Reader’s links for March 12, 2022

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Each day at just after midnight Eastern, a post like this one is created for contributors and readers of this site to upload news links and video links on the issues that concern this site. Most notably, Islam and its effects on Classical Civilization, and various forms of leftism from Soviet era communism, to postmodernism and all the flavours of galloping statism and totalitarianism such as Nazism and Fascism which are increasingly snuffing out the classical liberalism which created our near, miraculous civilization the West has been building since the time of Socrates.

This document was written around the time this site was created, for those who wish to understand what this site is about. And while our understanding of the world and events has grown since then, the basic ideas remain sound and true to the purpose.

So please post all links, thoughts and ideas that you feel will benefit the readers of this site to the comments under this post each day. And thank you all for your contributions.

This is the new Samizdat. We must use it while we can.

About Eeyore

Canadian artist and counter-jihad and freedom of speech activist as well as devout Schrödinger's catholic

20 Replies to “Reader’s links for March 12, 2022”

  2. Zoltan Pozar, financial analyst extraordinaire, predicts Bretton Woods 3:

    https://content.production.cdn.art19.com/validation=1647165190,32a9d4c6-15ab-52ad-bc51-1c7a1487c08f,MB9IDSlu8eG2jKKGIoapLt9RtKM/episodes/fbfddb8f-4b8e-4e8b-a52e-f1763968df7d/f47817632fb62fadeb36eac0bb14f3987e913cdfb56b161e48de648754e5cf365d0fb3a7df735daf5806b41e61e2ed506ace5f6806ba8d875860a22d8ae202e8/BD2022-03-11_Bretton_Woods_III_RELEASE.mp3

    The original Bretton Woods:

    https://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/brettonwoodsagreement.asp#:~:text=The%20Bretton%20Woods%20Agreement%20and%20System%20created%20a%20collective%20international,to%20the%20price%20of%20gold.

    In the end money is about trust. Any counter-party risk associated with any currency of exchange will be assessed for the confidence it does or does not elicit. The current regime is collapsing because of suicide. Alienating the world’s largest commodity producer shows the world that the USD is available only to those who tow the political line. This weaponization of the USD may gratify hawks today, but will severely weaken the USD tomorrow. It bifurcates the planet. It reveals a counter-party risk that did not exist prior to the war in Ukraine. A smaller example is seen in the freezing of truckers’ and their supporters bank accounts. This action showed Canadian banks were but an extension of an untrustworthy government. It has caused tremendous capital flight from Canadian charter banks. This is evidenced by the inability of retail precious metals brokers to keep up with demand. This phenomenon has not been reported by legacy media, for to do so will accelerate the run.

    It is unlikely the Canadian truckers story played any role in the Ukraine war, however Chrystia Freeland’s Fifth Business-like minor nexus
    (Those roles which, being neither those of Hero nor Heroine, Confidante nor Villain, but which were nonetheless essential to bring about the Recognition or the dénouement, were called the Fifth Business in drama and opera companies organized according to the old style; the player who acted these parts was often referred to as Fifth Business:
    –Tho. Overskou, Den Danske Skueplads)
    in the matter merits recognition.

    The counter-party risk of digital currency may be, essentially, electricity. Physical gold and silver, autonomous as they are, represent the highest form of money. In the inverted pyramid model everything else is a derivative.

    In the Bretton Woods 3 model I cannot see the Western fiat model, backed by bullshit and bluster, competing with an Eastern money backed by gold and other commodities.

    • When browsers censor what goes onto their search engines, that makes them content creators. Such activists for Good, will become Activists for Safe.
      The Safe Search Engine.

      “The search engine DuckDuckGo has begun penalizing sites linked to “Russian disinformation” amid the Russia–Ukraine war, according to the company’s CEO”

  8. WND – Pfizer seeking emergency approval for 4th COVID shot!

    ‘Clearly there is a need in an environment of omicron to boost the immune response’

    Despite the mildness of the dominant omicron variant and the evidence that the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine hasn’t stopped infection or transmission of SARS-CoV-2 while posing serious health risks, the company’s CEO is asking the FDA to grant emergency use authorization for a second booster, a fourth shot.

    “Clearly there is a need in an environment of omicron to boost the immune response,” Albert Bourla said Friday on CNBC’s “Squawk Box.”

    Bourla claimed the data indicate the protection against severe disease after three doses is “very good.” But the protection wanes after only three or four months, he acknowledged.

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    video

    https://twitter.com/aginnt/status/1502324306562338820

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    In January, Bourla acknowledged that two doses of his vaccine “offer very limited protection, if any” against omicron. And he said the mRNA vaccines “don’t have the safety profile that we hoped we can achieve with this technology.”

