seeding the AI answers

 I only uses Grok to look up history or medical stuff. 

But even in the medical stuff, I trust my own investigations instead of what they say. Sometimes it means I have to ignore the first few pages of my DDG search to find the article I want, because the first line articles are the most popular i.e. pushed by the crowds or the ones who are self selected experts. But never mind. The truth is out there, even if you have to do a deep search (and Grok will list the references if you ask nicely).

Why? Because in the olden days we docs used to have small journal groups, where we discussed articles from journals and pulled them apart, using our own expertise or other journal articles. Lots of bad science or bias in those days, so things haven't changed. 

What has changed is that now doctors are being pressured to follow guidelines or they won't get paid.

But often clinical guidelines were summaries of what was being published. 

But what gets published? And who checks the science?

And even 20 plus years ago, Dr Marcia Angells of the NEJM was cautioning about the influence of what we now call Big Pharma on medical practice and what gets published in medical journals

 

But it goes beyond shoddy science: The ethics of medicine were being changed by the economic pressures to join HMOs, to use only cost effective treaments, and in places like the UK, this means obeying guidelines biased by your quality of life index.

Fast forward to AI.

We see how the discussion of the COVID response has backfired to the point that people no longer trust doctors, and some are suspicious of getting shots (with good reason: Most are lifesaveing but some are given to everyone instead of the high risk population, so the side effect/benefit ratio gets skewered.)

 We saw this in the Philippines with the Dengue vaccine kerfuffle, and nnded up with kids dying of measles and diphtheria because their parents got afraid of all shots: So one wonders what will happen if a large minority of first world parents do the same.

Well, anyway, right now, a lot of people act as if  AI is god and infallible. But it isn't: It is an  algorhithm, and summarizes what is on line. 

which brings me to the lies about Charlie Kirk. 

So anyway, while perusing the ususal loud voices of controversy, and trying not to notice all the lies about Charlie Kirk by those who obviously never listened to him but only were parroting straw man arguments they were told to believe, I came across this observation via Instapundit on GermanOddities blog:

People published fake quotes pretending that the people speaking at Charlie’s funeral were fully fascists and were basically not speaking from the heart but quoting literal Nazis. These quotes are an absolute lie. A blatant one. At first I was like. This is dumb. Why would they do this? Then… I was drinking a glass of wine late at night and suddenly it hit me. “They are feeding the AI!”

,,,If you just state something often enough, AI believes it to be factual.

italics mine.

of course this goes both ways.

It reminds me that what is important is not who votes, but who counts the votes. 

There are sociopaths and true believers who will deliberately use their power to have you lose your job, similar to what they did with the Covid vaccine, with the gender ideology, or if you are a medical resident who refuses to do an abortion (or stealth euthanasia) (long story), well, you can lose your job or have your talk destroyed by mobs, or even be attacked for saying the truth...

Which is why I am leery about firing those who tweet they support murder of their political enemies: No, if you fire them you will not silence them, alas. They are in a bubble and literally don't know what is the truth.

 

the remedy is the truth.

what stopped the communists/ fascists/other dictators who pushed the BIG LIE  was that there were communities of memory outside the mainstream that refused to lie, and kept the candle of truth alive: The churches, the social clubs, the families, etc. 

And in today's world, this might mean small churches, small prayer groups and small conservative action groups that refuse to stay silent in the face of the mobs.

 

bad reporting and censorship and ignoring future economic issues.

a cyberattack (not glitches) tried to stop it, the EU sent threatening letters, etc.

trying to shut down fringe parties is one thing but failing to report on a major candidate for US President? Uh, what about issues? Much of the talk was of economics (not screening those trying to enter the USA is about economics. I don't agree with Trumpiboy but he is a pragmatist and like Reagan will solve it pragmatically (my daughter in law is a proud US citizen thanks to Reagan's amnesty).

I read in despair the spin of the news about this meeting. Apparently the talking points were out there before the talk started

Here’s what the mainstream media is saying about the #ElonMusk & #DonaldTrump Interview pic.twitter.com/NR1aGF8LdP

— Valuetainment Media (@ValuetainmentTV) August 13, 2024

So do I believe what I saw, or the spin in the papers?

so does Twitter allow hate speech? Well, a lot of Hama propaganda are on my twitter feed, but hey that's because I want to hear both sides of the story.

but why do I worry about the censorships? Because of what happened with the covid policies, which censored problems.

and by the way, while all this smoke and mirrors is happening in the US presidential campaign, we are facing increased Chinese aggression, which  has spread from harassing fishermen and Philippine coast guard vessels to now bullying the airspace.

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

remember: this would affect not just the Philippines but the international shipping and now international flights. True, shipping and flights could detour, but that would cost money and raise prices.

