A Review of the Past Three or Four Years on Mainstream Media

 

All about Covid-19 and vaccines.

Damar Hamlin

 

Damar Hamlin’s collapse on the field during a late-season televised game may be a turning point. At last report, he is still in critical condition.

We do not know that it was due to the Covid vaccine. But we know that sudden deaths of young men from heart attacks are exponentially more common suddenly. The Covid vaccine is the most likely suspect.

Assuming this proves to be the case, seeing it happen right before their eyes on live TV is going to make denial a lot harder for millions of ordinary Americans. The kitty may be out of the disposable plastic container. The powers that be may, will, and already are trying to suppress that claim, but people saw something troubling. They will ask questions.

I think the Canadian government knew by the fall of 2021 that the vaccines had dangerous side effects. This best explains their behaviour since about that point. After assuring the public that there would never be a requirement to get vaccinated, they imposed one. Despite an exceptionally high voluntary vaccination rate, and just when it was clear that herd immunity was not a possibility. This looks like the automatic narcissistic reaction to learning one has made a mistake: rather than admit error, one doubles down and attacks the victim. 

This also explains why the Canadian Liberals went for a seemingly unnecessary and pointless snap election at about that time, and are preparing again for one this spring: they know they have something to hide, and expect it to come out at any time. Then they would have no chance at re-election. Better to go now and grab four more years. This explains why they imposed the Emergency Act with no good reason. The Freedom Convoy was peaceful and reasonable, but the Liberals were hearing footsteps behind them. This explains why Nathaniel Erskine-Smith was so sensitive about references to the Nuremberg protocols, when as far as I could see nobody was raising the issue. And I follow the news pretty closely. They knew they were vulnerable to this charge: of performing medical experiments on their own citizenry. 

The good news is that, if the powers that be in Canada and in other parts of the Anglosphere collapse, we rather suddenly have real leaders to replace them. In Canada, Pierre Poilievre is ready to step in. In the US, Ron De Santis’s stock will rise dramatically. Trump bears some responsibility for the vaccine. In Britain, Jacob Rees-Mogg has apparently laid down the groundwork for a leadership bid. With a lot of luck, he might take over the leadership before the next election.

One can dream of how much better the political and cultural climate would be if, two years from now, these three were in power. And the authoritarian left thoroughly discredited. And Putin, Xi, and Khamenei gone as well.

Excess Deaths

 

Canada did not do well in managing the pandemic.

Sweden did best.

Moral: lockdowns and mandates caused more deaths.

British Data on Excess Deaths

 

Confirms what Germany is saying ...

A Journal of the Plague Year--Er, Decade

 

It's probably of little interest, but on my afternoon walk today, in this Toronto neighbourhood, absolutely nobody I passed was wearing a mask. One guy looked at me knowingly (I was not wearing a mask either) and said hi; as if we knew each other. A few weeks ago everyone would be wearing a mask.I think ordinary people are quietly expressing their feelings in this way. 

Were Lockdowns Effective?

 

Recognizing Dr. Campbell's reservations, lockdowns might have been worthwhile at the start--but it seems clear from this study they are no longer.

A Journal of the Plague Decade

 

The amount of empty shelving at the local supermarket has become alarming. Picking up weekly needs has become hit and miss. For a time I was trying to make up the difference by visiting two or three supermarkets a week. But with Omicron raging, and of uncertain potency, I’m not sure it is worth it any longer. My estimate is that the weekly food bill has gone up 30%.

So You Thought It Was Over?

 

Is there really a bat in here?

Two bits of troubling information on Covid. First, confirmation that people who have previously had Covid can be reinfected with the Omicron variant. Second, 80% of a sampling of white-tail deer have or have had Covid. So Covid now has an “animal reservoir” from which to re-emerge forever in new variants, even if we eliminate it in the human population.

Pandora’s box is well and fully open now. 

But as with Pandora’s box, one hope remains: that Omicron will be milder in its effects.

Ivermectin--or Something

 

We may be seeing the end of the virus...

A Journal of the Plague Year--Year 2

 

Out and about in downtown Toronto yesterday. In the Eaton Centre, the Food Court seating is cordoned off. To enter you must wear a mask, and show your vaccine passport and some form of ID. 

