Best of the Web:

Vader

Best of the Web: Why the Bill Gates global health empire promises more empire and less public health

Jeremy Loffredo and Michele Greenstein
The Grayzone
Wed, 08 Jul 2020 05:18 UTC
Behind a veil of corporate media PR, the Gates Foundation has served as a vehicle for Western capital while exploiting the Global South as a human laboratory. The coronavirus pandemic is likely to intensify this disturbing agenda.

Bill gates empire 1
President Donald Trump's announcement this July of a U.S. withdrawal from the World Health Organization (WHO) set into motion a process that will have a dramatic impact on the future of global public health policy - and on the fortunes of one of the world's richest people.

The US abandonment of the WHO means that the organization's second-largest financial contributor, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, is soon to become its top donor, giving the non-governmental international empire unparalleled influence over one the world's most important multilateral organizations.

Bill Gates has achieved a hero-like status during the pandemic. The Washington Post has called him a "champion of science-backed solutions," while the New York Times recently hailed him as "the most interesting man in the world." Gates is also the star of a hit Netflix docu-series, "Pandemic: How to Prevent an Outbreak," which was released just weeks before coronavirus hit the U.S., and was produced by a New York Times correspondent, Sheri Fink, who previously worked at three Gates-funded organizations (Pro Publica, the New America Foundation, and the International Medical Corps).

Comment: See also:

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Chess

Best of the Web: Trump reaps the whirlwind with China/Iran mega deal

Tom Luongo
tomluongo.me
Wed, 08 Jul 2020 12:00 UTC
sanctions dollar
For more than three years I've tried to explain that President Trump's foreign policy was having the exact opposite effect of its intended purpose.

Trump, under the advice of people like John Bolton, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) has pursued a maximum pressure campaign against Iran in the hopes of the regime either crumbling or suing for peace.

Trump was warned by both Chinese Premier Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin that Iran would 'rather eat dirt' than submit to him on nuclear weapons, support for Hezbollah, Iraq and President Bashar al-Assad in Syria.
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Sherlock

Best of the Web: Media outlets continue to be duped by a Middle East propaganda campaign

Adam Rawnsley
Daily Beast
Tue, 07 Jul 2020 20:01 UTC
fake news
© The Daily Beast/Getty
If you want a hot take about the Middle East, Raphael Badani is your man.

As a Newsmax "Insider" columnist, he has thoughts about how Iraq needs to rid itself of Iranian influence to attract investment and why Dubai is an oasis of stability in a turbulent region. His career as a "geopolitical risk consultant and interactive simulation designer" and an "international relations senior analyst" for the Department of Labor have given him plenty of insights about the Middle East. He's printed those insights at a range of conservative outlets like the Washington Examiner, RealClear Markets, American Thinker, and The National Interest.

Unfortunately for the outlets who published his articles and the readers who believed them, Raphael Badani does not exist.

His profile photos are stolen from the blog of an unwitting San Diego startup founder. His LinkedIn profile, which described him as a graduate of George Washington and Georgetown, is equally fictitious (and was deleted following publication of this article).
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Magnify

Best of the Web: Riot-torn Twin Cities already forgotten

Michael Tracey
Wall Street Journal
Tue, 07 Jul 2020 19:54 UTC
riots in Minneapolis
© LUCAS JACKSON/REUTERSBuildings burn during the riots in Minneapolis, May 30
The national media might have "moved on" from the riots in Minneapolis, but residents have nowhere to go. Much of the Twin Cities is still in ruins. Boarded-up storefronts still display makeshift notices that read "black owned" or "minority owned" to ward off further destruction. Many locals are reluctant to speak on the record, but some are eager to do so.

"It's been agony," says Mohamed Ali, a native of Somalia. "I respect the public anger, but I think we carried it too far, to burn our city." At the height of the chaos, rioters set a large fire in front of his apartment, which sits atop several streetside shops. He spray-painted desperate appeals onto plywood affixed to the storefront windows: "Don't burn please . . . Kids live upstairs."

