openvaers | According to the VAERS reporting system (within the CDC) there were 5,997 currently reported fatalities in 2021 attributed to vaccinations during the first half of this year.
Of that 5,997 number: 5,888 are directly attributed to COVID vaccinations.
vanityfair | Since December 1, 2019, the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19 has infected more than 170 million people around the world and killed more than 3.5 million. To this day, we don’t know how or why this novel coronavirus suddenly appeared in the human population. Answering that question is more than an academic pursuit: Without knowing where it came from, we can’t be sure we’re taking the right steps to prevent a recurrence.
And yet, in the wake of the Lancet statement and under the cloud of Donald Trump’s toxic racism, which contributed to an alarming wave of anti-Asian violence in the U.S., one possible answer to this all-important question remained largely off-limits until the spring of 2021.
Behind closed doors, however, national security and public health experts and officials across a range of departments in the executive branch were locked in high-stakes battles over what could and couldn’t be investigated and made public.
A months long Vanity Fair investigation, interviews with more than 40 people, and a review of hundreds of pages of U.S. government documents, including internal memos, meeting minutes, and email correspondence, found that conflicts of interest, stemming in part from large government grants supporting controversial virology research, hampered the U.S. investigation into COVID-19’s origin at every step. In one State Department meeting, officials seeking to demand transparency from the Chinese government say they were explicitly told by colleagues not to explore the Wuhan Institute of Virology’s gain-of-function research, because it would bring unwelcome attention to U.S. government funding of it.
In an internal memo obtained by Vanity Fair, Thomas DiNanno, former acting assistant secretary of the State Department’s Bureau of Arms Control, Verification, and Compliance, wrote that staff from two bureaus, his own and the Bureau of International Security and Nonproliferation, “warned” leaders within his bureau “not to pursue an investigation into the origin of COVID-19” because it would “‘open a can of worms’ if it continued.”
There
are reasons to doubt the lab-leak hypothesis. There is a long,
well-documented history of natural spillovers leading to outbreaks, even
when the initial and intermediate host animals have remained a mystery
for months and years, and some expert virologists say the supposed
oddities of the SARS-CoV-2 sequence have been found in nature.
But for most of the past year, the lab-leak scenario was treated not simply as unlikely or even inaccurate but as morally out-of-bounds. In late March, former Centers for Disease Control director Robert Redfield received death threats from fellow scientists after telling CNN that he believed COVID-19 had originated in a lab. “I was threatened and ostracized because I proposed another hypothesis,” Redfield told Vanity Fair. “I expected it from politicians. I didn’t expect it from science.”
With President Trump out of office, it should be possible to reject his xenophobic agenda and still ask why, in all places in the world, did the outbreak begin in the city with a laboratory housing one of the world’s most extensive collection of bat viruses, doing some of the most aggressive research?
overcomingbias | That is, in response to any question of theory, it seems that they say the only acceptable answer is “I don’t know”. One must not express more refined degrees of belief, neither numerically nor in terms a more refined partition of possibilities. Regarding various possible hypotheses, one must not discuss their prior plausibility, the likelihood which which each one predicts various empirical details, nor the appropriate posterior beliefs that best combine prior plausibility and empirical fit. Just say “I don’t know” and shut up.
(Yes, they allow an exception for expressing confidence that hoaxes, lies, delusions, and honest mistakes don’t work as explanations. And for giving detailed reasons for this confidence. But only those exceptions.)
This anti-theory taboo among the “serious” who study UFOs seems to me quite wide-spread and it has been going for a long time. You can find a vast amount of UFO work on many particular cases, some work on patterns across those cases, and even some work considering concrete physical mechanisms to explain some common patterns. But you will find almost nothing among the “serious” people on less proximate more social explanations. They are okay with saying that UFOs often seem intelligent, aware, and responsive, but not with discussing the goals, agendas, origins, or histories of those intelligences.
Alas, I have seen this before, in other areas of social science. In fields similarly dominated by empiricists who keep throwing more data papers on the pile, but offering few rewards to those who might try to make sense of all that data. Often because they wouldn’t like the best explanations. It seems that UFOs is now such a field.
Apparently reports have been submitted on over 100,000 UFO encounters worldwide in the last 75 years. Of which 5-10%, or 5K-10K, seem quite hard to explain. Yes, the taboo may have discouraged reports on ten times that number, and yes some governments have actively taken or prevented some data. But the rate at which encounters allow concrete physical samples to be collected seems to have gone way down over the decades, and it isn’t obvious to me that we will really learn that much more from sharper and longer pictures, videos, and radar images.
