There is a saying, “Everything happens for a reason.” The fiasco in Afghanistan is no exception to this rule. Even though it is not obvious, the United States is up against energy limits. It needed to pull back from Afghanistan to try to have enough energy to continue in its other roles, such as providing benefits for its growing army of retirees, and building infrastructure to mitigate the COVID-19 downturn.
The fundamental problem is that governments can add debt and other indirect promises of resources that create goods and services, but they cannot actually create the low-cost energy, water and mineral resources needed to fulfill those promises.
The way energy limits play out is not at all intuitive. Most people assume that we will run out of oil, leading to a spike in oil prices. We will then transition to renewables. As I see it, this understanding is completely wrong. Limited energy supply first leads to a need for simplification: Stepping back from Afghanistan would be one such type of simplification. It would save energy supplies and reduce the need for greater tax revenue or added debt.
In this post, I will try to explain some pieces of the problem.
[1] Afghanistan was, and continues to be, in some sense, a “handicapped country.”
Everyone knows that the way a country can succeed in the world market is by providing needed goods or services to other economies at low cost. Afghanistan is a landlocked country. It also doesn’t have any big rivers it can use to transport goods out of the country. It isn’t a member of a trade alliance such as the EU to allow smooth transport of goods out of the country. The difficulty of transit into and out of the country adds a layer of costs that tends to make the country uncompetitive in the world market. No matter how much investment any country makes in Afghanistan, this handicap will still persist.
Also, Afghanistan has too high a population relative to its resources. We know that most wars are resource wars. The fact that Afghanistan has been involved in wars for many years hints at this problem. According to UN 2019 estimates, Afghanistan’s population was 7.8 million in 1950, 21.6 million in 2001, and 38.9 million in 2020, which is about five times the 1950 population. Water needs, in particular, tend to escalate as population rises.
[2] The US doesn’t know how to fight a guerrilla war.
The weapons developed by the US are too complex to be used in a guerrilla war. They tend to break down and require replacement parts. Needless to say, these parts are not available in Afghanistan. Even if Afghan soldiers are trained to use these weapons, they may not be available or suitable when needed.
George W. Bush should have known from the outcome of the 20-year Vietnam conflict (1955-1975) that any guerrilla war was likely to have a bad ending. In Afghanistan, the plan was to train Afghan soldiers, thus keeping US citizens out of the battlefield. This strategy kept the Afghan conflict off the front page of US newspapers, but the overall result seems to be similar.
[3] When George W. Bush took office in 2001, he seems to have had access to more funds than he knew what to do with. Starting a war in Afghanistan probably seemed like a good use for these funds. He could perhaps build military bases, and perhaps raise the standard of living of the people there.
The price of oil was especially low in the 1998 to 2001 period. This allowed tax revenue to “go farther” in providing benefits to the economy, allowing a temporary budget surplus. With such a surplus, getting funds appropriated for any purpose would likely have been easy.
Even more importantly, with a fairly young population, the Social Security system had been collecting funds in advance of when they were needed, with the plan of building up the plan’s Trust Fund for use when a bulge in retirements was expected, starting about 2010. Figure 2 shows one chart that roughly illustrates the overfunding and planned use for the funds. Unfortunately, Figure 2 doesn’t treat investment income in the way it is actually collected; it leaves out past investment income and uses discounted cash flow assumptions for the future, so a person cannot readily estimate net contributions to the Trust Fund balance by year from this chart.
Figure 2 indicates that there was considerable overfunding starting in the late 1980s. The thing that actuaries (and others) didn’t consider is the fact that there is a real difference between debt and the physical resources that will be needed when these older people retire. Retirees will need food, water and energy to heat their homes. They will need medicine and long term care institutions. They should also be able to provide their share of the upkeep of roads and electricity transmission networks.
Debt is a promise of future funds to purchase goods and services, but it doesn’t make the resources required to create these goods and services materialize out of “thin air.” To keep these promises, oil needs to be extracted, refined, and delivered to farmers. There needs to be enough fresh water available to irrigate adequate farmland to produce the required food. There need to be supply lines that are working to deliver the required food. There need to be enough young people who are willing to work on farms and in care centers for the aged. The wages for these young workers need to be high enough so that they too can have food, shelter and other things that we consider necessities.
When the extra Social Security funds were collected, the officials who collected them figured out that as a practical matter, there was little that they could do with them besides spend them at the time they were collected. They couldn’t set up warehouses with food, clothing, building materials and energy resources to keep on hand for 30 or 40 years. If they invested the money in the stock market, the money would simply cause a bubble in stock prices. If they built new factories or nursing homes, they would be unfairly competing with existing businesses.
I am not sure that there is any good record of how these extra funds were spent. My understanding is that they provided a very large slush fund that allowed expanded military activities among other things. From an accounting point of view, non-marketable government debt was substituted for the funds that were spent. Thus, when an actuary looks at the Trust Fund, it is fully funded. It is just that it is funded with more US government debt.
The catch is that the non-marketable US government debt doesn’t actually correspond to any resources. Any food used in 2022 (or 2050) will need to be grown in that year, using resources available in that year. Most clothing used in a given year will need to be produced with resources available at that time. Putting together a model that assumes business as usual forever tends to give a rosy picture because it leaves out this detail.
The 2020 OSDAI Trustees Report provides actual income, outgo, and interest income through 2019. From this report, it can be concluded that the extra Social Security slush fund is rapidly disappearing. In fact, it seems to be turning to a hidden source of required year-by-year funding starting as soon as 2020 or 2021.
In some sense, the “real economy” operates on a “cash basis,” rather than an “accrual basis.” This has not been recognized in our accounting or our models. Ignoring the way the system really works likely leads to a hidden crunch, starting about 2021. We know that retirements were high in 2020, adding to the potential problem. I am certain that President Biden and his advisors are aware of this issue, even though it is never reported on the front pages of newspapers.
[4] There is really a two-sided energy price problem. Consumers can afford only low energy prices but, as the result of depletion and population growth in oil exporting countries, producers need high oil prices.
Figure 3 is a chart I prepared a few years ago. In it, there is a pattern of rapidly rising wages when oil prices were very low. Workers became more productive with new factory equipment and vehicles, produced with oil, and operated using oil products. As a result, their wages rose.
On the other hand, when oil prices spiked, the prices of many goods, including food, airline tickets, and the fuel used for commuting to work, rose. People cut back on discretionary income, such as eating in restaurants and vacation travel. Businesses with fewer customers laid off workers. The workers who could find jobs often found lower-paid or part time jobs. The result was a dip in average wages, both in the 1970s and at the time of the Great Recession of 2007-2009.
We now live in a world with depleted resources. The oil and other types of energy that are available are high in cost, but the prices tend to stay too low for producers when all costs are included. Oil resources from the Middle East and Venezuela, especially, need a higher oil price because the governments of these countries need very high taxes on oil revenue to support their large populations. Even shale oil from the United States needs a higher price than is available today.
If we want OPEC to supply the rest of the world with more oil, the price will need to rise much higher than today’s Brent oil price of about $73. It likely will need to rise to at least $100 per barrel and show that it can stay at this high level. Otherwise, the supposed reserves of OPEC will mostly stay in the ground.
Even the US needs a higher oil price. Its oil, gas and coal production fell during the pandemic in 2020. Through May 2021 (and even later using weekly data, not shown), oil and natural gas production has not rebounded to the 2019 level.
Note that oil and gas production also dipped in 2016. Figure 3 shows that oil prices were also low then. If prices are too low, would-be producers leave them in the ground.
Adding in nuclear and renewables (hydroelectric, ethanol, wood, wind, solar and geothermal) still leaves a large dip in recent production.
President Biden is no doubt aware of the fact that the US’s production of energy products, especially crude oil, is now low. In fact, earlier in August he asked OPEC and its allies to increase their oil production to try to keep prices from rising too much. Why would OPEC want to increase its production, if the US can’t increase its own production at the current price level? All of the producers need a higher price level; it is consumers who cannot afford the higher price level.
[5] The world seems to have already begun shifting to a falling energy consumption per capita situation.
The amount of energy required tends to rise with population because all of the people require food, housing and transportation. Energy, especially oil and coal, are needed for these.
Many countries, including the United States, have been able to hold down their internal energy consumption per capita by moving much of their industry to China and India.
Figure 7 shows that US industrial production reached its peak in 1973, which was shortly after US oil production started to turn down in 1971. This partly reflects auto manufacturing moving to Japan and Europe, where smaller, more fuel-efficient cars were already being sold. Home heating and electricity generation also shifted away from oil to other fuels.
The issue now is that “Ex. Industrial” consumption has been falling since the Great Recession. In some sense, the economy has been losing strength since 2008 and continues to lose strength. Fewer and fewer people can feel like they are really getting ahead. They are saddled with low wage jobs and too much debt.
Figure 8 shows similar patterns for the European Union and Japan. Energy consumption per capita was rising until a few years before the Great Recession, and then it plateaued. It has been declining since.
The pattern shown on Figure 8 suggests that energy prices are still too high for consumers, even though they are, at the same time, too low for producers. Travel restrictions imposed by governments may also be contributing to this pattern.
GDP data indications are prepared on an accrual basis. In other words, they reflect the impact of added debt. If missing energy can be replaced with a promise of debt to pay for more goods and services in the future, made with future energy, then perhaps all will be well. The quantity of debt that is required, relative to the GDP impact, keeps rising, suggesting this substitution is not working very well.
With the addition of growing amounts of debt, GDP increases are reported to be much larger than expected growth, based only on the growth in energy consumption.
[6] We now seem to be reaching the end of the line with respect to what can be done with added debt to make the economy seem like it is performing adequately well.
Interest rates show a very distinct pattern. They rise until about 1981, and then they decline.
When the US economy was growing rapidly, it could withstand high and rising interest rates. Since 1981, the general pattern has been one of falling interest rates, making a larger quantity of debt affordable. Indirectly, these falling interest rates also helped prop up asset prices, such as those of homes and shares of stock. In recent years, interest rates have fallen about as far as they can go. To some extent, these lower rates were made possible by Quantitative Easing (QE). But at some point, QE needs to be stopped.
Today, interest rates are approximately at the level they were during the Great Depression of the 1930s. This makes sense; interest rates to some extent reflect the return an investor can expect to make. Right now, without a lot of government support programs, “Main Street” businesses around the world are struggling. This indicates that the economy is doing very poorly. There are too many people who cannot afford even basic goods and services. Indirectly, this feeds back to commodity prices that are not high enough for producers of energy products.
Recently, governments of many countries have tried a different approach. Instead of loans, they are providing something closer to giveaways. Renters are allowed to stay rent-free in their apartments. Or, checks are given to all citizens earning below some specified amount. What we seem to be finding is that these giveaways produce inflation in the price of goods that poor people buy most frequently, such as food and used cars.
The giveaways don’t actually produce more of the required goods and services, however. Instead, would-be workers decide that they really don’t want to take a low-paid job if the giveaways provide nearly as much income. The loss of workers then acts to reduce production. With lower production of goods and services, a smaller quantity of oil is required, so the oil price tends to fall. The price certainly does not rise to the level needed by oil producers.
[7] In a finite world, longer-term models need to take into account the fact that resources deplete and the population keeps rising.
Any modeler who tries to take into account the fact that resources deplete and the overall population keeps rising will quickly come to the conclusion that, at some point, every economy will have to collapse. This has been known for a very long time. Back in 1957, Admiral Hyman Rickover of the US Navy said,
Surplus energy provides the material foundation for civilized living – a comfortable and tasteful home instead of a bare shelter; attractive clothing instead of mere covering to keep warm; appetizing food instead of anything that suffices to appease hunger. . .
For it is an unpleasant fact that according to our best estimates, total fossil fuel reserves recoverable at not over twice today’s unit cost, are likely to run out at some time between the years 2000 and 2050, if present standards of living and population growth rates are taken into account.
Now, in 2021, it looks as if this problem is starting to hit us. But no one (since Jimmy Carter, who was not re-elected) has dared tell the general public. Instead, accrual accounting with more and more debt is used in financial statements, including GDP statements. Actuaries put together Social Security funding estimates as if the resources to provide the promised benefits will really be there. Climate change models are prepared as if business as usual can go on for the next hundred years. Everything published by the mainstream media is based on the underlying assumption that we will have no problems other than climate change for the next 100 years.
[8] About all that can be done now is to start cutting back on the less necessary parts of the economy.
President Biden’s abrupt pullout from Afghanistan reflects a reality that increasingly has to take place in the world. The US needs to start pulling back because there are too many people and not enough inexpensive to extract resources to fulfill all of the commitments that the US has made. As mentioned earlier, there are a number of obstacles to success in Afghanistan. Thus, it is a good place to start.
With the need to pull back, there is a much higher level of conflict, both within and between countries. The big issue becomes who, or what, is going to be “voted off the island” next. Is it the elderly or the poor; the military or the oversized US medical establishment; university education for a large share of students or classroom teaching for young children?
We don’t seem to have a good way out of our current predicament. This seems to be what is behind all of the recent internet censorship. Renewables and nuclear require fossil fuel energy for their production and maintenance. The powers that be don’t want anyone to know that nearly all of the “happily ever after using renewables” stories we hear are based on wishful thinking.
What does China do with its nuclear waste? I have never seen this discussed.
Too early to run into a big problem?
Bury it in the deserts of Xinjiang, maybe? I’m just guessing.
