Dissecting Leftism

Thursday, October 27, 2022

Looking back:

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New York Supreme Court Reinstates Unvaccinated Employees With Back Pay

A New York judge ordered Monday that Department of Sanitation employees terminated for refusing to get vaccinated be reinstated to their full employment status, writing that the vaccination mandate for city employees was “not just about safety and public health; it was about compliance.”

Judge Ralph J. Porzio wrote in his ruling that if the vaccine mandate was about “safety and public health, unvaccinated workers would have been placed on leave the moment the order was issued.”

“If it was about safety and public health, the Health Commissioner would have issued city-wide mandates for vaccination for all residents,” he continued. “In a City with a nearly 80% vaccination rate, we shouldn’t be penalizing the people who showed up to work, at great risk to themselves and their families, while we were locked down.”

Porzio’s ruling states that the Oct. 20, 2021, and Dec. 13, 2021, rulings from the commissioner of health and mental hygiene ordering that all employees get vaccinated are “arbitrary and capricious,” ordering that the petitioners be reinstated to their full employment status, and entitled to back pay in salary from date of termination.

“Yesterday marked a historic victory for sanitation workers, all the brave NYC employees who serve the public and our representative democracy,” attorney Chad LaVeglia told The Daily Signal. “The court struck down NYC’s draconian, arbitrary, vaccine mandate on multiple constitutional and legal grounds. The thousands of city employees who were ignored now have a voice. And as the court recognized, they deserve better.”

“The court also recognized a commonsense principle that has somehow eluded politicians like Eric Adams: Forcing one—and only one—segment of the population to get vaccinated during a worldwide outbreak is unconstitutional and arbitrary,” he added. “Sixteen sanitation workers fought back against tyranny. And won. This is a historic victory for individual rights, and the system of government mandated by the Constitution.”

https://www.dailysignal.com/2022/10/25/new-york-supreme-court-reinstates-unvaccinated-employees-with-backpay

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Judge Orders Fauci, Psaki, Top Officials Be Deposed in Big Tech Censorship Case

A federal court ordered on Oct. 21 that Dr. Anthony Fauci and other top officials testify under oath at depositions in a case that has uncovered evidence of alleged federal government collusion with Big Tech companies to censor users.

The attorneys general of Louisiana and Missouri and other plaintiffs allege that Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and President Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser, and other defendants colluded and coerced social media companies to “suppress disfavored speakers, viewpoints, and content” regarding COVID-19.

U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty went a step further than a previous ruling that forced written testimonies and ordered Fauci and other defendants to testify under oath at depositions.

“After finding documentation of a collusive relationship between the Biden Administration and social media companies to censor free speech, we immediately filed a motion to get these officials under oath,” Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt said in a statement.

“It is high time we shine a light on this censorship enterprise and force these officials to come clean to the American people, and this ruling will allow us to do just that. We’ll keep pressing for the truth.”

The New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA) joined the lawsuit in August, representing renowned epidemiologists Drs. Jayanta Bhattacharya and Martin Kulldorff, as well as Dr. Aaron Kheriaty and Jill Hines.

NCLA attorney Jenin Younes said she looks forward to learning just how far the accused government officials went to push their COVID-19 “perspective.”

“For the first time, Dr. Fauci and seven other federal officials responsible for running an unlawful censorship enterprise will have to answer questions under oath about the nature and extent of their communications with tech companies,” Younes said in a statement to The Epoch Times.

Doughty also ordered the depositions of former White House press secretary Jen Psaki, White House Director of Digital Strategy Rob Flaherty, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Director Jen Easterly, and FBI Supervisory Special Agent Elvis Chan.

Fauci’s ‘Self-Serving Blanket Denials’

In his ruling, Doughty said he agreed with plaintiffs that Fauci’s previous “self-serving blanket denials” about his role in censoring views on social media couldn’t be taken at face value.

“Plaintiffs argue that even if Dr. Fauci can prove he never communicated with social media platforms about censorship, there are compelling reasons that suggest Dr. Fauci has acted through intermediaries, and acted on behalf of others, in procuring the social-media censorship of credible scientific opinions,” Doughty said in his ruling (pdf). “Plaintiffs argue that even if Dr. Fauci acted indirectly or as an intermediary on behalf of others, it is still relevant to Plaintiffs’ preliminary injunction motion. The Court agrees.

“Lastly, Plaintiffs argue that Dr. Fauci’s credibility has been in question on matters related to supposed COVID-19 ‘misinformation’ since 2020. Specifically, Plaintiffs state that Dr. Fauci has made public statements on the efficacy of masks, the percentage of the population needed for herd immunity, NIAID’s funding of ‘gain-of-function’ virus research in Wuhan, the lab-leak theory, and more.

“Plaintiffs urge that his comments on these important issues are relevant to the matter at hand and are further reasons why Dr. Fauci should be deposed. Plaintiffs assert that they should not be required to simply accept Dr. Fauci’s ‘self-serving blanket denials’ that were issued from someone other than himself at face value. The Court agrees.”

The plaintiffs argued that Fauci allegedly insisted on the censorship of “speech backed by great scientific credibility and with enormous potential nationwide impact” that contradicted his views.

For example, he communicated in a long-shielded phone call with some scientists to discredit any theory that COVID-19 was the result of a “lab leak” in Wuhan, China. The scientists went on to write a paper severely reprimanding others who were open to the theory.

If the lab leak theory were true, in turn, it would mean that Fauci could be potentially implicated in funding the research on viruses that caused the COVID-19 pandemic that killed millions of people worldwide, the plaintiffs argued. This is because he funded risky “gain-of-function” research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology through intermediaries such as EcoHealth Alliance.

In late January 2020 and early February 2020, Fauci was also in touch with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg in oral communications about the government’s COVID-19 response. Facebook then allegedly went on censor the lab leak theory, according to the plaintiffs.

‘Overwhelming’ Need to Depose Officials

The court also found that Flaherty, Psaki, Andy Slavitt, and other officials also have personal knowledge about the alleged censorship issues and ordered them to be deposed.

Doughty said there’s an “overwhelming” need for Flaherty to be deposed to determine whether fundamental rights to free speech were “abridged” as a result of alleged collusion between senior Biden administration officials and Big Tech.

The plaintiffs argued that Flaherty had “extensive” oral meetings with Twitter, Meta, and YouTube on vaccine hesitancy and combatting misinformation related to COVID-19.

The judge said there’s a “substantive need” for the deposition of Slavitt, who served as the White House’s senior COVID-19 adviser. Doughty noted that Slavitt’s remarks on a podcast “showed he has specific knowledge as it relates” to the issues in the lawsuit.

The court order cited a series of public comments made by Psaki when she served as White House press secretary, including calling on social media platforms for consistency in banning disfavored speakers.

“Psaki has made a number of statements that are relevant to the Government’s involvement in a number of social-media platforms’ efforts to censor its users across the board for sharing information related to COVID-19,” Doughty said in his ruling.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/judge-orders-fauci-psaki-top-officials-be-deposed-in-big-tech-censorship-case_4813336.html

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs

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Wednesday, October 26, 2022

Confidence through censorship: The (medical) Ministry of Truth

On Wednesday, October 12, the Queensland Labor government – with support from the LNP opposition – passed a dystopian and dangerous bill.

The Health Practitioner Regulation National Law and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2022 refocuses the guiding principles of medicine to prioritise public confidence over public health and safety. It allows bureaucrats to name and shame doctors, a move which the AMA described as ‘incoherent zealotry’.

This bill, if passed by other jurisdictions in Australia, will essentially legislate national medical censorship as a means to ensure public confidence in government health services.

Adherence to the Good Medical Practice code of conduct means that advocating for patients (which is our primary concern) is being overridden by external demands to comply with public health messaging. Our code of conduct is predicated on The Hippocratic Oath, the Declaration of Geneva, and the International Code of Ethics which outlines our dedication to serving humanity: To first do no harm, making our patients our primary consideration.

Political-based medicine has now replaced evidence-based medicine.

History has proven that unquestioning compliance to government directives is dangerous. In 1947, the World Medical Association agreements were formed in the aftermath of the second world war due to the gross systematic human rights abuses which took place under enforced national laws. Tragically, the political currents in Australia appear to be heading towards bureaucratic medical compliance enforced through regulatory threats, soon to be legislative threats.

In 2015, the federal government passed The Australian Border Force Act 2015 which made doctors who advocated for their refugee patients liable to face up to two years imprisonment. Doctors for Refugees challenged this law in the High Court a year later. A major basis for their argument, according to their submission to the Medical Board’s 2018 Code of Conduct review, was that the Code doctors had sworn to uphold and advocate for the rights of their patients could not be overridden by the vagaries of domestic laws.

The government eventually backed down on this law and had that problematic section repealed.

Interestingly, their submission was in response to the Medical Board attempting to insert into the medical code the concerning phrase ‘doctors must comply with relevant laws’. The response to the word comply was fierce as the idea that the medical code of conduct could enforce compliance to political decree was antithetical to what doctors had sworn to uphold.

With the arrival of Covid came the bureaucratic decree through the March 9, 2021 joint statement by AHPRA and the National Boards that made undermining public confidence in the government’s Covid public health messaging equivalent to professional misconduct. Questioning ‘the message’ is now subject to investigation and disciplinary action, including immediate suspension of registration.

Letters received by practitioners who have questioned the government response to Covid are chilling in their implication. After being suspended by National Boards under the immediate action clauses for allegedly being a threat to public health and safety, they are accused of the crime of non-compliance. They are deemed a threat because they failed to comply with public health orders, undermined the Board’s position on the promotion of Covid vaccination, and undermined public confidence because their medical expert opinion contravened government health authorities.

In summary, health professionals are not permitted to question the ‘secret health advice’ without losing their registration to practise.

Consider that in response to Covid, our health bureaucracy overturned the medical industry’s well-researched 2019 pandemic preparedness plans – doing almost the total opposite of what was recommended by health professionals. Interestingly, Dr Rochelle Walensky, Director of the CDC, told employees recently: ‘To be frank, we are responsible for some pretty dramatic, pretty public mistakes from testing, to data, to communications.’

In December 2020, the FDA outlined, ‘At this time, data is not available to make a determination about how long the vaccine will provide protection, nor is there evidence that the vaccine prevents transmission of SARS-CoV-2 from person to person.’ Our health bureaucrats, regulatory agencies, and politicians mandated provisionally approved vaccines by telling the population repeatedly that they stopped transmission and people were selfish granny killers if they didn’t get jabbed.

We, as health professionals, are not allowed to question government statements on transmission without losing our registration to practise.

On September 2021, a delegate of the Secretary of the Department of Health rescheduled ivermectin, in effect banning it for use as an off-label treatment option for Covid stating ‘subsection 52E(1) of the Therapeutic Goods Act 1989, in particular paragraph (f), which empowers the Secretary to act on any other matters that the Secretary considers necessary to protect public health’.

Ivermectin is one of the World Health Organisation’s list of essential medicines. It was fully approved by the TGA and found to be very safe according to their own 2013 Australian Public Assessment Report for Ivermectin. Two of the reasons the TGA gave for denying Australians access to a drug that showed great promise in the treatment and prevention of Covid-19 was that it was all of a sudden unsafe and its availability might dissuade people from getting vaccinated. Behaviour modification was undertaken, with the TGA appearing to act in partnership with other government nudge units to promote vaccination.

We as health professionals are not permitted to advocate for ivermectin without losing our registration to practice.

In July 2021, as Australians were being mandated through coercive techniques to get vaccinated with poorly tested provisionally approved gene-based vaccines that our Health bureaucrats and politicians repeatedly told us had been proven safe and effective, the TGA was amending the Therapeutic Goods Regulation Act to further reduce the safety and efficacy requirements for any medicine that is for the treatment or prevention of Covid. Not only do manufacturers have six years to provide the government with safety and efficacy data on these provisionally approved jabs, they also no longer have to demonstrate they could provide a greater benefit than other available medicines or that the medicine is likely to provide a major therapeutic advance.

We, as health professionals, are not allowed to question the safety and efficacy without losing our registration to practise.

Recently, the TGA has granted provisional approval to Moderna for the active immunisation and prevention of Covid in high-risk babies and young children. The report concluded the vaccinations had low levels of protective efficacy against infection, they didn’t know how long any efficacy lasted, and while the (Advisory Committee on Vaccines) recommended the provisional approval to children at high risk they noted high-risk children were excluded from the study. Across the world, pandemic policy and guidelines vary. Denmark is no longer recommending vaccination for people under 50, Norway no one under 65, but our regulatory body is expanding approvals to 6-month to 4-year-olds.

We, as health professionals, are not allowed to question this approval without losing our registration to practise.

Whenever governments want to enact laws to suppress free expression, censor and punish dissenters through threats to careers and livelihood, to control public perception as a means of creating confidence through enforced public ignorance, it is time to ask some serious questions.

If this bill passes nationally and the government becomes the single authority on all health advice, then unquestioning compliance becomes the new accepted standard of good medical practice. That is the end of medicine and the death of science. George Orwell’s Ministry of Truth has arrived. Public confidence in politicians and their bureaucrats should never come at the expense of people’s right to full, free, and unhindered access to scientific evidence and emerging data.