So an anti-theory taboo risks us spending another 75 years in data collection, after which we may still not know that much more than we do now. The point of data is to inform theory, and it still seems to me that we now have plenty enough data, not only to judge if there is something real, but also to do some theorizing. Yes much theorizing so far has been motivated and/or sloppy, but honestly most of that has been done by folks not very experience or skilled at social science theory. Which is why it seems a shame that social theorists Wendt and Duvall explicitly endorse the anti-theory taboo.
Well I plan to continue to ignore both taboos, both the anti-UFO one and the anti-UFO-theory one. And I invite other experienced and knowledgeable social theorists to join me. It may be less fun at times to work on tabooed topics, but when the taboo is unfair you can have much higher of making valuable contributions on them. And the huge potential importance of this topic seems obvious.
NYTimes | Millions Are Skipping Their Second Doses of Covid Vaccines
Nearly 8 percent of those who got initial Pfizer or Moderna shots missed their second doses. State officials want to prevent the numbers from rising.
More than five million people, or nearly 8 percent of those who got a first shot of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines, have missed their second doses, according to the most recent data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That is more than double the rate among people who got inoculated in the first several weeks of the nationwide vaccine campaign.
Even as the country wrestles with the problem of millions of people who are wary about getting vaccinated at all, local health authorities are confronting an emerging challenge of ensuring that those who do get inoculated are doing so fully.
The reasons vary for why people are missing their second shots. In interviews, some said they feared the side effects, which can include flulike symptoms. Others said they felt that they were sufficiently protected with a single shot.
The stakes are high because there is only one vaccine authorized in the United States that is given as a single shot. The use of that vaccine, made by Johnson & Johnson, was paused this month after it was linked to a very rare but serious side effect involving blood clotting. Federal health officials on Friday recommended restarting use of the vaccine, but the combination of the safety scare and ongoing production problems is likely to make that vaccine a viable option for fewer people.
The C.D.C.’s count of missed second doses is through April 9. It covers only people who got a first Moderna dose by March 7 or a first Pfizer dose by March 14.
NYTimes | In a follow-up, the scientists found that 34 percent of people taking the drug were protected after a single dose of the Pfizer vaccine and only 27 percent after a single dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine. (In Britain, the current practice is to delay second doses to stretch vaccine availability.)
Likewise, another study published last month indicated that fewer than 15 percent of patients with cancers of blood or the immune system, and fewer than 40 percent of those with solid tumors, produced antibodies after receiving a single dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.
And a study published last month in the journal JAMA reported that only 17 percent of 436 transplant recipients who got one dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccine had detectable antibodies three weeks later.
Despite the low odds, immunocompromised people should still get the vaccines because they may produce some immune cells that are protective, even antibodies in a subset of patients.
“These patients should probably be prioritized for optimally timed two doses,” said Dr. Tariq Ahmad, a gastroenterologist at the Royal Devon and Exeter NHS Foundation Trust who was involved in the infliximab studies.
He suggested that clinicians routinely measure antibody responses in immunocompromised people even after two vaccine doses, so as to identify those who also may need monoclonal antibodies to prevent infection or a third dose of the vaccines.
Wendy Halperin, 54, was diagnosed at age 28 with a condition called common variable immunodeficiency. She was hospitalized with Covid-19 in January and remained there for 15 days. But the coronavirus induced unusual symptoms.
“I was having trouble walking,” she recalled. “I just lost control of my limbs, like I couldn’t walk down the street.”
Because she was treated for Covid-19 with convalescent plasma, Ms. Halperin has had to wait three months to be immunized and has made an appointment for April 26. But despite her condition, her body did manage to produce some antibodies to the initial infection.
“The take home message is that everybody should try and get the vaccine,” said Dr. Amit Verma, an oncologist at Montefiore Medical Center.
thehill | Morgan Freeman says if you trust him, you'll take his advice and get vaccinated against COVID-19.
"I'm not a doctor, but I trust science. And I’m told that, for some reason, people trust me," the "Vanquish" star says in a public service announcement released Monday by the arts advocacy group The Creative Coalition.
Freeman, 83, has played God in multiple films and is a popular choice for narrating documentaries and science specials.
“So here I am to say I trust science and I got the vaccine," he tells viewers in the PSA.
"If you trust me, you’ll get the vaccine," Freeman adds.
