President Biden told vast lies about the vaccine roll-out - but the groveling US media was too busy putting halos on Saints Joe and Kamala to say so

Well, the brave new world of honesty in American politics lasted a grand total of 24 hours. President Joe Biden promised an immediate end to the constant lying from the White House that we endured over four years of Donald Trump's tenure.

But then he couldn't help himself and promptly spewed the kind of brazen, bare-faced, media-bashing whopper that Trump is accused of loving.

Biden's made a big noisy deal of setting a target of 100 million coronavirus vaccines in his first 100 days.

But he knows that hitting this target would be a completely bogus 'achievement' because the US is already at that level of vaccination, averaging 914,000 daily doses administered last week according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and rocketing to 1.6 million on the very day of Biden's inauguration.

So, at this rate, the goal will be easily attained, and masks the reality that America could and should be aiming a lot higher.

That, though, wasn't the lie. That was just the kind of under-promise, over-deliver type of sneaky political spin designed to grab headlines and win a cheap 'victory' down the line when the target is easily met.

No, the lie came when Biden was asked by a reporter at the White House to defend such a comparatively derisory target and angrily snapped back: 'When I announced it, you all said it's not possible. Come on, give me a break, man. It's a good start - 100 million.'

This was utter nonsense. Nobody qualified to comment in the mainstream media said it was impossible. In fact, on the day in December when Biden first made his 100 million pledge, CNN's medical expert Dr Sanjay Gupta said it was 'very doable' given what he'd been told by the vaccine companies controlling supply.

Biden knows this, because he'll have been told the same information by the same companies. Yet he chose to pretend the media had ALL attacked him for making an impossible promise. And he did that to deflect them from rightly pulling him up on the weakness of his pledge.

Good politics, bad optics – especially from the man the media seems to think is more Saint than President.

I didn't have a problem with the generally euphoric reaction to Biden's inauguration. Like most people, I found his unifying speech very inspiring and it was a welcome relief to hear some civility coming out of the mouth of the President of the United States again after four long profane years.

But by the following morning, I expected the US media to start doing to Biden what they did to Trump from the moment HE got elected and hold his feet to ferocious fire. After all, the most important function of the media is to make government accountable for its actions.

Instead, the open fawning has carried on in a quite nauseating manner. With the exception of Fox News, which naturally is trashing Biden with the same fervour it defended Trump – often indefensibly - America's news networks and newspapers have fought amongst each other to see who can win the title of Biggest Biden Toady.

One journalist was even fired by the New York Times for being too overt about her breathless excitement after she tweeted 'I have chills' over a photo of Biden's plane landing for the inauguration.

I don't agree with the firing, not least because she was only tweeting what 99% of other New York Times journalists would have been thinking. But the fact she was happy to be seen to be so publicly partisan is a very bad look for the liberal-dominated media.

We've seen the same kind of cringe-worthy groveling across cable news too. Former Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly lambasted the media this week because she claimed they 'checked their objectivity' when covering Trump and the public 'lost trust' as a result. She even said this abandonment of normal impartial journalism was partly to blame for the riots at the US Capitol three weeks ago.

Kelly makes a good point about the danger of supposedly impartial journalists bringing personal feelings into covering a president, any president.

For example, I can't have been the only CNN viewer who was shocked when Anderson Cooper described President Trump as 'an obese turtle on its back flailing in the hot Sun'.

Cooper, who spent four years openly sneering at Trump on air, including spending two years gorging over a Russia collusion story that turned out to be a nothing-burger, has been barely able to contain his personal glee since Trump's downfall and Biden's election.

But Cooper's not alone. Much of the US media is currently in the grip of an unctuous prolonged period of gratuitously intense derriere-smoke-blowing towards 'Halo' Joe and his Vice-President, Kamala 'the new Mother Teresa' Harris.

Laughably, the only time the media's got angry about anything involving Ms Harris is when they thought her recent Vanity Fair cover wasn't flattering enough.

Yet she is now the second most powerful person in the country, already involved in huge decisions with huge ramifications for people's lives and livelihoods.

The vaccine roll-out is a perfect illustration of the double standard at play. The media's largely been very content to play along with Biden's narrative that Trump did nothing on vaccines, it's all been a 'dismal failure' and he's now the jab-administering cavalry to save everyone. One White House official even asserted as fact about the vaccine program: 'There is nothing for us to rework. We are going to have to build everything from scratch.'

This completely false statement was quickly debunked by Dr Anthony Fauci who said: 'We certainly are not starting from scratch because there is activity going on in the distribution.'

There certainly is….

It's perfectly true the Trump administration fell short of its own pledge to deliver 20 million vaccine doses by the end of 2020.

It only delivered around three million by then.

However, by the time of the Inauguration on January 20, that number rose to 16.5 million including, as I said earlier, 1.6 million that day alone.

This was equivalent to five doses per 100 people and put the US fourth in the world behind Israel, the UAE and the UK.

So, not the best, but considerably better than most other countries including European power-houses Germany and France. And the US federal government had actually distributed 35 million doses to the states by January 20, but less than half had been given.

If they'd all been administered, the US would have been even higher up the global vaccine league table.

I have no desire to defend Donald Trump but to pretend his administration did nothing on vaccine distribution is palpably untrue; another Biden administration vaccine-related lie in fact.

And ironically, the main reason President Biden will comfortably hit his 100m target is because his predecessor had already got the vaccine roll-out to the required daily levels.

So, why isn't Biden being torched for all this disingenuous self-promoting vaccine bullsh*t?

Sadly, I fear it's because the liberal torch-carriers in the media are reluctant to light the flame because Biden's one of them.

CNN's media correspondent Brian Stelter, an evangelical Trump-basher, added a personal comment to an image on his show yesterday featuring new White House press secretary Jen Paski. The banner headline said: 'Psaki promises to share 'accurate info' (How refreshing)'.

Hmmm. If would have been rather more 'refreshing' if Stelter had got Ms Psaki onto his show to flame-grill her about her boss's untrue claims about the vaccine roll-out.

He'd have certainly been all over the lies like a cheap rash if it had been Trump spewing them, as would the rest of the news media.

The non-questioning hero-worshipping treatment of Joe Biden and his administration is gut-wrenching and needs to stop immediately. And the media needs to start doing its job properly.

Otherwise, the 75 million Trump voters who suspected there was a media bias against their guy will have all those suspicions confirmed before their very eyes on a daily basis.

And that will cement rather than repair the shockingly partisan disunity that has enveloped America in recent years.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9184947/PIERS-MORGAN-President-Biden-lying-COVID-vaccine-roll-out.html

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Lockdowns cripple the poor and pamper the rich

Lockdown has improved the physical and mental health of the wealthy, while devastating the poor.

A new poll from Morning Consult provides a stark illustration of the unequal impact of personal finances, mental health and physical health.

Those in the US earning under $50,000 per year were the most likely to report a decline in their personal finances in 2020, whereas those earning over $100,000 reported a net improvement. The job security, take-home pay, personal life and work-life balance of the poorest have deteriorated significantly, too.

More strikingly, lower earners also experienced the greatest deterioration in mental and physical health. Those with postgraduate degrees, on the other hand, reported improvements in their physical health – by a whopping 23 per cent.

As spiked has repeatedly highlighted since the lockdowns began last year, the consequences for the working class have been devastating, while the more affluent seem to have profited from the restrictions.

In the US, between 18 March and 10 April 2020, over 22million people lost their jobs. But in the same three weeks, the wealth of billionaires increased by $282billion, according to a report by the Institute for Policy Studies.

And in the UK, an Instititue for Fiscal Studies report found that between March and September last year, the average monthly savings of the poorest fifth of people fell by £170 compared to a normal year. Higher-income quintiles, on the other hand, enjoyed a rise in their savings.

All this gives the lie to the absurd claims that opposition to lockdown serves the interests of the wealthy. Supporters of the lockdown – particularly on the left – are quick to denounce any call to reopen society as an attempt to ‘save the billionaires’.

But the billionaires and the well-heeled have done brilliantly out of lockdown. It is the poor who have suffered most from the shutdown of society, as they are less likely to be able to work from home and more likely to be hard-hit by redundancy and declines in pay.

Lockdowns are crippling the poor and pampering the rich.

https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/01/21/lockdowns-cripple-the-poor-and-pamper-the-rich/

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Biden's 'Illegals First' Amnesty Plan

Joe Biden plans to put the concerns of American citizens and their interests in the back seat as he will return to the disastrous Barack Obama-era immigration policy. Noncitizens and those who gained access to this country illegally will now receive priority treatment as if they were not only welcomed guests but were themselves citizens of the republic.

Biden has proposed a plan that will put an estimated 11 million illegal immigrants living in the country on an eight-year path to U.S. citizenship. The Washington Post reports, “To qualify, immigrants must have been in the United States as of Jan. 1, a move meant to blunt any rush to the border.”

