR test pandemic” based on false analysis.
In September 2020, former Pfizer chief scientist for allergy and infectious diseases Dr. Michael Yeadon and scientific colleagues said the following:
“We’re basing our government policy, our economic policy, and the policy of restricting fundamental rights, presumably on completely wrong data and assumptions about the coronavirus.”
“If it weren’t for the test results that are constantly reported in the media, the pandemic would be over because nothing really happened.”
“There are at least four coronaviruses that are endemic and cause some of the common colds we experience, especially in winter.”
“They all have a striking sequence similarity to the coronavirus, and because the human immune system recognizes the similarity to the virus that has now allegedly been newly discovered, a T-cell immunity has long existed in this respect.”
Some “30 per cent of the population had this before the allegedly new virus even appeared.”
“Therefore, it is sufficient for the so-called herd immunity that 15 to 25 per cent of the population are infected with the allegedly new coronavirus to stop the further spread of the virus. And this has long been the case.”
On PCR tests, Yeadon et al said “(t)he likelihood of an apparently positive case being a false positive is between 89 to 94 per cent, or near certainty.”
What PCR tests actually measure is “the presence of partial RNA sequences present in the intact virus, which could be a piece of dead virus, which cannot make the subject sick, and cannot be transmitted, and cannot make anyone else sick.”
Nothing justified draconian policies to protect against an alleged threat at most too minor to matter.
Fuellmich cited a German paper titled “False Alarm.”
According to him, it concluded that “there was…no sufficient evidence (of) serious health risks” to justify imposition of draconian policies, adding:
Many medical and scientific experts, as well as lawyers and judicial scholars, know that state-sponsored fear-mongering mass deception replaced the rule of law with totalitarian control — with diabolical aims in mind.
US/Western policies instituted to combat an invented viral threat caused enormous public health and economic harm to countless millions — demanding redress.
Fuellmich believes that all things flu/covid and related facts will be proved true in one or many courts worldwide.
Facts based on science “will pull the masks off the faces of all those responsible for these crimes,” he said, adding:
“To the politicians who believe those corrupt people, these facts are hereby offered as a lifeline that can help (aggrieved parties) readjust…and start the long overdue public scientific discussion (to hold culpable) charlatans and criminals” responsible for their high crimes against humanity.
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Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).
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Two days before the European Football Championship match between Denmark and Finland, the coach of the Danish national team had announced in the media that he was very worried because UEFA had not provided free COVID vaccines in the run-up to the European Championship and not all players of the participating teams in the European Championship had been vaccinated. This gives the impression that the Danish players, or at least a large proportion of them, were vaccinated. The captain of the Danish national team, Christian Eriksen, collapsed on the pitch during the match between Denmark and Finland on 12 June 2021.
In response to my press enquiry about coach Hjulmand’s statements, the Danish Football Association, or rather the head of the press department, has today – before the semi-final match between England and Denmark – refused to provide information about the vaccination of the Danish players, and in particular they refuse to say that Christian Eriksen, who is known to have had a pacemaker inserted after his collapse, was not vaccinated.
In addition, during the days of the European Football Championships, Danish officials vigorously emphasised that Eriksen had not been infected with Corona before the championship, but just as consistently refused to utter sentences such as „Eriksen was not vaccinated before the championship“, which smacks of an over-specific denial.
On 10 June 2021, two days before the European Championship match between Denmark and Finland with Eriksen’s collapse, the coach of the Danish European Championship team, Hjulmand, was quoted in the Süddeutsche Zeitung as follows:
„The 49-year-old Hjulmand had already criticised the European umbrella organisation UEFA several weeks ago for not supplying all European Championship participants with vaccine in time before the start of the tournament. There are some players who have been vaccinated: They have less to worry about.’“
National coach Hjulmand’s statements motivated me to send a press enquiry on 7 July 2021 to the chief press officer of the Danish Football Association and the press officer responsible for the current European Championship, which is called Euro 2020 because of the postponement, although it will take place in 2021:
„Dear Ms Kjaegaard and Mr Hoyer,
I have a press request with one question and I would like to use your answer in my forthcoming corresponding article.
Question:
There are some German articles citing Danish coach Kasper Hjulmand about a COVID vaccination of Danish and other players of the Euro 2020 like this: ‚The 49-year-old Hjulmand had already criticised the European umbrella organisation UEFA several weeks ago for not providing all European Championship participants with vaccine in time before the start of the tournament. ‚There are some players who have been vaccinated: They have less to worry about.‘. This implies that the Dansih team or at least a majority of the team had been vaccinated before the Euro 2020. Did Christian Eriksen get a vaccination before the EURO 2020 resp. before the Match Denmark-Finland?
The answer from press officer Jakob Hoyer was quite monosyllabic: they do not comment on the vaccination of players. A bad joke in view of the enormous public interest in this matter. The Danish Football Association’s statement also seems rather bizarre because the request to them was about a comment by a Danish Football Association official on the vaccination of players, which went through several media outlets and was never retracted. So they do comment on the vaccination of players – when it suits them.
To my reply that I interpreted his answer as confirmation that Eriksen had been vaccinated before the European Championship match, Hoyer replied that this was no confirmation. When I again asked him to confirm that Eriksen had not been vaccinated, he did not reply at first and then, a little later, he replied in the way you can read at the end of this article.
So we can state that the Danish Football Association officially refuses to confirm that the seriously injured captain of the national team, Christian Eriksen, who we wish a speedy recovery, was not vaccinated before the European Championship or before the match against the Finnish team. And two days before the match, the Danish coach vigorously criticised the lack of vaccinations among the participants in the European Championship. He could hardly have been referring to his own team.
What is the problem with confirming that Eriksen was not vaccinated when he was in fact not vaccinated?
In his final email to me, the Danish Football Association’s press officer describes vaccinations of its players as a „private issue“ that they do not comment on:
„Hi Jens
We have no comments on players vaccinations as it’s a private issue. You can quote me on that.
I have no further comments to you..
Bh Høyer“
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The Taliban’s lightning-fast takeover of Afghanistan in the wake of the US’ full military withdrawal by September 11th presents certain security concerns for India, but the South Asian state only has very limited options for ensuring its relevant interests, none of which credibly involve any conventional military involvement contrary to widespread speculation about this scenario.
India is struggling to ensure its security interests in Afghanistan after the Taliban’s lightning-fast takeover of broad swaths of the country in the wake of the US’ full military withdrawal by September 11th. The South Asian state is concerned that the war-torn nation might become a training ground for Kashmiri militants, or even worse, that some Taliban fighters might consider crossing over the Line of Control (LOC) into the Indian side of Kashmir. It should be kept in mind that the Taliban promised the US as part of last year’s peace deal that it won’t support any foreign militants, nor does it have a track record of expansionist plans outside of its native territory, but India still fears the aforementioned worst-case scenarios.
There’s been widespread speculation over the years and especially in recent weeks that India might provide conventional military assistance to Kabul in order to stem the Taliban’s rapid advance. According to those who ascribe to that scenario, this could possibly involve arms transfers, intelligence support, actual troops, and/or private military contractors (PMCs). The first two options are the most credible since they entail comparatively low costs and almost no risks to India itself. The last two ones, however, are much costlier in all respects. India’s leadership must also certainly understand that if it’s still struggling to contain what it regards as security threats in the part of Kashmir under its control, then it’ll be much more difficult to contain the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Some further elaboration on this insight is required in order to better understand India’s strategic calculations. Those who predict that India might commence some sort of conventional military intervention in Kabul’s support are likely influenced by one or two ideas: that India is pursuing a policy of regional expansionism and/or to trap the country in a deadly quagmire. They’re not mutually exclusive either since accepting the first observation as valid can in turn be instrumentalized through a clever information campaign to influence India into taking the second seemingly natural step of getting itself caught in the Afghan quagmire due to its earlier described fear of the Taliban taking over that country.
No matter how afraid India is of the Taliban conquering Afghanistan, there’s almost nothing that it could do to stop this. Even in the best-case scenario of it dispatching military equipment to the internationally recognized authorities there on an emergency basis and ramping up its intelligence support for their forces, that likely won’t be sufficient to stop the Taliban. At most, all that it could do is temporarily delay what appears to be the inevitable outcome of the war. As for the third and fourth policy options, they’d fully depend on Iran passively facilitating India’s military intervention since there’s no way that Pakistan would support this. The incoming “principalist”/”conservative” administration, however, might not be in favor of doing so.
President-Elect Raisi is predicted to take a stronger stand against the US and its proxies upon assuming office. Although Iranian-Taliban ties are complicated, the Islamic Republic might balk at being portrayed as having anything to do with another foreign military intervention in one of his country’s neighbors, especially one which would indirectly aid American strategic goals. It’s one thing for Iran to assist India’s regional economic integration plans through the Central Asian branch of the stalled North-South Transport Corridor (NSTC) and another entirely for it to approve the overflight of Indian forces and/or PMCs to Afghanistan in order to fight the Taliban. Some secret agents might still transit through Iran to enter the country, but not on a large scale.
Under these conditions, the best that India can unilaterally do is the first two options that were earlier discussed. It would be much better for its long-term interests, however, if it explored the possibility of entering into secret talks with the Taliban. Some outlets reported that this happened last month even though New Delhi recently denied it. Nevertheless, that’s the most pragmatic policy that India could follow at the present moment. It shouldn’t wage a proxy war against the Taliban via Kabul and/or its own forces/PMCs, but should prepare for the seemingly inevitable reality of that group returning to power to some extent in the coming future. They might still hold a grudge against India, but some level of dialogue is always better than conflict.
India’s Russian ally is the most reliable partner to facilitate such contact if New Delhi had the political will to see this proposed policy through. Although Moscow still officially regards the Taliban as a terrorist group, it nevertheless pragmatically hosted its representatives several times in the Russian capital over the years as part of its efforts to advance the difficult peace process. If Russia could talk to the Taliban despite that group having emerged from the US-backed Mujaheddin of the 1980s that was responsible for killing approximately 15,000 Soviet soldiers and wounding around 35,000 more, then there’s no reason why India can’t do so as well since it never suffered the same level of losses at their forerunner’s hands.
Speaking of Russian-Indian cooperation on Afghanistan, they could also jointly assist Tajikistan with bolstering its border security in the face of ISIS-K’s presence along this frontier. Dushanbe might feel somewhat uncomfortable accepting Indian military aid considering its recent partnerships with New Delhi’s Chinese and Pakistani rivals so it would be more acceptable for everyone if this assistance is coordinated through the SCO in which they all participate. Afghanistan is an observer in this organization so each member’s intelligence support could potentially be funneled through it in order to avoid any perception among some that one or another country’s relevant assistance to Kabul is somehow aimed against their interests (whether directly or indirectly).
With this in mind, an entirely new plan might begin to take shape. Instead of seeking to defeat the Taliban through proxy warfare, something that’s practically impossible to pull off since not even the world’s most powerful military in history could accomplish this task directly despite its two-decade-long occupation of Afghanistan, India should moderate its security goals to containing the threat of ISIS-K’s expansion into Central Asia. This would enable New Delhi to present itself as a responsible regional security stakeholder, especially if it coordinated such efforts through the SCO, perhaps by following Russia’s lead in this respect if Moscow is the first to propose a multilateral campaign to this effect.
There is nothing that India can realistically do to stop the Taliban from training Kashmiri militants apart from retaining a very limited intelligence presence in post-withdrawal Afghanistan to possibly sabotage such efforts on an extremely limited scale. Truth be told, however, that wouldn’t even be necessary to begin with since the Taliban seems to be working very hard to improve its international reputation and therefore is disinclined to train any foreign militants no matter how sympathetic it may speculatively be to their cause. Going back on its word concerning such a globally significant security matter would immediately raise suspicions about its grand strategic intentions and thus reduce the likelihood of it ever being accepted into the international community.
Considering this, India should reconceptualize its security concerns in Afghanistan. The Taliban will most likely take over the country at some time in the future, after which it’ll be cautiously welcomed into the international community for pragmatic reasons. Refusing to enter into dialogue with the group would therefore be a mistake for India’s regional economic interests. Its threat assessment should shift from the Taliban to ISIS-K, and India should accordingly coordinate its relevant security assistance to the Central Asian Republics and especially Tajikistan through the SCO, ideally under Moscow’s aegis. This proposal would enable India to present itself as a responsible regional security stakeholder while pragmatically defending its regional economic interests.
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This article was originally published on OneWorld.
Andrew Korybko is an American Moscow-based political analyst specializing in the relationship between the US strategy in Afro-Eurasia, China’s One Belt One Road global vision of New Silk Road connectivity, and Hybrid Warfare. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.
All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the “Translate Website” drop down menu on the top banner of our home page (Desktop version).
Carlos Lazo and a small band of Cuban Americans are on a 1,300-mile pilgrimage from Miami to Washington, D.C., to end the U.S. blockade of Cuba. Despite the blistering summer heat and occasional death threats (including a trucker who tried to run them off the road), the marchers persist. Lazo’s group is called Puentes de Amor, Bridges of Love, and this grueling walkathon is certainly a labor of love.
While right-wing Cubans in Miami call him “comunista,” Lazo has no time for ideology. He is neither for or against the Cuban government; he is for the Cuban people, the Cuban families. And he is disgusted by the cruelty of the U.S. blockade and by politicians who use the Cuban people as a political football–especially during this pandemic.
Lazo portrays Cuba and the U.S. as his parents—Cuba is his mother, the U.S. his father. He sees his job as trying to stop them from fighting and instead to embrace each other. “We try to unite people, whatever their ideology, religion, race or nationality,” Lazo told me. “The important thing is to take down walls that separate us and build bridges between our people.”
Lazo and the marchers set off from Miami on June 27 and will arrive in Washington, D.C., on July 25. All along the journey, they have been meeting with community groups—black farmers, veterans, students—explaining their purpose and their demands. They are calling for a lifting of all restrictions on sending remittances to their families back home; the resumption of flights from the U.S., not only to Havana but to all major Cuban cities (right now U.S. planes can only land in Havana); the reopening of a fully staffed U.S. Embassy and Consulate in Havana instead of the skeletal staff that exists now; a restart to the program of family reunification that Trump suspended in 2017; the granting to U.S. citizens of the right to travel freely to Cuba; and robust economic relations, as well as scientific and cultural exchanges. Despite candidate Biden’s campaign promises to revert to Obama’s openings, the Biden administration insists that its Cuba policy is still “under review.” In practice, it has continued the brutal Trump agenda.
You couldn’t invent a better person than Carlos Lazo—a gregarious high school teacher/veteran who also plays guitar, sings and dances like a Cuban rock star—to lead a movement to change U.S.-Cuba policy. His trajectory reads like a movie script. The son of a cigar maker and a housewife, Lazo grew up in the small fishing village of Jaimanitas, west of Havana, and spent the first 28 years of his life there. After his mother emigrated to the United States, Lazo dreamed of following her. He first tried to leave in 1988 when he and his friend rigged up a makeshift raft. After two days adrift in the ocean, they were picked up by the Cuban Coast Guard. Lazo was thrown in jail, where he spent an entire year for illegally trying to leave the island.
Undeterred, in 1991 he tried again. After four precarious days on a rickety raft with six others, this time they were rescued by the U.S. Coast Guard and allowed to enter the United States.
Lazo spent a few years in Miami working in restaurants, delivering pizzas and driving trucks, but moved to Seattle in 1998 to seek more economic opportunities. There he joined the Washington National Guard and studied nursing. When the U.S. invaded Iraq, he was sent as a combat medic. He participated in the battle of Fallujah and was awarded a bronze star for helping to save lives.
But in 2005, when this decorated veteran was on leave and tried to visit his two sons living in Cuba, he discovered that the Bush administration wouldn’t allow him to go. This was a turning point in his life, when Lazo realized that the U.S. blockade, which has existed in one form or another since the 1960s, was hurting both the Cuban people and Cuban Americans who wanted to visit and help their families back home.
So Lazo began speaking out. In 2007, he testified before the U.S. Senate and met with more than 100 members of Congress. He was featured on CNN and MSNBC and in national newspapers.
When Obama became president and started normalizing relations with Cuba, Lazo thought his political work was over. He got a teaching degree, became a high school Spanish teacher, and threw himself into building a unique cultural exchange program that took his students to Cuba. The “profe,” as he is known, taught his students to sing Cuban love songs and dance salsa, winning the hearts of their Cuban hosts. He called this project the Factory of Dreams.
These glorious exchanges, six in total, came to a crashing halt when Trump entered the White House. Trump tried to please right-wing Cubans in Miami by reversing Obama’s openings and adding 242 additional coercive measures designed to torpedo the Cuban economy.
While the pandemic left a trail of pain and death around the world, Trump insisted on restricting family remittances to Cuba, stopping fuel shipments that supplied electricity to Cuban homes and hospitals, and sabotaging Cuban medical brigades that were helping to save lives around the world. “The planet cried out for solidarity and cooperation,” Lazo fumed, “but Trump responded by trying to suffocate the Cuban people.”
Lazo decided to take action. Despite the raging pandemic in the summer of 2020, he and four family members got on their bikes and rode more than 3,000 miles from Seattle to Washington, D.C., to urge Donald Trump and Congress to lift the blockade. Lazo livestreamed their voyage on Facebook, gaining an enormous following along the way.
Lazo’s cross-country trip inspired a group of Cuban Americans in Miami to begin their own caravan of bicycles and cars on the last Sunday of every month. Starting with just 11 bicycles last July, the Miami caravan has grown to more than a hundred vehicles and bicycles going down Calle Ocho in Little Havana. Carlos teamed up with Miami YouTube personality Jorge Medina (El Proteston) to galvanize hundreds of Cuban Americans. For the older generation of Miami Cubans who, at great personal risk, have been proposing normal relations and opposing the right-wing “haters” of the Cuban government since the 1959 revolution, this infusion of energy is a thrilling development.
Inspired by the success in Miami, there are now monthly caravans taking place in some 30 cities in the United States and scores more throughout the world, including in Cuba itself. Clearly, Lazo’s rejection of hatred and his commitment to building “bridges of love” reflect the sentiments of a growing number of Cuban Americans and their allies.
When the marchers arrive in the nation’s capital, they will be greeted by hundreds of supporters, including Cuban Americans flying all the way from Miami. Lazo plans to stay in Washington to meet with members of Congress and present the Biden administration with a petition signed by more than 25,000 people calling on him to build “bridges of love” between the two countries—just as President Obama started to do when he was in the White House.
Lazo’s pilgrimage shows his understanding that opponents of the blockade in the Cuban community need allies among broader layers of people–the farmers, students, church people, truck drivers, etc.–that he is meeting on the way. He believes the bridges of love go both ways because many groups, besides Cubans, have an interest in ending the blockade. These include farmers who want to sell their crops; tourists eager to enjoy Cuba’s nearby beauty, culture, and history; and scientists and public health officials seeking to collaborate with the island’s advanced medical system and biotech industries. In his pilgrimage, he wants to give a voice to these allies as well.
The mushrooming of caravans across the country, the increasing number of city council resolutions against the blockade, the recent vote of the Longshore Union to condemn it, the $400,000 raised by groups sound the country to send syringes for Cuba’s COVID vaccinations— all show a growing feeling that it’s past time for the Biden administration to re-examine its cynical, electoral calculations in continuing Trump’s restrictions on Cuba.
Lazo is not naive. He is under no illusions that his trek to Washington, D.C., will be enough to change Biden’s policies. But his philosophy is both simple and profound: “Everything you do to make the world better helps to make the world better,” he says. And whether it’s a cross-country bike trip or a 1,300-mile trek in the summer heat, Lazo takes these bold actions with so much joy, love and enthusiasm that others can’t help but follow his lead.
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Medea Benjamin, cofounder of CODEPINK, is author of several books on Cuba, including No Free Lunch: Food and Revolution in Cuba Today. She is a frequent contributor to Global Research.
Featured image: Carlos Lazo getting ready to start his march from Miami to Washington, D.C. Credit: Tighe Barry
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President Joe Biden on Tuesday announced plans to ramp up the federal government’s efforts to get more Americans vaccinated against COVID under a new program that includes “literally knocking on doors,” as Biden puts it.
Speaking from the White House two days after the federal government fell short of its goal of having 70% of adults get their first COVID shot by July 4, Biden said:
“So, please get vaccinated now. It works. It’s free. And it’s never been easier, and it’s never been more important. Do it now — for yourself and the people you care about; for your neighborhood; for your country. It sounds corny, but it’s a patriotic thing to do.”
According to data from the CDC, more than 67% of American adults have received at least one shot and more than 157 million are fully vaccinated.
Under the new program, Biden said the White House will deploy teams of officials from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Federal Emergency Management Administration and other federal health agencies.
The Biden administration developed a state, county and sub-state level predictions map of hesitancy rates using the most recently available federal survey data.
Biden suggested the unique door-knocking approach was needed now that “we are continuing to wind down the mass vaccination sites that did so much in the spring.”
The program also will make the vaccine available in more healthcare settings, and will provide more assistance to thousands of pharmacies, doctor’s offices and other medical facilities so they can distribute vaccines, Biden said. Vaccines will also be doled out at sporting events, summer events and religious activities, he added.
Biden said the administration will “step up efforts to get vaccines to your family doctors and other doctors who serve younger people so that adolescents ages 12 to 18 can get vaccinated and — as they go for back-to-school check-ups or getting ready for their physicals they need for fall sports,” Biden said.
Biden cited concerns over the COVID Delta variant, which he said is more transmissible and has forced some European countries to return to lockdowns.
The president did not mention any of the safety concerns previously noted by the CDC and U.S. Food and Drug Administration, including blood clots and heart inflammation, associated with the vaccines.
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki, in a briefing earlier in the day, said efforts would continue to convince vaccine holdouts, but she ruled out any federal mandates for now.
The administration will first target communities with lower vaccination rates, Psaki said. The door-to-door outreach efforts will get information about vaccines to people who haven’t received them yet.
In addition to the door-to-door information campaign, Psaki said other measures would include a “renewed emphasis on getting the vaccines to more primary care doctors,” and increasing access for workers at job sites.
“You don’t just give up just because you haven’t reached every single person,” Psaki told reporters. “We’re going to continue to apply … what we’ve seen have been the best practices over the past several months.”
Plan sparks backlash
Children’s Health Defense Chairman Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., criticized the plan, saying it would “accomplish nothing beyond making Americans fear and despise their government.”
Kennedy said:
“It’s a foreboding fork in the road to totalitarianism. We are now moving beyond the propaganda stage into this very coercive program where federal agents appear at American homes with the menacing message: ‘We know who you are and where you live. We have you on our list, we have your medical records, we want your neighbors to know that you are dangerous. We don’t recognize your property or privacy rights. You must take our untested, experimental pharmaceutical product. If you want to end this harassment, you must submit to a risky medical intervention made by an unscrupulous company with no liability and if you die or suffer permanent neurological injury, tough luck!’”
Biden’s announcement also sparked backlash on Twitter.
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) tweeted:
No.
The gov't doesn't decide who gets vaccinated. You do.
Nearly three in 10 Americans (29%) say they are not likely to get vaccinated, including 20% who said they will definitely not do so, according to a Washington Post-ABC News poll published last week. The 29% who said they are unlikely to get a vaccine is an increase over the 24% who said the same thing in April.
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Evidence suggests people who have received the COVID “vaccine” may have a reduced lifespan as a result of the acute, subacute and long-term effects from the COVID injection
If you’ve gotten the COVID shot, consider yourself high risk for COVID and implement a daily prophylaxis protocol. This means optimizing your metabolic flexibility, vitamin D, and taking vitamin C, zinc and a zinc ionophore on a daily basis, at least throughout cold and flu season
Evidence shows NAC may be used to prevent blood clots and break up any that might already have formed
If you’re low risk for COVID and have not been vaccinated, make sure you have these items on hand and begin treating at the very first signs of cold or flu symptoms
Also buy yourself a tabletop jet nebulizer, some saline solution and food grade hydrogen peroxide. Nebulized peroxide is an excellent go-to both for prevention and treatment, regardless of the stage the respiratory infection is in. For prevention, nebulize every other day. For treatment, use at first signs of respiratory infection
In this interview, return guest Dr. Vladimir Zelenko discusses an incredibly serious concern, one shared with at least two other highly credible experts — Michael Yeadon, Ph.D., a life science researcher and former vice-president and chief scientist of allergy and respiratory research at Pfizer, and professor Luc Montagnier, a world-renowned virologist who won the Nobel prize for his discovery of HIV.
Yeadon, Montagnier and Zelenko all believe the COVID-19 shots could reduce life expectancy by several decades, depending on several factors, including whether you’re required to get booster shots. In fact, there may be reason to suspect that many who get the jabs and subsequent boosters could lose their lives within two to three years, as a result of pathogenic priming.1,2
Many may not realize that when I was a youngster I was a Boy Scout, but you might know their motto is “Be Prepared.” It is an approach that has served me well over the years. I am not stating unequivocally that dire outcome will materialize, as my interview next week with Dr. Peter McCullough goes into. However, it would seem prudent to have a good protocol in your hands in anticipation of a worst-case scenario.
So, on that note, Zelenko and I take a deep dive into what can be done to prevent such a fate. Zelenko categorizes the risks of COVID-19 “vaccines” into three categories: acute, subacute and long-term, so let’s begin by reviewing the primary risks found in each of these categories.
Risk Category No. 1 — Acute Risks
The acute phase of harm begins at the moment of injection and likely lasts for about three months or so. Based on reports filed with the U.S. Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), it’s clear that many cannot survive past the acute phase.