Morgan, I don't trust you as far as I could spit on you. First, there's your recent Russiagate foolishness and phukkery:
And then, there's that deeply disturbing personal failing from several years ago when your nasty old ass was simultaneously on those blue pills and your own step grand daughter!!! Now, low-information, short-memory, IQ-75 may have forgotten what you were up to, but these liminal views of consensus reality CANNOT UNSEE what they have seen:
CJR | Meanwhile, coverage of the shooting by national media outlets remained vague; reporters seemed reluctant (or were unable) to find details about the victims or pick up reports from the Korean press. Instead, the mainstream press published profiles of the shooter. And when the Atlanta Sheriff’s Office held a press conference on Wednesday morning, the press raced to take down the official statement, which uncritically echoed the suspect’s claims that he suffered from sexual addiction, and which minimized the role of racial animus in his motivation for the killing spree.
Lee, who had worked the police beat in Korea earlier in his career, was in disbelief. “I’ve never before seen a case where the police suggest: ‘The suspect said it wasn’t the case, therefore it’s not the case,’ ” he says. Worse, the press replicated the official statement in headlines and presented it as breaking news. In most news pieces, the spokesperson’s words were treated as self-explanatory, without additional context or questions. “It was almost as though the press believed what was said to be correct, like they wanted it to be the case,” Lee says.
To Lee, the official statement was “clearly too absurd to repeat.” He felt no obligation to cover the press conference or to recite the spokesperson’s words. Instead, Atlanta K ran a story that recounted the community response to the official statement, titled: “ ‘Does a bad day mean you can kill someone?’: white police officers’ protection of a white murderer.”
The press corrected course a day later, but already, public perception of the suspect’s racist and anti-Asian motives had been muddied. The shooter’s explanation for the murders—sex addiction—had been widely circulated, giving weight to long-standing associations between Asian-owned massage shops and illicit sex work. Investigations into the spas in the past week cited suggestive customer reviews and a history of police raids (some of which had been undertaken wrongfully, Lee says), in effect imputing criminality to the women. The media should ask if it is meaningful to determine whether the victims had been offering sexual services, and whether such questions are worth stigmatizing the deceased women and risking harm to family members and other spa workers. This also means that survivors, who have long lived under the radar—fearful of losing their livelihoods and immigration statuses—feel discouraged from talking publicly. “Unless they have immense courage, it’s improbable for these women to want to put themselves out there,” Lee says.
From the beginning, Lee had feared this sort of scrutiny. Reporters for national media outlets had asked him about criminal activity at the spas, to which he declined to respond. Why speculate on a question that lacks clear relevance to the story at hand? Already, the women have been unfairly immortalized in association with their place of work. The spas could never be a full reflection of who the women were; they were survival jobs—jobs the women might have worked tirelessly to retire from, had they been allowed to live out their lives.
npr | So obviously, it's a heartbreaking incident, and it hits particularly close to home for me since I consider Atlanta home. And so I certainly grieve for the victims and their families. The FBI is supporting state and local law enforcement, specifically APD, the Atlanta Police Department, and the [Cherokee County] Sheriff's Office. So we're actively involved but in a support role.
And while the motive remains still under investigation at the moment, it does not appear that the motive was racially motivated. But I really would defer to the state and local investigation on that for now.
I elevated racially motivated violent extremism to our top threat priority level about a year and a half ago or so. And I've been trying to call out this threat for a number of years now since I've been in this job.
We have doubled the number of domestic violent extremist investigations we've had since where they were when I started as director, and we were up to about 2,000. And that was before the Jan. 6 siege. So I expect the numbers to be even higher this year. And arrests likewise went up dramatically from 2019 to '20.
And so at the same time, the international terrorism threat — especially international terrorist organizations that inspire homegrown violent extremists here in the U.S. — hasn't gone away by any stretch of the imagination. So we clearly are making do right now with what we have. But we need and will need more resources to tackle that problem.
The sprawling investigation into Jan. 6
You know, I was appalled that something like that could happen in this country and determined to make sure that it doesn't happen ever again. ...
We intend to see this to its conclusion, no matter how many people it takes us to devote to it, no matter how long it takes us to do it, we're going to see it to the end. ... If we have the evidence to charge somebody and they committed a crime on that day, I expect them to be charged. ...
We've arrested people all over the country. I think we have ... open investigations specifically related to the Jan. 6 siege in all but one of our 56 field offices, which gives you a sense of the national sprawl of the investigation. And in some of those instances, there have already been conspiracy charges — small, I would call them — sort of small cells of individuals working together, coordinating their travel, etc. I don't think we've seen some national conspiracy, but we're going to keep digging.
worldboxingnews | Former middleweight rival Thomas Hearns has claimed Marvin Hagler’s death at the age of 66 was linked to the coronavirus vaccine he received recently.
Hearns, known as ‘The Hitman’ during his career, took to social media to report that Hagler was ‘fighting for his life in the ICU’ on Saturday. The ex-boxer also added that Hagler was there due to the ‘after-effects of the vaccine.’