PS. “Since 1990, the major efforts [at finding nuclear waste disposal sites] have been concentrated on Beishan area, Gansu Province.” (Right next to Xinjiang, also mostly desert.)
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1674775515300159
“We don’t seem to have a good way out of our current predicament. This seems to be what is behind all of the recent internet censorship.”
Hmm, I find it hard to imagine how energy prices going through the roof or blackouts could possibly be censored away.
Blackouts in California and Texas are attributed to “climate change.”
Energy prices don’t really go through the roof because of shortages. This is simply an erroneous belief. Lack of energy affects demand (jobs and how much they pay) as much as it affects supply.
It is the cost of extraction plus the taxes required by governments that goes through the roof. What people can afford becomes a problem. Something collapses. Governments, because of not enough taxes, for example.
The last lorry from the printing press will go to the government.
Maybe I should have said “going through the roof for the consumer”? People who live on the edge have quite low “roofs”.
Anyway, what’s wrong with saying that natgas price in Europe is going through the roof?
https://ycharts.com/indicators/europe_natural_gas_price
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-08-06/the-era-of-cheap-natural-gas-ends-as-prices-surge-by-1-000
First of all, there is so much money in “the markets” that we have long since left the territory of a chart signalling “supply and demand”.
As economists rightfully say, a skyrocketing price shows that demand can not be met by physical limits. As Gail says, the price can not go up until supply is feasible because payment is not feasible for the customers.
In Europe quite a substantial amount of coal and nuclear will go offline this -winter-…
The charts looks to me like some speculaters have boarded the train.
Remember:
In Germany the usual price for electricity is around 3-6 €/MWh.
During hard times it can go up to 140€/MWh.
As we saw in Texas, several companies went bust during excess price swings for “futures contracts” with “unexpected delivery failure” what Gail would address as “cheap credit/or better: speculative success” for future goods and services”.
The chart does not mean anything until it enters the purses of the ordinary customer – in some months time?
Then the money will have to flow. Sorry guys, too late.
By the way, anyone here that has a link for a good final summary of what happened in the Texas energy sector after “the storm” last winter ? Thank you.
left out a 0. Sorry.
30-50. This year around 80€/MWh
No, this isn’t about speculation or one-off weather events. The reasons are explained in the linked Bloomberg article (excerpts):
“The era of cheap natural gas is over, giving way to an age of far more costly energy that will create ripple effects across the global economy.
Natural gas, used to generate electricity and heat homes, was abundant and cheap during much of the last decade amid a boom in supply from the U.S. to Australia. That came crashing to a halt this year as demand drastically outpaced new supply.
With few other options, the world is expected to depend more on cleaner-burning gas as a replacement to coal to help achieve near-term green goals.
The price of gas is more likely to stay elevated over the medium-term and to rise over the longer-term.
While there are several one-off factors that have pushed gas prices higher, such as supply disruptions, the global economic rebound and a lull in new LNG export plants, there is a growing consensus that the world is facing a structural shift, driven by the energy transition.
Utilities in Europe are switching to the cleaner-burning gas due to sky-high carbon prices, South and Southeast Asian governments are planning dozens of new gas-fired plants to meet greater electricity needs, and China is poised to depend more on gas than ever as it seeks to peak coal consumption.”
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-08-06/the-era-of-cheap-natural-gas-ends-as-prices-surge-by-1-000
To summarize, the price of natgas in Europe has steadily risen to 1,000% since May 2020. Which shows that energy prices can go through the roof because of shortages. And yes, it is absolutely going to affect consumers. Here in Slovakia, the price increase for 2022 is expected to be 15–30%.
Regarding the withdrawal from Afghanistan, I’m going with the blunt statement of the Chinese (actually, the author is a retired Marine Corps infantry officer):
“It is quite natural for a gambler to quit and cut their losses when bets and investments go sour. So it was with colonialism, and so it goes again with modern American expeditions as both were and are still fueled by opportunism, not necessity.”
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202108/1231566.shtml
As for the invasion itself, the article “Pipelines to 9/11”, written in 2006, makes a compelling case:
“Short content: This article is about backgrounds of the US war against Afghanistan. It is about oil, gas and pipelines around the Caspian Sea. To transport oil and gas from the east side of the Caspian Sea, pipelines had been planned through Afghanistan. Because a US company, UNOCAL, failed to control the Afghan route, the war was prepared. When the military was ready to strike, the terrorists of 9/11 gave Bush the pretext to start this war and obtain support from Congress, the U.S. population and the rest of the world.
[…]
Conclusion: The Afghan pipelines are only one step in US political moves to take over the influence in the oil and gas rich former Soviet republics. Consuming 25 percent of the world oil consumption, their imperialism is first of all about energy. Today the US already relies for over 60 percent on foreign oil, a percentage that is quickly increasing. The neoconservative ideas to transform the US into a “dominant force” do not come out of nowhere.
The thought that they needed a “catastrophic and catalysing event” was not just motivated by the personal financial benefits several of them get from the war industries. It was also a sign of panic of a nation facing drying up oil wells and preparing itself to conquer foreign oil wells until the last drip is gone.”
http://www.courtfool.info/en_Pipelines_to_9_11.htm
I remember that Afghanistan used to be called “Pipelanistan.” This may have entered into the consideration to take military action against Afghanistan.
Do they actually have any pipelines, though? I know there’s a dozen planned projects…
“Authorities in India’s southern Kerala state are racing to contain an outbreak of the Nipah virus.
“The virus, which is not related to the coronavirus behind the current global pandemic and is far more deadly, killed a 12-year-old boy in Kerala over the weekend, prompting stepped-up efforts to trace his contacts. New infections have been confirmed.”
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/nipah-virus-outbreak-india-kerala/
“For more than a week now, children in some districts in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh have been waking up with a high fever and drenched in sweat…
“Physicians… say many of the patients were taken to hospital with a declining platelet – a blood component which helps form clots – count, which characterises a severe form of dengue.
“The patients, especially children, in hospitals are dying very quickly,” says Dr Neeta Kulshrestha…”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-58387520
“Viruses may exist ‘elsewhere in the universe’, warns scientist…
“Prof Paul Davies suggests viruses may form vital part of ecosystems on other planets.”
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/sep/06/viruses-may-exist-elsewhere-in-the-universe-warns-scientist
I have heard the idea that passing comets may bring virus particles. This is why they were feared by some ancient people.
A little astronomical knowledge is a dangerous thing
Drink deep, lest ye turn into a Velikovsky or a von Daniken
(doesn’t scan, sorry)
Viruses are the cockroaches of the bacterial world. Except to find them wherever life if found.
According to the article,
Based on an earlier comment, maybe ivermectin would be a solution, if it is dengue.
Vaccinating them will save them!
Evidently, this is a disease that jumped from animals to humans, and now is being transmitted among humans. If it shows symptoms and kills quickly, it would seem to be self-limiting.
ZH is rag run by one very unpleasant bulgarian (ex agent of the Bulgarian stasi, knows as DS) but it sometines provides useful news aggregation like the following:
https://www.zerohedge.com/covid-19/massive-foia-release-proves-fauci-funded-wuhan-research-construct-sars-related
Let’s see if this FOIA revelations will find place in the official news cycle.
This is an excerpt:
The funny thing about this story is that it isn’t new. David Martin exposed all of this and much more well over a year ago. It doesn’t take a FOIA request to find out — all of the key information is public record. Talk about lazy and uninformed journalists …
Have a laugh with Marc Faber here (45 min):
https://rumble.com/vm27mf-desperate-money-printing-leads-to-depression-dr.-marc-faber.html
“The Powerful Case Against Covid mRNA Vaccine”
https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2021/09/07/the-powerful-case-against-covid-mrna-vaccine/
In all except the oldest age groups, the share of the hospitalizations among the vaccinated exceeded the share of the population vaccinated. Incredible!
Not at all. Given that the COVID vaccines we have are less than 90% effective against delta, it is absolutely unsurprising. As the proportion of vaccinated individuals in a population approaches 100%, of course you would expect infections, and hospitalizations, in the vaccinated to outnumber the unvaccinated. There simply aren’t enough unvaccinated individuals to infect.
It does mean that this is going to be around for a long time yet.
And, if vaccinations provided ANY protection against infection WHATSOEVER, would you expect the proportion of vaccinated individuals infected or hospitalized to exceed the total proportion of vaccinated individuals in the overall population?
Asking for a friend.
I would have thought even someone who never got farther than agricultural junior-high school could have worked that out.
A good follow-up question would be, why is delta infecting a higher proportion of vaccinated individuals than unvaccinated individuals in almost all age groups?
Those are good questions for mike … he’ll enjoy ignoring them
That’s just what CovIDIOTS do … then they gather in small groups and snicker…
Pingback: AWED NEWSLETTER: From COVID to Climate and Energy to Elections. - Dr. Rich Swier
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“Covid-19 and the structural crises of our time… The pandemic landed on a wobbly financial stage. It hit the world economy hard just when it was still struggling to emerge from the catastrophic 2008 Global Financial Crisis (GFC)…
“…repeating the same monetary policies that were used to fight the last financial crisis is sowing the seeds for the next financial crisis.”
https://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opinion/2177583/covid-19-and-the-structural-crises-of-our-time
“Post-Pandemic Economic Puzzle Widens to ‘Phantom Menace’ Rate…
“The disruption caused by Covid-19 has been so extensive that economists including Kristin Forbes at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are now wondering if one repercussion could be an increase in advanced economies’ neutral level of interest rate — the setting at which growth is neither stimulated nor constricted.
“If that equilibrium point — sometimes called R* — has drifted higher, that would mean central banks’ already ultra-easy monetary policy is looser than generally thought… a policy error could open the door to an enduring bout of inflation.”
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-09-07/post-pandemic-economic-puzzle-widens-to-phantom-menace-rate
Higher interest rates will bring the world economy down, on their own, I am afraid.
“The pandemic landed on a wobbly financial stage.”
So the question becomes, was this all strategic? Because it just creates a perfect scapegoat…i.e. Covid
Right! COVID is an easy scapegoat.
A scapegoat and a trigger.
How fortuitous.
All of this gives rise to what we can call an Event. An Event is a large-scale disturbance, a crisis which calls for a radical and long-lasting response involving different sectors of society—economic, governmental, scientific, technological, and so on. By its nature it thus transforms society, since nothing will be the same afterwards. An Event begins with a Trigger, which may be momentous or, more likely, rather unimportant when taken in itself. For example, World War I, the first major Event of the twentieth century, began with the assassination of an Austrian archduke in Sarajevo by a Yugoslav nationalist.
As soon as the Trigger has occurred, a Narrative begins to be shaped by the official organs of government in collusion with the mass media. Ostensibly the Narrative exists to explain what has happened, but on a deeper level it creates the Event by setting the Trigger in the context of other things that are happening or are presumably going to happen. It exploits the emotions of the public and seeks to direct them in the appropriate direction. Thus the Narrative generally awakens anxiety and pernicious uncertainty in the population, that fear of death and destruction which always lies just below the surface in our world, while at the same time it gives people the feeling of security that the experts are in control of things and, if their instructions are followed, all will be well. So finally, the Narrative leads to a Praxis, a series of things that must be done. Again, this is ostensibly to ward off the dangers of the Event, but in fact their import is largely symbolic: they play the same role as a fetish in so-called primitive religions, defined by the dictionary as “an object believed to have magical powers to protect or aid its owner.” In addition, they create a community of the like-minded, something akin to the true believers in a cult, and by so doing they exclude and stigmatize the recalcitrant.
https://www.celos.ca/wiki/wiki.php?n=BackgroundResearch.BernardLhermitePart1
With breathtaking speed, all the disparate elements coalesced into a new Narrative that was propagated across the world by the mainstream media. Once again, it should be emphasized that this does not necessarily mean that it was crafted by a small group of conspirators behind closed doors. By this time almost all the elements were already at hand in the worldwide medical and scientific establishment, generously funded by wealthy donors with their own agenda: one could almost say that the Narrative wrote itself. And on a more everyday level, beliefs that made the Narrative credible had been circulating among the population for over a century. It is not for nothing that the Covid-19 Narrative closely resembles a blockbuster movie from Hollywood, something along the lines of “The Attack of the Megavirus of Doom.” Again, it was a Big Idea, a monolith prepared over decades whose time had now finally come.
The main lines of that Narrative were fairly simple. Humankind is currently being attacked by a deadly virus that, unless unprecedented measures are taken, will decimate the population of the globe. It has already spread in record time from China to the rest of the world, causing hospitals to overflow and overtaxing the medical resources of many countries. But fear not: courageous researchers are already in the process of developing a remedy. What is essential is to trust the authorities and follow their instructions; then and only then can we defeat this peril.
https://www.celos.ca/wiki/wiki.php?n=BackgroundResearch.BernardLhermitePart2
I think that this analysis is “right on.” It is a narrative that appeals to the Main Street Media. It also appeals to people who are very concerned abut their own health, without thinking much about the bigger picture (longer term health, how the number and adversity of variants will rise).