The Australian Medical Professionals Society is dedicated to fighting for medical free speech for the safety of those we swore to protect, our patients. Prioritising public confidence in government through censorship has led to what Professor Bhattacharya has said is the single biggest public health mistake in human history. With Dr Aseem Malhotra, a British Cardiologist, recently describing the mandates as ‘perhaps the greatest miscarriage of medical science we will witness in our lifetime’. We must stop medical censorship and allow doctors to be doctors. This bill is dangerous to the future of medicine and the health of our nation.

https://spectator.com.au/2022/10/confidence-through-censorship-the-medical-ministry-of-truth/

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New Covid Boosters Aren’t Better Than Old Ones, Study Finds

Bivalent booster shots from Moderna Inc. and Pfizer Inc. failed to raise levels of protective proteins called neutralizing antibodies against the dominant omicron strains any more than four doses of the original Covid vaccine, according to an early independent study on a small group of people.

Researchers at Columbia University and the University of Michigan compared levels of neutralizing antibodies in blood samples from 21 people who got a fourth shot of the Moderna or Pfizer-BioNTech SE bivalent boosters against antibody levels in 19 people who got four shots of the original vaccines.

Three to five weeks after a fourth shot, those people who received the new boosters aimed at BA.4 and BA.5 variants “had similar neutralizing antibody titers as those receiving a fourth monovalent mRNA vaccine,” the authors conclude in a manuscript posted on the preprint server bioRxiv.org. This held true for antibodies that protect against BA.4, BA.5 and older variants such as the original omicron strain, according to the study.

Moderna shares rose 2.7% to $136.57 at the close in New York trading. Pfizer stock was little changed.

The results don’t mean that getting a bivalent shot has no benefit, and it will need to be confirmed in much larger studies. However, they raise the question of whether the switch to a new version of the vaccine was necessary.

The results also contrast sharply with an Oct. 13 press release from Pfizer and BioNTech touting “positive early data” from a clinical trial suggesting that its bivalent vaccine “is anticipated to provide better protection.” The statement was based on data collected from subjects in the first seven days after immunization, and the company has not yet released details.

“So far we don’t see the benefit” of the bivalent shots over the old ones, said study senior author David Ho, a virologist who heads the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center at Columbia University. A clear difference between the boosters could emerge over longer periods of time, he said in a telephone interview. It could also turn out that a second booster shot with the bivalent vaccine may be needed, he said.

Ho said that the study has been submitted for publication in a scientific journal.

Slow Rollout

Rollout of the bivalent vaccines has been slow so far. Only about 20 million Americans have received the latest version of the vaccine, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The lackluster results for bivalent boosters could be due to a phenomenon called imprinting, Ho said. That means that the immune system most strongly remembers the first version of a virus it encounters. After it mutates, the response to a vaccine -- even one targeting newer strains -- may still be tilted toward fighting the original pathogen.

Ho said he personally has gotten four doses of the original generation of mRNA shots, and that he is waiting for more data to roll in to decide what to do about a fifth dose.

Pfizer declined to comment on outside research. A spokesperson said the company would reveal additional 30-day data on its bivalent shot in the coming weeks. Moderna didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

In early October, Moderna researchers published data from the clinical trial of a different bivalent booster that is tailored to the original omicron strain. That study, in the New England Journal of Medicine, found that a fourth shot of that bivalent vaccine produced higher levels of antibodies compared to four shots of Moderna’s original vaccine. Moderna’s bivalent vaccine against the original omicron strain, called mRNA-1273.214, is not authorized in the U.S., but has been cleared for use in numerous countries including the UK and Canada.

Nonetheless, scientists have harbored doubts about the benefit of switching up the shots’ composition. Before the US began rolling out updated boosters in September, John Moore, a professor of microbiology and immunology at Weill Cornell Medical College said the new vaccines would be “little or no better” than earlier formulations.

https://www.inkl.com/newsletters/morning-edition/news/new-covid-boosters-aren-t-better-than-old-ones-study-finds

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs

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Tuesday, October 25, 2022

Another dubious study of Ivermectin

This study concluded that ivermectin was no help for outpatients with mild to moderate COVID-19. But like many previous studies, it appears to have ignored the time factor. Enrolment in the study appears to have been very relaxed, with no attention paid to how long the patient had had Covid symptoms. Since Ivermectim is one of the drugs that normally need to be taken very soon after symptoms become evident, this study tells us effectively nothing -- JR

Effect of Ivermectin on Time to Resolution of Symptoms Among Adults With Mild COVID-19

Susanna Naggie et al

Abstract

Importance: The effectiveness of ivermectin to shorten symptom duration or prevent hospitalization among outpatients in the US with mild to moderate symptomatic COVID-19 is unknown.

Objective: To evaluate the efficacy of ivermectin, 400 μg/kg, daily for 3 days compared with placebo for the treatment of early mild to moderate COVID-19.

Design, Setting, and Participants: ACTIV-6, an ongoing, decentralized, double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled platform trial, was designed to evaluate repurposed therapies in outpatients with mild to moderate COVID-19. A total of 1591 participants aged 30 years and older with confirmed COVID-19, experiencing 2 or more symptoms of acute infection for 7 days or less, were enrolled from June 23, 2021, through February 4, 2022, with follow-up data through May 31, 2022, at 93 sites in the US.

Interventions: Participants were randomized to receive ivermectin, 400 μg/kg (n = 817), daily for 3 days or placebo (n = 774).

Main Outcomes and Measures: Time to sustained recovery, defined as at least 3 consecutive days without symptoms. There were 7 secondary outcomes, including a composite of hospitalization or death by day 28.

Results: Among 1800 participants who were randomized (mean [SD] age, 48 [12] years; 932 women [58.6%]; 753 [47.3%] reported receiving at least 2 doses of a SARS-CoV-2 vaccine), 1591 completed the trial. The hazard ratio (HR) for improvement in time to recovery was 1.07 (95% credible interval [CrI], 0.96-1.17; posterior P value [HR >1] = .91). The median time to recovery was 12 days (IQR, 11-13) in the ivermectin group and 13 days (IQR, 12-14) in the placebo group. There were 10 hospitalizations or deaths in the ivermectin group and 9 in the placebo group (1.2% vs 1.2%; HR, 1.1 [95% CrI, 0.4-2.6]). The most common serious adverse events were COVID-19 pneumonia (ivermectin [n = 5]; placebo [n = 7]) and venous thromboembolism (ivermectin [n = 1]; placebo [n = 5]).

Conclusions and Relevance" Among outpatients with mild to moderate COVID-19, treatment with ivermectin, compared with placebo, did not significantly improve time to recovery. These findings do not support the use of ivermectin in patients with mild to moderate COVID-19.

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2797483 ?

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Children's Health Defense Demands Lawmakers Stop COVID Vaccine Mandates

A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advisory committee on Thursday voted that the agency should update its recommended immunization schedules to add the COVID-19 vaccine, including to the schedule for children.

Committee members said the vote doesn’t affect what vaccines are required for school attendance, the CDC is merely codifying its pre-existing recommendation. School mandate decisions are made at the state, county and municipal levels, the committee said. “This discussion doesn’t change that,” a committee member said.

But as Dr. Robert Malone pointed out, pediatricians and state public health officials use the CDC schedule.

Writing on Substack, Malone said:

“State public health systems use the schedule to determine which vaccines to require for children to enter schools. Yes, some states have more stringent requirements than others. Some states allow for ‘opt-outs,’ but in the end, most states follow the CDC guidelines. The ACIP functionally establishes ‘standard of care’ in this area.”

Commenting on the vote, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., chairman of the board and chief legal counsel for Children’s Health Defense (CHD), said:

“This reckless action is final proof of the cynicism, corruption and capture of a once exemplary public health agency. ACIP members have again demonstrated that fealty to their pharma overlords eclipses any residual concerns they may harbor for child welfare or public health.”

This is an act of child abuse on a massive scale.

The regulatory agencies and their advisory committees have gone amok. It’s time for people to stop consenting and stop complying. To tell your state’s leaders “No COVID vaccine mandates for our state’s kids” click the link.

Despite immense blowback, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) voted unanimously to add COVID-19 injections to its recommended schedule of vaccinations for infants, children and adolescents. The committee members’ votes solidify their steadfast loyalty to protecting pharma profits at the cost of children’s lives. This is the first step to granting permanent, blanket liability protection for all current and future COVID-19 injections.

This is a declaration of war on our children. The responsibility to be unrelenting as we defend the next generation from Big Pharma now falls on us. In the coming months, nearly every state in the nation will universally adopt the CDC’s recommended vaccination schedule.

Fortunately, the CDC doesn’t have the authority to set school immunization requirements, and the vote doesn’t mandate the vaccine for schoolchildren. That’s a decision left to the states.

https://www.conservativehq.org/post/add-your-voice-children-s-health-defense-demands-lawmakers-stop-covid-vaccine-mandates

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Persian Pilot Study: Atorvastatin Efficacious in Mild to Moderate Hospitalized COVID-19 Patients

Recently, investigators looked at the broadly used cholesterol-reducing generic atorvastatin (Lipitor®). Atorvastatin is a lipid-lowering drug included in the statin class of medications. By inhibiting the endogenous production of cholesterol in the liver, statins lower abnormal cholesterol and lipid levels and ultimately, reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease. Statins have been theorized to be potentially helpful against Covid-19 for quite a while now, as highlighted in this published mechanistic paper from April 2020. They have multiple mechanisms that might provide benefits, such as pleiotropic effects on inflammation and oxidative stress, which contribute to their beneficial impact on cardiovascular diseases. They modulate the immune response, restore the vascular redox balance by reducing reactive oxygen species and increasing antioxidants, and ameliorate nitric oxide bioavailability, endothelial function, and integrity.

The Persian research team was aware of the many clinical benefits of statins, along with their excellent safety profile, low cost, and their broad availability. As a result, they conducted a triple-blind, randomized placebo-controlled trial evaluating atorvastatin in mild to moderate hospitalized Covid-19 patients. There were 52 patients who were randomized 1:1 into the treatment group to receive 40mg atorvastatin once daily for 14 days or the placebo group. They tracked patients' symptoms and laboratory markers at baseline and during the follow-up period. They also evaluated the duration of hospitalization and supplemental O2 therapy. The results were reported in Pubmed and Eureka Select.

Results

After a 14-day of follow-up, the oxygen saturation (SaO2) was significantly higher, and the serum high-sensitivity C-reactive protein.

The (hs-CRP) level was lower in the treatment group compared to the placebo group. Moreover, at the end of the follow-up in the treatment group, the lymphocyte count was higher, and the duration of symptom resolution was shorter but not significant. Also, in the treatment group, the length of supplemental oxygen therapy and hospitalization duration were meaningfully shorter. The investigators shared the study results reveal that the mortality rate was almost twice higher in the placebo group compared to the treatment group, without any significant adverse drug reaction.

Conclusion

Atorvastatin significantly reduces supplemental oxygen need, hospitalization duration, and serum hs-CRP level in mild to moderate hospitalized COVID-19 patients.

TrialSite contributor Paul Elkins tracked this study and reported on the potential cost of such a course of treatment of atorvastatin for a patient who doesn't have insurance. Checking GoodRX.com, the retail price at Walmart Pharmacy is $15 for a 30-day supply of 40mg. That would treat two Covid-19 patients on the dosing regimen tested in this trial or $7.50 per patient. Of course, TrialSite isn't making medical recommendations, and this was a small study that would need further validation. The point: If we are moving to the endemic stage of COVID-19, consumers in America need low-cost, repurposed regimens that can help lower the cost of care. The NIH and academic health systems should be seriously investigating low-cost repurposed therapeutic regimens.

https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/persian-pilot-study-atorvastatin-efficacious-in-mild-to-moderate-hospitalized-covid-19-patients-72de5d39

DeSantis Versus Lockdowns: What the Data Reveals About Florida’s COVID-19 Policies

While many states remained locked down during the COVID-19 pandemic, Governor Ron DeSantis took a drastically different approach in Florida. The exclusive documentary “DeSantis: Florida vs. Lockdowns” follows the journey of one governor standing against the mainstream COVID narrative. Presented by EpochTV’s American Thought Leaders host Jan Jekielek, who traveled to Florida during the height of the pandemic to get the full story.

Florida Residents Love Freedom

DeSantis graduated from Yale before he attended Harvard law school. He served his country as a Seal Team legal adviser in Iraq and became the youngest governor of Florida in more than a century. Jekielek traveled across the diverse state to get a taste of the people and the current political sentiment. From the cities to the countryside, the film features Americans telling their immigration stories and sharing their love for America and freedom.

DeSantis describes himself as “knee-jerk anti-communist.” Jekielek, whose parents escaped communist Poland in the ’70s, is also deeply moved by people’s stories of escape from communism. DeSantis explained that to people in Florida, tyranny does not seem distant like it might to those in other states. He also spoke about how the founders of the American Constitution held a vision for state autonomy to counter overreach from the federal government.

