Ottawa 'outcasts' opposing ocracy overreach...

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OK, mentioned yesterday as Truck Fudeau, one of the two stories breaking the internet over the weekend, and not just Ottawa - but that was the main destination of The Freedom Convoy 2022 (sort of appropriate but the name Ottawa is derived from the Algonquin word 'adawe', which means 'to trade'...keep on trucking!).

As the image suggests, the protest against medical MANDATES - not against vaccination per se [although I personally definitely am against anti Covid jabs that they call vaccines] - is gaining worldwide support. Australia, Brazil, Italy, USA to name a few...needless to say young Castro has left the building. 
 

Slightly off on a tangent, the amazing thing is, more and more I find myself agreeing with Russell Brand*: "With a large convoy of Canadian truckers forming a ‘Freedom Rally’ to protest vaccine mandates, how are government and media framing them less than 2 years after truckers, like nurses, were called heroes?" [Rumble] 

* should I be worried?

Update 30th Jan: the bad cat puts it so well, "justin trudeau: a portrait in cowardice and projection"... ..."but justin is a liar and so are all his filthy friends." [sic]

2nd update: The Cavalry Rode In. Wow...[Link] and good full week (good build-up info and videos) HERE at GD's Political Animal blog. 

Ottawa 'outcasts' opposing ocracy overreach...

---

OK, mentioned yesterday as Truck Fudeau, one of the two stories breaking the internet over the weekend, and not just Ottawa - but that was the main destination of The Freedom Convoy 2022 (sort of appropriate but the name Ottawa is derived from the Algonquin word 'adawe', which means 'to trade'...keep on trucking!).

As the image suggests, the protest against medical MANDATES - not against vaccination per se [although I personally definitely am against anti Covid jabs that they call vaccines] - is gaining worldwide support. Australia, Brazil, Italy, USA to name a few...needless to say young Castro has left the building. 
 

Slightly off on a tangent, the amazing thing is, more and more I find myself agreeing with Russell Brand*: "With a large convoy of Canadian truckers forming a ‘Freedom Rally’ to protest vaccine mandates, how are government and media framing them less than 2 years after truckers, like nurses, were called heroes?" [Rumble] 

* should I be worried?

Update 30th Jan: the bad cat puts it so well, "justin trudeau: a portrait in cowardice and projection"... ..."but justin is a liar and so are all his filthy friends." [sic]

2nd update: The Cavalry Rode In. Wow...[Link] and good full week (good build-up info and videos) HERE at GD's Political Animal blog. 

Oblectation over opinion of one oldie's obnoxious obstreperousness...

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...one of two things ruling the internet this weekend, and it isn't Truck Fudeau. No, as you can tell by the blog-post title (you couldn't?) it's the Neil Young/Spotify/Joe Rogan thing. Surfing away I landed at Riggery Pokery and enjoyed the succinct turn of phrase on the arrogance of certainty; nothing like a good rant; indeed I enjoyed the frisson but no skin orgasm...but I did laugh a lot. 

I don’t particularly want to single out Neil Young here, he’s far from being the only one - but he has rather raised his wrinkly buggeration of a visage above the parapet. He is representative of a very worrying trend that has emerged. Where has this rising trend of fascist fuckwittery come from? 

"Who the holy fuck is Neil Young to determine what I can, and cannot, listen to?
Arrogant shite."

"You supercilious wanker."

There's a lot more. :-)

Also a shout out too to Sophia in the comments: "In other news, my husband thought up with a new cologne yesterday that I think many of us would like to get our hands on. It's called "'Leave Me the Fu' Cologne."

Update 30th Jan: LOL, "Just when you thought Neil Young’s ill-conceived boycott of Spotify over Joe Rogan was fizzling out, Prince Harry and Meghan step in to keep it fizzling a little longer..." [The Daily Skeptic].

And more good reading on the generational aspect of the Young/Rogan spat and Covid HERE: The Needle and the Damage Done from Christopher Roach: "Far from being a cesspool of disinformation, the mainstream media are slowly catching up with the skeptics." [sic]

Oblectation over opinion of one oldie's obnoxious obstreperousness...

---

...one of two things ruling the internet this weekend, and it isn't Truck Fudeau. No, as you can tell by the blog-post title (you couldn't?) it's the Neil Young/Spotify/Joe Rogan thing. Surfing away I landed at Riggery Pokery and enjoyed the succinct turn of phrase on the arrogance of certainty; nothing like a good rant; indeed I enjoyed the frisson but no skin orgasm...but I did laugh a lot. 