This is very well observed:
“The transformation of civil society into a flock of compliant sheep occurred so quickly and unexpectedly that it led some commentators to speak of the imposition of a “Chinese model.” Upon closer examination, however, one can see that the seeds of this transformation had already been present and growing in the Western world for a long time. Reliance on so-called experts, disinterest in social questions in favor of a focus on personal comfort and fulfillment, the weakening of social bonds and belief systems that gave meaning to life, an exaggerated need for security and the denial of one’s vulnerability, pressures to conform vastly amplified by an omnipresent communications media, these and other trends turned originally self-reliant men and women concerned with the public good into frightened individuals ready to sell their birthright to anyone claiming to rescue them from potential disasters, however hypothetical. In retrospect, however unbelievable it may once have seemed, contemporary Western society was ready for the imposition of drastic means of control, for what can aptly be termed a soft totalitarianism.”
The Elders have been planning for this for many years… they’d been conditioning the masses for the very situation we are experiencing right now.
Remember on OFW in 2019… we were monitoring the degrading situation … it was one of those what cannot continue will stop … and it was just amazing it hadn’t come apart and resulted in another GFC…. many months of declining industrial production … negative interest …. she was running hot….and smoking….
Then Covid hit.
Anyone who doubts this is a manufactured crisis need look no further than Sweden – no lockdowns – no masks… 30th on the deaths per capita from covid list…. life has been as normal as it would be if a bad flu was circulating…
Are the hospitals overwhelmed? Is it a disaster?
Nope. Life has been normal. And the deaths plummeted once they adopted focused protection.
If the world had followed Sweden this would have been similar to flu season of 2017/18… 650k dead I think (from flu – not with flu)…
It was always about taking a virus and vaccinating for the purpose of creating a super virus.
You do not vaccinate children with an experimental treatment that does not stop them from getting a disease — a disease that is generally no more harmful than a common cold. Period. Unless you are up to no good….
F789 trudough https://twitter.com/i/status/1434768260893978624
Anger and pissed off Plebs on the rise. I love it!
The best part is that Trudeau is a very sensitive person (snowflake)… so he is probably inside the bus toilet crying and whining ‘why don’t they like me?’
“‘Our children are hungry’: economic crisis pushes Afghans to desperation.
“Afghans forced to sell possessions on streets of Mazar-e-Sharif as fragile economy buckles under instability.”
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/sep/07/our-children-are-hungry-economic-crisis-pushes-afghans-to-desperation
“Price rise is driving Delhi’s food vendors to financial collapse – and their customers to hunger.
“Shooting oil prices have made food more expensive. And daily wagers who struggle to find work have less money to spare.”
https://scroll.in/article/1004550/price-rise-is-driving-delhis-food-vendors-to-financial-collapse-and-their-customers-to-hunger
“Sri Lankan Economic Crisis: Food Shortage, Debts And Depreciating Currency… Amidst declining sovereign credit ratings, Sri Lanka has total debt obligations of over $3.6 billion for the current year.”
https://swarajyamag.com/world/sri-lankan-economic-crisis-food-shortage-debts-and-depreciating-currency
“South Sudanese are reeling from fuel shortages and soaring food prices after Kenyan and Ugandan truck drivers went on strike nearly two weeks ago, stifling commerce along the Uganda/South Sudan border.”
https://www.voanews.com/africa/south-sudanese-reel-fuel-and-food-shortages
If only we could get these drivers to Scotland for the veg harvest.
Call me stupid but $68 a barrel does not match with “high price”.
Matches with low income or general low productivity as Gail might put it.
Too many poor people!
many people, and nations, carry the fantasy that living by god’s laws will solve all problems
the streets of Afghanistan give the lie to that.
The christian nutters in Texas want the same thing.
it will lead to the same end
Humans generally are complete nutters. In fact there is nothing ‘sane’ about society. : )
Come the Day of Judgement, Norman, you’ll regret you said that. You’l be stuck in purgatory for ages with Richard Dawkins for company.
well–I hope his conversational level is higher than that of my blow up doll
with any luck that might be higher than you can manage
norm… can you post a photo of your doll?
You know you can have a harem of dolls… none of them will bitch about your infidelity…
The real abortion ban is the high cost of maintaining functional health systems, so look forward to de facto abortion bans across the world.
Whether you perceive people to be ‘nutters’ on the basis of an ethical preference is immaterial if what they’re selling has to happen anyway.
On the other hand, I have always found sincere and kind-hearted Christians and Muslims to be much better people than knee-jerk SNEERING atheists……
And is it really any less absurd or irrational to believe that an experimental drug, promoted and injected by financially and ethically corrupt ‘scientists’ (the priests of the atheists) who then cover up the harm done, will save one’s miserable carcass?
And might we not compare the mass injection of children, knowing that some will die and many be maimed, to the child sacrifices of the most abominable religions?
Exactly, Xabier. My experience is the same, although I am an atheist. During the chaos and irrationality of the last year and one-half, the religious have been among the foremost users of reason and logic, in contrast to many of the supposedly intellectual atheists. I know that if I had to choose to live among only atheists or only the religious, I would choose the latter.
Since my trip to Uzbekistan … the Muslim thing has been intriguing… if I were to get religion 100% Islam…
Norman,
“The christian nutters in Texas want the same thing.”
I find that very offensive as well as lacking in generally accepted capitalization.
Millions of people the world over attempt each year to migrate to Christian nations, perhaps you might consider helping out by balancing that migration in the other direction.
Dennis L.
Very few convert to a religion.
I suspect that they are after the bourgeois lifestyle. And no doubt some come to the West to get away from religion.
I doubt that hardly anyone comes to the West thinking, ‘you know what, I fancy moving to a Christian country.’ It all about the fruits of modern capitalism.
And indeed the more prosperous countries that draw them are more secular anyway. No one really prefers moving to the less developed. Hungary and Poland eg., struggle with demographics.
USA is a bit of an oddity. But I doubt that many Mexicans go to USA for religious reasons. They have high apostasy rates in USA.
Mirror,
My hypothesis would be and is, Christian nations, even nominal ones seem to have a desirable system of governance which works more or less, more than most or at least has historically.
Watched a video last night of some ALWebber music from I believe Royal Albert Hall. The world has lost a great deal of civility and beauty these last years, the English were not perfect, but they produced some great beauty.
Unfortunately the US has become very crude and comparing our screen idols to Christ, well, enough said other than, “Would Christ have made the cover of People? Nah, not enough drugs, sex, etc.
Dennis L.
There is nothing particularly ‘Christian’ about ‘liberal democracy’. Churches have endorsed classical slave empires, for the longest time monarchy and feudalism, and various degrees of liberal democracy; it even fits with CCP. It is a radically otherworldly religion that got adapted by Rome.
It has been argued that northern Europe (and all societies) ‘succeeded’ to the extent that it ditched Christian (gospel) morality and dogmas. There was a long standoff between religion, classical paganism and modern science in the Renaissance and the early modern period. ‘Christianity’ tends to be adapted and a lot of cutting edge theology is basically secular and pluralist these days.
English snobs tend to be pretty extreme and ALW is seen by them as popular rubbish. German culture was always the big thing here, until the massive fallings out in the 20c., which left Britain at a bit of a cultural loss – although it remains the core of the classical repertoire. America is more of an influence these days, which is seen as ‘trashy’ culture and ALW would fall into that ‘Broadway’ bracket.
: )
christianity isn’t worth a cap.
like most religious obsessions, they want to inflict ‘their way’ on everyone else.
strip away most of the evils in the world, and you will find a god behind it somewhere.
the belt buckle of the Werhmacht had ‘Gott mitt unz’. embossed on it.
Is that offensive enough to be going on with?
The mess in the Middle East can be traced back the crusades.
Is that enough offence for you?
Millions of people try to migrate to regions of better prosperity. People of Central America migrate north to another christian nation because their own godspot fouled up. (Catholic–too many kids)
the chaos in much of the world was caused by colonists trying to inflict ‘christian values’ on the lesser nations of the world.
Africa is a basket case–we in Europe are reaping the rewards of centuries of colonisation there (the bible sanctioned it) –now they all want to come here.
god has nothing to do with it. we looted their countries–now it’s payback time.
As the USA goes into terminal decline and collapse, the short term result will be secession of regions. Some of those regions will (not maybe) become theocratic dictatorships..
if you happen to live in one of those regions, god help you.
I hope thats offensive enough for you.
Apart from the Industrial Revolution, Norman, your understanding of history is truly lamentable.
There is no point in wasting much time correcting your errors, which largely arise from your strange obsession with the supposedly unique evils of religion.
Were you fondled by a vicar as a child? Were you beaten by Baptists?
But let’s take one, that the violence of the Middle East results from the Crusades: has it escaped your notice that the Crusaders were soundly beaten and exterminated within a mere 150 years or so? They barely registered.
And in fact when they first arrived, the Islamic Empire was reeling from brutal attacks by Turkic hordes…..
Both before and after that, all the vile history of that region was a self-generated struggle among competing kingdoms and empires.
Stick to thy last, Old Cobbler!
PS Are you going to stand against child abuse by the vaccinators as your last good deed in this wicked world?
I hope so. For there is the true Evil we face in our day.
I reckon norm was abused by the Vicar when he was young … and he still invites Vicars over now…
It’s one of those — he hates to do it and feels dirty afterwards but he can’t help himself — kinda things
The blow up doll collection is an attempt to wean off the Vicar… but it’s just not the same
i only use my blow up doll as an alternative to your barstooling eddy.
the level of intellect goes far deeper, the conversation is more stimulating. No constant repetition of conspiracies, no obsession with being injected with iron filings. (painful)–in fact no obsession with ‘self’ at all.
20th Anniversary of 9/11 tomorrow. She just rolls her glass eyes at the conspiracy thing.
Grown up dolls these days are quite sophisticated really.
Capable of original thinking, able to come up with a point of view that isn’t dependent on any input from anyone else. She isn’t concerned with the mindless parroting of hoaxes and plots. Being ‘not human’, she sees through all that nonsense.
She can even argue just like a real person, she doesn’t just nod and agree with every damn fool comment i come out with.
Most refreshing.
In fact, i’ve taken to letting her open all the links you post eddy, and use her super-brain to check them. I didn’t know sex dolls could laugh so much. I have to keep blowing her up because of it.
Just like having a real person around.
Better in many respects
talking to her recently on the subject of stimulation gave me the insight on why you are called fast eddy .
But we better not go there.
yet.
‘like most religious obsessions, they want to inflict ‘their way’ on everyone else’
Similar to the believers in “The Science” methinks.
Funny how believers come in all shapes; science is a religion to the plebs here in NZ Govt. They are the truth according to our details PM.
https://www.google.com/search?gs_ssp=eJzj4tFP1zcsNjAtK0s3NDBg9JJJysnMS0lNUUiqVChOzkzNS05VSMsvSs1Mz0stAgA0uw7Y&q=blinded+by+science+foreigner&oq=blinded+by+science&aqs=chrome.5.69i57j46i512l2j0i512l2j46i512l2j0i512l3.8680j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
Forgot to add this small snip.
‘What’s in the future, has it just begun
Blinded by science, I’m on the run
I worry ’bout the world that we live in
I’m worried by all the confusion
I wonder ’bout the lies I’ve been reading
I wonder where this madness is leading…’
there are always scientific theories awaiting proof—that is the nature of the beast.
but the basic laws of physics govern ‘established’ science. Not possible to debate it. If you don’t like an established scientific fact, there’s not a lot you can do about it.
Unless of course you are Senator Jim Inhofe
And I quote:
the reason I am not impressed with science and scientists, is because god almighty can overcome those so called facts in the blink of an eye.
No arguing with that is there?
Especially as Inhofe was at the time chair of the senate environment committee.
scientists do not seek to inflict ‘thier way’ on anyone. Unless the scientist is a charlatan.
Truth is truth, opinion is opinion.
If you are discussing covid, the opinions on the vary by as many people whove caught it. They tend to agree though that it can be very nasty–and kill.
Religions are arguably best looked at abstractly – and at a distance.
I doubt that many here would be well suited a theocracy.
‘Get on your knees, do what you are told and stop mouthing off!’
Or maybe some would.
‘Believers gonna believe.’
Whatever. : )
Religions are self-organizing systems. They solve a lot of problems simultaneously. Many give hope for a future life after death.
Religions provide an in-group to belong to, somewhat like relatives do, but without the hereditary aspect. Thus, religious groups form a good way of finding marriage partners that are not biologically related. I know I found my husband at a church that we both attended. Finding partners in this way used to be very common.
We know that resources per capita will run short at some point. In some sense, wars between competing religious groups is a way of solving this problem. If one group wins and the other loses, population and resource use of the losing group will likely fall significantly.
Exactly, Gail: above a certain level of population density groups of humans will becompelled compete violently for resources, religion or no religion.
There is likely some truth to that if ideology is largely a reflection of the self-organising material, dissipative base. And if human evolution has taken the course of a balance between illusion embrace and illusion criticism, then religion does seem to have had the upper hand over free thinking scepticism for most of human history, certainly in pre-late modern energetic, material and social conditions. Indeed criticism of religions rests on its own ideological assumptions, which are liable to be relative in various ways.
Nietzsche argues that all human ‘truth’ is simply what ‘works’ for our species, including ‘metaphysical’ categories like causality, logic and Euclidean space, and certainly ‘morality’. Our ‘truths’ are conditioned by our evolution as this species and what ‘works’ for it, and by material and social conditions. There are only conditioned, functional ‘perspectives’. Of course not everyone has the same perspective, the same interpretation or the same values, meaning and purpose, and they can, and do, come to form competing centres of force that vie for dominance (even wars).