Sigh.

on the other hand, one wag noted that if China blocks this shipping route, either in the West Philippine sea or (what they plan later) the straits off of Singapore (with it's large Chinese population, if Taiwan falls, could Singapore be next?), there is an alternative route: Thanks to global warming, the northern shipping route could be an alternative. Trumpieboy is aware of this: remember when he trolled that he would like the US to buy Greenland? That was about bringing attention to China investing in one of their ports and in their mining interests. And the war in the Ukraine is leading Russia to help China in this area.

Trump as an international businessman is aware of these things. Is Harris? She has no expertise in running a business or even in running a state. So except for the press adoring her and pushing her as the joyful candidate, what are her positions on international issues? Will she talk with Musk about these things?

So you see, there is a reason that who becomes president will affect the world.  

stories below the fold

About that strange biolab in California. Heh. One lowly lady inspector was the one who found and followed this up. Where were the feds and CDC? Headsup Instapundit.

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

they removed the youtube video from Dr. Campbell about that covid lethal brain virus that I posted about a few days ago. But it is still on RUmble:

...................,

China continues to bully the Philippines:

It is a hint that China wants to continue to steal our fish and petroleum resources in the West Philippine sea, so the Philippines needs to make nice with China. 

Meaning that if they can claim Taiwan, they can later claim VietNam, Luzon, and Singapore.

and of course it means they can control the sea lanes much more efficiently, not to mention the internet cables that go by that island.

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

we have koi and goldfish in our fountain. Here is a video on goldfish:

:................

in family news: The puppies are eating so it's time to send them to new homes. Two went next door to replace the watchdog there, and one to a neighbor. Joy wants two for her farm which leaves us one.

We need to keep a breeding female since Mama dog is getting older, but I don't think I can cope with house training another dog.

the frustrations of fake news

 Was the George Floyd story manipulated?

..restraints of people fighting you is dangerous for both the patient and the caregiver/cop, (those who never worked with violent people naively don't realize this).

and of course, with a criminal, it could be a ploy to escape.

but pressure on the lateral neck does not impede the airway. and saying you can't breathe doesn't mean you can't breathe.

The danger of fentanyl overdose is that when you pass out, your tongue falls back and you can't breathe. So to stop this you either have to open the mouth, pull the chin forward and insert an airway, (something very hard to do with a combative patient)... the alternative is to put the person on their side to keep the airway open and it also makes it easier to clear the vomitus from the mouth.

this is called the recovery position.

..Now I know this and indeed any medically trained person who has worked with combative overdoses knows this....did anyone write about this when the story happened? You have to remember that I live in the Philippines so don't have all those cable news channels discussing such things so it makes me wonder.

......

the UK Economist: asks if the NYTimes lost their way.

every one of his (Trump's)  political lies became more powerful because journalists had forfeited what had always been most valuable about their work: their credibility as arbiters of truth and brokers of ideas, which for more than a century, despite all of journalism’s flaws and failures, had been a bulwark of how Americans govern themselves.

The average Yank who saw Trumpieboy on his tv shows knows he bullshits a lot, so you don't take him seriously when he exaggerates. Indeed, if you read his books, he teaches this as a negotiating tactic in business.

But one does expect the MSM to be a bit more truthful...

It is sort of like when I read AlJezeerah on Gaza, I know they are based in (Iran friendly) Qatar and will be biased and not question the narrative, so I take what they reports are true but not the whole truth. They truthfully report the Hamas press releases, and have articles by reporters who admit they are in Gaza to report on the bad Israelis. In other words, one side of the story, and maybe from Hamas liars (500 killed in a hospital that was bombed? whoops. Make that half a dozen in the parking lot killed when a nearby missile misfired). 

Indeed, a lot of the lies about Gaza are by folks crying genocide: based on Hamas press release. Without verification.

Attention: Wars are nasty and a lot of innocent people are killed in the crossfire. But when one side aims to keep weapons in civilian areas, stop civilians from fleeing, and to use civilian dead as propaganda, maybe they aren't the good guys they are pretending to be.

And I have nothing but contempt by those crying genocide... probably half of the dead are soldiers, and  ten thousand dead from a population of two million is not genocide...

Ah but the anti semites in the US are ignoring the real genocides in the area in Syria, Lebanon, against the Kurds by Turkey, not to mention the Rohingye and Uighars.sigh.

attacking normal people doesn't bode well for the Democrats, but only John Fetterman (!) dares to warn them. 

Me, I remember 1968... and that is how you got Nixon.

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

I won't go into all the censorship on covid, where real experts were censored and even lost their jobs for not going along with the narrative.

Sigh.

I did read the book Work Racism.

