offguardian--2020-04-23--The Seven-Step Path from Pandemic to Totalitarianism

There are just seven steps from pandemic declaration to permanent totalitarianism – and many jurisdictions are about to start Step 5 As if it was planned in advance , billions of people around the globe are being forced step by rapid step into a radically different way of life , one that involves far less personal , physical and financial freedom and agency Here is the template for rolling this out .
A new virus starts to spread around the world .
The World Health Organization ( WHO ) declares a pandemic .
International agencies , public-health officials , politicians @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fear by focusing almost exclusively on the contagiousness of the virus and the rising numbers of cases , and by characterizing the virus as extremely dangerous .
Within a few days governments at national and local levels also declare states of emergency .
At lightning speed they impose lock-down measures that confine most people to their homes – starting with closing schools – and shut down much of the global economy .
World markets implode .
The stunned , fearful and credulous public – convinced over the previous few years that their bodies @ @ @ @ @ @ @ react to pathogens by producing antibodies that confer long-lasting immunity – largely complies willingly .
The first weekly virtual class on local emergency and crisis responses to COVID19 is held for mayors and other city officials around the world .
Coordinated by a handful of American organizations in the academic , medical , financial , political and transportation spheres , the classes feature guests ranging from Barack Obama to Bill Gates .
National , state/provincial and municipal leaders , as well as public-health officials , start daily press briefings .
They use them @ @ @ @ @ @ @ asserting the virus has the potential to kill many millions .
Most of this information is hard to decipher and sheds little real light on the natural course of the virus ’ s spread through each geographic area .
Officials and media downplay or distort inconveniently low death tolls from the virus and instead focus on alarming statistics produced by compliant academics , social-media influencers and high-profile organizations .
The main message is that this is a war and many lives are at stake unless virtually everybody stays at home .
Mainstream media @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at the mercy of the virus .
Simultaneously , central banks and governments hand out massive amounts of cash largely to benefit the big banks .
And they bring in giant private-sector financial firms to manage the process despite these global companies ’ very poor track record in the 2008-2009 crash .
Governments also rapidly start to create trillions of pounds ’ worth of programs that include compensating businesses and workers for their shutdown-related losses .
There is a concerted effort by all levels of government and public health to very rapidly ramp @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with production of personal protective equipment .
They push aside the need for regulation , including quality standards and independent verification of tests ’ rates of accuracy , by insisting that fast approval and roll-out are imperative for saving lives .
Models are released that predict snowballing of numbers of cases , hospitalizations and deaths even under best-case scenarios .
At about the same time , public-health officials significantly loosen the criteria for viral infections , outbreaks and deaths , particularly in the oldest members of society .
That increases the numbers of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pathogen .
The media continue to clamour for more testing and for severe punishment of people who aren ’ t completely compliant with the lock-down measures .
As a result , there ’ s little backlash as police and military with sweeping new powers enforce these measures and give stiff penalties or even jail terms to those who disobey orders .
States also monitor with impunity massive numbers of people ’ s movements via their cellphones .
Vast human resources are focused on tracking down people who have had contact with a virus-positive @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Thus the portion of the public exposed to the virus remains relatively small .
It also contributes to social isolation .
Among many effects , this enables those in control to even further erase individual and collective choices , voices and power .
When the numbers of cases and deaths start to plateau , local officials claim it ’ s too early to tell whether the virus has finished passing through their population and therefore , restrictive measures must continue .
An alternative narrative is that if such measures aren ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ resurgence of cases and deaths .
Yet another is that the continuing climb in elderly persons ’ deaths means all bets are off for the time being .
They admit that initial models incorrectly predicted there would be a tsunami of cases , ICU admissions and deaths .
However , they assert more time is needed before it can be determined whether it ’ s safe to loosen some of the restrictions and let children return to school or adults go back to work .
Officials do not try to calculate the overall @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the shut-downs and other measures against , nor do they discuss what cost level may be too high .
They and powerful media organizations also push for the massive virus-testing over-capacity to be used to surveil the general population for viral DNA in their bodies .
At the same time , the roll-out begins of widespread blood testing for antibodies to the virus .
Meanwhile , new data are published showing the virus has a high capacity to mutate .
Scientists and officials interpret this as meaning a larger medical arsenal will @ @ @ @ @ @ @ two or three weeks later , the dramatic increase in testing for viral DNA produces the desired goal of a significant upsurge in the number of people found positive for the virus .
Public-health officials add jet fuel to the surge by adding to their case and death tallies the large number of people who are only suspected – and not lab-test-confirmed – to have had an infection .
Politicians and public-health officials tell the populace this means they can not return to their jobs or other activities outside the home for the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ agencies , academics , industry , the WHO and other organizations to start to design and implement immunity-passport systems for using the results of the widespread antibody testing to determine who can be released from the lock-downs .
This is one of many goals of the seven steps .
Meanwhile , government leaders continue to highlight the importance of vaccines for besting the virus .
Large-scale human testing of many different types of antivirals and vaccines begins , thanks to a concerted push from the WHO , Bill Gates and his collaborators , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ universities .
Large swaths of the population don ’ t have the antibodies to the virus because they ’ ve been kept from being exposed to it ; they eagerly accept these medications even though they ’ ve been rushed to market with inadequate safety testing .
They believe these medical products offer the only hope for escaping the virus ’ s clutches .
Soon the new virus starts another cycle around the globe – just as influenza and other viruses have every year for millennia .
Officials again fan the flames of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of deaths among people not yet protected from the virus .
They rapidly roll out virus and antibody testing again , while companies sell billions more doses of antivirals and booster vaccines .
Governments simultaneously cede control of all remaining public assets to global companies .
This is because local and national governments ’ tax bases were decimated during Step 1 and they ’ re virtually bankrupt from their unprecedented spending in the war against the virus in the other steps .
The overall result is complete medicalization of the response to the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is no more harmful than influenza .
This is coupled with the creation of permanent totalitarianism controlled by global companies and a 24/7 invasive-surveillance police state supported by widespread blossoming of ‘ smart ’ technology .
The key players repeat the cycle of hysteria and massive administration of antivirals and booster shots every few months .
And they implement a variation of steps 1 to 7 when another new pathogen appears on the planet .
With the arrival of COVID19 many countries quickly completed Steps 1 , 2 and 3 .
Step 4 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ number of jurisdictions .
Step 5 is on track to start in early May .
Rosemary Frei has an MSc in molecular biology from a faculty of medicine and was a freelance medical writer and journalist for 22 years .
She is now an independent investigative journalist in Toronto , Ontario .
You can find her earlier article on the novel coronavirus for Off-Guardian here , watch and listen to an interview she gave on COVID19 and follow her on Twitter .

There are just seven steps from pandemic declaration to permanent totalitarianism – and many jurisdictions are about to start Step 5
Rosemary Frei
As if it was planned in advance, billions of people around the globe are being forced step by rapid step into a radically different way of life, one that involves far less personal, physical and financial freedom and agency.
Here is the template for rolling this out.
Step 1
A new virus starts to spread around the world. The World Health Organization (WHO) declares a pandemic.
International agencies, public-health officials, politicians, media and other influential voices fan fear by focusing almost exclusively on the contagiousness of the virus and the rising numbers of cases, and by characterizing the virus as extremely dangerous.
Within a few days governments at national and local levels also declare states of emergency. At lightning speed they impose lock-down measures that confine most people to their homes – starting with closing schools – and shut down much of the global economy. World markets implode.