All ‘truth’ is will to power.
Perhaps Biden and others could see the handwriting on the wall with respect to future food supply in Afghanistan.
Gail, great point. Afghanistan is periphery and the US did not want to feed and cloth and heat its people.
Tim Black has an interesting piece on the ‘War on Terror’ as a post-Cold War existential crisis, a counter-productive morality play that proved a catastrophe for everyone touched by it bar the ‘terrorists’ themselves. The whole thing is worth reading.
> The ‘war on terror’ has been a disaster
Since 9/11, Western intervention has unleashed more mayhem than al-Qaeda could ever dream of.
During the 1990s, the US had been struggling with its post-Cold War role. It had become the world’s sole superpower. But without its Soviet rival, and the project of defeating Communism, it lacked a sense of purpose.
Some in America’s foreign-policymaking establishment – including soon-to-be influential figures, like Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz – wanted the US to continue, Cold War-style, to seek out and curtail rival powers. Others, drawn guiltily and excitedly to grandstanding interventions in Sierra Leone and Kosovo, sought to refashion the US-led West as a blue-bereted force for good – a liberal-interventionist power with a ‘responsibility to protect’. All felt that the solution to America’s existential doubt, its want of purpose, was to be found in its actions abroad.
And then 9/11 happened. Washington’s response focused and intensified both liberal interventionism and Cold War-style Manichaeism. Because now the US had a moral, political cause – or, as then vice president Dick Cheney put it in 2002, ‘a single, immediate, global threat that any roomful of experts could agree upon’.
President George W Bush, already surrounded by a hawkish foreign-policy team, was a man transformed. Hitherto he had shown little interest in foreign affairs. Now he could see that it provided America’s post-Cold War elite with something that domestic politics could not – namely, a mission.
Speaking from Washington National Cathedral three days after 9/11, Bush’s rhetoric was messianic – he vowed to ‘rid the world of evil’. Six days later, he gave this dualistic worldview its lasting expression – the US and its allies were to wage ‘a war on terror’. It ‘begins with al-Qaeda’, Bush told the nation, ‘but it does not end there. [The war] will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated.’
Righteous, boundless and interminable – this was war after 9/11. It was not really governed by material concerns and strategic interests. Like the liberal interventionism that informed it, it was a hypermoralised crusade against the abstract forces of ‘evil’ or ‘terror’. It was existential, a means to provide the US-led West with a sense of purpose.
But, as abstract as the war on terror was, it still had to be fought somewhere – this was a performance of Western virtue in need of a stage. And so, from 2001 onwards, the US and its allies toured their morality play around Asia, the Middle East and Africa. They fought actual wars in Afghanistan from 2001 and in Iraq from 2003. They fought proxy wars in Yemen and Somalia from 2001. And, increasingly, they enjoyed risk-averse drone wars everywhere else. Even after the Obama administration started to retire the phrase ‘war on terror’ in 2009, the US continued the performative post-9/11 interventions against evil, first in Libya in 2011 and then, later that year, through a series of proxies in Syria.
The theatres for this performance varied, but the interventions themselves were remarkably similar. They were presented as simple operations – to stop evil people doing evil things. And they were justified by cheerleading pundits with easy moralistic slogans – ‘who will save Iraq?’, ‘we can’t stand by and let innocents in Syria die’, ‘we’re fiddling while Libya burns’, etc.
…. Twenty years on, the lessons are clear. Everywhere touched by post-9/11 interventionism has been plunged into chaos and violent conflict. The very people the West set out to help have been left disempowered and impoverished. Tired of violent instability, some have even begun to miss the dictatorships from which the US ‘liberated’ them….
https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/09/07/the-war-on-terror-has-been-a-disaster/
Our regretful school system. And them journalists coming out of it.
“War on” has always meant “War to steal their stuff”. For at least all of human history.
I can not understand why you can get a highscool grade not knowing this.
Anyways, it still pays some lousy jobs.
Education in the collective west is pure indoctrination and mass serialization of spinelss consumers. Grades and diplomas nowadays are as worthless.
Regarding, ” Everywhere touched by post-9/11 interventionism has been plunged into chaos and violent conflict.”
We really don’t know the purpose of the original interventions. Perhaps they were partly to get more resources for the US. They seem to also have been a way to stimulate the US economy, with funds available at the time. We can’t expect such interventions to work out well for the countries impacted.
There is always the possibility of ulterior motives – and humans tend to be instinctively driven by organic drives – to expand, resist, dominate and assimilate – that tend to compel predictable, aggressive behaviour anyway.
USA had the means to invade pretty much anywhere – and it found ‘reasons’ to do so. How much of it is really ‘conscious’ is anyone’s guess, and ‘morality’ and ‘politics’ may largely be a window-dressing of the mind.
Afaik Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld had a “oil asessment meeting” in 2001.
The report was never released.
A FOIA request here would make some sense to me…
In all cases it fuelled the industrial military complex for quite a while.
Drones and social media were badly required for citizenry control later on.
“‘A train wreck’: Congress faces a daunting September as deadlines pile up.
“Democrats are grappling with how to avert a government shutdown while advancing infrastructure and budget bills at the heart of President Joe Biden’s agenda.”
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/train-wreck-congress-faces-daunting-september-deadlines-pile-n1278565
“Bull run on Wall Street leaves bankers warning over risks of stock market sell-off.
“Analysts are concerned by rising inflation, a fall in consumer sentiment and flattening growth in profits.”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2021/09/06/overheated-markets-poised-pullback-amid-concerns-inflation-flagging/
A person wonders how the economic system can continue with an attempt to substitute growing debt for growing energy consumption per capita.
“Lorry driver shortage: strike threat at two [UK] firms increases supply chain fears.
“The threat of strike action by lorry drivers at two firms supplying the construction industry and convenience stores has raised the prospect of further disruption this autumn amid Britain’s worst supply chain meltdown since the 1970s.”
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2021/sep/06/lorry-driver-shortage-strike-threat-two-firms-supply-chain-fears-tesco-owned-booker-hanson
“UK builders face rising costs as materials and labour shortages bite.
“The cost of building materials and labour “went through the roof” in August as global supply shortages of equipment and staff curtailed expansion in the UK construction sector.”
https://www.ft.com/content/76be7676-879e-4304-95d5-6ae96c1e1507
“Scottish vegetable growers are having to throw away millions of cauliflower and broccoli heads due a shortage of farm workers and lorry drivers.
“Producers predict that problems with lack of labour will only get worse in the run up to Christmas.”
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/labour-shortages-brexit-farmers-b1914304.html
“We [UK] are sleepwalking into a winter energy crisis… a disastrous energy shock cannot be ruled out.
“Britain is in the grip of a natural gas crunch that has triggered a sharp spike in prices, leaving millions of households grappling with soaring bills, and forcing energy-intensive businesses to consider curbing activity.
“The former has the potential to become a massive political crisis, the latter, an economic catastrophe that could derail the fragile recovery.”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2021/09/06/sleepwalking-winter-energy-crisis/
“Food import crisis is looming, warns M&S.
“One of Britain’s biggest retailers has warned of “significant disruption” to food imports from Europe because officials in some EU countries do not work at weekends.”
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/food-import-crisis-is-looming-warns-m-amp-s-gfbm7xvxn
In Spain at least people in the public sector love the ‘puente’ or ‘bridge’: a Friday-Monday holiday that they try to turn into Thursday-Tuesday.
On the one hand, I fully understand it (viva la siesta!): on the other, they are outrageously lazy bastards.
They like to call it, of course, ‘work-life balance’…..
Shelves are still very full here, except for my favourite junk potato snack which has vanished, and I have chorizo (no refrigeration needed) to last until next Spring, so bring on the Apocalypse!
A Basque with a chorizo in his hand – and an axe in the other – is unbeatable!
“A Basque with a chorizo in his hand – and an axe in the other…”
An unnerving proposition, Xabier. 😆
I’m aware of longer wait-times for some internet orders and costs creeping up for various goods but so far, touch wood, these supply-chain issues are not having a significant impact on my life. I’m still unclear as to how much of this is the usual media hyperbole tbh.
“UK builders face rising costs as materials and labour shortages bite.”
Good, the destruction of the countryside for the expansion of capital will only be slowed by market failure. The environmental heritage of milliennia is being concreted over to maintain a decrepit ‘mature’ capitalist economy.
I gave up caring some years back – it really is not worth the stress. The ‘right’ cares only about capital expansion through constant market and labour expansion, and the ‘left’ cares only about ‘homes for all’ – and they all pose as ‘green’.
Politics in bourgeois Britain is a complete waste of time, and it is best to leave them to it – ‘caring’ is a complete mistake in this country. Late capitalism has its own destructive constructive ‘logic’.
It will fall when it falls
It is getting things done that is the problem. Everyone needs to chill out, drop the chaos and stop trashing the place. : )
It is just about autumn again here – not that anyone is going to be chilling, the usual grim insanity of everyday life will only accelerate for most people.
At present, the son of one of the richest men in Britain is getting student work experience sitting in a cab with a lorry driver.
The owner of the logistics firm makes all new recruits do this, to see the reality of trucking.
The biggest gripe of the driver (apart from abysmal pay) has been the fact that Polish drivers left the UK en masse, and were replaced by Bulgarians – it takes only 3 weeks to get a licence there (and bribes?) and they are therefore very dangerous drivers it seems.
Perhaps this was one of those lethal Bulgarians: “Three ferry staff members had a lucky escape when the kiosk they were working in was flattened by a passing HGV.
“Passengers and other staff members rushed to help when the lorry struck the kiosk at Town Quay in Southampton shortly before 13:00 BST.”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-58467000
It might be, Sir Harry.
A regular courier here is Bulgarian, Istvan by name: he has a ferocious and magnificent beard, but I can’t vouch for his driving.
Re chorizos, I must quote my favourite passage from the erotic stories of Anais Nin.
You must imagine a lonely young lady in 1930’s Paris, sitting in a bed-sit and feeling in need of some love.
‘There was a knock at the door. She opened it: it was The Basque.
‘I heard you needed a real man!’ ‘
That’s where the dialogue ends……..
Shortages seem to show up as broken supply lines. These shortages can be shortages of workers because they don’t want to work at low wages.
“Wastewater plants have been told by the government they may dispose of sewage not fully treated due to a shortage of chemicals caused by the lorry driver crisis.”
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9966911/Supply-chain-chaos-causes-stink-Government-eases-rules-dumping-waste-rivers.html
What problems could under-treated sewage possibly cause?
just another crack in the sequence of falling apart
Cholera in England, I blame the vid.
Just burry it with the spent fuel…
22 gold objects, dating from the sixth century, were discovered by an amateur archaeologist near the town of Jelling.
According to the Vejle Museum, where the horde is due to be displayed, Ole Ginnerup Schytz had just acquired a metal detector and was walking the fields when he came across the gold.
Jelling is considered by historians to be the cradle of Viking-age kings between the 8th and 12th centuries.
The treasure, which weighs just under a kilogram, includes a medallion the size of a saucer.
One piece represents the Roman emperor Constantine from the early 4th century.
“It is the symbolism represented on these objects that makes them unique, more than the quantity found,” said Ravn.
According to initial examinations, the treasure could have been deposited as an offering to the gods at a chaotic time when the climate in northern Europe was turned upside down, after a volcanic eruption in Iceland covered the sky with ash in the year 536.
The treasure will be on display at the museum in Vejle from February
https://www.euronews.com/2021/09/06/enormous-treasure-trove-of-sixth-century-gold-found-in-denmark
Wonder what we all will bury in our attempt to save our wealth 🤑 of BAU
I feel like burying a small bag of gold coins, with a tablet inscribed in many languages, plus Klingon, reading:
‘No, I didn’t ever expect to reclaim this – enjoy!’
“One of the world’s largest port and terminal operators has warned the global shipping and supply chain crisis that is leaving shelves empty on the high street can be resolved only by a slowdown in consumer demand…
““We need to work out how we break this vicious circle,” said the boss of APM, the ports and terminal division of the world’s biggest shipping group…”
https://www.ft.com/content/747be2c8-7ee8-4ec3-9725-a2fdbebc937d
“Major automakers fear the global chip shortage could persist for some time.
“Car manufacturers including Ford, Volkswagen and Daimler are still struggling to deal with the impact of the global chip shortage, with executives from each of the companies warning a lack of silicon is likely to remain a problem.”
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/09/06/vw-ford-daimler-fear-chip-shortage-could-persist-for-some-time.html
Some time = permanently?
Perhaps the solution is to find some excuse to keep people at home, to make the goods and services that are available “stretch further.”
but if much of humankind stays home
the economic bike is left leaning against the wall, rusting away
Pingback: Energy and Environmental Review: September 7, 2021 – Climate- Science.press
For those of you who suspect that global warming hysteria may be just as manufactured as COVID hysteria, this guy is a good read: https://electroverse.net
In brief he asserts sun and (real, undoctored) climate data says we’re heading into a Maunder minimum i.e. a (potentially very) cold period. Yes humans have stuffed the ecosphere, but the sun is still the primary driver of temperature.
If you enjoy annoying sheeple with COVID/vaccine truths, this is another theme you can get them worked up with.
And the preppers better get out there and chop more firewood.
Ski hills open in QT tomorrow as we drop a lockdown level:
– Masks or face coverings are mandatory across the ski area as well as on lifts, ski busses and shuttles.
