From Small Dead Animals
To be on the left permits you to believe whatever you want without the intervention of reality
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The Four Reformers
The Four Reformers by Robert Louis Stevenson. Written in 1888. Could have been written just today, except that when this was written, the author thought these reformers were complete fools.
FOUR reformers met under a bramble bush. They were all agreed the world must be changed. “We must abolish property,” said one.
“We must abolish marriage,” said the second.
“We must abolish God,” said the third.
“I wish we could abolish work,” said the fourth.
“Do not let us get beyond practical politics,” said the first. “The first thing is to reduce men to a common level.”
“The first thing,” said the second, “is to give freedom to the sexes.”
“The first thing,” said the third, “is to find out how to do it.”
“The first step,” said the first, “is to abolish the Bible.”
“The first thing,” said the second, “is to abolish the laws.”
“The first thing,” said the third, “is to abolish mankind.”
The essence of a free and civilized society
Daniel Andrews, the world’s stupidest political leader, deals with covid
This is taken from Nick Cater’s article in today’s Oz: Victoria: From a state of emergency to a state of tyranny. Daniel Andrew’s level of incompetence is astonishing, but the high regard so many still have for this utterly stupid buffoon is more astonishing still. Here is the story as told by Nick.
The Andrews government serves as a living example of why governments that rule by fiat are more prone to failure than those forced to run the gauntlet of parliament. Decision-making is restricted to a handful of individuals who lack perfect knowledge and are vulnerable to groupthink. Contrary facts, discordant data and alternative strategies are suppressed. Since all power emanates from the emperor, no one in his inner circle is game to tell him he has no clothes. Increased power leads to an excess of hubris. Any reserves of humility the leader might have had are depleted as the god complex begins to set in.
From the start of the outbreak, there were many who tried to argue for a different strategy, one a lot less like that employed in China and more in keeping with the principles of individual liberty and personal responsibility that have served us well. The alternative approach advocated focusing protection on the elderly and vulnerable instead of pretending the risks were equally shared. There was strong evidence in March 2020 that the World Health Organisation’s estimate of a 3 per cent fatality rate was wildly overstated. It was also known the risk of death for the elderly was substantial, but the risk for the young was statistically insignificant.
Yet instead of putting all available resources into protecting the few, most governments were fixated with the false indicator of the incidence of Covid-19 in the general population. Kids with almost no risk of becoming seriously ill were kept home from school and barred from playgrounds to stop infection spreading to the elderly.
The strategy failed. The notorious hotel quarantine bungle that led to Melbourne’s outbreak in the winter of 2020 was a minor hiccup compared with what happened afterwards in Victorian nursing homes. The government followed flawed advice that Covid-positive residents should be treated in their nursing homes, supposedly to prevent hospitals being overwhelmed.
By early July, it was apparent that scores of residents were dying in nursing homes who might have survived if they had been treated in hospital. Since nursing homes lacked the experience and equipment to abide by the highest protocols of quarantine, the virus rapidly spread to other residents.
Nursing homes were screaming for ambulances, but Andrews’ bureaucracy was slow to react. In mid-July, chief health officer Brett Sutton said the official strategy was to keep the virus out of aged-care homes by screening healthcare workers who entered, rather than removing sick residents: “I don’t think moving residents out who are infected is always the control measure that is required.”
Belatedly, the policy was changed, but by then the coronavirus wave was passing and the damage was done. In 2020, 678 nursing home residents died, all but 19 in Victoria. In 2020, three out of four Covid deaths were nursing home residents. So far this year, with the new policy in place, the figure is one in 50.
The core to understanding Victorian policy is to understand that it is entirely the will of Andrews who is a particularly stupid man. I would also add that he seems to have taken all of his policies from Andrew Cuomo, who was at the time the Governor of New York. Putting elderly covid patients back into nursing homes was a particularly deadly killer. But for those who have not died, they are grateful to be alive and think it is in some way because of Andrews they have been spared.
Wrecking an economy has an ancient history now being repeated
If you deliberately set out to ruin an economy nothing would work better than vast oceans of public spending while interest rates were kept artificially low.
But I thought this was the perfect complement to all the rest, specially if you were intent on sabotaging a Liberal government: ‘Era of low interest rates is over’: Rate rises expected ahead of federal election. I’m not saying that rates should not go up, but I am saying that the “readjustment process” will make the economy fall into very hard times before it finds its way back to prosperity a couple of years later.
The video is all about just this process. These are the notes that come with the vid:
Many countries around the world have, on paper…seemingly recovered from the economic collapse that occurred last year. Unemployment rates are getting closer to normal, the number of business bankruptcies has hit a 2 year low, and the stock market is at an all time high?
On the surface, this seems great. But in reality, we are actually going through the biggest and scariest economic experiment in history. An experiment which could help bring us into a golden age of a new kind of economy…or it could bring us into a new dark age that the world has never seen before.