About 6,000 deaths have been reported so far, and death commonly occurs within 48 hours of injection. Many serious disabling events also occur rather rapidly, typically within a few days or weeks. However, Zelenko has a very dismal perspective on the accuracy of the VAERS database. He explains:
“According to a paper published by the Salk Institute in San Diego, they’ve discovered that the spike protein that’s generated through the vaccination itself has negative health effects. It’s toxic … on its own …
There’s plenty of evidence that shows that it spreads from the injection site and goes to the bloodstream, and basically comes into every single cell in the body.3,4
mRNA has a half-life of around one to two weeks, depending on the mRNA, and during that interim, each mRNA molecule makes around 2,000 to 5,000 spike proteins. So, we’re talking about trillions and trillions of spike proteins.
Your entire body becomes a spike protein factory. Several orders of magnitude more than if you were to get COVID, because COVID infects the upper and lower airways primarily. Those are the cells that get infected and begin to produce spike proteins. But here we’re injecting the vaccine and it actually travels to every single cell in your body and converts every single cell in your body into a factory for spike proteins.”
As the mRNA disseminates through your vascular system, the cells lining your blood vessels begin producing spike protein. This is why we’re seeing such a staggering number of reports of people experiencing blood clots from these injections.
According to Zelenko, 40% of these events occur within the first two days after injection. The risk then diminishes, but vascular events such as heart attacks, strokes, renal infarcts and pulmonary infarcts don’t completely peter out until about three months after the last injection.
But these events of the past three months are not being reported to VAERS. It is, of course, possible that people simply aren’t connecting them to the COVID shot they got several months earlier.
How Many Have Actually Died From the COVID Shots?
As noted by Zelenko, underreporting is part of the problem we’re facing. The real number of side effects is impossible to determine, given the fact that the Food and Drug Administration didn’t insist on a robust post-vaccination data collection system, but it’s most certainly higher than what VAERS is listing.
“If you look at the VAERS [vaccine adverse event reporting system], which in my opinion is a piece of garbage … as of today, let’s say says there’s 6,000 deaths associated with taking the vaccine. Well, we need to understand what that actually means,” Zelenko says.
“If you look at the 2009 Harvard study on the VAERS system, they said only 1% of events are actually reported. So, OK … whatever the number is, it’s not 6,000. Maybe only 10% are being reported. I don’t know. But definitely it’s being underreported.
And then there’s two [additional] big problems. There’s evidence coming out that VAERS reports that have been filed are being erased off the server, No. 1. No. 2, I personally know of two dozen cases of deaths associated with the vaccine, and the doctor and/or family members that tried to file a VAERS report, their reports were rejected due to some technicality.
The fact that they all couldn’t make a report, that raises my eyebrows. What percentage of the information are we actually seeing? The answer is, I estimate, there are already around 200,000 dead Americans, directly related to the vaccinations.”
To get to that number, Zelenko assumes only 10%5 of adverse effects are reported. Studies have indicated it could be as low as 1%.6,7 That gives us a death toll of about 60,000, to which he adds another 140,000 given the fact that reports are being scrubbed and refused.
“The point is that it should definitely raise eyebrows and have the public start screaming and saying, ‘We want to know the truth. We want to know the accurate numbers. Stop suppressing the truth … I want to be able to make an informed choice whether or not I want to take this injection.’ And that’s not being given to the people.
My problem is not with the vaccine. My problem is with the government, governing bodies and certain people that are obstructing the flow of life saving information and suppressing the truth from people, and then using coercion to force people to take this vaccine. That’s the nefarious part.
The suppression is so blatant and so overt that doctors with impeccable credentials are being deplatformed for just voicing an opinion. And then you couple that together with proven prehospital treatment approaches and protocols that have been proven to reduce hospitalization and death by 85%, and that information is being suppressed.
So here you have a dual censorship where the positive, hopeful, life-saving information is being suppressed and the dangerous outcomes of the vaccination approach is being suppressed. It’s a perfect setup for genocide.”
Risk Category No. 2 — Subacute Risks
The subacute risk phase, which begins around three months’ post-injection, is exceedingly difficult to quantify. At bare minimum, it’s likely to last several months to a couple of years. The primary concern now is antibody-dependent enhancement (ADE), also referred to as pathogenic priming and/or paradoxical immune enhancement (PIE) as it more accurately describes the disease mechanism.
Zelenko believes the mRNA will have degraded by this time, and your cells will hopefully no longer produce spike protein. I believe he may be overly optimistic here, as the synthetic mRNA has been genetically modified to be less perishable, plus it’s encased in a nanolipid to resist breakdown.
I suspect this modified mRNA may remain viable far longer than anyone suspects, thanks to its synthetic nature. What’s more, there’s a mechanism by which the mRNA can be reverse transcribed into your DNA, which would make the spike protein production permanent — and probably intergenerational. I describe this process in “The Many Ways in Which COVID Vaccines May Harm Your Health.”
If Zelenko is correct, then the primary disease agent now switches from the spike protein to the antibodies produced in response to the spike protein. We don’t know how long these antibodies will last, but chances are they’ll stick around for a number of months or years.
While antibody production is the primary purpose of these shots, and the response said to provide you an immune benefit, they can actually be the source of problems.
Animal trials in which conventional coronavirus vaccines were tested have shown coronavirus vaccines routinely cause ADE,8,9,10,11,12 so when the animals are challenged with the real virus they’ve been immunized against, they can get seriously ill and even die. If hospitals start filling up with vaccinated individuals this fall, you’ll know why. They’re suffering the effects of ADE.
“In other words, those antibodies that were produced with the vaccination were pathologic,” Zelenko says. “They were lethal and they led to an exaggerated immune response. That’s what it means, antibody-dependent enhancement. It’s an enhancement of your immune response in a way that it will kill you …
The question is, how safe is it long-term, or in the subacute [phase] from three months to three years? That is a big question mark. Based on animal models — and this is what Dr. Mike Yeadon is saying — it could be absolutely genocidal. It’s the biggest gamble on the survival of humanity in the history of humanity.”
However, as a counter to this view, Dr. Peter McCullough, who is in complete agreement with the engineering of this event and it being one of the most egregious crimes against humanity, is not convinced that there will be a massive die-off in the fall.
He is well-trained in the science and has essentially completed a fellowship in COVID-19 along with being the senior editor of two prestigious medical journals so his opinion also deserves consideration. We will be posting his interview next Sunday, July 11, 2021.
Why Is Humanity’s Survival Being Risked?
The questions on many people’s mind right now are, “Why are lifesaving early treatment approaches suppressed?” “Why are the toxic side effects and death rates of the vaccines being suppressed?” and “Why are entire continents being coerced into taking a vaccine that is both medically unnecessary and unproven in terms of safety and effectiveness?”
Taken together, none of it makes any sense, which is why people like Yeadon, Montagnier, Zelenko and others are raising concerns about global genocide. Is that what this is all about? Is there an alternative interpretation of what’s happening? When you consider the actual data, mass vaccination simply isn’t necessary, so why the frantic push to get a needle in every arm? Zelenko explains:
“There’s something called medical necessity. So, let’s analyze if there’s any medical necessity for this vaccine, and you have to do that in a systematic way based on demographics.
If you look at the CDC’s data, anyone 18 and younger has a 99.998% chance of recovery from COVID-19 with no treatment. [Their risk of dying is] 1 in a million. It’s safer than influenza virus. If you gave me a choice, I would rather my kids have COVID-19 than influenza. So, why would I immunize a demographic that has close to 100% chance of recovery with an experimental vaccine that has already killed more kids than the virus?
If you look at the demographic between 18 and 45, people who are healthy have a 99.95% chance of recovery with no treatment … according to the CDC. Same question, why would I vaccinate a demographic that recovers on its own with no treatment?
Third question, if someone has antibodies — and there’s a plethora of evidence [showing] naturally produced antibodies are much more effective in clearing future viruses than vaccine-induced antibodies … Natural immunity is much better, more effective and safer, than vaccine-induced immunity. So, someone who has antibodies already from having COVID before, why would I vaccinate them? …
Fear is an extremely useful tool in manipulating the behavior of people. And that fear has been used to create a psychological motivation to get vaccinated with a vaccine that, in my opinion, has no medical necessity, has tremendous amount of actual and potential risks, and very questionable efficacy.”
Risk Category No. 3 — Long-Term Risks
Beyond the two-to three-year mark are the long-term risks, which are even more difficult to predict. One particularly difficult risk to predict or quantify is infertility. It’ll take decades before we have the data on reproductive effects. Women in their 20s who get the jab might not get serious about trying to get pregnant until they’re in their 30s.
Teens and young children will have to wait decades before fertility can be ascertained. Of course, by then, it’ll be too late. The damage will be done, and hundreds of millions will be in the same boat.
Zelenko cites research published in The New England Journal of Medicine, which concluded COVID vaccination during pregnancy had no increased risk of miscarriage. However, a closer look at the data set revealed that this was only true for women who got vaccinated during their third trimester. Women who get the COVID jab in their first and second trimester have a 24-fold higher risk of miscarriage.
There are also reports of declining sperm counts and testicular swelling in men, and menstrual cycle disruptions in women of all ages. “There is an absolute effect on fertility,” Zelenko says. We just don’t know to what degree yet.
Overall life expectancy is likely to be affected across the board but, again, it’s very difficult to predict just how many years or decades will be lost. Zelenko, like many other doctors, suspect autoimmune diseases and cancer rates will go up as a result of the jabs. As noted by Zelenko:
“Whether you look at the acute spike protein-induced death, the miscarriages, or the myocarditis in young adults, or you look at the subacute pathogenic priming issue, or you look at the potential long-term effects of infertility, auto immune disease and cancer, you have an absolute setup for a genocide. And that’s why these world-leading thought leaders, scientists, are cautioning people …
Let’s do a thought experiment. If COVID-19 were to infect every single human being on this planet and was not to be treated, what would be the overall global death rate? The answer is less than 1%, and I’m not advocating for that, by the way. That’s a lot of people still.
Now, what is going to be the death rate from global vaccination? That is going to be several orders of magnitude greater. And it actually depends how far out you look. Because if someone’s meant to live 80 years and they live 60 years, how do you quantify that? …
We’re talking about 1.5 to 2 billion people [dying] for no reason, except the agendas of a few psychopaths or sociopaths. Why do I say that? It’s because there have been people advocating for population reduction for decades. I just saw a video from [U.K. prime minister] Boris Johnson’s father … advocating for the reduction of England’s population to 15 million …
This type of ideology exists. In this generation, it’s not really anti-Semitic. What it is, is there’s a small group of sociopaths that believe … they’ve evolved into a superhuman enlightened [state] that entitles them the right to dictate the course of history.
For example, Bill Gates in 2015 said the world population needs to be reduced by a certain percentage because of global warming or whatever. So, my question is a very simple question. He’s one of the main supporters and profiteers of global vaccination. Why would I take a vaccine for my health from someone is advocating for the reduction of the world population?
Another scary individual is Klaus Schwab, the founder of the World Economic Forum. He’s very influential. He wrote the book ‘COVID-19 The Great Reset.’ In 2016, in a French interview … Schwab made an announcement that within 10 years, all of humanity will be tagged with an identifier. If you look at the UN 2030 plan, which was crafted by the World Economic Forum, it says ‘America will no longer be a superpower.’
That’s a stated agenda. Then, my favorite is, ‘You’ll own nothing and you’ll be happy. You won’t eat any meat. Fossil fuels will be prohibited. There’ll be a billion refugees, which will have to be integrated into your societies.’ So, my question is, what sociopath feels entitled to make a statement like ‘You will own nothing and you will be happy’?
What entitles this type of individual, or group of individuals, to think that way? Well, they believe that they’re enlightened far beyond the average human or subhuman.”
War Against God
Zelenko, a devout Jew, believes the root of this global takeover is really a war against God. The implication is that life has sanctity, and if life has sanctity, we have human rights, “earned” by our birth alone. This is the source of natural law. And, if we have human rights, handed down by God, then no one has the right to decide how long any one of us should live, or how many people there should be on the planet.
“That’s God’s prerogative,” Zelenko says. “However, if you take that out and view people as no different than an animal, a Darwinist perspective or eugenics perspective, and basically survival of the fittest is the yardstick that you measure the dominance hierarchy of humanity, in that case, these people feel that they are on top of the pyramid, and that entitles them to decide if you and me should live …
I call the [COVID] vaccine ‘Zyklon-V.’ That is the gas the Nazis used to kill my relatives. So to express my sentiments, I call it Zyklon-V. It’s an absolute weapon of mass destruction. People are being lied to, and they’re running into the gas chambers themselves because of the pathogenic fear.”
How to Protect Your Health Post-Jab
If you or someone you know or love got the COVID jab and now have serious regrets, there are definite strategies you can use to protect your health.
It appears if you made it through the first three months OK, then your risk for blood clots is likely radically diminished. To counteract excessive clotting, an anticoagulant may be appropriate. A natural alternative with great promise is n-acetyl cysteine (NAC), as it has both anticoagulant13 and thrombolytic effects,14 meaning it may both prevent clots and break up clots that have already formed. Obviously, do not get any more booster shots.
In the subacute phase, your No. 1 goal will be to avoid ADE. The key to this is to avoid triggering a pathogenic immune reaction, and the only way to do that is to implement some sort of prophylactic protocol, i.e., a COVID, common cold and influenza prevention protocol.
This is especially important for anyone that has received the COVID jab as they are at a high risk of having complications and are under the false impression that they are “protected” when actually they are at increased risk now that they got the jab and need to take extraordinary precautions.
Any symptoms of upper respiratory infection should also be treated immediately, not later. COVID is a multi-phase disease. The first phase is the viral phase, which lasts five to seven days. This is when it’s most easily treated. After Day 7, the disease typically progresses into the inflammatory phase, which requires different treatment.
Zinc supplementation is an important component for prevention and early treatment in the viral stage, as it impairs viral replication. You need to take it with a zinc ionophore, however, such as quercetin, EGCG (green tea extract), hydroxychloroquine or ivermectin.
“The majority of the COVID protocols focus on inhibition of our RNA virus replication. What that means is that for a virus to make copies of itself, it needs to enter the human cell. In the case of RNA viruses, all the COVID, coronaviruses and even the influenza viruses, they use a common pathway called RNA dependent RNA polymerase. That’s a very important enzyme.
That enzyme is what makes copies of the viral genetic material, which then enables for new viruses to be formed and spread. So, if you inhibit the viral RNA replication process, you’ll eliminate viral spreading, viral growth. The beautiful thing about what we found with zinc is that zinc inhibits this enzyme extremely well, if there’s another zinc [molecule] inside the cell.
But zinc cannot really get into the cell on its own. That’s where the concept of zinc ionophores come in. Zinc ionophores opens the door in the cell membrane and allows for zinc to go from outside of the cell, to inside of the cell. And when you increase the concentration of zinc inside the cell, then it can effectively inhibit this enzyme, stopping most if not all, coronaviruses and influenza viruses from replicating.”
If you want to use either hydroxychloroquine or ivermectin and live in a state that restricts their use, look for online telehealth options. The American Frontline Doctors is one resource. They only charge $90 for a consultation and you will be able to get the prescription that you need. Do not use Ivermectin from veterinary sources as it may be contaminated and is not designed for human use.
In addition to zinc and a zinc ionophore, you also need to optimize your vitamin D level. The range you’re looking for is 60 ng/mL to 80 ng/mL year-round. The appropriate dose of oral vitamin D3 is the dose that gets you within that range.
Vitamin C is another important component, especially if you’re taking quercetin, as they have synergistic effects. To effectively act as a zinc ionophore, the quercetin needs vitamin C.
In an effort to make it easier for patients, Zelenko has developed an oral supplement that contains all four: vitamin C, quercetin, vitamin D3 and zinc. It’s called Z-Stack and can be purchased on zstacklife.com. For a downloadable “cheat sheet” of Zelenko’s protocol for COVID-19, visit VladimirZelenkoMD.com
The take-home message here is that if you’ve gotten the jab, consider yourself high risk for COVID and implement a daily prophylaxis protocol. This means optimizing your vitamin D, and taking vitamin C, zinc and a zinc ionophore on a daily basis, at least throughout cold and flu season.
It would also be useful to do a daily sauna. Ideally one that can heat up to 170 degrees Fahrenheit. The best saunas are far-infrared and have low EMFs. Sadly, I don’t know any that go to 170 degrees and are low EMF.
I use one that goes to 170 and then I turn it off and turn on the SaunaSpace four near IR bulb system in the sauna and go in for 20 minutes. This practice activates heat shock proteins which will help remove the spike proteins and improve other damaged proteins in your body.
If you’re low risk for COVID and have not been vaccinated, make sure you have these items on hand and begin treating at the very first signs of cold or flu symptoms.
Nebulized Peroxide and Other Health Promoting Measures
In addition to NAC (to prevent and break up clots), vitamin D, vitamin C, quercetin and zinc, buy yourself a tabletop jet nebulizer, some saline solution and food grade hydrogen peroxide. You’ll want to dilute the peroxide with saline to get a 0.1% solution.
Nebulized peroxide is my personal go-to both for prevention and treatment, regardless of the stage the respiratory infection is in. To learn more, download Dr. Thomas Levy’s free e-book, “Rapid Virus Recovery.” As a preventive measure, simply nebulize every other day. Vitamin C is important here too, as it works as a catalyst for the peroxide. A daily dose of 500 milligrams would likely be sufficient for most.
We were forced to remove all the hydrogen peroxide videos that I had previously posted for liability reasons but fortunately they are all now posted on our Substack site. This is important as, in my view, this is the most important step you can take. I would recommend nebulizing a 0.1% solution every day as indicated in the videos, linked below.
There is no danger in doing it every day and likely there is a health benefit. As Dr. Tom Levy describes in one of the videos below, it seems to help improve your bowel movements, which may be a result of eliminating respiratory pathogens that were having negative impact on your microbiome.
Other important health-preserving strategies include the following:
Make sure you’re metabolically flexible so that your body can seamlessly transition between burning fat and sugar as your primary fuel. This will allow your innate immune system to function optimally. Time-restricted eating is one surefire way to accomplish this.
Avoid processed seed oils in your diet, such as sunflower oil, corn oil, safflower oil or avocado oils. All contain high levels of linoleic acid, which impairs your mitochondrial function, and in upper respiratory infections, it’s the precursor for the Leukotoxin that occurs in these infections.
Focus on certified-organic foods to minimize your glyphosate exposure, and include plenty of sulfur-rich foods to keep your mitochondria and lysosomes healthy. Both are important for the clearing of cellular debris, including these spike proteins. You can also boost your sulfate by taking Epsom salt baths.
To combat the toxicity of the spike protein, you’ll want to optimize autophagy, as this may help digest and remove the spike proteins. Time-restricted eating will upregulate autophagy, while sauna therapy, which upregulates heat shock proteins, will help refold misfolded proteins. They also tag damaged proteins and target them for removal.
It is important that your sauna is hot enough (around 170 degrees Fahrenheit) and does not have high magnetic or electric fields.
If you’re having post-vaccination symptoms, you could consider:
Low-dose interferons such as Paximune, to stimulate your immune system
Peptide T (an HIV entry inhibitor derived from the HIV envelope protein gp120; it blocks binding and infection of viruses that use the CCR5 receptor to infect cells)
Cannabis, to strengthen Type I interferon pathways, which are part of your first line of defense against pathogens
Dimethylglycine or betaine (trimethylglycine) to enhance methylation, thereby suppressing latent viruses
Silymarin or milk thistle to help cleanse your liver
The National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC) recently posted more than 50 video presentations from the pay-for-view Fifth International Public Conference on Vaccination held online October 16 to 18, 2020, and made them available to everyone for free.
The conference’s theme was “Protecting Health and Autonomy in the 21st Century” and it featured physicians, scientists and other health professionals, human rights activists, faith community leaders, constitutional and civil rights attorneys, authors and parents of vaccine injured children talking about vaccine science, policy, law and ethics and infectious diseases, including coronavirus and COVID-19 vaccines.
In December 2020, a U.K. company published false and misleading information about NVIC and its conference, which prompted NVIC to open up the whole conference for free viewing. The conference has everything you need to educate yourself and protect your personal freedoms and liberties with respect to your health.
Don’t miss out on this incredible opportunity. I was a speaker at this empowering conference and urge you to watch these video presentations before they’re censored and taken away by the technocratic elite.
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The British personnel are said to be based at Al-Ghaydah airport in Mahra province of eastern Yemen, where Human Rights Watch says Saudi forces run a prison camp in which detainees are subject to torture and extraordinary rendition.
British troops are believed to have been based at the airport for months. A local journalist who was embedded with Saudi forces at the airport, Naser Hakem Abdullah Awidh, told Declassified he has seen British troops there this year.
He claimed: “They are a fully-fledged force. We can’t say they are minor.” The British forces allegedly spend their days off conducting tourist trips in civilian clothes to local archaeological sites.
Hameed Zaabnoot, a tribal sheikh who has led sit-in protests against the presence of Saudi forces in Mahra province, told Declassified that staff at Al-Ghaydah airport have seen British troops inside.
Zaabnoot understands that British forces are located in designated parts of the airport. He said:
“The tasks assigned to them so far are military training and logistical support, either for Saudi forces or Saudi-backed militia that are elements from the Southern Transitional Council,” a Yemeni separatist group.
“The number of British forces… is between 20 and 30 instructors, 10 of which are permanent,” Zaabnoot relayed, claiming they are flown into the airport on board Saudi military aircraft and bypass normal visa checks.
“Saudi forces carry out strict security measures against civilian or military personnel inside the airport,” he explained, adding that mobile phones are banned, making it hard for anyone to photograph the British troops.
Saudi special forces prepare to unload a C-130 plane at Al-Ghaydah in January 2018. (Photo: Saudi military)
British ambassador ‘fighting terrorism’
In an interview in Arabic broadcast late last month by Yemen’s Al-Mahriah TV channel, Britain’s ambassador Michael Aron was repeatedly questioned over allegations that UK forces have been seen in the east of the country.
“We support efforts of fighting terrorism and smuggling. This is our position for a long time,” adding that “we have good and deep relations with the legitimate government”.
Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) reportedly has a presence in Mahra province, with Saudi and Yemeni forces recently killing or capturing several members of the group.
For years following 9/11, the UK’s Foreign Office provided Yemen with counter-terrorism training to deal with AQAP, but instructors officially withdrew in 2015 when the British embassy had to close as the war broke out.
US ambassador to Yemen, Christopher Henzel, visited Mahra in December 2020, drawing criticism from Badr Kalashat, a provincial deputy for youth affairs.
Kalashat tweeted that Henzel “visited the American and British forces present at Al-Ghaydah airport”, complaining that it coincided with the anniversary of Yemen’s independence from British colonialism.
Then in March 2021 the former deputy governor of Mahra province, Sheikh Ali Salem Al-Huraizi, said US and UK troops were present at the airport and called for all foreign forces to leave, denying there was a terrorism threat to the area.
Al-Huraizi pledged to “reveal to the world the truth about what is happening in terms of the occupation”. He has since claimed that Saudi and Western forces have built more than 100 underground cells inside the airport.
Torture
Geneva-based advocacy group, SAM for Rights and Liberties, told Declassified that Yemenis are being tortured by the British-backed Saudi forces at the airport.
The group’s president, Tawfiq Alhamidi, said:
“Saudi forces operate the airport’s prison where they receive logistical support and military training by British troops stationed at the airport since the beginning of this year.”
He added:
“There are multiple violations, some of which amount to war crimes such as torture, enforced disappearance, [and] forced deportation beyond the borders of the Republic of Yemen.”
Based on testimony his group has received, Alhamidi said the airport has “large underground structures” that are used by the foreign forces.
He called for the airport to return to civilian hands, saying “it could have played a positive role in alleviating the suffocating blockade” that has left millions of Yemeni children on the brink of famine.
“It would have assisted in freedom of movement outside Yemen, especially for the sick, the elderly, and children,” he lamented. “Turning this facility into a prison where arbitrary detention and torture are practised is a crime under the Geneva Convention and the Rome Convention establishing the [International] Criminal Court.”
Human Rights Watch has accused Saudi forces of responding to protests against their presence in Mahra by having “arbitrarily arrested demonstrators” and torturing them in the airport detention facility.
At least five detainees were forcibly disappeared for months and illegally transferred to Saudi Arabia, the group claimed.
Michael Page from Human Rights Watch said last March the torture and renditions of Mahra residents “is another horror to add to the list of the Saudi-led coalition’s unlawful conduct in Yemen”.
The British government has repeatedly claimed that it is “not a party” to the coalition’s war in Yemen, which seeks to restore the government of Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi that was ousted by the Houthi rebel group.
Despite these denials, the British military plays a key role in sustaining the Saudi war machine, especially in training, advising and supplying the Saudi air force bombing Houthi strongholds.
Members of the elite Special Boat Service were allegedly injured in northern Yemen, and since February 2020 British air defence units have operated radars in Saudi Arabia that track Houthi drones, a deployment costing UK taxpayers £2.3-million so far.
The Saudi takeover of Al-Ghaydah airport was partly prompted by concerns that the Houthis were smuggling weapons into Yemen through Mahra province over the border with neighbouring Oman, where 230 British troops are based.
Declassified asked the Ministry of Defence (MOD) why parliament was not informed about the deployment of troops and whether the UK is a party to the conflict in Yemen.
We also asked if British personnel in Mahra province have reported any allegations about suspected torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, in accordance with the government’s Torture and Mistreatment Reporting Guidance.
In response, an MOD spokesperson told Declassified: “The UK is not a member of the Saudi-led coalition and we have played no role in setting Saudi-led coalition policy.
“The UK’s defence relationship with Saudi Arabia includes training courses, advice and guidance. This supports the efforts of Saudi Arabia to protect national and regional security, as well as their military’s compliance with international humanitarian law.”