The stunned, fearful and credulous public – convinced over the previous few years that their bodies do not have the natural ability to react to pathogens by producing antibodies that confer long-lasting immunity – largely complies willingly.
The first weekly virtual class on local emergency and crisis responses to COVID19 is held for mayors and other city officials around the world. Coordinated by a handful of American organizations in the academic, medical, financial, political and transportation spheres, the classes feature guests ranging from Barack Obama to Bill Gates.
Step 2
National, state/provincial and municipal leaders, as well as public-health officials, start daily press briefings. They use them to pump out frightening statistics and modelling asserting the virus has the potential to kill many millions.
Most of this information is hard to decipher and sheds little real light on the natural course of the virus’s spread through each geographic area.
Officials and media downplay or distort inconveniently low death tolls from the virus and instead focus on alarming statistics produced by compliant academics, social-media influencers and high-profile organizations.
The main message is that this is a war and many lives are at stake unless virtually everybody stays at home. Mainstream media amplify the trope that the world is at the mercy of the virus.
Simultaneously, central banks and governments hand out massive amounts of cash largely to benefit the big banks. And they bring in giant private-sector financial firms to manage the process despite these global companies’ very poor track record in the 2008-2009 crash. Governments also rapidly start to create trillions of pounds’ worth of programs that include compensating businesses and workers for their shutdown-related losses.
Step 3
There is a concerted effort by all levels of government and public health to very rapidly ramp up testing for viral RNA, along with production of personal protective equipment.
They push aside the need for regulation, including quality standards and independent verification of tests’ rates of accuracy, by insisting that fast approval and roll-out are imperative for saving lives.
Models are released that predict snowballing of numbers of cases, hospitalizations and deaths even under best-case scenarios.
At about the same time, public-health officials significantly loosen the criteria for viral infections, outbreaks and deaths, particularly in the oldest members of society. That increases the numbers of cases and deaths ascribed to the new pathogen.
The media continue to clamour for more testing and for severe punishment of people who aren’t completely compliant with the lock-down measures.
As a result, there’s little backlash as police and military with sweeping new powers enforce these measures and give stiff penalties or even jail terms to those who disobey orders. States also monitor with impunity massive numbers of people’s movements via their cellphones.
Vast human resources are focused on tracking down people who have had contact with a virus-positive individual and confining them to their homes. Thus the portion of the public exposed to the virus remains relatively small.
It also contributes to social isolation. Among many effects, this enables those in control to even further erase individual and collective choices, voices and power.
Step 4
When the numbers of cases and deaths start to plateau, local officials claim it’s too early to tell whether the virus has finished passing through their population and therefore, restrictive measures must continue.
An alternative narrative is that if such measures aren’t kept in place there will be a resurgence of cases and deaths. Yet another is that the continuing climb in elderly persons’ deaths means all bets are off for the time being.
They admit that initial models incorrectly predicted there would be a tsunami of cases, ICU admissions and deaths. However, they assert more time is needed before it can be determined whether it’s safe to loosen some of the restrictions and let children return to school or adults go back to work.
Officials do not try to calculate the overall skyrocketing cost to their populations and economies of the shut-downs and other measures against, nor do they discuss what cost level may be too high.
They and powerful media organizations also push for the massive virus-testing over-capacity to be used to surveil the general population for viral RNA in their bodies. At the same time, the roll-out begins of widespread blood testing for antibodies to the virus.
Meanwhile, new data are published showing the virus has a high capacity to mutate. Scientists and officials interpret this as meaning a larger medical arsenal will be needed to combat it.
Step 5
About two or three weeks later, the dramatic increase in testing for viral RNA produces the desired goal of a significant upsurge in the number of people found positive for the virus.
Public-health officials add jet fuel to the surge by adding to their case and death tallies the large number of people who are only suspected – and not lab-test-confirmed – to have had an infection. Politicians and public-health officials tell the populace this means they cannot return to their jobs or other activities outside the home for the time being.
Governments work with public-health agencies, academics, industry, the WHO and other organizations to start to design and implement immunity-passport systems for using the results of the widespread antibody testing to determine who can be released from the lock-downs. This is one of many goals of the seven steps.
Meanwhile, government leaders continue to highlight the importance of vaccines for besting the virus.
Step 6
Large-scale human testing of many different types of antivirals and vaccines begins, thanks to a concerted push from the WHO, Bill Gates and his collaborators, pharmaceutical and biotech companies, governments and universities.
Large swaths of the population don’t have the antibodies to the virus because they’ve been kept from being exposed to it; they eagerly accept these medications even though they’ve been rushed to market with inadequate safety testing. They believe these medical products offer the only hope for escaping the virus’s clutches.
Step 7
Soon the new virus starts another cycle around the globe – just as influenza and other viruses have every year for millennia. Officials again fan the flames of fear by positing the potential for millions of deaths among people not yet protected from the virus.
They rapidly roll out virus and antibody testing again, while companies sell billions more doses of antivirals and booster vaccines.
Governments simultaneously cede control of all remaining public assets to global companies. This is because local and national governments’ tax bases were decimated during Step 1 and they’re virtually bankrupt from their unprecedented spending in the war against the virus in the other steps.
The overall result is complete medicalization of the response to the virus, which on a population level is no more harmful than influenza.
This is coupled with the creation of permanent totalitarianism controlled by global companies and a 24/7 invasive-surveillance police state supported by widespread blossoming of ‘smart’ technology.
The key players repeat the cycle of hysteria and massive administration of antivirals and booster shots every few months.
And they implement a variation of steps 1 to 7 when another new pathogen appears on the planet.
Sounds far-fetched? Unfortunately, it’s not.
With the arrival of COVID19 many countries quickly completed Steps 1, 2 and 3.
Step 4 is well under way in a large number of jurisdictions.
Step 5 is on track to start in early May.
Rosemary Frei has an MSc in molecular biology from a faculty of medicine and was a freelance medical writer and journalist for 22 years. She is now an independent investigative journalist in Toronto, Ontario. You can find her earlier article on the novel coronavirus for Off-Guardian here, watch and listen to an interview she gave on COVID19 and follow her on Twitter.


offguardian--2020-04-23--Why you can’t trust the UK’s “daily” Covid19 updates

The daily Covid19 deaths reports , issued by the UK government , are generally misleading and being so misrepresented by the media they amount to little more than a lie .
Each day , the UK ’ s Department of Health and Social Care ( DHSC ) releases a report titled “ Daily number of COVID-19 associated UK deaths in hospital ” .
The media then report these numbers as the “ daily death toll ” , presenting the total as if all these people : A ) Died of Covid19 .
B ) Died in the preceding 24 hours @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Point A we ’ ve already covered in great detail .
The UK government , like many other national governments , makes no effort whatsoever to distinguish between those who died of the coronavirus and those who died with the coronavirus .
Therefore , of the “ daily Covid19 deaths ” , an unknown number may have died of something else .
This is not new information .
Point B is not as widely known : The reported “ daily ” death toll is NOT a list of those who died that day @ @ @ @ @ @ @ daily mortality reports , which are supposed to cover Covid19 deaths over the previous 24 hours , will regularly , and apparently randomly , include data from many other days , going back six weeks or more .
To illustrate this , let ’ s look at one day in detail : April 10th .
The DHSC report released that day states that 980 people died of Covid19 .
This was covered in the press as the UK ’ s “ deadliest Covid19 day ” .
The Telegraph ’ s headline announced : @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 24 hours in biggest rise yet ” .