Well, so much for preventing that border rush. A migrant caravan that has formed in Honduras is not only expecting but demanding that Biden open the border for them. As one migrant stated, “I just want patience and prayers that we can get to the U.S. because they have a new president, Biden. He’s going to help all of us, he’s giving us 100 days to get to the U.S. and give us [legal] papers, so we can get a better life for our kids, and for our families.” Who can blame these migrants? Biden has essentially laid out the welcome mat by eliminating Donald Trump’s “wait in Mexico” asylum policy and suspending deportations.

Meanwhile, American citizens, especially lower-income working-class Americans, will be the ones feeling the brunt of Biden’s amnesty policy as they see their wages and job opportunities diminish due to an influx of illegal aliens.

Of course, for Biden and company, the prospect of gaining 11 million new Democrat voters outweighs any concerns over the plight of the American working class. As Breitbart reports, “Under current rules, legal immigrants can get citizenship and voting rights five years after getting green cards. But the Biden bill would allow the migrants to convert their green cards into citizenship in just three years.”

By the way, aren’t we still in the middle of a “dark winter” of a global pandemic? Why fling the immigration door open wide right now? Well, because the Democrats’ agenda on immigration has not changed. It is what it always has been — making more Democrat voters.

https://patriotpost.us/articles/77173-bidens-illegals-first-amnesty-plan-2021-01-21

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

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The luckiest country: Australia goes a WEEK with zero coronavirus cases across the entire nation

Australia has gone a week without a single community transmission of Covid-19, as other nations across the world continue to buckle under the strain of the virus and its ever changing and increasingly dangerous mutations.

While a day without any local cases may seem impossible for other countries battling the virus, for Australia it is slowly becoming the new normal.

In Victoria, the state has gone an incredible 18 days without a single community transmission case following fears the Northern Beaches cluster would completely ruin their long standing streak after it spread across the border.

After enduring a hard three-day lockdown in Brisbane, Queensland also recorded zero new cases of Covid-19.

The rest of the country have continued to record no community transmission as the virus is once again under control.

In the meantime, beaches around the country were packed over the weekend with restrictions eased many weeks ago, in stark comparison to the strict lockdowns experienced across Europe.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9181047/Australia-goes-WEEK-zero-coronavirus-cases-entire-nation.html

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Justice Department considers NOT charging up to 800 MAGA rioters who caused havoc at the Capitol 'since most of them just trespassed and were not violent'

This is a very big admission: "most of them just trespassed and were not violent"

The FBI and prosecutors at the Justice Department are debating whether to decline to charge some of the MAGA rioters who stormed the United States Capitol on January 6 in an attempt to derail President Joe Biden's certification.

There is concern among DOJ officials that bringing charges against all of the estimated 800 rioters who ransacked the Capitol building could flood the local federal courthouse in Washington, DC, with cases.

There appears to be unanimous agreement among Justice Department officials to bring charges against alleged extremists who are suspected of coordinating and planning violent actions inside the Capitol.

Prosecutors have indicated that they intend to bring seditious conspiracy charges to anyone who has been found to plot violent actions against the government.

Among those who participated in the January 6 assault were members of the Oath Keepers, which often recruits current and former military, police or other first responders; the Proud Boys neo-fascist group; followers of QAnon, which spreads bizarre conspiracy theories; racists and anti-Semites; and others with nearly blind devotion to then-President Donald Trump.

Federal authorities on Tuesday presented new details about three self-described members of a paramilitary group who were the first to be charged with plotting the attack.

The FBI said a Virginia man, Thomas Edward Caldwell, appeared to be a leader of the effort. Caldwell and a man and woman from Ohio were all charged with conspiracy and other federal counts.

Details of the documents made public offer some insight to planning and coordination behind the extraordinary attack, which apparently took law enforcement by surprise despite various warnings online.

But there is serious question as to whether it is worth pursuing charges against a large majority of the people who were seen streaming into the Capitol.

Those individuals entered the grounds of the building and trespassed, but they were not involved in any serious crimes that would warrant stiff prison sentences.

There is also a fear among federal prosecutors that bringing trespassing charges against those who did not commit any other violent acts could lead to losses in trial.

'If an old man says all he did was walk in and no one tried to stop him, and he walked out and no one tried to stop him, and that's all we know about what he did, that's a case we may not win,' one official said.

DOJ officials told the Post that evidence is still being gathered and that those rioters who were initially thought to be relatively harmless could be charged if photos or videos show them committing serious crimes.

One option that federal prosecutors are weighing for non-violent Capitol offenders is to enter deferred plea agreements in which they agree to drop charges if they do not commit crimes over a certain period of time.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9178755/Justice-Department-debate-NOT-charging-800-MAGA-rioters-Capitol.html

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74,216,722

That number keeps coming back to me.

74,216,722 votes for a president who was relentlessly vilified, maligned, lied about, and falsely accused of treason (not to mention high crimes and misdemeanors) every day of his presidency.

74,216,722 votes for a man who made unforced errors and harmed his own cause in innumerable ways but still managed to accomplish policy goals the polished, practiced, professional Republicans who came before him only gave lip service to but never really intended to lift a finger to accomplish.

74,216,722 voters who defied the overwhelming, multi-headed leviathan of academia, pop-culture, mainstream news media, Hollywood, Broadway, professional sports, and big tech by going out of their way in a pandemic to vote for the most demonized figure in modern American history.

74,216,722 voices who are now expected to just go away.

Well, we won't. We aren't going anywhere.

"Unity" seems to be the word of the hour. It's a lovely notion. I mean, who doesn't want unity? Things are so much easier when we are unified, aren't they?

But unity is a goal without any moral, principle, or value associated with it. To merely unify is a meaningless activity without examining what we are to unify around.

That important detail was glaringly absent from President Biden's inauguration address.

To unify a nation around a destructive, immoral, and even evil policy is no great accomplishment.

We are all for unity. We would have appreciated a little unity around "America First" or perhaps around "Enforce our immigration laws as written" or "The US Embassy in Israel belongs in the capital city of Jerusalem." These are all good ideas and would be worthy of unified support. Instead, all we got was The Resistance.

The calls for unity are really calls for no more debate. As Obama (the last great "Let's all unify" president) said as he dismissed Republicans who wanted some input into some of his more radical agenda items, "I won, you lost."

They want to shut you up. They want to shut me up.

They sort of succeeded in the final weeks of the presidential campaign.

The mainstream media and big tech oligarchs colluded with the Biden campaign to virtually erase a factual, truthful, and completely legitimate report concerning an open FBI criminal investigation involving Hunter Biden and his ties to America's foreign adversaries, millions of dollars, and an alleged pay-to-play scheme reaching all the way to the new president.

That story was virtually muted. Silenced. In other words, we had unity.

74,216,722.

They want all of us to shut the hell up. That's the only way they achieve unity.

We aren't going away. At least, not easily.

But, all of us have to be ready because the attempts to silence us and our ideas in the name of unity have already begun.

The attacks on social media freedom are now leading to an attack on conservative-leaning news outlets and will be followed by attacks on talk radio and eventually on right-leaning websites like this one.

The first thing all of us can do is to support all those outlets we need on a daily basis to stay informed and, even more importantly, stay united in our loyal opposition to the creeping socialism we are about to witness in Washington, DC.

To that end, please, if you haven't already, renew your VIP membership to Townhall and, more importantly, share the news of your membership with your friends and contacts on Facebook and other social media platforms so they can join too. If we stay strong and stay together, we have a chance to stay alive to fight another day.

Now is the time when we need to know who our friends are and plan for what's coming next.

74,216,722. That's not nothing. And it is the perfect start for the courageous growth we need to renew this country again.

We aren't going away. And we won't be quiet. Never.

https://townhall.com/columnists/larryoconnor/2021/01/21/74216722-n2583499

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Lockdowns cripple the poor and pamper the rich

A new poll from Morning Consult provides a stark illustration of the unequal impact of personal finances, mental health and physical health.

Those in the US earning under $50,000 per year were the most likely to report a decline in their personal finances in 2020, whereas those earning over $100,000 reported a net improvement. The job security, take-home pay, personal life and work-life balance of the poorest have deteriorated significantly, too.

More strikingly, lower earners also experienced the greatest deterioration in mental and physical health. Those with postgraduate degrees, on the other hand, reported improvements in their physical health – by a whopping 23 per cent.

As spiked has repeatedly highlighted since the lockdowns began last year, the consequences for the working class have been devastating, while the more affluent seem to have profited from the restrictions.

In the US, between 18 March and 10 April 2020, over 22million people lost their jobs. But in the same three weeks, the wealth of billionaires increased by $282billion, according to a report by the Institute for Policy Studies.

And in the UK, an Instititue for Fiscal Studies report found that between March and September last year, the average monthly savings of the poorest fifth of people fell by £170 compared to a normal year. Higher-income quintiles, on the other hand, enjoyed a rise in their savings.

All this gives the lie to the absurd claims that opposition to lockdown serves the interests of the wealthy. Supporters of the lockdown – particularly on the left – are quick to denounce any call to reopen society as an attempt to ‘save the billionaires’.

But the billionaires and the well-heeled have done brilliantly out of lockdown. It is the poor who have suffered most from the shutdown of society, as they are less likely to be able to work from home and more likely to be hard-hit by redundancy and declines in pay.