The problem? I was working class and indeed there is racism out there. But the Archie Bunker racists tended to work with other races and cultures, and much of their crude language was not echoed in their deeds.

But for the upper class white elite, it is good that someone points out the errors in this mindset.

But when doctors lose patience with poor people who are destroying their lives with bad behavior, you can see how this could be twisted into a racism meme, even though the druggies etc. in many areas are white. It is economic bias.

That is why I understand where my patients come from, but I will not be silenced when the PC pretend not shutting down mass demonstrations in the midst of a Covid epidemic, or nowadays not shutting down gay raves spreading monkeypox because of political correctness, or the failure to point out the severe side effects of hormones and GNRH antagonists on both the body and emotions is quite severe and might be part of the reason for the high suicide rate in the children who are trans (or maybe claiming to be trans because doing so gets you a lot of emotional support and positive feedback). 

Sigh

never mind.

Banned for burlesque or bad speak?

The big news in the Philippines this week:,, 

Blackpink star Lisa removed from Chinese social media after cabaret show...

SHANGHAI, China - K-pop singer Lisa of megastar girl group Blackpink has been banned from China's Weibo social media platform, sparking speculation among fans Friday that the censorship was tied to a burlesque performance she gave in Paris.

Lisa, whose full name is Lalisa Manobal, disappeared from Weibo this week, with her personal page replaced by an error message saying her account was "not viewable due to being reported for violating laws (and) regulations". Also banned from posting was Hong Kong actress Angelababy, whose real name is Angela Yeung, due to "violations of relevant laws and regulations", a message on her official Weibo account says.

How dare she dance (no it's not burlesque: she keeps her clothes on)...

Weibo is a Chinese social media platform, but is under the thumb of the government there.

Blackpink is the Asian equivalent of Taylor Swift 

Imagine if a famous singer in the USA was banned from twitter because their songs upset someone in the Biden administration, so they used pressure on the social media to remove it.

But of course the US government would never pressure social media sites (/sarcasm).

But this is not about K pop: it is about China pushing people around... because they can.

Chinese censors are quick to block content considered politically sensitive or going against the ruling Communist Party’s socially conservative values, with stars targeted in the past for tattoos and “effeminate” fashion. The blocking of the two stars comes after President Xi Jinping called on women to help in “promoting traditional Chinese virtues and sound family values”.

 hmm... wonder if that includes traditional Chinese values like polygamy, infanticide, and foot binding...

So what is the back story?

K-pop group BLACKPINK gets blasted for calling fans as ‘Macanese,’ not ‘Chinese’

BLACKPINK has faced a torrent of online criticism this week after referring to their Macau fans as "Macanese" rather than "Chinese" following its concerts there, spawning a disapproving hashtag from nationalistic social media users. ....

 so how dare they use the wrong pronoun ethnic description!

Or is there a backstory to that backstory?

 The furor over Macau's status came as a major pro-democracy party in the city disbanded in the wake of tighter restrictions on public dissent in the city under Chinese rule. The New Democratic Macau Association dissolved in the wake of changes to the city's national security law that make it far more risky to continue with open political opposition in Macau, ...  "Even striving for democracy could be regarded as trying to overthrow the current political system," Au said. 

Fast forward to minute 53 and this satire site discusses what was going on: 

here are examples of Blackpink's music:

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

Stories in the background

 Strategy Page has two stories about GPS. One is about jamming it by Israel and Russia, 

it's about stopping those missiles, and mentions other systems that by pass GPS.

and this essay is about a new system that will bypass the satellites.

or you could use the old fashioned ways: with maps

 

or with sextants:

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

the anti vax nut Robert Kennedy is running for president. But if you want to hear his opinions, fugetaboutit because Youtube has removed the video of his interview with Jordan Peterson. However it can be found on Rumble, if you can stand actually going to that controversial site.

cue Joe Rogan.

And the pro vax scientist laments he is having his feelings hurt by these influential folks.

What I worry is that, like the lies about the Dengue vaccine here, that the lies about the covid vaccine will lead to a distrust of all vaccines, and lead to people dying of diseases like measles, whooping cough, tetanus, etc...even though these vaccines have been around for decades and have saved millions of lives. 

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

In the meanwhile, I might get into trouble because I tweeted this report about the newest Covid vaccine to a local newspaper pushing folks to get the newest vaccine:

Among adults aged ≥18 years without immunocompromising conditions, bivalent booster vaccine effectiveness (VE) against COVID-19–associated hospitalization declined from 62% at 7–59 days postvaccination to 24% at 120–179 days compared with VE among unvaccinated adults. Among immunocompromised adults, lower bivalent booster VE was observed.

translation: it seemed to lower the death ratefor two months (!): (italics mine).