The UK Foreign Office was also asked to comment.
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Naseh Shaker is a freelance journalist based in Yemen’s capital, Sanaa.
Phil Miller is chief reporter and Mark Curtis is editor of Declassified UK, an investigative journalism organisation that covers the UK’s role in the world.
Featured image: A Saudi C-130 plane at Al-Ghaydah airport, where British troops are believed to be based. (Photo: Saudi military)
All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the “Translate Website” drop down menu on the top banner of our home page (Desktop version).
“The Hindu Kush is an 800-kilometre-long mountain range that stretches through Afghanistan, from its centre to Northern Pakistan and into Tajikistan”
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And it’s all over
For the unknown soldier
It’s all over
For the unknown soldier
– The Doors, The Unknown Soldier
Let’s start with some stunning facts on the ground.
The Taliban are on a roll. Earlier this week their P.R. arm was claiming they hold 218 Afghan districts out of 421 – capturing new ones every day. Tens of districts are contested. Entire Afghan provinces are basically lost to the government in Kabul – de facto reduced to administer a few scattered cities under siege.
Already on July 1st the Taliban announced they controlled 80% of Afghan territory. That’s close to the situation 20 years ago, only a few weeks before 9/11, when Commander Masoud told me in the Panjshir valley, as he prepared a counter-offensive, that the Taliban were 85% dominant.
Their new tactical approach works like a dream. First there’s a direct appeal to soldiers of the Afghan National Army (ANA) to surrender. Negotiations are smooth – and deals fulfilled. Soldiers in the low thousands have already joined the Taliban without a single shot fired.
Mapmakers cannot upload updates fast enough. This is fast becoming a textbook case on the collapse of a 21st century central government.
The Taliban are fast advancing in western Vardak, easily capturing ANA bases. That is the prequel for an assault on Maidan Shar, the provincial capital. If they get control of Vardak they will be literally at the gates of Kabul.
After capturing Panjwaj district, the Taliban are also a stone’s throw away from Kandahar, founded by Alexander The Great in 330 B.C. and the city where a certain mullah Omar – with a little help from his Pakistani ISI friends – started the Taliban adventure in 1994, leading to their Kabul power takeover in 1996.
The overwhelming majority of Badakhshan province – Tajik majority, not Pashtun – fell after only 4 days of negotiations, with a few skirmishes thrown in. The Taliban even captured a hilltop outpost very close to Faizabad, Badakhshan’s capital.
I tracked the Tajik-Afghan border in detail when I traveled the Pamir highway in late 2019. The Taliban, following mountain tracks on the Afghan side, could soon reach the legendary, desolate border with Xinjiang in the Wakhan corridor.
The Taliban are also about to make a move on Hairaton, in Balkh province. Hairaton is at the Afghan-Uzbek border, the site of the historically important Friendship Bridge over the Amu Darya, through which the Red Army departed Afghanistan in 1989.
ANA commanders swear the city is now protected from all sides by a five-kilometer security zone. Hairaton has already attracted tens of thousands of refugees. Tashkent does not want them to cross the border.
And it’s not only Central Asia; the Taliban have already advanced to the city limits of Islam Qilla, which borders Iran, in Herat province, and is the key checkpoint in the busy Mashhad to Herat corridor.
The Tajik puzzle
The extremely porous, geologically stunning Tajik-Afghan mountain borders remain the most sensitive case. Tajik President Emomali Rahmon, after a serious phone call with Vladimir Putin, ordered the mobilization of 20,000 reservists and sent them to the border. Rahmon also promised humanitarian and financial support to the Kabul government.
The Taliban, for their part, officially declared that the border is safe and they have no intention of invading Tajik territory. Earlier this week even the Kremlin cryptically announced that Moscow does not plan to send troops to Afghanistan.
A cliffhanger is set for the end of July, as the Taliban announced they will submit a written peace proposal to Kabul. A strong possibility is that it may amount to an intimation for Kabul to surrender – and transfer full control of the country.
The Taliban seem to be riding an irresistible momentum – especially when Afghans themselves were stunned to see how the imperial “protector”, after nearly two decades of de facto occupation, left Bagram air base in the middle of the night , scurrying away like rats.
Compare it to the evaluation of serious analysts such as Lester Grau, explaining the Soviet departure over three decades ago:
When the Soviets left Afghanistan in 1989, they did so in a coordinated, deliberate, professional manner, leaving behind a functioning government, an improved military and an advisory and economic effort insuring the continued viability of the government. The withdrawal was based on a coordinated diplomatic, economic and military plan permitting Soviet forces to withdraw in good order and the Afghan government to survive. The Democratic Republic of Afghanistan (DRA) managed to hold on despite the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Only then, with the loss of Soviet support and the increased efforts by the Mujahideen (holy warriors) and Pakistan, did the DRA slide toward defeat in April 1992. The Soviet effort to withdraw in good order was well executed and can serve as a model for other disengagements from similar nations.
When it comes to the American empire, Tacitus once again applies:
“They have plundered the world, stripping naked the land in their hunger… they are driven by greed, if their enemy be rich; by ambition, if poor… They ravage, they slaughter, they seize by false pretenses, and all of this they hail as the construction of empire. And when in their wake nothing remains but a desert, they call that peace.”
In the wake of the Hegemon, deserts called peace, in varying degrees, include Iraq, Libya, Syria – which happen to, geologically, harbor deserts – as well as the deserts and mountains of Afghanistan.
That Afghan heroin rat line
It looks like Think Tank Row in D.C., between Dupont and Thomas Circle alongside Massachussets Avenue, have not really done their homework on pashtunwali – the Pashtun honor code – or the ignominious British empire retreat from Kabul.
Still, it’s too early to tell whether what is being spun as the US “retreat” from Afghanistan reflects the definitive unraveling of the Empire of Chaos. Especially because this is not a “retreat” at all: it’s a repositioning – with added elements of privatization.
At least 650 “U.S. forces” will be protecting the sprawling embassy in Kabul. Add to it possibly 500 Turkish troops – which means NATO – to protect the airport, plus an undeclared number of “contractors” a.k.a mercenaries, and an unspecified number of Special Forces.
Pentagon head Lloyd Austin has come up with the new deal. The militarized embassy is referred to as Forces Afghanistan-Forward. These forces will be “supported” by a new, special Afghan office in Qatar.
The key provision is that the special privilege to bomb Afghanistan whenever the Hegemon feels like it remains intact. The difference is in the chain of command. Instead of Gen. Scott Miller, so far the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, the Bomber-in-Chief will be Gen. Frank McKenzie, the head of CENTCOM.
So future bombing will come essentially from the Persian Gulf – what the Pentagon lovingly describes as “over the horizon capability”. Crucially, Pakistan has officially refused to be part of it, although in the case of drone attacks, they will have to overfly Pakistani territory in Balochistan. Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan also refused to host American bases.
The Taliban, for their part, are unfazed. Spokesman Suhail Shaheen was adamant that any foreign troops that are not out by the 9/11 deadline will be regarded as – what else – occupiers.
Whether the Taliban will be able to establish dominance is not an issue; it’s just a matter of when. And that leads us to the two really important questions:
1. Will the CIA be able to maintain what Seymour Hersh initially, and later myself, described as the Afghan heroin rat line that finances their black ops?
2. And if the CIA cannot continue to supervise opium poppy field production in Afghanistan as well as coordinate the subsequent stages of the heroin business, where will it move to?
Every thinking mind across Central/South Asia knows that the Empire of Chaos, for two long decades, was never interested in defeating the Taliban or fighting for “the freedom of the Afghan people”.
The key motives were to keep a crucial, strategic forward base in the underbelly of “existential threats” China and Russia as well as intractable Iran – all part of the New Great Game; to be conveniently positioned to later exploit Afghanistan’s enormous mineral wealth; and to process opium into heroin to fund CIA ops. Opium was a major factor in the rise of the British empire, and heroin remains one of the world’s top dirty businesses funding shady intel ops.
What China and the SCO want
Now compare all of the above with the Chinese approach.
Unlike Think Tank Row in D.C., Chinese counterparts seem to have done their homework. They understood that the USSR did not invade Afghanistan in 1979 to impose “popular democracy” – the jargon then – but was in fact invited by the quite progressive UN-recognized Kabul government at the time, which essentially wanted roads, electricity, medical care, telecommunications, education.
As these staples of modernity would not be provided by Western institutions, the solution would have to come from Soviet socialism. That would imply a social revolution – a convoluted affair in a deeply pious Islamic nation – and, crucially, the end of feudalism.
“Grand Chessboard” Brzezinski’s imperial counterpunch worked because it manipulated Afghan feudal lords and their regimentation capacity – bolstered by immense funds (CIA, Saudis, Pakistani intel) – to give the USSR its Vietnam. None of these feudal lords were interested in the abolition of poverty and economic development in Afghanistan.
China is now picking up where the USSR left. Beijing, in close contact with the Taliban since early 2020, essentially wants to extend the $62 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) – one of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) flagship projects – to Afghanistan.
The first, crucial step will be the construction of the Kabul-Peshawar motorway – through the Khyber pass and the current border at Torkham. That will mean Afghanistan de facto becoming part of CPEC.
It’s all about regional integration at work. Kabul-Peshawar will be one extra CPEC node that already includes the construction of the ultra-strategic Tashkurgan airport in the Karakoram highway in Xinjiang, only 50 km away from the Pakistani border and also close to Afghanistan, as well as Gwadar harbor in Balochistan.
In early June, a trilateral China-Afghanistan-Pakistan meeting led the Chinese Foreign Ministry to unmistakably bet on the “peaceful recovery of Afghanistan”, with the joint statement welcoming “the early return of the Taliban to the political life of Afghanistan” and a pledge to “expand economic and trade ties”.
So there’s no way a dominant Taliban will refuse the Chinese drive to build infrastructure and energy projects geared towards regional economic integration, as long as they keep the country pacified and not subject to jihadi turbulence of the ISIS-Khorasan variety – capable of spilling over to Xinjiang.
The Chinese game play is clear: the Americans should not be able to exert influence over the new Kabul arrangement. It’s all about the strategic Afghan importance for BRI – and that is intertwined with discussions inside the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), incidentally founded 20 years ago, and which for years has advocated for an “Asian solution” for the Afghan drama.
The discussions inside the SCO regard the NATO projection of the new Afghanistan as a jihadi paradise controlled by Islamabad as not more than wishful thinking nonsense.
It will be fascinating to watch how China, Pakistan, Iran, Russia and even India will fill the vacuum in the post-Forever Wars era in Afghanistan. It’s very important to remember that all these actors, plus the Central Asians, are full SCO members (or observers, in the case of Iran).
Tehran plausibly might interfere with potential imperial plans to bomb Afghanistan from the outside – whatever the motive. On another front, it’s unclear whether Islamabad or Moscow, for instance, would help the Taliban to take Bagram air base. What’s certain is that Russia will take the Taliban off its list of terrorist outfits.
Considering that the empire and NATO – via Turkey – will not be really leaving, a distinct future possibility is a SCO push, allied with the Taliban (Afghanistan is also a SCO observer) to secure the nation in their terms and concentrate on CPEC development projects. But the first step seems to be the hardest: how to form a real, solid, national coalition government in Kabul.
History may rule that Washington wanted Afghanistan to be the USSR’s Vietnam; decades later, it ended up getting its own second Vietnam, repeated as – what else – farce. A remixed Saigon moment is fast approaching. Yet another stage of the New Great Game in Eurasia is at hand.
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This article was originally published on Asia Times.
Pepe Escobar,born in Brazil, is a correspondent and editor-at-large at Asia Times and columnist for Consortium News and Strategic Culture in Moscow. Since the mid-1980s he’s lived and worked as a foreign correspondent in London, Paris, Milan, Los Angeles, Singapore, Bangkok. He has extensively covered Pakistan, Afghanistan and Central Asia to China, Iran, Iraq and the wider Middle East. Pepe is the author of Globalistan – How the Globalized World is Dissolving into Liquid War; Red Zone Blues: A Snapshot of Baghdad during the Surge. He was contributing editor to The Empire and The Crescent and Tutto in Vendita in Italy. His last two books are Empire of Chaos and 2030. Pepe is also associated with the Paris-based European Academy of Geopolitics. When not on the road he lives between Paris and Bangkok.
He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.
Featured image: Afghanistan in Badakhshan province, seen from the Pamir highway in Tajikistan during my November 2019 Central Asian loop. This district, not far from Ishkashim, is now under Taliban control. Photo: Pepe Escobar
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Unknown assailants overnight assassinating Haitian President Jovenel Moïse was a horrific act that should be condemned in no uncertain terms. Unfortunately, such violence is unsurprising. As the Black Alliance for Peace (BAP) noted in its July 6 press release, Moïse’s actions since usurping power have brought Haiti to a boiling point, with heavily armed gangs being unleashed, both supported by and enabled by the Haitian elite and those international “friends” of Haiti, including the United States, the United Nations, the Core Group and the Organization of American States.
What happens now is the question. Will the Biden administration and other political players use this moment as the pretext for military intervention, as was done in 1915? Will interim Prime Minister Claude Joseph attempt to consolidate power under the pretext of the current state of siege? Will the Core Group find a new willing puppet, more pliable than Moïse, to bring “stability”?
Whatever happens, the Black Alliance for Peace remains steadfast in our call against foreign intervention and occupation of Haiti. And we call on all anti-imperialist and Black internationalist forces to stand with the Haitian people and oppose U.S. and European interventions deployed under the guise of the “Responsibility to Protect.”
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“The best way to destroy the capitalist system is to debauch the currency. By a continuing process of inflation, governments can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens.” – John Maynard Keynes (1883-1946), British economist, 1936.
“All crises have involved debt that, in one fashion or another, has become dangerously out of scale in relation to the underlying means of payment.” – John K. Galbraith (1908-2006), in 1994.
“Sooner or later a crash is coming and it may be terrific. The vicious circle will get in full swing and the result will be a serious business depression. There may be a stampede for selling which will exceed anything that the Stock Exchange has ever witnessed. Wise are those investors who now get out of debt.” – Roger Babson (1875-1967), American entrepreneur, economist, and business theorist, on September 5, 1929.
After forty some years of disinflation and declining interest rates, there is some confusion about whether or not this long disinflationary decline is about to end, to be replaced with a creeping up of real wages, prices and interest rates.
This could certainly be the case in the wake of the current post-pandemic economic recovery. In the longer term, we can foresee a context of significant demographic changes, while economic and financial globalization will continue to show signs of abating, and could even be reversed in the years to come.
These changes will produce negative shocks on labor supply and be accompanied by upward price pressures. All of this, of course, in the context of significant climate change and rising adjustment costs.
Similarly, it is also possible that major economies will experience creeping inflation, at least in the coming few years, as this has happened after the economic dislocations of a war.
After World War II, for instance, the six-year period of reconstruction, from 1946 to 1951, was characterized by an average inflation rate of 6.4% in the U.S. This was the result of a combination of both demand-pulled inflation and cost-pushed inflation.
Many governments and central banks had injected a lot of money in the economy during the war, but because of rationing, people were allowed to spend only part of their incomes and were forced to save a higher proportion of their incomes than they otherwise would. Inevitably, saving rates were very high. Consequently, after the war, there was a lot of pent-up demand, and increased spending pushed prices up.
Also, industrial plants had to be refitted to produce private goods, and those costs also pushed up prices. Moreover, the real estate market was especially propelled by the demographic factor of the post-war baby-boom surge and by more accessible mortgages.
Today, in the wake of the war against the 2020-2021 global pandemic, the real estate market is also very hot, again propelled by a demographic phenomenon, this time by record immigration levels, accompanied by generous public emergency income support programs and by super low mortgage rates.
Larger public deficits and growing public debts, and ultra-lax monetary policies by central banks
In order to fight the economic damage brought about by the 2020-2021 pandemic and the subsequent economic lockdowns, governments and central banks in major economies embarked upon aggressive income support programs, larger deficits and higher public debts, combined with important measures of money printing by central banks.
In the U.S., for example, the national debt (excluding total unfunded Social Security and Medicare promises) of the federal government ballooned from $22.7 trillion in 2019, to $28.2 trillion in May 2021, a 24% increase and a level that has pushed the U.S. national debt above 100% of yearly GDP.
Also in the U.S., the Fed purchased massive amounts of Treasury and mortgage-backed securities with newly printed money, as it did during the Great recession of 2008-2009. Indeed, on March 15, 2020, the Fed announced that it would be buying at least $500 billion in Treasury securities and $200 billion in government-guaranteed mortgage-backed securities over “the coming months”.
And, in December 2020, the Fed reiterated its policy of buying monthly ‘at least’ $120 billion of Treasury bonds and mortgage-backed securities ($80 billion of government debt and $40 billion of mortgage-backed securities), and this “until the economy recovers to ‘full employment’”.
However, there could be a problem in defining ‘full employment’, because millions of workers have decided to exit the labor force or to retire for good during the pandemic and the economic downturn.
Thus, the labor force could be smaller today than before the pandemic, resulting in a tight labor market and labor shortages in some trades, because, according to employers, some workers simply ‘do not want to work’, unless it is from home. Therefore, no matter how long the Fed keeps interest rates to the floor, it’s dubious that all jobs lost during the pandemic recession will come back.
The risk of financial bubbles
However, the massive purchases of securities by the Fed have pushed short-term interest rates to close to zero, while keeping longer-term interest rates artificially low. In so doing, the Fed (and other central banks) has created bubbles in bond prices, in stock prices and in real estate prices. And when such bubbles burst, a severe recession could logically follow.
The Fed’s ultra loose monetary policy of excess liquidity has also resulted in the unusual situation of banks being awash with excess cash that they couldn’t lend profitably, leaving them no other choice but to deposit most of it at the Fed, in the form of excess reserves. As of June 2, 2021, American banks’ deposits totaled $15,802.6 billion (not seasonally adjusted), as compared to only $13,912.2 billion in March 2020, a 12% increase.
As an indication of such an ultra loose monetary policy, the Fed’s balance sheet ballooned during the pandemic, going from $4.17 trillion in late December 2019, to $7.95 trillion in early June 2021, a huge 90% jump.
An extended ultra loose monetary policy can possibly feed inflation, or, if an economy is already in a recession or into an economic downturn, it can produce so much liquidity that the economy becomes mired in a liquidity trap.
A liquidity trap and a debt trap
In my intermediate macroeconomics textbook, here is how I define John Maynard Keynes’ liquidity trap:
The monetary situation that prevails when short-term interest rates are way down and everyone anticipates a fall in the price of bonds and an increase in interest rates, so that any further increase in money supply by the central bank is not spent but is hoarded.
To extricate an economy from a liquidity trap, a central bank can gradually end its purchases of securities and let interest rates slowly rise. On the other hand, fiscal policy can become more aggressive in stimulating investments and aggregate demand.
Currently, central banks in the largest economies are at an impasse, as their persistent policy of artificially keeping interest rates close to zero—with even negative interest rates in Europe—has not only created a liquidity trap, it has also encouraged a general increase in debt levels, possibly creating a debt trap when rates are one day allowed to rise.
Debt trap for monetary policy
Indeed, central banks are not immune from a situation of moral hazard or from a debt trap.
When a central bank pursues an easy money policy and keeps interest rates artificially low (and even pushes them into negative territory) over a long period, it creates an environment that incites not only governments, but also businesses and consumers, to take on heavy or excessive debt loads. This is the well-known case of Japan, where the economy has been bogged down by deflation and economic stagnation for more than a quarter of a century.
Both in Europe and in North America, central banks have been pursuing—since 2008, and even more since March 2020—very aggressive quantitative easing (QE) monetary policies. They have kept interest rates artificially low, a replica of Japanese monetary policy.
For example, in the United States, as in most developed countries such as Canada, total mortgage debt is presently very high, even as some other categories of debt, such as credit card debt, have slightly declined.
In so doing, central banks may have built for themselves a policy debt trap, because they may have reasons to fear that letting interest rates return to their normal level could trigger a wave of bankruptcies, and this would damage the economy. Central banks may have become prisoners of their own ultra loose monetary policy.
Cycle analysis for the real estate market: The Kuznets’ cycle
In the U.S., and especially in Florida and California for obvious demographic reasons, the 18-year Kuznets’ cycle is well and alive. Previous tops in this cycle were in 1987 and 2005, while bottoms occurred in 1993 and 2011. If the cycle is as reliable nowadays as in the past, (with 12-year price upswings and 6-year price contractions), the year 2023 could see another major top unfolding in real estate prices in the U.S.
Considering that Fed chairman Jerome Powell has indicated that it is the Fed’s intention to keep interest rates at rock-bottom levels for months to come, possibly until 2023, this would seem to coincide perfectly with the Kuznets’ cycle rationale.
What does this entail for future inflation, recession, deflation, stagflation and even ‘secular stagnation’?
Let us keep in mind that the 2005 top in real estate prices was followed by the 2007-2008 subprime mortgage crisis and the 2008-2009 Great recession, two crises in which the Fed played a major role.
Now, sixteen years later, it would seem that the Fed is going to keep the bubbles alive until 2023, through its purchases of securities and its ultra loose monetary policy. Therefore, inflation should keep creeping up for some months to come.
When the Fed stops its purchasing program, letting interest rates adjust upwards, this will be the sign that the bond market bubble and the real estate bubble are about to end. The stock market bubble could linger, but not much longer. However, when this happens, a severe economic recession could follow.
Conclusion
The coming years should see major reversals in some important economic trends, especially in demographics and in globalization. The 2023-2025 period, in particular, should be watched closely. It could herald a period of stagflation, that is a period of slower economic growth, rising taxes and creeping cost-push inflation.
Indeed, after that period, the demographic shift could intensify. The 2023-2029 years will see the last baby-boomers retiring, while governments could be facing a looming post-pandemic budgetary crisis arising from the ballooned public debt and the increased costs of caring for an aging population.
Because of a demographic shock to be experienced in most advanced economies in the coming years, labor shortages are likely to linger on, pushing real wages and prices up. Businesses will have a growing incentive to accelerate the use of computer-assisted automation, robotization and artificial intelligence. Such a move will reduce the demand for some categories of labor and may keep some wages in check.
A wholesale reliance on mass immigration cannot solve a labor shortage, except in some well-identified sectors or industries requiring specific skills. The generous refugee and family reunification programs in place in many countries add more to the demand for labor than newly imported workers can do to alleviate the labor supply shortage, besides creating social problems.
Finally, let us also keep in mind that 2029 will mark the 100th anniversary of the beginning of the Great Depression (1929-1939). This could revive talks among economists about a potential era of ‘secular stagnation’, under the influence of negative structural demographic factors and a slowdown in economic and financial globalization.
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Environmentalists have known for decades that the “greenest” form of energy available is reduction of useless and harmful energy. Over 50 years ago, the first Earth Day embodied this with “Reduce; Reuse; Recycle.” Today, that seems to be replaced with the slogan “Recycle; Occasionally Reuse; and, Never Utter ‘Reduce.’” Even mentioning the word “reduce” can be met with complaints that “Reduction means ‘austerity,’” as if any type of collective self-control would plunge the world into depths of suffering.
Unquestioning enthusiasm for “alternative energy” (AltE) can open the door for endless consumerism. It avoids the real problem, which is uncontrolled economic growth.
Overproduction for what purpose?
Acceptance of consumerism hides the twin issues that AltE creates its own negative outcomes and that lowering the amount of harmful production could actually improve the quality of life. Simply decreasing the amount of toxic poisons required for overproduction would cut down on cancers, brain damage, birth defects and immune system disorders.
No one would suffer from the massive toxins that would be eliminated by halting the manufacture of military armaments or disallowing the design of electrical devices to fall apart. Very few would be inconvenienced by discontinuing lines of luxury items which only the rich can afford to purchase.
Food illustrates of how lowering production has nothing to do with worsening our lives. Relying on food produced by local communities instead of food controlled by international corporations would mean eliminating the processing of food until it loses most nutritional value. It would mean knowing many of the farmers who grow our food instead of transporting it over 2000 miles before it reaches those who eat it. It would cut out advertising hyper-sugarfied food to kids.
When I first began studying environmentalism over 30 years ago, I remember hearing that if a box of corn flakes costs $1, then 1¢ went to the farmer and $.99 went to the corporations responsible for processing the corn, packaging it, transporting the package and advertising it. Reduction does not mean “doing without” – it means getting rid of the excess.
Closely linked to food is health. My book on Cuban Health Care: The Ongoing Revolution points out that the island nation’s life expectancy is longer and infant mortality lower than that in the US while it spends less than 10% per person of what the US does. Reducing energy devoted to health care does not mean less or worse care. It means getting rid of the gargantuan unnecessary and expensive components which currently engulf health care.
Electric vehicles (EVs) embody collective environmental amnesia. Once upon a time, not too many decades ago, people wrote of walkable/bikeable communities and some even put their dreams to the test. Let’s not crush that dream. Since AltE has become so popular, the idea of redesigning urban space is being pushed aside so that every person can have at least one EV. Memory of environmental conservation has fallen into oblivion.
It may not be getting better all the time
Despite the hype about AltE, use of energy is expanding, not contracting. We are constantly told to buy the latest electronic gadget – and the time period between successive versions of gadgets gets shorter and shorter. AltE can exacerbate the energy crisis by distracting society from practicing conservation.
The Bitcoin Ponzi scheme reveals the expansion of energy in the service of uselessness. Jessica McKenzie describes a coal-burning power plant in Dresden, NY. The plant was shut down because the local community had no use for its energy. But Bitcoin needs energy to compute its complex algorithms. So, like Dracula, the coal plant rose from the dead, transformed into a gas burning plant.