Lockdowns are crippling the poor and pampering the rich.

https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/01/21/lockdowns-cripple-the-poor-and-pamper-the-rich/

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IN BRIEF

Making America energy dependent again: Joe Biden pauses federal drilling program (Reuters)

House to send Trump impeachment article on Monday (AP) | Trump hires attorney Butch Bowers to represent him at trial (Forbes)

Biden to keep Christopher Wray on as FBI director (NBC News)

Hunter inquiry looms large as Biden pledge prevents "improper interference" with DOJ investigations (Examiner)

Democrats slap Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley with ethics complaint over Capitol mob (Examiner)

Unity! Bernie Sanders dismisses meeting in "the middle" with Republicans (Newsweek)

House approves waiver for Lloyd Austin to serve as defense secretary (U.S. News & World Report)

Policing free speech but not actual crimes? Twitter faces lawsuit for refusal to remove child porn (Disrn)

Google threatens to pull out of Australia over plan to make it pay for news (Time)

U.S. sees five-fold increase in methamphetamine overdose deaths from 2011 to 2018 (UPI)

Policy: Raising the minimum wage won't stimulate the economy, but it will stimulate Democrat interest groups (City Journal)

Policy: Don't rush to failure on Iran nuclear negotiations (Daily Signal)

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Proof the Pfizer Covid vaccine works in the real world? Israeli healthcare group says coronavirus infections have PLUNGED by at least 60% among vaccinated over-60s

An Israeli healthcare group on Friday said coronavirus infections had plunged among people aged over 60 who had been vaccinated with the Pfizer Biontech vaccine.

Israel is currently leading the global vaccination drive, with around 30 per cent of its citizens having had at least a single dose of a jab so far. But concern had risen globally over infection, death and hospitalisation rates in the country, which remained stubbornly high.

Out of 82,930 active cases on Thursday, 1,918 were hospitalized. Last week, the hospitalisation figure was just over 1,000.

Officials had hoped that the vaccine drive - which began on December 19 - would start to show an effect by mid-February.

But KSM Maccabi Research and Innovation Center claimed on Friday there had been a 'significant decrease' in the number of coronavirus infections among people aged over 60 who were vaccinated between December 19 and 24.

After analysing data of more than 50,000 patients aged over 60, they also found that hospitalisations in the same group had plunged by more than 60 per cent.

Israel secured access to large amounts of Pfizer's jab by agreeing to provide data about its citizens for the company to track how well the jab works.

The new figures are a sign of hope that nationwide infections, deaths and hospitalisations could soon start to see a sustained fall.

KSM Maccabi Research and Innovation Center's report was based on data 50,777 members of Maccabi who were aged over 60 and were vaccinated 23 days ago.

KSM, which is part of Israeli healthcare provider Maccabi, noted that there was a 'significant decrease within the vaccinated members aged 60+', reaching a decrease of around 60 per cent in new infections.

They added that there was also a 'decrease of slightly more than 60 per cent in the number of new hospitalised patients.'

However, KSM cautioned that 'on this level of efficiency, there should be no exemption from performing Corona tests, isolation, or the enablement of crowded gatherings, until additional convincing data is obtained. 'And of course continue to wear masks and keep social distancing, as recommended'.

It was reported yesterday that a single shot of the Pfizer vaccine had led to a 'major presence' of antibodies in 91 per cent of doctors and nurses who received it in Israel within 21 days.

On Friday, Israel announced a further 6,159 new cases, an 18 per cent increase on the figure of 5,235 announced seven days ago, but down from Wednesdays and Thursdays totals, of 10,213 and 7,027 respectively.

Since the rollout of vaccinations one month ago, more than 2.5 million of Israel's nine-million-strong population have been vaccinated already, the health ministry said on Friday.

Israel began administering vaccines on December 20, beginning with health professionals and quickly proceeding to the elderly, sick and at-risk groups, continuously lowering the minimum age of those entitled to the shot.

On Thursday, the estimated COVID-19 reproduction number in Israel dipped below 1 for the first time since the country launched its vaccination campaign, the government announced.

An 'R' number above 1 indicates infections will grow at an exponential rate, while below 1 points to their eventual halt.

Israel's 'R' number hit 1.3 on Dec. 11. It began vaccinating citizens the following week. With contagion surging, on Dec. 27 it imposed a third national lockdown - which is still in effect.

On Friday, the UK's Chief Scientific Adviser Sir Patrick Vallance said it was too early too draw conclusions from Israel's vaccination drive after alarm that hospitalisations have not yet dropped.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9179677/Israeli-healthcare-group-says-coronavirus-infections-plunged-vaccinated-60s.html

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As more countries impose COVID curfews, scientists ask: Do they work?

The NYT:

With coronavirus infections rising and a contagious new variant threatening to accelerate the pandemic, France has implemented a stringent 6pm-to-6am curfew. Citizens nationwide are sequestered indoors, and businesses must close down.

In Quebec, Canadian officials imposed a similar restriction earlier this month, running from 8pm to 5am. It has frayed nerves: Notably, a woman who was walking her boyfriend on a leash at 9pm has argued that this was permitted during the curfew, surely one of the pandemic’s most unexpected moments.

The question for scientists is this: Do curfews work to slow transmission of the virus? If so, under what circumstances? And by how much?

A curfew requires people to be indoors during certain hours. It is often used to quell social unrest — many cities imposed curfews during the George Floyd protests this summer — and following natural disasters or public health emergencies.

But curfews also have been used as instruments of political repression and systemic racism. Decades ago, in so-called sundown towns in the United States, black people were not permitted on the streets after dusk and often were forced to leave altogether.

As the pandemic unfolded, Melbourne, and many European countries imposed curfews, on the theory that keeping people at home after a certain hour would slow viral transmission. Usually curfews were implemented alongside other measures, like closing businesses early and shuttering schools, making it difficult to tease out the curfew’s effectiveness.

The scientific evidence on curfews is far from ideal. There has not been a pandemic like this one in a century. While curfews make intuitive sense, it’s very hard to discern their precise effects on viral transmission, let alone transmission of this coronavirus.

Ira Longini, a biostatistician at the University of Florida, believes that curfews are, on the whole, an effective way to slow the pandemic. But he acknowledged his view is based on intuition. “Scientific intuition does tell you something,” Longini said. “It’s just that you can’t quantify it very well.”

“In general,” she said, “we expect that staying at home mechanically slows the pandemic, as it reduces the number of interactions between people.”

“The trade-off is that the reduction in economic activity especially hurts many workers and their families in the large service sector of the economy,” she added.

“Assuming that nightclubs and such are already closed down anyway, for instance, prohibiting people from going for a walk around the block with their family at night is unlikely to reduce interactions,” Polyakova said.

Moreover, the virus thrives indoors, and clusters of infection are common in families and in households. So one daunting question is whether forcing people into these settings for longer periods slows transmission — or accelerates it.

“You can think of it like this,” said William Hanage, a public health researcher at the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health, “what proportion of transmission events happen during the time in question? And how will the curfew stop them?”

One study, published recently in Science, analysed data from China’s Hunan province at the start of the outbreak. Curfews and lockdown measures, the researchers concluded, had a paradoxical effect: These restrictions reduced the spread within the community but raised the risk of infection within households, reported Kaiyuan Sun, a postdoctoral fellow at the National Institutes of Health, and his colleagues.

Longini and his colleagues incorporated lockdowns and curfews into models of the pandemic in the United States and concluded that they can be an effective way to reduce transmission. But, he cautioned, models come with a lot of assumptions about the population and how the virus spreads.

“Whether you believe that is a scientific rationale depends on whether you believe the model,” he said.

Jon Zelner, a public health researcher at the University of Michigan, said that there was too little scientific data to know whether curfews are effective, but that such coercive measures rarely work in the long run.

“With respect to curfews, I think that it is hard to understand what the positive impact of them is going to be,” he said. “One of the things I worry about with relatively vague or poorly reasoned orders is that it erodes the trust people need to have to follow these.”

In countries like Japan, which have a much lower incidence of COVID-19 than the United States, the secret seems to be a population that accepts and follows guidelines like social distancing and mask wearing, “rather than a series of rule-like restrictions” like curfews.

That could have happened in the United States, Zelner said, but public health recommendations were “drawn into our broader set of unending cultural and political conflicts.”

https://www.smh.com.au/world/north-america/as-more-countries-impose-covid-curfews-scientists-ask-do-they-work-20210124-p56wfs.html

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UK PM Boris Johnson warns new COVID-19 variant may be more deadly

New evidence is emerging to suggest the UK’s new COVID-19 variant may be more deadly, says prime minister Boris Johnson.

The variant is already known to be more easily spread, and is putting the National Health Service under “intense pressure”, he said in a press conference.

“We’ve been informed today that in addition to spreading more quickly, it also now appears that there is some evidence that the new variant, the variant that was first discovered in London and the southeast, may be associated with a higher degree of mortality,” he said.