In a sad final statement, Hearns said he believed ‘he’ll be just fine, but we could use the positive energy and Prayer for his full recovery.’ Sadly, that didn’t happen, and Hagler passed away a short time later.
Hearns’ revelation will be a massive blow to the continued roll-out of the vaccination program. Reports in Europe of the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine causing blood clots in three patients already dealt a debilitating thud as countries have paused using the UK-based jab. Social media conspiracy theories have gone into overdrive, and there will be some work to be done to assure those taking the vaccine that it’s safe.
nationalreview | Here’s the real story. What Senator Paul asked and what Levine refused to answer was this: “Do you believe that minors are capable of making such a life-changing decision as changing one’s sex?” And this, “Do you support the government’s intervening to override the parent’s consent to give a child puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and/or amputation surgery of breasts and genitalia?”
As Senator Paul referenced, these are the very same questions that appeared before the High Court in England and Wales last year. In his questioning of Levine, Senator Paul cited the plaintiff in that case, Keira Bell:
I would hope that you would have compassion for Keira Bell, who’s a 23-year-old girl who was confused with her identity. At 14, she read on the internet about something about transsexuals and she thought, “Well, maybe that’s what I am.” She ended up getting these puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, she had her breasts amputated.
But here’s what ultimately she says now, and this is a very insightful decision from someone who made a mistake, but was led to believe this was a good thing by the medical community.
“I made a brash decision as a teenager, as a lot of teenagers do, trying to find confidence and happiness, except now the rest of my life will be negatively affected,” she said, adding that the medicalized gender transitioning was a very temporary superficial fix for a very complex identity issue.
Having reviewed the evidence from all sides, the judges in Bell’s case concluded that it was “highly unlikely that a child aged 13 or under would be competent to give consent to the administration of puberty blockers,” adding that it was also “doubtful that a child aged 14 or 15 could understand and weigh the long-term risks and consequences of the administration of puberty blockers.”
Accordingly, the court ordered a National Health Service moratorium on the use of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones for gender-dysphoric young people.
Got that New York Times, et al.? The Keira Bell decision happened in Enlightened, secular Britain — and at the behest of impartial and liberal-minded judges. Unfortunately, in the absence of a similar judicial intervention — or indeed of a centralized health-care system — the situation in the United States is far more out of control.
There are currently 40+ transgender-youth clinics (and counting) in the United States, according to the Human Rights Campaign. The largest transgender-youth clinic in Los Angeles saw more than 1,000 patients in 2019; the youngest patient was four years old. And the director of that clinic has admitted to personally recommending double mastectomies for “probably about 200” adolescent females, a decision she has justified by the argument that “they don’t identify as girls,” thus breast removal is actually “chest reconstruction.” Similarly, a study entitled “Age Is Just a Number,” published in 2017 in the Journal of Sexual Medicine, reveals that eleven out of the 20 surgeons interviewed admitted to having performed vaginoplasty — that is, castration followed by the inversion of the penis to form a pseudo-vaginal canal — “1 to 20” times on males under the age of 18.
If the British judges think that minors can’t consent to taking drugs and hormones to halt puberty, how likely is it that a minor can consent to having his or her sexual organs removed or mutilated?
usatoday | On his first day in office last month, President Joe Biden signed an executive order which threatened to pull federal funding from schools unless they allow transgender women to compete on girls’ sports teams. On Thursday, the House passed a bill that would write this policy permanently into law.
Like many Americans with common sense, we strongly oppose these radical and unfair measures. And like many parents, our opposition is rooted in the care and concern we have for our daughters.
Participation in sports has had a positive impact on countless young women, helping them to develop leadership skills and learn to work together as a team. Striving to be the best is the goal, and valuable opportunities can stem from the competition. However, these lessons and opportunities would be seriously endangered if transgender women are allowed to compete in girls' sports. Indeed, the entirety of women's athletics would be deeply imperiled.
The reason is obvious. Biological male athletes have an insurmountable physical advantage over biological female athletes. They have greater muscle mass,bigger and stronger bones, and larger hearts and lungs than women. Moreover, one new study shows that even after taking female hormones, transgender women athletes still enjoy at least a temporary physical advantage on the playing field.
This reality cannot be ignored. It could even be dangerous.
For
example, consider the implications of a young woman competing in boxing
or another physical sport being matched up with a biological male
opponent. Besides likely being at a fundamental disadvantage, she might
also be at increased risk of severe injury based on physical
differences. Unfortunately, this hypothetical has already played out in a 2013 incident, and it could have major consequences on the whole of women’s sports should such situations become more normal.