In the 7th century in China, copper coins were used as the main currency for chinese merchants. But these merchants at the time, began running into a problem. You see, these coins were quite heavy and many of them could be used for a single transaction, which was quite inconvenient for carrying around a city.
So to combat this problem, Chinese merchants came up with the idea. What if they just deposited these heavy coins with a person or business, and received a piece of paper called, a promissory note, or banknote, in return? That way merchants would not have to carry around large amounts of heavy coins all day, and they can be safely stored at a single location.
And thus the primitive form of paper money was born, and was implemented throughout the currency system in China. After a few centuries of using this type of currency system, the Chinese government noticed something strange.You see, a copper shortage caused the government to issue more of these promissory notes and less copper coins. And during this time, the government saw a massive boost to its economy, allowing for the government to spend more on things like military and infrastructure. So, they ran an economic experiment that would become very important to what we are experiencing today.
The chinese government declared that their new form of paper currency, was considered a public monopoly owned by the government. This allowed the ancient chinese government to completely control its own currency. And for a couple hundred years, the government’s ability to print money on command, and control inflation, worked well.
But little did they know, a global threat was emerging out of central asia, that would change the course of history. A man named Temujin had recently united the Mongol Tribes in the year 1206, and then became known as Genghis Khan. He soon launched the largest military conquest in human history, with his successors eventually taking over China and forming the yuan dynasty in 1271.
During the Yuan Dynasty, the newly formed Chinese/Mongol government wanted to keep spending government money to further fund their conquests. But instead of limiting their spending, or worrying about their government debt, they decided to just manufacture more and more paper money, in order to fund their military campaigns.
They figured that because they were the government and had a public monopoly on its currency, they could do whatever they wanted with little or no repercussions. So they essentially revamped their paper money, turned it into the worlds first fiat currency, and started running their empire on a completely new economic theory.
And for a little while it worked. But after years war in Japan, Vietnam, Burma, and Java, and years of ignoring debt and inflation, the economy of the Yuan Dynasty began to collapse. Inflation rose to 80% in the early 1300’s, their was a severe debt crisis, the population became impoverished within the span of about 5 years, and the government’s theory on how printing money could solve their economic problems came crashing down. And it was this economic downfall combined with the government’s inability to help its people after several natural disasters, that led to the collapse of the yuan dynasty in 1370.
And that brings us to today. You see, as we all know, governments around the world have compiled record levels of debt in order to keep their economies afloat during the pandemic. They have also printed money at not only record levels, but levels that are comparable to that of the yuan dynasty in the early 1300’s.
If it were only that they are stupid
It is not stupidity but a wilful desire to believe the impossible that makes the world turn out as madly as it does.
People do not believe lies because they have to, but because they want to.
When I was on the left, there was nothing I enjoyed more than discussing politics with others, which in a way saw me move to the right, but only eventually. Today, however, no one I know on the left wants to talk politics, because they no longer believe the things they have to believe if they are to remain in good standing with their comrades.
But their determination to believe their fantasies is far more powerful than any argument anyone will ever produce. The evidence of how wrong they are is found at every turn. The effort now is to avoid having to notice just how wrong they are about every one of the idiocies they are made to believe.
Peasants edition
Only peasants wear masks edition
“There is a duty to refuse” Covid-19 vaccines
Archbishop Vigano Denounces The Coronavirus Vaccine: ‘There Is A Duty To Refuse It’, (who is Abp Vigano?), said the following.
“The Note on the morality of using some anti-Covid-19 vaccines was issued last year in the absence of complete data on both the nature of the gene serum and its components,” Vigano writes in his letter to the bishops and others, in which Vigano exposes the faulty “safety and effectiveness of the vaccines,” argues that “the experimental drugs are not vaccines in the proper sense,” and raises alarms about “side effects on pregnant mothers and nursing children.”
“In this case, the health authorities have decided to carry out experimentation on the entire world population, as an exception to the usual practice of the scientific community, international standards, and the laws of individual nations. This means that the entire population finds itself in the condition of being susceptible to suffering the adverse effects of the vaccine, at their own risk, when normally experimentation is done on a voluntary basis and carried out on a limited number of subjects, who are paid to undergo it,” Vigano writes. “…I think it is evident that there are medical treatments without adverse side-effects, even though they have been systematically boycotted by the Health Institutions – WHO, CDC, EMA – and by mainstream media.”
“Having established that the drugs sold as vaccines do not give any significant benefit and on the contrary may cause a very high percentage of deaths or grave pathologies even in subjects for whom Covid does not represent a threat, I do not think that we can conclude that there is any proportionality between the potential damages and the potential benefits. This means therefore that there is a grave moral obligation to refuse inoculation as a possible and proximate cause of permanent damages or death. In the absence of benefits, there is therefore no need to expose oneself to the risks of its administration, but on the contrary there is a duty to refuse it categorically,” Vigano writes.
There’s much more at the link. There is this as well: Abp. Viganò warns US bishops about COVID jab: The Great Reset wants ‘billions of chronically ill people’. This is the subhead for the article.
