If Trump has shown us anything, it is that you can be a billionaire, you can be President of the United States, there still are those above you.

Kennedy they shot, Trump they voted out. It's more sophisticated, but not by much.

Posted by: passerby | Dec 13 2020 14:32 utc | 1

passerby @Dec13 14:32 #1

Oh please, what has Trump done that the Zionist, neoliberal, establishment the neocon Deep State would not approve of?

!!

Posted by: Jackrabbit | Dec 13 2020 14:59 utc | 2

passerby @1

With Kennedy they could deflect the public's attention to the Apollo program. "We'll do this moon-shot thing in his memory!" There is no similar issue that Trump represents that can be used as a sink for the outrage if Trump were assassinated. Furthermore, many Americans were already primed for the possibility that Trump would get the Kennedy treatment, and the establishment, despite how dense they are, could sense that. While they would have no difficulty finding some broken freak like our resident drug witch to pull the trigger on Trump, they were afraid of what the public's backlash might be. They couldn't foresee Trump winning in the first place, and that spooked them, leaving them more than a little apprehensive and deeply questioning their ability to read the mood of the public. To a large degree the American public became a big question mark to the establishment when Trump won, and they spent the next four years scrambling to recover the feeling that they were in control. That wasn't an environment that they felt confident enough to pull off something so disruptive as an assassination in.

Posted by: William Gruff | Dec 13 2020 15:25 utc | 3

re: William Gruff @4

I should say, unlike Kennedy's Apollo program to distract the public, the most probable Trump issue that the public would fixate on were Trump to be assassinated would be Swamp draining. Not an issue that the establishment would want a martyr attached to.

Posted by: William Gruff | Dec 13 2020 15:29 utc | 4

JR @2

"what has Trump done that the Zionist, neoliberal, establishment the neocon Deep State would not approve of?"

Muse openly about endless wars, getting along with Russia - two things that come to mind.

Even if he didn't deliver, such things are not to be discussed in contemporary democratic "America", particularly if you are positioned to possibly be able to implement them.

Posted by: expat | Dec 13 2020 15:55 utc | 5

RE: "Evidence of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in an Oropharyngeal Swab Specimen, Milan, Italy, Early December 2019-Emerging Infectious Diseases / CDC"

As per usual, The US CDC is a dollar short and at least *three months late*.

https://nypost.com/2020/11/15/covid-19-may-have-been-in-italy-as-early-as-september-2019/

CGTN story

Gabriella Sozzi, an INT biologist, told CGTN Europe that while Italy's first coronavirus patient was officially detected on February 21 in the northern region of Lombardy, blood samples taken in September 2019 showed the presence of the antibodies against the Sars-Cov-2 virus.

"What we noticed, and it was unexpected, we found more than 10 percent of the samples presenting antibodies against the COVID-19 virus," said Sozzi. "This finding seems to tell us that the Sars-Cov-2 virus was probably circulating at a low level in Italy before the outbreak that we had in February."

The Italian researchers' findings, published by the INT's scientific magazine Tumori Journal, show that 11.6 percent of the 959 healthy volunteers enrolled in a lung cancer screening trial between September 2019 and March 2020, had developed coronavirus antibodies well before February.

Tumori Jpurnal paper

Posted by: gm | Dec 13 2020 17:05 utc | 6

Re: "Evidence of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in an Oropharyngeal Swab Specimen, Milan, Italy, Early December 2019":

Yet more pieces of evidence that SARS-CoV-2 is not the "China virus" that the USA wants us to believe. Is it perhaps related to EVALI instead?

Re: gm | Dec 13 2020 16:06 utc | 8

None of these experts talk about the way to stop COVID before it hits.

It has become abundantly clear by now that COVID is not a respiratory disease, but a vascular disease. Cue to the vascular health situation of many first world citizens: it is ugly, mainly because of diet and lifestyle. Instead of focusing on pharmaceutical interventions on a mass scale, we should be reconsidering many of our everyday behaviours and reserve the needles and pills for a last resort.

Special attention is warranted for the pandemic of vitamin D deficiency that is a major contributor to bad outcome cases of COVID. The general population does not get exposure to the proper amount of the sun's rays that we have evolved with for milennia. Add to that the range of environmental and dietary toxins that block vitamin D receptors and we get a picture of a severely wrecked vitamin D system, which is essential for an effective immune system, cardiovascular health and neurological functioning. We have only discovered these things in recent decades and your general practitioner is likely not up to speed, nor are the ordained experts who advise the governmental deciders.

Posted by: Lurk | Dec 13 2020 17:13 utc | 7

China holds state commemoration for Nanjing Massacre victims

Little know fact about the Nanjing Massacre is that it was the first show of Chiang Kaishek's true face. He and his command center knew of the inevitability of the Japanese advance to the city (which was the nationalist capital at the time) and flew with his gang from the city in the cover of darkness, leaving the city's population to pay the price of being at the wrong place, the wrong time.

This would be only the first of a series of flights of Chiang Kaishek while the Japanese went from one triumph to the other during WWII. Worse sacrifices on the altar of his majesty's and his crew of corrupt landlords were still to come (see the dyke destruction of the Yellow River, which only delayed the Japanese advance for some three months).

WWII destroyed every faith remaining of the Chinese people - specially the peasantry - on the nationalists. It showed they ugly face of liberalism. By the end of the war, public opinion already was overwhelmingly favoring the Communists, as American intelligence documents prove.

The second part of the Civil War (1945-1949) as a series of spectacular victories by the Communists. It showed the series of defeats during WWII were not only due to Japanese alleged overwhelming might, but due to nationalist (liberal) incompetence, greed and corruption.

--//--

A defeat of capitalism:

Merkel orders Germany into hard lockdown as infections swell

--//--

Good news:

Sputnik V likely to offer two-year protection against coronavirus - developers

Competition happened and was fair. Western Big Pharma should accept defeat, take the losses they must, and give up their market shares to Gamaleya, which has already announced it can produce enough for half of the world's population (it will be able to produce even more if Big Pharma gets out of the way).

Free market is free market, isn't it? The best product must win, mustn't it? This is a great opportunity of the Western peoples to show they are not mere hypocrites, stick to their liberal values and do the right thing.

--//--

Nobel laureate warns COVID-19 won't be last pandemic of this century

There is a register in history of two pandemics happening 70 years apart, instead of the average 100 years. Even excluding the "unknown unknowns" factor, it is possible for another pandemic to happen already in 21st Century.

--//--

China will lead the world's post-COVID-19 green recovery

It already was (before the pandemic), and already is (as it has already defeated the pandemic). The headline is imprecise.

Red is the new Green.

--//--

Leyen, Johnson to 'go extra mile' with Brexit talks

The Germans don't want to admit this, but the EU does need the UK more than the UK needs the EU.

Not because of economics - the UK will certainly lose more in this front than the EU - but in the political-ideological front. The loss of the UK is the first loss of territory of the EU; it is also one of its most (in cultural-ideological terms) prestigious members, Europe's last true world superpower. There's also a bad omen to this: Britannia was the first truly consolidated province to be lost by the Roman Empire (death of Magnus Maximus, legendary founder of Wales). Will history repeat itself?

--//--

More good news:

Uzbekistan, Cuba granted observer status at Eurasian Economic Union

I hope Cuba becomes a full member in the future, the sooner the better. It can then have full access not only to the Russian markets, but also to its weapons. This would open a huge flank on the American Empire's defenses.

By the way, Cuba is now officially abandoning the CUC - probably Fidel's biggest mistake.

Posted by: vk | Dec 13 2020 17:14 utc | 8

Another fun fact about the initial SARS-COV-2 outbreak in Europe:

Many of the first clusters of cases were located in close proximity to NATO installations.

Posted by: Lurk | Dec 13 2020 17:15 utc | 9

@ Posted by: passerby | Dec 13 2020 14:32 utc | 1

Trump is a very small, fringe billionaire by American standards (only USD 3 billion total wealth). There are CEO's richer than him.

Let's not kid ourselves: the USA is a plutocracy, always was, always will be.

Posted by: vk | Dec 13 2020 17:22 utc | 10

Accidentally deleted this comment by gm:

EARLY OUTPATIENT TREATMENT Protocols & Strategies to manage COVID-19 Pandemic Dr Peter McCullough,11/27/20
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJ1fkKqK7T8

Posted by: b | Dec 13 2020 17:27 utc | 11

RE: "None of these experts talk about the way to stop COVID before it hits"

-Posted by: Lurk | Dec 13 2020 17:13 utc | 11

That is not correct in the case of Dr. McCullough.

In both the late Oct YT at #8 and the late Nov YT at post #9 he addresses the "Four Pillars of Pandemic Response", with the first pillar being *preventative actions* (masks/transmission limiting measures/index case tracking etc).

McCullough also points out in the latter YT that, in the case of the US, Canada, UK and much of western EU, 'First Pillar' measures have failed miserably to stop the resurgent wave of covid.

Posted by: gm | Dec 13 2020 17:35 utc | 12

Posted by: vk | Dec 13 2020 17:14 utc | 12

Cuba to access the EAEU is the Silk Road making it all the way to the Caribbean. Uzbekistan is just as important if not more, population and geography.

Not once but twice, and still the deadliest poison since hemlock known as Novichok -sounds like Starichok by now, that is to say old stuff- and still they could not do bovine Navalny -the adjective was granted by the great and greatly missed Limonov-. Any movie will do, now that they’ve got the whole world on the couch.

Posted by: Paco | Dec 13 2020 17:38 utc | 13

Interesting read by F William Engdahl

The widely-praised German model of the Angela Merkel regime to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic is now engulfed in a series of potentially devastating scandals going to the very heart of the testing and medical advice being used to declare draconian economic shutdowns and next, de facto mandatory vaccinations. The scandals involve a professor at the heart of Merkel’s corona advisory group. The implications go far beyond German borders to the very WHO itself and their global recommendations.

Coronavirus Scandal Breaking in Merkel’s Germany

Posted by: Down South | Dec 13 2020 17:55 utc | 14

@ b | Dec 13 2020 17:27 utc | 13 who outed himself as human

Thanks for that. Some around here have been writing that you are something else....grin

What part of the shit show are you going to show us next?

5 weeks until Trumps is gone but how much more shit stirring will he do before then?

