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November 1, 2020
The MoA Week In Review – Open Thread 2020-87

Last week's posts at Moon of Alabama:

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Other issues:

Venezuela:

By then the Defense Department had also been sharing with Venezuelans a secret plan to foment insurgencies called Operation X Zone.

It all casts doubts on the narrative claiming that Goudreau operated as a freelancer in a vacuum in one of the most closely watched areas of the world.

Covid-19:

Household transmission of SARS-CoV-2 is common and occurs early after illness onset. Persons should self-isolate immediately at the onset of COVID-like symptoms, at the time of testing as a result of a high risk exposure, or at time of a positive test result, whichever comes first. All household members, including the index case, should wear masks within shared spaces in the household.

Covid-19 in German language:

France bad, headchoppers good?

Use as open thread …

Posted by b on November 1, 2020 at 15:07 UTC | Permalink
Comments

c1ue @193
Perhaps, but you are demonstrably factually wrong. To remind you of how wrong you are, your own words: “There are no outside travelers going there [Xinjiang, China], at least on airlines, because that whole region is national security locked down to start with.”
Orbitz listing of flights from New York to Xinjiang.
Customs inspection at Turgart truck port in Xinjiang. “No outside travelers”?
You are factually wrong, as I just demonstrated. What is offensive, though, is that you then tried to salvage your lie ignorant and jingoist misstatement with bullshit about cops checking people’s IDs in an area victimized by terrorist attacks and targeted by foreign intelligence (CIA) goons, and trying to call that a “lockdown”. Comments in response to that hyperbolic blog post you linked are of this sort: “Just visited Xinjiang from 22 May to 3 June 2016… and I didn’t feel any obstacle related with security. We spend walking around Urumqi even nearly midnight and feel ok.”
Your “objective view” is anything but.
There is no “lockdown” in Xinjiang, either in the sense that you originally implied of one which is intended to halt community spread of contagions, nor of the sort you switched it to of just police harassing travelers. Since the original bio attack by the US in Wuhan was foiled by the lockdown in February, all subsequent restrictions in China have been local and only long enough to complete testing, tracing, and isolation of infected individuals. What’s more, that test/trace/isolate operation is completed with astonishing efficiency and rapidity, clearing entire big cities for return to normal life in just a couple days. If the only problem the US was having with the coronavirus was a single major city every other month or so getting locked down for a couple days to isolate a dozen infected individuals, then America would be in dramatically better shape right now and hundreds of thousands of victims of the virus would still be alive. Your pretending otherwise is dishonest or stupid.

Posted by: William Gruff | Nov 3 2020 11:53 utc | 201

Excerpt from Tucker Carlson show last night talking about Trump’s visit to Butler, Pennsylvania Youtube video

Millions of Americans sincerely love Donald Trump. They love him in spite of everything they have heard – they love him often in spite of himself. They’re not deluded – they know exactly who Trump is. They love him anyway. They love Donald Trump because no one loves them.
…
The country they built – the country their ancestors fought for over hundreds of years – has left them to die in their unfashionable little town. Mocked and despised by the sneering half-wits with finance degrees – but no actual skills – who seem to run everything all of a sudden.
Whatever Donald Trump’s faults, he is better than the people in charge.
At least he doesn’t hate them for their weakness.

Butler, Pennsylvania started diverging above the national increase in opioid deaths in 2015 – they’re now at double the national rate: 20 deaths per 100,000 people.
Compare this with COVID: 71.5 per 100,000 for the US overall and 69.5 per 100,000 for Pennsylvania.
For Butler county specifically: 29 opioid deaths vs. 28 COVID deaths in 2020 thus far – only the opioid deaths have been going on since 2015…

Posted by: c1ue | Nov 3 2020 13:01 utc | 202

James,
It is hard to have an intelligent conversation with people who compare wearing masks to rounding up and killing jews.
It is also hard to have a conversation with a person who thinks they know all the hidden details about what is going on in the world, and will post it every third post in every thread.
It is also hard to have a conversation with a person who will talk about how the MSM is duplicitous and untrustworthy, and the very next day cite that MSM paper as an authoritative source in support of their argument.
I am not the problem here. This isn’t my bar, I am not responsible for keeping it clean or inviting.
Someone has let in the barn yard animals who are shitting all over the place, but according to you, that is not the problem, I am the problem for noticing and pointing out the shit, and also for not helping to clean it up.
I know, I know, don’t let the door hit me on the way out. Enjoy the mess fellas, at the rate you are going, this place will be just like zero hedge in no time.