In time-stratified analyses comparing mortality rates among unvaccinated persons with those among vaccinated persons 2 weeks–2 months after receipt of a bivalent booster dose, mortality RRs significantly declined from 16.3 during the BA.5-predominant period to 8.4 during the XBB.1.5-predominant period, representing a modest reduction in crude vaccine effectiveness

so give it to grandmom, not your two year old kid. 

I should note: Someone needs to teach these folks to write clearly.

and not answered: Will repeated shots increase the rate of spike protein induced auto immune problems? LINK Immunology 2022 article wondered about this. 

and this article (Vaccines Basel) wonders if this mechanism means more vaccine shots increase your vulnerability to covid. 

and this 2022 article (Cureus) noted that the myocarditis in young men was increased after the second dose. but as this Korean study (Jan 2023 Eur heart journal) shows, it remains rare with 1.35 per 100 thousand, but much higher (5 in 100thousand)  in young men. 

the original covid virus, which killed mainly the eldelry but also killed the middle aged and young (several local businessmen died of it, and one of our friends' pregnant daughter and her baby died of covid: She refused the vaccine because of pregnancy.) 

But now, with the omicron varient, covid pneumonia deaths  which had a typical x ray. are rare,

Most of the deaths are with covid (of bacterial pneumonia, simlar to deaths with influenza), not from the virus causing pneumonia.

The problem is was not pushing the use of covid vaccines early in the epidemic. That was justified.

The problem was censoring alternative opinions, prolonging the lockdown, etc. And now the problem is continuing to promote their use on low risk people after omicron varient took over.

Dr Malone discusses (banned video).

His criticisms are a bit over the top, so he was banned, but the Streisand effect kicked in and the banning made his discussion with Joe Rogan pretty well explode the monopoly of the gatekeeprs. And not just to the anti vax types:

Joe Rogan Savagely Bullies Scientist By Inviting Him On Podcast To Explain His Position https://t.co/UMEtNaKS5o pic.twitter.com/K1bSQHoio6

— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) June 20, 2023

 A lot of us got upset when doctors trying to give possible helpful medicines were threatened by losing their licenses... the problem was trying to give anti virals and medicines with few side effects like Ivermectin was now taboo despite contradicting studies  link link link

people who face a serious disease will often succumb to quack medicine of course. or sometimes just find a way to buy the medicines because they know that they could die wanting for the FDA to approve the medicine. Dallas buyers club anyone?

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

the British scandal of party gate has MPH Dr Campbell and historian Neil Oliver angry. Apparantly the VIPs in the UK partied at a time when lockdowns prevented people visiting their loved one, etc.

Sort of like when BLM protests were okay but attending church or school was not.

Sigh.

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

then we come to the censorship wars over controversial (banned in Europe) treatment of under age trans folk.

the MSM uses the trans vocabulary (gender affirming treatment, don't say gay) to push the agenda. 

Before if you posted anti trans stuff, (including medical studies that question the agenda) you were kicked off of twitter, facebook, youtube, blogger etc.

But now Elon is fighting back. But has he gone too far?

twitter will now stop you from using the newfangled word cis and cis gender because it is being used in a racist way to ridicule normal people. (In English cis suggests the word Sissy).

sorry: the term should not be banned. It should be criticized and ridiculed.

Like the term "white people", a racist term I first heard bandied about by NPR it is merely a term used by SJW to bully people.

I had to look it up, but it makes sense: in history one reads about Cisalpine Gall, and I always thought they used cis to imply bad white people (the Romans disliked the blond Celts aka Gauls because they once looted Rome).

 but of course in today's world, even the term normality is being banned.

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

experts who covered up covid origin will never be punished.

More and more articles are coming out that the covid epidemic was a lab leak, and that the virus was caused by gain of function research, funded by Fauci (because President Obama stopped this dangerous research in the USA) and yes it may have been part of Chinese bioweapon research (luckily they didn't accidentally leak a more virulent version).

shellenberger Twitter thread

Max Taibbi Racket news article

Public news at substack written by MICHAEL SHELLENBERGER, MATT TAIBBI, AND ALEX GUTENTAG

read the entire article and weep. Because this was all highly suspected for years, but the experts pushed back to stop these rumors. And major MSM and medical journals went along with the ruse to the point of punishing those who promoted these theories. But the Racket article ends hopefully saying that the MSM still has some honest reporters so maybe we will find the truth.

One reason that this story is appearing now: First of all, because Elon Musk allowed an investigation on censorship on Twitter.

Second, this article in the very liberal UK Times (behind paywall) LINK

this goes beyond China lying about it (heck, China lies all the time). It is about lies by experts in the USA who silence voices who dared to point fingers and say it needed to be investigated. And it is about major medical journals who went along with the propaganda.