What, exactly, are politicians like Joe Biden, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and even Bernie Sanders doing to put the breaks on this expansion of FFs in programs like the Green New Deal (GND)? Not as much as you might think. As Noam Chomsky points out in his forward to Stan Cox’ The Green New Deal and Beyond, “… the GND does not challenge the fossil-fuel industry.” Congressional proposals leave out the most critical part of reducing FFs – limiting the total quantity that can be produced. Instead, they rely on the false assumption that increasing AltE will somehow cause a decrease in FF use. Without a “cap” on FF production, AltE simply adds to the energy mix.
Are problems with AltE “minimal?”
Despite stated goals to end FF production by such-and-such a date, the high heat they generate is essential for producing (1) silicon wafers for solar panels, (2) concrete and steel used in construction of windmills and dams, and (3) plastic coverings for industrial windmill blades. Every type of AltE requires FFs. Supporters of AltE often say that it is so much smaller as to pale by comparison to direct use of FFs.
Claiming that the amount of FFs used by AltE is trivial ignores both the quantities actually being used now and, most importantly, the uncontrollable corporate urge toward infinite growth. Hydro-power (dams) is currently the greatest source of AltE and is in line to expand most rapidly. Ben Gordesky describes research showing that “Canadian large-scale hydro projects have an ongoing carbon footprint that is approximately 40% that of electricity generated by burning natural gas. These emissions do not include the carbon footprint of dam construction.” This is not an insignificant amount of FFs used by dams, especially since hydro-power “is expected to grow by at least 45% by 2040.”
Estimates are that “Solar and wind have a carbon footprint of 4% to 8% of natural gas.” For the sake of simpler arithmetic, let’s say that hydro, wind and solar average 12.5% of the carbon footprint of FFs (even though is it probably much higher). Then, let’s say that healthy capitalism grows at least 3% annually, which means a doubling in size every 25 years. If AltE requires 12.5% of the equivalent FFs now, then,
in 25 years it will require what is twice that, or 25% of current FF use;
at 50 years, it again doubles (to four times its current size), requiring 50% of current FF use; and,
at 75 years, the economy doubles (to eight times its current size), reaching 100% of current use.
To put it bluntly, reliance on AltE in no way eliminates FF usage – in only 75 years economic growth would return us to current FF levels.
But would we have to wait 75 years to see current levels of FF restored? For some parts of the economy, the answer is definitely “No.” As Stan Cox documents, “… the huge increase in mines, smelters, factories and transportation required for this transition [to EVs] would continue heightened CO2 levels long before any emission savings would be realized.”
It might be possible theoretically to concentrate energy to reach the extremely high temperatures necessary for production of wind turbines and silicon wafers for solar arrays. Relying on Cox’ calculations, expanding infrastructure to reach 100% AltE by 2030 “… would require a 33-fold increase in industrial expansion, far more than has ever been achieved anywhere and would result in complete ecological devastation. One little fact regarding this quantity of build-up is that 100% RE would require more land space than used for all food production and living areas in the 48 contiguous states.”
Time for despair?
Is it time to throw up our hands in despair that the only route to preserve humanity is a return to hunter/gatherer existence? Not really. Focusing on local, community-based energy can create sufficient production for human needs.
Child Labor in the Democratic Republic of Congo. (Source: Don Fitz)
Many underestimate the ability of low tech devices. When in high school during the 1960s, my science project was a solar oven that could cook via medium heat. When I returned from college a few years later, my mom intimated that my dad, an engineer, thought that a solar reflector device could not possibly generate much heat. So, one morning he used it as a greenhouse for his vegetable seedlings. When he returned later that day, the plants were fried.
Solar power does not require high-tech based on massive arrays. Few techniques are more powerful at reducing energy than a passive house design or use of passive solar for existing homes. It is even possible to run a website via low tech solar without destroying farmland for gargantuan solar arrays.
“For more than two thousand years, windmills were built from recyclable or reusable materials: wood, stone, brick, canvas, metal… It’s only since the arrival of plastic composite blades in the 1980s that wind power has become the source of a toxic waste product that ends up in landfills. New wood production technology and design makes it possible to build larger wind turbines almost entirely out of wood again… This would make the manufacturing of wind turbines largely independent of fossil fuels and mined materials.”
A global effort
The corporate obsession with expanding production infects every aspect of exploring, mining, transporting, using and disposing of energy infrastructure. For decades, this has been painfully obvious for FFs and nuclear power. The opposition now rippling through AltE is increasingly clear.
In case you did not notice, the two key words common to all of these efforts is “Stop it!” A better life for all begins with rejecting limitless economic growth by developing technologies that minimize mining, processing, over-producing goods with short durations, and transporting products over long distances. Instead, we must develop locally-based products that have the least harmful effects.
One of the main problems with tunnel visioning on AltE is that how that approach accepts and perpetuates the ideology of greed, which insists that everyone in the US (and, of course, the world) must adopt the consumerist life-style of the upper middle class.
People believe in preserving what they hold sacred. For most of us, these include sacred places and beings, the inorganic world, creatures that sleep in water or on land, and human Life. Corporate profits should not be included among the things we hold sacred.
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Dr. Walter Rodney (1942-1980) was an acclaimed Pan-African historian and Marxist theoretician from the time he graduated from the London School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in 1966.
Rodney soon took a faculty position at the University of Dar es Salaam in the East African state of Tanzania, which was a center during the 1960s and 1970s for the national liberation movements fighting across the continent against western imperialism.
The historian and political activist was assassinated on June 13, 1980 in the capital of his home country of Guyana, Georgetown, located in South America. Rodney had returned to Guyana in 1974 after being offered a faculty position at the university. Viewing his appointment as a potential threat to the People’s National Congress (PNC) government of then President Forbes Burnham, his job offer was revoked.
Rather than return to Tanzania, another African country or a university in North America, Rodney chose to stay in Guyana and delve into the internal politics of the country. By 1979, Rodney had transformed along with other veteran activists, the Working People’s Alliance (WPA) as a political party in an effort to build unity among the working people of Guyana, who had been largely divided along ethnic lines between the slightly majority East Indian, Asian population pitted against the African descendants.
After the assassination of Rodney, the administration of Burnham claimed that the historian was attempting to plant a bomb outside a government building. His brother, Donald Rodney, was charged with being an accomplice in the alleged crime and sentenced to a term in prison.
Many people within the Left, Pan-African and progressive academic communities were in disbelief of the Guyana government’s explanation related to Rodney’s death. Blame was placed on the Burnham administration which continued to deny involvement.
Over four decades later, with the prodding of his widow, children and comrades within the WPA which remains active in Guyana politics, the government shifted its position recognizing Rodney as an historian while changing his death certificate to indicate he was murdered. The original death certificate stated that Rodney was “unemployed” although he was still working on academic projects by writing a History of the Guyanese Working People, which was published posthumously.
An article published on the recent developments in Guyana says:
“In April this year, the Court of Appeal, set aside the conviction that linked the 69-year-old Donald Rodney to the assassination of his brother. The Court of Appeal also set aside the 18-month sentence for possession of explosives against Rodney, said to have been the only eyewitness to the assassination of his brother, who was the co-leader of the Working People’s Alliance (WPA). In 2014, a Commission of Inquiry declared that Rodney’s death was not a misadventure but rather an assassination and Attorney General Nandalal also told legislators in parliament Thursday (June 10) that the death certificate will be amended to delete the words ‘misadventure’ as the cause of death.”
The person identified during the 2014 tribunal as the individual which lured the Rodney brothers to the location, Gregory Smith, was a security operative of the Burnham administration. This individual was later sent to another Caribbean territory, French Guiana, and never held accountable for the killing. He is reported to have died in 2002.
Since 1980, the writings and lectures of Walter Rodney are still in circulation. Although the situation in Africa, the Caribbean and South America has changed in regard to the level of mass mobilization and political debate, the underlying conclusions of Rodney’s approach to analyzing the historical development and social conditions of the peoples of Africa and the world remains fundamentally sound.
Imperialism is continuing to exploit and dominate the majority of the peoples of the globe while the struggles of working people, the peasantry, youth and revolutionary intellectuals are ongoing. The current battle against the COVID-19 pandemic illustrates clearly once again the marginalization of the peoples of the Southern Hemisphere through the denial of pharmaceutical products including the billions of doses of vaccines needed to aim at protecting population groups from infection, serious illness and death.
The Significance of Walter Rodney in the 21st Century
Rodney’s academic and political work was done during the period of 1966-1980 amid an upsurge in the struggle for national liberation and socialism in Africa and other geo-political regions. Tanzanian President Mwalimu Julius Nyerere, the leader and co-founder of the Tanganyika African National Union (TANU), oversaw not only the independence of his country in 1961 he was a committed force within the efforts to build socialism inside the country and the continent.
In 1967, TANU issued the Arusha Declaration which called for socialist construction in the post-colonial state attempting to overcome the legacy of imperialism and its concomitant results which are impoverishment and general underdevelopment. Rodney had researched the Atlantic Slave Trade and its impact in the Upper Guinea Coast of West Africa for his dissertation at the SOAS. Therefore, he was well acquainted with the challenges facing the continent even after national independence.
By 1968, Rodney had accepted an offer as a visiting scholar at the University of West Indies in Jamaica. During his stay in Jamaica, he held lectures for people within the community attracting broad interests. In August of that same year, Rodney traveled to Montreal, Quebec (Canada) to speak at the Black Writers Conference that was attended by numerous luminaries of the time including Stokely Carmichael, James Baldwin, CLR James and James R. Forman.
In attempting to return to Jamaica, he was denied admission back into the Caribbean-island nation. Youth and workers rose up in rebellion leading to him being banned inside the country for many years afterwards. A series of his lectures in Jamaica was later published under the title: “The Groundings with My Brothers.”
Rodney then returned to the University of Dar es Salaam where he continued historical research resulting in the publication of his most famous work: “How Europe Underdeveloped Africa”, a book issued by the Tanzanian government in 1972. Two years later the book was reprinted by Howard University.
His return to Guyana in 1974, led to his involvement in opposition politics inside the country during the mid-to-late 1970s. Due to his WPA activities, Rodney and several of his comrades were indicted for arson by the Burnham administration in 1979. The impending threat by the government made many of his comrades and colleagues fear that his life would be taken.
Prof. Issa Shivji, who had been a student in Tanzania at the time of Rodney’s arrival in 1966, would later become a faculty member at the University of Dar es Salaam during the early 1970s in the field of law. Shivji recalled in a tribute paid to Rodney in 2012 that at the time of Zimbabwean independence in April 1980:
“On his way to Zimbabwe, and this was a time when the movement was in trouble, he passed through and stayed with one of our comrades here. This comrade told him, ‘Walter stay, don’t go back. Guyana is dangerous.’ There was a case against him in court. Walter said, ‘No, I cannot just run away. I have to go back.’… It’s more believable that he was pulled because he felt he could make his contribution there, in Guyana. And he did, in my view. One can make critical assessments in hindsight, but one of the things we appreciated, and came to learn from, the Party, the WPA, was how it managed to bring together Indian and African youth.” (See this)
Just three years ago in 2018, a series of lectures for a course Rodney developed at the University of Dar es Saleem on the History of Russia, the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 and later efforts to build socialism, was finally published after nearly five decades. The book is perhaps the most comprehensive view of the Russian Revolution, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), socialist construction and its relevance to the African independence movements in the struggle for socialism and continental unity.
The announcement by the Guyana government earlier in the year was a welcome development for many people. It was also revealed that a Walter Rodney Chair in the History Department at the University in Guyana will be established. These events illustrate the importance of Rodney’s work and the necessity of the continuation of the study and application of his writings, lectures and political activity.
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Abayomi Azikiwe is the editor of Pan-African News Wire. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.
Featured image: Walter Rodney African historical scholar and political activist (Source: Abayomi Azikiwe)
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A friend sent me a link to a Foreign Policy news story about the Turkey / Syria border crossing at Bab al Hawa. He asked, “Is this accurate?” What could be wrong with humanitarian aid?
There have been many such stories, both short and long. The essence of them all in western media is that Bab al Hawa must be kept open for humanitarian reasons. Many of the articles castigate Russia or any other country such as China which might vote to block a renewal of United Nations authorization of the border crossing.
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UPDATE
On Friday July 9 the UN Security Council unanimously agreed to a one year extension of the Bab al Hawa crossing. As part of the agreement, the UN Secretary General needs to report regularly on what is happening with the aid going into the Al Qaeda dominated zone. Evidently Russia and China thought the time was not right to insist on principle. The problems outlined in this article remain true.
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There are important facts which western media stories typically leave out or distort. Here are some reasons why the Bab al Hawa border crossing should NOT be renewed.
The aid is supporting Syria’s version of Al Qaeda, Hayat Tahrir al Sham (HTS). They control the region on the Syrian side of the crossing. They are the foreigners and hard-core extremists who invaded Idlib from Turkey in 2015 plus those who left Aleppo and other cities when the militants were defeated by the Syrian army. Even if the United Nations inspects all the trucks going into Idlib province in northern Syria, the truck deliveries are ultimately controlled by HTS (formerly called Jabhat al Nusra).
The aid is effectively supporting the partition of Syria. Idlib province, and the militants which govern there, seek to separate permanently from Syria. They are attempting to Turkify the region through sectarian education, promoting the Turkish language and even using Turkish currency.
The aid violates the United Nations Charter which says all member countries shall refrain from threatening the territorial integrity of another member state. Turkey and the USA are the major violators, since they have military troops illegally occupying Syrian lands. But it is a shame for the United Nations to be complicit through the authorization of aid to the breakaway Al Qaeda dominated region.
The aid to northwest Syria is prolonging the conflict instead of helping end it. It is evident that after failing to militarily overthrow the Syrian government, western powers are now using other means to attack Damascus. They continue to interfere in Syria’s domestic affairs. Led by the USA, they have economically attacked Syria while pouring support into the breakaway northwest region.
Western aid to the Al Qaeda dominated region distracts from the pain, damage, and destruction which US and European sanctions have wreaked on most Syrians. The Caesar sanctions, imposed by the USA amid the Covid19 pandemic, have had a horrendous impact. By outlawing the Syrian Central Bank and making it nearly impossible to trade with Syria, US sanctions have undermined the Syrian currency. Many goods have increased in price by 4 and 5 and even 10 times. Like a modern-day gangster, the US has been openly stealing the oil and wheat from eastern Syria. The US has attacked the electrical grid by prohibiting parts, engineering, or construction to repair or rebuild power plants. “Caesar” sanctions prohibit support for anything government related including schools and hospitals.
According to a December 2020 United Nations General Assembly resolution, Unilateral Coercive Measures such as the “Caesar” law are illegal and a violation of the UN Charter, international law, and international human rights law. Yet because of US global economic dominance, it is still in force and the US claims the right to prohibit any country, company, or individual from supporting or trading with Syria. This is what makes US claims to humanitarian concern so ironic and cynical.
The western aid to Syrians through Bab al Hawa is discriminatory and serves to divide the country. Before the conflict Idlib province had a total population of 1.5 million persons and the number is LESS today. Much of the population left when the province was over-run by extremists. Some fled into Turkey; others fled to Latakia province to the west. Some opposition militants and their supporters chose to go to Idlib rather than reconcile with the government. For example, when East Aleppo was taken back by government soldiers, there were about thousands of militants and their families transferred – but not hundreds of thousands as was incorrectly predicted in the wave of propaganda before East Aleppo was recaptured. So, in contrast with some estimates, there are one million or fewer persons in Idlib.
The civilians in north west Syria are being effectively bribed to live there through cash payments and vastly greater relief. One thousand trucks per month are taking aid into northwest Syria. As noted in in OCHA document, people are “incentivized by access to services and livelihoods.” This is understandable but the divisive effect is also clear.
In contrast, there are between 14 and 17 million Syrians living elsewhere in Syria. They are receiving little if any of the aid. Instead, they are bearing the brunt of vicious US unilateral coercive measures.
Aid to civilians in Syria should be distributed fairly and proportionally. This can be done with monitoring or supervision by a respected international agency such as the Red Crescent / Red Cross. In keeping with the UN Charter, western countries should respect the political independence of the Syrian government and stop their continuing interference and efforts at “regime change”.
Weaponizing “Humanitarian Aid”
There are many western NGOs crying out about Bab al Hawa. For example, the International Rescue Committee has raised many millions of dollars which should have gone to help all Syrians but has not. Their literature should be carefully considered however because – according to their 2019 tax returns – western governments are their main funders at $440M in 2019. The CEO, David Miliband, is well compensated at over $1 million per year. We can be sure they keep on message with the US State Department.
Humanitarian aid is big business and has been politically weaponized. While there are many well-meaning people working hard, there political agendas at work.
If Russia and other nations in the UN Security Council veto the extension of the Bab al Hawa crossing, there are good reasons why.
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Rick Sterling is an independent journalist based in the SF Bay Area. He can be reached at [email protected]. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.
Featured image: Bab El Hawa boarder crossing from Turkey to Syria in March 2006. (CC BY 3.0)
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Most of the foreign takfiri fighters held in Syria’s containment camps and living in the country’s north-western Idlib province are spurned by their home countries and their wives and hapless children are rejected for repatriation. Consequently, these people have nowhere to go.
Hundreds of takfiri fighters are imprisoned by the US-backed Syrian-Kurdish-dominated Democratic Forces regime in the northeast while as many as 30,000 are stuck in Idlib.
The 70 per cent of Syria under government control does not want them. Iraq and the 50 countries from which they come reject them. This is true also for Hay’at Tahrir Al Sham, which rules Idlib with an iron hand and the Kurds who hold 25 per cent of Syria’s territory. They are compelled to guard and provide for the takfiris. They are forever prisoners of an unfinished, decade-long war.
Al Hol camp in north-eastern Syria near the Iraq border houses 43,000 mainly women and children of fighters as well as low level fighters: half are Iraqis, a quarter Syrians, and the rest non-Arab foreigners. The UN children’s fund, UNICEF, estimates that 22,000 are children. Since there is no schooling or sports programmes for them, they are growing up without something to do, without a homeland, without a future.
Conditions are crowded and harsh. Residents are constantly confronted by Daesh loyalists seeking to intimidate, impose control and conservative restrictions on them, and secure fresh recruits for their cause. Children as young as four or five are indoctrinated by Daesh and often verbally abuse or throw stones at camp guards and visitors. Al Hol is a hell hole.
The situation is better in the much smaller al-Roj camp in the same area. It houses 1,400 persons, the majority Iraqis but also some Europeans. Daesh does not have a firm grip on Al Roj residents. Iraqis remain in the camp because they have nowhere to go as their villages and homes have been destroyed or former neighbours who were persecuted by Daesh do not want them to return.
Early last month, the Dutch government repatriated a woman, who faced no criminal charges, and three children who had been living in al-Roj camp. This was, however, only the second time Dutch citizens were allowed to go home from northern Syria. Two orphans were repatriated in June 2019. A British woman Shamima Begum, 21, who travelled from London to join Daesh as a teenager, was moved for her own safety from Al Hol to Al Roj. She has lost her British nationality and has been refused permission to return home. Britain is among the countries which do not repatriate their nationals.
US envoy to the anti-Daesh coalition, John Godfrey warned that those held in Syria’s camps “constitute a potential threat to security in the region and beyond”. The US has repatriated 28 of its citizens, of whom 12 are adults and 10 have been prosecuted or are under prosecution.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called on US allies to repatriate their nationals and escribed the imprisonment of 10,000 suspected Daesh fighters, some 2,000 of whom are foreigners, as “untenable”.
COVID has slowed the repatriation of children. Only about 1,000 have been sent home since the fall of Daesh in Iraq in 2017.
Ironically, the US expresses concern about the residents of internment camps in north-east Syria while Washington and its allies tolerate the rule of Al Qaeda offshoot Hay’at Tahrir Al Sham (HTS) in the north-western province of Idlib. HTS — which operates under Turkish protection — has consolidated its grip on Idlib over the past year by forcing smaller factions to merge or dissolve and send fighters home. According to Al Monitor, HTS has now tackled Jund Al Sham, a small, mainly Chechen group, headed by Muslim Al Shishani who rejected this demand and asked HTS to allow the faction to remain independent and focus only on the battle with the Syrian army while staying out of provincial social and political affairs.
However, HTS is intent on asserting control over Idlib and eliminating other factions with the aim of establishing a one party administration and a separate, fundamentalist entity in Idlib. This would divide Syria, pose a threat to this region comparable to the false “caliphate” created by Daesh and amount to a takfiri base on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean. While HTS may claim it does not intend to export its ideology or fighters, the very existence of such an entity wouldamount to a fundamentalist challenge to regional and European governments.
Meanwhile, Daesh elements are taking advantage of deteriorating conditions in Iraq and Syria to regroup and recruit disaffected young people. While post-war Syrian reconstruction and economic revival have been prevented by US sanctions, in both countries drought, poor harvests, corruption, rising unemployment and increasing poverty are creating an economic crisis. Daesh is making a come back in mountainous northern Iraq and rural western Iraq as well as desert areas of eastern Syria.
Having replaced secular Baathists in Iraq with sectarian Shiites and waged war against the Baath in Syria, weakening the anti-takfiri government, the Western powers incompetently led by the US, cannot deal with the chaos they have created. The hurried US and NATO withdrawal from Afghanistan after 20 years of failing to eliminate the Taliban can only encourage and empower takfiris.
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Previously solid ground is quickly degrading. The melting of the permafrost is about to cause huge damage to buildings and infrastructure across the country, Russia’s natural resource minister warns.
The heat is on, and it is hitting the Arctic with detrimental consequence. Global warming is now leading to quick and irreversible change in the North. And Russia is among the ones worst affected.
This week, the temperatures in the Russian north again beat records. In Saskylah, a small community in the Arctic Circle, the air temperature reached 31.9 C, the highest measurement since 1936. According to Roshydromet, the Russian meteorology institute, average temperatures along parts of the Russian Arctic coast have since 1998 increased with as much as 4,95 C degrees.
The development is of growing concern in Moscow. The country’s Minister of Natural Resources Aleksandr Kozlov confirms that more than 40 percent of all buildings in the North are now experiencing deformation in their building structure. And the construction of roads and railways is getting increasingly difficult, he said in a round table discussion in late May.
According to Kozlov, the melting ground is today the underlying reason for 23 percent of all technical system failure in the region, and up to 29 percent of oil and gas production facilities can no longer be operated.
Leading Russian researchers estimate that the degrading ground by year 2050 will inflict damages worth about five trillion rubles (€58 billion). That is equal to about 25 percent of the total Russian federal budget.
“What will happen with our towns in ten, fifty, hundred years?” governor of the far northern Yamal-Nenets region Dmitry Artyukhov asked during the conference. He is concerned about the comprehensive ongoing construction works in his region, much of which is made without regionally adjusted technology.
According to Artyukhov, the latest geological maps from the region dates back to the 1980s.
“The construction workers that today come to any project [in the region] do not have a clear-cut document that describes how the permafrost works and what solidity margins that are needed in order to make the buildings last for their due time,” the regional leader said.
The Russian Ministry of Natural Resources this year launches a new state monitoring system for the permafrost. The system will be based on existing research installations managed by state meteorological authority Roshydromet, and two development phases are envisaged.
The first pilot phase will cover the period 2022-2024 and be based on experiences and methodology applied in Spitsbergen, Franz Josef Land and Severnaya Zemlya, the Ministry of Natural Resources informs.
The permafrost melting is already affecting operators of Arctic infrastructure, including oil and gas installations. Experts have argued that the spill of 21,000 tons of diesel oil in the Taymyr Peninsula in 2020 came after the ground under a major oil storage tank degraded.
Researchers from the Russian Cryosphere Institute believe that the border of the permafrost zone over the last 40 years has moved more than 30 km to the north and that up to 500 square kilometers of land is every year sliding into the Arctic ocean and disappearing.
This process is irreversable, and it is impossible to stop it, Head of the Russian Cryosphere Institute Dmitry Drozdev said.
With the melting of the frozen tundra comes also growing risks of new and lethal diseases. Among the many infectious disease agents preserved in the permafrost is Anthrax.
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Featured image: Dikson is among the many Arctic towns troubled by melting permafrost. Photo. Thomas Nilsen
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Just as in 2018, Nicaragua is once again the subject of the kind of mass international bad faith news coverage and perception management more usually associated recently with US and allied government offensives against Bolivia, Cuba, Iran, Syria and Venezuela. In Nicaragua’s case the current offensive is aimed at influencing the country’s elections scheduled for next November 7th. Currently, all the opinion polls show that, should President Daniel Ortega stand again for election, he and his FSLN party will win easily with over 60% support against around 20% for the the country’s right wing opposition.
The campaign against Nicaragua’s Sandinista government is clearly intended to encourage punitive coercive economic measures from the US and European Union governments aimed at influencing voter opinion in those November elections against President Ortega and the FSLN. Right now, the main false accusation is that “Ortega” has unjustly imprisoned over twenty opposition leaders, among them several presidential candidates. All US attempts to overthrow governments resisting US and allied government dictates depend on this kind of big lie. The standard big lie is that target governments are unpopular, repressive dictatorships. Invariably, the truth is very different if not the complete opposite.
For example, in 2009, the big lie in preparation for the coup against then Honduran President Manuel Zelaya was that the proposed Fourth Ballot referendum aimed to secure him re-election so as to impose a dictatorship. In Nicaragua’s case, the current big lie is that “Ortega” is arresting opposition leaders to prevent them defeating him in next November’s elections. These big lies only flourish in an essentially fascist culture of corporate dominated government in which truthful information is systematically suppressed and substituted by false beliefs.
