this doesn't sound good

 

translation: Marcos is making nice with the US against China, who is threatening our resources.

China, of course, is also planning to invade Taiwan, meaning they can block the sea lanes more efficiently

and blackmail us (Manila is on the western side of the Philippines) and this doesn't even mention the internet cables going through that area;

in some ways, China blew it when they failed to keep promises of aid with Duterte: Now China is claiming Duterte had a gentleman's agreement they could steal the West Philippine sea from us, but there is a problem: NO paperwork, of course, and the president can't do that without the senate agreeing.

This isn't the first time they pulled this trick: The ZTE scandal with GMArroyo did the same but was stopped when our free press caught them at it.

But this was the backstory of that deal: letting china explore the area for oil etc. which was later declared an unconstitutional agreement.

But of course this year's execizes are more worried about the possible invasion of Taiwan than China's continued steal of the Philippine resources in the West Philippine sea. When they started making those artificial islands etc. President Obama told PNoy not to fight but take them to court. The Philippines won in courts, which sent China a nasty letter which they ignored of course. 

I should note that these joint Balikatan exercizes go on all the time. 

since a nearby airbase is used by the Philippine special forces to teach Yanks jungle warfare etc, usually we know they are there when we hear planes and helicopters going over us. 

But this year, the joint exercizes will be bigger than usual.

And ironically, most of the training is about coordination between militaries, which comes in valuable when a disaster strikes. And this being the Philippines, disasters are always striking (earthquakes, volcanos, landslide, typhoons, floods). Indeed, disasters are so  common we have our own Wikipedia page.

in the meanwhile, it is "TagInit", aka hot season/summer. It is supposed to go up to 100 F today. No not global warming: It does this every year.

And with the hot/dry season comes other problems; My airconditioner needs to be cleaned because it isn't working as well as usual.

But the city water got a leak, so we are without water. We do have a pump but it is not efficient. Kuya is too busy harvesting the rice to hire someone to fix it, so our handiman is trying his best. 

We still haven't had electrical brownouts so that is good (usually the hydro electric power available relies on adequate water, which  goes down during hot/dry season).

Oh well, I know how to shower with a tabo so no problem.

----------------

update; also see yesterday's post.

Some of Chinese students in Cagayan were reportedly shelling out P2-M to obtain degrees with others not even bothering to attend classes amid worries about the reported surge of their presence there where there are two Edca sites @inquirerdotnet https://t.co/XNlBF18UrS

— John Eric Mendoza (@JEMendozaINQ) April 18, 2024

Fraud in medical reporting?

....................

The pressure of big Pharma, not just by their advertisements, but because they fund the studies that get published in journals, was pointed out by former editor of the NEJM, Dr. Marcia Angell, twenty years ago: 

italics mine.

Book review here.

For two decades the drug industry was the most profitable sector; even in 2003 it came third, behind crude oil and banking. But now, Angell says, it is facing “a tidal wave of government investigations and civil and criminal lawsuits.”

She writes, “The litany of charges includes illegally overcharging Medicaid and Medicare, paying kickbacks to doctors, engaging in anticompetitive practices, colluding with generic companies to keep generic drugs off the market, illegally promoting drugs for unapproved uses, engaging in misleading direct-to-consumer advertising, and, of course, covering up evidence. Some of the settlements have been huge.”

that was 20 years ago. 

Place conspiracy theory here. 

MUSICAL INTERLUDE OF THE WEEK

 

Chinese students or prepositioned spies?

so what are those Chinese students doing in the Northern Philippines ?

 

Two Cagayan Valley lawmakers said the presence of large numbers of Chinese nationals in the region and other parts of the country pose a risk to the country’s national security and economy, particularly since these foreigners had been involved in “spurious schemes.”

READ MORE:… pic.twitter.com/bm4qRMW2eK

— Inquirer (@inquirerdotnet) April 15, 2024

Lara, in his Resolution No. 1666 dated March 20, noted “an alarming increase in the number of Chinese citizens coming into the province of Cagayan as students enrolled in the various higher education institutions from the past to the current year.”

the article then goes on to list various shady schemes by so called Chinese businessmen, and also notes that the students are in the Philippine legally.

but two EDCA sites are in that area Enhanced Defense Cooperation Arrangement (EDCA) which are bases of shared US and Philippine military.

So are they students, drug dealers, or prepositioned Chinese military, to spy on these bases to find out what is going on as part of their plan to invade Taiwan?

happy tax day to you Yanks

actually I did my tax with Turbotax six weeks ago and have gotten my refund.

When we were in the US, we had an accountant but he said don't waste our money on him after retirement since we only had pensions etc and no longer had to calculate stuff about CME, licenses, offices, business expenses etc. so it didn't need him to figure it out.