CNN | Caster Semenya, the South African Olympic champion runner, has appealed to the European Court of Human Rights to end "discriminatory" testosterone limits imposed on female athletes.
This fight is not just about me, it's about taking a stand and fighting for dignity, equality and the human rights of women in sport. All we ask is to be able to run free as the strong and fearless women we are!! Thank you to all of those who have stood behind me✊🏽 pic.twitter.com/0PdBiujH8b
— Caster Semenya (@caster800m) February 25, 2021
forbes | Minor reactions following Covid-19 vaccination are common, and can include fever, chills, fatigue, body aches, a bump or redness at the injection site, or lymph node swelling. All of these are signs that the immune system is appropriately responding by developing antibodies. This is a good thing (although do not fear if you have no reaction at all— this is also fine). These reactions are more commonly seen in younger individuals, and because lymph node swelling tends to develop as a reaction to a nearby area of the body, the nodes in the armpit region can become inflamed after the Covid-19 vaccine. As these lymph nodes are near the outer breast tissue, women have raised valid concerns that these lymph nodes are breast masses or breast cancer metastases.
As one in eight women will develop breast cancer in her lifetime,
this is an important distinction to address. Because as common as breast
cancer is, inflamed lymph nodes due to breast cancer are very rare, and
cause for more concern. Less than 0.5% of patients
with breast cancer present with axillary (armpit) lymph nodes, but when
they are present in the setting of cancer, there is a 50% chance that
they are either cancerous or representing another type of cancer such as
leukemia or lymphoma. This finding has led many women to seek early
evaluation, including surgical consultations and mammography or
ultrasonography to assess these lymph nodes following their Covid-19
vaccine.
Axillary lymph node swelling was seen in both men and women during both the Pfizer and Moderna Covid-19 vaccine trials. The Moderna trial reported approximately 6% of patients after the first dose and about 8% after the second dose with temporary axillary lymph node swelling. The overwhelming majority of these swellings did not require pain medications or medical assessment, and most lasted no more than three days. Trial participants under age 64 developed axillary lymph nodes twice as often as those ages 65 years and older. The Covid-19 vaccine is not the first vaccination to present with axillary lymph node swelling. This has also been reported after the flu vaccine, hepatitis vaccines, polio vaccine, and the tetanus vaccine, to name a few. These similarly lead to local, temporary reactions to the body’s immune response.
In the January 2021 issue of Clinical Imaging, the authors discuss four cases of women presenting with axillary lymph nodes following Covid-19 vaccination, under the same arm as the injection site. The recommendation in their article is to repeat imaging several weeks after this finding, instead of heading to more aggressive interventions such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) or biopsy. Dr. Sunny Mitchell, Medical Director of Breast and Women’s Services and Director of Breast Surgery at Montefiore Nyack Hospital in New York commented, “We are seeing unilateral axillary adenopathy on breast imaging, [such as] Mammogram, Ultrasound, and Breast MRI after Covid-19 vaccinations are administered. This is presenting in individuals with a history of breast cancer as well as no history of breast cancer. Breast Radiologists are considering short term follow-up/repeat imaging prior to recommending a biopsy in these situations.”
BAR | Black Lives Matter Inland Empire, in an open letter, last week announced its departure from the cash-heavy Black Lives Global Network.
“The issue of greatest concern for us is the relationship between the Global Network and the Democratic Party.”
To our community,
Recently, a group of BLM chapters known as the BLM 10 has come forward to voice their concerns and opposition to the Global Network. Those concerns, along with the egregious conduct the Global network demonstrated on Dr. Martin Luther King’s birthday, have brought us to the conclusion that continuing to remain silent would be an act of betrayal. While the issues and problems that have been raised have been well known within our circle for years, it prompted many questions & concerns for us locally. We’d like to let the community know everything outlined in the statement put out by the BLM 10 is valid. We’ve also reached out to the BLM 10 and offered to sign on in support. Hopefully, we can provide insight and clarification into our chapter’s history, our relationship with the global network, and our commitments going forward.
When BLM IE first started, we were originally known as the Black and Brown Underground (BBU). In 2015 we were approached by an individual named Patrisse Cullors, who offered us an opportunity to join the Global Network and organize as a Black Lives Matter chapter. After hearing her proposal, we believed that our work, direction, and principles aligned and agreed to join the network; renaming ourselves Black Lives Matter Inland Empire in the process. We were told that the organization we were joining was decentralized and leaderless, but we quickly discovered that was not the case. The Global Network is a top-down dogmatic organization that promotes certain chapters that choose to align with their direction and sequester the ones that don’t. For us locally, that chapter has been Los Angeles.
“Continuing to remain silent would be an act of betrayal.”