    Indeed, the FDA has released 55,000 pages of Pfizer clinical trial data – after attempting to keep it hidden for 75 years – that is now being examined by scientists and others who already have pointed to signals, such as the CDC’s Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System, indicating unprecedented vaccine injuries and deaths. Among the Pfizer documents are nine pages listing 1,291 different side effects.

    Meanwhile, the European Union’s top health agency has warned that getting boosted every four months could harm the immune system’s ability to fight off the disease. Further, a landmark Israeli study found that a fourth Pfizer booster shot was only partially effective in protecting against the omicron variant. A German government report found more than 95% of reported cases of the omicron COVID-19 variant in the country were in vaccinated individuals.

    A second booster already is available for Americans 12 years of age and older. Last fall, the FDA approved the Pfizer shot for children 5 to 11 despite concerns by the agency’s expert panel about the lack of safety data.

    CDC Director Rochelle Walensky recently acknowledged that she and her agency were wrong when they told the public the vaccines were 95% effective in stopping infection and transmission. And New York state health officials released a study earlier this month showing the Pfizer vaccine is only 12% effective for children ages 5 to 11 amid the omicron wave.

    Data from many countries indicate people who are fully vaccinated have a higher risk of hospitalization and death than the vaccinated. Data from the CDC itself shows a massive increase in COVID-19 infections and hospitalizations among the fully vaccinated.

    CDC officials have acknowledged hiding from the public most of the agency’s COVID data for fear it would be misinterpreted by critics. Meanwhile, Walensky still refuses to fulfill her promise to a Senate committee to provide data on vaccine-related deaths.

    The VAERS data – with more than 24,000 deaths and 1 million adverse events linked to the vaccines – is consistent with, among other things, the alarming trend observed in the insurance industry, the spike in sudden deaths and heart attacks in healthy athletes, the testimonies of vaccine-injured people and the more than 1,000 peer-reviewed studies presenting evidence of vaccine-related adverse events.

    https://www.wnd.com/2022/03/pfizer-seeking-emergency-approval-4th-covid-shot/

  9. Dr. Albert Bourla – Pfizer Chairman and CEO

    As the COVID-19 pandemic continues, one truth continues to be proven time and time again: the vaccine is saving lives, and to Pfizer CEO Dr. Albert Bourla, it was the product of one of the most incredible private sector achievements in history.
    Mobilizing the corporation amid some of the most strenuous conditions experienced in modern times, he had a front row seat to see the years-long process of developing a vaccine played out in nine months in a riveting story of innovation, determination and ingenuity.

    Dr. Albert Bourla is chairman and chief executive officer of Pfizer Inc., and was named the top pharmaceutical CEO in America by Institutional Investor in 2020. A Greek immigrant, former veterinarian and child of Holocaust survivors, Dr. Bourla became the head of Pfizer in 2019 and transformed the corporation just before it was put to the test by the COVID-19 pandemic.

    In his book Moonshot: Inside Pfizer’s Nine-Month Race to Make the Impossible Possible, Dr. Bourla describes how the corporation met the unimaginable challenges and pressures to rapidly develop a vaccine using the core values of courage, excellence, equity and joy. Detailing the leadership strategies and innovations he used to guide Pfizer in making unprecedentedly rapid scientific breakthroughs, Dr. Bourla describes the epic journey of their “moonshot.” Facing political, economic and social crises, he explains it wasn’t luck but methodical preparation, strong leadership and a clear vision that brought the vaccine forward, and shares the lessons in management and leadership that he learned.

    Join us as Dr. Bourla recounts the unimaginable adversity facing the developers of one of the most impactful medical inventions in recent history, and the ingenuity and wisdom that led them to success.

    • NYT – Austria Does a U-Turn on Mandatory Vaccinations, Citing Milder Variant Cases

      Despite high caseloads, the number of Covid patients in intensive-care-unit beds remains steady, prompting the country to rethink its approach, at least for now.

      BERLIN — Four months ago, Austria made headlines when it announced plans to become the first Western democracy to impose a general vaccine mandate to fight the coronavirus, a measure that would have hit adults who refused to be inoculated with fines of up to 3,600 euros (about $4,000).

      That was a different time, one before the highly contagious Omicron variant of the coronavirus became seemingly omnipresent.

      Calling the law “not proportionate” given the relatively mild symptoms experienced by most people with the variant, Karoline Edtstadler, the minister responsible for Austria’s constitutional affairs, said the country was doing a U-turn on its policy.

      The mandate for Austria, where about 74 percent of the population has received at least two doses, officially took effect early last month, but enforcement was not scheduled to begin until next Tuesday.

      Now it will be temporarily suspended, Ms. Edtstadler said, although the legal framework will be kept in place in case another, more dangerous variant became dominant in the future.