Loss of trust and other side effects of covid policies

This video discusses one side effects of the covid quarantine policies: missed routine childhood vaccines, and we now have an epidemic of whooping cough.

I suspect we have it in our area, because the cook has come to me asking to give money to one of the neighbors because their kid had "Broncho" and needs to go to the hospital/clinic for treatment.

But whooping cough right now is spreading in other countries. But then it never really goes away because  adults, who have a mild version of the disease. can spread it to babies who are more vulnerable to get a severe case.

I have seen two cases of whooping cough in my patients in the USA: Both had missed their shots because they were sick (one with reflux related pneumonia the other with wheezing post RSV). The problem is that the routine antibiotics don't work: You have to use something in the Erythromycin family (e.g. azithromycin) instead of the penicillin/amoxicillin/cephalosporins which don't work.

One clue to the disease: A very high wbc. This is important since to get a routine test for pertussis in our rural area would have taken days.

here is the characteristic whoop:

Years ago, the vaccine for pertussis/cough vaccine had a rare but serious side effect of brain damage. In the UK, this got a lot of publicity so parents refused the vaccine and voila, a pertussis epidemic with several deaths. Luckily, the Japanese had just developed an acellular pertussis vaccine that didn't have the problem, and that solved the problem. Except for one thing: It didn't give as strong an immune responses. And since pertussis was still present (probably in adults whose immunity had waned and who had few symptoms) babies who hadn't yet received the vaccine could still catch it.

this article discusses the statistics of pertussis in the UK.

Sigh.

 I have written several articles about vaccines and the overreach for power that was behind the covid shutdown.

By censoring physicians who questioned the so called experts, it resulted in the hysterics taking over the discussion of problems. The good news: The problems finally got discussed. The bad news: The problems were taken out of context, and this resulted in a decrease in trust in so called authorities.

For covid? A lot of people died of this, something that is now being forgotten, and not all the deaths were in elders.

The problem? Yes the quarantine was needed, but not for two years.

As I have noted earlier: The anti covid shot hysteria is not big here, because we used all sorts of vaccines and only got the mRNA vaccine late in 2021 because the DOH would not sign a no liability papers. But as soon as various covid vaccines became available, most folk took these shots. The AZ and later the  Yankee shots which worked better to prevent the disease were given to high risk folk. I got the AZ ... I was aware of the blood clot problem: so it was not given to young folk because of this.  Our younger staff got the Chinese Sinovax, which essentially didn't work, but hey better than nothing. And since Omicron hit, few here are getting boosters.  

In other words, the mRNA vaccines were touted as lifesaving, which they were, but they didn't work very well after a few months and needed more and more boosters. And probably the same problem was seen with other vaccines.

So essentially (thanks to omicron and herd immunity) the disease burnt itself out and although it is still around, like influenza one can live with the problem.

So yes I support vaccines 

but no, I didn't get any more boosters for covid.

One has to remember: nothing in life is perfect.

When patients asked about rare side effects of vaccines or medicines, I would tell them yes these things happen but they are rare. Then I would ask how they got to the office, and most admitted they drove their car. So I would point out that there was a danger that on the way home they might be killed in a car wreck, and that life is risky.

Silencing doctors who have expertise as if they were paranoid anti vaxers has been the real problem of the covid policies.

Which is why the WHO's policies for the next epidemic will be seen as a power grab instead of good policy to stop disease.

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;

deception in medicine, alas

 

,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

his website has been following the documents for awhile. Here is an example: March 20,2024: even before the details of the treaty was released, the usual suspects approved of it.

Over 100 members of the Club of Madrid, the Global Leadership Foundation and the Nizami Ganjavi International Center (NGIC), and other prominent people from around the world have published a joint letter to the leaders of the member states of the WHO, calling for an urgent agreement on a pandemic accord.

  

A pandemic accord would deliver vast and universally shared benefits, including greater capacity to detect new and dangerous pathogens, access to information about pathogens detected elsewhere in the world…

sounds good. No problem, right?

The devil is in the details: 

 As countries now enter what should be the final stages of the negotiations, they must ensure that they are agreeing on actions which will do the job required: to prevent and mitigate pandemic threats. 

italics mine. 

it implies that all countries will have to go along with the decisions on what to do, but the big question is: who decides what actions need to be done.

We urge solutions which ensure both speed in reporting and sharing pathogens, and in access – in every country – to sufficient tools like tests and vaccines to protect lives and minimise harm.

good.  

The public and private sectors must work together towards the public good.

 so far so good. Makes sense.

Uh oh:

This global effort is being threatened by misinformation and disinformation.

translation: censorship of those who say wait a second. 