Trump could do something good like stopping the prosecution of Assange and Snowden as some are writing about around the intertubes but I think Trump is more motivated by interpersonal revenge...and discrimination

Posted by: psychohistorian | Dec 13 2020 18:12 utc | 15

expat @Dec13 15:55 #7

Muse openly about endless wars, getting along with Russia - two things that come to mind.

Even if he didn't deliver ...

LOL.

Watch what they do, not what they say.

!!

Posted by: Jackrabbit | Dec 13 2020 18:45 utc | 16

@ Posted by: Down South | Dec 13 2020 17:55 utc | 16

Nah. Engdahl is just spreading fake news.

1) There is no "German model": Engdahl is fabricating a concept that doesn't correspond to anything in reality. The whole little story he tells in one of the first paragraphs is fantasy.

2) it is just one article. One snowflake a winter doesn't make. Just because you manage to take down one article doesn't mean you decisively debunked a scientific theory.

3) the arguments of the "peer-reviewed" scientists against Drosten are of as circumstantial and as vague as his. They analyze the same data he did (they didn't bring any new one) and just deliver another interpretation to the results. There are a lot of fallacies in their review as those they claim there are in Drosten's paper.

4) the 23 scientists who signed the review only ask for the retraction of the paper, not the stoppage of usage of PCR tests. They do not offer any other useful solution.

5) the review itself is not peer-reviewed. Its only source is a website ridiculously named "https://cormandrostenreview.com/". It only has two "papers", both practically posted at the same time (27/11 and 28/11). It is clearly an ad-hoc astroturf NGO based on pseudo-science.

6) it's funny how those "reviews" came exactly by the time the Merkel government decided to re-enforce lockdowns in Germany. It's almost like a miracle: every time the Covidiots need some propaganda piece on which they can base their vitriol, a couple of "peer-reviewed" papers fall from the sky!

7) China is doing PCRs since the dawn of time and there is not an explosion of new cases as the anti-PCR squad is claiming. On the contrary: when they decided to re-test all the Wuhan inhabitants with obligatory PCR tests, they found none, zero, nada positive results.

Posted by: vk | Dec 13 2020 18:45 utc | 17

What a pack of bullshit dogfart hypocritical authoritarian fuckwits. Read and weep/laugh. My concern for the well being any of these governments has evaporated.
https://www.unodc.org/documents/commissions/CND/CND_Sessions/CND_63Reconvened/statements/03Dec/Russia_Joint_Statement.pdf

Joint Statement at the reconvened 63rdsession of the Commission on Narcotic Drugs on the WHO/ECDD recommendations on cannabis and related substances

Vienna, 2 December 2020

On behalf of Algeria, Angola, Bahrain, Belarus, Burkina Faso, China, Cuba, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kyrgyz Republic, Libya, Namibia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Palestine, Philippines, Russian Federation, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Syria, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan, the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela

We are extremely disappointed at the outcome of the voting on the recommendation 5.1 to reschedule cannabis plant and cannabis resin from the strictest Schedule IV of the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs. Cannabis remains the most abused drug globally. For the past 60 years, the international drug control system has been effective in addressing and countering the illicit production of and trafficking in cannabis and cannabis-related substances whilstensuring their availability for medical and scientific purposes. There is limited evidence that justifies any changes to the scheduling system for cannabis and its related substances, which remains relevant today in curbing the worsening global drug situation.

The outcome of the voting clearly shows that there is no consensus on such an important decision and nearly half of the Commission does not see sufficient reasoning for the proposed change. We express deep concern that the decision to change the existing scheduling status for cannabis and its related substances may be interpreted as the Commission finding that these substances are no longer regarded as harmful to health, in sharp contrast to the recent scientific findings.

Notwithstanding the outcome of the voting, there should be no ambiguity about the implications of this decision. The Commission does not condone the legalization of cannabis, which is contrary to the conventions.

We are concerned that the change in the control system will result in an
increase in the illicit use and production of cannabis and cannabis-related substances, as we have seen in some State Parties that eased the control measures long before the official decision of the CND and contrary to the conventions. In addition, this change will not improve access to cannabis for medical and scientific purposes considering that access for such purposes is not restricted within the current legal framework. This change will cause planting more cannabis for its economic benefits and will result with an increase in drug trafficking. Also, replacing the cultivation of agricultural products with cannabis will have adverse effects on food security.

Deliberations on the recommendations over the past two years clearly illustrate that there is no agreement as to their need and that there is no clear understanding of their possible implications. We rejected these recommendations because they will cause uncertainties and gaps in the implementation of control measures, which will weaken the integrity of the international drug control regime.

Cannabis plant and cannabis resin will remain included in Schedule I of the 1961 convention with strict level of international and national control. We call upon the Parties of the conventions to fulfil their obligations to prevent and combat drug addiction in order to protect the health and welfare of mankind and encourage the international community to support these efforts.

Member States maintain the right to impose the strictest domestic control measures for cannabis and cannabis-related substances, which in their opinion are necessary having regard to their particularly dangerous properties, in accordance with Article 39 of the 1961 convention.

The focus should now be on helping Member States effectively implement the control measures for cannabis and cannabis-related substances. Technical assistance will need to be provided, including through the UNODC, to Member States who lack the necessary detection, testing, monitoring and enforcement capabilities to implement them.

We call upon the Commission to elaborate in close cooperation with the INCB, UNODC and WHO clear guidelines to ensure coherent application of the
provisions of the conventions related to licit production, trade, medical and scientific use of cannabis as well as control of emerging high-potency cannabis products. We are concerned that cannabis cultivation might expand further without proper control measures, which could lead to diversions to illicit market and result in weakening of the international drug control system.

The Commission spent two years discussing this complex and interconnected set of recommendations and their possible implications. We believe there is a need for a closer and more coherent coordination between the WHO/ECDD and Vienna-based entities –the INCB and the UNODC -prior to the submission of scheduling recommendations in order to avoid such unfortunate situations in the future, as these recommendations might have very serious implications for the present and future generations.

Finally, we commend the CND chair Ambassador Mansoor Ahmad Khan for his prudent and strong leadership throughout the process of consideration of these recommendations, despite the unprecedented challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic. We appreciate the valuable input provided by the UNODC and the INCB during the expert deliberations on the WHO/ECDD recommendations and underline the leading role of the CND as the policy-making body of the UN system with prime responsibility for drug control matters and mandated by the three drug control conventions, which constitute the cornerstone of the international drug control system, to amend the schedules of those conventions.

Posted by: tucenz | Dec 13 2020 18:46 utc | 18

Expanding on the fake "Drosten imbroglio", here's the true story of this pandemic:

West is choking on its own poisoned COVID-19 well water

I remember a lot of commenters here with outright glee and racist comments on how the COVID-19 only killed Chinese, and that it would be the beginning of the end of China. Those same commenters are now spreading bullshit here about how the pandemic is not real at all.

Posted by: vk | Dec 13 2020 18:53 utc | 19

Posted by: Down South | Dec 13 2020 17:55 utc | 16
Posted by: vk | Dec 13 2020 18:45 utc | 19

As I understand it, the false positives are a result of poorly conducting the analyses through putting the samples through too many cycles. If you intensify the concentration of the virus more than 25 cycles, you are likely to get false positives. This apparently has been a problem in the US and other EU countries. Any country that conducts the test properly significantly reduces the probability of false positives. Most likely China, among others, does it properly

Posted by: Blue Dotterel | Dec 13 2020 19:00 utc | 20

I have increasingly the impression "multi polar world order" is just a code word for "anti-USA".

Posted by: m | Dec 13 2020 19:32 utc | 21

The elites want Trump out now because he's not good for business. Trade War with China and poor Covid response did him in. by pete richards @ 6.. <= Trump heightened general awareness that deep state was taking bread from the table of the governed; Trump exposed the office of president as a dictator in charge of war, as the source of continued war, and taught that troops in foreign lands were not there to protect a valid state interest or to fight a just war, but that the troops were in foreign lands to subsidize a corrupted foreign government and to justify the use of tax payer money to finance the purchase of more weapons. When trump bombed Syria and kill the Iranian General I think Trump lost many many American votes these two events showed that Trump did no do what Trump promised in his first campaign. The House just passed a bill that said no president has the power to bring the troops home.

Many of the first clusters of cases were located in close proximity to NATO installations. by: Lurk @ 11
blue Dotterel @ 22 says PCR cycle numbers determine infection rate.. and vK @ 19 and 21 says
When China decided to re-test all the Wuhan inhabitants with obligatory PCR tests, they found none, zero, nada positive results. but then vk @ 21 blames commentators for spreading bullshit about pandemic not real at all.. What do you mean vk.. ?

Posted by: snake | Dec 13 2020 19:47 utc | 22

Blue Dotterel @ 22

Exactly so.

None of them are arguing that COVID-19 does not exist, it is that the maximum reasonably reliable Ct value is 30 cycles.and as you increase the cycles above that you start getting more false positive results as only non-infectious (dead) viruses are detected.

The issue that the report raised is that the WHO and Drosden are recommending a Ct of 45. The higher the cycles the more the “cases” the more drastic the action the government will take to bring the number of “cases” down.

Therefore, to ensure that the government action is reasonable it is necessary to ensure that the information the government is using to justify such action is indeed reasonable and justifiable.

You have to be an absolute idiot to think that government diktats should simply be obeyed and not questioned especially by people who have the necessary credentials to evaluate such information.

Posted by: Down South | Dec 13 2020 19:51 utc | 23

first off - thank you b! any of you fuckers who don't financially support b need to reconsider... moa is the best!

@2 jackrabbit and @4/5 william gruff.... i happen to agree with you both...

it amazes me how these open threads always get hijacked into the never ending conversation about trump-biden, usa... usa.. usa.. usa.. usa.. jesus... just wait til the crazy girl with the emoticons arrives! it will then go into hyper drive and i blame you guys, lol...

listening to some fun new orleans grooves
craig handy and 2nd line smith

right on b - "James Jeffrey is a stupid man" these are the types who get promoted in the usa of dementia...

Posted by: james | Dec 13 2020 20:22 utc | 24

From the Guardian

The World Health Organization has been accused of conspiring with the Italian health ministry to remove a report revealing the country’s mismanagement at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic – the publication of which was intended to prevent future deaths.