Typical Western false beliefs or presuppositions are, for example, that the US and its allies are a force for good in the world, that Western culture is morally superior to others and that capitalism promotes optimal economic and social outcomes. These ridiculous false beliefs are fundamental tenets of Western intellectual life and public discourse. They make possible the kind of psychological warfare repeatedly unleashed against governments that obstruct the wishes of Western corporate elites and the governments they own.
An important component of Western psychological warfare shaping the moral dimension of any given disinformation assault is the essentially class based solidarity with the target country’s imperialist proxies. This neocolonial solidarity operates in reactionary and progressive varieties, both claiming a Western monopoly on freedom, democracy and defence of human rights. Both essentially agree that governments resisting Western demands deserve to be attacked one way or another.
The reactionary variety, prevalent mostly among the business and financial classes and related professionals, insists on abandoning international law in favour of intervention based on Western dictated rules. The progressive variety, prevalent mostly among non profit organizations, academics and other socially oriented professionals, agrees but is more diffident about the means of intervention deployed, demanding alibis to satisfy susceptibilities over humanitarian and human rights concerns. The right wing variety generally favors aggressive, overt or covert military-based solidarity with armed opposition rebellion, while the progressive variety favors smart-power coercive measures prioritizing solidarity with some version of opposition civil society or popular movements.
Nicaragua experienced the first right wing version of neocolonial solidarity during the Contra war of the 1980s when president Reagan declared, with more truth than he realized, that the CIA-run narco-terror campaign was “the moral equivalent of the founding fathers”. Subsequently, ever since the Sandinista FSLN party returned to government in 2007, Nicaragua has experienced principally the progressive version of smart power neocolonial solidarity developed under president Obama. That policy, supporting Nicaragua’s anti-Sandinista opposition, intensified under president Trump and continues unchanged now under “Biden”.
Self-evidently, these varieties of neocolonial solidarity thrive on their respective class loyalties and ideological susceptibilities. In 2018, a massive disinformation campaign covered up the Nicaraguan opposition’s extreme violence and their deliberate campaign of destruction. As Harold Pinter remarked in relation to the 1980s Contra War, even as the opposition violence of 2018 was happening, the murders, the extortion, the arson, the torture, it was made to seem that nothing happened. Now, when the Nicaraguan authorities have acted to preempt a repeat of that failed 2018 coup attempt, a furious psychological warfare assault is taking place to conceal the coup mongering opposition’s treasonous collusion with the US and EU country governments.
As regards progressive and left wing opinion in general, militant foreign supporters of Nicaragua’s ex-sandinista opposition have long been important protagonists covering up the ex.sandinistas’ anti-democratic collaboration with Western imperialist intervention. Even before the 2006 elections, the US authorities had coopted ex sandinistas as collaborators. But when Daniel Ortega and FSLN won those elections, successfully managed the crisis of 2008-2009 and then triumphed in the 2011 elections, US government support for the opposition switched to promoting efforts at outright regime change. Inside Nicaragua, the ex sandinistas, devoid of popular support, abused their non profit networks to camouflage their political opposition to the government and the accumulation of resources necessary to mount the 2018 coup attempt.
That systematic abusive subterfuge has been eliminated and its protagonists held to account. So now foreign supporters of the ex sandinista opposition again cloak their militant, aggressive, politically driven advocacy under phony human rights concerns. In 2018, they did so to cover up the violent role of the ex sandinistas in the failed coup attempt. Now, they falsely allege human rights abuses to cover up ex sandinista US collaborators’ treasonous criminality. The false human rights propaganda motif makes it possible for proponents of the progressive variety of neocolonial solidarity in North America, Europe and elsewhere, to work in parallel with their right wing counterparts. Even many supposedly left wing figures have written articles or signed declarations in support of the ex-Sandinista US collaborators and those people’s right wing allies in Nicaragua. They do so for three main reasons.
Firstly, many supposedly left wing figures attacking the Nicaraguan authorities for defending Nicaragua’s independence and sovereignty have some degree of friendship with the ex-sandinistas now under investigation, so they defend them for essentially personal reasons. Secondly, it is likely that many supposed left wingers supporting the ex Sandinista US collaborators have been duped by the massive psychological warfare assault on Nicaragua without bothering to question it. A third main reason for that kind of neocolonial solidairty from people who should know better, is that they fear alienating their support networks and are simply signaling how virtuous they are so as to avoid criticism.
In any case, the current situation, just like the 2018 coup attempt, categorically defines where everyone’s loyalties lie. People genuinely committed to the principles of sovereign independence and self-determination recognize the Nicaraguan authorities are applying the country’s laws and criminal code to defend the country against US intervention aimed at overthrowing the elected government. People who believe the bogus human rights accusations and claims that the current criminal investigations are driven by electoral considerations are engaging in the kind of neocolonial solidarity regularly deployed to justify yet another operation of imperialist regime change. For anyone foolish enough to credit the ex sandinista leaders denials of complicity with the US government, this series of photographs should help disabuse them of that false belief.
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Stephen Sefton, author and renowned political analyst based in northern Nicaragua, actively involved in community development work focussing on education and health care, Stephen Sefton is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG)
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El Gato al Agua, the Spanish national political and current affairs talk show hosted by José Javier Esparza, has given space in its program to the biostatistician and founder of La Quinta Columna to comment on the official interim report of the analysis of the first vaccination vial obtained.
According to Ricardo Delgado, La Quinta Columna has obtained a dozen more from different laboratories and will continue to analyze them.
Throughout the program it has blown everyone’s mind that between 98% and 99% of the content of the vaccination vials corresponds to graphene oxide.
As the Spanish team have been saying, this is not a vaccine but a dose of pure graphene oxide into the vein.
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The top pharmaceutical lobbyist in the 2020 elections was Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), which spent $25.9 million at the state and federal level
Big Pharma targets bipartisan lawmakers in influential positions who can affect decisions that affect the industry. Once elected, they are tempted with lucrative job promises after leaving office, known as the “revolving door”
Companies form political action committees (PACs) to circumvent laws that prohibit corporations from donating directly to candidates. Money can be legally shuffled to support their candidate’s reelection
The industry has benefited from a public opinion reversal during the pandemic, moving from criticism over drug prices in early 2019 to becoming popular again in the vaccine effort
Although the cost of drugs is not the center of media attention, Big Pharma has not lowered prices and continues to push for higher revenue
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Lobbyists are professional advocates whose job it is to influence political decisions. According to the law, a lobbyist cannot pay a politician directly to secure a vote. However, the industry has found several ways of working around this restriction. One way is to organize a fundraiser for the candidate they want to influence.1
The fundraiser helps support the candidate’s reelection and term in office and the lobbyist can talk with a candidate about their legislative concerns. Lobbyists can spend big money to influence decisions that ultimately yield much more money.
For example, one yearlong analysis by the Sunlight Foundation2 found that for every dollar spent influencing politicians, corporations received $760 from the government. This is a 76,000% return on their investment. The Sunlight Foundation examined 14 million records to reach this result. According to the Foundation, in 2010 the U.S. Supreme Court suggested that political donors do not receive anything in return for their donations.3
In the landmark Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission decision, the justices wrote that corporate money spent on federal elections “do[es] not give rise to corruption or the appearance of corruption.”4 STAT analyzed data gathered in 2020 and discovered many health care decisions are in the hands of pharmaceutical companies that are making big bucks.
Your Health Care Decision in the Hands of Big Pharma
In a series titled “Prescription Politics,” STAT5 analyzed lobbyist expenditures in the 2020 elections at the state and federal levels. The data showed that the top pharmaceutical lobbyist in 2020 was Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA). They earned this spot having spent $25.9 million on lobbying efforts.6
Going back for a minute to the research from the Sunlight Foundation, if their estimation holds true and you do the math, the $25.9 million investment by PhRMA may ultimately net the industry $19.6 billion. One area where many states have fought the pharmaceutical industry is over the high price of drugs.
Lawmakers in Oregon have tried several strategies to lower drug prices and nearly every proposal has failed. When STAT looked at campaign contributions, they found two-thirds of the state legislature in Oregon had cashed at least one contribution check from the drug industry.
An analysis of other states found more dramatic results in Louisiana, California and Illinois. Documentation showed 84.4% of lawmakers in Louisiana, 81.7% in California and 76.3% in Illinois had accepted and cashed a check from the pharmaceutical industry.7
During the 2020 election campaign, the pharmaceutical industry wrote 10,000 checks that totaled more than $9 million. The STAT analysis found in 2019 and 2020, 2,467 state legislators nationwide had used Big Pharma cash to support their campaigns.
While many of the state campaign contributions were relatively small, other state and federal lawmakers cashed much larger checks as the industry focused on donating to legislators in key positions:8,9
Chad Mayes — Mayes is the vice chair on the Committee on Health for the California State Assembly10 and he accepted $79,600.
Tim Knopp — Vice chair of the Oregon Senate health care committee, Knopp accepted $25,000. This was the largest contribution from a single trade group, PhRMA.
Richard Hudson — U.S. Rep. Hudson, R-N.C., holds a seat on the Energy and Health subcommittee,11 which oversees health care legislation. He accepted $139,500. According to Open Secrets,12 his donations from pharmaceutical and health industries totaled $275,980.
Thom Tillis — U.S. Sen. Tillis, R-N.C., holds a seat on the Senate Judiciary Committee13 that oversees intellectual property law. He wrote a bill to expand the industry’s patent protection. He accepted $471,489 in pharmaceutical and health industry contributions.14
Anna Eshoo — Rep. Eshoo, D-Calif., chairs the Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health and has taken more money over her career than any other member of the House in California, totaling more than $1.6 million.15
These are just a few of the state and federal legislators who are taking money from the drug industry to fund their campaigns, which gives the industry a front row seat to influence the lawmaker. Constance Bagley, consultant and former Yale professor, spoke with STAT about campaign contributions, saying:16
“A campaign contribution gets you access. Legislators will say, ‘Well, that doesn’t mean I’m being bribed.’ But frankly, my view is that if you get immediate access if you give a contribution, and you don’t get immediate access if you don’t, it’s hard to say that it’s not getting you something.”
Bipartisan Big Pharma Support Funded Congressional Campaigns
The analysis of the state and federal campaign contributions from the pharmaceutical industry shows the industry takes a bipartisan approach to influencing legislators. In other words, it is not an ideology the industry supports, but rather their own bottom line.
In 2020, $4.5 million was donated to Democrats on the state level and $4.4 million to Republicans.17Although the industry appears to have an interest in preventing the Democratic Party from controlling the White House and Congress, during 2020 $7.1 million was spent on Republican candidates and $6.6 million was spent on Democratic candidates.18
In the federal elections, STAT found that taking drug money increased the potential the candidates would be elected.19 Once elected, the drug industry and lobbyists continue to extend perks to the legislators by offering them lucrative jobs once they leave office, which has become known as the “revolving door.”
This encourages the lawmakers to protect the best interest of their future employers, the lobbyists who are representing the pharmaceutical industry. Former lobbyist and author Jack Abramoff was convicted on felony charges for fraud and conspiracy as a lobbyist and “became a symbol of the excesses of Washington influence peddling.”20
When interviewed by Lesley Stahl in 2011, he characterized lobbyists’ relationships with lawmakers this way:21
“When we would become friendly with an office and they were important to us, and the chief of staff was a competent person, I would say or my staff would say to him or her at some point, ‘You know, when you’re done working on the Hill, we’d very much like you to consider coming to work for us.’
Now the moment I said that to them or any of our staff said that to ’em, that was it. We owned them. And what does that mean? Every request from our office, every request of our clients, everything that we want, they’re gonna do. And not only that, they’re gonna think of things we can’t think of to do.”
State campaign finance laws differ across the U.S. In some cases, corporations can donate directly to lawmakers and in other states there are no contribution limits. Maribeth Guarino, a health care advocate for the nonprofit Oregon State Public Interest Research Group, talked about the fight in Oregon to lower prescription prices, saying:22
“Pharma is fighting us hard in any way that they can: By campaign contributions, by lobbying, whatever angle they can get to gain a foothold. Oregon has no contribution limits for campaigns. Pharmaceutical companies can spend as much as they think it’ll take to win.”
Political Action Committees Exploit a Legal Loophole
In some states it is illegal for industries, businesses and corporations to donate directly to candidates. However, that has not stopped the industry from finding a legal loophole that allows them to continue to influence candidates. Companies form political action committees (PACs) to raise and spend money that influences elections.
A PAC can give up to $5,000 to a single candidate committee or up to $15,000 each year to a national party committee.23 A PAC can also give $5,000 annually to any other PAC and receive up to $5,000 from any individual, PAC or party committee annually.
According to STAT, these PACs are often funded by contributions from industry executive and corporate leadership. In their analysis of the data, they found that legislators could directly receive campaign contributions from a PAC, and they could also be funneled through the legislators’ separate PAC campaign group.
This allows the industry to donate twice to the legislature — individually and through their PAC. While legislators may create their own PAC, others, like the Blue Dog PAC,24 are affiliated with a group of legislators and are not directly linked to an individual member of Congress.
STAT found that the Pfizer drug company used its PAC to write 1,048 checks in 43 states to lawmakers and candidates.25 A spokesperson from Pfizer said in a statement that the donations are:26
“… part of our overall efforts to advance public policies that support the health needs of the patients we serve. Even during our important work for the development of a safe and effective Covid-19 vaccine, we remained laser-focused on advocating for state laws that support scientific innovation and lower out-of-pocket costs.”
PhRMA wrote fewer checks but spent more money than any other drug industry group, totaling $1.58 million.27 A spokesperson for PhRMA talked about the breadth and depth of the group’s involvement in state and federal legislatures in a statement, commenting they were monitoring 220 bills in Washington and 200 state proposals in 44 states. Each of these bills had an impact on biopharma companies.
In early 2019, the pharmaceutical industry was faced with criticism over drug prices and lobbyists were fighting a wave of bills that sought to cap prices or add transparency requirements.
This changed in 2020 when major drug makers developed a COVID-19 vaccine in record time for which they are not held responsible for related adverse effects or death.28 Guarino commented on the orchestrated reversal in public opinion:29
“They’ve become very popular in the last year because of their efforts to create and develop and deliver vaccines. But when it comes to cost, the public is still frustrated, still paying out of pocket, still hurting.”
Big Pharma Profiting From Pandemic Response
One example of the high drug prices during the pandemic is remdesivir. This antiviral drug was initially evaluated in 2014 for the Ebola outbreak.30 It cost taxpayers $70.5 million, and that number may be higher.31 After disappointing results for Ebola, it was brought out again in the early months of 2020 for the COVID-19 pandemic.
Despite initial estimates showing the cost to produce a finished product was $10,32 drugmaker Gilead charges the government $2,340 and private insurers $3,120.33 The estimate to produce remdesivir was made by The Institute for Clinical and Economic Review (ICER).34
ICER revised this cost range to between $10 and $600 for a 10-day course after three producers in Bangladesh and India reported developing the drug in a price range of $590 to $710 for a 10-day course. You’ll find more about Remdesivir and the pricing model in “Remdesivir Is a Scam Like Tamiflu.”
As I wrote in “Just How Powerful Is Big Pharma?” the Wellcome Trust has been a major player in the COVID-19 pandemic and is part of the technocratic globalist network. Wellcome is the largest charity in the U.K. that funds “innovative biomedical research.”35
The director, Jeremy Farrar, holds a position in the U.K. Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies and a board seat with the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, which gave $1 billion to COVID-19 vaccine development.
Wellcome is heavily invested in companies manufacturing the vaccine and reported gains of $4.5 billion from investments in 2020, which the BMJ notes36 is “three times more money than the trust gave away in charity.”
The cost of the vaccine to the government has also been called into question. Thus far, the price has been set by government contracts since only governments have been purchasing the COVID-19 vaccine. However, as has been pointed out, different countries pay different prices.37
For example, South Africa paid more than twice the price per dose paid by the European Union and the EU is paying less for the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine than the U.S.
Drug companies are playing a long game, looking beyond the current pandemic response and anticipating the vaccine will be as routine as the flu vaccination. A journalist from Managed Healthcare Executive reports Pfizer’s CFO Frank D’Amelio spoke at an earnings call in February 2021, saying:38
“Now let’s go beyond a pandemic-pricing environment, the environment we’re currently in. Obviously, we’re going to get more on price.
And clearly, to your point, the more volume we put through our factories, the lower unit cost will become. So clearly, there’s a significant opportunity for those margins to improve once we get beyond the pandemic environment that we’re in.”
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As the UK High Court grants limited permission for the US government to pursue its appeal against the decision opposing the extradition of Wikileaks publisher Julian Assange, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) reiterates the call for Assange’s immediate release and for the case against him to be dropped.
On 7 July, the UK High Court gave notice to the parties involved that the US government’s appeal against the extradition decision will be listed for a hearing. No date has yet been given. The US government will be permitted to appeal only on technical grounds, not on the broader merits of the case.
The US appeal is against the decision by UK District Judge Vanessa Baraitser on 4 January, ruling against Assange’s extradition to the US on mental health grounds. Although RSF welcomed the decision against extradition, RSF condemned the court’s failure to take a strong position for press freedom and journalism, as the substance of the ruling – which found largely in favour of the prosecution’s arguments – leaves the door open for further similar prosecutions.
“It comes as no surprise that the UK High Court will consider the US government’s appeal, but Julian Assange should not be in this position in the first place. He has been targeted for his contributions to public interest reporting, and his prosecution in the US would have severe and long-lasting implications for journalism and press freedom around the world. We call again for the Biden administration to drop the appeal and close the case, and for the UK to immediately release Assange from prison, where his mental and physical health remain at high risk,” said RSF’s Director of International Campaigns Rebecca Vincent.
In the US, Assange faces a total of 18 charges — 17 under the Espionage Act, and one under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. Assange would be the first publisher prosecuted under the Espionage Act, which lacks a public interest defence. If convicted, Assange could face a total of 175 years in prison. RSF is one of 24 press freedom, civil liberties, and international human rights organisations that has called on the Biden administration to stop pursuing its appeal.
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“We need to openly consider all the costs, benefits, and consequences of military action,” said the two Democratic lawmakers, “and that includes doing everything we can to prevent and respond to civilian harm.”
Sen. Elizabeth Warren on Tuesday called on the U.S. Department of Defense to review “significant discrepancies in civilian casualty counts,” a month after the Pentagon released its annual report on civilian deaths and injuries as a result of U.S. operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, Nigeria, and Somalia.
The Massachusetts Democrat spoke out on social media days after joining Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) in writing (pdf) to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin III regarding the annual report.
The Pentagon stated in its “Annual Report on Civilian Casualties In Connection With United States Military Operations in 2020” (pdf) findingthat there were “approximately 23 civilians killed and approximately 10 civilians injured” in U.S. military actions last year—numbers which did not match the findings of independent outside researchers including Airwars and Brown University’s Costs of War Project.
“Sources say the real number [of casualties] is almost five times higher,” than the Pentagon reported, said Warren. “Protecting civilians must be a priority—Rep. Khanna and I want Secretary Austin to investigate.”
The @DeptofDefense reported 23 civilian deaths and 10 injuries from US military operations last year, but sources say the real number is almost 5 times higher. Protecting civilians must be a priority – @RepRoKhanna and I want @SecDef Austin to investigate. https://t.co/BEZpz5ECmE
In their letter, Khanna and Warren cited research from Airwars, a U.K.-based monitoring group run by journalists and international conflict researchers, which reported at least 34 civilian deaths caused by U.S.-led attacks last year in Iraq and Syria alone. The groups also counted between seven and 13 civilian deaths in Somalia.
“The minimum public estimate of civilian deaths caused by U.S. forces during 2020 across five conflict nations was 102 fatalities,” said Airwars in its own annual report last month.
As Common Dreams reported, Airwars and the Costs of War Project found an even greater discrepancy in the Pentagon’s official tally last year after the DoD claimed responsibility for 132 civilian deaths, compared to 1,100 reported by the two groups in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria.
This year, the Pentagon claimed responsibility for 20 deaths and five injuries in Afghanistan, but as Airwars reported, the United Nations Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) “attributed 120 civilian casualties (89 killed and 31 injured) to international military forces.”
Warren and Khanna called on Austin “to ensure that U.S. military investigations into civilian casualties give greater weight to external sources of information rather than relying solely on its own internal records and sources when assessing third party reports of civilian harm.”
“Using the same sources of information that were used to plan the strike or raid and to verify its results without seeking information from witnesses or survivors of attacks or by visiting the site of strikes cannot give a clear and accurate account of the civilian casualties,” they wrote.
The lawmakers also questioned the DoD’s approach to officially expressing condolences to the families of victims of U.S. military operations—which the Pentagon’s report suggested officials had not done last year.
Despite the allocation of $3 million for payments to grieving families, Warren and Khanna noted, the Pentagon report “said the department offered zero ex gratia payments in 2020.”
“This is despite repeated authorization and funding from Congress, the congressionally mandated development of a new interim policy on ex gratia, and the large number of cases over many years where the department has confirmed civilian casualties and has a means of contacting survivors,” they wrote. “It’s especially striking this year, given that the DoD could have used its $3 million allocation to offer ex gratia to every single civilian confirmed harmed in 2020, with significant funding to spare.”
Warren and Khanna called on Austin to put into practice the measures proposed in the two Democrats’ bicameral legislation, the Protection of Civilians in Military Operations Act, which they introduced in June 2020, including:
requiring U.S. military commanders to select an officer from outside their unit or chain of command to conduct an investigation into civilian casualties arising from that unit’s or command’s military operations;
establishing a publicly accessible database for all DoD reports of investigations into the civilian casualties resulting from U.S. military operations, and the results of such investigations; and
requiring each commander of a geographic combatant command to establish an uninterrupted line of communication between his or her command and the Chief of Mission in order to field and coordinate reports of civilian casualties resulting from U.S. military operations.
“We need to openly consider all the costs, benefits, and consequences of military action, and that includes doing everything we can to prevent and respond to civilian harm,” said the lawmakers. “Strengthening investigations, accurately and transparently reporting on civilian harm, expressing condolences for harm when it happens, and learning from these incidents to prevent harm in the future are all essential steps that reinforce the importance of protecting civilians as a national security priority and as a moral and ethical imperative.”
From Common Dreams: Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
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NATO’s Allied Air Command reported that the military bloc participated in the multinational air combat exercise Anatolian Eagle 2021, which occurred from June 21 to July 2.
Hosted by Turkey at its Third Main Jet Base in Konya, the war games included combat aircraft from Turkey, Pakistan, Azerbaijan and Qatar. All four nations are NATO members or partners.
Earlier the Turkish Defense Ministry also confirmed that NATO was conducting a certification assessment of six F-16s, a Boeing KC-135R Stratotanker and six Stinger air defense teams “committed to the NATO Response Force (NRF)” for the first time during the exercise.
As previously reported, Qatar provided French-made Rafales of the sort recently sold to Greece and India, and Azerbaijan supplied Russian-made combat planes used by Armenia and India: Sukhois and MiGs, respectively, are the very backbone of the Armenian and Indian air forces.
Please note the terminology in this excerpt from the NATO press release on the event: “The exercise was designed to provide training opportunities for combat ready aircrews to increase proficiency and exchange experiences with allied and partner nations.” Allied in NATO language means a NATO member and partner is a member of a NATO military partnership. The latter term is never used in any other capacity.
The transparent, the irrefutable purpose of the two-week exercise was to train the Turkish and Pakistani air forces for encounters with those of Armenia and India and even with NATO member Greece.
NATO was fully aware of that, and in participating in the maneuvers it endorsed alike their intent and probable application.
To editorialize. The growing and at time deafening chorus of voices from both sides of the world and across the political spectrum (such as it is) claiming that the Turkey-Pakistan-Azerbaijan military alliance – we have to have to courage to admit it is now a Turkey-Pakistan-Azerbaijan-Russia axis – is a challenge or counterbalance to NATO need only acquaint themselves with the evidence of the facts, which are amassing daily, that the above alliance represents anything but opposition to NATO. Recent examples abound, they are legion: here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here.
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Rick Rozoff, renowned author and geopolitical analyst, actively involved in opposing war, militarism and interventionism for over fifty years. He manages the Anti-Bellum and For peace, against war website
He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization.
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It took over half a year, but the US government’s case against Julian Assange continues its draining grind. Even the Biden administration, which claims to tolerate a free press and truthful dialogue with the fourth estate, has decided to exhaust its legal options in seeking the publisher’s scalp.
On July 7, the UK High Court of Justice agreed to hear the appeal from the US government on narrow grounds, though no date has been set for those proceedings. The Crown Prosecution Service, representing the US government, is challenging District Court Judge Vanessa Baraitser’s ruling that Assange not be extradited for health and medical reasons.
That judgment accepted the defence’s evidence that Assange was a suicide risk, and that the conditions of detention in a US supermax prison facility might well exacerbate it. There was also a “real risk that … Assange will be subject to restrictive special administrative measures [SAMs].” The result of such measures would see his mental health “deteriorate to the point where he will commit suicide with the ‘single minded determination’ described by Dr [Quinton] Deeley.” She was further “satisfied that Mr Assange’s suicidal impulses will come from his psychiatric diagnoses rather than his own voluntary act.” Given such evidence “it would be oppressive to extradite [Assange] to the United States of America.”
The submissions by the prosecution are not publicly available, but have been reviewed by Kevin Gosztola of Shadowproof. They contend that the judge erred in law in determining that Assange’s extradition was oppressive. The judge should have also been forthcoming to the US government of her concerns or “provisional view” of the risk posed to Assange and sought relevant “assurances”.