The Daily Mail reported : “ Britain records Europe ’ s highest single-day death toll : Number of victims jumps by 980 ” Sky News went with : “ 980 tops Spain and Italy ’ s highest daily number of deaths , which were 961 and 919 respectively.
” But , at the time the report was released , the previous 24 hours had seen just 117 “ Covid19 related deaths ” according to NHS England , with a further possible 90 coming from Northern @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a maximum possible total of 204 .
The other 776 people included in the report had died at seemingly random points between March 5th and April 8th .
The reported “ 980 deaths in one day ” were , in reality , spread over five weeks .
This is not a “ conspiracy theory ” , it ’ s not any kind of theory .
It ’ s a fact openly admitted in the official numbers , here .
It ’ s not even an isolated incident , the same is true of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” .
Who were the 980 added to the Covid19 death figures on April 10th ?
Why was this apparently random sample of people , whose deaths were many weeks apart , selected for inclusion as “ daily deaths ” on the same day ?
We don ’ t know .
No explanation is given , no rationale supplied .
What we DO know is that , despite what government graphs claim , they didn ’ t all die on the same day .
We know that , when the media reported that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ day , they were essentially lying .
And we know these lies are being repeated by police officers to scare people into staying out of their own front gardens .

The daily Covid19 deaths reports, issued by the UK government, are generally misleading and being so misrepresented by the media they amount to little more than a lie.
Each day, the UK’s Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) releases a report titled “Daily number of COVID-19 associated UK deaths in hospital”.
The media then report these numbers as the “daily death toll”, presenting the total as if all these people:
A) Died of Covid19.
B) Died in the preceding 24 hours.
Neither of which is true.
Point A we’ve already covered in great detail. The UK government, like many other national governments, makes no effort whatsoever to distinguish between those who died of the coronavirus and those who died with the coronavirus. Therefore, of the “daily Covid19 deaths”, an unknown number may have died of something else. This is not new information.
Point B is not as widely known: The reported “daily” death toll is NOT a list of those who died that day.
Essentially, the NHS’s daily mortality reports, which are supposed to cover Covid19 deaths over the previous 24 hours, will regularly, and apparently randomly, include data from many other days, going back six weeks or more.
To illustrate this, let’s look at one day in detail: April 10th.
The DHSC report released that day states that 980 people died of Covid19. This was covered in the press as the UK’s “deadliest Covid19 day”.
The Telegraph’s headline announced: “UK death toll jumps 980 in 24 hours in biggest rise yet”.
The Daily Mail reported: “Britain records Europe’s highest single-day death toll: Number of victims jumps by 980”
Sky News went with: “980 tops Spain and Italy’s highest daily number of deaths, which were 961 and 919 respectively.”
But, at the time the report was released, the previous 24 hours had seen just 117 “Covid19 related deaths” according to NHS England, with a further possible 90 coming from Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, for a maximum possible total of 204.
The other 776 people included in the report had died at seemingly random points between March 5th and April 8th.
The reported “980 deaths in one day” were, in reality, spread over five weeks.
This is not a “conspiracy theory”, it’s not any kind of theory. It’s a fact openly admitted in the official numbers, here. It’s not even an isolated incident, the same is true of ALL the daily “Covid19 death reports”.
Who were the 980 added to the Covid19 death figures on April 10th? Why was this apparently random sample of people, whose deaths were many weeks apart, selected for inclusion as “daily deaths” on the same day?
We don’t know. No explanation is given, no rationale supplied.
What we DO know is that, despite what government graphs claim, they didn’t all die on the same day.
We know that, when the media reported that they did all die on the same day, they were essentially lying.
And we know these lies are being repeated by police officers to scare people into staying out of their own front gardens.


offguardian--2020-04-25--Consortium News deploys the CIA’s “conspiracy theory” meme

The late , great Robert Parry founded Consortium News in 1995 , in response to “ a crisis building in the U.S. news media , ” whose allergy to inconvenient information he knew all too well from having worked for Newsweek and AP .
“ The mainstream media was falling into a pattern of groupthink on issue after issue , often ignoring important factual information because it didn ’ t fit with what all the Important People knew to be true , ” wrote Parry in 2015 .
“ Looking back over the past two decades , ” he continued @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that the media trend that we detected in the mid-1990s had been reversed .
But , if anything , it ’ s grown worse .
The major Western news outlets now conflate the discrete difficulties from made-up ‘ fake news ’ and baseless ‘ conspiracy theories ’ with responsible dissenting analyses .
All get thrown into the same pot and subjected to disdain and ridicule.
” Such was the tactic used to make Parry himself look like a kook , when he shed light on Iran/contra and the “ October surprise , ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ mid-Nineties to demolish Gary Webb , the investigative journalist who broke the story of the CIA ’ s drug smuggling out of Nicaragua .
By then the tactic had been used successfully for roughly thirty years , after the CIA , in its Memo # 1035-960 , first weaponized the phrase “ conspiracy theory ” to discredit critics of the Warren Report .
By the time Parry founded Consortium News — as George Seldes ( in 1940 ) and I.F .
Stone ( in 1953 ) had founded their respective antidotes to the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ conspiracy theory ” had been absorbed into the hearts and minds of everybody in the US and beyond , so that most people felt — and feel — that they must distrust their own quite rational suspicions of elite attempts to rob them of their rights and freedoms , as if the very notion of such covert class warfare , waged by Them against the rest of us , is absolutely crazy on its face .
That is a very dangerous idea , as it has largely incapacitated We the People , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ executive authority , so that they often can ’ t believe our government would do the things it ’ s actually , demonstrably , been doing to the rest of us , and peoples all over the world , for decades .
From the assassinations of our most beloved leaders , to the initiation , and protraction , of gratuitous wars and rightist coups abroad , to the orchestration of horrific terrorist attacks on our own soil , to the stealing of elections everywhere ( including here ) , to the harassment and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to the shattering experiments in mind control inflicted on prisoners , mental patients , students and other helpless people , to the routine approval of drugs and vaccines that do lasting harm , and even kill ; and so on .
Those independent outlets bold enough to tell the awful truths that all the other media ridicule as lunacy are few and far between ; and Robert Parry ’ s was among the best of them .
I say “ was ” because Consortium News has just gone over to the enemy , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Secretary-General Antonio Guterres ’ recent diatribe against the “ dangerous epidemic of misinformation ” about COVID-19 .
“ Wild conspiracy theories are infecting the Internet , ” raved the UN chief ( see above video ) , casting all such dissident material as itself a plague that — clearly — must be “ cured , ” which is to say , wiped out , just like that apocalyptic virus .
And what , exactly , would those “ wild conspiracy theories ” urge us to believe ?
Guterres , or his speechwriter ( @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to make what Parry called some quite “ responsible dissenting analyses ” sound as unhinged — and dangerous — as possible .
All four of what the Secretary-General “ decries ” as “ wild conspiracy theories ” are obfuscations of important facts that everybody needs to know , in order to protect ourselves from real “ misinformation ” that ’ s more dangerous than COVID-19 .
1 ) “ Social media has been inundated by opposition to vaccines.
” Thus Guterres , following Big Pharma ’ s script , casts advocates of vaccine @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is like calling critics of Vioxx , or opioids , “ anti-drug , ” or critics of GMO ’ s , glyphosate , or refined sugar , “ anti-food.