It’s going to need to be a stellar blue sky perfect day for me to haul ass up that hill….
normdunc…..
Australia – regular cycle of vaccination and revaccination … hahahahaahahahahahahahahahahahahahaahahahahahahaha
https://twitter.com/i/status/1432161229179539460
https://summit.news/2021/09/06/dr-chant-covid-will-be-with-us-forever-people-will-have-to-get-used-to-endless-booster-vaccines/
Damn, Tony Fauci isn’t that ruthless and the Aussies will probably just suck it up until they hit the breaking point. That’s how revolutions usually start.
I suspect that will fail…. the CovIDIOTS are a big majority … and if any protesters turn to violence the military would enter the picture and shoot to kill….
Professional soldiers against amateurs who will have no community support — anyone who dares to help them will be arrested for supporting terrorism….
The only way this changes is if the military turns against the government.
warned you before about those stuck h and a keys
‘stuck’? The only one who is stuck is you norm… and you’ll be getting stuck every few months…
Along with mike and dunc of course…
Kate Nicholls, the chief executive of Hospitality U.K., said the Government would open itself to legal action if it excluded theatres where people mixed but required it in other smaller live venues. “It’s potentially discriminatory against a younger age demographic and an industry sector,” she said.
Hugh Osmond, the founder of Punch Taverns, has already threatened legal action against the Government over vaccine passports for nightclubs as discriminatory against the young.
Ms. Nicholls warned it could cut customers by 20%. “There is a significant proportion of people who don’t want to use passports or are not vaccinated. It has settled at 20% in France. We expect something similar here,” she said.
She added: “It will also add administrative costs for part of the industry which is already facing an uphill battle of getting back. This would be a further nail in the coffin of returning for many venues.”
Michael Kill, of the Night Time Industries Association, said the plans had already started deterring people with ticket sales from the end of September “flatlining”. “We are seeing a lot of pushback from people who don’t want to come and have to show their health status on entry,” he said.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/09/05/vaccine-passports-theatres-will-nail-coffin/
Children and young people aged 12 years and over who are household contacts of persons (adults or children) who are immunosuppressed should be offered 2 doses of Pfizer-BNT162b2 vaccine on the understanding that the main benefits from vaccination are related to the potential for indirect protection of their household contact who is immunosuppressed. The offer of vaccination may help to alleviate stress and anxiety experienced by the children and young people living in these difficult circumstances. This advice is provided recognising that persons who are immunosuppressed are at higher risk of serious disease from COVID-19 and may not generate a full immune response to vaccination themselves[footnote 10].
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/jcvi-statement-august-2021-covid-19-vaccination-of-children-and-young-people-aged-12-to-17-years/jcvi-statement-on-covid-19-vaccination-of-children-and-young-people-aged-12-to-17-years-4-august-2021
Did they not get the memo that the Injections do NOT stop people from contracting or infecting others with covid?
Government policy in the UK has long ago lost all contact with reason and scientific method – we know why, no mystery.
How kind of them to want to relieve the stress of those poor children, they are all heart!
And I’m sure Norman and his ilk will be deeply touched by their sacrifice for him (they will certainly be injured and some will die) and all those who only have just a few years, or even months, of life expectancy in any case.
Drumming it into the young that they could ‘kill granny’ will lead many to get injected, even in defiance o parents, and the goverment is encouraging that.
As Norman would say, ‘beneath contempt’ – although he only abuses sane people with those words.
Imagine having to fear that teachers and school admins will try to convince them to be injected…
‘Hey little girl… do you want some candy? … come over here behind the curtain … and I’ll give you some … candy’….. beyond creepy.
When does a teacher target the wrong kid… the one with the parent who is the type who might seek revenge? I am thinking… if a teacher vaccine rapes a child … and something unfortunate happens to that teacher… that will Make My Day.
Omar’s got another excellent article up … he’s not aware of the CEP… but that’s ok… this is a great read:
COVID Bosh: The Illicit and the Desperate
The lies are growing more desperate. Now more than ever, we have to cleave to what we can best discern and know to most likely, rationally, be the case.
Questions I’ve been asked, answers I’ve sought to offer.
How ‘remarkable’ truly is the COVID-19 narrative?
Governments deceiving their people with half-truths and distortions is par for the course. Those WMDs still beckon from their illusory lair. The devastating cost, futility and denouement of Afghanistan shrieks at us. But war and peace are woven in the fabric of our national narratives.
The “announcement” of a rare pathogen requiring the suspension of life as we know it, on no real data, and the stern, almost reflexive, stifling of any recommendations that seek to educate us away from raw panic, are a curious brew.
What is remarkable is not so much the deception, but that far from the inculcated “majesty” of war and peace, and all the iconic stirrings of national identity, we were sent cowering away, over what has been akin to a medium impact influenza strain.
And a pathogen, that within months we knew objectively was only of real danger for those above 65 with chronic illnesses. For the rest, 99%+ recovered. These stats methinks, do not seem to portray “apocalypse.” But the unrelenting media manic panic bombardment, and the whole paraphernalia of COVID conceit and deceit, unseated our reason, unnerved us to a degree that, given the mildness of evident facts, was “remarkable.”
Are we really that gullible as a society?
More https://www.headsupster.com/forumthread?shortId=68
“Are we really that gullible as a society?”
Beyond gullible.
Electric cars are all BS …here’s why
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_9fFArZ-nU
Try replacing the battery in one…
I am attempting to watch a Biophysical Economics conference today. I will be giving a Zoom presentation this afternoon. (Doing two things at once.)
What reminded me is the fact the Roger Baker gave a presentation on the non-feasibility of a shift to electric cars this morning. There are many ways of showing the non-feasibility.
The preprint runs 26 pages and includes 56 footnotes. I am no expert on the structure and function of heart cells, but as far as I can tell it appears meticulously documented. And it paints a troubling picture: specialized blood vessel cells called pericytes have receptors called CD147s. The novel coronavirus itself (Sars-Cov-2) cannot attack these CD147s and damage the pericyte cells, potentially leading to clotting and heart attacks.
Taken together, the papers provide at least a potential avenue through which the vaccines may cause myocarditis and other heart damage – spike proteins may be leaking into the blood after vaccinations and then damaging these crucial cells.
https://alexberenson.substack.com/p/pay-no-attention-to-the-spike-proteins
No wonder!
Doctors advise against intensive sport after Covid vaccination https://www.headsupster.com/forumthread?shortId=60
norm … take it easy on the deadlifts…
BAU gets nuttier and wacky..
The former Walmart executive last week unveiled plans for Telosa, a sustainable metropolis that he hopes to create, from scratch, in the American desert. The ambitious 150,000-acre proposal promises eco-friendly architecture, sustainable energy production and a purportedly drought-resistant water system. A so-called “15-minute city design” will allow residents to access their workplaces, schools and amenities within a quarter-hour commute of their homes.
Although planners are still scouting for locations, possible targets include Nevada, Utah, Idaho, Arizona, Texas and the Appalachian region, according to the project’s official website.
Architecture
Plans for $400-billion new city in the American desert unveiled
https://www.cnn.com/style/amp/telosa-marc-lore-blake-ingels-new-city/index.html
Wonder if it’s next door to the Biosphere.???
The idea is admirable but building a city in a place with no water is a non starter.
Maybe he is aware of humans who can live without water. Also, without food grown with water.
Despite 95% vaccination rate, Cornell today has 5 times more COVID cases than it did this time last year
Cornell University has aggressively pushed its students to get vaccinated, announcing a vaccine mandate for the 2021-22 academic year in April and frequently denying religious and medical exemptions.
As a result, 95 percent of the campus population, both students and faculty, is vaccinated.
Despite this, Cornell University has more than five times the amount of confirmed positive cases during its first week of this academic year than it did during its first week of the 2020-21 academic year, according to the Cornell COVID dashboard.
By the numbers, during the first week of school that ran from Aug. 27 to Sept. 2 of this academic year, Cornell reported 322 positive COVID-19 cases.
In comparison, during the first week of school last year, which ran from Sept. 3 through Sept. 9 of 2020, Cornell reported 59 positive COVID-19 cases.
That is 263 more cases, or more than five times the amount of positive cases, when comparing the first week of school.
Most students attended in-person classes in the fall of 2020 and were required to wear masks, just like this academic year. The increase in positive cases cannot be attributed to an increase in testing — in fact, more tests were administered in the first week last fall, according to the Cornell COVID dashboard.
More https://www.headsupster.com/forumthread?shortId=67
Really strange! I would like to see a link to the original article, however.
Once this information starts getting around, the push toward vaccinating everyone goes away.
https://www.thecollegefix.com/despite-95-vaccination-rate-cornell-today-has-five-times-more-covid-cases-than-it-did-this-time-last-year/
I would like to see major publications publishing articles along this line.
https://cornellsun.com/2021/09/06/as-cornell-reports-record-cases-students-miss-first-classes-bear-burdens-of-covid-policies/
Too little too late… the suckers are jabbed….
Cornell clearly hadn’t planned for all of the sick students, despite the required vaccinations.
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Hey mike… did someone get the context wrong? Can you find a retraction?
A Covid-19 outbreak in a Massachusetts county in July primarily occurred among vaccinated people, sparking fears that a variant of the virus can impact that population more than other strains.
Of the 469 cases detected in Barnstable County, 74 per cent occurred among the fully vaccinated, according to a new study published by the CDC on 30 July. It also emerged last month that 49 fully vaccinated people in New Jersey died of coronavirus.
https://spectator.com.au/2021/08/most-covid-patients-at-israeli-hospital-fully-vaccinated-what-does-this-mean-for-australia/
And then there is this…. who got vaxxed first? Ahhhhh…. the older folks…. who’s in the hospital now? ahhhhhh…. the older folks… norm… be careful!!!
Vaxxed Over Age 50 at Increased Risk for Serious Infection
Data from the U.K. show a similar trend among those over the age of 50. In this age group, partially and fully “vaccinated” people account for 68% of hospitalizations and 70% of COVID deaths.12
https://media.mercola.com/ImageServer/public/2021/August/covid-19-delta-variant-hospital-admission-and-death-in-england.jpg
Out of context as well?
Notice how mike doesn’t respond … that’s because he’s lying in a ditch with his pea leaking out of his skull… once he puts it back in and recovers… he’ll return to post more nonsense….
How many times does one have to be proved wrong before one says … hmmmm… I’m actually kinda stoooopid…
That one was tough … really tough…. even Einstein would have trouble with that one….
Let’s try another…. it is acknowledged that the vaccine does not stop you from getting and passing covid…. in fact looking at the record infection rate in Israel it appears that the injected are actually more susceptible to contracting covid….
What is the purpose of the vaccine passports?
Vaccine passports = registration for the execution chamber.
The objective is to make people enter in a new system which will give you permission or not to make normal things.
They will progressively add various options until they will link it to your credit card and other personal badges.
If you will be considered not complying to the rules you will be switched off from society.
Vaccine passports are like a wonderful, inviting and (till now) forbidden cream cake for a greedy child.
Biden says jabs are safe.. including for kiddies https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2021-05-12/biden-says-vaccine-is-safe-for-kids-children-12-15-video
In 1976, after the death of a US army recruit triggered fears of a repeat of the deadly 1918 pandemic, around 48 million Americans were given a swine flu vaccine. Of these, 532 developed Guillain-Barré syndrome, a paralytic condition caused by rogue antibodies attacking nerve cells. Most people recover from Guillain-Barré, but not all; 25 died after 1976 and others suffered lasting damage.
https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18014-swine-flu-myth-the-vaccine-isnt-safe-it-has-been-rushed-through-tests-and-the-last-time-there-was-a-swine-flu-scare-the-vaccine-hurt-people-why-take-the-risk-to-prevent-mild-flu/#ixzz75ke3TB9E
The Swine Flu vax has permanently halted after 48 deaths were reported…
Punchline https://www.openvaers.com/covid-data
“The Swine Flu vax has permanently halted after 48 deaths were reported”
That’s the thing NO one dares bring up anymore. We are at what close to a million injuries and or severe adverse reactions along with possibly 12K related deaths? Different times.
A glimmer of light… the CovIDIOT actually looked at the VAERS report … then did a fact check (as MOREONS do) and came up with this https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-vaers-12000-idUSL1N2P21DB
Fast pointed out what exactly VAERS is and that historically if there are plenty of reports the CDC FDA will halt a vaccine pending further investigation … as they did with swine flu after 48 deaths in 50M injected….
Yet in spite of 14,000 reported covid deaths… the CDC and MSM and Biden are showing no concern… instead they squeal… ‘it’s safe – get the jab’….
The Pea is Processing that….
Most Peas will not have Fast Eddy to lead them … so they will be clamouring for Boosters…
Stay tuned for more updates as Fast Eddy tries to extract a man from the Covid Cult!
In Lebanon, the only school for autistic people goes out of business https://www.lorientlejour.com/article/1273881/la-seule-ecole-pour-autistes-met-la-cle-sous-la-porte.html
the periphery goes first
I would agree.
And look at what Fast Eddy has dragged out of the bush …
Fauci: ‘Dramatic Data’ From Israel Support COVID-19 Boosters
— Cites “rather substantial positive impact” of a booster dose
WASHINGTON — COVID booster shots are showing good efficacy in Israel, Anthony Fauci, MD, chief medical advisor to President Biden, said Thursday at a briefing held by the White House COVID-19 Response Team.