I don’t particularly want to single out Neil Young here, he’s far from being the only one - but he has rather raised his wrinkly buggeration of a visage above the parapet. He is representative of a very worrying trend that has emerged. Where has this rising trend of fascist fuckwittery come from? 

"Who the holy fuck is Neil Young to determine what I can, and cannot, listen to? Arrogant shite."

"You supercilious wanker."

There's a lot more. :-)

Also a shout out too to Sophia in the comments: "In other news, my husband thought up with a new cologne yesterday that I think many of us would like to get our hands on. It's called "'Leave Me the Fu' Cologne."

Update 30th Jan: LOL, "Just when you thought Neil Young’s ill-conceived boycott of Spotify over Joe Rogan was fizzling out, Prince Harry and Meghan step in to keep it fizzling a little longer..." [The Daily Skeptic].

And more good reading on the generational aspect of the Young/Rogan spat and Covid HERE: The Needle and the Damage Done from Christopher Roach: "Far from being a cesspool of disinformation, the mainstream media are slowly catching up with the skeptics." [sic]

Outing our overt overspending ocracy...

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Once again the Tax Payers' Alliance is doing a sterling service by highlighting the overt overspending of our Members of Parliament, those sent to represent the people, no really, stop sniggering at the back, that is what they are meant to do. 

This is not new, MPs and their hangers-on seem to be consumed with self-entitlement,  to claim back what most 'normal' people have to spend out of their own pockets (2nd mortgage, furniture, utility bills, TVs, donations to charities [i.e. poppies FFS!], and remember this has been going on for decades:  "ice cube tray, a fluffy duster, a toilet roll holder and tealights" [DT] and even porn!!!). What does your MP claim?  

The TPA have "revealed the average cost of an MP has increased by 29 per cent over the covid pandemic, from £157,747 in 2019-20 to £203,880 in 2020-21." 

Among the highlights is the astounding fact that the "average cost of an MP was £203,880". Remember this DOES NOT include their salary. [Full Report PDF] 

Britain’s most expensive MP was the member for Broxtowe, Darren Henry, with total spending of £280,936. Now, to not prejudge - oops too late - maybe he had set-up expenses, being a fairly new MP (2019) but Broxtowe is by Nottingham - not even half way up the country, and the M1 motorway runs through the constituency; it is between Derby and Nottingham mainline stations i.e. it is effing easy to get to London. In fact it is just a few stops up the same line as Kettering, the constituency of the least expensive MP, Philip Hollobone (£80,709. A full 200K less). Philip has CONSTANTLY been the lowest spender - or amongst the lowest - for as long as he has been an MP. 

Just as a reminder that MPs taking advantage of the pandemic and lockdown with a total spend of £132.5 million (up 4.6 per cent on previous years) is peanuts compared to - revealed last month - the [sadly unsurprising] news that there is " £17 billion estimated to be lost from unpaid business loans as any losses were guaranteed to be covered by taxpayers - that's 36 per cent of the entire scheme." [Bounce Back Loan Scheme PDF update].

Outing our overt overspending ocracy...

---

Once again the Tax Payers' Alliance is doing a sterling service by highlighting the overt overspending of our Members of Parliament, those sent to represent the people, no really, stop sniggering at the back, that is what they are meant to do. 

This is not new, MPs and their hangers-on seem to be consumed with self-entitlement,  to claim back what most 'normal' people have to spend out of their own pockets (2nd mortgage, furniture, utility bills, TVs, donations to charities [i.e. poppies FFS!], and remember this has been going on for decades:  "ice cube tray, a fluffy duster, a toilet roll holder and tealights" [DT] and even porn!!!). What does your MP claim?  

The TPA have "revealed the average cost of an MP has increased by 29 per cent over the covid pandemic, from £157,747 in 2019-20 to £203,880 in 2020-21." 

Among the highlights is the astounding fact that the "average cost of an MP was £203,880". Remember this DOES NOT include their salary. [Full Report PDF] 

Britain’s most expensive MP was the member for Broxtowe, Darren Henry, with total spending of £280,936. Now, to not prejudge - oops too late - maybe he had set-up expenses, being a fairly new MP (2019) but Broxtowe is by Nottingham - not even half way up the country, and the M1 motorway runs through the constituency; it is between Derby and Nottingham mainline stations i.e. it is effing easy to get to London. In fact it is just a few stops up the same line as Kettering, the constituency of the least expensive MP, Philip Hollobone (£80,709. A full 200K less). Philip has CONSTANTLY been the lowest spender - or amongst the lowest - for as long as he has been an MP. 