The new UK variant is transmitting between 30 per cent and 70 per cent more easily than the original COVID-19 strain.

However Johnson said current evidence showed both vaccines remained effective against old and new variants.

Chief Scientific Adviser Patrick Vallance has warned that there was some uncertainty about the data, and the evidence suggesting a higher risk of death was not strong at this stage.

“I want to stress that there’s a lot of uncertainty around these numbers and we need more work to get a precise handle on it,” he said. “But it obviously is a concern that this has an increase in mortality as well as an increase in transmissibility.”

https://www.couriermail.com.au/coronavirus/joe-biden-gets-tough-on-coronavirus-pandemic-uk-heads-for-doubledip-recession/news-story/a26b32c2e8ce576b37354da14bbf5708

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Hi-tech quarantine solution proposed in Australia

The Queensland State Government is pushing ahead with controversial plans to establish quarantine camps in central Queensland and Toowoomba.

Dr Anseline, together with epidemiologists Professor Marylouise McLaws and Dr Henning Liljeqvist, is lobbying for a similar national scheme.

They said recent evidence suggested hotels were far from optimal for quarantine, as the virus could easily spread among guests and workers.

Dr Anseline said locking people up in hotel rooms for 14 days – often without fresh air or exercise – was having a huge impact on mental health.

He said while state and federal governments had done a great job thus far containing the virus, changes were needed as the pandemic dragged on.

“Hotels have been a stopgap solution, but we have to look at the medium and longer term because even with a vaccine, this virus could be with us for years,” he said.

“There are still tens of thousands of Australians waiting to return home, as well as overseas students and tourists hoping to travel to Australia again in the not-too-distant future once travel bans are lifted.

“We need to come up with safer, novel and more effective solutions, and we believe that new technology and processes, which can be overlaid on existing hotel quarantine protocols, are the answer.”

Under Hemisphere’s plan, overseas arrivals would be rapid-tested on arrival in Australia, with those testing positive housed in separate quarantine accommodation.

Those testing negative would be quarantined in single-level cabins with their own kitchens, outside CBDs but close to airports and hospitals. “This would reduce worker and guest transmission but also significantly improve mental health outcomes,” Dr Anseline said.

The plan also involves guests and staff wearing new hi-tech wristband trackers to monitor movements and vital signs. The wristbands could also be used for home quarantine, Dr Anseline said.

Quarantine facilities would have COVID marshals and on-site sewage testing.

https://www.couriermail.com.au/coronavirus/coronavirus-qld-celebrity-docs-hitech-quarantine-solution/news-story/b625ae0cb4359a4746e1fee2019e74fb

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

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

http://john-ray.blogspot.com (FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC) Saturdays only

https://heofen.blogspot.com/ (MY OTHER BLOGS)

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Biden Promises Pain

America’s new placeholder president speaks.

Joseph Robinette Biden Jr., 78, was installed North Korea-style as the placeholder president of the United States of America on January 20, surrounded by 25,000 U.S. troops, along with hundreds of socially-distancing well-wishers in front of an empty National Mall populated with a vast forest of planted American flags to distract from the fact that no one was there.

How long he will last before Nancy Pelosi invokes the 25th Amendment to replace him with the predatory Obama wannabe Kamala Harris is anyone’s guess.

The speech came as the Washington Post admitted hours after militia members were charged in connection with the January riot that former President Donald Trump had nothing to do with the civil disturbance that delayed our Potemkin parliament’s certification of electors a few hours. This was, of course, the riot after which Biden, statist simpleton that he is, scolded lawmakers who thought they were running for their very lives for not stopping to put face masks on.

In the process Biden misgendered his own home state House member, saying he was “so proud of my congressman right here in the state of Delaware, Lisa Blunt Rochester,” for trying to distribute masks to other lawmakers during the riot. Reportedly, some Republicans declined the offer, prompting Biden to growl, “What the hell’s the matter with them? It’s time to grow up.”

No one needed to worry about riots in the nation’s capital, not only because of the armed soldiers and out-of-state police that occupied the city, but because the nonentity who blundered his way into becoming the leader of the free world does not inspire passion, except perhaps in the most radical precincts of the Left. While he enjoyed his first half-day in the Oval Office busily trying to erase the legacy of Orange Man Bad by executive fiat, mostly peaceful Antifa rioters marked the occasion in Seattle, Denver, and Portland, Oregon.

The man who administered the oath of office to Biden, Chief Justice John Roberts, is arguably largely responsible for Biden’s so-called victory because he signed on to a series of decisions that ignored election law and put Trump, whom he hates with a passion, at a disadvantage.

In one case, on October 19, 2020, Roberts inexplicably betrayed his own oath of office by voting with the three liberal justices to refuse a stay in Republican Party of Pennsylvania v. Boockvar. With only eight justices on the Supreme Court at the time, this resulted in a tie 4-4 vote denying a Republican request to stay the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s blatantly unconstitutional ruling that usurped the power of the state legislature and forced state election officials to accept mail-in ballots received up to three days after Election Day. The GOP presciently argued the extra time was an invitation to fraud, especially because the Pennsylvania court ruled election officials had to accept ballots late even if they lacked a postmark.

Roberts ignored the Electors Clause of the U.S. Constitution, which vests the power to determine state election procedures in state legislatures alone. Article II of the Constitution provides that “Each State shall appoint [electors for president and vice president] in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct.” The courts have long held that the legislative power here is “plenary,” meaning unqualified and absolute, so when the Pennsylvania Supreme Court acted it did so unconstitutionally.

The Supreme Court ruled in McPherson v. Blacker (1892) that “the appointment and mode of appointment of Electors belong exclusively to the states under the constitution of the United States.”

“The legislative power is the supreme authority except as limited by the constitution of the State, and the sovereignty of the people is exercised through their representatives in the legislature unless by the fundamental law power is elsewhere reposed.”

The Supreme Court affirmed this legislative power as recently as 2000 in Bush v. Gore.

When Florida lawmakers saw that Democrat Al Gore was trying to steal the election by gaming the courts, they threatened to ignore the statewide popular vote and appoint electors pledged to Republican George W. Bush. The Supreme Court reminded the litigants that state legislatures have the final say. “The individual citizen has no federal constitutional right to vote for Electors for the President of the United States…”

But instead of following the law, Roberts decided to stick it to the Trump campaign and snuff out any momentum his campaign might have had a chance of developing in courts across the nation.

Eager to get started destroying the American republic, the cadaverous former vice president was sworn in at 11:48 a.m., 12 minutes before Noon when the 20th Amendment specifies an incoming president’s term actually begins.

Squinting, and at times barking out the words on the teleprompter like someone with a wildly malfunctioning hearing aid, the newly inserted chief executive stumbled over a text that was weighted down with clichés, sentence fragments, and what passes for patriotism in Democratic Party circles. It was a bargain-basement inaugural address.

A co-conspirator in the ultimately successful four-year-plus-long rolling coup that used, among other things, Hillary Clinton’s fake Russian dossier and taxpayer-funded U.S. intelligence agencies to undermine the duly elected 45th president of the United States, the corrupt, lying serial plagiarist, groper of females of all ages, and hair sniffer, outlined his planned assaults on economic freedom, the First and Second Amendments, as well as the coming wave of repression directed against his enemies.

“Few people in our nation’s history have been more challenged, and found a time more challenging or difficult than the time we’re in now,” Biden said.

“A once-in-a-century virus that silently stalks the country. It’s taken as many lives in one year as America lost in all of World War II. Millions of jobs have been lost. Hundreds of thousands of businesses closed. A cry for racial justice some 400 years in the making moves us. The dream of justice for all will be deferred no longer. A cry for survival comes from planet itself. A cry that can’t be any more desperate or any more clear now. A rise in political extremism, white supremacy, domestic terrorism that we must confront and we will defeat. To overcome these challenges – to restore the soul and to secure the future America – requires so much more than words.”

He’s right.

Words are not enough.

Doing what Biden and his far-left base want to do requires brute force because sane Americans won’t allow it. Normal Americans oppose slavery reparations paid by people who never owned slaves to people who were never slaves. They don’t want to kill the economy by banning gasoline-fueled cars to save an environment that doesn’t need saving. They don’t want to turn America into a giant prison to control a virus that spares almost all its victims. They don’t want what Biden is selling.

The Chinese Communist Party-promoted virus that causes the disease COVID-19 has ravaged the land, if the questionable official body count for the disease is to be believed. Biden, who refuses to blame the People’s Republic for its murderous biological attack, wants to expand on the failed containment policies including universal mandatory mask-wearing and continuing the economy-killing lockdowns that have thrown millions out of work. He wants to use more force to compel compliance with pandemic mitigation efforts.

Biden’s allies, left-wing Democratic governors like New York’s Andrew Cuomo, California’s Gavin Newsom, and Michigan’s Gretchen Whitmer, condemned thousands of elderly Americans to COVID-19 deaths in elder care facilities.

Pennsylvania’s Health Secretary Rachel Levine, the Butcher of Harrisburg, sent infected old people to such facilities. Levine is Biden’s token transgender nominee to be Assistant U.S. Secretary of Health.