Posted by: visak | Nov 3 2020 13:01 utc | 203

“Canadian military wants to establish new organization to use propaganda, other techniques to influence Canadians”
behaviour modification techniques of the same sort used by the parent firm of Cambridge Analytica,

Posted by: arby | Nov 3 2020 13:02 utc | 204

@William Gruff #201
The fact is that Chinese travelers are restricted going to XinJiang – and there are all manner of internal restrictions going on in that province as well.
That they’re “open” for foreigners to go in is really pretty much irrelevant.
Foreigners could go into Soviet Russia.
Foreigners can go into North Korea today.
Just because an American can go to Xinjiang doesn’t mean that the place is not actually under a serious lockdown, or that each visiting foreigner is as likely as not to have an actual tail.
So feel free to argue all you want – all you have demonstrated thus far is style over substance.

Posted by: c1ue | Nov 3 2020 13:05 utc | 205

Covid news – live: Liverpool offered rapid tests as England hospital admissions jump 60% in 10 days

Two thousand military personnel will be drafted in to help with the first mass testing pilot of its kind, which will begin a day after England is plunged into its second national lockdown.
It comes as leaked data seen by The Independent revealed the number of Covid patients admitted to hospitals in England has jumped by more than 60 per cent in just 10 days.

This clarifies a common misconception of many Covidiots here: PCR tests are for gathering information, not for formal, medical diagnosis. It gives the politicians in government a general picture of the pattern and advance of the pandemic in their jurisdiction.
In Liverpool’s case, mass testings are coming only after hospital admissions spiked up. It’s not that the city is inventing fictitious cases in order to legitimize anti-freedom policies (disaster capitalism), but the polar opposite: they tried to ignore the pandemic until its healthcare system approached collapse.

Posted by: vk | Nov 3 2020 13:41 utc | 206

I would take those negative reports of Xinjiang with a grain of salt.
I did read or saw a video recently by an American who was biking through there and he said it was fine.
Posted by: arby | Nov 2 2020 23:36 utc | 183
A friend of mine visited Xinjiang in November/December 2019 for about a week with a group of medical technology experts, flying to various different parts of the province. He was very impressed with the experience. He brought me a couple of souvenirs from Urumqi.

Posted by: BM | Nov 3 2020 14:30 utc | 207

c1ue @205 <--Massive and repeated fail Really, just give it up. Your initial assertion was that the coronavirus was in Xinjiang from community spread and couldn't have been imported from abroad because nobody from abroad could go there, but now you are asserting that foreigners can go to Xinjiang but not Chinese people! So which is it? What a `tard you are! You destroy your own point.

Posted by: William Gruff | Nov 3 2020 14:40 utc | 208

More on Ms German Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer:
Germany to Deploy a Frigate to Patrol the Indo-Pacific
I imagine the Indo-Pacific is quaking in its boots.

Posted by: Bemildred | Nov 3 2020 14:46 utc | 209

“Jordan
@JordanChariton
·
12h
A night b4 election, when it will get buried, DOJ releases previously unknown part of Mueller’s findings…
That found no conclusive evidence @wikileaks
Julian Assange worked w/ Russia on DNC “hacks” (for which there’s still no evidence for) ”

Posted by: arby | Nov 3 2020 15:50 utc | 210

Nathan Mulcahy @15
You should add a last bullet point by adding:
Any attempt at challenging the current narrative will be treated with derision and banning from social media platforms.

Posted by: anon48 | Nov 3 2020 16:01 utc | 211

visak @203
All of a sudden you want a civilised discussion? Your response to my post was: 1) insults 2) ban him & 3) misrepresenting what I wrote.
I’m quite happy to respect your opinion if you care to express one. I do not respect any of the above actions.
BTW I compared masks as a symbol, like the yellow badges Jews had to wear. I made no mention of rounding up and killing anyone. Apparently you seem to think you know what I mean better than I do.

Posted by: EoinW | Nov 3 2020 16:14 utc | 212

@ Bemildred 209
Germany to Deploy a Frigate to Patrol the Indo-Pacific . .I imagine the Indo-Pacific is quaking in its boots
It’s a bit more serious than that, IMO. Germany is (1) striving for European sovereignty and (2) joined (only verbally so far) the Indo-Pacific US military gambit to limit China world sovereignty. Meanwhile, economically, Germany has connections with China’s ally Russia (energy) and China (rail).

Posted by: Don Bacon | Nov 3 2020 16:24 utc | 213

Don Bacon–
Sounds like that is all the rage these days. Playing both sides of the fence.