WHO accused of conspiring with Italy to remove damning Covid report

Posted by: Down South | Dec 13 2020 20:23 utc | 25

it would be funny if we could put a tag behind posters names like - trump-biden endless conversation, or covid endless conversation... this seems to be the soul basis for some posters conversations here at moa. one or the other.. i guess i don't need to see the tag... i see it enough, i figured it out, lol..

Posted by: james | Dec 13 2020 20:25 utc | 26

can anyone dispute this ???

Posted by: snake | Dec 13 2020 20:29 utc | 27

@ Posted by: m | Dec 13 2020 19:32 utc | 23

Well, we live in an unipolar world hegemonized by the USA. Do the math.

--//--

@ Posted by: snake | Dec 13 2020 19:47 utc | 24

Evidently, China re-tested Wuhan after it had already defeated the pandemic, not before. Cause and consequence.

Needless to say, no Western nation has defeated the pandemic. So their PCR tests will continue to return a lot of positives.

--//--

@ Posted by: Down South | Dec 13 2020 19:51 utc | 25

The problem is not the discussion about how many cycles are adequate or not. The problem is that you don't have the authority to decide that. You can't use a non-peer-reviewed paper from mysterious sources to try to debunk a peer-reviewed paper. What kills Bill kills William.

And, as you said @27, the WHO's initial instinct was to downplay - not hype - the pandemic. Its president delayed updating the status of the COVID-19 from epidemic to pandemic by almost one month. As everybody in the West, he was also expecting/hoping the SARS-CoV-2 would never get out of Asia (as was the case with the original SARS, MERS and others).

Posted by: vk | Dec 13 2020 20:33 utc | 28

Posted by: james | Dec 13 2020 20:25 utc | 28

Posted by: james | Dec 13 2020 20:25 utc | 28

That's probably because we have ndividual interests based on our backgrounds. I do not see much point in flogging a dead horse concerning Us elections since I know nothing really changes. But I will comment on neoliberal issues. I might comment occasionally on Canadian topics given that I am a Canadian, but I have not resided in Canada for almost 20 years.

Right now Covid is of some importance to me because of what it is and how its being abuse. I am also interested in the way Turkey is handling it, since I live and work here. Naturally, I am also interested in other issues related to Turkey that appear on this site and others.

Similarly, most other posters tend to comment on issues they are interested in or understand well. So I don't think it is a mystery that you can tag people to some extent. People have different interests, and tend to comment on those that interest them more.

Posted by: Blue Dotterel | Dec 13 2020 20:36 utc | 29

the 3 links on Syraqistan were well worth the read - the first one especially.. thanks!

Posted by: james | Dec 13 2020 20:38 utc | 30

China reacts rapidly, heavily to new outbreaks in several major cities:

"Dongning and Suifenhe in Northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, Turpan in Northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, and Chengdu in Southwest China's Sichuan Province. To fight the virus, the cities have all rolled out massive nucleic acid testing programs and three have entered quasi-lockdown mode....

"On Sunday, Suifenhe and Dongning — both of which border Russia — entered a 'wartime' mode, with reports of three confirmed cases and one case, respectively. The province had reported a total of eight domestic infections as of press time."

China's response versus that here in Oregon where case numbers are many multiples larger IMO is very instructive. Various business, trade and religious organizations instead of working together to fight the virus are instead trying to sue Governor Brown for doing what she can to try and keep it under control. The lead story in my Sunday newspaper revolves around the saga of one family's experience with the virus that saw the death of their 30-year old son who died alone after being sent home to heal himself. When you read the article you'll note that all hopes are vested in the efficacy of the vaccines. It's almost certain my wife's parents have become infected, and we're in no position to help being on the other side of the nation, thus increasing our own level of internal stress. The land of the Freely Inane and Insane indeed.

Posted by: karlof1 | Dec 13 2020 20:39 utc | 31

@ Blue Dotterel | Dec 13 2020 20:36 utc | 31.. thanks bd... don't get me wrong.. i think it is all important in some way... it is just a passing observation on my part that some posters seem particularly attached to one of these 2 issues and also appear incapable of getting beyond these same issues... to a point i get it...

Posted by: james | Dec 13 2020 20:40 utc | 32

@30
Yeah, my mistake. I thought this "multi polar world order"-thing was about was about, well, world with multiple poles. But apparently people in Washingtin aren`t the only ones stuck in the Cold War mentality.

Posted by: m | Dec 13 2020 21:00 utc | 33

vk @ 30

The problem is not the discussion about how many cycles are adequate or not. The problem is that you don't have the authority to decide that.

And neither do you. But that didn’t stop you from calling Engdahl a spreader of fake news and calling the 23 scientists Covidiots, so put your money where your mouth is and inform us of your scientific credentials that make you so qualified to evaluate scientific papers with regards to COVID-19

You can't use a non-peer-reviewed paper from mysterious sources to try to debunk a peer-reviewed paper.

You were in such a hurry to throw stones that you actually either didn’t read the article or you did and you actually didn’t understand it.

So let me point out the key part for you:

the paper that established the Drosten PCR test for the Wuhan strain of coronavirus that has subsequently been adopted with indecent haste by the Merkel government along with WHO for worldwide use–resulting in severe lockdowns globally and an economic and social catastrophe–was never peer-reviewed before its publication by Eurosurveillance journal. The critics point out that, “the Corman-Drosten paper was submitted to Eurosurveillance on January 21st 2020 and accepted for publication on January 22nd 2020. On January 23rd 2020 the paper was online.”

Incredibly, the Drosten test protocol, which he had already sent to WHO in Geneva on 17 January, was officially recommended by WHO as the worldwide test to determine presence of Wuhan coronavirus, even before the paper had been published.

As the critical authors point out, for a subject so complex and important to world health and security, a serious 24-hour “peer review” from at least two experts in the field is not possible.

How is it possible that a credible scientific study in the means to test for COVID-19 is completed, peer-reviewed and accepted as the general standard in less than a couple of weeks after China announces the emergence of a new virus ?????

Posted by: Down South | Dec 13 2020 21:06 utc | 34

There's someone else who should be considered for a presidential pardon -- Leonard Peltier of the American Indian Movement, who is the longest serving political prisoner on the USA.

Posted by: Chas | Dec 13 2020 21:06 utc | 35

@ snake | Dec 13 2020 20:29 utc | 29

can anyone dispute this ???

It's from veteranstoady.. QED!

Well now, that wasn't too difficult to do, was it?

My guess is that since rumors about the "Fort Detrick virus" are unquenchable, they have been tasked to poison the well. And boy, do they like to piss into the river at veteranstoady!

Posted by: Lurk | Dec 13 2020 21:08 utc | 36

Posted by: Chas | Dec 13 2020 21:06 utc | 37

I think half the inmates in the US penal system should be pardoned. It certainly seems to have more than its share per capita.

Posted by: Blue Dotterel | Dec 13 2020 21:14 utc | 37

@ Posted by: Down South | Dec 13 2020 21:06 utc | 36

I don't have the authority - but the governments of the sovereign nation-states do. And they're adopting the PCR tests the way they are. That is a fact, not an opinion.

You can flail against reality, it won't change it.

Of course the scientific standards for times of emergency do fall because of time constraints. That doesn't mean the debunk attempts aren't equally flawed. It will take decades of research until we understand the SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19 satisfactorily.

--//--

@ Posted by: m | Dec 13 2020 21:00 utc | 35

Simple logic:

USA, the world's sole superpower ≠ USA, a regional superpower.

In order to make the USA just a regional power, you have to destroy the USA as the world's sole superpower. Simple maths.

The British Empire only became the UK, the pathetic European nation, after two world wars brought it to its knees.

Posted by: vk | Dec 13 2020 21:15 utc | 38

m @35

Perhaps you have some ideas about how to transition the world from a unipolar one into a multipolar one without defeating or containing the forces trying to maintain unipolarity? That would be quite the useful trick.

Posted by: William Gruff | Dec 13 2020 21:20 utc | 39

the usa prison system is a ''for profit'' system.... capitalism at its finest, locking up countless innocent people, especially if they are black, indian or poor and heaven forbid - caught smoking grass or horrible stuff like that.....meanwhile the criminals on wall st - or those with the money to pay for a high powered lawyer - never have to worry! i am sure the usa police state can frame these same people for some reason to perpetuate the disenfranchised reality for a whole part of society that doesn't fit into the nice little grid they are supposed to fit into... a system for 2 different classes of people...

Posted by: james | Dec 13 2020 21:36 utc | 40

Down South #36

How is it possible that a credible scientific study in the means to test for COVID-19 is completed, peer-reviewed and accepted as the general standard in less than a couple of weeks after China announces the emergence of a new virus ?????

Thank you for every word in your post. +++ The frenetic scramble to demonstrate the infallibility of private financed science over public funded and cautious institutions seems to be the driver here. As soon as I grasped the Bill Gates link with the WHO it was clear that neo liberal economics had engulfed the world leading health institution.

You simply cannot believe their blather as it is entirely at the service of neo liberal economics and therefore propaganda first, second, and third with a veneer of science fact somewhere.

Meanwhile USA passenger flights arrive in Sydney. No doubt 'PCR screened'

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Dec 13 2020 21:41 utc | 41

@JackRabbit #2
@expat #7
JackRabbit said:

Oh please, what has Trump done that the Zionist, neoliberal, establishment the neocon Deep State would not approve of?

I can't remember if it was a military, CIA or some other government institution's study: but it noted that Obama was great because he made Europeans comfortable with American (imperial) policies.
Trump, on contrast, makes them angry about even American anti-imperial policies.

That's the ultimate definition of Trump making the MIC uncomfortable - being a bad spokesmodel.

Posted by: c1ue | Dec 13 2020 21:43 utc | 42

Posted by: james | Dec 13 2020 21:36 utc | 42

... locking up countless innocent people, especially if they are black, indian or poor and heaven forbid - caught smoking grass or horrible stuff like that.....

Maybe in the past, but how many states have now legalised? But these countries arsewipe governments want to keep up the persecution.