This latter point is disingenuous; the case by the US Department of Justice was based on shoddy assertions by prosecutors and expert witnesses who betrayed their ignorance about the role played by SAMs and supermax prison conditions. But in making their appeal, the prosecutors were all sweetness, suggesting that SAMs would not be imposed on Assange in pre-trial detention or, should he be convicted, in prison. Feeling the need to draw the line somewhere, they would not promise that other forms of isolation of administrative segregation would not be used. While Assange would not necessarily find himself incarcerated at the ADX Florence in Colorado, it would depend on any “future act” that would qualify.
As for how Assange would be treated medically, the CPS made another weak promise that he would “receive clinical and psychological treatment as is recommended by a qualified clinician employed or retained by the prison.”
The prosecutors were also willing to give another assurance they refused to test at trial. Assange would be allowed to avail himself of the Council of Europe Convention on the Transfer of Sentenced Persons in brokering a prisoner transfer to Australia. The DoJ would give their consent to any such arrangement.
Assange’s defence lawyers were terse in rejecting the contention. “They had every opportunity to offer such an assurance at the extradition hearing, since the relevant Council of Europe treaty has been in operation for many years.” Any such proceeding pursuant to the treaty, in any case, “could not take place until the conclusion of the trial and all appellate processes, which are obviously likely to be very prolonged.” As this was taking place, the publisher would face conditions of isolation “in an alien and hostile environment far from his family.”
The prosecutors further sought to weaken Varaitser’s judgment by again targeting the testimony of Professor Michael Kopelman, whose evidence they had failed to discredit at trial. That less than noble effort involved claiming that Assange “had a strong incentive to feign or exaggerate his symptoms” aided by his consultation of “scientific journals”. The prosecution also accused Kopelman of a lack of partiality “by deliberately concealing information that he had been told about Mr Assange’s partner Stella Moris, and their children.” Judge Baraitser found the concealment “misleading and inappropriate in the context of his obligations to the court, but an understandable human response.” She accepted Kopelman’s view that “Assange suffers from recurrent depressive disorder, which was severe in December 2019, and sometimes accompanied by psychotic features (hallucinations), often with ruminative suicidal ideas.”
The defence countered in their submission against the appealing prosecutors that Baraitser had not erred in law in concluding that Assange’s “suicidal impulses” would stem from his “psychiatric condition” and would not be the result of “his own voluntary act.” The “attack” on Kopelman also failed to “recognise the entitlement of the primary decision maker to reach her own decision on the weight to be attached to the expert evidence of the defence on the one hand and the prosecution experts on the other.”
In a statement in response to the High Court decision, Moris responded by recounting the miscellany of glaring defects in the case against her partner: the fabricated testimony of lead DoJ witness Sigurdur Thordarson; nefarious suggestions that Assange be assassinated by US agents; surveillance of his legal team and the theft of legal documents; and, for good measure, threats against the family. “The case is rotten to the core, and nothing that the US government can say about his future treatment is worth the paper it is written on.” Such a presumption is virtually beyond rebuttal.
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Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research and Asia-Pacific Research. Email: [email protected]
Dr Jane Ruby joins Stew Peters to discuss a scientific report that just came out from the University of Almería School of Engineering in Spain entitled, “Graphene Oxide Detection in Aqueous Suspension: Observational Study in Optical and Electron Microscopy”, where it was found that each dose of the Pfizer shot “was found to contain 6 ng of RNA and 747 ng of graphene oxide, which is 99.103% of the medication.
It is not the first time that humanity faces a new virus : it experienced H2N2 in 1957, H3N2 in 1968, SARS-CoV in 2003, H5N1 in 2004, H1N1 in 2009, MERS-CoV in 2012 and faces the seasonal flu virus every year. However, none of the measures taken for SARS-CoV-2 has been taken for these viruses.
The underlying cause of death is defined by the WHO as “the disease or injury that initiated the train of events leading directly to death”. What the CDC is recommending with regards to statistical coding and categorization is that COVID-19 is expected to be the underlying cause of death “more often than not.” The CDC combines these two criteria. “underlying cause of death”, more often than not.
As Big Tech, the Biden Administration, Hollywood, politicians, employers and health care providers around the nation galvanize the public to undergo Covid vaccination, the number of casualties who have died or suffer life-threatening effects from the experimental mRNA injections continues to climb.
More than 520 of America’s 5,300 colleges and universities, approximately 10 percent, have announced students must be fully vaccinated against COVID before they return for fall classes. Among these institutions are the public universities of California and New York, pending full U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval of the vaccines. Together, these two systems enroll approximately 1.5 million students.
A stunning revelation emerged recently that exposes the lies behind the global “vaccination” campaign in one of the leading nations when it comes to the percentage of people who have been fully jabbed. According to Public Health England data, 43% of Covid-19 fatalities in the UK were people who were fully “vaccinated”. Furthermore, a shocking 60% of Covid-19 deaths are attributed to people who have received at least one dose.
One question that many people ask with regards to the events of September 11 was why the U.S. Air Force went missing in action for over 90 minutes as four lumbering commercial jets traveled around American airspace at will. Now with the death of Donald Rumsfeld, 88, the world may never know.
On July 2nd, fleeing questions from reporters about U.S. plans in Afghanistan, President Joe Biden sought refuge behind the July 4th Independence Day holiday. Yet he obliquely acknowledged that the U.S. will use some level of “over-the-horizon” air attacks to prevent the Taliban from taking power, attacks that will include drones and manned aircraft, possibly even B-52s.
Reports that US and British aircraft carrying arms to ISIS were shot down by Iraqi forces (Iraqi News 2015) were met with shock and denial in western countries. Yet few in the Middle East doubt that Washington is playing a ‘double game’ with its proxy armies in Syria.
As the father and brother of imprisoned journalist Julian Assange wrapped up their month long “Home Run for Julian” tour through 16 U.S. cities, the government’s principal witness against Assange recanted his testimony. Sigurdur Ingi Thordarson, whom the Department of Justice (DOJ) had recruited to build its case against Assange, admitted to the Icelandic newspaper Stundin that he fabricated key allegations in the indictment in return for immunity from prosecution by the FBI in a quid pro quo.
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A stunning revelation emerged recently that exposes the lies behind the global “vaccination” campaign in one of the leading nations when it comes to the percentage of people who have been fully jabbed. According to Public Health England data, 43% of Covid-19 fatalities in the UK were people who were fully “vaccinated”. Furthermore, a shocking 60% of Covid-19 deaths are attributed to people who have received at least one dose.
What this tragic news reveals is something most of us who have been railing against these experimental “vaccines” have been saying for months only to be shouted down and dismissed as “antivaxxers” and “conspiracy theorists”. There is a reason why truly safe and effective vaccines take on the average of 10-15 years to develop, test and garner approval for general use. That was not the case with these biotech corporation nostrums which were rushed into production after only three months of human trials.
Pfizer's shot causes "mortality hundreds of times greater in young people compared to mortality from coronavirus without the vaccine, and dozens of times more in the elderly, https://t.co/9AhVNBVudO
— William Christenson (@William95147321) July 6, 2021
As evidenced by the horrific condo collapse in Miami, cutting corners is a recipe for disaster. What is true of buildings is infinitely truer when it comes to the human body. For decades, the standard protocol for determining the safety and efficacy of vaccines required subjecting all pharmaceutical products to undergo clinical trials that had five phases. Each clinical phase entailed rigorous testing, double-blind studies, murder boards and meticulous peer reviews. These steps were essential to eliminate confirmation bias and to ensure perceived short-term benefits were not overcome by long-term risks. These prerequisite steps were bypassed for the first time when it came to Covid-19 “vaccines”, which is why we are seeing record numbers of injuries and deaths associated with them.
The CDC’s own VAERS database shows an explosion in the number of injuries and deaths associated with just children. This same picture is evident among the overall jabbed population
The events we are witnessing in real time should be the basis for Nuremberg Trials 2.0; politicians, pundits, public health officials and medical professionals have maliciously pushed these unproven and unsafe “vaccines” and leveraged their status to condition more than 2 billion people around the world to get jabbed with toxins that could one day lead to a global holocaust. The same way Nazi doctors injected Jews and “undesirables” with experimental drugs, authority figures are coercing tens of millions of Americans and billions around the world to get jabbed without informed consent.
The alarming number of post-“vaccination” injuries and deaths that are being reported in the UK, the United States and beyond are but the tip of the iceberg. As much as I hope and pray that I am wrong, past studies have shown that there are greater body counts to come. Though mRNA “vaccines” were only tested on humans for three months last year, they have been around ever since Messenger RNA was discovered in 1961. Virologists have been testing mRNA boosters on lab animals, specifically ferrets and cats, for more than two decades.
All animal trials resulted in disaster, the death of most or all of the animals.
What transpired next is what keeps me awake at night given the number of family and friends who have been “vaccinated”. The lab animals that developed antibodies once they got jabbed were wiped out once their short-lived immunity wore off and they were reintroduced to SARS. What led to their wholesale extermination was a condition called Antibody-Dependent Enhancement (ADE). An autoimmune disease much like HIV/AIDS, ADE hijacks immune systems and turns an organism’s natural defense systems against its own vital organs.
If we actually had a free-press, the breathtaking developments in the UK would be treated as breaking news and politicians would treat this devastating development as the crisis it truly is. To the contrary, the political class and their enablers in mainstream media are bandying talking points stating that 99% of Covid-19 deaths in America are attributed to the “unvaccinated”. What they are omitting from this propaganda is that they are not using the same PCR [enlargement] thresholds between those who got jabbed and those who refused. Not even Enron stooped to this level of dishonest accounting.
As Dr. Brian Tyson noted in the interview below I conducted with him last week, which was subsequently deleted by YouTube, there is a global conspiracy to bury truths and promote these unsafe and inefficacious experimental gene therapy cocktails they are promoting as “vaccines”. The fact that any hint of dissent and any questions about these boosters, including from renowned doctors who specialize in Covid-19 treatments, is being censored in ways that are truly unprecedented is all the proof we need that there is something afoot beyond protecting the public.
The more the media narratives that are driving this insane mass-“vaccination” campaign start to unravel, the more the establishment double-down. Since facts are not on their side, the only thing they can do is traffic in fear-porn, revert to ad hominem and inflame people’s already frayed emotions. Their latest gambit is the “lambda variant” as they try to scare the hell out of people in order to manufacture “vaccine” consent. What they are not telling us is that it’s the jabs that are most likely causing the mutations to begin with. Last year, Brazil, South Africa and the UK were the countries that the AstraZeneca “vaccines” were tested in. I’m sure it was just a coincidence that those three countries happen to be the source of the three mutations that are ricocheting around the world.
Instead of pressing pause and truly assessing the risk profile of these experimental “vaccines”, the establishment have moved the goal post in order to justify the continued use of these deadly boosters. Their latest talking point is that deaths are to be expected among “vaccinated” people even though a few months ago they were raving about how “safe and effective” these jabs were. They are perfectly prepared to sacrifice you and your children in order to get to their desired outcome. Question is, are you willing to risk irreparable harm or death in order to protect yourself from a virus that has a mortality rate of less than 0.66%?
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Teodrose Fikremariam is the co-founder and editor of the Ghion Journal. Prior to launching the Ghion Journal, he was a political organizer who once wrote a speech idea in 2008 that was incorporated into Barack Obama’s South Carolina primary victory speech. He is originally from Ethiopia and a direct descendent, seven generations removed, of one of Ethiopia’s greatest Emperors Tewodros II.
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As the father and brother of imprisoned journalist Julian Assange wrapped up their month long “Home Run for Julian” tour through 16 U.S. cities, the government’s principal witness against Assange recanted his testimony. Sigurdur Ingi Thordarson, whom the Department of Justice (DOJ) had recruited to build its case against Assange, admitted to the Icelandic newspaper Stundin that he fabricated key allegations in the indictment in return for immunity from prosecution by the FBI in a quid pro quo.
The admissions of Thordarson — that he lied about Assange being a hacker — threatens to unravel the government’s case. “The factual basis for this case has completely fallen apart,” Assange attorney Jennifer Robinson toldDemocracy Now!
By enlisting Thordarson to construct a case against Assange, the U.S. government “made a deal with the devil,” constitutional law scholar Stephen Rohde stated during the tour’s June 28 Los Angeles panel discussion, in which I also participated.
The superseding indictment that the Trump administration filed in May 2019 charged that Assange and WikiLeaks obtained and published classified material provided by Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning, in violation of the Espionage Act. Those charges carry 170 years in prison. But they were vulnerable to attack because of what is called the “New York Times problem.”
The “New York Times Problem”
No journalist or media outlet has ever been prosecuted under the Espionage Act for publishing truthful information. The First Amendment allows journalists to publish material that was illegally obtained by a third person if it is a matter of public concern. The U.S. government has never prosecuted a journalist or newspaper for publishing classified information, which constitutes an essential tool of journalism.
Indeed, the Obama administration, which prosecuted more whistleblowers under the Espionage Act than all prior presidents combined, declined to indict Assange. WikiLeaks did what The New York Times, The Guardian, Der Spiegel, Le Monde and El País also did. It published articles based on documents Manning had leaked. The Obama administration feared establishing “a precedent that could chill investigative reporting about national security matters by treating it as a crime,” according to Charlie Savage of The New York Times. Obama could not distinguish between what WikiLeaks did and what news media organizations like the Times “do in soliciting and publishing information they obtain that the government wants to keep secret,” Savage wrote. This is the “New York Times problem.”
In light of potential difficulties in convicting Assange as a journalist, the Trump administration filed a second superseding indictment in June 2020, based on Thordarson’s allegations. It aimed to shore up the hacking count under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act charged in Trump’s original indictment. Thordarson said Assange instructed him to commit computer intrusion or hacking in Iceland.
If U.S. prosecutors could portray Assange as a hacker instead of a journalist, they could get around the “New York Times problem.” But now that Thordarson has recanted his testimony, the hacking charge unravels.
Notwithstanding the Obama-Biden administration’s refusal to charge Assange, President Joe Biden has refused to dismiss Trump’s appeal of the British judge’s denial of extradition of Assange to the United States. Magistrate Vanessa Baraitser denied extradition on humanitarian grounds. She ruled that the U.S. prison system was unable to protect Assange from committing suicide since he would be placed in solitary confinement with onerous conditions, although she accepted the Trump administration’s other contentions. Trump appealed the denial of extradition and Biden is continuing that appeal, even though the U.K.’s High Court has not yet decided whether it will even allow the U.S. government permission to appeal. Meanwhile, Assange remains incarcerated in London’s maximum security Belmarsh Prison.
Revelations of U.S. War Crimes
So why are the revelations by Assange and WikiLeaks so threatening to the U.S. government?
In 2010 and 2011, WikiLeaks published evidence of war crimes that the U.S. military had committed in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantánamo. That is the basis for 17 charges against Assange under the Espionage Act. Manning provided the documents to WikiLeaks after she tried in vain to enlist her chain of command to investigate the evidence of torture and atrocities that she had uncovered.
The disclosures included 400,000 field reports about the Iraq War, 15,000 unreported deaths of Iraqi civilians, and evidence of systematic torture, murder and rape after U.S. forces “handed over detainees to a notorious Iraqi torture squad,” the documents reveal. WikiLeaks also published the Afghan War Logs, 90,000 reports about the war in Afghanistan, which revealed more civilian casualties by coalition forces than the U.S. military had admitted to. And the Guantánamo Files — 779 secret reports — showed that 150 innocent people had been imprisoned there for years and documented the U.S. government’s torture and abuse of 800 men and boys, in violation of the Geneva Conventions and the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.
But the most notable release by WikiLeaks was the 2007 “Collateral Murder” video, depicting a U.S. Army Apache helicopter gunship in Baghdad target and fire at unarmed civilians. At least 18 civilians were killed — including two Reuters reporters and a man who tried to rescue the wounded. Two children were injured. An U.S. Army tank then drove over one of the bodies, cutting it in half. The video records three separate war crimes that are prohibited by the Geneva Conventions and the U.S. Army Field Manual.
Manning was troubled by the comments of U.S. soldiers in the video who referred to their targets as “dead bastards.” She thought the revelations could spark a domestic debate about the role of the military and U.S. foreign policy in Afghanistan and Iraq and its effects on the Afghan and Iraqi people.
At the Los Angeles panel, Assange’s father John Shipton called Manning “a historical figure of phenomenal importance” for providing “those magnificent releases” which Assange and WikiLeaks published.
Biden Must Dismiss Trump’s Appeal Against Assange
John described the 8-by-10-foot cell in which Assange spends 23 hours a day. Shipton cited the 2015 finding of the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention that Assange had been arbitrarily detained in violation of international law. Before he was sent to Belmarsh Prison more than two years ago, Assange had resided in the Ecuadoran embassy in London under a grant of asylum for seven years. After a change of government in Ecuador, a U.S.-friendly regime ended Assange’s asylum, and the U.K. police arrested him for charges in the indictment filed by the Trump administration.
“I don’t think a lot of Americans recognize what a gross injustice this is,” University of Southern California law professor Jody Armour remarked during the Los Angeles panel discussion. “When you have people from Amy Goodman to Tucker Carlson stepping back and saying … ‘this doesn’t smell right,’ when you have people characterizing someone as a hacker to try to solve the New York Times problem, because it’s not soluble, really.”
Gabriel Shipton, Assange’s brother, characterized the reception they have received during their nationwide tour as an “upwelling of support [that] has taken our breath away.” He is heartened by the Biden DOJ’s response to the Trump subpoenas of journalists’ records and emails targeting reporters from The New York Times and CNN.
Now that Attorney General Merrick Garland “has started to pull those back,” Gabriel noted, that is “very encouraging.” Gabriel is also encouraged by the release of whistleblower Reality Winner from prison and the Supreme Court’s narrowing of the scope of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. Moreover, Gabriel said, when the U.S. government confronts “authoritarian states,” such as Russia, China and Azerbaijan, about their human rights violations, those countries’ leaders point to the U.S.’s hypocrisy when it has targeted Julian Assange, a publisher.
“This is a global problem,” John said. He is reassured by the support for Assange from cross-party groups in Germany, the U.K. Parliament, the Australian Parliament, France, Spain, Italy and the Council of Europe, as well as Austria, Switzerland and Mexico.
“Let us not be fooled,” UN Special Rapporteur Nils Melzer wrote in a 2019 article in Newsweek, arguing that the extradition of Assange must be understood as a direct attempt at “drowning his radical challenge to government secrecy, which holds the power to change world affairs forever.” Melzer added that this is why “the powerful prosecuted Assange with ferocity, while proven war criminals are allowed to walk free.” Melzer ends his op-ed with a call to people in the United States to “use your democratic rights to hold your Government accountable.” Melzer’s investigation revealed that Assange suffered “prolonged exposure to psychological torture” during his confinement in Britain.
In February, 24 human rights organizations — including the ACLU, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, the Committee to Protect Journalists and Reporters Without Borders — wrote a letter to the DOJ, urging it to drop the appeal of the denial of extradition.
On Memorial Day, Biden invoked the global struggle for democracy, declaring that it thrives “when a free and independent press pursues the truth.” In publicizing evidence of U.S. war crimes, Assange and WikiLeaksrevealed the truth for all to see. It is time for Biden to put his actions where his mouth is and dismiss the U.S. government’s appeal of the U.K. court’s denial of extradition of Julian Assange to the United States.
John Shipton stated that by prosecuting Assange, the U.S. government “brought shame upon themselves.” But, he added, “with the freeing of Julian and bringing him home to his family … we are allowed to emerge once more and see the stars.”
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Marjorie Cohn is professor emerita at Thomas Jefferson School of Law, former president of the National Lawyers Guild, and a member of the bureau of the International Association of Democratic Lawyers and the advisory board of Veterans for Peace. Her books include Drones and Targeted Killing: Legal, Moral, and Geopolitical Issues.
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More than 520 of America’s 5,300 colleges and universities, approximately 10 percent, have announced students must be fully vaccinated against COVID before they return for fall classes. Among these institutions are the public universities of California and New York, pending full U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval of the vaccines. Together, these two systems enroll approximately 1.5 million students.
Other state universities that have enacted vaccine “mandates” include the universities of Michigan and Maryland, as well as Indiana University. Scores of private institutions have also mandated COVID vaccines, including Yale, Stanford, Duke, Johns Hopkins, Cornell, Notre Dame, Emory, Brown, Syracuse, Boston University, and Princeton.
We think that these mandates are unethical, chiefly because they indiscriminately require administering an experimental biological agent in the setting of a clinical investigation to a population that is at greater risk of harm from the drug than from COVID. Our advice to schools that have not yet adopted vaccine mandates is: don’t.
But where participation in the investigational vaccination program is nevertheless required by university policies, there must be sensible, medically sound policies for granting medical exemptions.
Many Exemptions Policies Are Medically Unsound
All the colleges and universities that have announced mandates have also indicated they will grant medical exceptions. Some have publicly made available the criteria according to which they will decide exemption petitions.
We have examined many of these rubrics. The narrow scope of these medical exemptions is alarming: the exemptions are so medically unsound and unduly restrictive that they create a clear and present danger to the health, and potentially, the lives, of students subject to these mandates.
In our professional medical judgment, these published protocols are deficient in at least four crucial respects. Any sound policy for granting medical exemptions from COVID vaccine mandates must avoid all four of these mistakes. A school making any one of them endangers its students. A school making all four is headed for a catastrophe.
Four Major Mistakes These Policies Make
First, none of the schools whose published criteria we have examined include the most elementary medical ground of all: natural immunity from a previous COVID infection. At Rutgers, the state university of New Jersey, the website asks students: “already had COVID? You still need to show proof of vaccination for in-person attendance.”
The Cornell website’s reply to whether students should get vaccinated even with a prior infection is “Yes.” Notre Dame made this especially clear when summer school opened. At first, the university website said that “lab results showing your immunity” would be acceptable proof of a vaccine. Then it abruptly changed. It now states that “lab results showing your immunity…does not include Covid 19 antibody testing.”
The scientific data demonstrate that the natural immunity acquired by previous COVID infection is at least as durable and effective as that provided by the vaccines. The data also shows that those who possess this natural immunity present no greater risk of transmitting the virus to others than those who have been vaccinated.
Every school justifies its mandate by claiming this is the only effective way to maintain a safe campus environment. But jabbing students who are already immune contributes nothing whatsoever to campus safety. All that it does, medically speaking, is create danger.
Requiring the immune to get vaccinated exposes these students to a significant risk of excess adverse reactions, especially of thrombosis and myocardial inflammation, neurologic injury, and possibly of death. Several publishedstudies suggest, moreover, a significantly increased risk of adverse reactions to the vaccine among those previously infected. There is no reason to put the hundreds of thousands—if not millions—of students who possess natural immunity in such danger.
The CDC Is Not a Medical Institution
Cornell said in support of its resolve to vaccinate immune students that “the CDC has recommended that COVID-19 vaccine be offered regardless of a prior COVID-19 infection.” Cornell’s claim illustrates a second crucial mistake made by many schools, namely, relying upon the Centers for Disease Control’s guidelines as if they constitute medical advice applicable in every case. They do not.
The CDC is not a medical institution; it is a public health and disease prevention body. According to the CDC’s own mission statement, the agency focuses on “disease prevention and control, environmental health, and health promotion and health education activities.” It is not qualified and usually does not purport to offer professional medical opinions applicable to specific patients.
From time to time, the CDC offers findings and recommendations that competent medical practitioners often will consider in arriving at a professional medical judgment for a particular patient. In this respect, CDC guidelines are analogous to guidelines from other public health associations or medical societies: they are guidelines, not prescriptions.
In fact, any serious condition or circumstance that justifies exemption from college mandates can be described without reference to the CDC—and would be so described by most competent practicing physicians.
The University of Maryland’s website provides an illustration of the third crucial mistake, an error that includes but goes beyond the second. This third mistake is not just about following this or that CDC “recommendation” as it if it constitutes sound individualized medical advice. It is going all-in on the mistaken conception of the CDC as a super-doctor.
Maryland would limit medical exemptions to “CDC contraindications.” There is no sound medical basis, however, for doing so, especially since (again) the CDC does not practice medicine. The CDC’s list of contraindications was never meant to be comprehensive or exhaustive, but merely representative of the more common situations in which caution is warranted.
Many Reasons to Not Get a COVID Vaccine
For individual patients, physicians have always been granted wide discretionary latitude and appropriate room for clinical judgment, to apply general guidelines and other relevant sources of medical information to the unique needs and circumstances of particular patients. Any physician would find that there are many additional medically reasonable bases for the current COVID vaccines to be contraindicated.
For example, none of the current vaccines have passed fertility, teratogenicity, or mutagenicity testing, thus may be contraindicated in women of childbearing potential or those about to become pregnant. We fear universities have adopted the Maryland approach for public-relations reasons, not on a medical basis. But this is to make a popular sport of students’ safety.
The medical unsoundness of this limitation is apparent from Notre Dame’s published rubric, which expressly distinguishes the criteria for COVID vaccine exemptions from those appropriate to all other vaccines. “For COVID-19 vaccines only,” the university’s website stipulates, the criteria are “[a]pplicable CDC contraindications.”
“For all other vaccines,” the same website says, exemptions may be obtained for “[a]pplicable contraindication found in the manufacturer’s packaging insert for the vaccine(s), or a statement that the physical or medical condition of the student is such that immunization is not considered safe, indicating the specific nature and probable duration of the medical condition or circumstances that contraindicate immunization with the vaccine(s).” In fact, this is the correct reasoning for all vaccine exemptions, including COVID.
Put Yourself in Danger to Find If You’re In Danger?
Fourth and finally: several published rubrics include a limitation that is eminently sound in itself, but which is, in an important way, quite dangerous. It is that exemptions are available where there is “a documented anaphylactic allergic reaction or other severe adverse reaction to any COVID-19 vaccine—e.g., cardiovascular changes, respiratory distress, or history of treatment with epinephrine or emergency medical attention to control symptoms.”