America is systemically racist, argued Biden, who for most of last year’s nationwide Antifa-Black Lives Matter riots following the drug-caused death of George Floyd remained silent about the lawlessness and destruction as his bloodthirsty running-mate Kamala Harris cheered them on, saying they “should not let up.”

In the hours after taking the oath, Biden rescinded President Trump’s executive order banning Marxist-invented Critical Race Theory in federal training, and killed his 1776 Commission that sought to move American education away from a Howard Zinn-style curriculum that unduly emphasized race-related injustices of the past.

Biden previously endorsed the communist Green New Deal which would return the United States to the 1800s in a few years, so unsurprisingly he falsely claimed that the environment was in grave danger in his speech. The Green New Deal “is a crucial framework for meeting the climate challenges we face,” his campaign website states.

Joe “You Ain’t Black” Biden’s ominous statement that “political extremism, white supremacy, domestic terrorism” are on the rise and must be confronted should be particularly worrisome to anyone concerned about civil liberties. This is because we know he wasn’t referring to his friends on the Left. He was smearing 75 million Trump voters as potential enemies of the state.

The leftists who run the Democratic Party believe that anyone outside of their ranks is a potential enemy. And they have funny ideas about what constitutes racism. Remember that when principled conservatives opposed Barack Obama’s socialist juggernaut they were reflexively denounced as racist. The only reason to oppose Obama was “racism – straight up,” washed up actress Janeane Garofolo whined at the time.

The activists of the Tea Party movement who filled townhall meetings as Obama and Biden were forcing Obamacare down the throats of the American people, were similarly denounced at the time by leftists as domestic terrorists. Biden obviously plans to apply the label to Trump supporters to discredit and marginalize them, along maybe with throwing some of them into prison for their political beliefs if he can get away with it . And since some of the January 6 rioters had military backgrounds, he is already setting in motion a disturbing Stalinist-style purge of the armed forces.

Then there was the Orwellian part of Biden’s address in which he seemed to be outlining plans for a new Thought Police or maybe a citizen-dominated Thought Militia.

Biden said, “we must reject the culture in which facts themselves are manipulated and even manufactured.”

“Recent weeks and months have taught us a painful lesson. There is truth and there are lies. Lies told for power and for profit. And each of us has a duty and a responsibility, as citizens, as Americans, and especially as leaders – leaders who have pledged to honor our Constitution and protect our nation — to defend the truth and defeat the lies.”

This sounds much like Barack Obama urging his supporters to “get in the face” of his opponents.

The ”lies” to which Biden refers concern the justified worries of Americans about election fraud. Anyone who says Biden or the Democrats stole the election from Trump may be targeted in some way. As I wrote earlier this week, Republican lawmakers and lawyers are the first to be attacked but more harassment and persecution are coming.

And this supposed duty to defend truth and defeat lies isn’t something the Founding Fathers would have recognized. They believed, in the words of the Declaration of Independence that exalted “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Americans are supposed to be free to believe what they want.

People have to be left alone to figure out the world for themselves, without compulsion from the government or politically correct censorship at the hands of Mark Zuckerberg’s 12-year-old content moderators jam-packed into electronic sweatshops.

Joe Biden will never get that.

And his inability to comprehend this quintessential aspect of what it is to be American is going to get people killed.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/01/biden-promises-pain-matthew-vadum/

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IN BRIEF

So woke! White House adds preferred pronouns dropdown to contact form (Examiner)

Department of Homeland Security suspends deportations, stops "Remain in Mexico" policy (NPR)

Evidence shows well-laid plan by some Capitol rioters (Politico)

Workers file 900,000 new jobless claims as COVID total tops 75 million (NY Post)

"Anti-Facebook" MeWe social network adds 2.5 million new members in one week (ZDNet)

Colleges lobby Biden to halt federal probe into foreign donations; Education Department has already found $6.5 billion in unreported gifts (Free Beacon)

Unsatiated antifa anarchists trash Oregon Democrat Party HQ to mark Biden's inauguration (Post Millennial)

Congress gears up for fight over Joe Biden's cabinet nominees (Fox News)

Biden to propose eight-year citizenship path for immigrants (AP)

Wobbly Senator Joe Manchin: "I really do" support deplatforming Republicans (Daily Wire)

For the record: There's a lot Biden won't be able to do with a 50/50 Senate (Hot Air)

Democrats publish bill to install Capitol fence despite claiming walls don't work (National Pulse)

FBI and DOJ knew there was no Russia collusion by spring of 2017 (Washington Times)

Lincoln Project funneled over $10 million to its own founders' companies (National Pulse)

Facebook and Google allegedly cut a deal that reduced ad competition (Engadget)

Portland "defund police" activists have vandalized commissioner's home seven times in three months (Hot Air)

New York University professor attributes black Trump support to "multiracial whiteness" (PJ Media)

China's economy grew 2.3% in 2020 — no doubt augmented by its cornering the PPE market (UPI)

The states Americans headed to the most in 2020: Tennessee, Texas, and Florida (CNBC)

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

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

http://john-ray.blogspot.com (FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC) Saturdays only

https://heofen.blogspot.com/ (MY OTHER BLOGS)

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Pfizer's Covid vaccine COULD stop people spreading the virus as well as preventing serious illness, Israeli doctor claims

Pfizer's Covid vaccine could produce a strong enough immune response to stop people who get the jab from spreading the coronavirus, a doctor in Israel has claimed.

Researchers found in a small study that recipients of the jab developed up to 20 times more antibodies within a week of having the second dose of the jab.

Higher levels of antibodies likely lead to a stronger immune response which could clear the virus before someone has a chance to spread it, but this is still not proven.

Until now, scientists didn't know whether vaccines would stop transmission and were banking only on it preventing severe illness and death. Pfizer itself has not published any data showing how the jab affects the spread of the disease.

Developers of other vaccines have also not offered any proof that their vaccines will be able to reduce transmission of the virus.

The survey done on 102 hospital staff in Israel is the first indication that a Covid-19 vaccine may stop transmission. It saw all but two of them develop antibody levels that were even higher than patients who had recovered from Covid-19.

Antibodies are substances produced by the immune system which store memories of how to fight off a specific virus.

Study leader Professor Gili Regev-Yochay said the results were 'encouraging and reasonable to assume that these people will not be carriers or contagious, although that is still not a direct conclusion,' the International Business Times reported.

Medics running the study found that 100 out of 102 people mounted large antibody responses to the coronavirus after two doses of the vaccine. The research was done on members of staff at the Sheba Medical Centre in Tel Aviv.

One of the two who didn't had a compromised immune system; the other is still being investigated, The Telegraph reports.

The main purpose of the Covid-19 vaccines when they were developed was to give people some early immunity against the virus so they wouldn't end up in hospital or die if they caught it.

The jabs developed so far have all shown signs of being able to do this and are being rolled out to try and stem the tide of deaths caused by Covid.

But if the vaccines produce a strong enough immune response they could also stop the virus from spreading by training people's bodies to destroy it on sight.

Immunity developed by vaccines is based on substances called antibodies and also other types of immune substances such as white blood cells.

These destroy the virus when it gets into the body, stopping it from reproducing and entering the body to cause infection.

Any amount of this protection will likely reduce the risk of illness and death because it reduces how much of the virus can get into the body, but a weak response might allow the virus to linger in the body for a short period of time, during which people might be infectious to others even if they don't get ill themselves.

A strong immune response from a highly effective vaccine, however, could make the body so good at destroying the virus that all of it gets eliminated as soon as it enters the body of a vaccinated person.

This could mean it exists for too short a period of time for the person to breathe it out and spread it to other people.

None of the vaccine-makers have yet published data showing whether this will be the case.

Antibodies are critical for the immune system because they both destroy viruses and also flag them up for destruction by other white blood cells.

The director of the hospital's Infectious Disease Epidemiology Unit, Professor Regev-Yochay, said she thought it was unlikely that people who receive two doses of jab would spread the illness.

This is expected to be because they develop strong enough immunity that the virus cannot reproduce in their body.

It is possible that if people have vaccines that aren't highly effective, the virus can continue to circulate in their body for a short while without making them ill but still allowing them to pass it on.

Professor Regev-Yochay said in a briefing yesterday: 'The results of the survey are in line with Pfizer’s experiment and even better than expected,' the Jerusalem Post reported.

'I expect that the survey results of the other employees participating will be similar. There is certainly reason for optimism.'

Israel has had one of the world's fastest Covid vaccination programme and has given jabs to 2.6million of its 9million people already.

But the country has yet to see its infection and death numbers come tumbling down after four weeks of immunisations.

Studies from the country suggest the jab could eventually slow the rate of contagion by up to 50 per cent as well as stopping infected recipients becoming sick.

While Israel is leading the world in the vaccine race with more than one in five people receiving an initial dose, its infection rates were last week at their highest ever with more than 8,000 positive tests per day and a record 1,102 patients in hospital.

The vaccine trials run by Pfizer, Moderna, Johnson & Johnson and Oxford University and AstraZeneca had one primary goal which was to try and reduce Covid-19 rates.