Algeria, Angola, Bahrain, Belarus, Burkina Faso, China, Cuba, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kyrgyz Republic, Libya, Namibia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Palestine, Philippines, Russian Federation, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Syria, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan, the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela

https://www.unodc.org/documents/commissions/CND/CND_Sessions/CND_63Reconvened/statements/03Dec/Russia_Joint_Statement.pdf

Joint Statement at the reconvened 63rdsession of the Commission on Narcotic Drugs on the WHO/ECDD recommendations on cannabis and related substances

Vienna, 2 December 2020

Posted by: tucenz | Dec 13 2020 21:54 utc | 43

c1ue @Dec13 21:43 #44

Trump making the MIC uncomfortable - being a bad spokesmodel.

Sucks when you have to turn on a dime.

Trump's tough-guy act is a big change from Obama's inclusive nice-guy huckster. But Deep State had to make a big change once they realized in 2013-14 that Russia was not going to join the West (and thus isolate China).

It was a holy crap! moment that few really appreciate. Group-think and hubris had led the Empire managers to believed their own "end of history" propaganda.

Trump takes the gloves off? That's a feature, not a bug.

<> <> <> <> <>

If Deep State believes that the Empire has time to counter Russia & China then they could take their collective foot off the gas with Biden. But if the Deep State thinks that time is not on its side (a sentiment that many at moa have expressed) then they are likely to continue with Trump.

Another thing to consider is the many failures of the Democrats to 'resist' Trump. I doubt that the duopoly's controlled opposition Party is even really trying. They bolster Trump and the right with every failure. The election seems like just more kayfabe that will end with populist hero Trump's prevailing over the corrupt left and their corrupt Deep State cronies.

!!

Posted by: Jackrabbit | Dec 13 2020 22:23 utc | 44

Well, it is sad to note absolute lack of intellectual curiosity about something that most likely will not pass without profoundly changing western societies. On side note it would be good to recognise both taoist and christian way of handling the exception of sickness – being sick of sickness is way less dangerous than people being religiously afraid of contamination, of sick people, and organising accordingly.

Most likely this, now already mental, curse will not pass before one or all of the following happens:
– forced vaccination using either public or private coercion or both,
– global (or regional) digital health IDs and tracking systems,
– social, health and education sectors of lesser states will be overridden and forced open to global international providers,
– not to mention that the precendent of tiers and lockdowns is established and can be used repeatedly for the purpose of global health imperialism. There’ll be the mandate to force people self-isolate as well.

One could say these are the markings of global sanitary dictature. Or, this could be the way to make formal the hidden features of the system currently in use. The spooky license will be made official. All the tracking, etc.

The Drosten testing non-protocol is faulty to the core, and – without doubt – it is enabling corruption of both politics and science (cormandrostenreview.com).

Resulting actions are criminal in their essence – that is the reason why we are seeing leaders of nations acting in such a bizarre way. The truth is being established by the means of spectacle. Once harsh and overdecisive, then lacking in resoluteness – even in the EU the countries still can not coordinate simple and relevant statistics.

China has nothing to gain from this virus, hence there it is mostly over and done with. Seems to go for Russia as well.

Still, they are playing the ball. Wonder why?

Posted by: js | Dec 13 2020 22:28 utc | 45

vk @ 40 said "of course the scientific standards for times of emergency do fall because of time constraints. That doesn't mean the debunk attempts aren't equally flawed".

I'm sorry but this is not the way science works and cutting corners during emergencies is an even worse practice. The amplification issue, lack of Standard Operational Protocol, and clear bias and hijacking of the peer review process for this paper which formed the foundation of PCR implementation is utterly and completely outrageous. But of course not surprising. It's clear that all UN agencies including WHO have been corrupted. Right from the beginning there has been a consistent and widespread effort to discredit any testing method aside from PCR. Are you not even remotely interested why?

It's easy to see how COVID testing with a flawed PCR testing procedure rolls out and I will give you an example from a place that I am familiar with. COVID has magically disappeared in Thailand, but large number of positive cases are appearing in Thai who are returning and in foreign visitors. These PCR positives are occurring in spite of all returnees having tested negative just prior to boarding their flight to Thailand. Almost all of the positives in returning residents are also of the asymptomatic variety. I would wager that the amplification level for a domestic PCR test is 25 while the returning resident test level is set at 35 or higher. Lacking transparency and a Standard Operational Protocol for the RT-PCR test, including a universally accepted amplification level, you can create any result you want, any time, any place. These are serious issues and you can't label people who have issues with scientific integrity as deniers or misleading.

The entire justification of PCR as a public health tool (as opposed to a diagnostic tool) has been vaporized and I cannot for the life of me understand why you don't "get it" or the wider implications.

Posted by: sad canuck | Dec 13 2020 22:45 utc | 46

Well I guess an apology to the forum and our host is in order. My tongue must have slipped somewhere.

My apologies.

Posted by: Vasco da Gama | Dec 13 2020 23:01 utc | 47

The March toward genuine multilateralism and a multipolar world according to Henry Wallace's view on 8 May 1942 began with the American Revolution, and IMO there's some truth to that. He makes that reflection at the beginning of the speech he delivered that day which was later rechristened "The Century of The Common Man". It's most illuminating to reread Wallace's words now that the enemies are the same yet different and are no longer foreign but domestic. He relates:

"The march of freedom of the past one hundred and fifty years has been a long-drawn-out people's revolution. In this Great Revolution of the people, there were the American Revolution of 1775, The French Revolution of 1792, The Latin-American revolutions of the Bolivarian era, The German Revolution of 1848, and the Russian Revolution of 1917. Each spoke for the common man in terms of blood on the battlefield. Some went to excess. But the significant thing is that the people groped their way to the light. More of them learned to think and work together....

"The people are on the march toward even fuller freedom than the most fortunate peoples of the earth have hitherto enjoyed. No Nazi counter-revolution will stop it. The common man will smoke the Hitler stooges out into the open in the United States, in Latin America, and in India. He will destroy their influence. No Lavals, no Mussolinis will be tolerated in a Free World.

"The people, in their millennial and revolutionary march toward manifesting here on earth the dignity that is in every human soul, hold as their credo the Four Freedoms enunciated by President Roosevelt in his message to Congress on January 6, 1941. These four freedoms are the very core of the revolution for which the United Nations have taken their stand. We who live in the United States may think there is nothing very revolutionary about freedom of religion, freedom of expression, and freedom from the fear of secret police. But when we begin to think about the significance of freedom from want for the average man, then we know that the revolution of the past one hundred and fifty years has not been completed, either here in the United States or in any other nation in the world. We know that this revolution can not stop until freedom from want has actually been attained.

"And now, as we move forward toward realizing the Four Freedoms of this people's revolution, I would like to speak about four duties. It is my belief that every freedom, every right, every privilege has its price, its corresponding duty without which it can not be enjoyed. The four duties of the people's revolution, as I see them today, are these:

1. The duty to produce the limit.
2. The duty to transport as rapidly as possible to the field of battle.
3. The duty to fight with all that is in us.
4. The duty to build a peace — just, charitable and enduring.

"The fourth duty is that which inspires the other three."

Wallace laments about the failure after WW1; but when he spoke, few knew the actual reasons for the war, although Wallace was correct that it wasn't to serve the Common Man's interest. To solve the basic problem that in reality goes back 4-5,000 years. Wallace then drives the nail home:

"We did not build a peace treaty on the fundamental doctrine of the people's revolution. We did not strive whole-heartedly to create a world where there could be freedom from want for all peoples. But by our very errors we learned much, and after this war we shall be in position to utilize our knowledge in building a world which is economically, politically and, I hope, spiritually sound."

The United Nations contained within it the above vision that it could become the vehicle for attaining the goals enunciated in that last sentence. It's now 75 years later, and it appears we might have an opportunity to attain Wallace's, FDR's, and numerous others dream goal of an unfettered people living in harmony while enjoying those four basic freedoms, but most importantly, the freedom from want and the chains of debt that attends it always.

Wallace knew about banks and finance from the farmer's POV for he was a member of a longstanding Iowa farming family--the Iowa Asgards. And he knew about the Devilish threats within the USA to the Four Freedoms as he noted in his speech. Although the focus was on Germany, Wallace knew the Nazi Devil lived in many places:

"Through the leaders of the Nazi revolution, Satan now is trying to lead the common man of the whole world back into slavery and darkness. For the stark truth is that the violence preached by the Nazis is the devil's own religion of darkness. So also is the doctrine that one race or one class is by heredity superior and that all other races or classes are supposed to be slaves. THE belief in one Satan-inspired Fuhrer, with his Quislings, his Lavals, and his Mussolinis — his "gauleiters" in every nation in the world — is the last and ultimate darkness. Is there any hell hotter than that of being a Quisling, unless it is that of being a Laval or a Mussolini?" (Quisling was a Norwegian Fascist executed in 1945 for treason.) [My Emphasis]

Wallace knew and he displayed his knowledge in a very famous op/ed written at the request of the NY Times and vetted by FDR, "The Dangers of American Fascism," published 9 April 1944. Besides that message, Wallace's most powerful message was spoken toward the conclusion of his speech which provides an excellent benchmark to measure just how far we've come and how much farther we need to go:

"Some [Henry Luce] have spoken of the 'American Century.' I say that the century on which we are entering — The century which will come out of this war — can be and must be the century of the common man. Perhaps it will be America's opportunity to suggest that Freedoms and duties by which the common man must live. Everywhere the common man must learn to build his own industries with his own hands is a practical fashion. Everywhere the common man must learn to increase his productivity so that he and his children can eventually pay to the world community all that they have received. No nation will have the God-given right to exploit other nations. Older nations will have the privilege to help younger nations get started on the path to industrialization, but there must be neither military nor economic imperialism. The methods of the nineteenth century will not work in the people's century which is now about to begin. India, China, and Latin America have a tremendous stake in the people's century. As their masses learn to read and write, and as they become productive mechanics, their standard of living will double and treble. Modern science, when devoted whole-heartedly to the general welfare, has in it potentialities of which we do not yet dream.

"And modern science must be released from German slavery. International cartels that serve American greed and the German will to power must go. Cartels in the peace to come must be subjected to international control for the common man, as well as being under adequate control by the respective home governments. In this way, we can prevent the Germans from again building a war machine while we sleep. With international monopoly pools under control, it will be possible for inventions to serve all the people instead of only a few.

"Yes, and when the time of peace comes, The citizen will again have a duty, The supreme duty of sacrificing the lesser interest for the greater interest of the general welfare. Those who write the peace must think of the whole world. There can be no privileged peoples. We ourselves in the United States are no more a master race than the Nazis. And we can not perpetuate economic warfare without planting the seeds of military warfare. We must use our power at the peace table to build an economic peace that is just, charitable and enduring.