In other words, a severe reaction to a first vaccine shot indicates the second shot should be delayed, and possibly declined altogether. Just so. But the danger arises from this criterion when viewed in connection with the unjustifiably dangerous limitations of exemptions overall. The purpose of any exceptions policy for any vaccine is to avoid such extreme reactions.
Doctors and patients do this all the time by considering the patient’s whole medical history, family history, all of the active ingredients in the drug, and then, in light of the doctor’s professional judgment, making a decision about the overall benefits and perils of getting vaccinated—or not. The Notre Dame criteria cited above “for all other vaccines” capture well this appropriately personalized approach to practicing medicine.
As the same rubric also shows, however, all this is out the window for these college policies regarding COVID. For COVID and this alone, the colleges’ exceptions policies amount to a Catch-22: you must take the vaccine to obtain the data that you need to be exempt from taking it.
We urge colleges and universities to suggest but not mandate vaccination of students. Clearly, students do not generally need vaccination to protect themselves from serious or life-threatening outcomes of COVID-19 or to avoid spreading COVID to others who may be at higher risk. Staff and faculty are free to obtain vaccination to protect themselves.
Thus, there is no clear benefit from widespread vaccination of students that will outweigh the potential, and possibly catastrophic, harm to individual students under this policy.
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The six coauthors of this article are:
Andrew Bostom, MD, MS, an associate professor of family medicine (research) at the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University;
Aaron Kheriaty, MD, a professor of psychiatry at the University of California at Irvine School of Medicine and the director of the Medical Ethics Program at UCI Health;
Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPH,
Harvey A. Risch, MD, PhD, a professor of epidemiology at Yale School of Public Health;
Michelle Cretella, MD, the executive director of the American College of Pediatricians; and
Gerard V. Bradley, JD, a professor of law at the University of Notre Dame.
All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the “Translate Website” drop down menu on the top banner of our home page (Desktop version).
The Lancet and Nature have both promoted the natural origin theory for SARS-CoV-2, and protected the theory by refusing to publish counter arguments and/or publishing scientific statements by individuals with serious conflicts of interest
The Lancet’s COVID-19 Commission included Peter Daszak, Ph.D., president of EcoHealth Alliance, a nonprofit organization that collaborated with various universities and organizations on research in China, including the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV). He was recently taken off the Commission due to controversy over his large number of conflicts of interest
The Lancet’s COVID-19 Commission also includes Danielle Anderson, an Australian WIV virologist who left Wuhan shortly before the pandemic broke out. Anderson says she “does not believe” the virus is manmade. Anderson’s Commission biography does not mention that she worked at the WIV
In January 2021, 14 global experts submitted a letter to The Lancet in which they argued that “the natural origin is not supported by conclusive arguments and that a lab origin cannot be formally discarded.” The submission was rejected with the justification that the topic was “not a priority” for the journal
Richard Horton, the editor-in-chief of The Lancet is now being criticized for his long defense and support of the Chinese regime, and is accused of using The Lancet to pursue political causes and stifle scientific debate
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More than a year ago, in February 2020, a group of 27 scientists wrote a letter published in The Lancet condemning “conspiracy theories suggesting that COVID-19 does not have a natural origin.”1
Although The Lancet — like other medical journals — requires contributors to disclose financial or personal interests that might be viewed as possible conflicts of interests with their submissions, the 27 authors declared they had “no competing interests.”
June 21, 2021, The Lancet published an addendum admitting that “some readers have questioned the validity of this disclosure, particularly as it relates to one of the authors, Peter Daszak.”2
As a result, The Lancet asked the 27 signers to “re-evaluate” their competing interests and to declare any “financial and nonfinancial relationships that may be relevant to interpreting the content of their manuscript.” So far, Daszak has updated his previous claim of having no competing interests to include a 416-word disclosure statement clarifying that, indeed, he had several conflicts of interest.
First, he is the president of EcoHealth Alliance, a nonprofit organization that receives funding from a “range of U.S. Government funding agencies and non-governmental sources.”
Second — and most importantly — Daszak also explained that, although its work with China is currently unfunded, he and the Alliance have collaborated with various universities and organizations on research in China, including the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV). Specifically, this work includes studies of bats and viruses, including “the isolation of three bat SARS-related coronaviruses that are now used as reagents to test therapeutics and vaccines.”
The Lancet Accused of Kowtowing to China
The COVID pandemic has brought attention to any number of problems within the academic arena. Disturbingly, we’ve discovered that scientific journals held in high regard for many decades — The Lancet has been around for 198 years — are colluding to censor important facts and stifle scientific debate. The Lancet statement deriding the lab leak theory as a conspiracy theory to be ignored is a prime example. As reported by the Daily Mail, June 26, 2021:3
“The Lancet letter, signed by 27 experts, played a key part in silencing scientific, political and media discussion of any idea that this pandemic might have begun with a lab incident rather than spilling over naturally from animals.
It was even reportedly used by Facebook to flag articles exploring the lab leak hypothesis as ‘false information’ … Yet it emerged later that The Lancet statement was covertly drafted by British scientist Peter Daszak — a long-term collaborator with the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which was carrying out high-risk research on bat coronaviruses and had known safety issues …
Four months later, The Lancet set up a ‘Covid-19 Commission’ to assist governments and scrutinize the origins. It was led by Jeffrey Sachs … Incredibly, he backed Daszak to lead his commission’s 12-person taskforce investigating Covid’s origins — joined by five fellow signatories to The Lancet statement …
Last week The Lancet finally ‘recused’ him from its commission and published an ‘addendum’ to its statement detailing some of his Chinese links. Yet critics say the journal has still failed to admit that six more signatories to that February statement have ties to Daszak’s EcoHealth Alliance as directors or partners.
‘It would have been better for The Lancet to have stated that Daszak’s and other signers’ previous declarations were untruthful and to have attached an editorial expression of concern,’ said Richard Ebright, a bio-security expert and professor of chemical biology at Rutgers University in New Jersey.
Now The Mail on Sunday has learned that The Lancet is set to publish a second statement by these signatories that presses the case that Covid probably emerged through natural ‘zoonotic’ transmission from animals to humans.”
Richard Horton, the editor-in-chief of The Lancet is now being criticized for his long defense and support of the Chinese regime, and is accused of using The Lancet to pursue political causes and stifle scientific debate.4
In January 2021, 14 global experts submitted a letter to The Lancet in which they argued that “the natural origin is not supported by conclusive arguments and that a lab origin cannot be formally discarded.” Horton rejected the submission, stating it was “not a priority” for the journal.5
Any medical journal worthy of a good reputation needs to be an open platform for wide-ranging debate. Horton’s refusal to publish the other side of the origins argument has without a doubt damaged the credibility and reputation of the journal. Tory MP Bob Seely told the Daily Mail:6
“The claims of a cover-up over the most important scientific issue of our time grow stronger by the day. It is vital we get to the truth over what appears to have been a cover-up on the pandemic origins with the collusion of journals such as The Lancet.”
Let’s also remember that The Lancet published an entirely fake study claiming hydroxychloroquine was dangerous. This paper using completely fabricated data made the media rounds and led to countries banning the drug’s use against COVID-19.
This too raises serious questions about the journal’s credibility. How was this fraud not discovered during the peer review process? Could it be that The Lancet allowed it because it would help protect the roll-out of profitable new COVID drugs and “vaccines”?
What’s Behind Science Journals’ Censorship?
What could possibly be behind science journals’ decision to silence debate in what appears to be a concerted effort to protect Chinese interests? In a June 18, 2021 article,7 Matt Ridley suggests it might have to do with the fact that “scientific papers have become increasingly dependent on the fees that Chinese scientists pay to publish in them, plus advertisements from Chinese firms and subscriptions from Chinese institutions.”
The Lancet is not alone in its less than objective stance on China. In 2017, the Nature journal admitted it censors articles containing words like “Taiwan,” “Tibet” and “cultural revolution” in its Chinese editions at the request of the Chinese government.8 “In April 2020 Nature ran an editorial apologizing for its ‘error’ in ‘associating the virus with Wuhan’ in its news coverage,” Ridley writes.9
Nature also attached an editorial note to several old articles, saying they were being misused “as the basis for unverified theories that the novel coronavirus causing COVID-19 was engineered,” and that “there is no evidence that this is true; scientists believe that an animal is the most likely source of the coronavirus.”
One of those articles, published in 2015, was titled “Engineered bat virus stirs debate over risky research.” The research being questioned was done by WIV researchers.
Gaslighting Alert: Abusers Now Play the Victim Card
For the past year and a half, scientists, doctors, reporters and anyone else who dared point out blatant discrepancies in the natural origins narrative have been attacked and painted as quacks and dangerous conspiracy theorists. They’ve been censored, deplatformed and publicly defamed and shamed. Many a fine career has been ruined or seriously tarnished by baseless personal attacks.
Now that undeniable evidence is finally reaching critical mass, natural origin defenders are playing the victim card. For example, Amy Maxmen, Ph.D., a journalist for Nature for the past 13 years, has been covering the SARS-CoV-2 origin debate. In a May 26, 2021, tweet, she stated the “debate over a lab-leak has become toxic and risky.”10
Angela Rasmussen, Ph.D., a natural origin proponent, responded saying that “the origins debate has become a toxic milieu dominated by opportunists, dilettantes, racist/misogynist assholes, and trolls.”11 Rasmussen claims she’s been personally attacked and abused for trying to explain the natural origin theory.
The irony is that the same people who abused others for talking about the lab leak theory are now getting a taste of their own medicine, and they don’t like it. They’re the ones who have been peddling misinformation all along, and as the masses are catching on to the deceit, they’re catching heat.
To deflect and finger-point yet again, abusers are now playing the victim. Another tactic is to claim that attacks on them are attacks on science itself. Dr. Anthony Fauci, for example, has stated this on more than one occasion already.12,13 In a June 2021 MSNBC interview, Fauci said criticizing him was “very dangerous,” and that:14,15
“A lot of what you’re seeing as attacks on me quite frankly are attacks on science because all of the things I have spoken about from the very beginning have been fundamentally based on science … If you are trying to get at me as a public health official and scientist, you’re really attacking not only Dr. Anthony Fauci, you are attacking science.”
His comments didn’t go over well, based on social media responses.16 Reporter Glenn Greenwald’s Tweet will suffice to summarize the general consensus:17
“Beyond the dangerous arrogance and pomposity of proclaiming ‘anyone who criticizes me is attacking Science’ — thus placing himself off-limits from questioning — he *admitted* he purposely issued false, anti-science, politicized claims … Once you *admit* that you made false statements in violation of The Science™, you don’t then get to equate yourself to The Science™ such that attacks on you are attacks on it.”
Another example is that of Dr. Peter Hotez, one of the most shockingly hateful people in the medical field who has publicly stated he wants to “snuff out” vaccine skeptics and has called for cyberwarfare measures to be deployed against me and others who share vaccine safety information. Coincidentally, this public plea was published in the journal Nature.18
This man, who has spewed all sorts of vile language at parents of vaccine-injured children and called for physical harm and imprisonment of people who don’t agree with the one-size-fits-all vaccine agenda is now complaining about getting bombarded with “anti-vaxx hate speech.”19
Billions of Dollars at Stake
To circle back to the question of why prominent and previously respected science journals are publishing propaganda and suppressing open discussion, the most likely reason — aside from their dependence on Chinese publishing fees and advertising dollars — is the fact that if SARS-CoV-2 is proven to be a manmade virus that escaped from a lab (regardless of its location), billions of dollars in funding for gain-of-function research and even vaccine research could evaporate.
As a publisher of research, it makes sense that journals would be willing to protect the research industry as a whole, and provide a platform for chosen spokespeople — such as Hotez — who shamelessly promote the official narrative, no matter how tenuous or unscientific it might be, or how clear the conflicts of interest.
Here’s another case in point: June 28, 2021, Bloomberg tweeted out a short video featuring Danielle Anderson, an Australian WIV virologist who left Wuhan shortly before the pandemic broke out. Anderson says she “does not believe” the virus is manmade. In response, Hotez tweeted:20
“And we’re in agreement: SARS-2 coronavirus has natural origins, was not produced through GOF [gain-of-function] research, and probably has nothing to do with the Wuhan Institute of Virology.”
Coincidentally, Anderson is also on The Lancet’s COVID-19 Commission,21 the same Commission that Daszak was on. Her Lancet Commission bio22 says nothing about her work at the WIV, only that she is a senior research fellow at the University of Melbourne, Australia. Why is that? Is Anderson’s link to the WIV yet another “random coincidence” that has no bearing on her message? Or is it part of a pattern?
I believe the engineering of viruses and other pathogens is one of the greatest threats to life on earth at this point. We lucked out with SARS-CoV-2, as it turned out to be far less lethal than initially predicted. The next time we might not be so lucky.
As reported in July 2020, China has plans to erect high-security biolabs in all of its 23 provinces, despite concerns about leakage risks.23 Worldwide, there are hundreds of laboratories where this kind of research is taking place on a daily basis. Considering the history of lab leaks, it’s only a matter of time before something truly nasty gets out.
This is why we must get to the bottom of where SARS-CoV-2 came from. We must know if it was manmade because, if so, we need to ban gain-of-function research aimed at making pathogens more dangerous to humans.
Yes, there are harmless gain-of-function experiments, and that’s not what we’re talking about here, although, harmless experiments can, of course, be steps in a process that ultimately results in a dangerous bioweapon. Overall, I think we need to seriously reconsider the need and value of genetic manipulation of viruses and the creation of synthetic ones.
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The south-east Asian country has recorded just 36 deaths since the start of the pandemic, and officials now want to ditch measures such as counting infection numbers each day.
A blueprint has been laid out by three leading members of Singapore’s Covid-19 taskforce to end 18 months of tough restrictions in order to restore quarantine-free travel and public gatherings.
The hope is to let people “get on with their lives” by scrapping tough rules and instead controlling the virus through other means.
“Instead of monitoring Covid-19 infection numbers every day, we will focus on the outcomes,” the trade, finance and health ministers wrote in a joint op-ed in the Straits Times.
“How many fall very sick, how many in the intensive care unit, how many need to be intubated for oxygen, and so on. This is like how we now monitor influenza.
“We can’t eradicate it, but we can turn the pandemic into something much less threatening, like influenza, hand, foot and mouth disease, or chickenpox, and get on with our lives.”
Full details of the roadmap have yet to be revealed, but ministers suggested measures such as breathalyser-style tests, more therapeutic treatments and greater personal responsibility.
Singapore’s proposal could be an early sign of the world starting to live with Covid after more than a year of restrictions across the globe.
Meanwhile, a group of doctors have penned an “urgent open letter” to Singapore’s expert committee on Covid-19 vaccination, calling for the vaccination of youths in Singapore to be stopped until the US CDC clarifies why a teenage jab recipient died.
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As Big Tech, the Biden Administration, Hollywood, politicians, employers and health care providers around the nation galvanize the public to undergo Covid vaccination, the number of casualties who have died or suffer life-threatening effects from the experimental mRNA injections continues to climb.
Those who don’t want to be herded into the mass drug trial are told to just “get on with it” so we can “safely” move on with our lives.
Despite the unrelenting effort to censor “vaccine hesitancy,” thousands who are experiencing the vaccines’ ill effects are resorting to a private Facebook group to sound the alarm on the medical malpractice.
In post after post, over 25,900 members of “The COVID 19 Vaccine Victims & Families Group” detail the horrific health abnormalities they have suffered, including strokes, blood clots, excessive bleeding, needle-like pain in their limbs and paralysis, after receiving Moderna, Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca vaccines.
Irrespective of the heartbreaking testimonies, Facebook inserts a disclaimer on each of the group members’ posts to assure users the vaccines are “safe” and “effective.”
“COVID-19 vaccines go through many tests for safety and effectiveness and are then monitored closely,” the notification states, citing the World Health Organization.
The notification directs users to Facebook’s COVID-19 information Center, which promotes the vaccine and provides locations offering vaccines in each state.
Americans experiencing bizarre Covid vaccine injury have no legal recourse in a U.S. court of law. Drug companies have total immunity from liability if you die from their vaccines.
In February, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar of the outgoing Trump administration invoked the Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act declaring COVID-19 to be “a public health emergency warranting liability protections for covered countermeasures.” The 2005 law assures companies “cannot be sued for money damages in court” over injuries related to the administration or use of products to treat or protect against Covid until 2024, unless there’s “willful misconduct” by the company.
The Food and Drug Administration, which provides and approves the pharmaceutical companies’ products for mass distribution, has sovereign immunity for authorizing the vaccine for emergency use.
“You also can’t sue the Food and Drug Administration for authorizing a vaccine for emergency use, nor can you hold your employer accountable if they mandate inoculation as a condition of employment,” CNBC reports.
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Alicia is an investigative journalist and multimedia reporter. Alicia has contributed to numerous outlets, including the Gateway Pundit, Project Veritas, InfoWars, World Net Daily, Townhall.com and Media Research Center, where she exposed public corruption, fraud and abuse in government, media and Big Tech. She has a Bachelor of Science in Political Science from John Jay College of Criminal Justice. She served as a War Room analyst for the Rudy Giuliani Presidential Committee. She also served in the Correspondence Department of the George W. Bush administration. Alicia is originally from New York City and currently resides in Washington D.C.
All images in this article are from Gateway Pundit
All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the “Translate Website” drop down menu on the top banner of our home page (Desktop version).
Facing growing outcry, OPCW Director General Fernando Arias went before the UN and told new falsehoods about his organization’s Syria cover-up scandal — along with more disingenuous excuses to avoid addressing it.
In the two years since the censorship of a Syria chemical weapons investigation was exposed, the head of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), Fernando Arias, has vigorously resisted accountability.
Arias has refused to investigate or explain the extensive manipulation of the OPCW’s probe of an alleged April 2018 chlorine attack in Douma. Rather than answer calls to meet with the veteran inspectors who protested the deception, Arias has disparaged them. The OPCW Director General (DG) has even resorted to feigning ignorance about the scandal, recently claiming that “I don’t know why” the organization’s final report on Douma “was contested.”
In a nod to the public outcry, Arias backtracked from a previous statement that the Douma controversy could not be revisited. But while appearing to suggest that the investigation could be reopened, Arias offered more falsehoods about the scandal, and new disingenuous excuses to avoid addressing it.
This two-part report summarizes Arias’ latest evasions and distortions, which include the following:
Rejecting proposals for resolving the Douma controvery, Arias invoked restrictions that do not appear to exist. Arias falsely claimed that the OPCW’s Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) has “no authority” to examine the suppressed Douma evidence. Arias also claimed that he personally has “no authority whatsoever to reopen this investigation,” even though the OPCW’s regulations contain no such limits.
To discredit the vast quantity of work that was done for the investigation’s original report, which found no evidence of a chlorine attack, Arias falsely stated that the “bulk” of analysis was conducted after its chief author was no longer involved. To advance this falsehood, Arias cited a fabricated figure.
Arias tacitly retracted a previous false claim that no state has challenged the Douma report’s conclusions. But instead of acknowledging that prior falsehood, he replaced it with a new one.
Arias did not answer direct questions about the documented scientific fraud in the Douma probe, and how he plans to address it. The DG ignored a question from the Russian delegation about why the Final Report omitted the conclusions of NATO member state toxicologists who ruled out chlorine gas as the cause of death. And for the third time, Arias did not respond to a question asking whether he will agree to meet with the dissenting inspectors.
A recent BBC podcast interviewed a purported OPCW source who discussed sensitive information and criticized the Douma whistleblowers, as well as the organization’s first Director General, José Bustani. Arias offered an absurd excuse to avoid launching an investigation, stating that he would only probe the breach of confidentiality if the BBC’s source “is identified.”
Arias continued to deceptively minimize the role of the key dissenting inspector, Dr. Brendan Whelan. Arias downplayed the fact that Whelan was the scientific coordinator and chief author of the team’s original report, and falsely claimed that he was only involved “in a limited capacity.”
Arias also continued to falsely downplay the role of the second known whistleblower, Ian Henderson. Arias’ latest distortions about Whelan and Henderson are addressed in the second part of this report.
Arias’ UN appearance was the latest chapter in a saga that has upended the world’s chemical weapons watchdog. In April 2018, the US, UK and France bombed Syria after accusing its government of committing a chemical attack in Douma. In March 2019, the OPCW released a final report that aligned with the US narrative that Syria was guilty of dropping chlorine gas cylinders on a pair of apartment buildings, including one where dozens of dead bodies were filmed. But an extraordinary trove of leaks soon exposed that the OPCW had published a whitewash.
Internal OPCW documents showed that the inspectors who investigated the Douma incident had found no evidence of a chemical weapons attack. The files also revealed gross inconsistencies in the prevailing narrative that chlorine was the cause of death. These findings, if released, would have reinforced strong indications that extremist insurgents who controlled Douma had staged the incident, just as Syrian forces were set to retake control. But the Douma evidence was concealed in a multi-stage cover-up.
Unknown senior OPCW officials were caught trying to doctor the team’s original report to falsely suggest evidence of a chemical attack. A delegation of US officials also visited the Hague and, in a highly irregular move, tried to convince the team that chlorine gas was used by the Syrian government. The bulk of the original team who deployed in Douma was sidelined, replaced by officials who, for the most part, had not even set foot in Syria. The result was a deceptive final report that erased the key findings of the censored original.
Although the OPCW leaks first surfaced in May 2019, Arias did not face direct questioning about the controversy until December of last year, when he came before the United Nations Security Council. However, Arias refused to answer in open session, and reportedly gave vague, non-substantive answers in private.
The Director General’s decision to return to the UN to answer questions in open session followed growing public pressure, led by former senior UN official Hans von Sponeck, as well as Bustani, the former OPCW chief. Arias’ reliance on falsehoods and hollow excuses offered the most stark display yet that his handling of the Douma cover-up cannot be defended in good faith.
Just weeks before his UN appearance, Arias told the European Parliament on April 14th that when it comes to the OPCW’s Douma scandal, “the matter is closed.”
But when he came before the UN Security Council on June 3rd, Arias changed his tune. Rather than personally closing the door on revisiting the probe, Arias now claimed that he does not have the authority to re-open it. Arias did so by citing OPCW rules and restrictions that do not appear to exist.
Arias’ fallacious excuse came in response to a new proposal to break the impasse. In April, the Berlin Group 21 – established by former UN assistant secretary general Hans von Sponeck, former OPCW chief Jose Bustani and Richard Falk, an eminent Princeton Law Professor – put forward a way to address the dispute over the Douma report. They urged Arias to allow the OPCW’s own Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) — a subsidiary body made up of 25 independent scientific and technical experts who serve in their personal capacities — to assess the claims of the dissenting inspectors.
“The SAB possesses the necessary scientific and technical expertise,” the Berlin Group 21 statement said. “[We] believe that leaving the scientific debate to the scientists, who best understand the issues at hand, would provide a more objective and rational approach to begin resolving this unfortunate and highly damaging controversy that surrounds the OPCW and indirectly endangers global security by eroding confidence in future findings relevant to alleged uses of chemical weapons.”
At the UN Security Council, Arias rejected this proposal, claiming that his hands are tied by the OPCW’s own regulations:
The goal of the Scientific Advisory Board is written, in the terms of reference, is to enable the Director-General to render specialized advice in connection with very sophisticated, very complicated matters and issues related to chemicals and chemical weapons. Which means that the SAB has no role to assess the findings of the FFM. The FFM is entrusted to investigate and activate an investigation to produce a report. And this report—I sign the report, I don’t touch it—it goes directly to the policymaking organs, in this case the Executive Council. Which means that the SAB has no authority to reassess the investigation of the FFM or to assess any opinion of the inspectors produced on a personal basis.
In claiming that the SAB “has no authority to reassess” the Douma FFM’s findings, Arias is invoking a restriction that does not exist.
In citing the SAB’s terms of reference (ToR), Arias failed to mention that it – along with the Chemical Weapons Convention — explicitly allows for the establishment of a temporary working group of scientific experts to provide recommendations on “specific issues” – exactly as the Berlin Group 21 proposed. Paragraph 9 of the SAB’s ToR states:
In consultation with members of the [Scientific Advisory] Board, the Director-General may establish temporary working groups of scientific experts to provide recommendations within a specific time-frame on specific issues, in accordance with Article VIII, paragraph 45 of the [Chemical Weapons] Convention.
Contrary to Arias’ claim, there is nothing preventing him from convening a working group of scientific experts to review the particularly “specific issue” that is the Douma investigation – arguably the most internally contested specific issue in the OPCW’s history. Yet Arias is claiming that he is somehow hindered by regulations that, in reality, explicitly grant him the authority to do exactly what he now claims he cannot.
In stating this excuse, Arias also dismissed the work of the dissenting inspectors as having been “produced on a personal basis”, and therefore not subject to reevaluation. Yet there was nothing “personal” about the Brendan Whelan authored-original report, completed in June 2018 and reviewed and sanctioned by other inspectors, including the team leader. What remains unknown is who exactly were the senior OPCW officials who personally doctored its contents – a question that Arias has refused to investigate.
Arias also offered another hollow excuse. The OPCW chief claimed that he can no longer revisit the Douma investigation because it is no longer “in the hands” of his office, but instead the policy-making organizations of the OPCW. According to Arias, that power now lies in the hands of the Executive Council, (the rotating group of 41 member states who govern the OPCW), and the full Conference of State Parties (all OPCW member states):
I have to say that the report of the FFM directed to Douma is in the hands of the Executive Council and the Conference. The Director-General has no authority whatsoever to reopen this investigation that concluded and was reported to the Executive Council, and through the Executive Council to the Conference. The matter is in the hands of the policymaking organs and not of the Director-General. The Executive Council was already seized of the matterin March 2019.