To do that, the scientists simply vaccinated half of their volunteers with two doses apiece, and gave the other half two doses of a placebo jab.

They then recorded how many people were diagnosed with Covid-19 after the vaccine, they did not test how much participants caught or transmitted the virus without knowing.

In earlier tests in monkeys, animals that got Pfizer's jab had no traces of the virus in their respiratory tracts, and earlier tests in people showed they produced plenty of antibodies after vaccination.

Combined with the final clinical trial data, that suggests that the vaccine is triggering an immune response, and that immune response is strong enough to keep the virus from copying itself and spreading in the body.

In turn, that means the odds are low that someone's viral load - the concentration of virus in their cells - is high enough to spread the infection.

However the trials that Pfizer completed were not designed to state for sure that the vaccine can slow the spread of the virus.

It comes after nearly 5million people aged between 70 and 80 are being invited to receive their first dose, with some in Whitehall suggesting the rollout is going so well that the wider adult population could be covered by June rather than September.

However, vaccines minister Nadhim Zahawi said people in their 70s will only be offered jabs in areas where the 'majority' of over-80s have already had their first shot.

That could mean people in areas such as London and Suffolk, where progress has been slower, will have to wait longer.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9162639/Pfizer-vaccine-prevent-transmission-coronavirus-others.html

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Allergies to vaccine rare

Research report just out. Most allergic reactions were in people with other allergies

Allergic Reactions Including Anaphylaxis After Receipt of the First Dose of Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine

On December 11, 2020, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) for the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccine, administered as 2 doses separated by 21 days.1 Shortly after, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) issued an interim recommendation for its use.2 Following implementation of vaccination, reports of anaphylaxis after the first dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine emerged.3 Anaphylaxis is a life-threatening allergic reaction that occurs rarely after vaccination, with onset typically within minutes to hours.4

Notifications and reports of suspected severe allergic reactions and anaphylaxis following vaccination were captured in the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), the national passive surveillance (spontaneous reporting) system for adverse events after immunization.5 Physicians at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) evaluated these reports and applied Brighton Collaboration case definition criteria6 to classify case reports as anaphylaxis or not anaphylaxis. Nonallergic adverse events, mostly vasovagal or anxiety-related, were excluded from the analysis. Anaphylaxis and nonanaphylaxis allergic reaction cases with symptom onset occurring later than the day after vaccination were also excluded because of the difficulty in clearly attributing allergic reactions with delayed onset after vaccination. Because the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine was only available beginning December 21, 2020, this article focuses on the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine.

During December 14 to 23, 2020, after administration of a reported 1 893 360 first doses of Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine (1 177 527 in women, 648 327 in men, and 67 506 with sex of recipient not reported),3 CDC identified 21 case reports submitted to VAERS that met Brighton Collaboration case definition criteria for anaphylaxis (Table), corresponding to an estimated rate of 11.1 cases per million doses administered. Four patients (19%) were hospitalized (including 3 in intensive care), and 17 (81%) were treated in an emergency department; 20 (95%) are known to have been discharged home or had recovered at the time of the report to VAERS. No deaths from anaphylaxis were reported.

Median interval from vaccine receipt to symptom onset was 13 minutes (range, 2-150 minutes); 15 patients (71%) had onset within 15 minutes; 18 (86%) had onset within 30 minutes.3 The most common symptoms and signs were urticaria, angioedema, rash, and a sense of throat closure. Seventeen (81%) of 21 patients with anaphylaxis had a documented history of allergies or allergic reactions, including to drugs or medical products, foods, and insect stings; 7 (33%) had experienced an episode of anaphylaxis in the past, including one after receipt of rabies vaccine and another after receipt of influenza A(H1N1) vaccine (Table). During the same period, VAERS identified 83 cases of nonanaphylaxis allergic reactions after Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccination.3 Commonly reported symptoms in nonanaphylaxis allergic reactions included pruritus, rash, itchy and scratchy sensations in the throat, and mild respiratory symptoms.

Mortality from COVID-19 in populations at high risk is substantial,7 and treatment options are limited. Widespread vaccination against COVID-19 with highly effective vaccines represents an important tool in efforts to control the pandemic. CDC guidance on use of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines8 and management of anaphylaxis is available.9 Specifically, vaccination locations should (1) ensure that necessary supplies are available to manage anaphylaxis, especially sufficient quantities of epinephrine in prefilled syringes or autoinjectors; (2) screen potential vaccine recipients to identify persons with contraindications and precautions; (3) implement recommended postvaccination observation periods, either 15 or 30 minutes depending on each patient’s previous history of allergic reactions; (4) ensure that physicians and other health care professionals can recognize signs and symptoms of anaphylaxis early; and (5) immediately treat suspected anaphylaxis with intramuscular epinephrine (because of the acute, life-threatening nature of anaphylaxis, there are no contraindications to epinephrine administration).

Patients experiencing anaphylaxis should be transported to facilities to receive appropriate medical care. All patients should be instructed to seek immediate medical care if they develop signs or symptoms of an allergic reaction after their observation period ends and they have left the vaccination location. Clinicians have an important role in vaccine safety monitoring by being vigilant in recognizing and reporting adverse events to VAERS

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2775646

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IN BRIEF

Chuck Schumer looking for "power-sharing" agreement with GOP; filibuster is a sticking point (Fox News)

CIA Director Gina Haspel announces resignation (Forbes)

Biden taps "transgender" health official with horrifying COVID nursing home record (PJ Media)

Biden defense nominee blames leaders for failing to root out white supremacy (Examiner)

Court gifts Biden admin a running start by dumping Trump EPA's "Affordable Clean Energy" plan (Roll Call)

Mike Pompeo forces Biden into a corner, says China's policies on Muslims amount to genocide (AP)

Twelve National Guardsmen removed from inaugural duty "out of an abundance of caution" (UPI)

Trump grants Venezuelans 18-month protection from deportation (UPI)

Boston-based political scientist charged with being unregistered agent of Iran (Examiner)

Army soldier, a supporter of ISIS, arrested in plot to blow up 9/11 Memorial (AP)

Study shows extremely low rate of coronavirus transmission in school — 0% from child to adult (Examiner)

German quarantine breakers to be held in refugee camps and detention centers (NY Post)

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

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

http://john-ray.blogspot.com (FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC) Saturdays only

https://heofen.blogspot.com/ (MY OTHER BLOGS)

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A careful look at the Swedish death statistics

There is here a long and very academic recent article on Covid deaths in Sweden, The author looks at all sorts of confounding factors before we can make a judgment about whether the Swedish death-rate is high by historical standards.

For me, the most interesting point to emerge was that the death rate in 2019 was unusually LOW, so you would expect some rebound from that on regression to the mean alone. He calls that the "Dry tinder effect". So we could expect the 2020 figures to be above average on that ground alone. And, sure enough, when you combine the 2019 and 2020 years you have two fairly average years. So the claim that Covid caused a high death rate in Sweden falls rather flat.

Let me quote his final conclusions:

My personal take on Covid 2020 in Sweden is as follows:

Yes, Covid 2020 was real (and continues to be real at least until spring 2021, as all seasonal viruses). The number of deaths 2020 was higher than it should have been, which ever way we define “Excess”. Not exceptionally higher, and far from all the disaster scenarios painted by media, politicians and failed scientists.

Was Covid 2020 our generation’s “Spanish Flu” ? No. Far from it, as can be seen in the graph showing 1918 above, and by comparing mortality rates, where non-age-adjusted mortality 2020 is on par with that of 2012, and age adjusted mortality 2020 on par with 2013.

Was the Swedish Government’s response adequate ? To a large extent yes. Until they panicked and lost their mind in November 2020, and introduced “The Swedish Enabling Act“, a form of legislation that is a disgrace to any nation pretending to be democratic.

Where “The Strategy” failed was in protecting the frail and elderly, particularly in the care homes. The strategy also failed in overall crisis & contingency planning & management, where various governments since the early 90:ies have radically reduced investments and capacity in health care, care of elderly as well as many other vital parts of the societal safety net. So, the frequently repeated “Isolate, or our hospitals will be overwhelmed!” mantra was primarily caused by several decades of catastrophic political decisions and priorities regarding medical care and other critical societal function investments and resources, as much as by the virus itself.

What the future brings will be seen by those who survive. Myself, I’m afraid that more doom & gloom will follow for a long time in the tracks of the “2020 Covid Experience”, even if we should manage to eliminate the virus, e.g. by vaccine, during 2021. The psychological effect on populations having spent a year or more in Lockdown, thus missing most of what makes life and living worthwhile, will be interesting to observe, as will be whether social interaction patterns and behaviors eventually return to normal, or whether our future social interactions will be so deeply ingrained by Anno Covidis that we will, similar to Pavlov’s dogs, continue regarding fellow human beings as potentially deadly virus vectors.

