Politics and science, humor and hypocrisy. METANOODLE
Where to begin?
The epidemiological data are hopelessly confused by the huge number of CCP flu tests done for sometimes ridiculous reasons, the terrible accuracy of the tests themselves (is it CCP flu or is it Memorex?), the use of positive tests as an indicator of disease, the inaccurate reporting of deaths, and the general politicization of the entire issue.
How can a conversation begin when the proofs are padded with fluff and indifference.
"I don't know what to do. The government has got me to the point where I question whether I even love my own country any more but one thing I know for certain, I loathe my government. What do you do?"
"Give up your rights so you can get your rights back. That equation never made sense."
This cry from the heart started at a bowling alley where an 18 year old kid played the role of the secret police, asking for the man's papers as he stood there with four kids who wanted to bowl on a rainy Saturday afternoon.
Is it just because I like to bowl too that this so strongly moved me?
He's vaccinated but defends his integrity.
Data point 1: See chart for scope of Facebook outage.
Data point 2: Facebook employees not able to badge their way into their own building. This points to internal systems being down.
UPDATE: Doug Madory, director of internet analysis at the network monitoring company Kentik, said someone at Facebook caused an update to be made to the company’s BGP records, which resulted in the company’s system taking away the map telling the world’s computers how to find its various online properties. (Speculation follows: Malicious or accidental internal mayhem?)
So many cans have been kicked down the road that the unexpected is becoming the most likely next event. As a pile of sand is built higher and higher, eventually a single grain of sand at an unpredicted location will trigger the landslide.
One of those kicked cans is massive public debt financed against the unborn's earning power. (Taxation without representation).
The focus on covid vaccinations will shift suddenly when "fuck Joe Biden"chants or indifference to health authorities or an attack on Taiwan or a supreme court ruling or a sudden change of rulers in the US tips the balance.
Or consequences of hacking FACEBOOK and friends? 1.5 billion customers' data on offer for $5000.
From the preface to "Uncommon Grounds,:The History of Coffee and How it Trasnformed Our World"
From Richard Fernandez:
(China) lacks the amphibious capacity to land the 30-plus brigades it will need to overcome the island’s defense. China does not appear to be currently investing in the equipment likely required for a direct assault on Taiwan. ..... to overcome 22 defending brigades, the buildup could not easily be concealed, and there should be no surprises. ... Beijing’s current naval build implies that the prerequisite for taking Taipei is neutralizing the U.S. navy. ... the CCP thinks Washington must “fall” before Taipei can be stormed. .. the key to encirclement’s success is Washington’s reaction. So, while 77 Chinese combat aircraft have provocatively intruded into Taiwan’s air defense identification zone, their real purpose is to beat like rain on the windows of the Oval Office to attract the attention of the man within. ....Looming large over the scene is the perception that China is becoming more dangerous because it is a declining power. As the American Enterprise Institute put it, based on a recent piece in Foreign Policy, “The United States needs to prepare for a major war, not because its rival is rising but because of the opposite.” ..
Alex Lo of the South China Morning Post poses the question: “Suppose both China and the US are in decline …? I ask our wise political scientists: if both superpowers are in decline or have peaked, are they more or less likely to go at each other’s throats? Well, judging by the aforementioned discussions, if both sides are in decline, wouldn’t both be the problem?
More significant detail and links are in the source article by Fernandez.
His "Wretchard the Cat" twitter feed is rewarding to follow also.
UPDATE: Over 150 military flights outside the 12 nautical miles line but within the Air Defense Identification zone have now taken place in October with 52 October 4th alone. 12 nautical miles is scarcely one minute of flying time for a warplane.
UPDATE: Chinese state media (Global TImes) call Taiwan "an evil force the mainland must crush" and defend the intrusions on Taiwanese air space as training to "familiarize itself with battlefield conditions".
UPDATE: Maybe Taiwan has nuclear weapons (neutron bombs). This hasn't been in the news but would give Xi pause.
Does Taiwan have nuclear weapons?
While Taiwan has pursued several programs to develop weapons of mass destruction, there has never been public acknowledgement the island nation has such devices. Reportedly, Taiwan began working to build a nuclear weapon after China’s first nuclear test in 1964. Though it reportedly produced plutonium for the program during the 1970s, the official story line is that U.S. ultimately pressured Taipei to officially halt the research in 1976. Other reports indicate nuclear research continued in secret into the 1980s.
Still, many believe Taiwan has quietly built a stockpile of tactical nuclear warheads that, if used, would give China serious pause and could help repel a People’s Liberation Army seaborne invasion. The late Sam Cohen, the father of the neutron bomb, told journalists that Taiwan had a stockpile of such weapons and that he had personally briefed the Taiwan military staff on their use. The neutron bomb, developed in the 1970s and 80s, is a controversial device that disperses massive amounts of radiation in a limited target area without the blast of a traditional weapon.
Merck was making Ivermectin and now is promoting wonder covid drug, Molnupiravir with a similar molecular interface. Convince me that instead of repurposing Ivermectin, Merck is promoting an expensive simulacrum that the hypocrites in the public sphere can embrace without admitting wrongdoing while the patent holder makes a ton of money.
Merck had the patent on Ivermectin until 1996.
Have you ever thought about how to measure the temperature of the world and to detect a tenth of a degree change in it?
Click through to the ventusky map to get a sense of the variance and take a look at the options that vary from a few centimeters above the surface to turbulent kilometers above the surface, most of it measured from instruments more than a 100 km high in the sky. There are almost no ground stations above the arctic circle now.
Eventually covid vaccines may be safe and testing useful.
The latest step forward is a 3 minute breath test that detects covid-19 and variants.
The breathalyser is fast, non-intrusive and duplicates PCR tests results "100%".
Missing is how the rate of false positives compares.
Reported in Medical Press.
Linked here by a blogger who has had lots of vaccinations but is troubled by the under-reported hazards of the current covid jabs.
Senator Kennedy is making political points today but is he wrong?
The chart is what it is.
The three observations are what they are.
The unavoidable conclusion: The vaccine is somewhat ineffective against a virus that keeps redesigning itself to get past the things that are trying to kill it.
The avoidable conclusion but one that can't be fully ruled out: The vaccines are promoting the development of hardier viruses which results in additional illness and additional death.
Link here:
The three points: The population is over 60% vaccinated. Deaths had dropped significantly before the vaccine was introduced. Cases and deaths have surged since the introduction of the vaccine.
Remember, CDC just sneak-edited the definition of "Vaccine". Formerly a vaccine stimulated the immune system to develop immunity. Now it just stimulates the immune system.
"The Conservative philosophy is to “‘hunt where the ducks are,’ which is to say, tack ever further to the left.” The result is no duck for dinner. In shunting a traditionally right-of-center party into the left’s impregnable bailiwick in an effort to pilfer votes, O’Toole ensured his party’s defeat. He never understood the first rule of political sexuality, that that you must first love your own before attempting to seduce your adversaries.
(Trudeau)was re-elected, an event that could be viewed not only as a political farce but equally as a withering indictment of an irresponsible and profoundly myopic electorate."