” While there are arguments against all vaccination , and some pop up online , what ’ s “ inundating ” social media , and what Guterres actually deplores , is wholly valid information — scientific studies , records of the US Vaccine Court , product inserts from the vaccine manufacturers themselves , as well as harrowing personal accounts of vaccine injury — on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as the MMR , Gardasil and flu shots , among other proven toxins .
Also “ inundating ” social media are reports on scientific studies of the various drug therapies — hydroxychloroquine ( in combination with azithromycin and/or high-dose Vitamin C ) , remdesevir , Ivermectin , Interferon Alfa 2B ( from Cuba ) , Avigen ( a Japanese flu drug ) , a placenta-based cell therapy from Israel , and so on —that would obviate the need for a new COVID-19 vaccine .
Such is the solid and important information that ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ according to the UN Secretary-General — and the editors of Consortium News , who , apparently , would also like to see the Internet “ disinfected.
” 2 ) “ Social media has been inundated by … promotion of the idea that Covid-19 is just like a normal flu.
” While that “ idea ” is clearly ludicrous — “ a normal flu ” does not entail acute hypoxemia , nor is it fatally exacerbated by the use of ventilators —Guterres ’ blanket charge would necessarily include an “ idea ” that ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the death rate among COVID-19 patients is comparable to that of influenza .
Such is the important finding of Dr. John Ioannidis ’ s team , from their study of COVID-19 antibody seroprevalence in Santa Clara County : We find much the same rough equivalence in a Dutch study , suggesting that 3 % of Holland ’ s population may have the coronavirus antibodies , with a case fatality rate of 0.7 % .
Such numbers offer us a very healthy antidote to the terroristic coverage of this crisis by the media , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ danger facing us — exaggeration that ’ s now proving far more lethal than that virus — is based wholly on the shrieking prophecies of doom that we ’ ve been hearing from Bill Gates , WHO ’ s Tedros Adhonam , and now the UN Secretary-General , who seems to want us to be paralyzed with fear — and , evidently , so does Consortium News .
3 ) “ Social media has been inundated by … the idea … that hospitals are empty.
” While some hospitals are overwhelmed , as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ would say , if their bosses hadn ’ t gagged them ) , a lot of hospitals are empty — too empty , as fear of COVID-19 has kept all too many people far away , with grave conditions ( strokes , heart attacks , diabetes , appendicitis ) that would ordinarily have them in the hospital .
As for the field hospitals set up last month to handle the expected mobs of COVID-19 patients ( at the Javits Center in New York , the CenturyLink Field Event Center in Seattle , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ) , they ’ ve now been closed down for lack of business , while others ( at McCormick Place in Chicago , and in New York ’ s Central Park ) appear to have few patients , if the many photos of them in the local press failed somehow to exclude the suffering masses there .
To call this a “ conspiracy theory ” is to contradict what people the world over ( myself included ) have seen with their own eyes — and , again , to stoke the panic that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and , with it , countless people , mostly poor .
4 ) “ Social media has been inundated by … the idea … .
that enforced self-isolation based on medical advice is a plot to impose a permanent police state.
” This last of Guterres ’ charges of “ conspiracy theory ” is his craziest .
Leaving aside the fact that there ’ s much expert “ medical advice ” against the policy of “ enforced self-isolation ” ( a consensus that ’ s been growing steadily ) , the signs of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a rubber bullet in the eye , as governments have sicced the cops on people the world over , dictating day-to-day behavior with the zeal and vigilance of any Nazi Governor or Soviet commissar .
Perhaps the Secretary-General of the United Nations could devote some resources to tracking the abuse of power by national , state and city governments worldwide , as cops now use surveillance drones to badger people taking walks in Paris , Britain , Spain , California and Elizabeth , New Jersey , as well as in the UAE and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as “ governments in Italy , Germany , Austria , China , South Korea and Taiwan have begun analysing smartphone data so as to determine to what extent populations are really locking themselves down at home , ” as Forbes reported a few weeks ago ( noting that the US and UK were close to doing the same ) ; And as the cops in Colorado handcuffed a man ( a former cop ) for playing catch with his daughter in a park , and the cops are fining residents of Beverly , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 100 for walking the wrong way on the township ’ s one-way sidewalks , and thirty cops raided a child ’ s birthday party in Los Angeles , and the governor of Michigan has banned travel between two residences in the state ; and so on .
It would take a full-time staff to keep track of such police-state measures , now commonplace throughout the “ democratic ” West just as in Dubai , Colombia and the Philippines .
However , the prospect of “ a permanent police state ” — singular — @ @ @ @ @ @ @ crackdowns by those disparate governments , but also , or especially , in the clear agenda of the globalist cabal in which the UN Secretary-General serves so prominent a role .
It ’ s no “ conspiracy theory , ” but an established fact , that the World Health Organization , the Gates Foundation ( WHO ’ s most lavish funder ) , the World Economic Forum , the Clinton Foundation , UNICEF and the component giants of Big Pharma have joined forces in “ Gavi , the Vaccine Alliance , ” a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ intent on vaccinating every human being on Earth , through house-to-house campaigns by goon squads ( personnel with “ minimal training ” ) ready to confront and overcome resistance .
Nor is it a “ conspiracy theory , ” but a matter of public record , that Gates intends , through those mass vaccinations , to inject every member of the human race with a “ tattoo-like mechanism , ” so that one ’ s vaccine history may be read instantly by cell phones ; and it is also not a “ theory @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the meantime , Gates et al .
plan to require everyone who wants to leave the house to carry “ immunity certificates ” — a concept first proposed in Germany two weeks ago , and one that Dr. Fauci says is “ being discussed ” for roll-out here in the US .
Even if this dystopian scenario were groundless , as the UN Secretary-General has charged , it ’ s no “ conspiracy theory ” to point out that this crisis has been most convenient for the powers that be , as it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ protest movements that were growing all around the world .
From the un-silent majority supporting Bernie Sanders here in the US , to the Yellow Vests in France , to the robust protests of state corruption and/or neoliberal economic policies in Chile , Argentina , Honduras , Ecuador , Brazil , and Haiti , Indonesia , Lebanon and Cameroon , to the feminist uprisings in Mexico and all over South America ; and so on .
“ 2019 may be remembered as the year of the protests , as demonstrations are engulfing the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ( in an article spotlighting the Western media ’ s exclusive focus on Hong Kong ) .
The COVID-19 crisis has extinguished all that fire , and blocked all public memory that it was burning — just as World War I stamped out the rich political ferment of the Progressive Era in the US , and like developments in Europe ; and just as 9/11 put an end to the growing grass-roots pushback against “ free trade , ” and the mass refusal to accept Bush/Cheney as legitimate , after the theft of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as those prior crises were at ending mass resistance and dissent , they were as nothing by comparison with this crisis , which has not just silenced everyone , but has us all cut off from one another , locked up under quasi-voluntary house arrest .
Thus this crisis has not only radically empowered governments throughout the world , and granted international authority to a gigantic “ public-private partnership ” intent on exercising full control over our very bodies , and our children ’ s bodies — and , as well , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ( two “ conspiracy theories ” that I don ’ t have space for here ) .
While thus exalting those authorities , the COVID-19 crisis has also disabled actual mass protest of that empowerment—the only kind of protest that our masters fear — by terrorizing people into staying home , and keeping far apart when we skulk out , to go buy groceries ( if any ) and medicine ( if we can afford it ) .
Maybe the snuffing out of all that protest was deliberate , or maybe it was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ crisis .