For example, ecohealth funded the Wuhan lab research, but no one blinked when the head of ecohealth got a bunch of scientists to write a letter to Lancet to deny it was a lab leak very early in 2020.

and as the evidence continued to leak out, the slowness of the MSM continued.

For example, this article in May 2021 in the WAPOST admits it could be a lab leak, and hey maybe someone should look into it.

so why didn't they? The article essentially say the reason it wasn't looked into by their intrepid reporters is because those trying to publicize the theory were Republicans. They even blame Trump because when he hinted this might have been the case,  " The Trump administration’s messaging was often accompanied by anti-Chinese rhetoric that made it easier for skeptics to ignore its claims."

by the way: the anti Chinese rhetoric was because he called it the Chinese virus, and because he stopped travelers from arriving from China at a time when the W.H.O. said it wasn't infectious and that one shouldn't stop travelers. That is why Nancy Pelosi encouraged Chinese new year celebrations that probably spread the virus (and the BLM demonstrations were allowed because they didn't spread the virus either)

OF course by then it was too late: already it was spreading in Italy (and spread to NYC) and was making people sick in Seattle etc.

But it points out another way the anti Trump obsession resulted in news stories that were not just inaccurate, but resulted in people dying because no one dared to question the experts (and those who dared were ignored).

And guess who was the first to point out the lab leak as the source: according to that WAPO article:

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) from the start pointed to the lab’s location in Wuhan, pressing China for answers, so the history books will reward him if he turns out to be right.

Yup. what the article doesn't point out: He is a practicing physician, but of course he was a Republican from Oklahoma so could be ignored.

So those behind this propaganda (that slowed the original shutdown at a time that might have saved lives) are the same ones who later proposed over the top lockdowns that were not needed, and vaccines to children who were not at risk.

and don't forget those who placed infectious covid patients into nursing homes.

 Governor Cuomo sometimes is condemned for this since he allowed it, but of course he was following advice from experts. And of course, we need to blame those experts who followed out of date Medicare rules to do this because the Medicare rules insiste that well trained staff (/s) in (understaffed) nursing homes could keep people safe. But will anyone  blame those who wrote those rules? Of course not.Nor will those experts who told governors this practice was safe be punished.

 Indeed,  Dr. Levine, who approved of this in Pennsylvania has actually denied reality and defending her actions, and denied that placing infected people into nursing homes caused deaths because as Newsweek points out she didn't do it (she merely ordered them to do it, but never mind).

(although) Levine serve(d) as the Pennsylvania secretary of health and was active in that position when the state's health department issued the guidance to nursing home facilities saying they can accept patients from hospitals and patients who formerly had COVID-19, that (fact) does not prove she placed coronavirus-positive patients in nursing homes or contributed to thousands of elderly deaths in the state.

so Levine was rewarded with a high government job, because hey, he is a she and can't criticize a trans person for incompetence or you will be called a bigot.

so why is it important to bring all these things up?

Because those who lied should not be left in power to lie again. 

and because of the "boy who cried wolf" problem: When a real epidemic starts, no one will believe them.

We saw this in the Philippines, when children died from an experimental Dengue vaccine, so some parents didn't trust vaccines that had been around for decades: They refused to get their kids vaccinated against routine childhood illnesses, so kids got measles, diphtheria, etc. and some of them died.

so now that some  of the problems the establishment covered up (such as the side effects of the vaccines) are being revealed, the conspiracy theorists are being believed by some, often in an exaggerated form.

But what is worse, is that the establishment types who were behind the coverup are being rewarded:

and very real questions on risky research are not being asked by those who should be discussing the risk/benefit problems.

according to Nature

NIH reinstates grant for controversial coronavirus research

EcoHealth Alliance lost funding during the Trump administration, but can now proceed with its research — under extensive restrictions.

yup. But did EcoHealth learn their lessons? Who will be inspecting these facilities? And why are only those evil Republicans  trying to stop them when distrust of Big Pharma is a traditional liberal position?

By the way: EcoHealth got a grant to put one of these labs into the Philippines...it's aim?

 REDUCING THE THREAT OF VIRAL SPILLOVER FROM WILDLIFE IN THE PHILIPPINES

and some here are not pleased. Inquirer editorial Feb 2023 insists that this needs to be looked into:

The Defense Threat Reduction Agency is a combat support agency within the United States Department of Defense (DoD) doing work on weapons of mass destruction, chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and high explosives. Isn’t this funding suspicious? This role of civilian and agricultural cooperation rests with the US Department of Agriculture, not with agencies within the US DoD, clearly. Will the DFA and DND ask US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin during his visit to clarify the US position?