Posted by: arby | Nov 3 2020 16:28 utc | 214

Frigates are rather small boats to be that far from home.
Perhaps Germany’s frigate will be the flagship of a fleet of canoes?

Posted by: William Gruff | Nov 3 2020 16:49 utc | 215

Thanks to karlof1 @ 158 and Don Bacon @ 166 for views on education. I was thinking of Putin’s video visit to the schools when I wrote my last screed on debt and the expenses being loaded onto the US system. (I realized later that yes, this is Biden’s doing, education expenses are not bankruptcy material.)And indeed what Putin expresses in your quotes, karlof1, is totally absent as Don Bacon points out, in the US system — and has been for a very long time.
I had my children in New Zealand schools for a while, visiting during the early ’90s. Came back to the US to enroll them again in the upper grades before university – big, big contrast. Going to New Zealand, no problem; the school officials were happy to see them, and though the system there was different, both seasonally and by how grading students was done, they simply took the kids according to their ages, slotted them in and away we went. Coming back was another story – “oh, coming into summer (two months away)… can’t have them in school now … will need catch up classes during the summer though.” So, we did that for the one now of high school age (he got A- in that needed algebra class) and into the sophomore class he went. Meanwhile school administration doing a dicker…back and forth with NZ to ascertain grades. New Zealand fires back – “we don’t have that system; he passed!” Son finishes sophomore year…and US school administration sends me letter: “Sorry – can’t get the right answer from New Zealand – you have to take sophomore year over again.”
I was SO frustrated. I took him out and ‘home schooled’ him (in those days a very flexible system). He was able to go to the nearby community college and get his GED at the end of it, mainly on the strength of his superior New Zealand education. His younger brother, after a nightmare year of ‘education’ in US middle school, went through the identical process. And that was back in the early 90’s, so the system was well on the way to collapse, even before the finances went haywire or covid came along. And older sister, (long story short) got her college education in China! For which I do fervently thank God, Who does move in very mysterious ways.

Posted by: juliania | Nov 3 2020 17:08 utc | 216

I had to go to a thorough research to get to know what you mean by “Cootiestan”, already used by “b” in a previous post and now continue to be used by you talking about Covid pandemic, since the translator throws nothing..
Well, got to understand this is an imaginary illness of the opposite sex when children, biys and girls, start socializing with each other…
I did not know, it must be a byproduct of extremely puritan US society, but I had never known of anything remotely similar, at least in my working class neighborhood of childhood here in Spain…
We simply did not let them girls into our cabins made of waste cardboard and wood, but never on infectious invented terms, only because it was amn exclusive for boys space… bluntly…They girls had theirs too, as like when they played only for girls games..Bu there were always mixed games, generaly action ones, where everybody had contact with each other and teams were made in a mix..Athletic capabilities were required for these games, some of which incuded exigent gymnastics, at which some girls were really good…We all wanted out team to win, no cootie could mess it up.
You know, found the custom quite cruel, may be one whose effects trnalsates into adult life, since seems like a reflection of what the US tries to made of its opponents today, trying ot make of them plagued people with whom nobody would want to have deals …Witnessed yesterday at a neighboring military blog how dirty sex references were used to try to denigrate a woman…Sad…
The myriad of sex scandals who have spiced the two last US election campaigns, where all kind of sexual dirt, real or invented, has been throw to the opponent, seem also a reflection of such apparently “innocent” childish custom..This add to US current insanity, IMO this thematic was brought into public daily talk by people who hold dark instincts..at all levels..these is the people who were rightly languishing in their basements, embittered for not being accepted as they really are, until Trump gave them a new life…All pro-Trump forums are infested by this kind of people, they are few, but as they throw shit all the time, manage to get the environment messed up and stinky

Posted by: H.Schmatz | Nov 3 2020 17:29 utc | 217

@ visak | Nov 3 2020 13:01 utc | 203… visak… i hear you and appreciate what you are saying… people say stupid shit from time to time on moa! just ignore it! i know that’s hard to do.. you seem like a good person visak…. this covid divide has really polarized the world and a lot of people too.. you see it here at moa as well.. i try to ignore a lot of this as i feel it is much like the usa election divide… both are divisive… we don’t have to let ourselves be divided by it all though.. if someone says something we don’t agree with – let it go, or challenge them in a friendly and civilized way.. if they are talking crazy, maybe just don’t bother to respond to them! i hope you stick around! cheers james

Posted by: james | Nov 3 2020 17:31 utc | 218

Bemildred @ 209, thank you for your past link on the New Zealand foreign minister change – I loved reading that as when I was a child there I would often see an elderly woman on the bus who had the moko, never men just sometimes a woman. Bravo to her; it is an important step forward for the government.