The silence of so many cardinals and bishops, along with the inconceivable promotion of the vaccination campaign by the Holy See, represents a form of unprecedented complicity that cannot continue any longer.
Not your standard-issue conspiracy theorist.
The toxic avoidance of truth on the left
The article is titled The Ignoble Lie. It begins about the original defence of political lying going back to Socrates and Plato, but what really interested me was this part about vaxxination rates required in dealing with the pandemic.
Take Dr. Anthony Fauci, our point man on the COVID-19 epidemic.
Fauci said he misled the country about mask-wearing during the pandemic by claiming they were of little use. But he argued that he lied in order that the public not make a run on masks, deplete the supply, and thus rob medical professionals of protective equipment.
Fauci also told “noble” lies about the likely percentage of the public needing to be vaccinated to achieve herd immunity. He kept raising the bar—from 60-70 percent to 75-80 percent, to 85 percent.
Apparently, Fauci feared a lower figure, even if accurate, might lull people into complacency about getting inoculated.
If a 60-70 per cent vaxxination rate will do, why worry when we are well passed that rate? Unless there is some other agenda in play, of course.
Take Florida as the example the left tries to avoid talking about (like Sweden). What can the left do with this? Here is the first half of the heading: Florida now has America’s lowest COVID rate.It begins:
Which U.S. state has the lowest COVID-19 rate right now? …
The state with the fewest daily COVID cases per capita is the same one that recently had more than any other: Florida….
During the past two months, Florida’s daily average has plummeted by more than 90 percent, to about 1,700 cases, or eight for every 100,000 residents. That’s roughly half of California’s current COVID rate and less than a quarter of Vermont’s. Hawaii (with nine cases for every 100,000 residents) is the only other state in single digits.
A positive story. Not on the left, it isn’t. Here’s the second half of the heading: “Does Ron DeSantis deserve credit?”
The answer is no.
Bet you knew that was coming. And why not?
According to the New York Times’s David Leonhardt, “Covid has often followed a regular — if mysterious — cycle. In one country after another, the number of new cases has often surged for roughly two months before starting to fall.” And “the Delta variant, despite its intense contagiousness, has followed this pattern.”
Why it hasn’t happened anywhere else is neither here nor there and anyways, more people are dying which is perhaps not that surprising in a state where so many retirees end up living.
My point, though, is that you cannot get an accurate assessment anywhere. I would love to know how dangerous covid is but it is impossible to find out. I do, however, find the following chart of interest. From here.
AND THIS JUST IN: Florida Reaches Lowest Case Rate in the Nation.
“Without mandates or lockdowns, COVID-19 cases in Florida have decreased 90% since August,” said Governor Ron DeSantis. “In addition to cases, hospitalizations have plummeted in our state. This has been accomplished by making monoclonal antibody treatments and vaccines widely available throughout our state while protecting Floridians from government overreach.”
It’s not “pandemic legislation”
There is a “can’t-happen-here” attitude even as it is happening. A just-in story in The Age: New pandemic legislation passes Victorian Parliament’s lower house. The legislation has nothing to do with medical care. It is entirely about Daniel Andrews taking power into his own hands. Here’s the story.
Victoria’s new pandemic laws passed State Parliament’s Labor-controlled lower house on Thursday evening following two days of heated debate in which MPs hurled abuse at one another across the chamber.
Earlier in the day, Premier Daniel Andrews responded to criticism from the president of the Victorian Bar saying the claim by Christopher Blanden, QC, that the government had not properly consulted the barristers’ peak body about the legislation was “factually wrong”.
[The issue is NOT whether there was proper consultation. The issue is whether such legislation should ever be introduced into a free society.]
The government’s proposed pandemic legislation will replace state of emergency powers which expire on December 15, curtailing the chief health officer’s powers, giving the premier the authority to declare a pandemic and the health minister the role of making public health orders.
[And what follows from the Premier declaring a state of emergency? Are these provisions acceptable is the issue.]
The bill passed by 51 votes to 26.
The opposition, many crossbench MPs, and legal groups have raised concerns about various aspects of the legislation, including what they say is a lack of checks and balances on the government’s powers.
[More detail would be welcome.]
Mr Blanden on Wednesday described the proposed laws as “appalling” and claimed the government had “grossly misrepresented” its consultation with the Victorian Bar.
He said the Department of Health officials conducted a 45-minute online meeting with him to discuss the issue of whether the chief health officer should retain the authority to declare a pandemic.
“That’s factually wrong,” Mr Andrews said. “There’s a lot of [online Microsoft Teams] meetings going on at the moment, we’re in a global pandemic. I’m terribly sorry if a Teams meeting wasn’t sufficient, there’s literally hundreds of thousands of Teams meetings.
The upper house will debate the bill in Parliament in three weeks and it is likely to pass with the approval of Samantha Ratnam, Fiona Patten and Andy Meddick, who were involved in the negotiations.
And there you have it. Why are so few people concerned? Why is The Age unconcerned?
Law of Markets 