For years, the leadership of the Los Angeles chapter has aligned with the Global network and One United Bank to impose on various chapters, particularly ours. We believe that while doing this they received substantial donations and funding, despite them continually soliciting the community for donations. Together, the Los Angeles Chapter along with the Global Network have consistently tried to strong-arm other groups and have worked to undermine a grassroots movement by capitalizing on unpaid labor, suppressing any internal attempt at democracy, commodifying Black death, and profiting from the same pain and suffering inflicted on Black communities that we’re fighting to end. In spite of being ostracised, receiving no financial support, and the maltreatment from both the Global Network and Los Angeles Chapter we’ve maintained our composure while working to the benefit of our community and victims of state sanctioned violence.
Clearly, we do not have the same beliefs or sense of ethics. We no longer feel, as we initially did, that our politics align. As a result, we are announcing that we are no longer associated or connected to the BLM Global Network. As an attempt to distance ourselves, we have decided to rename part of our organization The Black Power Collective while we restructure.
The use of the BLM name, which we believed was intended to unify our struggle, has been commodified and debased. It is now being used to sell products, acquire book deals, T.V. deals, and speaking engagements. We have no interest in these pursuits, and we are opposed to the movement to substitute Black capitalism for white capitalism. It has become clear that the Global network and certain figures have platformed our struggles with the sole purpose of exploiting our labor.
“The BLM name is now being used to sell products, acquire book deals, T.V. deals, and speaking engagements.”
Furthermore, the issue of greatest concern for us is the relationship between the Global Network and the Democratic Party. This is hypocritical at best, as the Democratic Party has historically rejected and ignored BLM’s demands and has made it clear that they are pro-police, pro-prison, and committed to capitalism. From Obama’s support of police and his double-cross of Erica Garner, to “Top Cop” Kamala Harris’ denial of justice for Matrice Richardson, even going back to the 1994 Crime Bill authored by Joe Biden along with the Prisoner Litigation Reform Act that stripped basic human rights from countless Black people—the Democratic Party has literally created the conditions that led to the formation of this movement. Even now, the Democractic party continues to support imperialism, killing African heads of state, bombing Somalia, abusing immigrants (including those of the Black diaspora), and spreading the U.S. military throughout Black and Brown countries around the world. This is a party that is a threat both here and internationally. To ally with them is to ally against ourselves.
I’m honored and excited to rejoin active service on @HomelandDems, where I plan to focus on highlighting and finding solutions to the scourge of white nationalist extremism. pic.twitter.com/JIhh0fOAPk
— Rep. Eric Swalwell (@RepSwalwell) January 15, 2021
NYPost | Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell is joining the House Committee on Homeland Security one month after it was revealed he was targeted by a suspected Chinese spy.
The California lawmaker — who was revealed to have been duped by a Chinese honey-trap spy who cozied to him and other pols in a bid to infiltrate the US political system — announced his appointment back onto the sensitive post in a tweet on Friday afternoon.
“My committee memberships — along with my experience as a prosecutor and as the son and brother of law enforcement officers — will give me a unique opportunity to delve into one of America’s most serious national security threats,” Swalwell wrote.
Members of the committee are responsible for oversight of the US Department of Homeland Security and the nation’s security legislation.
Swalwell also still sits on the House Intelligence Committee.
WSWS | In a telling interaction on CNN Friday, retired capitol policeman Theortis Jones said, “I think they allowed them to do what they did.” The complacent moderator failed to ask who gave the orders to stand back. The interview with the 37-year veteran was ended abruptly soon after he added, “They were a part of allowing these people to come up to the Capitol the way they did.”
The Democratic leadership is boasting that it is conducting an investigation into the death of the police officer who was killed in the riot. But this “investigation” will be conducted by the Capitol Police and the FBI—the very institutions that must themselves be subject to a thorough investigation for their role in this ongoing plot.
The Capitol Police’s self-investigation comes even as Democratic Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren reported that the chief of the Capitol Police lied to her by stating that the National Guard had been called up before January 6. The chief “was not truthful to me,” Lofgren told the press. “It was just not true. They had not been called.”
New details are also coming to light showing how close Wednesday’s riot came to ending in a massacre or mass kidnapping event. PBS Newshour correspondent Lisa Desjardins told NPR yesterday that she realized the danger she was in when she noticed police had abandoned their posts inside the Capitol building. She was barricaded in a room with several congressional representatives who held hands and prayed, worried that they were about to be killed.