Posted by: juliania | Nov 3 2020 17:52 utc | 219

Interesting take on the Charlie Hedbo slander of Muslims by Israel Shamir
“Perhaps the very idea of mass immigration from the war-stricken regions was connected with the elites’ desire to start a low-intensity civil war in their own country while undoing social cohesion achieved by centuries of living together.”
“An 18-year-old youngster of Chechen origin (he had lived in France since he was six) killed him and allegedly decapitated him, and right away the killer was shot dead by police. This created a wave of panic in France, with Macron and Le Pen competing with calls to punish the Muslims. Some Muslim extremists allegedly attacked worshippers in a Nice church and killed three or four of them. This was decried as a false flag action, aimed at terrorising people into accepting the new lockdown, by a prominent radical French site that called for the “refusal of re-containment (or new lockdown) as the only real act of resistance in these troubled times”.
It could be a false flag, for no Muslim group accepted responsibility, and besides, the French secret service has a tradition of killing the perpetrators they sent to do the deed, and the killing of the young Chechen fits their playbook. The next terrorist act, the shooting of a Greek Orthodox priest in Lyon, was also ascribed to bloodthirsty Muslims, until it was discovered that the criminal was a fellow Orthodox ex-monk with some personal grudge against the priest; then the Lyon attack was dropped into the memory hole.”
https://www.unz.com/ishamir/charlie-hebdo-rides-again/

Posted by: Blue Dotterel | Nov 3 2020 17:55 utc | 220

China’s new 5-year plan contains new tools to deal with the “territories”–Macao, HK & Taiwan. The article and video I posted yesterday about the opening of the world’s longest ocean bridge links HK & Macao with the mainland and will certainly enhance connectivity. A different approach from the previous plan will be used with Taiwan:
“The new plan also focuses on improving systems and policies to ensure the well-being of Taiwan compatriots and equal treatment for them and mainland residents, and supports Taiwan businesses in participating in the Belt and Road initiative in the national development strategy. It also vows to support qualified Taiwan-funded enterprises to list on the mainland.”
The publication of the entire 14th 5-year plan was also announced, but I’ve yet to see a link to it, although I doubt it’s been translated into English yet. Related news:
“The Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee released Tuesday the full text of proposals for mapping out a blueprint for China’s development in the next 15 years, on which the top leader said the CPC Central Committee will announce the achievement of building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects after a systematic assessment and review in the first half of 2021.
“The document, the Party leadership’s proposals for formulating the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-25) for National Economic and Social Development and the Long-Range Objectives Through the Year 2035, was adopted at the fifth plenary session of the 19th CPC Central Committee which closed Thursday….
“Xi said that after ‘comprehensively considering various factors,’ the proposed draft adopts a ‘qualitative expression and a quantitative approach’ to the economic development goals by 2035, noting that the mid- and long-term planning goals should pay more attention to the optimization of the economic structure, and guide all parties to focus on improving the quality and efficiency of development.
“The change of tone in China’s economic development target is in line with the country’s development situation, as China is in pursuit of high-quality development rather than quantitative growth, Cong Yi, a professor at the Tianjin University of Finance and Economics, told the Global Times on Tuesday.
“Cong said it’s also possible that China will continue to downplay the GDP target in the future, as conducting all work around a specific growth target may lead to trifles and neglect the essentials, adding that structural adjustments and upgrading will be the primary task for China no matter how the external environment evolves.”
Not only is the Outlaw US Empire’s Ship-of-State firmly grounded on the COVID shoal, it’s also held back by two gigantic anchors–Neoliberal Dogma and its Overseas Empire. Even if the Ship can somehow manage to refloat itself, those two anchors will continue to retard any attempt to catch up with Russia and China.

Posted by: karlof1 | Nov 3 2020 18:31 utc | 221

H Schmatz
Coodies or I guess Cooties were lice.
Cracks against other kids, usually girls went like this. “She’s got coodies”
Even when I was a kid it was understood as more of a knock than truthfull.
Cootistan comes from the other countries denying access to Americans as if they have coodies (lice),means you’re not allowed to come here

Posted by: arby | Nov 3 2020 18:50 utc | 222

What’s happening with Zerohedge today? Where normally there are 100 to 1000 comments on most articles,they collect 30000 up to 280000 today.Is it a side effect of election-rigging by IT experts?