As I was sitting there with a friend, a group of perhaps five blonde women of varying ages walked past me, opened the cordon, walked out, then replaced the cordon. None of them were wearing masks. They did this right beside a group of five security guards and police, standing around talking to one another, presumably there to enforce the rules.

It seems obvious to me that this was a planned act of defiance. No doubt there were other places where they could have left the seating area that were not right beside a gaggle of security guards. It was anything but sneaky. It obviously did not affect anyone’s safety. It would have been little or no inconvenience for them to have just walked out by the designated exit; to leave, they would not have had to show anything.

One of the security guards challenged them. “Do you think you’re special? Do you think you don’t have to follow the rules like everyone else?”

I imagine this is what they had wanted. The women assembled in front of him. One of them responded, in a distinctly Eastern European accent: “we are doing this for you. You will thank us in two or three years. We are from a Communist country. We know how this is going to go. We are fighting for your freedom.”

The five stood there and took turns arguing with the security guard, remaining relatively calm. One turned to me and apologized for the disturbance.

I was impressed.

I hope they are wrong.

The Delta Variant Hits the Philippines

 

Not seeing anything about it in the international news, but my wife, who is on the ground, is reporting a dangerous surge in hospitalizations due to COVID in and around Cebu in the Philippines. These photos are taken outside two local hospitals within the past two days.

She is thankfully fully vaccinated. But she has stocked up on food, fearing a general lockdown or a collapse of supply chains. The vaccination rate in the Philippines is still quite low.

A Dog Not Barking

 

Isn't it surpassingly strange that India, where the Delta variant began, has seen a sharp decline in infections, despite the fact that few have been vaccinated? While in the UK, where a high proportion have been vaccinated, the incidence of the Delta variant just keeps going up, now far higher than it was in India even at the peak? And isn't it strange that nobody comments on this?

The obvious reason is that India began unrestricted use of Ivermectin as a prophylactic. And the evidence seems to be that this cheap and common medicine is actually better protection against COVID-19 than a vaccination.

But on the down side, the profit margin is low ...

The Endless Pandemic

 

People are losing hope. In Canada, we are into a third wave of the pandemic, and each wave seems worse than the last. Friend Xerxes writes a column on “What if it never ends?”

It will end.

Even without any human intervention, all epidemics end. The Spanish flu managed four waves, but it ended, without a vaccine.

We are going to break this third wave by summer. We may be fighting variants for a few years, but at a lower level, with booster shots. 

See if I’m not right.

A Shot in the Arm

 

Got the Pfizer vaccine, first dose, yesterday—Easter Sunday.

No detectable side effect so far. Not even an aching arm.

I figure in three weeks, round about April 25, I will have substantial immunity, and need not worry about being out and about. Masking and distancing still, but only for the sake of others’ peace of mind.

Surprised to learn now that my cousins, all but one of whom are younger than I, have all already had their second dose of Pfizer. How can that be? I’ve been keeping close tabs, and got mine as soon as I was eligible.

I think it must be because they have their Indian cards. Racial preferences; or, put more frankly, racial discrimination. My own second shot, although older and with a couple of comorbidities, is not slated until the end of July.

It might make sense to rush-vaccinate people living on reserves, based on higher infection rates. Online, I see claims that infection rates on reserves are 187% of the national average. On the other hand, the fatality rate is much lower—less than half. As a matter of fact, as of August, the story was that the rate of COVID, too, was much lower on reserves than in the general population: only 25% of the national average.

Whatever is happening currently on reserves, shouldn’t the risk be greater in urban settings, where people are closer together? Are matters worse on reserves than in other poor communities, or is the issue just poverty? In any case, my cousins are prosperous and indistinguishable from their urban neighbours. The different treatment seems based not on any scientific or humanitarian justification, but purely racial preference.

We are creating different classes of citizenship in Canada based on race.

A Journal of the Plague Year

 

It is now more than a year.

Just as the vaccines seemed to bring hope of an end, new concerns. The AstraZeneca shot, hoped to be the workhorse, has been suspended in Canada for under-55s for fear of causing blood clots. New variants are spreading that are deadlier and more virulent than the original virus. People are speaking of a “Third Wave.” 