This is the first time that the Director General has claimed that the report is out of his control, and instead “in the hands” of a higher body. In introducing this escape-hatch, Arias is now giving the appearance that in principle he no longer objects to a reopening of the investigation. In reality, he is skirting responsibility for that decision by passing it to executive bodies that have blocked any efforts to discuss the cover-up right from the start. Upon the release of the Douma final report in March 2019, the Executive Council immediately voted down a proposal to hear from all of the experts who worked on the Douma case. The US delegation lobbied to block the vote by reportedly arguing that such a hearing would be akin to “Stalinist trials.”
Contrary to Arias’ assertions, the Chemical Weapons Convention does not support his claim that once a final report is issued, it becomes “in the hands of the Executive Council and Conference.” The relevant passage of the CWC simply states that the “Director General shall promptly transmit the preliminary and final reports to the Executive Council and to all States Parties.” (Part XI of the Verification Annex to the CWC, Investigations of Alleged Uses of Chemical Weapons, Section D [Reports], paragraph 23.)
There is nothing to suggest here that the Executive Council – or the State Parties — becomes the custodian of these reports, or that the Technical Secretariat (TS), which the Director General oversees, somehow loses control over them.
This is indeed borne out by past practice. It is common for the TS to make amendments to final reports and issue them without the Executive Council’s permission. Such amendments, which are issued as official TS “Addendums” to published reports, can be minor technical or typographic corrections, but also major substantive additions.
This practice includes a previous OPCW investigation in Syria. After publishing a final report on alleged chemical attacks by insurgents in Syria in December 2015 (S/1318/2015/Rev.1), Syrian authorities invited the OPCW to return in order to collect further evidence that the report claimed was lacking. The FFM team paid a second visit to Syria one month later and published an Addendum to the final report — with details of its additional deployment — in February 2016. (S/1318/2015/Rev.1/Add.1).
The Addendum contains no mention of the Executive Council, and there is no record of any EC vote to authorize it. The opening paragraph reads:
This addendum provides information further to “The Report of the OPCW Fact-Finding Mission in Syria Regarding the Incidents Described in Communications from the Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs and Expatriates and Head of the National Authority of the Syrian Arab Republic” (S/1318/2015/Rev.1, dated 17 December 2015’).
In the case of Douma, no one is even proposing that the OPCW return to Syria, as it did after issuing that final report of December 2015. The OPCW is simply being asked to hear from the Douma probe’s own inspectors, and address their complaints, including the doctoring of the mission’s original report. Arias is passing the buck to a concocted higher authority in order to avoid exercising his own.
Disparaging whistleblowers, OPCW chief cites a fabricated figure
In one of his few attempts to make a substantive claim in defense of the Douma investigation, OPCW Director General Ferando Arias has repeatedly asserted that “most of the analytical work took place” in the last six or seven months, when the dissenting inspectors were no longer part of the Douma Fact-Finding Mission (FFM). Because of this, Arias has claimed that the whistleblowers “had manifestly incomplete information on the Douma investigation,” rendering their protests “egregious.”
At the UN Security Council, Arias doubled down on this argument by adducing, for the first time, a purported figure to substantiate it. According to Arias, 70 samples were analyzed by the OPCW in the last six months of the investigation, when the dissenting inspectors were no longer involved. Arias made this claim twice:
The FFM, after Inspector B departed, worked for more than six months, during which the bulk of the results of the investigation was got by the team. For instance, out of the more than 100 samples, around more than 70 results were brought in those last six months of the investigation.
…Of course, the bulk of the investigations related to Douma came after I arrived to the Organisation after July 2018. Of the more than 100 samples, more than 70 good samples were analyzed after the summer of 2018. The bulk of the investigation, the bulk of information, the bulk of analysis, of all the information that had been gathered came after the two inspectors left.”
Arias’ claim that “more than 70” samples “were analyzed after the summer of 2018” in the “last six months of the investigation” is a demonstrable falsehood. Unless the OPCW somehow failed to report dozens of analyzed samples until now, the claim of 70 samples is a fabricated figure. In reality, the final report on Douma shows that just 44 samples were analyzed throughout the entire probe. And just 13 of those samples were analyzed after the issuing of the interim report — i.e., after the dissenting inspectors were out of the picture.
With just 44 samples analyzed for the entire probe, and just 13 new samples analyzed in the final six months, this means that 70% of the Douma investigation’s total sample analysis was in fact conducted in its first month.
Completely inverting that reality, Arias has now produced a phony figure that paints a false picture of the work conducted in the six months after the dissenting inspectors were sidelined.
According to the Final Report, 70% of the total chemical samples analyzed were analyzed in the probe’s first month. Just 13 samples were analyzed in the last seven months, undermining OPCW DG Arias’ new claim that 70 samples were analyzed in that period. (Excerpt of Aaron Maté’s UN presentation, April 16 2021)
By claiming that the “bulk of the investigation” was conducted after the whistleblowers were no longer involved, Arias is also erasing other critical areas of work conducted in the first two months and included in the suppressed original report.
As I recently detailed in a UN presentation, a comparison between the interim report of July 2018 and the final report of March 2019 shows that the vast majority of the investigation was already done in the first two months in multiple key areas: 100% of the research of the scientific literature; 87% of the total interviews had been conducted and analyzed; a meeting with four NATO toxicologists had been convened, and 98.5% of the metadata analysis of media files from Douma was undertaken. In addition, a complete epidemiological study was reported in the original report, much of which was expunged from the final report.
This means that, contrary to Arias’ claim, the bulk of the work was in fact carried out in the probe’s first two months.
Retracting one falsehood, Arias replaces it with another
At the European Parliament in April, Arias falsely claimed that no state party has challenged any of the Douma report’s conclusions, and that Russia even “agrees” with them:
The conclusions of the report, paradoxically, have never been disputed by a state party. Even the Russian delegation agrees with the conclusions.
Arias’ implausible contention was that, despite the heated two-year public dispute over the Douma investigation, no member state has challenged it. Yet Syria and Russia have vigorously challenged the report’s findings, within the OPCW itself and in a series of UN Security Council debates.
As The Grayzone has previously reported, this phony talking point was first put forward by the NATO-tied website Bellingcat last year. Bellingcat produced excerpts of a letter that it claimed was sent by Arias in June 2019 to Dr. Brendan Whelan, the key dissenting inspector. This letter, Bellingcat declared, “reveals that at a diplomatic level behind closed doors, the Russian and Syrian governments have both agreed with the conclusions of the OPCW report.”
But The Grayzone then revealed that not only was this claim ludicrous, but based on a “letter” that was never actually sent. The Grayzone obtained and published Arias’ actual letter to Whelan, which contained none of Bellingcat’s text.
In a sign that he has now recognized the fallacy of the Bellingcat-promoted talking point, Arias tacitly walked it back in his June 3rd UN appearance. But instead of acknowledging his previous error, he replaced it with a new one. Arias now claimed:
None of the 193 Member States of the OPCW have challenged the findings of the FFM that chlorine was found on the scene of the attack, in Douma.
To support his claim about chlorine found at the scene, Arias cited a note verbal (diplomatic correspondence) from Russia:
I have here in front of me a note verbal of the Russian Embassy, dated the 26th of April 2019, note #759 that includes an attachment. It’s a Russian Federation paper, based on the conclusions of the report of the FFM in Douma. And this note required me to disseminate this report. This note, or report attached to the note by the Russian Embassy in The Hague said, “Conclusion. The Russian Federation does not challenge the findings contained in the FFM report regarding the possible presence of molecular chlorine in the cylinders, etc.” This is on the web page from the Organisation.
Arias’ own source undermines his claim. Whereas Arias told the UN that no state has “challenged the findings of the FFM that chlorine was found on the scene,” his evidence for that statement – a Russian note verbal – simply states that Russia “does not challenge” that there was a “possible presence of molecular chlorine in the cylinders.”
The Russian correspondence goes on to explain why it explicitly does challenge the final report’s conclusion that chlorine was likely used as a chemical weapon. Responding to Arias at the UN, Russian Ambassador Vasily Nebenzya read the relevant passage in full:
The Russian Federation does not challenge the findings contained in the FFM report regarding the possible presence of molecular chlorine on the cylinders. However, the parameters, characteristics and exterior of the cylinders, as well as the data obtained from the locations of those incidents, are not consistent with the argument that they were dropped from an aircraft. The existing facts more likely indicate that there is a high probability that both cylinders were placed at Locations 2 and 4 manually rather than dropped from an aircraft. Apparently the factual material contained in the report does not allow us to draw a conclusion as to the use of a toxic chemical as a weapon. On that basis, the Russian Federation insists on the version that there was false evidence and on the staged character of the incident in Douma.
Therefore, the only contention that Russia did not challenge is that of a “possible” presence of molecular chlorine in the cylinders found in Douma. That is for obvious reasons.
No one has argued that there was no possibility of a chlorine presence. There were, after all, two chlorine cylinders found at the scene, so traces of chlorine could be expected. In reality, the OPCW did not even report any finding of chlorine gas on the cylinder. They found chloride, a breakdown product of chlorine gas but also a very common substance in the environment, and in household products like table salt and other chloride salts. Chloride theoretically could have been dispersed around the cylinders.
Other possible evidence of chlorine gas use came from very low traces of various chlorine-containing organic compounds (CLOCs) found at the scene — most, if not all, of which can be present in the environment. Because the OPCW failed to test background samples – an oversight or deliberate omission that Whelan later described as scientifically indefensible – it could not determine if these trace quantities of CLOCs found at the scene pointed to chlorine gas use, or if they came from benign sources.
When challenged at the UN on his misrepresentation of the Russian note verbal, Arias did not offer a rebuttal. He instead tersely stated: “The Russian note verbale is published and that is what they have to say.”
Arias’ willingness to deceive the UN on the details of the Douma probe and the OPCW’s own capacity to address it also extends to his portrayal of the whistleblowers, as we will explain in detail in the second part of this report.
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Aaron Maté is a journalist and producer. He hosts Pushback with Aaron Maté on The Grayzone. In 2019, Maté was awarded the Izzy Award (named after I.F. Stone) for outstanding achievement in independent media for his coverage of Russiagate in The Nation magazine. Previously, he was a host/producer for The Real News and Democracy Now!.
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One question that many people ask with regards to the events of September 11 was why the U.S. Air Force went missing in action for over 90 minutes as four lumbering commercial jets traveled around American airspace at will. Now with the death of Donald Rumsfeld, 88, the world may never know.
Prior to the attacks of 9/11, a mosquito couldn’t penetrate U.S. airspace over Washington, D.C. without being intercepted or swatted down. So what went wrong that fateful Tuesday morning? For an answer to that question it is necessary to look at the actions and non-actions of then Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, second in military command only behind President George W. Bush, who was out of the loop at the time, visiting a class of elementary school students down in Florida.
Rumsfeld, as Pentagon chief, was in charge of the National Military Command Center [NMCC], which was responsible for coordinating with the Federal Aviation Administration [FAA] in the event of a hijacking. But when Rumsfeld’s presence was needed more than ever before in his career, he went missing in action. So what exactly was Donald Rumsfeld doing on the morning of September 11?
According to the 9/11 Commission Report, around 9 a.m., just after American Airlines Flight 11 had slammed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center, “Secretary Rumsfeld was having breakfast at the Pentagon with a group of members of Congress. He then returned to his office for his daily intelligence briefing. The Secretary was informed of the second strike in New York [9:03 am] during the briefing; he resumed the briefing while awaiting more information.”
Various individuals pleaded with the Defense Secretary to cancel his morning appointments after news that a second plane had slammed into the World Trade Center. Yet Rumsfeld rejected their desperate appeals. The first person to meet with Rumsfeld after it was clear America was under attack was CIA agent, Denny Watson, who was responsible for giving Defense Secretary his intelligence briefing each morning. At 9:03 a.m., Watson was in the anteroom of Rumsfeld’s office where she witnessed the second plane hit the South Tower live on television. Moments later, she is called into the office and, clearly aware there are more pressing matters at hand, doesn’t bother to remove the President’s Daily Brief [PDB] from her briefcase. “Sir, you just need to cancel this,” she tells Rumsfeld upon entering the office, as cited in David Priess’s book, ‘The President’s Book of Secrets’. “You’ve got more important things to do.” Rumsfeld, however, insists on going ahead with the meeting. “No, no, we’re going to do this,” he tells her.
An incredulous Watson has a seat as the Secretary of Defense flips through the PDB.
Watson was not the only person who tried to impress upon Rumsfeld the urgency of the moment. Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs, Victoria Clarke, wrote in her 2006 book Lipstick on a Pig that she went directly to Rumsfeld’s office after the second plane hit. “A couple of us had gone into… Secretary Rumsfeld’s office, to alert him to that, tell him that the crisis management process was starting up. He wanted to make a few phone calls.” Rumsfeld reportedly told Clarke to report to the Executive Support Center (ESC) and wait for him. Clarke would wait a long time. Yet that was not the only emergency meeting Rumsfeld failed to attend on the morning of September 11.
The acting-Deputy Director of the National Military Command Center, Captain Charles Leidig, who was substituting for Brigadier General Montague Winfield on this very morning, called an emergency ‘significant event’ conference (SIEC). According to the Commission Report, the meeting “began at 9:29, with a brief recap: two aircraft had struck the World Trade Center…” Now if that summary failed to get Rumsfeld out of his office then clearly nothing would.
At 9:37 a.m., eight minutes after Captain Leidig had called the emergency response meeting, the Pentagon was rocked by what numerous witnesses said felt like a bomb detonating inside of the complex. The Commission Report briefly describes what action Rumsfeld took next: “After the Pentagon was struck, Secretary Rumsfeld went to the parking lot to assist with rescue efforts.” Now just try and rationalize that decision.
Rumsfeld, the highest ranking commander of the U.S. military aside from the President of the United States, has taken it upon himself to inspect the crash site and assist with the search and rescue efforts. A quaint, touching story that the media happily devoured, and the Commission Report completely ignored, but an altogether implausible one. That is not to deny the claim, however, that Rumsfeld was on the front lawn of the Pentagon assisting with the rescue efforts. Indeed, there are photographs showing the Defense Secretary, with a security detail at his side, doing exactly that.
Paul Wolfowitz, in an interview with Vanity Fair, spoke glowingly about how his boss responded to the emergency: “He went charging out and down to the site where the plane had hit, which is what I would have done if I’d had my wits about me, which may or may not have been a smart thing to do, but it was. Instead, the next thing we heard was that there’d been a bomb and the building had to be evacuated. Everyone started streaming out of the building in a quite orderly way.”
So Wolfowitz is somehow of the opinion that Rumsfeld abandoning his command post and dashing outside to the Pentagon blast site, where more attacks could have been forthcoming, was the best course of action. The media papering over Rumsfeld’s disastrous actions did not stop there.
In the New York Times, journalist Andrew Cockburn provided a breathless account of Rumsfeld, the military man of impetuous action, as he inexplicably traversed about two miles around the Pentagon – each side of the Pentagon complex is around the length of three football fields – to inspect the damage site and help the wounded instead of leading the nation at its most critical hour. Brace yourself because this is classic.
“There were the flames, and bits of metal all around,” Cockburn writes, quoting Officer Aubrey Davis of the Pentagon police, who served as Rumsfeld’s personal bodyguard during this mindless morning jog. “The secretary picked up one of the pieces of metal. I was telling him he shouldn’t be interfering with a crime scene when he looked at some inscription on it and said, ‘American Airlines.’ Then someone shouted, ‘Help, over here,’ and we ran over and helped push an injured person on a gurney over to the road.”
Cockburn proceeds to pin media laurels on Rumsfeld’s chest when what the Pentagon chief really deserved was a military tribunal: “[T]hose few minutes made Rumsfeld famous, changed him from a half-forgotten twentieth-century political figure to America’s twenty-first-century warlord. On a day when the president was intermittently visible, only Rumsfeld, along with New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, gave the country an image of decisive, courageous leadership… Over time, the legend grew. One of the staffers in the office later assured me that Rumsfeld torn his shirt into strips to make bandages for the wounded …”
Keep in mind, Rumsfeld was paid to serve as chief of the military, not as a nurse.
Rumsfeld returned to the Pentagon building by 10 o’clock and despite desperate pleas from staff members, he continued to avoid the command center as if it were a leper colony. Instead, he went back to his office where he had a phone conversation with President Bush, though, as Cockburn reported, “neither man could recall what they discussed.”
Rumsfeld did not make it to the command center until 10:30 a.m., which, by that time, was too late to do anything of consequence, except to have a phone conversation with Dick Cheney, who was holed up in the basement of the White House.
As the authors of the Commission Report noted, “Secretary Rumsfeld told us he was just gaining situational awareness when he spoke with the Vice President at 10:39. His primary concern was ensuring that the pilots had a clear understanding of their rules of engagement.” Well, that concern arose about two hours too late. Rumsfeld’s presence at this point was no longer even symbolic. The emergency, for all intent and purposes, was already over. Now it was up to the media to twist this unforgivable dereliction of duty into some sort of act of heroism. And it was only too happy to comply.
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Robert Bridge is an American writer and journalist.
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Time was when Britain’s mighty fleets ruled a quarter of the earth’s surface. I’ve been savoring the names of its dreadnaughts and battle cruisers like George V, Prince of Wales, Hood, Princess Royal, Iron Duke and scores of other renowned warships.
Last week, the imperial British lion made a last, feeble roar by sending one of its new anti-aircraft destroyers, ‘Defender,’ to annoy the Russians by patrolling off the south-western coast of Crimea.
Russia and Ukraine both claim Crimea, which had been Russian since 1783. After a drunken dinner, the late Soviet leader, Nikita Khrushchev, ‘gave’ the Crimean SSR to the Ukrainian Soviet Republic.
Russia reoccupied Crimea, one of Russia’s most important naval bases, after a US-led coup overthrew Ukraine’s pro-Russian government in 2014. The UK, US and rest of NATO insist Crimea belongs to Ukraine. Of course they do. They engineered it.
HMS ‘Defender’s’ baiting the Russian bear took place while NATO naval and air forces were holding threatening war games over the southern Black Sea to intimidate Russia and embolden allies like Romania, Bulgaria and Poland, the three weak sisters of Eastern Europe.
This tempest in a teapot suddenly became a farce after a stack of soggy secret British naval documents was found behind a park bench in Kent. ‘Defender’s’ mission was discussed in them, Russia’s possible response, and, of all crazy things, potential new British operations in Afghanistan. All to please Uncle Sam, of course.
These embarrassing documents caused an uproar in Britain, made the government look like fools, and put the lie to Whitehall’s claims that the naval operation was only an innocent patrol. Britons are very intelligent people but tend to be sloppy and poorly organized. Britain has been a happy hunting ground for Soviet/Russian spies since the war.
Small wonder the French call Britain ‘perfide Albion.’ The Brits are masters at intrigue, double-dealing and propaganda. British propaganda drew the United States into two world wars. In our era, Britain has assumed leadership of western propaganda efforts against Russia and its allies.
Most Russians, who tend to be well-educated, are well aware of Great Britain’s 1853 invasion of Crimea, in league with France, the Ottoman Empire, and the then kingdom of Sardinia. The Crimean War was a bloody, three-year war designed to wrest the strategic peninsula from Tsarist control and thwart Russia’s expansion into the Balkans.
This nasty war saw the British finally storm fortress Sevastopol and temporarily reduce Russia’s influence in the Black Sea and Balkans. For France, the war was a thrilling return to military victories after the dark years of the Napoleonic wars. For Britain, it was also a triumph in spite of the disaster at Balaclava and heavy casualties due to disease. But, in the end, the war proved a stalemate: the foreign powers withdrew from Crimea and left Russia to lick it wounds.
The next serious invasion came from Germany and Romania in 1941, led by the great German general, Erich von Manstein. The second siege of Sevastopol lasted 250 days. I’ve walked over many of the old Soviet forts that so long resisted German attacks. Crimea was one of the hardest fought campaigns of WWII. Sevastopol was named one of the Soviet Union’s ‘hero cities’ for its legendary resistance.
No one who knows history should be surprised that western moves on Sevastopol and Crimea produced such a strong Russian reaction. Imagine how the US would react to a Russian naval squadron staging war games in the Gulf of Mexico or off New York City.
The point of the ‘Defender’ exercise was to humiliate Russia and show off its weakness, all part of the longer-term US/British/NATO strategy to splinter the remaining Russian Federation in a similar manner that the old Soviet Union was torn apart. That’s what the big NATO Black Sea exercise is about. There will be many more.
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Featured image: The Royal Navy Type 45 Destroyer, HMS Defender. (OGL v1.0)
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This is a controversial report based on the findings of Spanish researchers. It remains to be fully ascertained.
What is required is to have precise details on the composition of the mRNA vaccine, from one or more samples of the drug, also including the identification of the so-called digital microchip.
Independent laboratory studies based on several samples of all four major mRNA “vaccines” are required, namely AstraZeneka, BioNTech-Pfizer, Moderna Inc, Johnson and Johnson.
Statements pertaining to future impacts of the “vaccine” must be corroborated and confirmed.
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Several of the statements pertaining to the dangers of the vaccine by Dr. Jane Ruby in this report are premature and cannot at this stage be corroborated.
the Spanish study must be acknowledged and taken seriously.
It should be noted that while the “fact checking” media reports deny the existence of graphene oxide in the mRNA vaccine vial, several reports confirm patent applications pertaining to the use of graphene oxide in vaccines. e.g. Nano coronavirus recombinant vaccine taking graphene oxide as carrier
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Dr Jane Ruby joins Stew Peters to discuss a scientific report that just came out from the University of Almería School of Engineering in Spain entitled, “Graphene Oxide Detection in Aqueous Suspension: Observational Study in Optical and Electron Microscopy”, where it was found that each dose of the Pfizer shot “was found to contain 6 ng of RNA and 747 ng of graphene oxide, which is 99.103% of the medication.
“These graphene sheets that investigators found in the Pfizer vial, when they get into your system and when they start to penetrate your cells – which they have a lipid nanoparticle that pushes them into your cells – you get oxidative stress…
“It destroys literally everything inside the cell. It explodes the mitochondria. It creates a situation where the body is on a 10-Alarm fire truck and inflammation, cytokines, chemokines. This incredibly violent…inflammatory storm comes in and it has particular affinity for creating acute inflammation of the lungs, it creates an inflammatory storm in cardiac tissue and in brain tissue.
“Stew, this is going to tie directly to strokes, to the heart attacks – and we’re giving this to pregnant mothers and babies? This is really something everybody’s gotta start paying attention to.”
Stew asks her if graphene oxide is a poison and she responds, “It is most definitely a poison.”
Stew says,
“Spanish researchers have found that over 99% of the Pfizer vaccine is graphene oxide, is that right?”
“That’s right. Stew, there’s no other reason for this to be in there except to murder people… If the rest of the companies that are pushing these jabs, all four of the companies in the US are filled with 99% of this toxic industrial chemical, I don’t know what to say to you but everybody better shut everything down right now. This is really dangerous.”
Stew replies,
“This is horrific. I get chills listening to this. I don’t know why the media’s not picking any of this up. They’re in on it. They want you dead. They’re part of the murder plot…
“OK, let me ask you question. Aside from pre-meditated murder, what might be another motivation for one to fill another person’s body, their entire make-up with this graphene oxide? What else does this stuff do, other than poison and kill people?”
She responds,
“The only other explanation I could come up with, as a scientist, myself is that this is a mass-uninformed, without-consent global experiment, because they’ve never been able to get this into humans on an experimental basis.”
Stew asks,
“When they authorized this for emergency use, the efficacy was broadcast everywhere – fake, false lies, complete lies – they said that this thing killed the coronavirus, known as COVID-19, 98.6% success rate, whatever – how can they prove that? Was that just a lie? Did they just make up an arbitrary number? Is that documented anywhere? Does thing really delete or combat the SARS-CoV-2 virus?”
She replies,
“Stew, I’m going to go back to the beginning. The PCR test is a fraud perpetrated by Christian Drosten and Olfert Landt. The coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 has never been isolated, its protein sequences have never been demonstrated or validated, no one can prove to us that it ever really existed.
“Did something exist last year? Something flying around now that’s a flu? Lots of different versions of the Common Cold? Yes, yes and yes. But no one’s ever proven or shown an isolate; verified an isolate of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. That’s number one.
“And I want to add one more thing. These Spanish researchers in the group said that when you look at the different symptoms at whatever was the SARS-CoV-2 from last year, or a few residual cases now, they are all symptoms that would also be caused by excess graphene oxide in your body: the storm in the lungs – and by the way, they’re preparing an inhalant version of this “vaccine”. And God help us, Stew, because it’s more potent, it goes right into the lungs and it creates a pulmonary storm of pneumonia right away and you’re gonna see, if they get this into Emergency Use Authorization, you’re gonna start seeing respiratory flash pneumonias and rapid deaths…
“Since the Nuremberg Trials, you cannot experiment on human beings, regardless of the drug, the disease state, you cannot do it without the approval of a Human Subjects Review Board. That’s an independent board that approves your protocol and your informed consent, which no one’s ever seen – a real informed consent about these jabs…
“There’s also some information coming in and we’re going to see more and more of it and we’re going to talk about it, of the fact that when you get your body filled with enough graphene oxide, with the warmth of your body and…if it draws the oxygen into it, that [the graphene oxide] can be manipulated and your body can be affected by…the 5G network, which we haven’t seen be completely set up and rolled-out yet and so there’s a lot of concern around that.
“At that point, it’ll just be the residual people who haven’t died of lung or heart disease from this excess toxic chemical.”
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