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

update: UKGuardian opinion article on the UK investigation of the Covid response, and the complexity of deciding what to do

But it’s vital that the inquiry separates out what were scientific questions, that independent advisers and academics could provide data and input on, and what were leadership decisions. Policy measures such as closing gyms or schools or play parks, or the introduction of mandatory face coverings, were conveyed as “scientific” decisions, but they weren’t. Scientists could present the probable risks and benefits of certain policy options, but the final decision didn’t lie with them.

No, Google censors: That means terrorists, not we lovely elderly ladies

 I have received a handful of emails warning me that I have been violating community standards at blogger, and that these posts are now flagged.

So what kinds of community standards did I violate?

Horrors! one post from 2007 discussing local Philippine news metioned our local Moro Islamic Liberation Front.... using their initials, because anyone living in the Philippines, or who is associated with the US Military, or saw the movie  PLANE knows about terrorists in the southern Philippines... 

apparantly the google censors must be a computer that has a dirty mind and thinks our pious Moro terrorists are into pornography.

and since I was ordered to change that post, and cannot appeal, (because if I appeal, they might have to apologize) I think I'll leave it that way since I doubt that any of my half dozen readers will bother to view a 15 year old post that is mainly about volcanoes and other local problems.

If every blogger is being examined in minute detail for minor stuff like that, then one worries about the freedom of speech on blogger.

Wait til they scan my medical blog....

The covid coverup: Shut up conspiracy person.

Mr Musk blows up the BBC on covid stories being censored

 

Instapundit also posted a link to the archived article on the UKTelegaph cited above (the Telegraph is behind a pay wall).

Generally, when a journalist is preparing for an encounter of that importance, you really do your homework. Young Clayton thought it was sufficient to turn up with a bunch of lazy, Leftist assumptions which probably quite accurately represent the groupthink in the BBC newsroom. Elon Musk had other ideas.

Generally, when a journalist is preparing for an encounter of that importance, you really do your homework. Young Clayton thought it was sufficient to turn up with a bunch of lazy, Leftist assumptions which probably quite accurately represent the groupthink in the BBC newsroom. Elon Musk had other ideas.

In the meanwhile, Instapundit links to an Unherd article about the scientist who funded Wuhan and persuaded the Lancet to publish an artlce to condemn conspiracy theoriests. ....

Why did Peter Daszak change his mind? New documents reveal he warned against risky research,,,Peter Daszak spent many years hunting down bat viruses with Chinese scientists, helped fund their cutting-edge research in Wuhan, and then vociferously led opposition to any suggestions that the pandemic might have been linked to a laboratory in the city. A pugnacious character, the British zoologist would pop up regularly in the media to fiercely dismiss “conspiracy theories”, playing a key role in efforts to stifle debate over the origins of Covid-19.

So how strange to discover that this same man had previously warned that risky research was “intensifying” threats from “lab-enhanced viruses”. In fact, two years before the pandemic erupted, Daszak was involved in drafting a presentation about the dangers of engineered viruses being accidentally or even deliberately released into the world.....

another video discussing influence in the media that I post here to watch later since it is long and nuanced.

...In the past, most of us who were what was called liberals in the olden days were aware of the danger of corporation money influencing medical literature

But who was behind the censorship on various aspects of covid?

And why did it take Joe Rogan to break the silence that there was some truth behind those crazy conspiracy theories about the mRNA vaccines being dangerous?

My opinion has been stated many times: Early in the epidemic, the mRNA and other vaccines saved millions of lives, especially in high risk folks.

The irony is that thanks to people like Dr Levine (who is above criticism because trans) allowed a dangerous policy that caused thousands of deaths by allowing infectious covid patients to be readmitted into nursing homes, and justified this because of an out of date Medicare rule that was written before covid.

the censorship of vaccine side effects was because an active anti vax conspiracy types caused epidemics because they frightened people from having their children vaccinated for all sorts of diseases after people mistook a problem with one vaccine as a problem with all vaccines (this happened after the Dengue vaccine kerfuffle here in the Philippines).

mRNA vaccines were a new technology, so there should have been close examination of the pros and cons of using this, when older methods of making vaccines was available.

But of course, one also has to remember that older methods of making vaccines had problems:  AZ vaccine worked but caused Strokes/blood clots, and the older technology such as used by China's Sinovax essentially didn't work well... Indeed, one reason for China's recent outbreak of Covid was because they used an inferior vaccine.

the dirty little secret is that once Omicron hit, the risk benefit ratio changed, so the health authorities should have changed their plans to fight the epidemic to one similar to how they fight influenza: vaccine for the elderly etc. not those with little risk of death. But not shutdown except temporary and limited shutdowns in areas with a high rate of disease.

yet the governments kept stressing that you needed one booster after another, even in low risk young people, where the risk outweighed the benefit.