It seems possible that the virus will be able to mutate faster than vaccines can keep up. If, say, the UK and the US manage to vaccinate nearly everybody, new variants might still breed in other countries, enter the US/UK, and be resistant to the vaccines. New round of new vaccines, new round of virus mutations, and the battle goes on year after year.

And everyone seems at the breaking point with the lockdowns.

The COVID Stress Test

 

Ibn Khaldun

There is a theory, by Sir John Glubb, that empires last about 250 years, then collapse from having overreached themselves. 

The idea is not new. Ibn Khaldun suggested in the 14th century that regimes have a lifespan; ruling elites grow lax and self-indulgent over time. Then some new tribe thunders in from the desert.

This thesis has been raised by several voices recently, because American civic society seems to be breaking down. And because the USA is now in the 245th year of its official existence.

Perhaps. I’m old enough to remember when the USA was about to be replaced by the Soviet Union, or eclipsed economically by Japan. The USA is also arguably not an empire, certainly not for its entire existence. 

Any empire runs primarily on prestige. No empire could exist on mere power; human abilities are not distributed that unequally. Prestige builds on prestige; as prestige grows, its jurisdiction expands increasingly beyond what it can maintain without prestige. Eventually, the bubble bursts. 

The bubble perhaps burst for the British Empire with the fall of Hong Kong and Singapore in World War Two. The Warsaw Pact simply ran out of other people’s money. 

The current COVID-19 pandemic is like a stress test: for America, and for all nations, so that perhaps we can see who is decadent and who is not. It is probably too soon to draw firm conclusions—winners one month look like losers the next—but who is gaining prestige from the epidemic, and who is being revealed as less competent?

The case for the US, to begin with, is unclear. Their infection rate has been high, and may shoot higher as newer variants spread. The strain has led to rioting in the streets of many cities. Americans have certainly not pulled together. There have been problems with the vaccination rollout. On the other hand, the USA was first with effective vaccines. The US system has always been designed to be shambolic without breaking.

The UK situation is similar, based on a similar system. A higher infection rate than many countries; but they were almost as fast with a vaccine, and are faster in inoculating. Their vaccine is cheaper and easier to transport; they are set to produce it worldwide at cost. They are liable to benefit massively in earned international prestige. It all follows the typical British model: disorder at the start, but swiftly pulling things together through improvisation; losing every battle but the last.

Australia and New Zealand have done themselves credit so far by almost avoiding the pandemic in the first place; aided, no doubt, by their isolation.

Overall, the Anglosphere looks sound.

What about possible replacement powers?

China, of course, must lose prestige on a massive scale for being the source of the pandemic, and failing to do what was necessary to prevent its spread. They seem to have efficiently limited the virus internally, but by using brutal measures. They have hoarded necessary supplies. They have now developed a vaccine, but without proper testing; and indications are that it is not very effective.

Russia did well by shutting their border early, and have developed a vaccine. But it too has not undergone proper testing, and Russia apparently lacks the capacity to produce it in large quantities.

India will probably increase its prestige. The recorded rate of infection locally is relatively low. And India has most of the world’s actual vaccine production facilities. They are gearing up to produce the UK vaccine in bulk, and have at least one vaccine of their own in the works. They may be in a position to ship CARE packages abroad.

Brazil is doing notably poorly throughout the pandemic; so is Iran. Their initial responses to the virus were reckless, and their attempts to fight is seem riddled with corruption. So much for two other nations often cited as possible future powers.

The EC has also done poorly: things were terrible early in Italy and Spain, are now disastrous in Ireland and Portugal, the central commission has been slow to approve any vaccines, and France’s vaccine candidate seems to have failed its trials. Europe seems to have been suicidal since at least the 1920s. With the exception perhaps of the Nordic countries and the Central European nations that emerged from the Soviet Bloc. Denmark is doing notably well. Sweden may have chosen the wrong course early in not shutting down, but perhaps deserves admiration for trying something different, rather than going along with the crowd.

East Asia, outside mainland China, has also done well. Most notably, Taiwan has vastly increased its prestige. It was one of the first nations hit by the virus, and it effectively stopped it in its tracks. This is significant, because any prestige gained by Taiwan is in effect prestige subtracted from the regime in Beijing. This may bode well for China as a future superpower—but under new management.