Researchers have found that, even with the country’s very high vaccination rate, “we see new PCR-positive infections and new severe COVID cases in fully vaccinated people during the Delta wave in Israel from June 1 up to August 1. So clearly, Delta is dominant, and is responsible for new cases, including severe disease,” said Fauci, who is also director of the NIAID.
“And after 14 to 20 days, a 70% to 84% reduction in the risk of infection. There is no doubt from the dramatic data from the Israeli study that the boosts that are being now done there and contemplated here, support very strongly the rationale for such an approach.”
“I’d hope the countries that are boosting their population similar to what we are understand the importance of the global necessity to essentially suppress this at a global level,” Fauci said.
https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/covid19vaccine/94344
To summarize… Injected CovIDIOTS are getting severe covid… but the Boosters are blunting the disease…
Or in other words… the vaccines are doing exactly what was expected… they slap covid in the face… covid is slightly staggered… thinks about what just happened… then lashes out with a right hand at the vaccine… the response is another harder slap in the face of covid….
Covid will be staggered again … but not for long … he’s in a dog fight now… and he’s ready… he responds with a kick in the face…. the next Booster is a harder slap still… Covid replies with by stabbing back with a knife… another Booster.. another hard slap… covid has had enough… he pulls out an AK47 … and empties out a full clip… then another … and another….
https://videopress.com/v/p8r7ebpy?fbclid=IwAR0QxovRu1JdwTdsBOHBbxn9qx59fFbbAIwx5YGfU1s43Er96NIVFHmPA_E
A fun info cartoon graphic I thought.
Some discussion of Injection contents.
I’ve got a CovIDIOT on the line with this Israel Bombshell…
First he says it’s fake news… then I shoot over the other link … and a few others…
He still insists vaxxed are not getting ill in big numbers… they are a fraction … supported by a Boston Globe op-ed that says basically that….
So I mention:
A Covid-19 outbreak in a Massachusetts county in July primarily occurred among vaccinated people, sparking fears that a variant of the virus can impact that population more than other strains.
Of the 469 cases detected in Barnstable County, 74 per cent occurred among the fully vaccinated, according to a new study published by the CDC on 30 July. It also emerged last month that 49 fully vaccinated people in New Jersey died of coronavirus.
https://spectator.com.au/2021/08/most-covid-patients-at-israeli-hospital-fully-vaccinated-what-does-this-mean-for-australia/
No further comment … then he says — you have to stop telling people the vaccines are dangerous…
I ask him to contact the CDC and shut this site down cuz it’s a CDC FDA joint effort https://www.openvaers.com/covid-data
He calls it a ‘crank site’….
Oh I see the CDC is a crank organization … yet you followed their advice and put an experiment into your good self….
But I can see where you are coming from — the same guys who told everyone they couldn’t get covid if they jabbed… haha… ya they are a bit of a joke…. I guess…
No reply to that… there is the possibility that this communication is going to go end … people do not take kindly to being exposed as MOREONS
Let’s analyse what is happing in the Pea Brains…. they will continue to deny the developing situation ….but the MSM is gonna run with this … because…. they want the CovIDIOTS to be scared…. they want them terrified…
Yes the vaccines don’t stop you from getting covid or severe illness… never mind that we told you they would…. we can’t be negative in this time of crisis… we need to reach out to the CDC and Pharma to help us past this obstacle…
Then… they are going to run a deluge of stories — it’s like the flu — you have to get a booster each year…. the only difference is you might have to get one every few months…. don’t worry – it’s tested and safe….
And the CovIDIOTS will be high-fiving … they’ll be like parrots repeating ‘did you hear – it’s like a flu shot — no big deal … just get another shot every few months… ‘ …. ‘did you hear – it’s like a flu shot — no big deal … just another shot every few months’
Not the slightest suspicion that the shots are causing the more powerful variants… Booster Good! Booster Good!
I am saddened and ashamed to share DNA with these MOREONS…. I welcome the End Game… because I know that all the CovIDIOTS MOREONS GREEN GROUPIES and DelusSTANIS… will be exterminated…
They’re dying words will be Booster Good! Booster Good! More Booster! More….
I interrupted a CovIDIOT with that Israeli story … the CovIDIOT replies… ‘not true’… so instead of a screen shot I send the actual twitter video… and along with this
Most Covid patients at Israeli hospital fully vaccinated? What does this mean for Australia?
https://spectator.com.au/2021/08/most-covid-patients-at-israeli-hospital-fully-vaccinated-what-does-this-mean-for-australia/
So far… silence….
The PR Team has officially sprung the CovIDIOT Trap
It goes like this…
They told the CovIDIOTS they’d conjured up a vaccine in less than a year… and thoroughly tested it.
The frightened the CovIDIOTS to the extent that their feeble Pea Brains (that believe we’ve been to the moon and that solar panels and EVs will save the planet — oh .. and recycling too!) bought into this very obvious Bull Shit.
The CovIDIOTS flocked to the drive throughs around the world and waiting in epic queues for Salvation to be Injected into their shoulders… not once … but twice…
AND so pleased with themselves were they that they loaded post injection photos (well those that didnt fall to the floor shivering and convulsing vomiting blood)…. to their social media … vaxxies!
Then after a few months the PR Team informed them that no — the vaccine does not stop them from getting or passing covid… BUT we’ll all still need passports because… (leave it their imaginations I guess… Imagine There’s No Covid.. It’s Easy if Your Inject… or something like that)…
The CovIDIOTS should be alarmed.. because the vaccines were thoroughly tested… they were supposed to stop them from getting covid….
But before the Pea Brains can register than they’ve been f789ed over… the PR Team tells them to think that ‘well the vaccines still stop serious illness and death’
And the CovIDIOTS rejoice like a punch drunk boxers who can barely string a few words into a sentence… hurrah hurrah who cares if I can get Covid – so long as I don’t go to hospital and get hooked up to The Ventilator Machine!
Then a few weeks later the PR team drops this https://twitter.com/bryanvilleneuve/status/1429112778489483268
The CovIDIOTS are now in distress…. for all of 2.38797 seconds… because they get to the no problemo part where Faustian Fauci proffers the Deal with the Devil …. just get the Boosters!
Aha…. the CovIDIOTS rejoice… because the Boosters – like the initial jabs are ‘completely safe and thoroughly tested’….
And they fire up the car and get back in the drive through queue… and they post their vaxxies… and attrition kills and maims more of them…. and CNN says side effects are rare… and their are legions of CovIDIOTS so nobody notices…
And that’s how you get billions of MOREONS… to commit Extinction!
“An analysis of over 2 million comments on the subreddit r/conspir*** found that while only 5 % of posters exhibited conspiratorial thinking, they were responsible for 64 % of all comments. The most active author wrote 896,337 words, twice the length of the Lord of the Rings trilogy!”
–Stephan Lendanowsky and John Cook, “The Conspir*** Theory Handbook”
IC is going to completely melt down and we can’t do a thing about it.. so some of us communicate that eventuality with proper etiquette and terminology while others become a dark night or a wounded bird and prefer a midnight pool hall over a toast masters meeting hoping to test wits, draw out or throw pie in the badees faces. One of my favorite quotes by Shaw is a good suggestion for these troubling times.. “If You Want To Tell People the Truth, You’d Better Make Them Laugh or They’ll Kill You.” I’m convinced by normie viewpoints on collapse/peak FF as much as I am entertained and educated by the the plausibility of Covid-19 as a trojan horse for creating a new world order with managed economic contraction and humane depopulation. We are All in the Family. Best Wishes on this journey!
That’s the beauty of telling truths online ….they don’t know where you are so they can’t kill you…. and even if anyone wants to come to NZ to kill Fast Eddy ….. they ain’t allowed in!!!
And if they are somehow able to overcome that … Fast Eddy has many ‘little friends’ waiting for them … from his prepper delusional days
https://seriepolis.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/ali-g.jpg
Boris Johnson’s biggest lie about Europe is finally coming home to roost.
From plummeting trade to drastic shortages of workers, needlessly leaving the single market has been disastrous.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/sep/06/boris-johnsons-biggest-lie-europe-coming-home-single-market
===========
[ I agree with the article. I was horrified when Boris trumpeted that he intended to execute a “hard Brexit”. We, the UK, left the European single market without any substitute in place. At a stroke, UK and European businesses and clients were required to fill in masses of forms in order to trade. Anybody who has worked in business knows that excess bureaucracy is poisonous. It slows you down massively, is highly costly and kills efficiency. Apparently Boris and Gove did not know this, despite both being middle-aged.
Also, the single market was one of Mrs. Thatcher’s few unequivocal achievements. Any Conservative must and should know that. The crisis of shortages in the UK is just beginning. I hope that Boris will execute one of his prompt U-turns, show a bit of English pragmatism, and beg to be allowed back into the single market – if the Europeans will allow it. ]
https://twitter.com/bryanvilleneuve/status/1429112778489483268
That’s surely an OMG moment for a CovIDIOT.
Come on fellas…. think of Fast Eddy has your High Priest…. you can confess your Injection Sins to the Great Poobah….
What Fast Eddy cannot do … is save you from Hell….
Now you need to haul out the abacus and do the numbers…. are the risks higher of taking the booster(s) … or of contracting covid and dying after a relaxing stay in the ICU with pure oxygen being pumped into your failing respiratory system?
Seems that the ‘95%’ claim that dunc was trumpeting on here happened ages ago … but it was probably only about a month or so … time flies…dusn’t it!
Water under the bridge… water under the bridge… much ado about nothing… tempest in a tea cup that….
Now we are into the Nitty Gritty … the Life and Death …. The Real Deal…
As the Grand Poobah of Covid Fast Eddy recommends that you avoid the Booster and that you lock yourselves in air tight roofs that are triple sanitized…. have no contact with anyone (particularly your grand kids and anyone who has been Injected)…. make sure the room is big enough to stockpile plenty of canned food…
Then wait….
Sound the trumpets…. Bang the Gongs…. the stampeding chariot tramples the disabled Olympic ‘volleyball’ team as they vainly try to slither out of the way….
The horses snort as they come to a halt in the Thunder Dome….
Silence… Fast Eddy has an IMPORTANT announcement:
According to Dr Kobi Haviv, Director of Herzog Hospital in Jerusalem, fully vaccinated people account for 85-90 percent of hospitalizations at his institution. Given that less than that percentage of the Israeli population is fully vaccinated, it would seem that vaccination not only does not prevent you from contracting the disease, but may actually increase one’s chances of becoming a serious Covid case.
More towards the bottom of this page https://www.headsupster.com/forumthread?shortId=62
noooorrmmmmm dunnnncccc… where art thou fellas? What sayeth thou to this dothvelopment?
Fast Eddy hops back into the chariot and roars off back to the palace…. tally ho….
Never change FE 😂
Maybe Herzog Hospital is in a region where almost everyone is fully vaccinated. The official dashboard shows a different picture. 58% (388) of seriously ill patients in hospital are unvaccinated.
The government wouldn’t make stuff up would they?
Like they made up the story that if you get injected you won’t get covid?
I very much doubt that Dr Kobi Haviv said what he is reported to have said, or it has been taken out of context, judging from his comments in various facebook posts.
Can you understand Hebrew?
https://twitter.com/bryanvilleneuve/status/1429112778489483268
Apparently this is what he said – SPECIFICALLY:
Now an Israeli doctor has revealed a bombshell during a television interview. In the interview on August 5 with Israel’s Chanel 13, Dr Kobi Haviv, medical director of Herzog Hospital in Jerusalem, stated that the majority of coronavirus patients in an Israeli hospital are fully vaccinated, including those with severe disease.
Dr Haviv further specified that: “95% of the severe patients are vaccinated,” adding “85-90% of the hospitalizations are in fully vaccinated people” and the hospital is “opening more and more COVID wards.” This has led him to conclude that “the effectiveness of the vaccine is fading out.”
Of the 72 hospitalized COVID-19 patients, 25 patients were in “critical condition”, 38 were in “moderate” condition, and 9 were in “mild” condition. There were two deaths reported at the time of the interview.
https://spectator.com.au/2021/08/most-covid-patients-at-israeli-hospital-fully-vaccinated-what-does-this-mean-for-australia/
Feel free to alert us to the retraction….. however given there is a video of him saying whatever he said…. I won’t be holding my breath.
Feel free to hold your breath….
No, I don’t know Hebrew. Do you? The posts on the hospitals facebook page suggest that, at worst, his translated words were taken out of context (for example, someone on the facebook page said that he was talking only about the geriatric ward – in which case, it may be that even 95% represents a noticeably worse chance of being hospitalised if one is unvaccinated). If the meaning is what you and others are claiming, a) the doctor would be out of a job or b) he wouldn’t be calling on the unvaccinated to get vaccinated and for others to get their 3rd jab. Either way, it’s clear that the grabbed quote is not the whole story, even if the quote itself was accurate.
Normally when there are quotation marks around a sentence… that means the person said this:
Dr Haviv further specified that: “95% of the severe patients are vaccinated,” adding “85-90% of the hospitalizations are in fully vaccinated people” and the hospital is “opening more and more COVID wards.” This has led him to conclude that “the effectiveness of the vaccine is fading out.”
What more context would you like mike? I don’t think he could be any clearer.
I assume you also saw that the majority of covid deaths in the UK involved doubled jabbed 50+ year olds? First jabbed first to die….