Either way , it ’ s really happened — just as some vaccines are toxic , unnecessary and/or ineffective ; and the number of COVID-19 deaths is comparable to that of influenza ; and many hospitals are standing empty , even in the places that , reportedly , are hardest hit ; and the prospect of a “ permanent police state ” is very real , its signs quite clear to anyone who ’ s half-awake , and not gone blind from having drunk the Kool-Aid gushing endlessly from “ our @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to heed those dismal facts by calling them “ wild conspiracy theories ” is not only a Big Lie , and a form of gaslighting , but — in light of what will happen if we don ’ t face up to them — a crime against humanity .
We would expect that “ wild ” Big Lie from the UN Secretary-General , just as we ’ d expect it from Bill Gates , or Dr. Fauci , or — especially — the New York Times .
What we would not expect is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Lie instead of blowing it to smithereens , as Robert Parry always did as a reporter of forbidden truths , and as he clearly meant Consortium News to do .
That even his dissenting forum has now joined the thunderous propaganda chorus drowning out the truth about this lethal crisis—along with “ Democracy Now !
” and other outlets on “ the left ” — tells us that we ’ re in even bigger trouble than we thought , and that we must fight all the more intrepidly to honor Robert Parry ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ example .

Mark Crispin Miller
The late, great Robert Parry founded Consortium News in 1995, in response to “a crisis building in the U.S. news media,” whose allergy to inconvenient information he knew all too well from having worked for Newsweek and AP.
“The mainstream media was falling into a pattern of groupthink on issue after issue, often ignoring important factual information because it didn’t fit with what all the Important People knew to be true,” wrote Parry in 2015.
“Looking back over the past two decades,” he continued, “I wish I could say that the media trend that we detected in the mid-1990s had been reversed. But, if anything, it’s grown worse. The major Western news outlets now conflate the discrete difficulties from made-up ‘fake news’ and baseless ‘conspiracy theories’ with responsible dissenting analyses. All get thrown into the same pot and
subjected to disdain and ridicule.”
Such was the tactic used to make Parry himself look like a kook, when he shed light on Iran/contra and the “October surprise,” just as it was used in the mid-Nineties to demolish Gary Webb, the investigative journalist who broke the story of the CIA’s drug smuggling out of Nicaragua.
By then the tactic had been used successfully for roughly thirty years, after the CIA, in its Memo #1035-960, first weaponized the phrase “conspiracy theory” to discredit critics of the Warren Report.
By the time Parry founded Consortium News — as George Seldes (in 1940) and I.F. Stone (in 1953) had founded their respective antidotes to the propaganda gushing from the US press — “conspiracy theory” had been absorbed into the hearts and minds of everybody in the US and beyond, so that most people felt — and feel — that they must distrust their own quite rational suspicions of elite attempts to rob them of their rights and freedoms, as if the very notion of such covert class warfare, waged by Them against the rest of us, is absolutely crazy on its face.
That is a very dangerous idea, as it has largely incapacitated We the People, by giving them a sentimental misimpression of executive authority, so that they often can’t believe our government would do the things it’s actually, demonstrably, been doing to the rest of us, and peoples all over the world, for decades.
From the assassinations of our most beloved leaders, to the initiation, and protraction, of gratuitous wars and rightist coups abroad, to the orchestration of horrific terrorist attacks on our own soil, to the stealing of elections everywhere (including here), to the harassment and imprisonment of whistle-blowers and other activists, to the shattering experiments in mind control inflicted on prisoners, mental patients, students and other helpless people, to the routine approval of drugs and vaccines that do lasting harm, and even kill; and so on.
Those independent outlets bold enough to tell the awful truths that all the other media ridicule as lunacy are few and far between; and Robert Parry’s was among the best of them.
I say “was” because Consortium News has just gone over to the enemy, by publishing a solemn editorial highlighting UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’recent diatribe against the “dangerous epidemic of misinformation” about COVID-19.
“Wild conspiracy theories are infecting the Internet,” raved the UN chief (see above video), casting all such dissident material as itself a plague that — clearly — must be “cured,” which is to say, wiped out, just like that apocalyptic virus.
And what, exactly, would those “wild conspiracy theories” urge us to believe?
Social media has been inundated by opposition to vaccines, promotion of the idea that Covid-19 is just like a normal flu, that hospitals are empty and that enforced self-isolation based on medical advice is a plot to impose a permanent police state.”
Guterres, or his speechwriter (or handler), did his best to make what Parry called some quite “responsible dissenting analyses” sound as unhinged — and dangerous — as possible.
All four of what the Secretary-General “decries” as “wild conspiracy theories” are obfuscations of important facts that everybody needs to know, in order to protect ourselves from real “misinformation” that’s more dangerous than COVID-19.
1) “Social media has been inundated by opposition to vaccines.”
Thus Guterres, following Big Pharma’s script, casts advocates of vaccine safety as “anti-vaxxers,” which is like calling critics of Vioxx, or opioids, “anti-drug,” or critics of GMO’s, glyphosate, or refined sugar, “anti-food.”
While there are arguments against all vaccination, and some pop up online, what’s “inundating” social media, and what Guterres actually deplores, is wholly valid information — scientific studies, records of the US Vaccine Court, product inserts from the vaccine manufacturers themselves, as well as harrowing personal accounts of vaccine injury — on the dangers of particular vaccines, such as the MMR, Gardasil and flu shots, among other proven toxins.
Also “inundating” social media are reports on scientific studies of the various drug therapies — hydroxychloroquine (in combination with azithromycin and/or high-dose Vitamin C), remdesevir, Ivermectin, Interferon Alfa 2B (from Cuba), Avigen (a Japanese flu drug), a placenta-based cell therapy from Israel, and so on —that would obviate the need for a new COVID-19 vaccine.
Such is the solid and important information that’s “infecting the Internet,” according to the UN Secretary-General — and the editors of Consortium News, who, apparently, would also like to see the Internet “disinfected.”
2) “Social media has been inundated by … promotion of the idea that Covid-19 is just like a normal flu.”
While that “idea” is clearly ludicrous — “a normal flu” does not entail acute hypoxemia, nor is it fatally exacerbated by the use of ventilators —Guterres’ blanket charge would necessarily include an “idea” that’s not ludicrous at all: that the death rate among COVID-19 patients is comparable to that of influenza.
Such is the important finding of Dr. John Ioannidis’s team, from their study of COVID-19 antibody seroprevalence in Santa Clara County:
True infection rate fatality is in the ballpark of seasonal influenza,”
We find much the same rough equivalence in a Dutch study, suggesting that 3% of Holland’s population may have the coronavirus antibodies, with a case fatality rate of 0.7%.
Such numbers offer us a very healthy antidote to the terroristic coverage of this crisis by the media, whose “wild” exaggeration of the danger facing us — exaggeration that’s now proving far more lethal than that virus — is based wholly on the shrieking prophecies of doom that we’ve been hearing from Bill Gates, WHO’s Tedros Adhonam, and now the UN Secretary-General, who seems to want us to be paralyzed with fear — and, evidently, so does Consortium News.
3) “Social media has been inundated by … the idea … that hospitals are empty.”
While some hospitals are overwhelmed, as their workers have been saying (or would say, if their bosses hadn’t gagged them), a lot of hospitals are empty — too empty, as fear of COVID-19 has kept all too many people far away, with grave conditions (strokes, heart attacks, diabetes, appendicitis) that would ordinarily have them in the hospital.