DeSantis Vows to Never Do Lockdowns Again

DeSantis has been the target of a barrage of media attacks revolving around Florida’s COVID policies. Despite this, the governor has widespread support from diverse groups within his state. The lockdowns of Wuhan, China, in 2020 led governments worldwide to follow suit. While many states were still shut down, Florida was taking steps toward reopening, with DeSantis saying in a press conference, “we will never do any of these lockdowns again.” This came only one month after instituting the initial lockdown. DeSantis noted that the lockdowns were a panic-driven approach and a departure from what the scientific recommendations had traditionally been for pandemics.

Dr. Scott Atlas, a Public Health Policy Expert and Senior Fellow at Standford University’s Hoover Institute, served as a key COVID adviser to DeSantis. According to Atlas, it was appropriate to shut down initially, given the information they had at that time. He believes most people bought into the extreme measures out of fear and because it was supposed to be temporary. The initial understanding was to lock the state down for 15 days to get their bearings and prevent hospitals from becoming overcrowded while they determined how to proceed. But Atlas notes that there was a dramatic shift in the goal: from preventing overcrowding to stopping cases. He says health policy experts shouldn’t just look at the disease but must also look at the impact of what they do to mitigate the effects of the disease.

Protecting the Most Vulnerable Without Causing Harm to Others

Dr. Jay Bhattacharya is a professor of medicine at Stanford University and public health policy adviser. He is the co-author of the “Great Barrington Declaration,” which recommended a focused protection approach. This strategy is based on the fact that COVID-19 poses significantly more harm to the older population than the younger population and that the effects of lockdowns are devastating to public health. For older populations, COVID poses more risk than lockdowns. For younger age groups, the lockdowns proved more harmful than the disease itself. Because of this, Bhattacharya considers it immoral to subject the younger population to lockdowns. Atlas said, “There’s a big reason why lockdowns were never recommended in prior pandemics. It is not true that people have the same risk for hospitalization.” He gives examples of the tens of thousands of cases on college campuses early on in the COVID-19 pandemic. These cases induced excessive panic in the media but no perspective. Atlas cites that of the first 50,000 cases on college campuses, there were zero hospitalizations. Nevertheless, as the news kept tallying the case numbers, college campuses began shutting down. He said they were highlighting exceptions and throwing reason out the window.

Lockdowns Failed to Save the High-Risk

One of the main reasons these experts opposed the lockdowns was because the data showed the policy failed to save the elderly. Atlas said the elderly “were destroyed and killed by the lack of enough prioritization and enough resources.” He explained how public health resources were misallocated during the pandemic and how the lockdowns failed to stop the spread among the most vulnerable populations. For example, nursing home deaths comprised forty to fifty percent of all deaths. According to Atlas, the data showed all the cases in nursing homes came in from the staff in nursing homes, yet the recommendation was to test once per week. He said they should have been testing three or five times per week to prioritize the protection of the most high-risk. Fifteen days to slow the spread did not work, and DeSantis claimed it caused significant damage to people.

What Did DeSantis Do Differently?

In place of extreme lockdown measures, what did DeSantis do in Florida? The answer is simple: he made educated decisions based on accurate data that aimed to protect the vulnerable without harming the rest of the population. This EpochTV documentary shows recorded meetings of the governor going over current COVID-19 data in great detail. Examining the statistics and data with his policy experts, they worked to make decisions that would effectively protect the population. “You don’t have to be a medical scientist to understand the data,” said Atlas. “You just have to be a critical thinker.” DeSantis was concerned about the harms of the virus and the lockdowns alike. Dr. Bhattacharya said when he spoke with DeSantis, he didn’t recall citing an article that the governor had not already seen. Bhattacharya felt that the governor was more educated on the facts than his Stanford colleagues.

Protecting the most at-risk demographic was the primary concern for DeSantis. His policies focused on preventing the discharging of COVID positive patients back into nursing homes. DeSantis listened to the personal insights of family members and nursing home residents, guiding state policies accordingly.

Lockdowns Caused Excess Deaths

Atlas argued that the lockdowns did not just fail to stop the spread of COVID, but they also killed people. According to a CDC report, almost half of the patients in the United States who received chemotherapy skipped treatment during the lockdowns. Forty percent of people with an acute stroke were too afraid to call an ambulance. Thirty to 50 percent of heart attack patients did not come into the hospital. Eighty-five percent of live organ transplants did not get done during the two months of lockdowns.

One in four young adults reported serious thoughts of suicide. Atlas cited that 50 percent of people ages 18 to 24 said they were fearful of any social interaction. Over 300,000 child abuse cases during the pandemic lockdowns went undetected. Atlas called it “an enormous tragedy,” citing emails from people pleading with him to keep speaking out against the harms of the lockdowns. Many had family members who had died of suicide or attempted suicide.

With all this data readily available, why did Florida’s policies differ so drastically from other states? Atlas points out that the burden of proof for the lockdowns should be on the states that implemented them. According to the data, Florida did the best regarding age-adjusted deaths for ages 65 and older. In addition, Florida performed better than over half the states on the total number of deaths from COVID. The economy also did better, with the unemployment rate two to three times higher in California than in Florida at the time of the documentary.

Censorship of Scientific Debate

Nevertheless, DeSantis bore the brunt of much hostility and criticism from the media. He has called out Big Tech for censoring round table discussions, pulling his videos off their platforms, and censoring scientists and doctors who deviated from the mainstream COVID narrative. Atlas spoke to the serious threat facing any who dared to speak the truth about the data. “It’s off the rails. This is not the way civilization should be.” Bhattacharya said one side simply pretended to be correct and called the other side dangerous. In reality, the scientific community had many different opinions on what measures were appropriate and effective. Sadly, people weren’t allowed to hear the different views.

Bhattacharya said, “if you are going to censor scientific debate, you might as well not do science at all,” calling the one-sided narrative “absolutely shocking.” DeSantis said censorship is a telltale sign that the narrative is about enforcing orthodoxy, not about the facts. Interestingly, Florida’s approach never centered around herd immunity but advocated for protecting those at risk without harming those not at risk.

Florida’s Pandemic Legacy: Common Sense, Traditional Values, and Freedom

How did Western governments go from an alleged commitment to fundamental liberties to draconian measures such as lockdowns, censorship, and medical mandates? DeSantis said many leaders made mistakes but will never admit they were wrong. In Florida, they combatted COVID to the degree they could without causing further damage. DeSantis says he doesn’t mind taking criticism for his policies because that’s what the role of a leader is. He said he would rather people swing at him than have the residents of his state suffer. The governor’s philosophy is that a leader’s job is not to impose mandates and lockdowns but to listen, collaborate, and protect.

As a result, Jekielek found the state of Florida to be a breath of fresh air during the COVID-19 pandemic. DeSantis’s deep respect for the American Constitution and those who have fought to preserve freedom made him willing to fight and protect it. While much of the world was afraid and shut down, the EpochTV documentary shows Florida’s businesses were open. Contrary to what the mainstream media predicted, Florida’s legacy in the aftermath of the pandemic appears to be common sense, traditional values, and the desire to live the American dream.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/desantis-versus-lockdowns-what-the-data-reveals-about-floridas-covid-19-policies_4810784.html

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95 Percent of Corpses Had Received COVID Vaccination Within 2 Weeks of Death: Funeral Director

A funeral director from New Zealand says that 95 percent of the corpses he has been seeing had received a COVID-19 vaccine within two weeks of their passing away.

“Ninety-five percent of the people who have passed away through the work that I’ve done have been vaccinated within two weeks,” Brenton Faithfull said.

Faithfull has been working as a funeral director for the last 41 years and has been running his own mortuary business for the last 26 years. He recently spoke out about the apparent relationship between the COVID-19 vaccines and the deaths he has been observing.

“It’s very obvious, they die within two weeks of receiving the vaccination, a lot of them … almost appear to have died from anaphylaxis, almost a reaction straight away to the booster.”

Anaphylaxis is an acute reaction of the body to an antigen, such as that of a bee sting, or an injection.

“They die the same day, the following day after receiving the COVID-19 vaccination. This isn’t a one-off case, this is the majority of cases that have come through our facility,” Faithfull said in an interview.

Similar data has been discussed by funeral director John O’Looney in the UK and Richard Hirschman from Alabama, previously reported by The Epoch Times.

“From the very moment these injections went into arms, the death rate soared beyond belief. They labeled them all as COVID deaths, but the reality is they were almost exclusively the people who were vaccinated,” O’Looney told The Epoch Times.

“We now see record numbers of deaths in the vaccinated and in record numbers of young people. They die from a mixture of sudden very aggressive cancers or blood clots, which cause heart attack and stroke,” he added.

Doctors Comment

Dr. Sherri Tenpenny, who has been informing the public on the dangers of vaccines for over two decades, weighed in on Faithfull’s testimony:

“On Dec. 2, 2020, UK regulators granted emergency-use authorization (EUA) to Pfizer’s COVID-19 shot. Within a week, MHRA [Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency] Chief Executive Officer June Raine said in a statement that ‘Any person with a history of anaphylaxis to a vaccine, medicine or food should not receive the Pfizer BioNTech vaccine.’ She went on to say that ‘allergic reactions had not been a feature of Pfizer’s clinical trials,'” Dr. Tenpenny told The Epoch Times.

However, Tenpenny further noted that anaphylaxis was the “first identified risk.”

“Pfizer was forced to release their findings by a Texas federal judge in January 2022. Within that first tranche of documents, you will find Table 3–Safety Concerns–on page 10 of this document [pdf]. The first identified risk is anaphylaxis. In a risk survey … conducted between Dec. 1, 2020, and Feb. 28, 2021, a mere three months, 1,833 cases of anaphylaxis had been observed and four individuals died from anaphylaxis on the same,” she said.

In certain cases, Faithfull and his staff try to get the coroner involved.

Faithfull shared one instance where a man insisted that his father should not get the vaccine, but his sister pressured their father. When the father conceded and took the shot, he died four days later.

“When I started counting in August of last year, it was one after the other, after the other, after the other, and when I got to 20, it was 19 who had died within two weeks [of getting the vaccine],” Faithfull said.

“So the first 20 days, I counted 19 of them—that’s 95 percent,” the funeral director explained. “The next number was 100 percent of the people who died had been vaccinated within two weeks.”

https://www.theepochtimes.com/health/95-percent-of-corpses-had-received-covid-vaccination-within-2-weeks-of-death-funeral-director_4798942.html

Sunday, October 23, 2022

Republican governors pledge to fight children's COVID vaccine mandate, Dems largely silent

New guidelines by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) urging children to be vaccinated against the coronavirus to attend school have sparked a polarized response from the nation's governors.

GOP chief executives have largely denounced the voluntary guidelines, pledging to block school districts from adopting a coronavirus vaccination as a prerequisite for attendance.

"Under my watch, there will be no COVID vaccine mandates for kids — period," said Gov. Kim Reynolds, R-Iowa. "In fact, we signed a law that prevents it. It’s the parent's decision, not the government’s."

Other Republican governors were similarly quick to denounce the idea. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is seen as a potential front-runner for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, even argued that, given the relatively new nature of the coronavirus vaccine, the shot might not be suitable for young children.

"I get a kick out of it when people kind of compare it to (measles, mumps and rubella shots) and things that have been around for decades and decades," said DeSantis. "These are new shots."

Earlier this week, the CDC voted to add coronavirus inoculation to the Vaccines for Children Program. The inclusion does not make the shots mandatory for children but places it on a list of recommended vaccinations the CDC provides to physicians.

GOP governors fear the guidelines will be adopted wholesale by school districts across the country.

"I will never mandate the COVID-19 vaccine for Idahoans of any age group, especially children," said Gov. Brad Little, R-Idaho. "As long as I am governor, that decision will be determined solely by parents, families and individual citizens."

Democratic chief executives have followed a different course. Many have remained largely silent about the new guidelines. Of the 22 Democratic governors contacted by Fox News Digital Friday about their position on the topic, only three returned requests for comment.

Some, like Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, said the new guidelines are voluntary and have no immediate impact on either children or parents.

"The main impact of the CDC recommendation is that health insurance companies will be required to cover the cost of the immunization and that the federal government can continue to provide it for free to low-income families," a spokesman for Newsom said. "It's interesting that Republican states are criticizing this as schools already require vaccinations for chickenpox, polio, measles and more."

Still, others took a more muted stand. Democratic Gov. Janet Mills of Maine said she would not ask the state legislature to adopt the vaccine requirement for children.

"Maine has one of the highest vaccination rates in the nation. Any COVID-19 vaccine requirement for Maine children would need the approval of the state legislature," a spokesman for Mills told Fox News Digital.

"The governor will continue to encourage Maine people to be vaccinated, but she has no plans to ask the legislature to require the COVID-19 vaccination for children."