"If we really believe that we are fighting for a people's peace, all the rest becomes easy." [All Emphasis Mine]

Reading between the lines, we can sense Wallace's apprehensions about what the USA will become; and as we've witnessed, he was quite correct in his suspicions. But the people were quickly duped and he didn't have any chance of besting Truman in 1948 being attacked in media by those who supported him and FDR during the Depression and war--very much like the attacks on Sanders during the last two election cycles. As Wallace feared, something very similar to Nazism took hold within the USA quickly after the war. Behind it then as now stood Private Finance and the Neoliberals went to work, their goal to privatize everything and ensure the Common Folk owned nothing but the debt that enslaved him/her. No other political-economic example was to be allowed to exist; their one greatest failure and the only reason we're now on the path to the better world we should have already attained if the sort of Christian Commonwealth vision Wallace had and many shared could have arisen instead of the latent fascism within the USA gaining control.

Posted by: karlof1 | Dec 13 2020 23:01 utc | 48

@ Posted by: sad canuck | Dec 13 2020 22:45 utc | 48

Except that you're factually wrong: there are Standard Operational Protocols. They are whatever the national governments of sovereign nation-states determine. Those governments are all democratically elected, so they are blessed by the Will of the People (or by God, in the case of monarchies), therefore you can't contest them by definition.

Just to give an example: Operation Warp Speed. I don't see anybody contesting the legitimacy of this project, created by the USG, which resulted in a proliferation of dubious vaccines - including at least two made from the still experimental technology of mRNA. Is it protocol?

This is what is happening in reality, from a Marxist point of view: the petite-bourgeoisie is pissed and desperate because the lockdowns will bankrupt their already zombified businesses. Therefore they are hysterical, appealing to all the sorts of narratives to try to mobilize the working class to its size, because, as middle class, the petite-bourgeoisie cannot start a revolution on its own. But, so far, the working class is not biting the bullet of the petite-bourgeoisie, because they know it is them - not the working-from-home petit-bourgeois - who will die from the pandemic. The lumpenproletariat is the only class more or less fighting for the petite-bourgeoisie's class interests, because they are desperate depend to work daily in order not to starve to death - but those stimulus checks are keeping them from fully serving as cannon fodder for the middle class.

Posted by: vk | Dec 13 2020 23:05 utc | 49

@ Posted by: Hausmeister | Dec 13 2020 23:03 utc | 50

Germany has now reached more than 500 deaths per day (that's more than Cuba's total deaths, since the pandemic started). You can't falsify that, can you?

Like I said, you can easily assert the effectiveness of the PCR test from the mortality rates. You know its worldwide mortality is tending towards 1.5%, so you just have to factor the number of cases to the number of dead. Indeed, in countries with overall few cases, mortality rates often surpass 5%, because of statistical distortion given the extremely small sample (e.g. Cuba and China).

In Germany, you have 1,610,810 cases with 21,935 deaths as by December 13th 2020. That gives you a 1.36% death rate - well within the global projections. In this context, it is much more likely the German PCR tests are precise than not.

Finally, you have the problem of source reliability: the mysterious paper that arose in a mysterious website is not peer-reviewed. Any scientist or group of scientists can publicly contest the findings of a peer-reviewed article - the recent Spinosaurus reconstruction from the Kem Kem Beds being a very illustrative example of that. By putting all your faith on a single non-peer-reviewed rebuke, you're descending to the same level of the ones you claim to be corrupt and shady.

Posted by: vk | Dec 13 2020 23:17 utc | 50

@52 vk

You are gaslighting going off into operation warpspeed and marxist analysis.

The issue is the validity of the PCR test and the science behind it. If you think that a SOP is "whatever the national governments of sovereign nation-states determine" then you simply don't understand what that is (I doubt that), intensionally trying to mislead, or trying to discourage any consideration of the issue with statements that imply "why bother thinking about this" to readers. The latter two options are quite frankly disturbing.

Posted by: sad canuck | Dec 13 2020 23:18 utc | 51

@ sad canuck | Dec 13 2020 23:18 utc | 54

No no, you are a petit-bourgeous whose opinion is discredited as historically irrelevant. Because Marx. Our very own champion of the lumpenproletariat, vk is flying high on doctrinal imperative and facts don't count - even if you keep trying to point them out to him.

Posted by: Lurk | Dec 13 2020 23:47 utc | 52

Covid discussion

This will sound elitist, but it's not.

Not only does vk speak sense (or mostly at least) when it comes to Covid etc. but the people thinking they're arguing against him/her (and they're not, not anywhere close) have to be very unfamiliar with global standards in medicine or anything at all to do with medical science to keep cherry-picking (often weirdo) papers and the silliest of doctors or quotes etc.

Actually it's worse; they do not seem to grasp fundamental theory of knowledge (or equivalent) required to either gain access to university education or be able to continue from the very first introductory parts of university education. It's usually an actual course with an exam and some educational systems complete it before university level and that might give some an exception but often not. Maybe it's a requirement that has been dropped from US universities during the last crazy decades (although I doubt it has) but in the rest of the world it certainly hasn't.

It's not something that can be rectified by a handful of very long internet comments.

- - -

Covid situation

We know what works; China did it and it is crucial that they did it without a vaccine.

I will get back to why.

However yes initially China did not have to worry about the increases in transmissiveness and infectiousness of for example D614G (and potentially "Cluster 5") and now whatever the name is/will be for the new one identified in European labs that again "improves" the virus. Even so China is facing imported cases and viruses and those certainly include at least D614G and defeats that one successfully.

We are obviously dealing with evolution and here I'm going to get back to the vaccines:
if the vaccines predominantly only affect the initial strains they will act as evolutionary pressure in favor of the new more aggressive strains/mutations.

This "if" is nearly guaranteed to be a certainty given the pliability of this virus. Sorry people, it is not looking good.

So when the inept governments and shortsighted populations throw their huge vaccination parties (we all know those are coming) there isn't only the "unforeseen" consequences to deal with but also potentially some really nasty outbreaks of the virus that will hit faster and harder than the ones seen so far.

It is an obvious risk and it is stupid, and sadly; it is not at all unlikely.

Instead of a topic such as this people are busy arguing against plain common sense and doing anything in their power to "cheat the rules".

Instead we need to duplicate what China has been doing all along and which we still aren't doing.

- - - - - - - - -

The fall of the US

What the US on it's current path ("war" etc.) doesn't seem to grasp and which many elsewhere might not either is that the US could destroy both Russia and China and it doesn't make any difference: the US is still going down (and in this case only faster).

It's a case of a Toynbee suicide.

Posted by: Sunny Runny Burger | Dec 13 2020 23:53 utc | 53

@JackRabbit #46
You are consistent, but sadly, consistently wrong.
It is abundantly clear that the federal bureaucracy doesn't like Trump; it is clear the intel agencies don't either; nor the neocons.
Tough guy act is irrelevant. The US needs at least the tacit non-resistance of its allies to continue its ways. This is why Obama was so useful: he could emotionally connect with Europeans even as he meekly signed off on every military or color revolution adventure presented for his signoff.
Your read of this setup is just as wrong as your prediction of Trump winning in a landslide. It is 100% clear that the deep state is not helping Trump given the legalistic and bureaucratic maneuvers that were being performed in the months leading up to the 2020 presidential election.
And equally predictably, Trump outperformed the "experts" again - just not quite enough to overcome COVID+mail-in ballots.
What is really damning is that so many conservatives are genuinely angry over the "fraud" that it has created at least a powerful medium term base for Trump in the Republican party. If the Democrats couldn't decisively win the Presidential election with a 200K death global pandemic plus mass mail-in ballots - nor could they take control of the Senate and lost Hosue seats, 2022 is going to be a political bloodbath for them.

Posted by: c1ue | Dec 13 2020 23:54 utc | 54

The Spy who came in from the cold is now cold himself. David Cornwell, aka John le Carré, passes at 89. Good thing I haven't read all his books or seen all the films based on them yet.

Posted by: karlof1 | Dec 13 2020 23:54 utc | 55

I've not been following the covid-denial arguments lately (I know too many people who have actually died from it to waste time with denial nonsense, I guess) so I don't really understand this complaint about false positives with the PCR test. Why is the possibility of false positives such a big deal to the covid deniers? Even if we assume that half of the PCR covid results are false positives, what would that establish?Wouldn't that just demonstrate that the fatality rate is twice as high? And isn't diagnosis still done by a doctor anyway? The tests are just screening.

Basically, what is with the hyperventilating about false positives? What am I missing here?

Posted by: William Gruff | Dec 13 2020 23:57 utc | 56

To follow up on the last part of above: Newsmax is making a serious run to overtake Fox as the flagship of the conservative movement.
I will wait to see how they fare after the effort to overturn the election results fails, but the rise of this network signals that it isn't going to be a return to Republican business as usual even with Trump out.
Nor am I basing this just on some articles; I've seen Newsmax on the cable channel lists in hotel rooms in several cities now.
This is not insignificant.

Posted by: c1ue | Dec 13 2020 23:57 utc | 57

@ Posted by: Lurk | Dec 13 2020 23:47 utc | 55

In Brazil, people were protesting yesterday because of the risk of... shops being hurt by a Christmas under a lockdown. In the USA, people were protesting in Michigan for the right of... going to the hairdresser!

The same is happening in countries with strong petite-bourgeoisies, countries highly dependent on the services, particularly tourism-dependent (Portugal, Spain), economies. All of them either First World countries of "emergent economies", with a substantial petite-bourgeoisie, owners of small and medium businesses.

In the countries with those kind of economies where those protests aren't happening, there's a very strong social protection net (e.g. Norway, Japan) and also still relatively significant manufacturing.

Do you think I don't know these anti-lockdown protests are being organized by the petite-bourgeoisie? Do you think I can't analyze the substance beyond the form? Do you think I was born yesterday?

Posted by: vk | Dec 14 2020 0:02 utc | 58

@ Posted by: Hausmeister | Dec 13 2020 23:54 utc | 59

Then why is Drosten's paper "protocol". Unless, of course, it isn't. Which means Engdahl fabricated his story.