Just as a reminder that MPs taking advantage of the pandemic and lockdown with a total spend of £132.5 million (up 4.6 per cent on previous years) is peanuts compared to - revealed last month - the [sadly unsurprising] news that there is " £17 billion estimated to be lost from unpaid business loans as any losses were guaranteed to be covered by taxpayers - that's 36 per cent of the entire scheme." [Bounce Back Loan Scheme PDF update].

Obambulating over oriental Operation Overlord...

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Hat-tip to the bad cat for this surf session that ended in an amazing history lesson (further hat-tip to Madeira in the comments). 

Delta Airlines (not Omicron Airways [update: but we already have BA.2 right?]) asked a question on Twitter "Name a city that changed your life" and got many 'expected' answers: London, Paris, New York, Moscow, Barcelona, Istanbul and a few less obvious ones...but after a while - as you can guess by the image - the majority of answers became Wuhan, which to be fair has changed [almost] everyone's life so is clearly the winning answer. 

One reply even posted this video, presumably from Wuhan Tourist Board : "Wuhan, a city by the side of Yangtze river with high risen buildings, and connected by many majestic bridges. Countless fun and adventures are hidden in this energetic city awaits for you to discover." ...not a joke, posted in Nov 2021. The video is indeed almost entirely images and film of roads, intersections, traffic and bridges! I really don't think they can expect a rush of tourism, do you? 

The unexpected history lesson was - and how many people have any idea at all? - that Wuhan was strategically firebombed (a la Dresden) in December 1944; from Peter Harmsen's blog 'China in WW2'...The US Firebombing of Wuhan [Part 1] [Part 2]. Wang Shih-chieh, a Chinese politician and scholar, wrote 

"regardless of cost to the city and its civilian population. Wuhan had to be sacrificed." 

The raid used M-69 incendiary bombs, an 'extremely deadly cocktail of phosphorous and napalm just developed for the purpose by scientists at Harvard University'; after this "first experience with firebombing as a tactical weapon to be a successful experiment" it was later used extensively against the Japanese mainland cities. [update comment: those quotes are from Peter's blog, not that M69 Wiki page!]

 

Wuhan was a Japanese hub in WWII, and a launch pad for Operation Ichi-Go, which is important not so much for the eventual outcome of the war but for the turn of events that allowed the Chinese communists to gain against the National Revolutionary Army of the Republic of China; some have said that 'the impact Ichi-Go had on the political situation in China was as important to the post-war world order as Operation Overlord'.

Update 20:37: not - but almost - forgetting that today is one year on: "January 23rd, is the day, in 2020, when the world changed as China first implemented in Wuhan the novel public health policy that has come to define the COVID-19 pandemic."

Obambulating over oriental Operation Overlord...

---

Hat-tip to the bad cat for this surf session that ended in an amazing history lesson (further hat-tip to Madeira in the comments). 

Delta Airlines (not Omicron Airways [update: but we already have BA.2 right?]) asked a question on Twitter "Name a city that changed your life" and got many 'expected' answers: London, Paris, New York, Moscow, Barcelona, Istanbul and a few less obvious ones...but after a while - as you can guess by the image - the majority of answers became Wuhan, which to be fair has changed [almost] everyone's life so is clearly the winning answer. 

One reply even posted this video, presumably from Wuhan Tourist Board : "Wuhan, a city by the side of Yangtze river with high risen buildings, and connected by many majestic bridges. Countless fun and adventures are hidden in this energetic city awaits for you to discover." ...not a joke, posted in Nov 2021. The video is indeed almost entirely images and film of roads, intersections, traffic and bridges! I really don't think they can expect a rush of tourism, do you? 

The unexpected history lesson was - and how many people have any idea at all? - that Wuhan was strategically firebombed (a la Dresden) in December 1944; from Peter Harmsen's blog 'China in WW2'...The US Firebombing of Wuhan [Part 1] [Part 2]. Wang Shih-chieh, a Chinese politician and scholar, wrote 

"regardless of cost to the city and its civilian population. Wuhan had to be sacrificed." 

The raid used M-69 incendiary bombs, an 'extremely deadly cocktail of phosphorous and napalm just developed for the purpose by scientists at Harvard University'; after this "first experience with firebombing as a tactical weapon to be a successful experiment" it was later used extensively against the Japanese mainland cities. [update comment: those quotes are from Peter's blog, not that M69 Wiki page!]