Democratic Gov. Jared Polis of Colorado took a similar position, telling Fox News Digital there were no plans to require a coronavirus vaccination for school attendance.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/republican-governors-pledge-fight-childrens-covid-vaccine-mandate-dems-largely-silent

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There was no basis for Covid passports and Covid vaccine mandates -- Pfizer admission

The admission Dutch conservative member of the European Parliament, Rob Roos, dragged out of Pfizer representative Janine Small has thrown the vaccine passport and vaccine mandate narrative into disarray. It dismantled the lie that we should be taking – specifically – Covid vaccines to protect others.

Roos switched to English when asking his controversial question, which helped the answer turn viral on social media where it was viewed at least 20 million times in the days that followed.

‘…and I will speak in English so there are no misunderstandings. Was the Pfizer Covid vaccine tested on stopping the transmission of the virus before it entered the market? If not, please, say it clearly. If ‘yes’ are you willing to share the data with this committee? And I really want straight answer, ‘yes or no’ and I’m looking forward to it.’

‘No,’ was Small’s reply, followed by a little laugh – as if it were some kind of joke. ‘We had to really move at the speed of science.’ A comment that was shortly followed by the statement, ‘We had to do everything “at risk”.’

‘The speed of science… Honestly,’ said Rowan Dean, on The World According to Rowan Dean, which airs Tuesday-Thursday at 9pm on Sky News Australia.

He spoke with Rob Roos last night.

‘I was thrilled when you asked that question in English. You knew how important that question was. I remember, you started in Dutch and then went, “Hang on, I’m going to ask this question in English…!” Well done, and thank you so much. What led you to asking that particular question?’

‘Since the implementation of the Covid vaccines I’ve been searching for the answer to this question,’ replied Rob Roos. ‘I also asked it of AstraZeneca and Moderna because it’s important. Millions of people were placed outside society because of Covid passports. People lost their jobs and it was all based on that the vaccine would stop transmission, otherwise there would be no point in excluding unvaccinated people from society. If the vaccine doesn’t stop transmission, then vaccinated people spread the virus too. So, I found this to be an incredibly important question.’

‘Rob, you’re right, it is the single most important question because certainly here in Australia we had some of the worst lockdowns, we had this vicious persecution of unvaccinated people, we had our state premiers going on television and saying they wouldn’t be in the same room as the unvaccinated. It was this endless repetition of “this is a pandemic of the unvaccinated”. We had health authorities – health bureaucrats – telling the public that they were going to make life incredibly difficult for you if you weren’t vaccinated. This was persecution, I don’t know if it was the same in Europe, but it certainly happened here in Australia. You got that critical answer that they hadn’t even tested if it would stop transmission. Were you surprised by the answer? What’s it been like since you exposed this scandal?’

‘Well, I wasn’t that surprised,’ admitted Roos, ‘because the answer was as I suspected. We have all seen the daily practice during the Omicron variant but our governments keep telling the story – the fiction – that vaccination was necessary to protect others. But I was surprised about the honesty with which the Pfizer representative responded because the implications are massive. This means that there was no basis for Covid passports and Covid vaccine mandates.’

‘What has been the result in the European Parliament? It was the executive [from Pfizer] who turned up and spoke but it was the CEO who was invited. The CEO declined to come on to your interrogation and questioning… Maybe the executive wasn’t even aware of what dynamite she was exposing by giving the answer she gave?’ added Dean. ‘Are we going to see governments backing down and apologising for these vaccine passports? What’s been the response?’

‘There has been a massive response to the video. Worldwide people are angry because their governments lied to them. Austrians were denied access to their dying parents, for example. People all over the world – not only Europe. I also think a lot of people are now starting to see the government’s response for what it was. They have abused their power, maybe [they were] even tyrannical. They only cared about pushing vaccinations. There was no respect for people’s body autonomy and integrity. So, on the one hand, the response has been overwhelmingly positive, massively so. At the same time, I have been attacked by establishment media who claimed I spread “fake news”. But, when they attack me they don’t attack my actual argument, they attack a strawman. I am not claiming Pfizer lied, I am claiming our governments lied because they based their narrative on the idea that you do this for others and that vaccination stops transmission for which there was no evidence. And all fact-checkers have to admit that the government messaging was plain wrong and government policies undermined fundamental rights in an unprecedented way – a way which we thought would never be possible in a liberal democracy. But it was. And that’s shocking, because it tells us a lot about the state of our fundamental rights.’

‘You’ve used a phrase that I’ve been using a lot over the past few months, the abuse of power,’ replied Rowan Dean. ‘And, for me, that is what the absolute pivot of this is all about. I agree with you. We’ve seen a lot of people coming out and saying, “Oh… well, they never claimed that they had tested for transmission therefore there’s nothing in this story.” It’s complete rubbish. As you have put your finger on, the point is that our politicians led us to believe, in fact, they insisted at every level. Whether it was Anthony Fauci in the States or our own politicians here in Australia – at every level our health bureaucrats insisted that the vaccines prevented transmission and this was the rationale for mandatory vaccination which, in this country – and in other places – many people lost their jobs. Many people are still out of work. Many people had their lives turned upside down and destroyed because they insisted to us that it did stop transmission. This isn’t a problem with Pfizer, as you say, Rob, this is absolutely about the abuse of power by politicians who are either too stupid, or too lazy, or too corrupt to actually check out the facts and were prepared to abuse their power. What happens next?’

‘That’s a very good question. What should happen, in my opinion, is that politicians are held accountable. The people who were responsible for these policies should resign if they are still in office. This has been the most damaging violation of fundamental rights in decades. Its impact is lasting. Small businesses are still going bankrupt because of high inflation after they were already weakened by Covid lockdowns. Young people are still more often depressed and lost out on valuable life experience – our society suffers from an obesity epidemic – and this was not because of some force of nature, it was because politicians decided to enact these policies. Those who did should resign and this violation of fundamental human rights should never happen again.’

As Rowan Dean says, Rob Roos belongs in the history books for what he has done exposing the lies of our government officials during the pandemic years.

The fact-checkers can complain all they like that Pfizer never said or implied that their tests would prevent transmission. This is the excuse official fact-checkers use to call ‘fake news’ on Rob Roos. Are outfits such as Politifact so dense (or disingenuous?) that they don’t realise they are debating the wrong fact? Let’s have a ‘fact-check’ on the claims of politicians, such as President Joe Biden. As Rob Roos correctly states, it was the lies of government and the lies of health officials drafting policy, that matter. And they certainly lied.

https://spectator.com.au/2022/10/rob-roos-and-rowan-dean-on-the-abuse-of-rights/

Saturday, October 22, 2022

CENSORED

As a conservative writer I do of course run the risk of being censored by the establishment media. It's an advance on book burning. Now the book is no longer published in the first place.

Facebook has been pretty heavy with me, which is why I no longer put up much there. But the cancer has now spread to my PCWatch blog. If you try to access it via Google, you get some lurid and quite false warnings about it. What happens when you try to access it directly, I am not sure. If you just access it directly using the usual link in the list of blogs below, I hope you will still get straight through.

Anyway, I always create a backup whenever I post something so that should enable continued access to the blog. I normally upload backups only once a month but from now on I will upload them daily. So see http://jonjayray.com/pcoct22.html for that

Feedback would be appreciated

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Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

https://awesternheart.blogspot.com (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)

http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs

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Friday, October 21, 2022

The truth about Australia's Covid lockdowns is FINALLY exposed: Damning report slams school closures and politically-driven decisions - 'it was WRONG'

An independent review into Australia's Covid response has slammed politically driven health orders and the excessive use of lockdowns - finding they ultimately failed to protect the nation's most vulnerable people,.

The 97-page review, led by former secretary to the prime minister's office Peter Shergold, urged federal and state governments to learn from their mistakes and overhaul their processes in order to restore trust.

The report, funded by the Paul Ramsay Foundation, John and Myriam Wylie Foundation and Andrew Forrest's Minderoo Foundation, found the country's school closures were also a failure.

'It was wrong to close entire school systems, particularly once new information indicated that schools were not high-transmission environments,' the review said.

'For children and parents [particularly women], we failed to get the balance right between protecting health and imposing long-term costs on education, mental health, the economy and workforce outcomes.

'Rules were too often formulated and enforced in ways that lacked fairness and compassion. Such overreach undermined public trust and confidence in the institutions that are vital to effective crisis response.'

The review carried out over a six month period involved more than 350 confidential submissions and consultations from health experts, economists, public servants, business and community groups.

It consisted of more than 160 submissions, 3,000 hours of research and policy and data analysis.

The review concluded various lockdowns and shutting of borders should have been used as a 'last resort'.

'Too many of Australia's lockdowns and border closures were the result of policy failures in quarantine, contact tracing, testing, disease surveillance and communicating effectively the need for preventive measures like mask wearing and social distancing,' the review stated.

'Lockdowns, especially when targeted at a particular location, brought a deep sense of inequity among those who were most restricted. Lockdowns, overall, created a universal feeling that the pandemic was being policed rather than managed.

'As with lockdowns, border closures – particularly between states and territories – should be used sparingly and only in extreme situations. They should be applied with greater empathy and flexibility.'

The review noted despite the pandemic affecting everyone, 'its burden was not shared equally'.

DAMNING QUOTES FROM COVID REPORT

'It was wrong to close entire school systems, particularly once new information indicated that schools were not high-transmission environments.'

'Rules were too often formulated and enforced in ways that lacked fairness and compassion. Such overreach undermined public trust and confidence in the institutions that are vital to effective crisis response.'

'Lockdowns, especially when targeted at a particular location, brought a deep sense of inequity among those who were most restricted. Lockdowns, overall, created a universal feeling that the pandemic was being policed rather than managed.

It stated that the failure to plan adequately for the 'differing impact of Covid' meant the disease 'spread faster and more widely'.

The review also noted while Australia had early success in limiting infection rates and deaths, in comparison to other countries, this success 'started to falter in 2021'.

'Cases and deaths have risen even further during 2022, dramatically reversing our early competitive advantage,' the review notes.

'As of September 30, 2022, Australia has recorded 378,617 cases per million people in 2022. 'The latest available official data shows that by May 2022 excess deaths in Australia had spiked to almost 359 per million people in 2022.'

The document also said the 'absence of transparency' in the expert health advice 'helped mask political calculations'.

'Political calculation was never far from the surface of COVID-19 decisions,' the review stated.

'It is neither realistic nor desirable to remove politics from decision-making in an accountable democracy. 'But the absence of transparency in the expert advice going to leaders helped mask political calculations.

'It was difficult to gauge the trade-offs that were being considered between health and economic outcomes. It made it easier for leaders to be selective in the 'expert advice' they followed.'

The paper went on to explain the damning effect overreach had on the confidence of Australian citizens.

'Such overreach undermined public trust and confidence in the institutions that are vital to effective crisis response,' it read.

'Many Australians came to feel that they were being protected by being policed. These actions could have been avoided if we had built fairness into our planning decisions and introduced compassion into their implementation.'

The review recommended six measures to be implemented in order to avoid the same mistakes being repeated in another health crisis.

These included; establishing an independent, data-driven Australian Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, clearly defining national cabinet roles and responsibilities in a crisis, publicly releasing modelling used in government decision-making, regular pandemic scenario testing and the sharing and linking of data between jurisdictions.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11333647/Australia-Covid-review-finds-lockdowns-border-closures-schools-shut-avoidable.html

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Ivermectin Key for Early COVID-19 Treatment: Dr. Paul Marik

Ivermectin is a key drug for early COVID-19 treatment, Dr. Paul Marik says.

Ivermectin, an anti-parasitic drug, has shown efficacy against COVID-19 in some studies as a prophylactic and treatment.

The Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance (FLCCC), which Marik helped start, features ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine in its early treatment protocol.

“Ivermectin is a remarkable drug,” Marik told EpochTV’s “American Thought Leaders” during a recent conference.

“It’s antiviral, so it works against a whole host of RNA viruses. This is indisputable. It is anti-inflammatory. We know that there are multiple studies showing that ivermectin is a very powerful anti-inflammatory drug. We know that what it does is it stimulates a process called autophagy, which is very important in the process of healing. And it’s one of the main mechanisms that we use to help patients get rid of spike protein. And ivermectin, believe it or not, stimulates autophagy. The other thing it does, which is important, is it changes [and] improves the microbiome,” Marik added.

Ivermectin is used off-label to treat COVID-19 in the United States. It is approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to treat conditions caused by parasites.

The FDA says ivermectin should not be used to treat COVID-19, pointing to studies that have found little or no benefit for the drug against the disease. Other research has found ivermectin can be effective as a preventative and a therapy, including one from FLCCC doctors that found the drug lowered mortality rates.

Off-Label

Health care providers can prescribe drugs “off-label.” That means a drug is used for a purpose other than that for which it is authorized or approved.

“From the FDA perspective, once the FDA approves a drug, healthcare providers generally may prescribe the drug for an unapproved use when they judge that it is medically appropriate for their patient,” the FDA says on its website.

But a number of medical boards and other health bodies intervened during the pandemic, restricting or banning prescriptions for drugs used off-label for COVID-19, such as ivermectin.

Marik said he thinks many people misunderstand off-label, and aren’t aware that many hospitals use off-label drugs every single day.