Posted by: vk | Dec 14 2020 0:08 utc | 59

c1ue @Dec13 23:54 #57

We will see what happens on Jan. 6th.

!!

Posted by: Jackrabbit | Dec 14 2020 0:14 utc | 60

"The problem is not the discussion about how many cycles are adequate or not. The problem is that you don't have the authority to decide that. You can't use a non-peer-reviewed paper from mysterious sources to try to debunk a peer-reviewed paper...."

-Posted by: vk | Dec 13 2020 20:33 utc | 30

I think are you beating a dead horse with the obtuse Ct arguments--one that left the barn a lo-ong time ago to boot...

And where have you been? The following has already been posted by multiple others multiple times, including myself, on MoA before:

Even *Anthony Fauci* (who I'm no fan of) said way back in July that any (+)pcr test with a Ct value = 35 or greater is meaningless/insignificant from a diagnostic value standpoint, meaning virtually no risk of the person being infective.

https://youtu.be/a_Vy6fgaBPE?t=276

And Prof. Vincent Racaniello of TWIV, Columbia Univ virologist, drove home the point even further. He got a Ct= 34 (+)pcr result that was a false positive -> and then got a negative pcr when repeated [Ca-Ching] a couple days later, and also negative result when he had a rapid nCoV antibody (ELISA-type) test (Ca-ching-ca ching) done.

https://youtu.be/Lk64Zwcj3W8?t=437

This from Michael Mina MD PhD, Harvard, [same topic and point re: Ct value significance ] I also posted before:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ii4RRiMUxa8

Posted by: gm | Dec 14 2020 0:23 utc | 61

@ vk | Dec 14 2020 0:02 utc | 62

Way to go flying high on your doctrinaire wings of air Marx. Flying so high that the facts on the ground seem remote and insignificant.

Norway and Japan don't have a petit-bourgeoisie and are a lumpenproletariat paradise? Have you ever been there? Norway doesn't have significant manufacturing other than fiskebollen and oil rigs. It's the Saudi Arabia of the north - only with more booze and fewer mosques.

Do you think I was born yesterday?

Well, you're not really helping me there..

Posted by: Lurk | Dec 14 2020 0:23 utc | 62

Lurk @66

I missed where vk implied that either Japan or Norway were "a lumpenproletariat paradise". Could you point me to where that claim was made?

Posted by: William Gruff | Dec 14 2020 0:27 utc | 63

@ William Gruff | Dec 14 2020 0:27 utc | 67

I admit that I was trying to extrapolate the general narrative of vk's posts to his current exposé.

Other parts of my post also lack in some aspects of accuracy. Like, eg. Norway has significantly fewer camels than Saudi Arabia, but more reindeer and moose. I may have missed some other minor discrepancies. I am happy to see corrections.

Posted by: Lurk | Dec 14 2020 0:38 utc | 64

@ Posted by: gm | Dec 14 2020 0:23 utc | 65

Normal margins of error. Not impressed.

The first question you should ask yourself is this: is there a better alternative? If the answer is "no", then you work with what you get, and try to deal with the margins of error (which they majorly are, if you excludes the obviously corrupt regimes of Brazil and India). Humans always worked with margins of error, I don't see the fuss about it now. Maybe the Western peoples were too fed by their own propaganda of infallibility?

Posted by: vk | Dec 14 2020 0:53 utc | 65

"... is there a better alternative?"

-vk | Dec 14 2020 0:53 utc | 69

Er--Yes. A cheap, fast rapid- nCoV antigen (protein) at-home paper test (works on same principle as a home pregnancy test).

Michael Mina says the only hurdles preventing them from being introduced in US is FDG bureaucratic red-tape and no federal funding incentives:

https://youtu.be/CjphzlV5DYo?t=1524

Posted by: gm | Dec 14 2020 1:10 utc | 66

"Perhaps you have some ideas about how to transition the world from a unipolar one into a multipolar one without defeating or containing the forces trying to maintain unipolarity? That would be quite the useful trick." Posted by: William Gruff | Dec 13 2020 21:20 utc | 41

If you really want a multi polar world than stop down talking other poles like India.

Posted by: Antonym | Dec 14 2020 1:42 utc | 67

This exchange has been very enlightening. People who are actual scientists are being accused of being "deniers" for insisting on the scientific standards of their profession being upheld in the face of rampant abuse and out-right corruption. Having vk tell us "don't worry, be happy" because there is nothing you can do about it (exactly what a pawn of big pharma would say) and then veer off into meaningless Marxist rhetoric to gaslight this position is interesting. You've "outed" yourself and I will not waste any more time on this debate.

Posted by: sad canuck | Dec 14 2020 1:47 utc | 68

Normally after 60 comments at MoA, one could come to a viewpoint about a thing. Those were the days. We live in disputatious times.

Anyway, I went to read the Engdahl piece and then the scientific review of the Corman-Drosten paper. What's clear is that the Corman-Drosten paper was never peer-reviewed, and that it de facto now has been for the first time by the 23 scientists who are essentially finding many faults that a real review at the beginning would have found. A separate lawsuit in Berlin will now force another judicial record on the PCR test's failings as implemented in practice to fight a pandemic (i.e. not in its intrinsic value).

As with everything in this pandemic, there are with this paper some strong realities and many collateral suspect elements. The paper went to WHO on January 13, before it even was published on January 23. And on that date of the 23rd, there were 6 deaths in China, and no grounds for panic yet - but the paper lobbied hard for panic and stated its goal to cut corners because of the dire need. This was a strange case of cart before horse. And as if we couldn't have guessed, there were serious conflicts of interest between the authors and the publication, as well as the suspicion that Engdahl illustrates of a relationship between the authors and the test manufacturer.

So things are partly real, and also quite fishy. Personally, I believe this is simply how the western world is nowadays - so saturated in corruption that no clean slice of truth can emerge into daylight without being groped by dirty hands on the way.

On the one hand, we in the west seemed taken by surprise by the virus. On the other hand, vested interests had deals sewn up before we even had official notice. One formal announcement for the rich, and one for the poor - and spaced about 2 months apart to allow for deal-making, short-selling, patents and indemnities to be put in place.

~~

The virus is real - we know because we saw China deal with it. The testing is at root sound but in application hugely flawed, in terms of how best to fight a pandemic. And as we know, the measures taken in the west to deal with the virus, from testing to treatment to immunity, are hopelessly flawed, beyond any description I have the stomach to formulate, and totally subservient to mercenary interests.

And the rich are getting richer from it...and we know the rest.

In my view the Corman-Drosten scandal - and it is a scandal - is a litmus test (or should that be a rapid antigen test) that simply shows the water in the well is poisoned, as the Chinese are saying very clearly in the Global Times editorial that I believe karlof1 has linked to up-thread. You can't drink poisoned water and be healthy.

And that's how saturated our western world now is with corruption.

Posted by: Grieved | Dec 14 2020 1:53 utc | 69

@70 gm

Yes, we're not seeing enough clamor about this test. It works, it's quick, and it can be done at home. And Mina is correct, it's the perfect tool to slash the infection rate to nothing. But you can't get it in the US except through prescription, and only administered by a medical professional. And it costs around $50 per test, which is criminal, but let that pass.

How not to fight a pandemic: only allow testing when symptoms appear. Can it be any more insane?

There was the pub owner last week in Ireland (I believe) who defied the lockdown and opened his pub with a nurse to administer the test, and a waiting area for the 15-minute results to appear. He was shut down and arrested in one hour. It's on RT somewhere.

The corporations are intent on owning this world, and charging for a view of the commons.

Posted by: Grieved | Dec 14 2020 2:05 utc | 70

@ Grieved | Dec 14 2020 1:53 utc | 74 with the cogent summary and ending with
"
In my view the Corman-Drosten scandal - and it is a scandal - is a litmus test (or should that be a rapid antigen test) that simply shows the water in the well is poisoned, as the Chinese are saying very clearly in the Global Times editorial that I believe karlof1 has linked to up-thread. You can't drink poisoned water and be healthy.

And that's how saturated our western world now is with corruption.
"

That corruption exists to keep the narrative control of the Hollywood version of human events one step ahead of the sick reality behind the scenes....

..........

@ Antonym | Dec 14 2020 1:42 utc | 72 who wrote
"
If you really want a multi polar world than stop down talking other poles like India.
"

Humanity is in a civilization war about public/private finance and India has an elitist government just like those in the West and that is why they are lumped in with the uni-polar crowd.....just because India admits it practices discrimination does not make it moral.

Uni-polar = global private finance

Multi-polar = sovereign finance

Do I need to make it simpler for you? I know it is unfortunate that some folks think that government should be by and for the people and not some historical/inherited elite, but China is showing a much better example to the world than the barbarism of the West, including India.

Posted by: psychohistorian | Dec 14 2020 2:13 utc | 71

@ tucenz | Dec 13 2020 21:54 utc | 45.. thanks tucenz... i was unaware of that paper and how some want to maintain the viewpoint on cannabis from 1961.. it seems outdated in terms of the thinking.. i would be much more concerned about fentanyol and other drugs coming from china, or mexico into the country i live in - canada... cannabis is the least of our problems as i see it...

@ 74 grieved... thanks for sharing your perspective and overview on all that..

Posted by: james | Dec 14 2020 2:17 utc | 72

@77 psychohistorian

I was just about to drop a line to you. I took to heart your advice to get Texas on the public banking train. I got as far as the Public Banking Institute, which offers resources for each state in terms of groups, initiatives and legislative progressions. The good news is that there is great interest throughout the country.

Texas, however, is blank.

I guess if I want to join a group promoting public banking I will have to start one. I was hoping for a quiet life ;)

Posted by: Grieved | Dec 14 2020 2:23 utc | 73

@Grieved | Dec 14 2020 2:23 utc | 79 who wrote
"
I guess if I want to join a group promoting public banking I will have to start one. I was hoping for a quiet life ;)
"

Two data points for you.

I approached the Public Banking Institute (PBI) about helping fund creation of yard signs that say "I Support Public Banking" a number of months ago. After a bunch of pause and back/forth I was offered the chance to support PBI masks but they are not interested in yard signs at this time....Ellen Brown (founder of PBI) is in her mid 70's, I believe so maybe not ready to take to the barricades....

One of the reasons I moved to a small state college city is to try and get the college (fat chance) or some grad student(s) interested in a study of the similarities/differences between public/private banking......