Posted by: willie | Nov 5 2020 8:22 utc | 223

209# Bemildred
Well,we may laugh about Annegret Kramp-Karrebauer (AKK),and she did very well as a Bütteredner in Carnival in Cologne last year, but the fact is that she is the first german minister of Defense (War) that goes this far in projecting german army across the world,since the nazis officially lost World War Two.Now the americans plan leaving Afghanistan,after the french had left four years ago,why should germans stay in Afghanistan to make sur little girls can go to school unveiled?I think they’ll have to join the americans to threaten Russia,China and Iran,under a Harris_Clinton government.

Posted by: willie | Nov 5 2020 11:20 utc | 224

Posted by: willie | Nov 5 2020 11:20 utc | 224
Zero Hedge is a libertarian click-farm that also puts up lots of other political orientation articles, as long as it gets clicks, which is why I keep track of it. I read any place I can find useful info, not picky at all. The comment section there is one of the more debased ones outside Reddit and Unz. They are up in arms because Trump is losing, they run heavy to Trumpists and hate SJW. They also intermix articles with advertising that looks like “news” and generally are not above any sort of fakery that suits their political tastes. And of course they want donations. So, it’s an advertising business, not a news outlet, but can be useful.
I am not sure what you are trying to say about Ms AKK, but I don’t think we disagree. What concerns me about her and what she said is that she is trespassing over old unwritten red lines, and seems very naive about military affairs. To put another way: she is mouthing off and does not sound like she knows what she is talking about. She does not help her cause by speeches like that. If she is compelled by circumstances more than I think, well perhaps I’m too hard on her. But it is still a speech that is going to raise some eyebrows. “The West” is already in a position where they wnat us to buy their stuff and sell our stuff and go away.

Posted by: Bemildred | Nov 5 2020 13:09 utc | 225

@willie:
I would hazard to guess that what you are seeing there at Zero Hedge is a massive case of “cognitive disconnect”. Or else I’m nuts, which is always possible. I’ll go check it out later.

Posted by: Bemildred | Nov 5 2020 13:14 utc | 226

Bemildred.
I have same attitude to ZeroHedge as you,it seems.I quickly look for some article of interest,and do not bother to read or write comments.It is just very odd to see the numbers of posts multiplied by a factor 10 to 100.
AKK is one of those atlantist-bred european ministers posing as ministers of Defense,or other sensible positions.She was on the forefront,with Heiko Maas on the Navalny case,and the Russia bashing.
In France we have Florence Parly,Natalie Loiseau and such women.There are lots more,but I find it particularly dumb that in an epoch that sees the USA-imperium dwindle,that this new generation of lying officials is coming to power and want europe to cling to uncle sam’s trousers.
Indeed ,AKK has crossed a red line,that she maybe is not even aware of.
By the way,some week after the Chechen murdering the schoolteacher,French min.of Interior Darmanin said he was going to Moscou to talk with russian officials.That’s what the papers said.But the journey seems to have been cancelled:Darmanin would like to talk to the head of the FSB and russian anti-terrorist officials.Bad luck,this man has been placed only days before on the sanctions list.(Laughs)
Reminds me of french interior minister Manuel Valls,who in 2015 refused the aid of Syria and Bachar al-Assad’s security services who were able and willing to give him detailed information about french citizens perpetrating terrorism in Syria.

Posted by: willie | Nov 5 2020 15:54 utc | 227

Posted by: willie | Nov 5 2020 15:54 utc | 227
Agreed. (D’accord?)
Thanks for the French political gossip. I remember Heiko Maas’ statement, he too looked ridiculous. I remember M. Valls too. Petty, spiteful people. Bureaucrats, in other words. You may be in worse shape than we are. Hard to say. Stay safe.

Posted by: Bemildred | Nov 5 2020 16:37 utc | 228

Hello old friends, Annie, Dan of Steele, Noirette, many others. And new friends karlof1, bemildred, william gruff, James, uncle tungsten, grieved, Juliania, Anne and many others.
Bernhard (b).
Capitalization and typos by Android tablet.
Thanks for keeping it real. This blog is a major sanity point and source of wisdom and info for me.
My Hope is that the noise ratio does not drown out the signal.
There are many constant and occasional posters who distract from the notes I recognize and cherish and learn from you all.
Let’s not let that distract us from the common thread.
Scroll down!
It’s how I now skip instead of reading every comment. In other days I did read each one, more fool me.
Thanks to you all, talk to you soon.

Posted by: jonku | Nov 8 2020 8:47 utc | 229

thanks jonku! i hope you continue! james

Posted by: james | Nov 20 2020 22:22 utc | 230

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