"All these businesses are still boarded, and it's over a month later," Mr. Ali said, gesturing in every direction of his Minneapolis neighborhood. "This was a thriving area," he said. "Now a lot of minority businesses are burned."
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Microscope 1

Best of the Web: No second-wave of coronavirus in Russia, head of Genomic Engineering Lab in Moscow explains why

John Helmer
JohnHelmer.net
Wed, 08 Jul 2020 20:46 UTC
wave
Pavel Volchkov is an exceptional voice among the Russian scientists now dealing with the corona virus (Covid-19) pandemic.

The current Covid-19 policy administrators in Moscow are of the same academic generation but they have trained as doctors; Volchkov is a geneticist. They have spent their formative careers inside Russian institutions; Volchkov spent more than ten years in the US, at the University of Chicago then at Harvard.

He has not suffered from the inferiority complex which has been the precondition for success in the US careers of Konstantin (Keith) Gessen and other Russian graduates from Harvard. Volchkov's analysis of the US science market and his reasons for returning to his Russian laboratory are described here.

Comment: See also: And check out SOTT radio's: Objective:Health - The Ultimate Insanity of the Covid Lockdown - Interview with Sott.net Editor Joe Quinn

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Blue Planet

Best of the Web: What a mass of rotting reindeer carcasses taught scientists

Phoebe Weston
The Guardian
Wed, 08 Jul 2020 07:54 UTC
reindeer
© Olav StrandIn August 2016, 323 wild tundra reindeer were killed in a freak lightning event on Norway's Hardangervidda plateau.
In August 2016, a park ranger stumbled upon 323 dead wild tundra reindeer in Norway's remote Hardangervidda plateau. They had been killed in a freak lightning event. But instead of removing the carcasses, the park decided to leave them where they were, allowing nature to take its course - and scientists to study this island of decomposition and how it might change the arctic tundra ecosystem.

Over the years scientists observed the bloated, fly-infested bodies turn into dry skeletons. The latest paper, published by the Royal Society in June, looked at the creation of a "landscape of fear", as top predators such as wolverines, golden eagles and arctic foxes took advantage of the carrion.

"The landscape of fear framework has provided a better understanding of animal decisions in relation to food and safety trade-offs, predator-prey relationships and how communities are structured across trophic levels," it concluded.

Comment: See also: And check out SOTT radio's:

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Yellow Vest

Best of the Web: Massive protests rock Serbian capital after govt forces population BACK into Covid-19 lockdown


RT
Wed, 08 Jul 2020 00:18 UTC

Comment: Rank political abuse of Covid-19 isn't limited to Western govts. In Serbia, the govt declared victory against Covid-19, lifted the lockdown in order to hold elections, then once the incumbent party was reelected, announced a jump in Covid-19 numbers and a return to lockdown. The Serbian people aren't buying it for one minute...


Serbian parliament building
© REUTERS/Marko DjuricaA protest outside the Serbian parliament building against the announced Covid-19 lockdown in Belgrade, Serbia July 7, 2020.
Mounted police used teargas and truncheons to disperse a crowd of several thousand protesters gathered outside the Serbian parliament in Belgrade, opposed to the government's announcement of a new coronavirus lockdown.

President Aleksandar Vucic announced on Tuesday that a new curfew would go into effect on Friday and last over the weekend, after 300 new Covid-19 cases and 13 deaths - the most since the pandemic began, local media reported.


This prompted an estimated ten thousand people to gather outside the parliament building and demand Vucic's resignation, starting around 10 pm local time.

After some demonstrators reportedly broke into the building, riot police were deployed and used force to disperse the crowd, including tear gas. At one point, police on horseback charged the demonstrators.

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Black Cat

Best of the Web: Narcissists, psychopaths, and manipulators are more likely to engage in 'virtuous victim signaling' - study

Elizabeth Nolan Brown
Reason
Tue, 07 Jul 2020 19:17 UTC
Virtue signaling
© Stefan Boness/Ipon/SIPA/Newscom
New study links virtue signaling to "Dark Triad" traits. Being accused of "virtue signaling" might sound nice to the uninitiated, but spend much time on social media and you know that it's actually an accusation of insincerity. Virtue signalers are, essentially, phonies and showoffs โ€” folks who adopt opinions and postures solely to garner praise and sympathy or whose good deeds are tainted by their need for everyone to see just how good they are. Combined with a culture that says only victimhood confers a right to comment on certain issues, it's a big factor in online pile-ons and one that certainly contributes to social media platforms being such a bummer sometimes.