 

Wuhan was a Japanese hub in WWII, and a launch pad for Operation Ichi-Go, which is important not so much for the eventual outcome of the war but for the turn of events that allowed the Chinese communists to gain against the National Revolutionary Army of the Republic of China; some have said that 'the impact Ichi-Go had on the political situation in China was as important to the post-war world order as Operation Overlord'.

Update 20:37: not - but almost - forgetting that today is one year on: "January 23rd, is the day, in 2020, when the world changed as China first implemented in Wuhan the novel public health policy that has come to define the COVID-19 pandemic."

Obiter on official output; only one...

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On 22nd Jan you get 22 months of data on the actual deaths in the UK (from 1st Feb 2020 to Dec 31st 2021) from Covid ONLY. You have probably seen this by now...or maybe not, Freedom of Information request to UK gov: 

FOI Ref: FOI/2021/3368 [LINK] 

You asked: 

Q. Please supply deaths caused solely by covid 19, where covid is the only cause of death listed on the death certificate, broken down by age group and gender between feb 2020 up to and including dec 2021. [sic]

A. The numbers are supplied in the image below, of the table supplied HERE.

Q. Please supply the number of autopsies carried out on those where covid was the only cause stated. 

A. We do not hold analysis on the number of post-mortems completed. However, we can create analysis on deaths involving post-mortems in 2020 and 2021 as a custom output. Such services would be subject to legal frameworks, disclosure controls, resources and agreement of costs. If you would like to request this bespoke dataset, please contact health.data@ons.gov.uk to discuss your enquiry further. Please note, there may be a charge for this work which would be subject to our charging policy.

Yep...you're not wrong, your eyes are not deceiving you: deaths below age 30: 23, that is twenty three, not in hundreds or thousands, i.e. a tad over one per month. Deaths below 50 years of age: 317...etc. 

Yes, yes, meaningless really and we mustn't insinuate that deaths of other illnesses plus Covid should be ignored, plus with changes to the rules to facilitate the fast and uncorroborated filling out of death certificates and cremation authorisations etc., we will never really know how many were killed by our government or not...well you would have thought this might be 'on the news' but hey ho. 

Update: not quite sure why or what the difference is HERE (ONS UK Gov) where the total is 17,371. Still extremely low and below all the shouty media numbers but very different: "death registrations for 2020 and 2021 (provisional) that were due to COVID-19 and were recorded without any pre-existing conditions, England and Wales." 

2020: 9400 (0-64: 1549 / 65 and over: 7851) 

2021 Q1: 6483 (0-64: 1560/ 65 and over: 4923) 

2021 Q2: 346 (0-64: 153/ 65 and over: 193) 

2021 Q3: 1142 (0-64: 512/ 65 and over: 630) 

Obiter on official output; only one...

---

On 22nd Jan you get 22 months of data on the actual deaths in the UK (from 1st Feb 2020 to Dec 31st 2021) from Covid ONLY. You have probably seen this by now...or maybe not, Freedom of Information request to UK gov: 

FOI Ref: FOI/2021/3368 [LINK] 

You asked: 

Q. Please supply deaths caused solely by covid 19, where covid is the only cause of death listed on the death certificate, broken down by age group and gender between feb 2020 up to and including dec 2021. [sic]

A. The numbers are supplied in the image below, of the table supplied HERE.

Q. Please supply the number of autopsies carried out on those where covid was the only cause stated. 

A. We do not hold analysis on the number of post-mortems completed. However, we can create analysis on deaths involving post-mortems in 2020 and 2021 as a custom output. Such services would be subject to legal frameworks, disclosure controls, resources and agreement of costs. If you would like to request this bespoke dataset, please contact health.data@ons.gov.uk to discuss your enquiry further. Please note, there may be a charge for this work which would be subject to our charging policy.

Yep...you're not wrong, your eyes are not deceiving you: deaths below age 30: 23, that is twenty three, not in hundreds or thousands, i.e. a tad over one per month. Deaths below 50 years of age: 317...etc. 

Yes, yes, meaningless really and we mustn't insinuate that deaths of other illnesses plus Covid should be ignored, plus with changes to the rules to facilitate the fast and uncorroborated filling out of death certificates and cremation authorisations etc., we will never really know how many were killed by our government or not...well you would have thought this might be 'on the news' but hey ho. 

Update: not quite sure why or what the difference is HERE (ONS UK Gov) where the total is 17,371. Still extremely low and below all the shouty media numbers but very different: "death registrations for 2020 and 2021 (provisional) that were due to COVID-19 and were recorded without any pre-existing conditions, England and Wales." 