As for the field hospitals set up last month to handle the expected mobs of COVID-19 patients (at the Javits Center in New York, the CenturyLink Field Event Center in Seattle, and on the USNS Comfort and USNS Mercy), they’ve now been closed down for lack of business, while others (at McCormick Place in Chicago, and in New York’s Central Park) appear to have few patients, if the many photos of them in the local press failed somehow to exclude the suffering masses there.
To call this a “conspiracy theory” is to contradict what people the world over (myself included) have seen with their own eyes — and, again, to stoke the panic that is killing off the world economy, and, with it, countless people, mostly poor.
4) “Social media has been inundated by … the idea …. that enforced self-isolation based on medical advice is a plot to impose a permanent police state.”
This last of Guterres’ charges of “conspiracy theory” is his craziest. Leaving aside the fact that there’s much expert “medical advice” against the policy of “enforced self-isolation” (a consensus that’s been growing steadily), the signs of the police state are as blatant as a rubber bullet in the eye, as governments have sicced the cops on people the world over, dictating day-to-day behavior with the zeal and vigilance of any Nazi Governor or Soviet commissar.
Perhaps the Secretary-General of the United Nations could devote some resources to tracking the abuse of power by national, state and city governments worldwide, as cops now use surveillance drones to badger people taking walks in Paris, Britain, Spain, California and Elizabeth, New Jersey, as well as in the UAE and (of course) China;
And as “governments in Italy, Germany, Austria, China, South Korea and Taiwan have begun analysing smartphone data so as to determine to what extent populations are really locking themselves down at home,” as Forbes reported a few weeks ago (noting that the US and UK were close to doing the same);
And as the cops in Colorado handcuffed a man (a former cop) for playing catch with his daughter in a park, and the cops are fining residents of Beverly, Massachusetts, a Boston suburb, $100 for walking the wrong way on the township’s one-way sidewalks, and thirty cops raided a child’s birthday party in Los Angeles, and the governor of Michigan has banned travel between two residences in the state; and so on.
It would take a full-time staff to keep track of such police-state measures, now commonplace throughout the “democratic” West just as in Dubai, Colombia and the Philippines.
However, the prospect of “a permanent police state” — singular — is obviously looming not just in the crackdowns by those disparate governments, but also, or especially, in the clear agenda of the globalist cabal in which the UN Secretary-General serves so prominent a role.
It’s no “conspiracy theory,” but an established fact, that the World Health Organization, the Gates Foundation (WHO’s most lavish funder), the World Economic Forum, the Clinton Foundation, UNICEF and the component giants of Big Pharma have joined forces in “Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance,” a “public-private partnership” that is explicitly intent on vaccinating every human being on Earth, through house-to-house campaigns by goon squads (personnel with “minimal training”) ready to confront and overcome resistance.
Nor is it a “conspiracy theory,” but a matter of public record, that Gates intends, through those mass vaccinations, to inject every member of the human race with a “tattoo-like mechanism,” so that one’s vaccine history may be read instantly by cell phones; and it is also not a “theory” but a fact that, in the meantime, Gates et al. plan to require everyone who wants to leave the house to carry “immunity certificates” — a concept first proposed in Germany two weeks ago, and one that Dr. Fauci says is “being discussed” for roll-out here in the US.
Even if this dystopian scenario were groundless, as the UN Secretary-General has charged, it’s no “conspiracy theory” to point out that this crisis has been most convenient for the powers that be, as it has instantly and totally snuffed out vigorous protest movements that were growing all around the world.
From the un-silent majority supporting Bernie Sanders here in the US, to the Yellow Vests in France, to the robust protests of state corruption and/or neoliberal economic policies in Chile, Argentina, Honduras, Ecuador, Brazil, and Haiti, Indonesia, Lebanon and Cameroon, to the feminist uprisings in Mexico and all over South America; and so on.
“2019 may be remembered as the year of the protests, as demonstrations are engulfing the world,” FAIR noted in December (in an article spotlighting the Western media’s exclusive focus on Hong Kong).
The COVID-19 crisis has extinguished all that fire, and blocked all public memory that it was burning — just as World War I stamped out the rich political ferment of the Progressive Era in the US, and like developments in Europe; and just as 9/11 put an end to the growing grass-roots pushback against “free trade,” and the mass refusal to accept Bush/Cheney as legitimate, after the theft of the election in 2000.
As effective as those prior crises were at ending mass resistance and dissent, they were as nothing by comparison with this crisis, which has not just silenced everyone, but has us all cut off from one another, locked up under quasi-voluntary house arrest.
* * *
Thus this crisis has not only radically empowered governments throughout the world, and granted international authority to a gigantic “public-private partnership” intent on exercising full control over our very bodies, and our children’s bodies — and, as well, the world economy, and global food supply (two “conspiracy theories” that I don’t have space for here).
While thus exalting those authorities, the COVID-19 crisis has also disabled actual mass protest of that empowerment—the only kind of protest that our masters fear — by terrorizing people into staying home, and keeping far apart when we skulk out, to go buy groceries (if any) and medicine (if we can afford it).
Maybe the snuffing out of all that protest was deliberate, or maybe it was just an inadvertent benefit of this apocalyptic crisis. Either way, it’s really happened — just as some vaccines are toxic, unnecessary and/or ineffective; and the number of COVID-19 deaths is comparable to that of influenza; and many hospitals are standing empty, even in the places that, reportedly, are hardest hit; and the prospect of a “permanent police state” is very real, its signs quite clear to anyone who’s half-awake, and not gone blind from having drunk the Kool-Aid gushing endlessly from “our free press.”
To warn us not to heed those dismal facts by calling them “wild conspiracy theories” is not only a Big Lie, and a form of gaslighting, but — in light of what will happen if we don’t face up to them — a crime against humanity.
We would expect that “wild” Big Lie from the UN Secretary-General, just as we’d expect it from Bill Gates, or Dr. Fauci, or — especially — the New York Times.
What we would not expect is that Consortium News would echo that Big Lie instead of blowing it to smithereens, as Robert Parry always did as a reporter of forbidden truths, and as he clearly meant Consortium News to do.
That even his dissenting forum has now joined the thunderous propaganda chorus drowning out the truth about this lethal crisis—along with “Democracy Now!” and other outlets on “the left” — tells us that we’re in even bigger trouble than we thought, and that we must fight all the more intrepidly to honor Robert Parry’s name, by following his great example.


offguardian--2020-04-25--50 Headlines Darker: More of the “New Normal”

Despite the concise , well-intentioned and unavoidably ubiquitous nature of our previous Message , it seems some are still withholding @ @ @ @ @ .
Though all our Responsible Media Outlets are doing their duty , it appears some @ @ @ @ @ not yet understand the reality of our situation .
More distressing are the efforts of @ @ @ @ @ Policy , subvert The Message and engage in dangerous questions .
We hope the following @ @ @ @ @ by the good citizens at the Consent Factory – makes the nature of this new @ @ @ @ @ those who aren ’ t yet aware their lives will never be the same .
@ @ @ @ @ normal will endanger your life .
We call upon the degenerate few to cease endangering @ @ @ @ @ REMEMBER TO REPORT ANYONE DISPERSING ON ENDORSING MISINFORMATION OR CRITICISING THE STATE The world is @ @ @ @ @ is a luxury of the pre-Covid society .
Doubt is the weapon of the virus @ @ @ @ @ not be tolerated .

Despite the concise, well-intentioned and unavoidably ubiquitous nature of our previous Message, it seems some are still withholding their consent for necessary change.