Among the falsehoods circulating are allegations that the WHO intends to monitor people’s movements through digital passports; that it will take away the national sovereignty of countries; and that it will have the ability to deploy armed troops to enforce mandatory vaccinations and lockdowns. All of these claims are wholly false and governments must work to disavow them with clear facts

 uh, maybe the reason some folks think they will do these things is that they did this for covid. 

And a lot of people now think that it was overkill, causing economic damage, diverting resources from preventing other diseases, (dengue because no money to spray for mosquitos, rabies deaths because people threw out their dogs because they couldn't afford to feed them) and folks not getting routine care so they die of ordinary preventable diseases, (Cancer, high blood pressure, diabetes).

and it was the WHO and other experts who essentially instructed the Philippines what to do. 

in summary: the overblown shut down of the world economy to stop the covid virus is now being seen as less wise than a short shutdown and routine isolation of cases. 

And the censorship of opinions and possible treatments has resulted in pushback against these WHO experts.

Like the boy who cried wolf, the problem is that if a real pandemic happened, people will just ignore what they are told by these experts.

Once trust is lost, it will take awhile until it is reformed.

We saw this in the Philippines after the Dengue vaccine experiment that killed some kids: a lot of parents refused routine shots that have been around for fifty years, so we had more kids die of measles etc. because the parents no longer trusted the public health authorities.

sigh.

----------------

an example of disinformation: No, those sudden deaths were not caused by the vaccine says the CDC.

One state, Oregon, and reports of 40 cases, and all cases were early in the epidemic. June 2021 to Dec 2022... But a lot of the reports in the press were after second or third boosters.

the Epoch times notes the problems with this study: cross posted here on FreeRepublic (NSFW). because of firewall.

Genocide in Sudan: The forgotten Muslims

 every day one reads propaganda out of Iran/Hamas about Gaza, and demonstrations by the left's useful idiots who are influencing Biden, alas.

Wikipedia defines Useful Idiots.

A useful idiot or useful fool is a person perceived as propagandizing for a cause without fully comprehending the cause's goals, and who is cynically being used by the cause's leaders.The term was often used during the Cold War to describe non-communists regarded as susceptible to communist propaganda and psychological manipulation.

It's going to be a bad summer in the USA; Similar to what happened in the sixties in Chicago, except now the mainly blue collar Chicago cops won't be allowed to keep the peace by beating up the rich kids. Sigh. 

And remember: the results of those protests was you got Nixon (and in the long term, millions of refugees, ethnic cleansing of the Chinese from VietNam, and the Cambodian holocaust,,,, but hey, these rich kids never had to take responsibility for their actions: Heck I bet none of them ever took care of the Hmong or Catholic or Chinese refugees who made it into the USA, or heard their stories. )

So why am I cynical?

Because the biggest genocide going on right now is not Gaza, but in the Sudan.

It has been nearly one year since war broke out in Sudan, causing a devastating humanitarian crisis.

Here's what you need to know about the war, the peacemaking efforts undertaken since its outbreak, and the current humanitarian situation ⤵️https://t.co/UN0asdGx0e

— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) April 11, 2024

more here. 

A real mess, with thousands of dead civilians, mainly Muslim but they can't blame the Jews or the USA, so don't expect the useful idiots to care or protest.

Nor is this just a civil war 

as the NZZ article points out: everyone is involved, and it has geopolitical implications, not just because it will spill into nearby countries

And part of the backstory is the presence of the Russian mercs (aka Wagner group) arming the rebels so they can steal all the gold they can lay their hands on, while suppling weapons and Iranian drones to the rebels,

 and just for good measure, we have Ukrainians in there hunting the Russian Mercs.

from NZZ:

The think tank International Crisis Group, for instance, writes: «An ungoverned Sudan would open the door for warlords and militias of various stripes, possibly including jihadists, to fill the vacuum. Instability could then radiate into the Horn of Africa, the Sahel, North Africa and the Red Sea basin, while pushing yet more migrants into already overtaxed neighboring states or on perilous journeys across the Mediterranean, into the Gulf and Levant, or even farther afield to the U.S.» Although this is an extreme scenario, it is nevertheless plausible. Because the war in Sudan is receiving so little attention, its geopolitically disruptive potential is being underestimated.

Sigh.

FAMILY NEWS

they are tearing out the rotten wood and rebuilding my closet shelves, which were infested with termites. Yuck.

In the meanwhile, I am re reading the novel the Shell seekers, which is one of the books I brought with me to the Philippines.

The film can be found here.

 

putting the boxes in line, not intelligence

 The idea that AI is human like is being pushed in culture, but here is another expert explaining why this is a myth.