So early on, most of us elders and caregivers got the vaccine, but now not so much. The main problem is that students who wanted face to face class also agreed to get it (probably not a good idea).

Here, people don't obey the government when the law seems stupid.

Ironically, that is why so few people here got the booster.

and alas the main result of this censorship is a complete lack of trust in the medical establishment. And that bodes ill if another epidemic happens.

censoring medicine: Politics not science

 LegalInsurrection blog links to the latest twiiter expose on how discussions about covid were censored by a think tank.

Independent journalist Matt Taibbi examined Stanford University’s ‘Virality Project,’ which was ostensibly meant to combat “disinformation.” Actually, however, it appears to have targeted COVID content that ran counter to the establishment narrative.

So a private thinktank, not a government interfering with free speech, right? 

Uh... NO.

Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey...described the program: Federal health officials in the Surgeon General’s Office, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Health and Human Services collaborated in a “censorship enterprise called the Virality Project, which procures the censorship of enormous quantities of First Amendment-protected speech.”

Disinformation warriors worked overtime to suppress “false” claims about the side effects of COVID vaccine, especially the true claims. Since the Food and Drug Administration officially (and speedily) approved COVID vaccines, any reports of side effects were automatically disinformation.

The Virality Project recommended that social-media companies suppress “stories of true vaccine side effects” and “true posts which could fuel [vaccine] hesitancy.” The project “routinely framed real testimonials about [vaccine] side effects as misinformation, from ‘true stories’ of blood clots from AstraZeneca vaccines to a New York Times story about vaccine recipients who contracted the blood disorder thrombocytopenia.”

there is a long line of twitter posts, links, and refernces.

This would barely be acceptable if Covid was a severe disase (think smallpox or plague), but in today's world, it has larger implications.

@mtaibbi

·

Follow

http://44.To recap: America’s information mission went from counterterrorism abroad, to stopping “foreign interference” from reaching domestic audiences, to 80% domestic content, much of it true. The “Disinformation Governance Board” is out; but truth-policing is not.

10:09 PM · Mar 17, 2023

Now alas the crazies will say conspiracy theory. 

Nuances are important: Which is why one needs free speech. By censoring free speech, you let the crazies and paranoids think they were right.

and one of the results is a loss of trust in the medical community, and in vaccines which save millions of lives but do have side effects that could kill a small number of people.

So do you stop people from spreading conspiracy theories that could result in hundreds dying, or do you use the power of the government to censor such talk?

We saw this dilemma here in the Philippines, with the debacle over the dengue vaccine, which was given to thousands of poor children at risk from that disease.

The Dengue vaccine here in the Philippines had side effects  that made getting complicated dengue more common, and probably killed a dozen kids (alJ says many more died ).

.

as the film reports: the bad publicity from these deaths resulted in a lack of trust in other vaccines, and as a result dozens of kids dying of measles, etc.

So by the time Covid came around, one would suspect people would not get the vaccine. But that was not true, in part because a lot of us knew people who died of covid: not the elderly (elderly deaths are considered normal) but of the young and healthy middle age folk.

But once the omicron varient started, herd immunity meant the death rate was down, and not a lot of people are getting boosters, although they are still giving it to kids.

Our case load is low: But I suspect that it is because no one is being tested unless they are sick enough to go to the hospital.

Covid conspiracy theories now being confirmed

 the claim that that Covid came from a lab leak was believed by ordinary folk (and Trumpieboy) since the start of the epidemic, but any discussion of this was censored in the social media.

But now that MSM and government sites are saying the same thing, does this mean we can discuss this?

and what is the implications to ordinary folk trusting institutions?

....

as the discussion notes: everyone knew it, but it was not allowed to be discussed.

part of the problem was how the government tried to censor everything., not just the wuhan lab leak but how society should respond to it shutdown full or partial?

The pesky first amendment stopped them from doing it officially but now we are finding out how government agencies used twitter to do this, making one suspect that other social media sites were also pressured to censor badthink by government agencies.

Questions about the response to the epidemic that was not done but should have been discussed:

 Should we balance the problem of being infected with the need of the elderly to have family visiting? 

Should we allow the use of a medicine with few side effects like HCQ or Ivermectin  or Vitamin D or herbal medicines, or should we remove the medical license of doctors who advise for such use? 

What about the shutdown of society: we face economic depression that  will probably kill people, so should that be limited and how should that be done?  

V

the main problem? The federal government worked with the social media to censor alternative theories being discussed. And now that this is being exposed in the twitterfile investigation, the twitter file expose is being ignored by the MSM.

what needs to be discussed now that the pandora's box of silence is being shattered:

One: the coverup of the Wuhan lab leak, and if the US funding of the Wuhan lab was the reason the government health officials went along with the lies.