An aide close to Vice President Mike Pence also told CNN yesterday that the Trump administration did not contact Pence or take any measures to ensure his safety. Pence was with his wife, daughter and brother in the Capitol building Wednesday as he presided over the electoral vote certification. CNN wrote:
Several of the violent Trump supporters who were rampaging the US Capitol were heard screaming ‘where’s Mike Pence,’ the source said, frightening the vice president and his family. Yet, the President and his top aides barely lifted a finger to check in on Pence to make sure he and his family were unharmed, the source added.
Online, fascist militias are now preparing for an even larger event on Inauguration Day. Hampton Stall, the founder of MilitiaWatch and an expert on the US far-right, told the World Socialist Web Site:
There’s a lot of really cryptic chatter and overt discussions of violence around the January 6 event, but a lot of inauguration-related organizing is related to a few different dynamics that have been planned for at least a month’s time. One that stands out is the Million Militia March apparently organized for 20 January at the Capitol. Propaganda and event fliers have been circulating around militia chat groups.
Militia members are also making plans for protests at various state capitols in the days leading up to the inauguration. Stall added that while Wednesday’s demonstration in Washington DC was largely unarmed, this may change on January 20:
There are also multiple state capital events organized for the 17th, 18, 19th and 20th. Fliers for these events have been quite mixed as far as indications as to the specific ideological tendencies of those organizing, whether it be ‘2A’ activism, overt militia organizing, Boogaloo, or something else entirely. The one commonality is that all are expressly right-wing in nature and often point to a militant or armed gathering.
Exactly one year before the date of the scheduled inauguration, on January 20, 2020, the largest armed demonstration in US history took place in Richmond, Virginia involving roughly 10,000 fascists. In December, Trump’s fascist adviser Stephen Miller said, “The only date in the Constitution is January 20,” adding that this was the “deadline” for action to protect Trump’s presidency.
wired | Unlike a building such as the White House, in which access is very tightly controlled, the Capitol building is often called the "People's House.” Its security is similar to that of a hospital; many spaces are open and accessible if you have a reason to be there, and only some areas are tightly guarded or otherwise access-controlled. Larkin, who also spent years with White House security in the Secret Service and is now vice president of corporate development at SAP National Security Services, says that the Capitol inherently has more entrances and exits than can be simultaneously guarded at normal staffing levels. He emphasizes that failures to contain and secure the situation happened while the pro-Trump mob was outside the building. But Larkin, who retired as Senate sergeant at arms in 2018, adds that cybersecurity is the next priority after physical security.
In spite of this, the mob Wednesday had ample opportunities to steal information or gain device access if they wanted to. And while the Senate and House each build off of their own shared IT framework, ultimately each of the 435 representatives and 100 senators runs their own office with their own systems. This is a boon to security in the sense that it creates segmentation and decentralization; getting access to Nancy Pelosi's emails doesn't help you access the communications of other representatives. But this also means that there aren't necessarily standardized authentication and monitoring schemes in place. Larkin emphasizes that there is a baseline of monitoring that IT staffers will be able to use to audit and assess whether there was suspicious activity on congressional devices. But he concedes that representatives and senators have varying levels of cybersecurity competence and hygiene.
It's also true that potentially exposed data at the Capitol on Wednesday would not have been classified, given that the mob had access only to unclassified networks. But congressional staffers are not subject to Freedom of Information Act obligations and are often much more candid in their communications than other government officials. Security and intelligence experts also emphasize that troves of unclassified information can still reveal sensitive or even classified information when combined.
Former National Security Agency hacker Jake Williams points out that, while US law enforcement was somehow caught flat-footed, president Donald Trump's supporters (egged on by Trump himself) have repeatedly foreshadowed that something like this could occur.
“You have to step back and realize that foreign intelligence could have looked at this and said, ‘Yeah, this is going to be an opportunity,” says Williams, founder of Rendition Infosec. “I don’t think every office that was entered everything needs to be burned to the ground, but you need to be acknowledging that there’s real intelligence value in learning legislators’ intentions and plans on policy. This security breach is a big deal.”
Even without physical intrusions, foreign adversaries could also use the incident as a jumping off point to launch phishing campaigns against congressional offices or begin spreading disinformation to foment future unrest.
“One thing I can guarantee you is that in Tehran, in Moscow, in Beijing folks are sitting in meetings right now thinking how can we take advantage of this?" says Kelvin Coleman, executive director of the National Cyber Security Alliance, who formerly worked in the Department of Homeland Security and National Security Council.
guardian | By now, the world has witnessed white rioters seize the Capitol building in Washington DC. After hearing Donald Trump encourage them to reject the presidential election’s outcome, thousands reportedly pushed through cops to storm ongoing congressional debates and reign supreme over politicians who fearfully scurried out of the halls of power. Draped in American, Confederate, and Trump flags, the raiders invaded the House floor, occupied representative offices, and filled balconies and scaffolds that line the windows. Joe Biden took to a podium to respond, cautioning the country that “our democracy is under unprecedented assault”.