2020: 9400 (0-64: 1549 / 65 and over: 7851) 

2021 Q1: 6483 (0-64: 1560/ 65 and over: 4923) 

2021 Q2: 346 (0-64: 153/ 65 and over: 193) 

2021 Q3: 1142 (0-64: 512/ 65 and over: 630) 

Ominous observations...

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"Some things are indisputable. Death is one of them." 

If you don’t want your children to grow up in a miserable, fascist state or worse still die in it, I suggest you start paying more attention to the data and less to the propaganda on the television. The government is not your friend and does not have your best interests at heart. 

I could end the post there but there's more. The above paragraph is how Joel Smalley ends his latest plea for you to 'Challenge the Narrative'. The COVID "cure" is worse than the disease. [LINK] "Analysis of life-years lost in England shows a 76% increase in 2021 over 2020 because younger people are dying at much higher relative rates.". 

Joel paraphrases from Wikipedia's Quality-Adjusted Life Year definition because in the graphs in his post showing increased deaths in 2021 compared to 2020 (amazing in itself) he had not adjusted for 'quality of life', it represents. he has done all-cause mortality for each age group (see article).  

The Quality Adjusted Life year measurement is 'a generic measure of quantity of life lived'. 

It is used in economic evaluation to assess the value of medical interventions

Look at the other graphs and read the article, "The only age group not to show a substantial increase in deaths in 2021 compared to 2020 is the over 80s (Figure 13)."

"The cure is already worse than the disease."

The bad cat recently said the same about other Northern European countries: "Covid deaths are way down, but overall deaths are up considerably. this is a puzzle that warrants attention."

Origin of Oh Oh Omicron...

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Genomic epidemiology of novel coronavirus - Africa-focused subsampling [Nextstrain.org] 

Now, you could read that as 'Double O' short-hand for fictional licenced-to-kill undercover agent or 'Oh Oh' as in awareness of a problem, mild alarm or worry over the realisation of an error...but...Ian Rons at the Daily Skeptic gives us his 'Bond' tongue in cheek conspiracy theory (honest, I know all the others have come true but this is a joke). however, it may be the case ("Self-disseminating vaccines to suppress zoonoses")! 

Anyhooo, a month ago Igor Chudov wrote "Omicron 'variant' likely to be man-made. It evolved from a strain that is not in circulation as of 1.5 years ago." And from almost two weeks back "Omicron is Not Normal " [eugyppius], and last week from Jonatan Pallesen [his Twitter] "It is based on a variant last seen in mid-2020." 

"That is a very odd path for a virus to evolve naturally. But a normal one if it was investigated in a lab since then." 

There are many more with so much info (e.g. Dr. B, or the Chinese!) but links lead to links and the rabbit hole is endless albeit super interesting and thought provoking. Below you'll see two more images of the evolutionary connections (Omicron's goes back to mid 2020 remember), on the right the larger view, on the left a close-up of the origin (click to enlarge) ...maybe that OO isn't so conspiratorial after all...

Images from Nextstrain via Trevor Bedford.

Origin of Oh Oh Omicron...

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Genomic epidemiology of novel coronavirus - Africa-focused subsampling [Nextstrain.org] 

Now, you could read that as 'Double O' short-hand for fictional licenced-to-kill undercover agent or 'Oh Oh' as in awareness of a problem, mild alarm or worry over the realisation of an error...but...Ian Rons at the Daily Skeptic gives us his 'Bond' tongue in cheek conspiracy theory (honest, I know all the others have come true but this is a joke). however, it may be the case ("Self-disseminating vaccines to suppress zoonoses")! 

Anyhooo, a month ago Igor Chudov wrote "Omicron 'variant' likely to be man-made. It evolved from a strain that is not in circulation as of 1.5 years ago." And from almost two weeks back "Omicron is Not Normal " [eugyppius], and last week from Jonatan Pallesen [his Twitter] "It is based on a variant last seen in mid-2020." 

"That is a very odd path for a virus to evolve naturally. But a normal one if it was investigated in a lab since then." 

There are many more with so much info (e.g. Dr. B, or the Chinese!) but links lead to links and the rabbit hole is endless albeit super interesting and thought provoking. Below you'll see two more images of the evolutionary connections (Omicron's goes back to mid 2020 remember), on the right the larger view, on the left a close-up of the origin (click to enlarge) ...maybe that OO isn't so conspiratorial after all...

Images from Nextstrain via Trevor Bedford.