“It’s common practice. And in fact, the FDA promotes—the FDA themselves, if you go to their website—promotes the use of off-label drugs. And what they say is that doctors are fully entitled to use FDA-approved off-label drugs at their own discretion at the discretion of the physician,” Marik said.

“But suddenly, with COVID, the rules changed. You couldn’t use an off-label drug. And you have to ask why. And obviously, they don’t want people to use off-label drugs, they want you to use, firstly, the expensive drugs and it obviously would compete with the mandate for the vaccine, because if there were cheap, effective drugs that could treat COVID, why would you want to be vaccinated with an experimental vaccine whose safety has never been established?”

Early treatment using off-label drugs, he added, was a “valid alternative for people who wanted a choice.”

Marik is one of the doctors who sued the FDA in June for allegedly violating the law by interfering with doctors who sought to treat patients with ivermectin. The case is still ongoing.

Marik and colleagues founded FLCCC after seeing U.S. authorities fail to provide or recommend COVID-19 treatments early in the pandemic.

Even after months into the pandemic, no treatments were advised for patients, even those admitted to hospitals. Remdesivir was authorized for hospitalized patients on May 1, 2020.

Further, when hospitalized patients’ conditions worsened, they were placed on ventilators. Many of the patients who ended up on ventilators died.

“It just goes against the basic foundation of medicine, that you would have a disease, which had a high fatality rate and you wouldn’t try something—something—just to treat these patients,” Marik said.

The doctors figured out that COVID-19 attacks the lungs, causing fatal lung failure, inflammation, and clotting.

They turned to known anti-inflammatories like methylprednisolone, a type of corticosteroid that also helps with the lung issues. Heparin, used to prevent blood clots, was also part of the inpatient protocol, which became known as MATH+.

“At that time, we were heavily criticized, for firstly, using corticosteroids and then Heparin,” Marik recounted. “People said, ‘You can’t do it, it’s a viral disease, you’re gonna kill people.’ They were outraged. But we saw it worked. We were at the bedside. There’s nothing like being a doctor at the bedside, seeing what happens. And then, of course, six months later, the RECOVERY trial came around and showed, believe it or not, corticosteroids save lives. So unfortunately, in that study, they use the wrong steroid and the wrong dose. But steroids are so potent that it actually was was able to reduce mortality. So we were vindicated.”

At the time, Marik was chair of the Eastern Virginia Medical School’s Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, and helping treat patients at Sentara Norfolk General Hospital.

The protocol helped save lives, Marik said.

The group later developed a list of drugs effective for early, outpatient treatment for people who contracted COVID-19. The main goal was to prevent hospitalizations.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) COVID-19 Treatment Guidelines Panel says multiple trials indicate corticosteroids help people hospitalized with COVID-19. The panel also recommends against using ivermectin against COVID-19 except in clinical trials.

Other Drugs

Under “first line agents,” FLCCC lists hydroxychloroquine with ivermectin. Hydroxychloroquine is approved as an antimalarial, but it and a similar drug, chloroquine, are not recommended by U.S. authorities for treating COVID-19. Similar to ivermectin, some studies have shown efficacy while others have not, with debates raging regarding proper dosing and timing. And similar to ivermectin, the drug is cheap because generic versions are widely available.

Aspirin, another anti-coagulant, is also advised with vitamin D3 and melatonin. Zinc, vitamin C, and antiviral mouthwash are among the other aspects of the first phase.

The NIH panel does not advise for or against vitamins C, D, or zinc due to what it describes as insufficient evidence.

If symptoms persist for five or more days, FLCCC recommends a second set of treatments. They include sotrovimab, a monoclonal antibody; fluvoxamine, an anti-depressant; and spironolactone, typically used to treat high blood pressure.

The panel has no guidance on spironolactone. It previously recommended sotrovimab but does not any longer because it says the monoclonal does not perform well against newer Omicron subvariants. The panel also says there is not enough evidence to recommend for or against fluvoxamine. The FDA rejected a request from a doctor to authorize fluvoxamine for COVID-19.

Marik believes the emphasis always should have been on repurposed drugs, which have repeatedly been downplayed or ignored by U.S. authorities.

“If you kind of think about a pandemic, what you want to control it are repurposed drugs, because by their very nature these are cheap, inexpensive, easy to manufacture. And since this is a global issue, it then is very easy to distribute these drugs around the entire world and control the pandemic, which was the obvious answer, is the use of cheap, repurposed, effective, safe drugs,” he said. “Hydroxychloroquine is safe, if you use it in the right dose, which is really important.

And ivermectin is exceedingly safe, you could use 10 times the recommended dose and it’s safe. And vitamin D, vitamin C, nigella sativa, there’s a whole host of medications—melatonin—that are highly effective as a repurposed drug for controlling this disease. But it went against the narrative.”

Marik used the example of chloroquine, which was effective against SARS-CoV-1, and touted by the NIH as one of a number of drugs effective against MERS. But once COVID-19, or SARS-CoV-2, came around, “that didn’t apply anymore,” Marik said. “And clearly there were severe conflicts of interest. It was inconvenient. It was inconvenient for them.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/ivermectin-key-for-early-covid-19-treatment-dr-paul-marik_4804865.html

Thursday, October 20, 2022

COVID Vaccines Causing Death Can Be proven

There are various ways to show that COVID vaccines can kill people. Likely the best is conducting a very good autopsy.

A new medical article by a German researcher details the findings of an autopsy that proved death was caused by COVID vaccination. The title is “A Case Report: Multifocal Necrotizing Encephalitis and Myocarditis after BNT162b2 mRNA Vaccination against COVID-19.”

Here is the abstract:

“The current report presents the case of a 76-year-old man with Parkinson’s disease (PD) who died three weeks after receiving his third COVID-19 vaccination. The patient was first vaccinated in May 2021 with the ChAdOx1 nCov-19 vector vaccine, followed by two doses of the BNT162b2 mRNA vaccine in July and December 2021. The family of the deceased requested an autopsy due to ambiguous clinical signs before death. PD was confirmed by post-mortem examinations. Furthermore, signs of aspiration pneumonia and systemic arteriosclerosis were evident. However, histopathological analyses of the brain uncovered previously unsuspected findings, including acute vasculitis (predominantly lymphocytic) as well as multifocal necrotizing encephalitis of unknown etiology with pronounced inflammation including glial and lymphocytic reaction. In the heart, signs of chronic cardiomyopathy as well as mild acute lympho-histiocytic myocarditis and vasculitis were present. Although there was no history of COVID-19 for this patient, immunohistochemistry for SARS-CoV-2 antigens (spike and nucleocapsid proteins) was performed. Surprisingly, only spike protein but no nucleocapsid protein could be detected within the foci of inflammation in both the brain and the heart, particularly in the endothelial cells of small blood vessels. Since no nucleocapsid protein could be detected, the presence of spike protein must be ascribed to vaccination rather than to viral infection. The findings corroborate previous reports of encephalitis and myocarditis caused by gene-based COVID-19 vaccines.”

And here are the conclusions:

”Numerous cases of encephalitis and encephalomyelitis have been reported in connection with the gene-based COVID-19 vaccines, with many being considered causally related to vaccination [31,38,39]. However, this is the first report to demonstrate the presence of the spike protein within the encephalitic lesions and to attribute it to vaccination rather than infection. These findings corroborate a causative role of the gene-based COVID-19 vaccines, and this diagnostic approach is relevant to potentially vaccine-induced damage to other organs as well.”

Another recent study found the following:

“We report the autopsy results, including microscopic myocardial findings, of 2 teenage boys who died within the first week after receiving the second Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 dose. The microscopic findings are not the alterations seen with typical myocarditis. This suggest a role for cytokine storm, which may occur with an excessive inflammatory response, as there also is a feedback loop between catecholamines and cytokines.”

And yet another study found similar results;

“In these two adult cases of histologically confirmed, fulminant myocarditis that had developed within 2 weeks after Covid-19 vaccination, a direct causal relationship cannot be definitively established because we did not perform testing for viral genomes or autoantibodies in the tissue specimens. However, no other causes were identified by PCR assay or serologic examination.”

Unlike the German study these two US studies seemed reluctant to state the obvious causality between the COVID vaccine and death.

Here is part of a pertinent news story with this title: “FDA Withholding Autopsy Results on People Who Died After Getting COVID-19 Vaccines.”

“The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is refusing to release the results of autopsies conducted on people who died after getting COVID-19 vaccines.

The FDA says it is barred from releasing medical files, but a drug safety advocate says that it could release the autopsies with personal information redacted.”

Kim Witczak, a drug safety advocate who advises the FDA as part of the Psychopharmacologic Drugs Advisory Committee, said that the reports could be released with personal information blacked out.

“The personal information could easily be redacted without losing the potential learnings from [the] autopsy,” Witczak told The Epoch Times via email.

People make the choice to submit autopsy results to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, Witczak noted.

“If someone submits their experience to VAERS they want and expect to have it investigated by the FDA. This includes autopsy reports,” she said.

Autopsies are examinations of deceased persons performed to determine the cause of death.

“Autopsies can be an important part of postmortem analysis and should be done especially with increased deaths following COVID-19 vaccination,” Witczak said.the

A review of the scarcity of autopsies concluded:

“To ensure public safety, postmortem investigations on all fatalities associated with COVID-19 vaccination should be done. Autopsies should be publicly funded, carried out by independent pathologists, with results published free of authoritarian censorship that supports deceiving narratives. Pathologists must be protected against intimidation and retaliation if their reports differ from results desired by officialdom.”

Data analysis

Besides autopsies, a number of analysts have done data studies that lead to the conclusion that COVID vaccines explain many deaths. Here is a conclusion from one such analysis of Massachusetts data:

“It is apparent that as you move younger through the age groups that overall mortality and COVID-19 mortality gets relatively worse in 2021 than 2020. This is in stark contrast to the claims that the COVID-19 vaccine is both safe and effective.”

Another analysis, also of Massachusetts data, came to this cocnlusion:

“the official Massachusetts database of death certificates contains proof that C19 gene modification biological injectable products killed thousands of people in Massachusetts in 2021. There is not another dataset out there like that one that definitely proves prolonged excess death in causes specific to the circulatory system and in numbers in the thousands of lives and in younger people than expected. C19 was over in Massachusetts in June 2020. What has happened since then has been a hidden disaster of biological injectable product madness

https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/covid-vaccines-causing-death-can-be-proven-c3ebf991

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Real-World Evidence in Hong Kong Evidence Material Benefits of COVID-19 Oral Antivirals

According to the results of a recent Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) and University of Hong Kong (HKU) study, COVID-19 death rates plummet by 80% when inpatients are prescribed oral antiviral medication, and such a regimen also reduces the risk of hospital admission in outpatients by 90%. A prominent study team suggests the observational, real-world evidence investigation points to the need for a triage mechanism for an expeditious antiviral prescription for mild to moderate COVID-19 patients.

Before summarizing the Hong Kong-based observational study results, TrialSite takes a trip back in time to early in the pandemic when physicians such as Dr. Peter McCullough, a well-known, highly published cardiologist and clinical investigator created controversy for daring to take on the medical establishment regarding treatment approaches. His key points, “Four Pillars of COVID-19 Care,” emphasize the critical importance of treating COVID-19 patients early on with repurposed combinations of oral antivirals (and other known regimens), given the complete absence at the time of any approved pharmaceuticals or vaccines.

Early on American Doctors Called Out This Need

Early on during the pandemic, while shunned and even ridiculed by the mainstream, front-line physicians such as Dr. Peter McCullough of Dallas, Texas called out the need for combinations of repurposed, oral and other therapies based on the unfolding observations of the lifecycle disease states of COVID-19. McCullough shared his views on the various treatments associated with the “Four Pillars of COVID-19 Care,” which involved combinations of repurposed therapies, especially in the early stages of the infection.

McCullough’s Four Pillars included 1) contagion control or efforts to reduce the spread of SARS-CoV-2, 2) Early ambulatory or home treatment of COVID-19 syndrome to reduce hospitalization and death, 3) late-stage hospitalization treatment or a “safety net for survival,” and 4) vaccination to “herd immunity.”

Although ignored by much of the medical establishment that opted for a government-directed, top-down approach centered on pharmaceutical company-driven studies, front-line providers early on emphasized the unfolding, real-world observations of the COVID-19 disease states, using their experience, expertise, and wisdom to pair various medications at various stages of the lifecycle of the disease. This critical contribution by McCullough, an advisor to TrialSite, in many ways becomes validated, as the Dallas-based doctor was always pro-pharmaceuticals. He just didn’t want to sit back and do nothing while society waited for novel therapeutics that underwent clinical trials.

Other doctors and pharmacists also reported success with repurposed drug regimens following McCullough’s thesis. Others followed their own paradigm, such as a pharmacist from Adventist Health, reported on by TrialSite, who developed the ICAM protocol that appeared to be saving hundreds of lives. It turns out that that particular health system had a contract with Pfizer that precluded such real-world tinkering while they served as a trial site for vaccine trials.