Posted by: psychohistorian | Dec 14 2020 2:34 utc | 74

@Posted by: sad canuck | Dec 14 2020 1:47 utc | 73

You're all aware that the most you can accomplish by removing the alleged false positives is to rise the mortality rate, right?

With higher mortality rates, the legitimation for a government to enforce lockdowns increase, correct?

At the most, governments are cooking the books to make the pandemic look less worse than it really is, not more. They are on the side of business and get back to work, not against.

China's mortality rate is at more than 5%. Germany is with a 1.36% mortality rate. (Those numbers already take into account the excess mortality, so no need to go through that route.). Merkel may be a passioned liberal - but she's not illiterate. She knows how to interpret basic statistics.

Posted by: vk | Dec 14 2020 2:45 utc | 75

@21 vk

Actually it was you who linked the Global Times piece on the poisoned water - many thanks, and they are correct of course.

I had seen a link earlier, so perhaps also from karlof1. It's worth linking again:

Which country is the real sick man now? Who is the disease incubator? Facts speak louder than words. However, there are still large swathes of Westerners who firmly believe their politicians and media outlets, even when the latter have been too busy defending their "superior" systems, looking for scapegoats rather than solutions. Those forces are hurting their countries, bringing calamities on their people. - West is choking on its own poisoned COVID-19 well water

Apart from its outright condemnation of the US, not much new is introduced in the editorial, I think, and I will always love this version of the same story for nailing it so beguilingly:

Once Upon a Virus [fun cartoon, under 2 minutes]

Posted by: Grieved | Dec 14 2020 2:47 utc | 76

Switching gears away from covid, there was a discussion today with Sen Ron Johnson (R-Wisconsin, and Chairman/senior member of a several powerful Senate committees, also a straight arrow imo) during the first ~10 min of Maria Bartiromo's sunday morning political news interview program, that I found very interesting.

It had to do with the Hunter Biden laptop evidence which the FBI/DOJ had in possession since early Dec. 2019, and the trove of UKraine Burisma-Hunter/"Big Guy" shady financial dealings evidence on the laptop hardrives.

This was in the midst of the preposterous overwrought Trump impeachment hearings/trial that dragged on and on, and wasted/distracted the country's time, efforts and attention from Aug 2019 until late Jan 2020.

Among the serious questions Bartiromo had for Sen Johnson essentially had to do with 'WHat did DOJ AG Barr know' and what did he say to you [pertinent to Johnson's roles as Subcommittee on Europe and Regional Security Cooperation (Chairman), and Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs (Chairman)].

Johnston gave an answer that sounded to me in essence that he did not know what Barr knew about the Hunter Biden laptop evidence, but if Barr was doing his job competently he should have known the impact of that evidence on impeachment effort proceedings, and Barr had had a duty to share this very relevant information with Senate leaders at the time. Johnson indicated Barr did NOT do this with his committees. He sounded like he thought this was a failing on Barr's part.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAB-WCTEgT0

Posted by: gm | Dec 14 2020 2:52 utc | 77

Posted by: Antonym | Dec 14 2020 1:42 utc | 72

If you really want a multi polar world than stop down talking other poles like India.

Lead by example and stop talking down China. Even better, stop outright lying on this forum with your continuous stream of manufactured information and false arguments.

Posted by: Arch Bungle | Dec 14 2020 2:56 utc | 78

Indian PM Modi was quite pro-China, and had visited a several times. Remember the Modi-Xi summit at Mahabalipuram in December 2019? https://www.business-standard.com/article/current-affairs/modi-xi-summit-the-story-behind-mamallapuram-s-chinese-connection-119101000211_1.html
Then in May 2020 the Chinese PLA attacked the Indian army in Ladakh resulting in dozens of violent deaths making Modi's mood swung 180 degrees. A naive Pandit Nehru was betrayed before by neighbor Zhou Enlai decades before.
Did the PLA go rogue a la CIA or was Xi all the time talking with a forked tongue like Zhou?

Posted by: Antonym | Dec 14 2020 3:45 utc | 79

Guaido completed the consultation vote in Venezuela and overwhelmingly carried Florida.

Posted by: jayc | Dec 14 2020 3:54 utc | 80

Trump demanded an 'independent' [read no World Health Organisation] inquiry into the virus followed by a swift trial in one of his US kangaroo courts. No sovereign immunity allowed!
After China's certain conviction Trump's supposed penalty was 'cancelling the US national debt to China.' Trump couldn't help himself by claiming that China would then owe money to the US.

Very soon after Trump's outburst two former Australian neo-con foreign ministers, Julie Bishop and Alexander Downer, enthusiastically echoed and endorsed the first parts of the Trump shake down plan on national TV. The Chinese saw the obvious choreographed implications, now it is the Australian people and their shattered economy who will really pay the price. Bishop and Downer should just shut the F up like New Zealand.

Here is an interesting and revealing article on the economic impact of Australia's stupid fight with China, its biggest customer.

https://johnmenadue.com/the-china-import-banthe-disturbing-facts-and-figures/

Posted by: paul | Dec 14 2020 4:16 utc | 81

Blue Dotterel #39

I think half the inmates in the US penal system should be pardoned. It certainly seems to have more than its share per capita.

YES to that but unfortunately Karma Harris will have misgivings because her campaign funding bodies will be hurt. They are already suffering extreme loss of income due to their inmates high death rate.

The Biden Harris clown cart will never accept one of its (d)owners being penalised for an act of god.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Dec 14 2020 4:32 utc | 82

The Permanent Arms Economy has been the central principle of US state policy since 1944. It takes the form of a policy of maintaining the US in a position in which the rest of the world has to choose either to submit, as the UK has, and follow Washington’s every order, or to employ all national resources on striving to keep pace with the implied US military threat, or to endeavor to exist without provoking the wrath which leads to US aggression. They can do this either by opposing US actions or by developing successful, non capitalist domestic policies which the US ruling class feels obliged to wreck lest they become popular.
This is what the vast Pentagon budgets are really about, the need to force potential rivals to the Unipolar Hegemon to waste their substance on defending themselves against US threats.
Recent years have seen two major developments of a positive nature. The first has been the development of a rough alliance, both formal and informal, against US aggression in Eurasia which has made, for example, an attack on Iran almost impossible. The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation being the formal defensive pact which reflects the geographical reality-to which western europe has not yet awoken-that Eurasia cannot be ruled by the United States.
The second development, the (Silk Road) BRI is more interesting in that it revives the ancient substitute to aggression that China developed millenia ago, the Tribute system, or mutually beneficial trading between nations. What the Chinese mean by 'win-win' is nothing less than the folk wisdom that "you catch more flies with sugar than vinegar.' It is a recollection of the basic human practice, long pre-dating states, of exchanging gifts, of reciprocity. Of deterring enmity and jealousy with friendship and assistance.
What China has done, while developing a defensive capacity which can only be challenged by an enemy willing to commit suicide, is to spend the resources that the US spends on its 850 bases and its millions of troops and proxy armies (not to mention proxy states such as Israel), on investment and assistance-through mutual trade and loans- wherever countries feel the need. This includes, of course, countries like Iran and Venezuela which are being subjected to total economic warfare but it is also immensely attractive to a wide range of countries with many different governments, most of them inimical to what they are informed are communist ideas.
The choice before the world is increasingly stark: the planet faces real and very difficult problems, most of which, in the final analysis, have their roots in the capitalist system. Before we can even begin to address these problems we have to put an end to the Hobbesian power politics that are specific to the Empire whose HQ is now to be found in the USA. Contrary to all the nonsense talked by academics, there is no reason at all why there should be any military struggle between the United States and any supposed rivals. History makes no suggestion of such a struggle being inevitable or even likely. It makes no sense except to those who desire it. Far more likely than war is the development of an international consensus that wars are not only profoundly wasteful of every resource but an obstacle to humanity's saving itself.
There is a sense in which, as karlofi has outlined, what must come next-for America and everywhere else- is to pick up the strands of the progress that was being made in 1944 when the Red Army was burying fascism and there was a general agreement among the Allies that a new international order of peace and rebuilding was to hand. The US Vice President at the time was Henry Wallace. It was from the moment of his removal- by corrupt Democrats of the sort with whom we are very familiar- and his replacement by the malleable Senator from the Pendergast machine, Truman, that we can date the new era which became the Cold War, the anti-Union, McCarthyite era-the era of the Permanent Arms Economy and the seventy year holocaust of anti imperialists and socialists, the sordid era of lies, propaganda and cheating in which we have lived, like rats swimming in a cesspool.
That is the era- Henry Luce's American Century, of which the neo-conservatives wanted an eternity- that, even as Congress passes yet another record setting 'Defense' budget and the last embers of Free Speech are being crushed, which is coming to an end. Not with a bang on the battlefield but with a whimper.

The world has finally lost interest in Washington's tantrums and Israel's increasingly insane demands: the caste of the corny old drama is still on the stage-the MbS's and Bibis, the BoJos and Macrons, The Erdogans and Bolsonaros, the Trumps and the Obamas. And they are still all to be found-yea even unto the Merkels and Orbans- in the CIA pay records.
But the play itself has gone cold. Most people stopped watching it long ago. And now even people like ourselves, with an interest in such matters, have tired of the rubbish. Nobody believes in any of it any more. Everyone is eager to stop the wasting of time and precious energy.
And so it is that, even with the air filled with sinophobic and slavophobic screechings, we turn our faces towards the sensible and long overdue projects that China assures us-and in this is incontrovertible- we can start working on.
And these projects are very familiar. They are the ones that FDR, Churchill and Stalin, bowing to the almost unanimous demands of the peoples they ruled, and the millions of armed men they commanded, committed themselves to. That hunger be ended, because plenty was available for all. That everyone should have shelter, a home, and clothing. That there should be education-not indoctrination but a sharing of real knowledge- for all. That the arts of medicine and healthcare should be freely available to all. That there should be no more economic crises caused by capitalism and that there should be an end to all war, and to imperialism. That an earthly paradise be built, because mankind is capable of it.

Posted by: bevin | Dec 14 2020 4:52 utc | 83

Grieved | Dec 14 2020 2:23 utc | 79

There was/is a /A>

There was a Senate Bill to re-establish Public Banking using USPS. The old USPO offered Public Banking for many years until LBJohnson killed it about 1966. It saved the assas of many citizens in the Depression when many banks failed and savings completely lost [which then led to FDIC to encourage public to trust savings-accounts at banks].