Though all our Responsible Media Outlets are doing their duty, it appears some members of the public do not yet understand the reality of our situation. More distressing are the efforts of a Criminal Minority to misrepresent Policy, subvert The Message and engage in dangerous questions.
We hope the following collection – once again compiled by the good citizens at the Consent Factory – makes the nature of this new reality quite clear to all those who aren’t yet aware their lives will never be the same.
Remember, resisting the new normal will endanger your life.
*
One area of concern is that the powers detailed under the bill, as published, remain in force for two years … among the most draconian possible powers is for police, public health and immigration officers to detain people suspected of having Covid-19.” UK’s emergency coronavirus bill ‘will put vulnerable at risk’, The Guardian (23rd March 2020)
People who intentionally spread the coronavirus could face criminal charges under federal terrorism laws, the Justice Department’s No. 2 official said Tuesday […] “Threats or attempts to use COVID-19 as a weapon against Americans will not be tolerated.””
Those who intentionally spread coronavirus could be charged as terrorists, Politico, (24th March 2020)
A police force has defended using a drone camera to shame people into not driving into a national park during the lockdown, while another force said it was introducing roadblocks to stop drivers heading to tourist hotspots.”
UK police use drones and roadblocks to enforce lockdown, The Guardian, (26th March 2020)
Humberside Police has created an online reporting portal where people can send details of those not following social distancing rules.”
Humberside police creates online report portal for people not social distancing, ITV news (26th March 2020)
An Austin, Texas based technology company is launching ‘artificially intelligent thermal cameras’ that it claims will be able to detect fevers in people, and in turn send an alert that they may be carrying the coronavirus.”
Surveillance Company Says It’s Deploying ‘Coronavirus-Detecting’ Cameras in US, VICE, (18th March 2020)
As the jogger struggled with police, screaming for help, she was filmed by residents who had absolutely zero sympathy for her plight. ‘What’s not fair is that you go out running, you bloody idiot!’, shouted the woman apparently filming the encounter.”
Coronavirus lockdown: Jogger resists arrest in Spain and is abused by onlookers, AS.com, (21st March 2020)
Gordon Brown has urged world leaders to create a temporary form of global government to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic … involving world leaders, health experts and international organisations that would have executive powers to coordinate the response.”
Gordon Brown calls for global government to tackle coronavirus, The Guardian, (26th March 2020)
South African police enforcing a coronavirus lockdown have fired rubber bullets towards hundreds of shoppers queueing outside a supermarket in Johannesburg … the police used whips to get the shoppers to observe social distancing rules.”
South African police fire rubber bullets at shoppers amid lockdown, The Guardian, (28th March 2020)
President Trump said Saturday he may announce later in the day a federally mandated quarantine on the New York metro region, placing “enforceable” travel restrictions on people planning to leave the New York tri-state area because of the coronavirus.”
U.S. coronavirus-related deaths double in two days, The Washington Post, (March 28th 2020)
Rhode Island police began stopping cars with New York plates Friday. On Saturday, the National Guard will help them conduct house-to-house searches to find people who traveled from New York and demand 14 days of self-quarantine.”
Rhode Island Police to Hunt Down New Yorkers Seeking Refuge, Bloomberg, (27th March 2020)
A Police force has had a surge in calls from people reporting neighbours for “going out for a second run” and “gathering in their back gardens.” … “We are getting (dozens of) calls from people who say ‘I want you to come and arrest them’.
Coronavirus: Exercise rule-breakers spark surge in police calls, BBC News, (26th March 2020)
Police with batons and guns have moved in to protect supermarkets on the Italian island of Sicily after reports of looting by locals who could no longer afford food.”
‘We have to eat’: Sicilian police crackdown on locals looting supermarkets, The Local, (29th March 2020)
The National Guard will be deployed to enforce a mile-radius coronavirus “containment area” in overwhelmed New Rochelle … the National Guard will enforce the mandated closure of ‘large gathering areas’ — including schools and houses of worship.”
National Guard deployed to NY community with nation’s ‘largest cluster’ of coronavirus, New York Post, (10th March 2020)
New York City residents who break social distancing rules will be subject to fines up to $500, Mayor de Blasio said Sunday … he also announced that NYPD and MTA workers would do checks of subway cars and force riders off cars that are too crowded.”
New Yorkers who break social distancing rules will now face fines up to $500, Politico, 29th March 2020)
Anyone who leaves their house without a reasonable excuse could spend up to 6 months in prison and face an $11,000 fine under a directive [that] gives police sweeping power to enforce restrictions designed to limit the spread of coronavirus in Australia.”
Six months in jail, $11,000 fine for leaving home without a ‘reasonable excuse’, Sydney Morning Herald, (31st March 2020)
A coronavirus app that alerts people if they have recently been in contact with someone testing positive for the virus “could play a critical role” in limiting lockdowns … but the academics say no-one should be forced to enroll – at least initially.’
Coronavirus: UK considers virus-tracing app to ease lockdown, BBC News, (3st March 2020)
As coronavirus lockdowns have been expanded globally, police across the world have been given licence to control behaviour in a way that would normally be extreme even for an authoritarian state.”
Teargas, beatings and bleach: the most extreme Covid-19 lockdown controls around the world, The Guardian, (1st April 2020)
It is likely that we are not heading towards a general deconfinement in one go and for everyone,” Prime Minister Philippe told parliament … the interior minister noted 359,000 fines for violating the lockdown had been issued since lockdown began.”
French PM warns lockdown will not be lifted ‘in one go’, France24, (1st April 2020)
Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has warned he would order the country’s police and military to shoot dead anyone “who creates trouble” during a month-long lockdown of the island of Luzon enforced to halt the spread of the coronavirus.’
‘Shoot them dead’: Duterte warns against violating lockdown, Al Jazeera, (2nd April 2020)
French interior minister Christophe Castaner warned that “roadblocks would be set up on major highways and axes and extra police, gendarmes or soldiers dispatched to train stations and airports to verify the documents of anyone stopped out and about.”‘
Confirmed cases pass 1 million – as it happened, The Guardian, (2nd April 2020)
Around the world, police forces are testing how far to go in punishing ordinary behavior.”
How Far Should Police Go in Enforcing Coronavirus Lockdowns?, New York Times (2nd April 2020)
Western governments aiming to relax restrictions on movement are turning to unprecedented surveillance to track people infected with the new coronavirus and identify those with whom they have been in contact.”
U.S. and Europe Turn to Phone-Tracking Strategies to Slow Spread of Coronavirus, Wall Street Journal, (3rd April 2020)
If a person becomes infected, the app will automatically send a push notification to anyone they have crossed paths with in the past two weeks, to warn them of the risk of infection.”
Privacy-mad Germany turns to app to track coronavirus spread, The Local, (2nd April 2020)
Google will use its mammoth collection of mobile location data to measure whether people across the globe are following government directives …”
Google wielding its vast troves of phone-tracking data in virus fight, Politico, (4th April 2020)
A 70-year-old township man was arrested twice on Saturday after police alleged he tried to enter two different Wawa convenience stores without a mask and became belligerent … he was charged with second-degree terroristic threats during an emergency.”
Coronavirus NJ: Unmasked Toms River man, 70, arrested twice in one day at Wawa stores, app.com, (13th April 2020)
Residents in Riverside County, CA, are now required to wear face coverings and could face a fine of $1,000 per violation per day if the mandate is ignored. ‘This is a valid order and enforceable by fine, imprisonment or both,’ said Sheriff Chad Bianco.”