Another group was the Front-Line COVID-19 Critical Care (FLCCC) Alliance, and several independent groups and individuals, but the guidance from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and most of academic medicine was to do nothing despite a mounting death toll. They chose to wait for the vaccines that were authorized on an emergency basis in December 2020, and any novel, branded pharmaceuticals that ensued with provisional authorizations.

But what were front-line doctors to do with their patients? What about the Hippocratic Oath to do something? Was doing nothing better than doctors’ best efforts at something? The point here is that the lessons of COVID-19 must bring back together critically minded, independent front-line physicians and the healthcare systems. After all, the goal is the health of the patient above all.

Enter the Recent Hong Kong Real-World Evidence Study
Hong Kong-based researchers have verified that using the oral antiviral agent Paxlovid (Nirmatrelvir-Ritonavir) may reduce the risk of death in hospitalized patients by as much as 78% along with a lowering the risk of hospital admission (among outpatients) by as much as 88%. These are impressive numbers that the Hong Kong researchers argue could save considerable money per patient when compared to usual methods of care.

Recently published in The Lancet Regional Health—Western Pacific, the study team, led by the Jockey Club School of Public Health and Primary Care at CU Medicine and the Department of Emergency Medicine at HKU Med, report on the findings of their retrospective, cohort analysis involving 54,355 COVID-19 outpatients in designated clinics and inpatients in public hospitals in Hong Kong associated with the fifth COVID-19 wave between February and March 2022.

Both Pfizer’s Paxlovid (Nirmatrelvir-Ritonavir) and Merck’s Molnupiravir (Lagevrio) were significantly associated with a reduced death rate among inpatients. What did the Hong Kong-based team find?

For inpatient scenarios, antivirals led to a reduction in all-cause mortality.

https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/real-world-evidence-in-hong-kong-evidence-material-benefits-of-covid-19-oral-antivirals-d64faf1a

Wednesday, October 19, 2022

A cure for long COVID? Drug used to treat alcohol and opioid addiction is found to relieve persistent brain fog and fatigue

A drug used to treat addiction could be what millions of long Covid sufferers around the world need to finally address their symptoms.

Naltrexone is a generic drug approved by the Food and Drug Administration to treat both alcohol and opioid addicts.

But in small trials it has been able to relieve long Covid patients of lingering ailments like brain fog and fatigue that last months after the initial infection.

The drug - sold under the brand name Revia - is now being touted as a crucial piece of the puzzle of long Covid that has stumped experts for over two years.

Larger trials are underway and scientists are still searching for the mechanism as to why naltrexone seems to be so effective against chronic Covid.

Current treatments for long Covid include therapy targeted at the symptoms a person is feeling to manage the condition, though there are no universal treatments.

Treatments include physical therapy, and drug to manage symptoms like chronic pain, respiratory issues and others.

Lauren Nichols, a 34-year-old logistics expert for the US Department of Transportation in Boston, was a patient suffering from the condition.

She reported symptoms of impaired thinking and focus, fatigue, seizures, headache and pain since her COVID-19 infection in the spring of 2020.

In June, she was suggested the anti-addiction medication by the doctor. Within months, she could think clearly again and was pain-free.

The drug has previously shown promise against post-infection syndromes like chronic fatigue syndrome, suffered by people after a severe illness.

It works by blocking the euphoric and sedative effects of opioid drugs by blocking the brains receptors, and stopping cravings for the drug as a result. It is to be taken orally.

Common side-effects include nausea, headaches, dizziness, vomiting and other symptoms.

It also has anti-inflammatory properties and has been used in the past to treat conditions such as fibromyalgia, Crohn's disease and multiple sclerosis.

'It should be at the top of everyone's list for clinical trials,' said Dr Jarred Younger, from the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

Testing of naltrexone was included in a $1billion initiative by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to discover the causes and treatments for long Covid.

At least four clinical trials testing a low-dose naltrexone's (LDN) effectiveness against long Covid are now underway.

The condition is made up of a collection of some 200 symptoms ranging from pain and heart palpitations to insomnia and cognitive impairment.

At 50 milligrams (mg) naltrexone is approved to treat opioid and alcohol addiction. But in long Covid studies it is being used in tiny doses up to 10 times lower than that.

Dr Jack Lambert, an infectious disease expert at University College Dublin School of Medicine, had used the drug to treat pain and fatigue associated with Lyme disease.

During the pandemic, Lambert recommended naltrexone to colleagues treating patients with lingering symptoms after bouts of Covid.

It worked so well that he ran a pilot study among 38 long Covid patients. They reported improvements in energy, pain, concentration, insomnia and overall recovery from COVID-19 after two months, according to findings published in July.

Lambert, who is planning a larger trial to confirm those results, said he believes it may repair damage of the disease rather than mask its symptoms.

Other planned trials include one by the University of British Columbia in Vancouver and a pilot study by Ann Arbor, Michigan-based startup AgelessRx. That study of 36 volunteers should have results by year-end, said company co-founder Sajad Zalzala.

Scientists are still working on explaining the mechanism for how the addiction drug might work.

Experiments by Dr Sonya Marshall-Gradisnik of the National Centre for Neuroimmunology and Emerging Diseases in Australia suggest long Covid symptoms arise from a significant reduction in function of natural killer cells in the immune system. In laboratory experiments, naltrexone has been shown to help restore their normal function.

Dr Hector Bonilla, co-director of the Stanford Post-Acute COVID-19 Clinic and a RECOVER adviser, has used naltrexone in 500 patients with chronic fatigue syndrome, with half reporting feeling better.

He studied it in 18 long Covid patients, with 11 showing improvements, and said he believes larger, formal trials could determine whether it offers a true benefit.

There are also theories that long Covid is the product of the 'nocebo' affect, where a person's symptoms may be a result of a psychological effect, not physical illness.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-11328891/Generic-drug-used-treat-alcohol-opioid-addiction-relieves-persistent-brain-fog-fatigue.html

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Moderna's CEO admits only the vulnerable need a COVID booster and likens the virus to flu

Not everyone needs to get an annual Covid booster, according to the head of pharma giant Moderna who also likened the virus to seasonal flu. Stéphane Bancel said his company's shots should mainly be targeted at over-50s and people with underlying health conditions.

His comments seem to be at odds with the Centers for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC) which is urging everyone over the age of five to get boosted.

Covid is now predominantly only killing the most vulnerable because the US has built up strong immunity through high infection rates and repeated vaccine rollouts.

There are currently around 300 deaths from the virus across the country every day, compared to more than 1,000 this time last year.

Mr Bancel told a finance conference on Monday: 'I think it's going to be like the flu. If you're a 25-year-old, do you need an annual booster every year if you're healthy?

‘You might want to... but I think it's going to be similar to flu where it's going to be people at high-risk, people above 50 years of age, people with comorbidities, people with cancer and other conditions, people with transplants.’

Mr Bancel's comments come amid a sluggish vaccine booster rollout that has seen just one in 20 eligible Americans taking up their Omicron-specific shot. Despite there being little appetite for the new vaccines, the CDC last week approved Moderna and Pfizer's shot for children as young as five.

Pfizer recently joined forces with Marvel for a PR campaign that appeared to target children.

But Mr Bancel said it was ‘very important to think about’ whether or not to get Covid boosters.

He said there are around ‘1.5billion people’ globally who would fall into the vulnerable category. But he emphasized that younger people ‘are going to have to decide for themselves what they want to do’.

Dr Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), said the country was 'ripe' for a resurgence because it has low levels of immunity.

Influenza has been largely sidelined during the pandemic due to lockdowns and social restrictions, leaving Americans with little protection against the seasonal bug.

But there are signs the flu is making a comeback as latest data shows cases have quadrupled in recent weeks — months before the virus normally strikes.

Flu season typically runs from late October to May, picking up in December and peaking in February.

But the southern hemisphere - which is normally a precursor for the US - suffered an early and brutal wave during its winter earlier in the year.

There are also concerns about flu vaccine uptake, with just 12million Americans having received the shot so far.

Dr Walensky told NBC News: ‘We've noted that flu activity is starting to increase across much of the country.

‘Not everybody got flu vaccinated last year, and many people did not get the flu. So that makes us ripe to have potentially a severe flu season.’

Roughly 14.8million Americans have now received the updated bivalent booster, out of 215million eligible people.

Mr Bancel defended the sluggish Covid booster uptake, pointing out that it is stronger than seasonal flu uptake.

He noted that it is the first time people are getting the booster in more of an endemic than pandemic setting, meaning people are less anxious to get a new vaccine.

‘You might do it to protect other people or because you don’t want to get sick and miss work, or miss vacation.’

But he has been getting the annual flu shot since the age of 30, he said. ‘Is it because I was worried of being hospitalized? Of course not. I just didn’t want to be sick, I wanted to be able to work.’

Controversy was sparked over the Covid vaccine drive when the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) extended eligibility to children who are six months old earlier this year.

Many experts cautioned against the move at the time, saying children face a very low risk from the virus and warned it could interfere with other inoculations they need such as against polio or measles.

There is also now a prevailing sense that the Covid pandemic has come to an end, after President Joe Biden declared it was over on television last month.

He has since attempted to walk back from his words, but many are still under the impression that Covid no longer poses a threat.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-11327615/Modernas-CEO-admits-vulnerable-need-Covid-booster-shot.html

BACKGROUND

Home (Index page)

A simple definiton: Conservatism is all about preserving traditions and resisting sudden change

Deep down: The essence of conservatism is caution. The essence of Leftism is anger

Leftists use the rest of us as a tool to make themselves feel better

The extreme Right are actually the extreme Left

"Social justice" is inherently tyrannical

Postings from Brisbane, Australia by John J. Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.) -- former member of the Australia-Soviet Friendship Society, former anarcho-capitalist and former member of the British Conservative party. And now a "Deplorable"

When it comes to political incorrectness, I hit the trifecta. I talk about race, IQ and social class. I have an academic background in all three subjects but that wins me no forgiveness

Access past and present backups for all my current blogs

Some personal memoirs

Memoir highlights

My annual picture page

Subject index to my academic journal articles

Consolidated list of links to all my writings

The sidebar entries here had become very extensive. I have therefore divided them into two. The first half is below and the second half is here -- including some comments on Jews

References to "Leftists" below are to preachers of Leftism, not the ordinary Leftist voter

As a good academic, I define my terms: A Leftist is a person who is so dissatisfied with the way things naturally are that he/she is prepared to use force to make people behave in ways that they otherwise would not.

So an essential feature of Leftism is that they think they have the right to tell other people what to do. They see things in the world that are not ideal and conclude therefore that they have the right to change those things by force. Conservative explanations of why things are not ideal -- and never can be -- fall on deaf ears

That Left and Right are so hostile to one-another is most unfortunate. Broadly, the world needs Leftists to highlight problems and conservatives to solve them. But the Left get angry with conservatives when conservatives point out that there are no good solutions to some problems

Conservatism is as much a respect for reality as a respect for tradition. But tradition summarizes a lot of reality. So conservative thinking must change as reality changes. There is no unchanging body of doctrine in conservatism. Conservatism is an attitude, a realistic attitude. Leftists, by contrast, believe whatever suits them, reality regardless

Giorgia dal Italia -- my favourite politician

What the Left routinely forgets: As Henry Hazlitt pointed out: “The bad economist sees only what immediately strikes the eye; the good economist also looks beyond. The bad economist sees only the direct consequences of a proposed course; the good economist looks also at the longer and indirect consequences. The bad economist sees only what the effect of a given policy has been or will be on one particular group; the good economist inquires also what the effect of the policy will be on all groups.”

“Those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities,” -- Voltaire.

Social justice is injustice. What is just about taking money off people who have earned it and giving it to people who have not earned it? You can call it many things but justice it is not

But it is the aim of all Leftist governments to take money off people who have earned it and give it to people who have not earned it

Envy was once considered to be one of the seven deadly sins before it became one of the most admired virtues under its new name, 'social justice.’ - Thomas Sowell

At the most basic (psychological) level, conservatives are the contented people and Leftists are the discontented people. Conservatives don't think the world is perfect but they can happily live with it. And both those attitudes are largely dispositional, inborn -- which is why they so rarely change

Revolution is the ultimate desideratum for Leftists

Patriotism is a happy thing. No wonder Leftists have difficulties with it

Leftists' manifest desire is to destroy their country from the inside with division and hatred

The Left Doesn't Like Christmas because Christmas is just too happy for them

Former Philadelphia Mayor Frank Rizzo switched from Democrat to the Republican Party, saying, “A conservative is a liberal who was mugged the night before.”

Who is this Leftist? Take his description of his political program: A "declaration of war against the order of things which exist, against the state of things which exist, in a word, against the structure of the world which presently exists". You could hardly get a more change-oriented or revolutionary programme than that. So whose programme was it? Marx? Lenin? Stalin? Trotsky? Mao? No. It was how Hitler described his programme towards the end of "Mein Kampf". And the Left pretend that Hitler was some sort of conservative! Perhaps it not labouring the point also to ask who it was that described his movement as having a 'revolutionary creative will' which had 'no fixed aim, _ no permanency, only eternal change'. It could very easily have been Trotsky or Mao but it was in fact Hitler (O'Sullivan, 1983. p. 138). Clearly, Nazism was nothing more nor less than a racist form of Leftism (rather extreme Leftism at that) and to label it as "Rightist" or anything else is to deny reality.