South Korea, Japan, Thailand, Singapore, Vietnam, and Indonesia have also apparently reacted to the pandemic well at the outset. On the other hand, they do not seem to have been very aggressive in getting the vaccines; their record might look worse in the long term as a result.

Most impressive in the race to actually vaccinate, so far, have been Israel, Bahrain, and the United Arab Emirates. Each, individually, is too small to make many waves in the wider world. And the fall in the price of oil is not helpful for the region. On the other hand, the recent peace deals among these very nations suggest the possibility of a new Middle East, under their joint management, that might indeed rise to world power status.

Ibn Khaldun theorized that the new power should emerge from just beyond the fringes of the old, as the Arabs arose from the desert between to overwhelm both the Persian and the Eastern Roman Empire. Just as Rome emerged from the fringes of the Hellenic Empires left by Alexander.

Who might that be? Might a new alliance of CANZUK count as the fringe of the American Empire? Might a new alliance of the Middle East count as the fringe of old Europe? Might the fringes of China--ASEAN, Japan, Korea--become a separate power through alliance? Might Taiwan, as fringe, take over China? Might India be the fringe successor to the old British Empire?

Children are Getting Shot in China

 

I teach some Chinese students online. This gives me a bit of a window on China. 

Last week, one of my students did not appear for class. When I asked him about it this morning, he explained that he was sick from being vaccinated.

For Covid?

Yes.

Sick for how long?

A week.

He is eight years old.

Unless he is confused, this suggests that vaccination has become remarkably widespread in China--they are at the point of vaccinating eight-year-olds. Also, if an eight-year-old is sick for a week as a result, that's a pretty rough vaccination--considering eight-year-olds usually get little or no symptoms from the virus itself.

Why would they be vaccinating kids, if this is so? No doubt, to achieve herd immunity. Children could be carriers. Or little Adam may have the honour of being part of a test group to determine how children tolerate the vaccine.

It seems possible he has it wrong, and the vaccination was for something else. But this is a surprisingly strong reaction to a familiar and common vaccine.

The Threat from Danish Mink

 

There is a possibility they may spread coronavirus to a reservoir in nature.

Trudeau's Biggest Scandal

Brian Lilley, on the right, and Warren Kinsella, on the left, at last agree on something: Trudeau's government has seriously screwed up on the COVID vaccine.

Let's hope Kinsella is wrong in his prediction that Canadians will not get a vaccine for another six months.

 

Slightly Later in Canada

This blog has been relatively quiescent recently. For one thing, your humble correspondent has been busy with other work. For another, things have been so insane that comment seems superfluous. “Oh My God!” seems more or less sufficient. On Trump’s court challenges, I do not have the expertise: that’s for lawyers. The world is full of lawyers, and I’m not one of them.

Mad as things are south of 49, it is easy to forget about matters right here in Canada. It looks to me as though the Trudeau government is in serious trouble on the vaccine front. Canadians are about to watch as the US and the UK, most of Europe, India, Brazil, Russia, China, the Middle East get vaccinated, while Canada stays in shutdown, and Canadians continue to die of COVID. The effects on the Canadian economy may also be devastating. 

The government will insist that this is unavoidable, because we do not have our own production facilities. Perhaps this is true; even so, people will blame the government.

The government boasts that it has pre-ordered more vaccine per capita than any other country: nine times what is needed to vaccinate every single Canadian. But this is useless if every Canadian needs only one vaccination, and the pre-orders are fulfilled after all previous orders are filled. Apparently the Canadian government started late to make pre-orders, and overcompensated by over-ordering. Simply wasting a lot of money.

The present government seems spectacularly incompetent. Irresponsible children playing at being leaders. They have made an alarming hash of our foreign affairs, and they have been spending money recklessly. Yet they are still in power because we have also been saddled with an incompetent opposition. Both the Conservatives and the NDP seem to have been seized by sinister forces who have gotten rid of their most effective leaders (Mulcair and Bernier) in rigged leadership races. 

In our own quiet way, Canada seems to be in at least as much trouble as is the US right now. And the underlying cause is the same: a poison has infected our “elites.” It is, I think, the poison of postmodernism, the abandonment of all principle. 

COVID is at least helping to expose the problem.