      “Just as the virus is very agile, we need to be flexible and adaptable,” she told reporters at a news conference in Vienna.

      The turnaround speaks to how the pathology of the Omicron variant has influenced the way in which Austria and a number of other European countries are adjusting their virus strategies. It also comes as public attention is focused on other crises, most notably a war to the east and the surging energy prices it has already generated.

      While the country has been reporting some of its highest case numbers of the pandemic, Austria recently dropped most of its social distancing rules in a move that echoed others that were considering trying to “live with the virus.” Germany and France are also scheduled to drop a majority of their restrictions by the end of the month, despite substantial caseloads.

      The difference between November, when the mandate was first announced — and when the authorities virtually locked down the country for 20 days — and now is that only about 200 patients are in I.C.U.s with Covid-19. That is in contrast to more than 2,500, as was the case when the Delta variant was dominant in the country, according to government data.

      Austria had been the only European country with a general vaccine mandate that extended to all adults. In Italy, vaccinations are required for workers who are at least 50, and Greece requires Covid vaccines for people who are 60 or over.

      “It’s a topic that has really moved into the background,” Laurenz Ennser-Jedenastik, a political scientist at the University of Vienna, said about the coronavirus.

      The reversal was unsurprising to those watching politicians, including the Austrian chancellor, Karl Nehammer, repeatedly signal that the law was on fragile ground. Just weeks after Parliament passed the law in late January with a significant majority, Mr. Nehammer said it was not “set in stone.”

      In late November, shortly after a lockdown and the mandate were announced, 40,000 people took to the streets of Vienna to demonstrate against both measures. Although the large protest movement quieted over time, a smaller, more extreme protest culture emerged. Wolfgang Mückstein, the health minister who had helped shape the vaccine mandate, resigned last week citing threats to his personal safety.

      One of the official reasons the mandate was undone was because the expert advisory board to the Austrian government worried that forcing people to get vaccinated now might not be helpful if and when a new wave, driven by some unknown variant, emerged later.

      The commission plans to meet again in three months to make an updated recommendation about vaccine mandates.

      “In light of new scientific findings,” the advisers wrote in a 25-page report released on Wednesday, “that implementation of mandatory vaccination will no longer be necessary at all, or even better vaccines will be available.”

      The announcement came less than a week before the mandate, which was being carried out in phases, would have been enforced.

      The first phase consisted of the government sending letters reminding unvaccinated Austrians that they were in violation of the law if they did not get vaccinated. The second was to begin on Tuesday, when the police were scheduled to start conducting random checks and issuing fines that could have reached nearly $4,000 to those who declined to be vaccinated even after being caught.

      A third phase would have been the systematic search through vaccine databases to find those who did not comply. A date for the third phase was never set, and officials said that the phase might not be necessary if the pandemic abated.

      The country did experience an increase in first-time vaccinations in November, when the government effectively shut out the unvaccinated from most parts of public life in conjunction with the announcement of its plans for a mandate, but recently, the number of daily vaccinations has actually decreased, according to government data.

      “We are seeing a kind of political fatigue that’s affecting these decisions,” Prof. Ennser-Jedenastik said. Even though the decision had a strong majority when it was passed, with Parliament approving it 137 to 33, state governors, who play key roles in the governing conservative Austrian People’s Party, had started criticizing the law soon after.

      There were other, more practical, considerations. “It would have been an enormous bureaucratic effort for everyone from local health authorities to the courts,” Prof. Ennser-Jedenastik said.

      Austria’s announcement came a week before German lawmakers are set to discuss a proposal to impose a vaccine mandate of their own. The German mandate, which appeared to be inevitable when it was first announced late last year and was publicly supported by the parties in the governing coalition, also appears to be faltering. Lawmakers who would be needed for its passage in Parliament have recently expressed doubts about its necessity now.

      After reaching a peak in cases in early February, reported infections in Austria have plateaued. The authorities reported about 47,000 new cases on Tuesday, but the number of patients in intensive-care-unit beds has remained steady since a wave driven by the Delta variant subsided in December.

      https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/09/world/europe/austria-covid-vaccine-mandate.html
      ==================================
      AUSTRIA – VIENNA – MARCH 12 2022

    • DEUTSCHE PRAVDA – Vaccine skeptics: The reasons behind people’s decisions not to get vaccinated

      ( 10 min 10 )

      In Germany, the discussion about vaccination has been raging for months – the vaccination rate is too low, even compulsory vaccination is being discussed, social tensions are increasingly igniting over the question of the jab.

      Who are the people who “consciously” refuse vaccination and what are their motives?

  12. B.C. premier says there will be no occupation in Victoria

    “Get a hobby and find something better to do with your time.” B.C. premier telling anti-COVID mandate protesters planning on occupying Victoria streets, like they did in Ottawa, to think again.