A rarely acknowledged aim of Leftist policy in a democracy is to deliver dismay and disruption into the lives other people -- whom they regard as "complacent" -- and they are good at achieving that.

As usual, however, it is actually they who are complacent, with a conviction of the rightness and virtue of their own beliefs that merges into arrogance. They regard anyone who disagrees with them with contempt.

Leftists are wolves in sheep's clothing

Liberals are people who don't believe in liberty

Leftist principles are as solid as foam rubber. When they say that there is no such thing as right and wrong they really mean it.

Leftists FEAR the future

There is no dealing with the Left. Their word is no good. You cannot make a deal with someone who thinks lying and stealing are mere tactics, which the Marxists actually brag about

Montesquieu knew Leftists well: "There is no crueler tyranny than that which is perpetuated under the shield of law and in the name of justice."

Because they claim to have all the answers to society's ills, Communists often seem "cool" to young people

German has a word that describes most Leftists well: "Scheinheilig" - A person who appears to be very kind, soft natured, and filled with pure goodness but behind the facade, has a vile nature. He is seemingly holy but is an unscrupulous person on the inside.

The new faith is very oppressive: Leftist orthodoxy is the new dominant religion of the Western world and it is every bit as bigoted and oppressive as Christianity was at its worst

There are two varieties of authoritarian Leftism. Fascists are soft Leftists, preaching one big happy family -- "Better together" in other words. Communists are hard Leftists, preaching class war.

Equality: The nonsensical and incoherent claim that underlies so much Leftist discourse is "all men are equal". And that is the envier's gospel. It makes not a scrap of sense and shows no contact with reality but it is something that enviers resort to as a way of soothing their envious feelings. They deny the very differences that give them so much heartburn. "Denial" was long ago identified by Freud as a maladaptive psychological defence mechanism and "All men are equal" is a prize example of that. Whatever one thinks of his theories, Freud was undoubtedly an acute observer of people and very few psychologists today would doubt the maladaptive nature of denial as described by Freud.

Socialism is the most evil malady ever to afflict the human brain. The death toll in WWII alone tells you that

“Hanlon’s razor”: Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.”

American conservatives have to struggle to hold their country together against Leftist attempts to destroy it. Maduro's Venezuela is a graphic example of how extremely destructive socialism in government can be

The standard response from Marxist apologists for Stalin and other Communist dictators is to say you can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs. To which Orwell retorted, ‘Where’s the omelette?’

You do still occasionally see some mention of the old idea that Leftist parties represent the worker. In the case of the U.S. Democrats that is long gone. Now they want to REFORM the worker. No wonder most working class Americans these days vote Republican. Democrats are the party of the minorities and the smug

"The tendency of liberals is to create bodies of men and women — of all classes — detached from tradition, alienated from religion, and susceptible to mass suggestion — mob rule. And a mob will be no less a mob if it is well fed, well clothed, well housed, and well disciplined." —T.S. Eliot

We live in a country where the people own the Government and not in a country where the Government owns the people -- Churchill

"Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all others" -- Cicero. See here

The Left have a lot in common with tortoises. They have a thick mental shell that protects them from the reality of the world about them

Definition of a Socialist: Someone who wants everything you have...except your job.

A good article on Leftist hate

The real history of social Darwinism

One cheer for Jon Burge

Leftist writers usually seem quite reasonable and persuasive at first glance. The problem is not what they say but what they don't say. Leftist beliefs are so counterfactual ("all men are equal", "all men are brothers" etc.) that to be a Leftist you have to have a talent for blotting out from your mind facts that don't suit you. And that is what you see in Leftist writing: A very selective view of reality. Facts that disrupt a Leftist story are simply ignored. Leftist writing is cherrypicking on a grand scale

So if ever you read something written by a Leftist that sounds totally reasonable, you have an urgent need to find out what other people say on that topic. The Leftist will almost certainly have told only half the story

Leftists commonly have the Cyclops syndrome: to see with only one eye, in only one dimension and only half of reality.

We conservatives have the facts on our side, which is why Leftists never want to debate us and do their best to shut us up. It's very revealing the way they go to great lengths to suppress conservative speech at universities. Universities should be where the best and brightest Leftists are to be found but even they cannot stand the intellectual challenge that conservatism poses for them. It is clearly a great threat to them. If what we say were ridiculous or wrong, they would grab every opportunity to let us know it

A conservative does not hanker after the new; He hankers after the good. Leftists hanker after the untested

Just one thing is sufficient to tell all and sundry what an unamerican lamebrain Obama is. He pronounced an army corps as an army "corpse" Link here. Can you imagine any previous American president doing that? Many were men with significant personal experience in the armed forces in their youth.

'Gay Pride' parades: You know you live in a great country when "oppressed" people have big, colorful parades.

A favorite Leftist saying sums up the whole of Leftism: "To make an omelette, you've got to break eggs". They want to change some state of affairs and don't care who or what they destroy or damage in the process. They think their alleged good intentions are sufficient to absolve them from all blame for even the most evil deeds

In practical politics, the art of Leftism is to sound good while proposing something destructive

Leftists are the "we know best" people, meaning that they are intrinsically arrogant. Matthew chapter 6 would not be for them. And arrogance leads directly into authoritarianism

Leftism is fundamentally authoritarian. Whether by revolution or by legislation, Leftists aim to change what people can and must do. When in 2008 Obama said that he wanted to "fundamentally transform" America, he was not talking about America's geography or topography but rather about American people. He wanted them to stop doing things that they wanted to do and make them do things that they did not want to do. Can you get a better definition of authoritarianism than that?

And note that an American President is elected to administer the law, not make it. That seems to have escaped Mr Obama

That Leftism is intrinsically authoritarian is not a new insight. It was well understood by none other than Friedrich Engels (Yes. THAT Engels). His clever short essay On authority was written as a reproof to the dreamy Anarchist Left of his day. It concludes: "A revolution is certainly the most authoritarian thing there is; it is the act whereby one part of the population imposes its will upon the other part by means of rifles, bayonets and cannon — authoritarian means"

Inside Every Liberal is a Totalitarian Screaming to Get Out

Insight: "A man's admiration for absolute government is proportionate to the contempt he feels for those around him." —Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859)

Leftists think of themselves as the new nobility

Many people in literary and academic circles today who once supported Stalin and his heirs are generally held blameless and may even still be admired whereas anybody who gave the slightest hint of support for the similarly brutal Hitler regime is an utter polecat and pariah. Why? Because Hitler's enemies were "only" the Jews whereas Stalin's enemies were those the modern day Left still hates -- people who are doing well for themselves materially. Modern day Leftists understand and excuse Stalin and his supporters because Stalin's hates are their hates.

"Those who see hate everywhere think they're looking thru a window when actually they're looking at a mirror"

Hatred has long been a central pillar of leftist ideologies, premised as they are on trampling individual rights for the sake of a collectivist plan. Karl Marx boasted that he was “the greatest hater of the so-called positive.” In 1923, V.I. Lenin chillingly declared to the Soviet Commissars of Education, “We must teach our children to hate. Hatred is the basis of communism.” In his tract “Left-Wing Communism,” Lenin went so far as to assert that hatred was “the basis of every socialist and Communist movement.”

Karl Marx in his own words

If you understand that Leftism is hate, everything falls into place.

The strongest way of influencing people is to convince them that you will do them some good. Leftists and con-men misuse that

Leftists believe only what they want to believe. So presenting evidence contradicting their beliefs simply enrages them. They do not learn from it

Psychological defence mechanisms such as projection play a large part in Leftist thinking and discourse. So their frantic search for evil in the words and deeds of others is easily understandable. The evil is in themselves.

Leftists who think that they can conjure up paradise out of their own limited brains are simply fools -- arrogant and dangerous fools. They essentially know nothing. Conservatives learn from the thousands of years of human brains that have preceded us -- including the Bible, the ancient Greeks and much else. The death of Socrates is, for instance, an amazing prefiguration of the intolerant 21st century. Ask any conservative stranded in academe about his freedom of speech

Thomas Sowell: “There are no solutions, only trade-offs.” Leftists don't understand that -- which is a major factor behind their simplistic thinking. They just never see the trade-offs. But implementing any Leftist idea will hit us all with the trade-offs

Chesteron's fence -- good conservative thinking

"The best laid plans of mice and men gang aft agley"[go oft astray] is a well known line from a famous poem by the great Scottish poet, Robert Burns. But the next line is even wiser: "And leave us nought but grief and pain for promised joy". Burns was a Leftist of sorts so he knew how often their theories fail badly.

Mostly, luck happens when opportunity meets preparation.

Most Leftist claims are simply propaganda. Those who utter such claims must know that they are not telling the whole story. Hitler described his Marxist adversaries as "lying with a virtuosity that would bend iron beams". At the risk of ad hominem shrieks, I think that image is too good to remain disused.

Conservatives adapt to the world they live in. Leftists want to change the world to suit themselves

ABOUT

Many people hunger and thirst after righteousness. Some find it in the hatreds of the Left. Others find it in the love of Christ. I don't hunger and thirst after righteousness at all. I hunger and thirst after truth. How old-fashioned can you get?

The kneejerk response of the Green/Left to people who challenge them is to say that the challenger is in the pay of "Big Oil", "Big Business", "Big Pharma", "Exxon-Mobil", "The Pioneer Fund" or some other entity that they see, in their childish way, as a boogeyman. So I think it might be useful for me to point out that I have NEVER received one cent from anybody by way of support for what I write. As a retired person, I live entirely on my own investments. I do not work for anybody and I am not beholden to anybody. And I have NO investments in oil companies, mining companies or "Big Pharma"

UPDATE: Despite my (statistical) aversion to mining stocks, I have recently bought a few shares in BHP -- the world's biggest miner, I gather. I run the grave risk of becoming a speaker of famous last words for saying this but I suspect that BHP is now so big as to be largely immune from the risks that plague most mining companies. I also know of no issue affecting BHP where my writings would have any relevance. The Left seem to have a visceral hatred of miners. I have never quite figured out why.

I imagine that few of my readers will understand it, but I am an unabashed monarchist. And, as someone who was born and bred in a monarchy and who still lives there (i.e. Australia), that gives me no conflicts at all. In theory, one's respect for the monarchy does not depend on who wears the crown but the impeccable behaviour of the present Queen does of course help perpetuate that respect.

I imagine that most Americans might find this rather mad -- but I believe that a constitutional Monarchy is the best form of government presently available. Can a libertarian be a Monarchist? I think so -- and prominent British libertarian Sean Gabb seems to think so too! Long live the Queen! (And note that Australia ranks well above the USA on the Index of Economic freedom. Heh!)

The Australian flag with the Union Jack quartered in it

Throughout Europe there is an association between monarchism and conservatism. It is a little sad that American conservatives do not have access to that satisfaction. So even though Australia is much more distant from Europe (geographically) than the USA is, Australia is in some ways more of an outpost of Europe than America is! Mind you: Australia is not very atypical of its region. Australia lies just South of Asia -- and both Japan and Thailand have greatly respected monarchies. And the demise of the Cambodian monarchy was disastrous for Cambodia

Throughout the world today, possession of a U.S. or U.K. passport is greatly valued. I once shared that view. Developments in recent years have however made me profoundly grateful that I am a 5th generation Australian. My Australian passport is a door into a much less oppressive and much less messed-up place than either the USA or Britain

Following the Sotomayor precedent, I would hope that a wise older white man such as myself with the richness of that experience would more often than not reach a better conclusion than someone who hasn’t lived that life.

"Remind me never to get this guy mad at me" -- Instapundit

It seems to be a common view that you cannot talk informatively about a country unless you have been there. I completely reject that view but it is nonetheless likely that some Leftist dimbulb will at some stage aver that any comments I make about politics and events in the USA should not be heeded because I am an Australian who has lived almost all his life in Australia. I am reluctant to pander to such ignorance in the era of the "global village" but for the sake of the argument I might mention that I have visited the USA 3 times -- spending enough time in Los Angeles and NYC to get to know a fair bit about those places at least. I did however get outside those places enough to realize that they are NOT America.

"Intellectual" = Leftist dreamer. I have more publications in the academic journals than almost all "public intellectuals" but I am never called an intellectual and nor would I want to be. Call me a scholar or an academic, however, and I will accept either as a just and earned appellation

Some personal background

My full name is Dr. John Joseph RAY. I am a former university teacher aged 80 at the time of writing in 2024. I was born of Australian pioneer stock in 1943 at Innisfail in the State of Queensland in Australia. I trace my ancestry wholly to the British Isles. After an early education at Innisfail State Rural School and Cairns State High School, I taught myself for matriculation. I took my B.A. in Psychology from the University of Queensland in Brisbane. I then moved to Sydney (in New South Wales, Australia) and took my M.A. in psychology from the University of Sydney in 1969 and my Ph.D. from the School of Behavioural Sciences at Macquarie University in 1974. I first tutored in psychology at Macquarie University and then taught sociology at the University of NSW. My doctorate is in psychology but I taught mainly sociology in my 14 years as a university teacher. In High Schools I taught economics. I have taught in both traditional and "progressive" (low discipline) High Schools. Fuller biographical notes here

I completed the work for my Ph.D. at the end of 1970 but the degree was not awarded until 1974 -- due to some academic nastiness from Seymour Martin Lipset and Fred Emery. A conservative or libertarian who makes it through the academic maze has to be at least twice as good as the average conformist Leftist. Fortunately, I am a born academic.