Similarly, as this recent article (Swedish) shows – 90000 (!) medical treatments cancelled during 2020 – we will also have to expect further “Excess Deaths” down the road, where these deaths are only indirectly caused by Covid.

https://softwaredevelopmentperestroika.wordpress.com/2021/01/15/final-report-on-swedish-mortality-2020-anno-covid/

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Real Threats to Democracy Still Come From the Left

It is a well-rehearsed fantasy that Trump supporters threaten democracy. It is an observable fact that the left does

If self-congratulatory pats on the back could cause skin damage, Trump haters would have leprosy. Having been on a witch hunt to burn him at the impeachment stake since he took office, they believe they are vindicated forevermore.

But apart from their brutal mistreatment of President Donald Trump from the beginning through their coordinated and malicious hoaxes that incidentally rejected lawful election results (in 2016), and apart from the question of whether they have some legitimate complaints against him, this is still not mainly about him. In a few days, he’ll be gone. This is about whether America will descend into tyranny.

Just as the left exploited COVID-19 to damage the economy and President Trump’s political fortunes (as the Democratic New York governor’s and Chicago mayor’s recent call to reopen their economies demonstrate), and just as it milked the virus to exercise unprecedented control over Americans, it is now exploiting the Capitol riot to shame conservatives into succumbing to its efforts to further consolidate its power and erode our liberties.

I would love nothing more than to turn down the volume, take a breather from politics and pretend that partisan strife can be overcome by virtue-signaling platitudes, but that would be a delusional, selfish cop-out. Unless we no longer believe in American exceptionalism, the principles of limited government and the blessings of liberty, we are honor bound to continue the fight.

Whatever caused the breach of the Capitol, whatever percentage of the malefactors were Trump supporters and no matter how much their complaints coincide with those of the 74 million Trump supporters, their misdeeds do not taint the entire lot of us or what we stand for. They do not render moot our concerns over election integrity.

The overwhelming majority of Trump supporters oppose and condemn violent riots, including the riot at the Capitol, and they strongly sounded the alarm about them during the left’s march of mayhem and anarchy throughout America’s cities last summer. For the most part, Democrats who are now decrying riots remained silent. Many of those who voted for Trump’s impeachment have literally called for political violence.

Additionally, millions still believe (and observed) that there were massive election irregularities and that COVID was cynically used to relax voting procedures, which led to most of this insanity in the first place. All these efforts to demonize Trump and intimidate his supporters will not make them believe otherwise, and it will not calm the turbulent waters of political unrest in the country.

Did you read the articles of impeachment? You might find Trump’s speech to his supporters objectionable, but to say that he willfully encouraged violence, when his actual language called for peace, and to use that as a specification for impeachment is chilling, especially when we have evidence that the riots were planned far in advance of his speech (per CNN, no less).

Just as troubling, did you see how this Democratic-controlled Congress, with the help of 10 Republicans, snuck in the “fact” that Trump “reiterated false claims that ‘we won this election, and we won it be a landslide’”?

You may think Trump’s claims are outrageously false, but do you believe the Congress of the United States has any business declaring the expression of such an opinion an impeachable offense? Trump is entitled to his opinion until his dying day, as are the millions of Americans who share it. There is no question that Trump’s legal efforts to challenge the election failed — that’s a fact. But the leftist narrative that Trump’s allegations of election fraud “are false and not supported by the evidence” have been inserted in every liberal-media news report since Trump first started challenging the election. In other words, they dismissed these claims as factually false way before they’d even been formally filed. Now Democrats have outrageously memorialized their narrative in their articles of impeachment.

Even if the election-night shenanigans didn’t change the result of the election — and I’m not sure we’ll ever know for certain – way too many suspicious things occurred that night, and way too many state laws were changed in the middle of the stream to relax voting procedures. Many warned this could potentially lead to misconduct and rampant distrust in the election results. If election-integrity reform measures aren’t undertaken, I don’t see how it’s possible to restore confidence in our system.

Feel free to call us hypocrites in an effort to shame us into silence about the Democrats’ double standards on violence, rioting and threats to our democratic system, but the issue isn’t hypocrisy. That, too, is a distraction. The issue is whether the left, in reality, is threatening our liberties, about which there can be no reasonable doubt.

Whatever you do, don’t take your eyes off the big ball of leftist tyranny. This nation is now under siege by the digital oligarchy, which is censoring political speech with every bit as much power as an authoritarian government. It is about to be under siege by a Democratic-controlled government, one of whose prominent members, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, is threatening to create an investigative commission to “rein in” the media following the D.C. riots.

Go ahead and bark about President Trump’s intangible so-called threats to our democracy, but while you’re falling for that diversion, understand that many Democrats are on the verge of proposing concrete measures to undermine our constitutional system in ways that will ensure their permanent majority, from opening our borders to turning territories into states to legislatively neutering the Electoral College to enacting federal laws that legalize obscenely lax voting procedures and more.

While you’re busy hating on Trump and his supporters, ask yourselves whether conservatives ever call for the silencing of their political opponents. The answer is never, or almost never.

In the meantime, leftists are purging conservative speech and conspiring to destroy conservative digital competitors. Leftist students at Harvard University seek to ban Trump administration officials from speaking on their campus and are now calling for revoking the degrees of Trump supporters and aides. Where are the long-lost civil libertarians in the Democratic Party?

It is a well-rehearsed fantasy that Trump supporters threaten democracy. It is an observable fact that the left does.

Be peaceful, but stay vigilant, because freedom is “never more than one generation away from extinction.” Indeed, we are well into that menacing generation today.

https://patriotpost.us/opinion/77076

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Now the Washington Post Admits Trump Did Not Incite the Capitol Riot

With the second bogus impeachment in the books, the Washington Post has finally seen fit to admit that President Trump did not incite the storming of the U.S. Capitol on January 6 with his speech, acknowledging that it was, in fact, planned in advance.

The article, published Tuesday, the day before Biden’s inauguration, declares in its headline “Self-styled militia members planned on storming the U.S. Capitol days in advance of Jan. 6 attack, court documents say” and opens with the following paragraphs.

Self-styled militia members from Virginia, Ohio and other states made plans to storm the U.S. Capitol days in advance of the Jan. 6 attack, and then communicated in real time as they breached the building on opposite sides and talked about hunting for lawmakers, according to court documents filed Tuesday.

While authorities have charged more than 100 individuals in the riot, details in the new allegations against three U.S. military veterans offer a disturbing look at what they allegedly said to one another before, during and after the attack — statements that indicate a degree of preparation and determination to rush deep into the halls and tunnels of Congress to make “citizens’ arrests” of elected officials.

U.S. authorities charged an apparent leader of the Oath Keepers extremist group, Thomas Edward Caldwell, 66, of Berryville, Va., in the attack, alleging that the Navy veteran helped organize a ring of dozens who coordinated their movements as they “stormed the castle” to disrupt the confirmation of President-elect Joe Biden’s electoral college victory.

Several paragraphs later, here’s what the authors of the article concede:

The arrests this weekend of several people with alleged ties to far-right extremist groups, including the Oath Keepers, the Proud Boys and the Three Percenters, suggest that the riot was not an entirely impulsive outburst of violence but an event instigated or exploited by organized groups. Hours of video posted on social media and pored over by investigators have focused on individuals in military-style gear moving together.

CNN acknowledged last week that the storming of the Capitol was planned prior to Trump’s speech, reporting that, “Evidence uncovered so far, including weapons and tactics seen on surveillance video, suggests a level of planning that has led investigators to believe the attack on the US Capitol was not just a protest that spiraled out of control, a federal law enforcement official says.”

The CNN report and the Washington Post article completely undermine the entire case Democrats made for impeaching Trump. As I previously noted, the riot at the Capitol was either planned in advance or inspired by President Trump’s speech. It simply cannot be both. That the media is starting to acknowledge the whole thing was planned in advance now, after the bogus impeachment, is no accident.

https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/matt-margolis/2021/01/20/now-the-washington-post-admits-trump-did-not-incite-the-capitol-riot-n1398722

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

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Is Novavax the dark horse of COVID-19 vaccines?

Experts say early clinical data on Australia's third COVID-19 vaccine, Novavax, is promising enough to suggest it could play a significant role in the nation's pandemic strategy.

The federal government has signed up to buy 51 million doses of Novavax’s two-shot vaccine and those involved in trials say it is expected to be made available as early as the middle of this year, in addition to COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer and AstraZeneca that will be available in coming weeks.

Australia's Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly on Tuesday confirmed the nation's drug regulator was in direct talks with European and Norwegian authorities after several elderly people died after receiving Pfizer's vaccine. It is not yet clear if there was a link between the deaths and the vaccine.

While large phase three studies for the Novavax vaccine are ongoing, early data released in December suggests it is likely to offer strong protection against COVID-19. There are even hints it may do something other vaccines have struggled with: stop the coronavirus' spread.

"The phase one data was really convincing. The immune responses were really strong – up there in the realms we saw with the mRNA vaccines. That level of immune response tends to be a bit of a correlation ... those are the vaccines that have ended up giving very strong efficacy," said University of Sydney professor of medical microbiology James Triccas.