So: Here's some fun new research looking at "the consequences and predictors of emitting signals of victimhood and virtue," published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. The paper โ€” from University of British Columbia researchers Ekin Ok, Yi Qian, Brendan Strejcek, and Karl Aquino โ€” details multiple studies the authors conducted on the subject.

Their conclusion? Psychopathic, manipulative, and narcissistic people are more frequent signalers of "virtuous victimhood."

Comment: Dr. Stanton Samenow also writes about this in different terms in "Inside the Criminal Mind". The criminal minded create a persona or image that basically protects their ability to manipulate others. A predator who preys on the elderly might go out of his way to help his elderly neighbor cross the street. One who targets children may also be found teaching kids, and so on. Several of the principle features of the criminal mind are claiming victimhood and seeing themselves as essentially good, but underlying all this is an indulged drive to have power and control over others.

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Alarm Clock

Best of the Web: Coronavirus: Why everyone was wrong - immune response stronger than thought

Beda M Stadler
Medium
Wed, 01 Jul 2020 17:10 UTC
masque covid
© inconnu
The original article was published in the Swiss magazine Weltwoche (World Week) on June 10th. The author, Beda M Stadler is the former director of the Institute for Immunology at the University of Bern, a biologist and professor emeritus. Stadler is an important medical professional in Switzerland, he also likes to use provoking language, which should not deter you from the extremely important points he makes.

This article is about Switzerland and it does not suggest that the situation is exactly the same globally. I am advocating for local measures according to locale situations. And I advocate for looking at real data rather than abstract models. I also suggest to read to the end, because Stadler makes crucial points about testing for Sars-CoV-2.

Why everyone was wrong

The coronavirus is slowly retreating. What actually happened in the past few weeks? The experts have missed basic connections. The immune response against the virus is much stronger than we thought.

By Beda M Stadler

This is not an accusation, but a ruthless taking stock [of the current situation]. I could slap myself, because I looked at Sars-CoV2- way too long with panic. I am also somewhat annoyed with many of my immunology colleagues who so far have left the discussion about Covid-19 to virologist and epidemiologist. I feel it is time to criticise some of the main and completely wrong public statements about this virus.

Firstly, it was wrong to claim that this virus was novel. Secondly, It was even more wrong to claim that the population would not already have some immunity against this virus. Thirdly, it was the crowning of stupidity to claim that someone could have Covid-19 without any symptoms at all or even to pass the disease along without showing any symptoms whatsoever.

But let's look at this one by one.

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Dollars

Best of the Web: Deutsche Bank accepts 'improper monitoring' of Epstein bank transactions, settles for $150m fine

Oscar Williams-Grut
Yahoo! News
Wed, 08 Jul 2020 15:49 UTC
Jeffrey Epstein court hearing
© Palm Beach Post/TNS/Sipa USA/PAJuly 30, 2008 photo of Jeffrey Epstein (center) in court in West Palm Beach. He would plead guilty to a single charge of soliciting prostitution.
New York's Department of Financial Services said in a statement on Tuesday it had imposed the penalty on Deutsche Bank's New York branch for "significant compliance failures in connection with the Bank's relationship with Jeffrey Epstein," the accused child sex trafficker who died in police custody last year. New York's Department of Financial Services said in a statement on Tuesday it had imposed the penalty on Deutsche Bank's New York branch for "significant compliance failures in connection with the Bank's relationship with Jeffrey Epstein," the accused child sex trafficker who died in police custody last year.

The penalty also covers anti-money laundering failings linked to Danske Bank Estonia and Cyprus-based bank FBME.

The settlement brings to an end three investigations by the regulator into compliance failings at the German banking giant.

It also marks the first enforcement action by a financial regulator linked to the Epstein case.

Comment:

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