There’s your context mike… the plug
The onus is on YOU to get the whole story mike… and ‘someone said on FB that he must have misquoted’ … won’t due.
I suppose it will if one is a MOREon… but the standard for at least some of us on OFW… is higher….
Get the booster mike … I hear McDonalds is offering a free booster with the happy meal!
Hey mike… let’s assume he said what he said…. and that the visual I posted yesterday showing the majority of deaths of people over 50 in the UK are vaxxed is real…
Does that make you … anxious? depressed? angry? all 3?
Here are some quotes from the hospital’s posts on Facebook:
!! BS ALERT !!
“𝗪𝗲 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗮𝗹𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝘆 𝘀𝗲𝗲𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗲𝗳𝗳𝗲𝗰𝘁 𝗼𝗳 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗿𝗱 𝘃𝗮𝗰𝗰𝗶𝗻𝗲. 𝗝𝘂𝘀𝘁 𝗮𝗯𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝗮 𝘄𝗲𝗲𝗸 𝗮𝗴𝗼, 𝘄𝗲 𝘄𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝗳𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗼 𝗰𝗮𝗽𝗮𝗰𝗶𝘁𝘆, 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗮𝗯𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝟴𝟬 𝗵𝗼𝘀𝗽𝗶𝘁𝗮𝗹𝗶𝘇𝗲𝗱. 𝗙𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝗹𝗮𝘀𝘁 𝘄𝗲𝗲𝗸𝗲𝗻𝗱, 𝘄𝗲 𝘀𝗲𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗳𝗶𝗿𝘀𝘁 𝘀𝗶𝗴𝗻𝘀 𝗼𝗳 𝗮 𝗱𝗲𝗰𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘀𝗲 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗻𝘂𝗺𝗯𝗲𝗿 𝗼𝗳 𝗽𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀 𝗿𝗲𝗳𝗲𝗿𝗿𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗼 𝘂𝘀, 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗸𝘀 𝘁𝗼 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗲𝗳𝗳𝗲𝗰𝘁 𝗼𝗳 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘃𝗮𝗰𝗰𝗶𝗻𝗲.
Even if they were effective, which is not proven, these “vaccines” don’t act that fast.
According to the CDC, and I quote, “It typically takes 2 weeks after vaccination for the body to build protection (immunity) against the virus that causes COVID-19. That means it is possible a person could still get COVID-19 before or just after vaccination and then get sick because the vaccine did not have enough time to build protection.”
And according to an article published last month in Nature—the gold standard for scientific authority sticklers—
scientists say that the case for COVID-19 vaccine boosters at this point is weak. They might not be necessary for most people, and could divert much-needed doses away from others. On 4 August, the World Health Organization called for a moratorium on boosters until at least the end of September. “Wasting resources on boosters for those who are already protected against severe disease does not really make too much sense,” says Laith Jamal Abu-Raddad, an infectious-disease epidemiologist at Weill Cornell Medicine—Qatar in Doha. “Down the line, probably, we would need to think of it. But really, we don’t have strong arguments for it right now.”
mike… you can take this is a learning moment … or you can continue with your regurgitation…
All Hail Tim!
mike … just in case it’s not apparent to you …. the message is … ‘your shot wears off… if you don’t get the Booster there is a good chance you will be hooked up to the dreaded ventilator in the ICU… and die…. but the Booster is very effective at preventing this outcome … therefore it is important to get the booster’
The thing is … the PR Team has consultants who assist them with presenting lies in a certain way that resonate with MOREONS…. MOREONS are easily frightened… and when they are frightened… they will look to authority for protection and advice… most of them will get the Booster…
Therein lies the danger of trusting the government and the MSM…. when they look at this they see collateral damage https://www.openvaers.com/covid-data … kinda like that family that got droned by Biden recently.
Hmm, must have forgotten a quote. The facebook link is here:
https://www.facebook.com/1894herzog.hospital/posts/4465850053436021
https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa675c379-abb0-4aa3-ab64-585ab6b92c87_4017x1878.jpeg
Data Reveal Rapidly Waning Immunity From Shots
Indeed, Israeli data show Pfizer’s shot went from a 95% effectiveness at the outset, to 64% in early July 2021 and 39% by late July, when the Delta strain became predominant.8,9 Meanwhile, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s expectation for any vaccine is an efficacy rate of at least 50%.
Pfizer’s own trial data even showed rapidly waning effectiveness as early as March 13, 2021. BMJ associate editor Peter Doshi discussed this in an August 23, 2021, blog.10
https://www.headsupster.com/forumthread?shortId=62
This would seem to indicate that the CovIDIOTS are prone to severe disease… since 90% of the country is comprised of Injected CoviIDIOTS… it would make sense that since they almost no protection that 85-90% of the hospitalized … are Injected CovIDIOTS…
If one applies common sense it’s amazing what heights a person can ascend.
You excited about the Booster(s) mike?
How about a link to the original article?
Mike, check out Israel’s recent daily new confirmed Covid-19 cases per 100,000 people. That is the most accurate measure of how effective vaccination is at stopping infection.
Why would that be an accurate measure? The graph actually shows that the unvaccinated or partially vaccinated (1 dose) has been well above the fully vaccinated (2 or more doses) for the last month, with the number for fully vaccinated trending down for most of that period.
Well, if you want to find out how effective vaccination is at stopping infection, look at the vaccination rates in a country over time and the daily new confirmed cases over time, and you have a numerical yardstick.
In Israel, for instance, 66% of people have had one shot, over 60% have had two shots (both of these percentages are much higher in the case of older adults, who are much more likely to get sick), and quite a few people have had three shots.
So if the vaccines are working well in Israel, overall new cases there should be much lower now than they were before vaccinations began.
Please feel free to point out any huge gaping holes in my logic. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were several.
Well, it’s not necessarily the case that the new cases should be lower than before vaccinations began. It depends on what restrictions are in place and on the dominant variant (and Delta, I think, is over 5 times more transmissible than the original virus). I would have thought that the proportion of cases who are fully vaccinated is a much more reliable measure. For example, it may be possible to have 80% vaccinated but the virus running wild among the unvaccinated and still have far more cases than before vaccinations began (I’m not saying that’s likely, just possible).
Having said this, I do see that there were a couple of spikes in cases for fully vaccinated people in late July/early August, which I haven’t seen explanations for (though they were so sudden and short lived that I would have thought they were some kind of reporting anomalies).
There seem to be quite a few cases in the fully vaccinated. For example, pretty much all of the cases appearing in the Cornell students are cases among the vaccinated. The article said that 95% of the students were vaccinated. Yet, this is what happened:
Here’s an article by Egon Von Greyerz who shows the insane levels of debt created just by the US Got in the last 40 yrs.
https://kingworldnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/KWN-Greyerz-III-962021.jpg
The full article is here: https://kingworldnews.com/greyerz-the-world-is-now-entering-a-terrifying-endgame/
Doom p*** is boring. Everyone knows that the end of the world can be solved by the Fed printing more money. Been working for the last 40 years no?
This is a recent article published by the JAMA called, Estimated US Infection- and Vaccine-Induced SARS-CoV-2 Seroprevalence Based on Blood Donations, July 2020-May 2021″
Comment by me: If the combined infection and vaccine induced antibody level was 83.3% in May 2020, a person would think that COVID would stop circulating, unless the vaccine induced antibodies don’t work very well. This study ended before the delta variant started to become a problem. In fact, there was a lull in cases in June and July.
But by August, delta had appeared, and the vaccine antibodies were less protective.
This study probably overstates the share of the population with vaccine antibodies and understates the share that caught the disease. One of the limitations of the report is
Blood donors are a somewhat biased sample. I can’t imagine many people in nursing homes are blood donors, for example.
The JAMA article I referenced is the same article referred to in this Market Ticker link Fred gave a bit ago.
https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?blog=Market-Ticker-Nad
The Market Ticker is a great source of info for deconstructing vaccine BS. E.g. https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=243495
This post “How They Killed Your Grandmother” is a doozy https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=243448
Entry point: https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?blog=Market-Ticker-Nad
Fascinating, Fred. Thanks for sharing:
“Here’s WHY They Killed Your Grandmother”
“If the hospital or physician refuses to treat you with anything other than Remdesivir (which has an EUA still outstanding despite failing said trials), dexamethasone, oxygen and a ventilator (which, you remember, Trump bought tens of thousands of for this explicit purpose under the DPA) they are immune from all legal action you may take due to their negligence, even if they KNOW there are other treatment options that, on the science, work.
“If they use those options they lose the PREP Act immunity.
“That’s right: The US Federal Government demanded that in exchange for legal protection in all respects with regard to Covid-19 treatment only what they approved for said use could be used. Anything else and poof — the PREP Act liability shield is gone.
“HHS killed every single person denied care and treatments by direct decree as they not only pay the hospitals $30,000+ to put you on a ventilator they immunized the hospitals from legal action if and only if they refused to treat you with anything not on the FDA’s ‘approved’ list.
“THE PROBLEM WAS CREATED BY TRUMP AND CURRENTLY RESIDES WITH BIDEN WHO HAS REFUSED TO PUT A STOP TO IT.”
Interesting conversation with Catherine Austin Fitts regarding wealth transfer. She doesn’t seem to think “Mr. Global” has run out of room yet. Many will die, we are at the end of sovereign states, and a process of turning on the populace and (my word) cannibalization has begun. She doesn’t think the bad guys will win in the end, though. Not sure what to make of her
https://delingpole.podbean.com/e/catherine-austin/
Thanks for pointing this out. I have only listened to the first six minutes so far; I will try to find time to listen to it later. I suspect she has some good insights. The fact that she grew up with a family of “insiders” makes a difference. Relatives that were involved with the Rockefeller Foundation, I believe she said.
I had come across her back in the days of the “Great Financial Crisis”, and she has always had a strange way about her of being revelatory without revealing particulars. What’s interesting here is that she talks about the fact of her having been a loyal handmaiden to the system currently offering her a degree of protection (although at the same time she talks about being financially ruined by adversaries from within the system). It’s all couched in a way that is less than 100% concrete so, while I agree with some of her insights, I feel she is operating on some other, shadier, plane of existence (which planes of existence she references in varying kind).
CAF is legit. She is interviewed a lot by Greg Hunter on his website USAWatchdog.com and she always offers a lot of behind the curtain information.
She was the Assistant Housing Secretary under the Bush Sr. Administration.
From MOL listening to the whole thing, she comes off as someone who knows the ropes and the ups and downs of the society we can see. But she warns of an entirely secret society–or what you can’t see that affects the world. I guess that’s what she compares with a man having two separate families in two geographically different places, and the families don’t know about each other. And it takes unimaginably large amounts of syphoned-off money to afford this.
According to Miles Mathis, Fitts is controlled opposition. Who isn’t controlled opposition these days?
“So What is Really Going on behind the nuclear programs?” by Miles Mathis
First published February 10, 2017
“For the most part, the stolen trillions are not being diverted into real programs, overt, covert, or any other kind. They are being diverted directly into the coffers of the trillionaire families, with only a story and some fake video as cover. And it isn’t just a few trillion. The ‘trillions’ Fitts is talking about are the 2 or 3 trillion unaccounted for in early 2002. Remember Cynthia McKinney grilling Donald Rumsfeld on the House floor in that year? But those trillions were only for a couple of fiscal years. It is now 17 years later, and countless trillions more have been stolen. These trillions don’t even come up in the newer stories, since they still have you connected to the 2.4 trillion of 2001. Which is of course another goal of the newer admissions. Fitts and her pals keep you glued to the events of 2001 and before, so that you forget that was just the beginning of an ever-accelerating treasury theft. Either that, or they keep your eyes on the future: you are kept fearful of an upcoming economy collapse, so that you buy gold or silver or duct tape for the windows.
“But there is no upcoming crisis. The crisis is not upcoming, it is ongoing. You aren’t about to be raped, you and your fathers and mothers have already been raped. Worldwide treasuries have been emptied for centuries by these people, and yet you have never once noticed that they haven’t delivered anything they billed you for. The economy has been collapsed for centuries and is currently collapsed. By collapsed I mean that most of your taxes are simply being stolen in broad daylight, with nothing to show for them. That entire part of the economy is a vast charade. While at the same time, all the things a government should be doing aren’t being done. Your children aren’t being educated, your water isn’t being kept clean, companies aren’t being regulated, food isn’t being kept pure and nutritious, the Earth isn’t being protected, and money isn’t being spent on real research. Rather, the things actually getting done are things no rational person would wish done. Art history has been killed, science has been eviscerated, medicine has been kidnapped for profit, the family has been exploded, and the media has been turned into a giant whore.
“So you really can’t take anything at face value anymore. I keep getting emails from bright readers, but many of them still aren’t getting it. I keep having to tell them: look closer. Open your eyes wider. Read each sentence twice and question everything. Demand sense from every article, and every paragraph in every article, and every sentence in every article, and every word in every article. If you bump into a contradiction, don’t keep going. Stop. Ask yourself if it is just an accident or an outcome of poor editing. It rarely is. It is usually a sign of the Matrix.”
http://mileswmathis.com/caes.pdf
Despite my deep cynicism, I can’t buy the full extent to which Mathis labels everyone and everything a hoax/hoaxster/FF, etc… but, yes, I think the “Heist” is orders of magnitude greater than conventionally appreciated, and part of a game that’s been afoot since the beginning of history. If anyone knows where at least a few important bodies are buried, it should be CAF, but she doesn’t seem keen on explicit exhumation (perhaps understandable).