Posted by: chu teh | Dec 14 2020 5:07 utc | 84

Oops-forgot preview

Posted by: chu teh | Dec 14 2020 5:08 utc | 85

White Helmets founder Le Mesurier is now a mainstream saint, but leaked docs raise questions about his widow's role — RT Op-ed
https://www.rt.com/op-ed/508929-white-helmets-founder-le-mesurier/

Posted by: virgile | Dec 14 2020 5:36 utc | 86

Reuters is reporting on some major hacking of US government and corporate systems. It seems like it may have been going on as early as last March and a govt. IT security contractor evidently had their new hacking tool set stolen.....GRIN

One posting at ZH said that US Treasury was compromised and wouldn't it be a hoot if some of that financial perfidy that has been going on since at least September 2019 came out.....on a related note I read at Wall Street on Parade that the Treasury REPO market didn't resolve itself this past June but Treasury just stopped reporting on it.....The US has the best government that private money can buy

Posted by: psychohistorian | Dec 14 2020 6:13 utc | 87

right on bevin... thank you..

Posted by: james | Dec 14 2020 6:29 utc | 88

bevin @89--

That hunger be ended, because plenty was available for all. That everyone should have shelter, a home, and clothing. That there should be education-not indoctrination but a sharing of real knowledge- for all. That the arts of medicine and healthcare should be freely available to all. That there should be no more economic crises caused by capitalism and that there should be an end to all war, and to imperialism. That an earthly paradise be built, because mankind is capable of it.

Thanks bevin!! That's the Liberalism I was taught. The What If? can still be made reality. The vision still lives. At the base of the Solstice Celebration it still lives. The Star was to guide the Magi to the Prince of Peace, or so the story goes. The only sane, rational, logical way forward is for all people to be secure and have their basic needs fulfilled. As Humanity, we can do that, as long as we cast aside the Parasites.

Posted by: karlof1 | Dec 14 2020 6:46 utc | 89

On Friday, Sidney Powell filed emergency requests to the Supreme Court, asking the justices to order officials in Georgia, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Arizona to de-certify their 2020 election results

Posted by: Perimetr | Dec 14 2020 7:04 utc | 90

Posted by: William Gruff | Dec 13 2020 23:57 utc | 60

The people concerned with false positives are not necessarily COVID "deniers". Remember there are two issues linked to this virus issue: First the reality of the virus and its infectiousness; second, the reality of the of the abuse of the pandemic for political and economic gain, particularly in the US and UK with their on again of again lock downs, and corporate handouts. The abuse of testing here is not to disprove that the virus is dangerous, it is to magnify and falsify that danger into enabling the criminal classes to gain more power and wealth at the people's expense.

As far as China is concerned, the major difference between China then and now, is that the virus has never been widespread in China, so that China has not had to do more than localize its lock downs, and has had the good fortune to avoid a massive lock down of the country, or large parts of the country. This might have been good practice in other countries, as well, done in time for a very short time, but Pandora has opened the box.

Unfortunately, for the rest of us, and China, the virus is now so widespread and evolves so quickly that nothing will stop it, unless it stops itself like Sars 1 and MERS(highly unlikely). It is with us to stay, and we need to develop means to treat it, aside from and in addition to the proper development of vaccines. Most indivduals with adequate health regimes and countries with adequate public health care will not be affected by the virus any more seriously than they might be affected by the flu. This means practicing preventative medicine/health care through proper diets and exercise for the population, and a development of old age homes that take into better consideration the infectious diseases of the elderly.

In the US and even the rest of the West, it means making public health care a right, not something to be sacrificed to private profit mongering. Even in countries with "universal healthcare", like Canada and the UK, the public health care system is being degraded (closing of hospitals, shortages of equipment, drugs) to "justify" the privatization of that system to the financial sponsors of corporate compromised politicians.

There may be "deniers" in the sense that the virus is not important, but there is clearly an issue as big as the virus itself. It is highly unfortunate that b is seemingly not capable of dealing with it, as well as some others commenting on this site. It shows a lack of understanding of the history of oligarchic regimes and their means and willingness to exploit society whenever opportunity arises or can be created, and that includes especially the US, but not solely.

Posted by: Bluedotterel | Dec 14 2020 7:05 utc | 91

Meanwhile in other news Chinas BRI steams quietly onward. Just out yesterday:

"
The first train of the “China-ASEAN multimodal international rail freight transport service” which mainly serves the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, departed from Baoding City, north China’s Hebei Province, on Saturday, opening a new channel for trade between China’s inland cities and ASEAN countries.

The train set off from a smart logistic park in Baoding and will exit through Hekou port in southwest China’s Yunnan Province to transfer cargoes to ASEAN countries, making a stopover at Kunming and passing the Honghe Area of China (Yunnan) Pilot Free Trade Zone.

The total length of the line is more than 5,000 kilometers, and the whole journey runs for about 80 hours, which is nearly 30 hours less than road transportation."

https://www.beltandroad.news/2020/12/14/first-china-asean-freight-train-launched/

BRI:

- First they laughed
- Then they scoffed
- Then they sanctioned
- Then when it was too late they tried to compete ...

But how does one compete with a state that can build the largest high speed rail system in history in a mere 12 years?

"China's railway network served nearly 3 billion passenger rides in 2016, a figure that has increased by about 10% each year. It's little surprise. The nationwide system covers 15,500 miles, a figure made more impressive when you consider the first line was built in 2008 for the Beijing Olympics."

Posted by: Arch Bungle | Dec 14 2020 7:37 utc | 92

vk 10

Taierzhuang.

Posted by: johnf | Dec 14 2020 8:08 utc | 93

So we get the impression that the Covid test is a dodgy as a Trump or Biden promise. Can we get a picture of the TR-10 or Ursolic Acid remedy for those afflicted. It seems to me that we should put our effort to assisting those impacted by Covid19 which appears to be a small minority of our population.

Venezuela stands by its excellent TR-10 research and Maduro sings its praises.

The medicine is based on a molecule called TR-10, which was isolated and, when pitted against the virus, proved its absolute effectiveness, he claimed.

Maduro said the study has already been reviewed by experts and scientists, and will be presented to the World Health Organization (WHO) so that it can certify its findings.

Wiki has some interesting information on TR-10 aka Ursolic acid.

Ursolic acid is present in many plants, such as Mirabilis jalapa,[2] as well as in many fruits and herbs used in daily life (e.g. apples, basil, bilberries, cranberries, elder flower, peppermint, rosemary, lavender, oregano, thyme, hawthorn, and prunes). Apple peels contain large quantities of ursolic acid and related compounds.

In late October 2020 the Venezuelan Institute for Scientific Research (IVIC) announced claims that they had discovered a molecule named "TR-10" which is a highly effective antiviral against SARS-CoV-2 commonly known as COVID-19. TR-10 is an ursolic acid derivative, which the IVIC claims has shown 100 percent inhibition of virus replication in vitro, and that studies conducted so far show that the drug will not have any side effects on patients.

It will be interesting to see what the WHO has to say and if it can find its voice in a timely manner but more interesting will be the institutions and individuals that seek medicinal support from our plant world and can report from rigorous studies.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Dec 14 2020 8:57 utc | 94

William Gruff @ 60

Basically, what is with the hyperventilating about false positives? What am I missing here?

Let me use a real example where I live.

If you test positive (false or not) the first thing they do is quarantine you and trace down everyone (Group A) you came into contact with in the previous days and test them for COVID-19 and trace down all those people that Group A came into contact with and test them too. During that process until the test comes back negative everyone has to self- quarantine.

Now as you can imagine a lot of resources goes into this effort. Now let’s say for the above example they used a Ct of 45 as recommended by the WHO. That test picks up any fragment of the virus, even dead fragments and comes back positive. Now even if you were you had the virus 6 months ago, didn’t even know it because you were not symptomatic and the virus is long dead the above procedure I described above kicks in.

So you will literally be quarantining people who do not need to be quarantined and expending a massive amount of resources tracing down people who came into contact with you for no reason, as the virus in you died long time ago.

Now if you use a maximum Ct of 30 as recommended by the Borger-Kammerer study you minimise the amount of false positives and invest your resources where they are needed.

No-one here is denying that COVID-19 exists or even that it kills people.

Posted by: Down South | Dec 14 2020 10:01 utc | 95

virgile #92

White Helmets founder Le Mesurier is now a mainstream saint, but leaked docs raise questions about his widow's role — RT Op-ed
https://www.rt.com/op-ed/508929-white-helmets-founder-le-mesurier/

Thank you for that link. It pays to keep an eye on these turds and especially so when Bellingcat is involved.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Dec 14 2020 10:43 utc | 96

@all

I unfortunately had to again delete a bunch of Corona-nonsense.

Those who spread such may please go elsewhere.

Posted by: b | Dec 14 2020 11:13 utc | 97

Thanks b @ 99 I must admit ——-
I was beginning to lose the will to live..
——————
b could you email details to send my contribution,
I deleted them last time (security)

Posted by: Mark2 | Dec 14 2020 11:43 utc | 98

b | Dec 14 2020 11:13 utc | 99

„I unfortunately had to again delete a bunch of Corona-nonsense.“
If you think it is nonsense you should tell why. In this particular situation, all figures that one can obtain are politicized and may be corrupt, there is nothing like an established truth.

Posted by: Hausmeister | Dec 14 2020 12:09 utc | 99

B, thanks for allowing me to raise awareness about the importance of vitamin D. But meh for deleting my speculative post in your zeal to remove "Corona-nonsense".

I explicitly advertised my posting as a personal speculation. None of it advocated dangerous practices nor did it deny objectively established facts about SARS-COV-2 or COVID-19.

Many aspects of the outbreak and the various responses to it are still unclear and reasonable inquest is warranted. Speculation that does not transgress into the hysterical and does not feature evident and blatant falsity is a useful means to further understanding of possibly related events.

A blanket embargo on all mentions of viewpoints diverging from the "official" (whose anyway?) canon will only encourage people to flock towards the very disinfo tarpits that you find disagreeable and wish to avoid your site to turn into.

Much of this feels like 9/11 all over again.

Posted by: Lurk | Dec 14 2020 12:20 utc | 100