CALIFORNIA COUNTY FINING RESIDENTS $1,000 FOR NOT WEARING FACE MASKS IN PUBLIC, Newsweek, (7th April 2020)
A family claimed a 500-mile round Lake District trip was acceptable if they wore masks and gloves, police said. The family were criticised as “absolute idiots” and called “clowns” after the force posted about it on Twitter.’
Coronavirus: Police stop family on 500-mile Lake District trip, BBC News, (14th April 2020)
A woman in Victoria says she was left feeling “heartbroken” and like a criminal after uniformed police officers carrying weapons interrupted her father’s funeral over the Easter long weekend to enforce social distancing rules.’
‘Totally disrespectful’: police interrupt funeral while enforcing social distancing rules over Easter weekend, The Guardian, (13th April 2020)
The coronavirus pandemic has led to an unprecedented global surge in digital surveillance, researchers and privacy advocates around the world have said, with billions of people facing enhanced monitoring that may prove difficult to roll back.’
Growth in surveillance may be hard to scale back after pandemic, experts say, The Guardian, (14th April 2020)
Protesters rallied to reopen North Carolina … at least one was arrested. “You are in violation of the executive order,” said police. “You are posing a risk to public health. If you do not disperse, you will be taken and processed at Wake County jail.”
Protesters rally for NC to reopen. One woman arrested for violating governor’s order., New Observer, (14th April 2020)
Officers have become public health police, breaking up crowds at stores … the department has mobilized the Citywide All-Out Task Force, which is usually assembled to flood high-crime areas and other assignments.”
New Role for New York Police: Breaking Up Crowds at Trader Joe’s, New York Times, (14th April 2020)
A South Australian couple was hit with a hefty fine from cops for nonessential travel amid the pandemic after the pair posted vacation snaps from 2019 on Facebook … the couple was warned that if they ‘posted any more photos,’ they would “be arrested.”
Couple mistakenly fined for posting old vacation photos during coronavirus lockdown, New York Post, (14th April 2020)
Attorney Beate Bahner challenged Germany’s coronavirus regulations in the Constitutional Court and failed. Now she has been taken to a psychiatric facility.”
Coronavirus: Anwältin Beate Bahner will gegen Verordnung klagen – und landet selbst vor Gericht, Heidelberg24.com, (24th April 2020)
Ms Bahner submitted a 36-page urgent motion to the Constitutional Court regarding the unlawfulness of all 16 German federal states’ Coronavirus measures … [her] interview for “incitement to commit criminal acts” is scheduled for Wednesday 15 April.
Coronavirus lockdown: German lawyer detained for opposition, UK Column, (14th April 2020)
Police in Berlin broke up a large birthday gathering in the early hours of Monday … a 16-year-old girl was celebrating with 31 other people … all 32 party attendees [are] being investigated for criminal offenses.”
Berlin police bust 16th birthday party amid coronavirus lockdown, DW, (13th April 2020)
Extraordinary times require extraordinary measures and it is about protecting the public.”
Federal government open to new law to fight pandemic misinformation, CBC.com, 15th April 2020)
The UK’s health secretary, Matt Hancock, has suggested “something like an immunity certificate or a wristband” in the future.’
Coronavirus: Could biometric ID cards offer the UK a lockdown exit strategy?, Sky News, (10th April 2020)
Attempting to issue some kind of immunity certificate to millions of Americans would be unprecedented.”
What are ‘immunity passports’ and could they help us end the coronavirus lockdown?, The Hill, (10th April 2020)
The COVID-19 Credentials Initiative (CCI) is working on a digital certificate, [that] lets individuals prove (and request proof from others) they’ve recovered from the novel coronavirus or have received a vaccination, once one is available.”
COVID-19 ‘Immunity Passport’ Unites 60 Firms on Self-Sovereign ID Project, coindesk.com, (13th April 2020)
[T]he drones use computer vision systems to monitor temperatures and heart and respiratory rates of people from above and single out people sneezing or coughing … Draganfly also sees a possible security use around borders or critical infrastructure.”
‘Pandemic drones’ could single people out in a crowd for coughing, sneezing, or running a temperature, Business Insider, (11th April 2020)
Mobile phone tracking software could be compulsory if not enough Australians voluntarily download the application to help in coronavirus case tracing.”
Coronavirus: Mobile tracking app could be compulsory, Morrison says, 9 News, (17th April 2020)
The three-page document, entitled “what constitutes a reasonable excuse to leave the place where you live”, is designed to help police enforce the emergency restrictions that came into effect three weeks ago and are set to be extended.’
Coronavirus lockdown: Police guidelines give ‘reasonable excuses’ to go out, BBC News, (16th April 2020)
[T]here is a danger that these new, often highly invasive, measures will become the norm around the world …”
Compulsory selfies and contact-tracing: Authorities everywhere are using smartphones to track the coronavirus, Business Insider (14th April 2020)
Norway unveiled its Smittestop app, which will notify users if they have been less than 2 metres from an infected person for more than 15 minutes. “To get back to a more normal life … we all have to make an effort and use this app,” PM Solberg said. […] Developers in several European countries are working on similar apps to inform people quickly when they have been in contact with someone who is infected with the virus, as part of a pan-European privacy-preserving proximity tracing (Pepp-PT) initiative.
Coronavirus ‘under control’ in Germany, as some countries plan to relax lockdowns, The Guardian, (17th April 2020)
Officials say they routinely saw people visit the skatepark, even children accompanied by their parents, according to the San Clemente Times … city officials followed in the footsteps of other cities and filled the skatepark with 37 tons of sand.”
Coronavirus: San Clemente Fills Skatepark With 37 Tons Of Sand After Skaters Ignore ‘No Trespassing’ Signs, CBS Local, (17th April 2020)
In one [Michigan] county, anyone deemed a ‘carrier and health threat’ can be detained by police and taken to an Involuntary Isolation Facility.”
Michigan judge authorizes arresting people on suspicion of COVID-19 illness, Life Site News, (16th April 2020)
Technology firms are processing confidential UK patient information in a data-mining operation […] Palantir, founded by rightwing billionaire Peter Thiel, is working with Faculty, a UK artificial intelligence startup, to consolidate government databases.”
UK government using confidential patient data in coronavirus response, The Guardian, (12th April 2020)
‘Imagine an America divided into two classes […] “It will be a frightening schism,” a World Health Organization special envoy on Covid-19 predicted. “Those with antibodies will be able to travel and work, and the rest will be discriminated against.”’
The Coronavirus in America: The Year Ahead, The New York Times, 18th April 2020
Riots have broken out in Paris amid anger over police ‘heavy-handed’ treatment of ethnic minorities during the coronavirus lockdown.”
Riots break out in Paris amid anger at police ‘heavy-handed’ treatment of minorities during lockdown, The Daily Mail, (20th April 2020)
… law enforcers have killed 18 people in Nigeria since lockdowns began on 30 March. Coronavirus has killed 12 people, according to health ministry data.”
Coronavirus: Security forces kill more Nigerians than Covid-19, BBC News, (16th April 2020)
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We call upon the degenerate few to cease endangering our new social order.
REMEMBER TO REPORT ANYONE DISPERSING ON ENDORSING MISINFORMATION OR CRITICISING THE STATE
The world is different now. Unfettered expression is a luxury of the pre-Covid society. Doubt is the weapon of the virus spreader.
Pro-Infection propaganda will not be tolerated.
Have a nice day.