Paul Young, co-leader of the University of Queensland's aborted COVID-19 vaccine project, agreed the data "does look promising".

"The preclinical animal data showed that viral titres in the upper respiratory tract were lower in vaccinated animals, suggesting but not proving that infectivity and transmission may be lower," he said.

Paul Griffin, medical director of the Nucleus Network – contracted by Novavax to conduct clinical trials in Australia – said if all went well, the vaccine could be available for use by May or June.

"I think this is one, just based on where it’s up to timing wise, that has fallen off the radar in this country. There has been a lot of attention on Pfizer, AstraZeneca and Moderna," he said. "It is looking very safe and effective."

It is difficult to directly compare phase one trial results, but data reported in the New England Journal of Medicine in December suggested Novavax’s vaccine produced an immune response similar to vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna.

"They were able to induce higher [antibody] titres than recovered COVID patients. And that’s a really good sign. When we were seeing results like that, it did highlight Novavax is one to watch, and a really promising formulation," said Kylie Quinn, an RMIT vaccine designer.

Griffith University virologist Adam Taylor said the trials showed the vaccine was safe and generated good antibody responses. "Certainly, this is a useful candidate."

Other vaccines have already shown themselves capable of inducing strong immune responses and protecting people from the virus.

What makes Novavax different is a hint in the early data it could not just protect people but also stop the virus spreading. Stopping or reducing transmission of the virus is valuable to protect people who cannot or will not get vaccinated. At this stage, it remains unclear if any of the vaccines available can prevent transmission.

In a small study, Novavax’s vaccine effectively prevented COVID-19 growing in the noses of monkeys. Results in animals often do not translate to humans. But other vaccines have struggled to repeat the achievement; they effectively protect the lungs but still allow the virus to grow in the nose, where it could spread.

While other vaccines quickly moved from phase one to phase three trials and then approval, Novavax's progress has been slower. The company started its key phase three trial on December 28 after several delays due to issues scaling up vaccine manufacture.

Novavax has had a chequered history. Two failed vaccine trials in recent years led to the company’s stock plunging; it sacked 100 employees and closed two manufacturing plants. In its near-30-year history it is yet to develop an approved vaccine.

Nevertheless, the company is aiming to produce 2 billion doses of vaccine this year.

Novavax’s jab combines traditional and cutting-edge technology. Inside each vial are copies of COVID-19’s spike protein – the cellular harpoon it uses to attach to and enter our cells – and a dose of the company’s adjuvant. The adjuvant triggers the immune system, which recognises the spike protein and builds antibodies and immune cells capable of defending the body against the virus.

"It’s more of a traditional vaccine – the same type we have used for other vaccines we have in use," said Professor Triccas.

Novavax produces the spike proteins using moth cells, and then studs them on a nanoparticle, creating a shape that looks much like the spike-covered virus. In theory, immune cells should be much more likely to spot and attack these nanoparticles, as they look just like little viruses.

The company used similar technology in a flu vaccine it is developing. In a late-stage clinical trial, it produced much stronger antibody results than a current flu vaccine.

Addressing the deaths in Norway, Chief Medical Officer Professor Kelly said on Tuesday: "In a normal week, 400 people do pass away in their aged care facilities.

"In general terms, they were very old, they were frail, some of them were basically terminally ill."

It is not yet clear if the deaths are linked to the vaccine, and Australian experts have already said they are no reason to slow the vaccine's rollout.

Professor Kelly said it was possible Australia's drugs regulator would advise against giving the very elderly and frail the vaccine.

"That is a very tricky balance. We know elderly people, as is the case in Norway, elderly people in aged care facilities are towards the end of their life. We know from our own data from the Australian pandemic, of the 900 people who have died, they have mostly been in the very elderly group, they are of the greatest risk of severe infection," he said.

"The mortality rate is very high once you get over 80 or 90 if you get COVID-19. It's that risk balance equation which the [regulator] will need to do around which people should be excluded from the vaccine."

https://www.smh.com.au/national/is-novavax-the-dark-horse-of-australia-s-covid-19-vaccines-20210119-p56vbb.html

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Relying on Lockdowns, Social Distancing, and Masks Isn’t Working to Curb COVID-19

COVID-19 cases and deaths continue to surge. The seven-day moving average of daily confirmed new cases eclipsed 260,000 on Jan. 9, the highest rate yet recorded. The U.S. is expected to reach the grim milestone of 400,000 COVID-related deaths later this month, around the anniversary of its first confirmed case.

These numbers suggest that the strategy of relying predominantly on social distancing, lockdowns, and mask-wearing is not working. We need better interventions.

Some have called for national mask mandates. We recently examined the effects of mask mandates in the U.S. and Italy, and our findings are not encouraging.

Of the 25 U.S. counties reporting the highest number of new cases during the current surge, 21 had mask mandates in place before August. Looking at the 100 counties with the most confirmed cases during this period, 97 had either a county-level mask mandate, a state-level mandate, or both. Of these 97 counties, 87 instituted their mandates prior to October.

Mask mandates failed to prevent a surge in cases in other countries as well. Italy enforces a national mask mandate, imposing fines of up to 1,000 euros. That mandate did not prevent a surge of cases that began in October and peaked in mid-November. As of early January, Italy was still recording new infections at four times the early October rate.

Our findings do not deny the efficacy of mask-wearing. Nor should they discourage the practice. Public health authorities in the U.S. and throughout the world cite studies showing that mask-wearing slows the pathogen’s rate of spread.

Although mask-wearing may reduce transmission rate, it has not prevented cases from spiking either here or abroad.

Governments should pursue additional strategies. These include adopting better measures to protect nursing home residents and enabling nationwide screening through the widespread use of rapid self-tests.

The U.S. and other governments have done an abysmal job at protecting nursing home patients. As of Jan. 7, U.S. nursing home residents accounted for less than 0.5% of COVID-19 cases but 37% of COVID-related deaths.

Cases and deaths continue to mount even as the process of vaccinating residents and staff has begun. The current federal policy of requiring weekly tests of staff and temporal thermometer screenings of visitors is inadequate. Government should require daily testing of staff, at least until all residents and staff have been immunized. Visitors should be tested before entering the facility.

Government should also take steps to protect the general population. The distribution of rapid, at-home tests that don’t require a prescription or laboratory analysis would inform people of their COVID-19 status and limit the disease’s transmission.

The technology exists to produce low-cost, rapid home tests in sufficient volume for tens of millions of Americans to test themselves daily. Unfortunately, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has not approved these tests. The agency’s concern is that self-administered, in-home tests are less sensitive than laboratory-analyzed tests used for clinical diagnosis. This view allows the perfect to be the enemy of the good.

Acknowledging this, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, recently embraced the notion of “flooding the system with tests, getting a home test that you could do yourself, that’s highly sensitive and highly specific.”

Rapid tests are marginally less accurate, but that is more than offset by their volume (testing tens of millions of people daily, as opposed to 2 million), frequency (people can test themselves often), and immediacy (results within minutes, rather than days).

Unlike mask-wearing and lockdown edicts, widespread self-testing is neither culturally nor politically divisive, making it more likely to gain population-wide acceptance. It combats the contagion by empowering and informing people, not confining them, restricting their activities and suggesting that they are to blame for the spread of a contagious pathogen.

Equipping people to make the best decisions for themselves, their families, and their fellow citizens offers a promising new approach to combating the pandemic.

https://www.dailysignal.com/2021/01/15/relying-on-lockdowns-social-distancing-and-masks-isnt-working-to-curb-covid-19

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IN BRIEF

Biden to ask Congress on Day One to legalize 11 million illegal aliens (Daily Wire)

Incoming White House climate team blames "systemic racism" for climate change (Free Beacon)

Biden team already in talks with Iran over return to nuclear deal (Breitbart)

Biden poised to undo Trump alternatives to Obamacare plans (Examiner)

Biden to yank Keystone XL permit on first day of presidency (Politico)

New rule bars banks from targeting gun manufacturers — at least until Biden (maybe) negates it (Free Beacon)

Ben Sasse, in fiery op-ed, appropriately says QAnon is destroying GOP (The Hill)

Nancy Pelosi puts Eric Swalwell back on Homeland Security panel despite spy scandal (NY Post)

Lincoln Project in disarray after founder accused of "grooming" young men for sex (Free Beacon)

Hotel chain cancels fundraising event for Senator Josh Hawley (Examiner)

Minnesota law school students — who can't even get her district right — aim to "cancel" alumna Rep. Michelle Fischbach (Daily Signal)

Thanks to right-wing boycott, Fox News trails both CNN and MSNBC in ratings for the first time since 2000 (Disrn)

Federal court dismisses charges against church deacon arrested for singing outdoors without a mask (Disrn)

Portland City Council demands reparations from Congress (The Federalist)

Welfare fraud scandal leads to resignation of Dutch government (Disrn)

The nuclear energy advancements of the past four years will blow your mind (The Federalist)

Guy accidentally found a dead body on Google Maps that had been missing for 22 years (Not the Bee)

New Yorker releases new 12-minute footage of inside view of Capitol riot (Examiner)

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