Two: The implications of the Wuhan lab leak coverup by the WHO. 

Three: The fact that Trumpieboy closed the borders to try to stop it from coming to the USA and was demonized because the WHO and CHina at the time insisted it was not infectious. Were the facts here (racism charges) politicized to destroy Trump?... heck, even now the fact Chna won't let the lab be investigated is blamed on the fact that Trump did this, and made them mad, not because they want to deny they had a lab accident and covered it up to save face. this has geopolitical implications with a China that is becoming more aggressive against East Asian countries. Eight part podcast on this starts here:

p>

Four: the shut down of society which only now is being recognized as causing more deaths (from other diseases that were not diagnosed or treated properly, from being unemployed, from depression and other social results of isolation). Question: is the despair from social isolation have anything to do with the 100 thousand Fentanyl deaths?

So why wasn't these risks from the shutdown of society allowed to be discussed i.e. the cost benefit ratio, especially as those at high risk received the vaccine (which worked and saved lives), meaning that the risk had gone down? This was especially true as the milder Omicron version started to go around, and probably induced herd immunity.

Five": the suspicion now being pushed that the economic shutdown shows that the public will obey the changes that are needed for the Great Reset. Is there truth in this conspiray theory?

Six: the implications of freedom of speech that can be extended to other matters, such as the censorship of Harry Potter because the author dared to say men and women exists, or the censorship of books (the latest: James Bond, who they just noticed is a male chauvenist pig, duh ). 

Seven: What happens when AI becomes politicized?

...

What I worry is that the mistrust of science and government because of the lies, censorship and over reaction will make people sceptical of a really dangerous epidemic: and the worry that Bird flu or a similar disease will break out into a really dangerous epidemic, (probably not says Dr. C):

 

But if bird flu or a similar virus pops up that could  cause an epidemic, the problem is that no one will obey.

and it could have other political implications if those who didn't kowtow to the science or woke push back.

LINK

Not good news for the Democrats. Sigh.

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

Update:

Now they came for the BFG

 someone in a podcast was saying that one needs to collect paper books, not ebooks, to preserve the book before the censors destroy them.

I thought that sounded a bit paranoid but now I am reading that someone decided to censor Ronald Dahl's children's books to make them politically correct and not hurt the feelings of the kids.

AnnAlthouse has examples... 

'I’d knock her flat' becomes the much more diplomatic 'I’d give her a right talking to,' for instance." "'You saucy beast!' becomes 'You trickster!'

 Best comment to her blogpost:

J L Oliver said...

The queen has declared, “Let them read about sex acts and gender unicorns! But save them from the saucy beast!”

This is on top of censoring Dr. Seuss for racism.

so wait till they come for Shakespeare. Oh someone already has.

Mr Bowdler, as in Bowdlerism:

verb (used with object),

to expurgate (a written work) by removing or modifying passages considered vulgar or objectionable.

So even in those days, there were Karens willing to censor stuff they did not approve of.

Or maybe I should say Henriettas. From the ChapelHillBookBlog:

in his book, Dr. Bowdler’s Legacy: A History of Expurgated Books in England and America, Noel Perrin convincingly argues that the 1807 edition was actually edited by Thomas’s sister, Henrietta Bowdler (1750-1830), whose name was omitted from the title page.

By the time the first edition of The Family Shakespeare appeared, Henrietta was already a published author and a well-known bluestocking. Perrin estimates that Henrietta excised about ten percent of Shakespeare’s words, taking special care to eliminate any hint of religious irreverence.

yes. the more things change the more they stay the same.

cartoon by Dahl 

 -----------------------------

Update: it's worse in the UK where an anti terrorism taxpayer funded group has a list of bad books:

From the

UKMail:

Yes Minister and The Thick of It were among the satire programmes flagged by beleaguered counter-terror Prevent scheme for 'encouraging far-right sympathies'

And now they came for comedies like Yes Minister, and classics like Shakespeare, the Lord of the Rings, 1984,Chaucer, Milton, Tennyson, Kipling and Edmund Burke. 

 The report even highlighted the BBC’s 1990s political thriller House Of Cards, John le Carre’s seminal spy trilogy Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, and Sharpe, the ITV drama set in the Napoleonic wars.

Other books, shows and films on list Beowulf The Canterbury Tales The Complete Works Of William Shakespeare Paradise Lost The Four Feathers Lady Hamilton The Dam Busters The Bridge On The River Kwai The Great Escape Zulu Civilisation Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy House Of Cards Trilogy Sharpe Ray Mears’ Bushcraft Survival David Starkey’s Monarchy.

It said the works of fiction were ‘key texts’ for ‘white nationalists/supremacists’.

Like these two:

 

 headsup Instapundit.