Despite my great sympathy and respect for Christianity, I am the most complete atheist you could find. I don't even believe that the word "God" is meaningful. I am not at all original in that view, of course. Such views are particularly associated with the noted German philosopher Rudolf Carnap. Unlike Carnap, however, none of my wives have committed suicide

In my teenage years, however, I was fortunate to be immersed (literally) in a very fundamentalist Christian religion. And the heavy Bible study I did at that time left me with lessons for life that have stood me in good stead ever since

Very occasionally in my writings I make reference to the greats of analytical philosophy such as Carnap and Wittgenstein. As philosophy is a heavily Leftist discipline however, I have long awaited an attack from some philosopher accusing me of making coat-trailing references not backed by any real philosophical erudition. I suppose it is encouraging that no such attacks have eventuated but I thought that I should perhaps forestall them anyway -- by pointing out that in my younger days I did complete three full-year courses in analytical philosophy (at 3 different universities!) and that I have had papers on mainstream analytical philosophy topics published in academic journals

IQ and ideology: Most academics are Left-leaning. Why? Because very bright people who have balls go into business, while very bright people with no balls go into academe. I did both with considerable success, which makes me a considerable rarity. Although I am a born academic, I have always been good with money too. My share portfolio even survived the GFC in good shape. The academics hate it that bright people with balls make more money than them.

I have no hesitation in saying that the single book which has influenced me most is the New Testament. And my Scripture blog will show that I know whereof I speak. Some might conclude that I must therefore be a very confused sort of atheist but I can assure everyone that I do not feel the least bit confused. The New Testament is a lighthouse that has illumined the thinking of all sorts of men and women and I am deeply grateful that it has shone on me.

I am rather pleased to report that I am a lifelong conservative. Out of intellectual curiosity, I did in my youth join organizations from right across the political spectrum so I am certainly not closed-minded and am very familiar with the full spectrum of political thinking. Nonetheless, I did not have to undergo the lurch from Left to Right that so many people undergo. At age 13 I used my pocket-money to subscribe to the "Reader's Digest" -- the main conservative organ available in small town Australia of the 1950s. I have learnt much since but am pleased and amused to note that history has since confirmed most of what I thought at that early age. Conservatism is in touch with reality. Leftism is not.

I imagine that the RD are still sending mailouts to my 1950s address

Most teenagers have sporting and movie posters on their bedroom walls. At age 14 I had a map of Taiwan on my wall.

A small personal note: I have always been very self-confident. I inherited it from my mother, along with my skeptical nature. So I don't need to feed my self-esteem by claiming that I am wiser than others -- which is what Leftists do.

As with conservatives generally, it bothers me not a bit to admit to large gaps in my knowledge and understanding. For instance, I don't know if the slight global warming of the 20th century will resume in the 21st, though I suspect not. And I don't know what a "healthy" diet is, if there is one. Constantly-changing official advice on the matter suggests that nobody knows

As well as being an academic, I am an army man and I am pleased and proud to say that I have worn my country's uniform. Although my service in the Australian army was chiefly noted for its un-notability, I DID join voluntarily in the Vietnam era, I DID reach the rank of Sergeant, and I DID volunteer for a posting in Vietnam. So I think I may be forgiven for saying something that most army men think but which most don't say because they think it is too obvious: The profession of arms is the noblest profession of all because it is the only profession where you offer to lay down your life in performing your duties. Our men fought so that people could say and think what they like but I myself always treat military men with great respect -- respect which in my view is simply their due.

It would be very easy for me to say that I am too much of an individual for the army but I did in fact join the army and enjoy it greatly, as most men do. In my observation, ALL army men are individuals. It is just that they accept discipline in order to be militarily efficient -- which is the whole point of the exercise. But that's too complex for simplistic Leftist thinking, of course

A real army story here

It's amusing that my army service gives me honour among conservatives but contempt from Leftists. I don't weep at all about the latter. I am still in touch with some of the fine people I served with over 50 years ago. The army is like that

This is just a bit of romanticism but I do have permanently located by the head of my bed a genuine century-old British army cavalry sword. It is still a real weapon. I was not in the cavalry but I see that sword as a symbol of many things. I want it to be beside my bed when I die

Even a stopped clock is right twice a day and there is JUST ONE saying of Hitler's that I rather like. It may not even be original to him but it is found in chapter 2 of Mein Kampf (published in 1925): "Widerstaende sind nicht da, dass man vor ihnen kapituliert, sondern dass man sie bricht". The equivalent English saying is "Difficulties exist to be overcome" and that traces back at least to the 1920s -- with attributions to Montessori and others. Hitler's metaphor is however one of smashing barriers rather than of politely hopping over them and I am myself certainly more outspoken than polite. Hitler's colloquial Southern German is notoriously difficult to translate but I think I can manage a reasonable translation of that saying: "Resistance is there not for us to capitulate to but for us to break". I am quite sure that I don't have anything like that degree of determination in my own life but it seems to me to be a good attitude in general anyway

And something that was perceptive comes from the same chapter. Hitler said that the doctrines of the interwar Social Democrats (mainstream leftists) of Vienna were "comprised of egotism and hate". Not much has changed

I have used many sites to post my writings over the years and many have gone bad on me for various reasons. So if you click on a link here to my other writings you may get a "page not found" response if the link was put up some time before the present. All is not lost, however. All my writings have been reposted elsewhere. If you do strike a failed link, just take the filename (the last part of the link) and add it to the address of any of my current home pages and -- Voila! -- you should find the article concerned.

COMMENTS: I have gradually added comments facilities to all my blogs. The comments I get are interesting. They are mostly from Leftists and most consist either of abuse or mere assertions. Reasoned arguments backed up by references to supporting evidence are almost unheard of from Leftists. Needless to say, I just delete such useless comments.

You can email me here (Hotmail address). In emailing me, you can address me as "John", "Jon", "Dr. Ray" or "JR" and that will be fine -- but my preference is for "JR" -- and that preference has NOTHING to do with an American soap opera that featured a character who was referred to in that way

SIDEBAR EXTENSION HERE

DETAILS OF REGULARLY UPDATED BLOGS BY JOHN RAY:

"Tongue Tied"
"Dissecting Leftism"
"Australian Politics"
"Education Watch International"
"Political Correctness Watch"
"Greenie Watch"
Western Heart

BLOGS OCCASIONALLY UPDATED:

"Marx & Engels in their own words"
"A scripture blog"
"Recipes"
"Some memoirs"
To be continued ....
Coral reef compendium.
Queensland Police
Australian Police News
Paralipomena (3)
Of Interest
Dagmar Schellenberger
My alternative Wikipedia

BLOGS NO LONGER BEING UPDATED

"Food & Health Skeptic"
"Eye on Britain"
"Immigration Watch International".
"Leftists as Elitists"
Socialized Medicine
OF INTEREST (2)
QANTAS -- A dying octopus
BRIAN LEITER (Ladderman)
Obama Watch
Obama Watch (2)
Dissecting Leftism -- Large font site
Michael Darby
Paralipomena (2)
AGL -- A bumbling monster
Telstra/Bigpond follies
Optus bungling
Vodafrauds (vodafone)
Bank of Queensland blues

There are also two blogspot blogs which record what I think are my main recent articles here and here. Similar content can be more conveniently accessed via my subject-indexed list of short articles here or here (I rarely write long articles these days)

Some more useful links

Alt archives for "Dissecting Leftism" here or here
Longer Academic Papers
Johnray links
Academic home page
Academic Backup Page
General Backup
General Backup 2
Dagmar Schellenberger
My alternative Wikipedia

Selected reading

MONOGRAPH ON LEFTISM

CONSERVATISM AS HERESY

A COMPREHENSIVE SURVEY OF NAZISM

Rightism defined
Leftist Churches
Leftist Racism
Fascism is Leftist
Hitler a socialist
Leftism is authoritarian
James on Leftism
Irbe on Leftism
Beltt on Leftism
Lakoff
Van Hiel
Sidanius
Kruglanski
Pyszczynski et al.

Cautionary blogs about big Australian organizations:

TELSTRA
OPTUS
VODAFONE
AGL
Bank of Queensland
Queensland Police
Australian police news
QANTAS, a dying octopus

INTERESTING BLOGS by others
(My frequent reads are starred)

10 o'clock scholar
Agitator*
AMCGLTD
American Thinker
ASTUTE BLOGGERS
Baby Troll
Bad Eagle
Belmont Club*
Betsy's Page
Bill Keezer
Blackfive
Bleeding Brain
BLOGGER NEWS
Blowhards
Bob McCarty
Booker Rising
Brian Leiter scrutinized
Brothers Judd*
Brussels Journal
Bullied and Badgered, Pressured and Purged
Bureaucrash
Candle in dark
Catallarchy*
Classical Values
Clayton Cramer*
Climate audit
Climate science
Colby Cosh
Cold Fury
Common-sense & Wonder*
Community Pride Childcare
(Clearwater, Florida)
Confront the Left
Conservative Grapevine
Conservative Oasis
Conservative Political Forum
Conservatives Anonymous
Critical Mass
Cronaca*
Daily Caller
Danegerus
Dead Cat Bounce
Dean's World
Dhimmi Watch
Discover the networks
Discriminations
Dodge Blog
Dr Helen
Dr Sanity
Drunkablog
Ed Driscoll
Dyspepsia
Eddy Rants
Electric Venom
Endiana
Enter Stage Right
Eugene Undergound
Evangelical Ecologist
Fighting in the Shade
Find the best gun
Fourth Rail
Free Patriot
Gates of Vienna
Gay and Right
Gene Expression*
Ghost of Flea
Global warming & Climate
Gold Dog
Grumpy Old Sod
Hack Wilson
Hall of Record
Heretical Ideas
Hitler's Leftism
Hugh Hewitt
Hummers & Cigarettes
IMAO
Icecap
Inductivist
Instapunk
Intellectual Conservative
Interested Participant
Jihad Watch
Jim Kalb
Junk Food science
Junk Science
Just One Minute
KBJ
Knowledge is Power
Ladybird Deed
La Shawn
Laudator
Libertyphile
Lone Wacko
Lubos Motl
Luskin
MA firearm safety
Main Street Radical
Mangan
Margaret Thatcher Foundation
Maverick Philosopher
Medicine World
Michelle Malkin
Moderate Voice
Moorewatch
National Center
National Scene
Neo Con Blogger
Never Yet Melted
New Zeal
Northeastern Intelligence Network
Not PC
On the Right Side
Orator
Overlawyered
Parable Man
ParaPundit*
Pedestrian Infidel
Poli Pundit
Prof Bainbridge
Promethean Antagonist
Qando
Qohel
Random Observations
Rand Simberg
Random Jottings
Red State
Rhodey
Rhymes with Right
Right Nation
Right Thinking
Right Wing news
Roadkill
Ron Hebron
Rottweiler
Schansberg
SCSU Scholars*
Sharp Blades
Sharp Knife
Should Know
Shrinkwrapped
Silent Running
Smallest Minority
Squander 2
Steve Sailer
Stop the ACLU
Stuart Buck
Talking Head
Tim Worstall
Truth and consequences
Two-Four Net
Urban Conservative
Urgent Agenda
Vdare blog
View from Right
Viking Pundit
Vodka Pundit
Watt's up with that
Western Standard
Bill Whittle
What If
WICKED THOUGHTS*
Wiki Law
Winds of Change
Wizbang
World of Reason
World Terrorism news

Education Blogs

Early Childhood Education
Education Bug
Eduwonk
Joanne Jacobs*
Marc Miyake*

Economics Blogs

Adam Smith
Arnold Kling
Chicago Boyz
Cafe Hayek
Econopundit
Environmental Economics
Jane Galt
S. Karlson
D. Luskin
Marginal Revolution
Mises Inst.

Australian Blogs

A E Brain
Brookes News
Catallaxy
Fortress Australia
Kev Gillett
Hissink File
ICJS*
Oz Conservative
Slattery
Tim Blair
WESTERN HEART*
Cyclone's Sketchblog

England

Anglo Austrian
Burning our Money
Campaign Against Political Correctness
England Project
Norm Geras
House of Dumb
IQ & PC
Limbic Nutrition
Majority Rights*
NHS Doctor
Policeman
Samizdata
Sean Gabb
Sterling Times
Englishman's Castle

Scotland

Freedom & Whisky
A Place to Stand

ISRAEL

IsraPundit
Steven Plaut
Think Israel

NOTE: The archives provided by blogspot below are rather inconvenient. They break each month up into small bits. If you want to scan whole months at a time, the backup archives will suit better. See here or here