On television, I saw paramedics rush a stretcher in the pandemonium. The woman bearing a bloodied face laying on top startled me, the anchor, and the cameraman. Please God, don’t let that woman be dead, I prayed, though her eyes lacked an animating essence. When I saw the video of the Proud Boys burn a Black Lives Matter banner a few weeks ago, I knew there would be more violent acts of desperation because they need a cause to feel empowered. Envying the resistance of the oppressed, Trump supporters want reasons to march and chant, so they create enemies and feign vulnerability as their cause grows lost. They sacrificed their lives to save white supremacy, even though it threatens them, too, materially and morally. And Black lives may never matter to people, like the woman, who will risk their own white lives during a pandemic to attack the nation’s capital to protect Donald Trump.
A senior Capitol police officer reportedly shot and killed her. But even the police shooting of the Trump supporter did not immediately catalyze significant law enforcement action to stop the conservative Caucasian invasion. Later, I watched a group of unmasked white men and women chase down a Black law enforcement agent who wielded only a stick in return. I was angry. Not because I felt bad for the cop, but because in that moment, I watched him realize that he was Black, outnumbered, and per the Dred Scott supreme court decision, “had no rights which the white man was bound to respect.”
Wednesday was a reminder of one difference between white rebellion to
feigned oppression and Black resistance to actual oppression: where
there is radical Black resistance, there is state repression. Where there is white rebellion for conservative causes, there is collusion with the state. Even when the white cops are outnumbered, like the McKinney, Texas, cops who assaulted Dajerria Becton
in her swimsuit, they escalate; he just pulled the gun out on Black
teens who came to her rescue. Police have stomped, beat, shot,
teargassed, and arrested protesters who organize, march, pray and sing
for our multi-racial liberation movements. Including me. Yet on
Wednesday, activists and bystanders knew damn well that if the election
refusers who raided the Capitol were Black, then the same politicians
who kneeled for George Floyd and painted yellow “Black lives matter” letters onto the streets would have sent the full force of the law to stop it.
americanthinker | Americans have common sense, so they can understand when they're being played (for example, when politicians place Americans under house arrest and then ignore their own rules to party and travel). And they know there is no way on God's green earth that decrepit, demented, corrupt, and terminally stupid Joe Biden fairly won this election. This post assembles various election anomalies that don't pass the smell test.
J.B. Shurk, who frequently publishes at American Thinker, wrote a knock-out article for The Federalist about Joe Biden's magical performance in the election. You should read the whole article, but here are four things that don't pass the smell test:
1. Biden allegedly got 80 million votes, which is more than Obama received at his peak, in 2008 — and Biden did this despite losing minority voters to Donald Trump and trailing Trump in voter enthusiasm.
2. Biden broke 60 years of precedent by winning nationally despite losing prodigiously in bellwether states and counties. The last time this happened was when the mafia got out the vote for John F. Kennedy in 1960.
3. Trump had extraordinary coattails, so much so that even the New York Times admitted that the "Democrats Suffered Crushing Down-Ballot Losses Across America." Think about that: Biden had no coattails and no enthusiasm, yet he allegedly won a record number of votes. Smells fetid to me.
cbsnews | The CEO of the voting technology company Smartmatic said Wednesday that results of Venezuela's election for an all-powerful constituent assembly were off by at least 1 million votes.
Antonio Mugica said results recorded by his systems and those reported by Venezuela's National Electoral Council indicate "without any doubt" that official turnout figures were inflated.
Smartmatic was created by Venezuelans and began providing electronic voting machines in 2004 during the presidency of the late Hugo Chavez.
"Even in moments of deep political conflict and division we have been satisfied with the voting process and the count has been completely accurate," Mugica told reporters in London. "It is, therefore, with the deepest regret that we have to report that the turnout figures on Sunday, 30 July, for the Constituent Assembly in Venezuela were tampered with."
President Nicolas Maduro's government announced late Sunday that more than 8 million Venezuelans had participated in the election for constituent assembly that will be granted virtually unlimited powers. His count was put into question by at least one independent exit poll, showing turnout was less than half that number.
The claim is certain to fuel further discord over the assembly, which Maduro has vowed to utilize to target his foes. Opposition leaders boycotted the election, arguing voting terms were rigged to favor the ruling socialist party. Nearly 7.6 million people voted in a symbolic referendum rejecting the assembly two weeks before the vote.
The assembly is expected to be sworn into office Thursday and the opposition is calling on Venezuelans to protest.