In the podcast, I did like her offering that we are all part of the dirty game.. that no one with even a superficial knowledge of how corrupt the system is, would actually ultimately vote to put a stop to it, given how many hands wash other hands.
Saying that the global economy ‘collapsed centuries ago’ undermines the meaning of the term.
For us it’s all about the inevitable – and accelerating – decay of the economy founded on coal, oil and gas – one shouldn’t lose focus on that.
Elites have always ’emptied the treasury’ to the detriment of society at large whenever possible, but that isn’t ‘collapse’, it’s compatible with growth and in fact requires it.
Remove the lawless and psychopathic elites and we would still have Collapse to endue.
SOME WRITING TAILORED FOR SOME OF THE DEEPLY ENTRANCED ON SOCIAL MEDIA
PEAK RESOURCES (among a lot more)
topsoil
fisheries
forestry
OIL AND GAS: People are unaware that so-called renewables away from oil, coal, gas are mined, constructed, transported repaired with these energy sources. There are many many other complications to the use of these “renewables”–intermittency, long transmission lines, forest fires, inappropriate development along the transmission lines, pricing, efficiency and a host of other things (mostly foreign to the artist’s mind).
The narrative that things will get back to normal if we only get our shots and follow instructions miss out on the fact that things cannot possibly get back to normal, since peak resources forbid it. We are covering up scarcity with debt. Abandoned fossil fuel energy cannot possibly be substituted for by renewables that depend in all respects on fossil fuels to establish them.
So the underlying fallacy is that we can abandon fossil fuels, thereby improving climate and other related issues (flooding, pollution and a huge lot more), and simply go green instead. This fallacy alone accounts for a major part of the problem around pandemic misunderstanding.
If we’re not going to return to normal, meanwhile with a still growing population and highly depleted resources, we have an existential problem. We need to reduce the consumption of these resources to a barely imaginable extent. One way toward doing so, some smart people think, is to impose lockdowns in the name of COVID emergency. But you can’t lock down people forever, since that will further deplete already problematic economic resources.
SO WHAT NOW?: You can lock down the society and keep people from disrupting the commons, but only for so long. Any responsible world leaders would want to figure out how to manage with only a fraction of the accustomed energy and resource use. But are lockdowns all they can think of? How can they tell their public otherwise than that there is nothing but sunshine and consumption ahead? They can’t. They must lie…providing they’re not so dumb as to not even understand the problem themselves.
WHAT WOULD I RECOMMEND?: I recommend (as gradually or expediently as feasible) telling the truth. If we don’t want to be eternally locked down or lied to, we must govern ourselves. Since it takes more energy (and appears humanly inadequate) to be governed centrally, it makes more sense to govern ourselves, and try to get the central governments to help and cooperate with us. We would do likewise for them.
I would also gently try to remove the myth that renewables and vaccinations will take us back to a way of life that is over.
Artleads, what would telling the truth accomplish?
If everybody had perfect information on resources and the state of environmental degradation, then we would be in insta-collapse, right away, tomorrow.
No more banks, no more currency, no more pensions, no more supply lines, no more groceries, no more stock markets or banks. All just gone..
Do you really want that? Like.. tomorrow?
What do you want to do? Why would you need the government, or an authority to give you permission to do that? Why do you need general approval or a massconsensus of loads of people, before you can do what you are thinking about?
Do what people who can make hard decision have always done. Assess the situation. Gather relevant information. Take in to account human stupidity and inertia. Make a decision what the best option for you is, under the given set of circumstances. And act! Act with confidence, power and force. Dont look back.
Artleads, you dont need anybodys permission, or approval. You dont have to be the grey man, or fit in to the herd. Make your own mind what the correct response should be, and act accordingly!
If official numbers are to be believed, 85% of population have already taken the first dose of the experimental injection in Portugal, and 76 % have already taken both doses!
Given that children under 12 (about 11% of the pop) have not yet been called to take the shot, that means only ~5% of my countrymen have enough intelligence to distrust the intentions of the political or health authorities, and therefore it’s safe to conclude that the portuguese are the most obedient, indoctrinated and stupid people in the world. That’s the result of 800 years of illiteracy (75% illiterate still in 1920), 250 years of Inquisition and 50 years of dictatorship in the 20th century. A nation of normies.The most perfect covidiots in the known universe.
We have reasons to congratulate ourselves. I always knew we would be the best in the world in something besides sardine grilling and roller hockey.
https://www.noticiasaominuto.com/pais/1826186/85-da-populacao-vacinada-hoje-e-um-dia-importante-para-todos-nos
JMS, my wife and I will be in Portugal on September 18. Maybe we can take you and your wife(? out to dinner?
It’s a shame, Ed, but from September 16 to 30 I hope to be in the middle of the Atlantic, for what will certainly be my last plane trip, and probably my last vacation. I decided it didn’t make sense to die without seeing the flowered islands of the Azores and that I might as well take the opportunity while it’s open. If it wasn’t now, I suspect it never would be. Unfortunately, i will not visit all the nine islands, only S. Miguel, Pico and Faial.
I hope you enjoy your visit to Portugal. How many days are you planning to stay? And what places are you planning to visit? If you need any tips….
I am burning with envy….
Wise indeed, JMS.
JMS, will be in Portugal September 18 to 30. Starting with three days in Lisbon then we will wing it. Any suggests are appreciated. First question start by going north or south?
Ed, I don’t know what kind of tourist you are, if you prefer to visit towns/cities, beaches or the countryside. About beaches I can’t tell you anything, since I’m no fan of beaches and don’t know much about them.
As for the rest, towns & landscapes, the highlights of PT for me are these, in descending order
1. Lisbon & Sintra
2. Oporto & Douro Valley
3. Some beautiful old towns (Coimbra, Guimarães, Évora, Viseu, Beja….) or villages (Óbidos, Marvão, Monsanto and an inexhaustible etc.),
4. Peneda-Gerês Park (in the extreme northwest), Arrábida Natural Park (south of Lisbon) and Alentejo Coast Park.
If I were you, I would spend four days in Lisbon & Sintra, then rent a car and take one of the roads leading North, stopping for two or three days in and around Coimbra. Then I would set aside five days for my stupendous hometown Oporto, plus Guimaraes and enough time for a leisurely drive through the magnificent Douro valleys. (There is also the possibility to reach the Douro valley by river, from Oporto to Régua). I never did it, but must be an awesome tour.
For the rest of the time, two options: Peneda-Gerês for hiking, or else a tour of the pretty villages and towns of the interior (Viseu, Almeida, Belmonte, Monsanto, Sortelha in the center, and in the south Évora, Beja, Marvão, Monsaraz).
That’s it, I’ve established your vacation itinerary, so you don’t have to worry about anything and can enjoy the best of PT according to JMS) 🙂
Cheers!
Not that I am a tour guide or anything like that … but my tip for Lisbon is to walk into the main shopping area… no idea what it’s called but it’s got cobble stones… and lots of shops of course…
Wander about until ‘the guy’ offers you a golf ball sized hunk of marijuana… then tell him you are more of an ‘8 ball’ kinda guy … ‘the guy’ should also be able to sell you that…
Don’t worry about the cops…’the guy’ offered me both and there was a cop no 30 metres away when ‘the guy’ held out the gear in his hand … I suppose he must pay the cops a commission?
Please be sure to inform us how the night goes…. I am now bleeding envy.
George Gammon has a good video on what is going on right now with the World economies..there is no growth just debt, disguised as growth….
do you have a link to that?
You don’t need a link to that. It’s an easy search as all these economists are saying the same thing. Dr. Paul Craig Roberts, Micael Pento, Dr. Marc Faber, Martin Armstrong, Wolf Richter, John Williams, Peter Schiff.
I can believe that “Debt disguised as growth” is all that is going on now. Energy consumption per capita is not rising; it is just debt and more debt, trying to keep the system going.
This is a link to a recent video of his called, “New Shocking Inflation Data that Proves It’s Not Transitory!!”
It sounds like debt and more debt is likely the cause.
Cheap debt could create pressure on building materials because people would like to upgrade their homes. That would increase the price of the materials what would need more cheap debt. A thing that can not go on for ever will not go on for ever.
Also if building material is up prices for desaster recovery for insurance companies will go up. Either these companies charge more or they go with less. More money will of course solve all of these small problems.
“Interest payments on the national debt fell last year, to $345 billion or 1.6% of gross domestic product. They’re on track to shrink further in 2021 — even after all the pandemic spending, plus a debt-market selloff that’s taken 10-year Treasury yields to the highest in more than 12 months.
Still Cheap
U.S. debt service costs are historically low, though set to rise”
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-03-16/yields-have-a-long-way-to-go-before-they-sting-yellen-s-treasury
If the interest rates are low enough, interest payments on the national debt don’t increase; they may even decrease. Nice slight of hand.
Factor out the debt part of the GDP, does that change the percentage?
A guess, the cost of real stuff had increased significantly.
Dennis L.
Let’s all move to Russia: https://www.rt.com/business/533990-arctic-reserves-last-hundreds-years/
“The potential of the Arctic zone is huge. Speaking about offshore resources only, those are 15 billion tons of oil and around 100 trillion cubic meters of gas. That will suffice for decades, hundreds of years if they are required and it is economically reasonable,” Novak said during the educational marathon ‘New Knowledge’ earlier this week, as cited by TASS.
These resources are too costly to extract so far, but Novak says the government is optimistic and has already taken steps to develop the means for it.
“Those are rather expensive projects, which require provision, certain subsidies, including on taxes, return on investment. The government has provided such incentives for projects like that. Certain taxes have been slashed to zero for offshore projects,” Novak stated, noting, however, that Russia will only dip into its Arctic resources in the case that other regions fail to provide them.
Or maybe not.
http://arctic-news.blogspot.com/p/global-extinction-within-one-human.html
https://www.counterpunch.org/2015/01/16/the-dreaded-methane-veil/
‘We’ have 5 years?
“The greatest threat to humanity on Earth is the escalating Arctic atmospheric methane buildup, caused by the destabilization of subsea methane hydrates. This subsea Arctic methane hydrate destabilization will go out of control in 2024 and lead to a catastrophic heatwave by 2026.”
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2021/05/extinction-by-2027.html?fbclid=IwAR3FEKqILrzS_Le1Z4LRmEvqoSRz6p2rBIFjbNmY1NFB_rHeU4RpDT8u2Zg
If it is not one thing, its another! No food, no water, too hot, too cold.
I remember in the 90’s when I believed man was burning up the planet…. reading about these dire predictions for the Arctic… the tipping point where the frozen mud melted released trillions of tonnes of methane we a few years away….
But then it never happened… nothing… nadda…. that was one of the things that ‘woke’ me to this scam… aren’t most coastal cities supposed to be submerged by now?
Why did Leo invest in a sea level resort?
> ‘We’ have 5 years?
Certainly the catastrophes have been ramping up fast in very recent years. Australia: over a billion animals estimated to have been killed in 2019/2020. In the USA this summer, a billion sea and other animals are believe to have been ‘cooked’, and starving emaciated birds fell out of the skies in droves.
The converging crises of the 21st century are plain to see. This is all too far gone to be rolled back now. The ‘King Canutes’ might try, if they can get themselves organised, but in vain. It’s Seneca’s cliff (see Ugo Bardi’s blog): ‘Increases are of sluggish growth, but the road to ruin is rapid.’ It certainly is.
That one is getting a bit old… it’s been used more times than norm’s blow up doll…
Can’t these people come up with something new and frightening?
Or is there no need because no matter how many times you cry wolf… the Green Groopies will always come running to help
Id–iots.
It’s been a very cool summer in Japan. And it’s still cool in September. Also, snow has settled on the upper slopes of Mount Fuji, a full month ahead of the average first snow date.
well–she does at least offer more adult conversation than one finds in here with certain individuals
and uses less wind too
Great – so you get satisfaction + you can win every argument. Sounds like you are living the Dream over their norm!
Tim, the geese started flying south earlier than normal here in New York State.
People remarked weeks back that autumn seemed to have arrived early here in UK.
We are just now having a few days’ late summer ‘heat wave’ (27 c.)
lookin like—burn baby burn then
Subsidies are going to become harder and harder to come by, I am afraid. I wouldn’t hod my breath.
Regarding Russian Arctic Oil Reserves:
I’m not sure where the Russian Deputy Prime Minister gets his figure of “Hundreds of years” supply.
102 billion barrels (15 billion tons) sounds like a lot, however…
Russia currently produces 8 million barrels per day from it’s declining fields.
102 billion / 8 million per day = 34 years of production at the current rate.
Yes, it is a sizable amount of oil, but the demand and price must be there for Arctic oil to be mined. The EROEI may be too low in the future. Or the price of oil may never get high enough to retrieve this oil.
The media reports 15 billion tons of reserves and world thinks we are saved. Not so 🙂
The problem is that the oil price will never go high enough.
The story about oil reserves in the ground is pretty much that–a story.
Some years ago, a guy from the US energy authority said to me “The USA now has literally limitles oil in the groud that can be fracked.”
Emphasis is on “some years ago”. I think it was 4 to be precise.
elevation in employment is not a yardstick for common sense
That was when we were promised a ‘Fracking Renaissance’ in the UK……
trouble is—unthinkers believe it