Vaccines, for Bill Gates, are a strategic philanthropy that feed his many vaccine-related businesses (including Microsoft's ambition to control a global vac ID enterprise) and give him dictatorial control over global health policy — the spear tip of corporate neo-imperialism.
Gates' obsession with vaccines seems fueled by a messianic conviction that he is ordained to save the world with technology and a god-like willingness to experiment with the lives of lesser humans.

Promising to eradicate Polio with $1.2 billion, Gates took control of India 's National Advisory Board (NAB) and mandated 50 polio vaccines (up from 5) to every child before age 5. Indian doctors blame the Gates campaign for a devastating vaccine-strain polio epidemic that paralyzed 496,000 children between 2000 and 2017. In 2017, the Indian Government dialed back Gates' vaccine regimen and evicted Gates and his cronies from the NAB. Polio paralysis rates dropped precipitously. In 2017, the World Health Organization reluctantly admitted that the global polio explosion is predominantly vaccine strain, meaning it is coming from Gates' Vaccine Program. The most frightening epidemics in Congo, the Philippines, and Afghanistan are all linked to Gates' vaccines. By 2018, ¾ of global polio cases were from Gates' vaccines.

A Nation investigation illustrates the moral hazards surrounding the Gates Foundation's $50 billion charitable enterprise.

Last fall, Netflix premiered a three-part documentary that promises viewers a rare look at the inner life of one of history's most controversial businessmen. Over three hours, Inside Bill's Brain shows us a rare emotional side to Bill Gates as he processes the loss of his mother and the death of his estranged best friend and Microsoft cofounder, Paul Allen.

Mostly, though, the film reinforces the image many of us already had of the ambitious technologist, insatiable brainiac, and heroic philanthropist. Inside Bill's Brain falls into a common trap: attempting to understand the world's second-richest human by interviewing people in his sphere of financial influence.

Some billionaires are satisfied with buying themselves an island. Bill Gates got a United Nations health agency in Geneva.

Over the past decade, the world's richest man has become the World Health Organization's second biggest donor, second only to the United States and just above the United Kingdom. This largesse gives him outsized influence over its agenda, one that could grow as the U.S. and the U.K. threaten to cut funding if the agency doesn't make a better investment case.

The result, say his critics, is that Gates' priorities have become the WHO's. Rather than focusing on strengthening health care in poor countries — that would help, in their view, to contain future outbreaks like the Ebola epidemic — the agency spends a disproportionate amount of its resources on projects with the measurable outcomes Gates prefers, such as the effort to eradicate polio.

Concerns about the software billionaire's sway — roughly a quarter of WHO's budget goes toward polio eradication — has led to an effort to rein him in. But he remains a force to be reckoned with, as WHO prepares to elect one of three finalists to lead the organization.

"All of the candidates are going to have to ally with him in some way," said Sophie Harman, associate professor of international politics at Queen Mary University of London. "You can't ignore him."

Evidence of Gates' unprecedented influence abounds in ways subtle and showy.

On Tuesday, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the nephew of former President John F. Kennedy, took to social media and shared a lengthy message about billionaire Bill Gates and his "obsession with vaccines":

"Vaccines, for Bill Gates, are a strategic philanthropy that feed his many vaccine-related businesses (including Microsoft's ambition to control a global vac ID enterprise) and give him dictatorial control over global health policy — the spear tip of corporate neo-imperialism.

"Gates' obsession with vaccines seems fueled by a messianic conviction that he is ordained to save the world with technology and a god-like willingness to experiment with the lives of lesser humans.

During Tuesday's White House press briefing, coronavirus task force leader Dr. Deborah Birx explained that COVID-19 deaths in the United States have "very liberal" recording guidance, noting that anyone who tests positive for the virus and dies would be included in their numbers of coronavirus deaths.

Responding to a question from a reporter about potential underreporting of novel coronavirus deaths in the nation, Dr. Birx responded: "I think in this country, we are taking a very liberal approach to mortality. And I think the reporting here has been pretty straightforward over the last five to six weeks," she said, adding, "If someone dies with COVID-19, we are counting that."

Dr. Birx suggested COVID-19 deaths in January and February were likely underreported, due to a lack of testing. "When there wasn't testing in January and February, that's a very different situation and unknown," she explained.

While the U.S.'s death toll has been highlighted in relation to other counties, Dr. Birx pointed out that other nations are not recording as liberally as we are.

"There are other countries, that if you have a pre-existing condition, and let's say the virus called you to go to the ICU (intensive care unit) and then have a heart or kidney problem," she explained. "Some countries are recording that as a kidney issue, or a heart issue, and not a COVID-19 death."

A national health crisis does not stop the beat of the war drums

The United States has just declared war against the coronavirus, with President Donald Trump self-proclaiming that he is now a "wartime president." Whether one believes that the virus must be confronted with maximum aggression by effectively shutting down the country or that the measures already in place are already an overreaction hardly seems to matter as developments over the next several months will likely demonstrate what could have/might have/should have been done. But meanwhile extreme views are proliferating, with Rush Limbaugh detecting a conspiracy by Democrats and communists to destroy capitalism under "the guise of saving lives" while a more restrained but ideologically driven libertarian Ron Paul meanwhile chose to pen an article entitled "Coronavirus Hoax" that personally pilloried as a "chief fearmonger" the government's widely respected expert on the origin and spread of the disease Dr. Anthony Fauci.


Stalin famously said that the death of one person was a tragedy while the death of a million is a statistic. For both Limbaugh and Paul an epidemic that could kill tens or even hundreds of thousands Americans produces a statistic, of lesser importance than retaining a completely corrupt Wall Street and the individual's "liberty" to go shopping. Indeed, if greed driven American "vulture" capitalism must be preserved in its current form to protect and empower the rich, radical change might be welcomed by most Americans to include a long overdue genuine health infrastructure safety net.

News has only gradually seeped out that the Minsk II agreement, to find a peaceful way to end the war between Ukraine and its breakaway far eastern Donbass region, collapsed on March 26th. It was an agreement which Francois Hollande of France and Angela Merkel of Germany had established with Vladimir Putin of Russia, on 11 February 2015, in Minsk, Belarus. U.S. President Barack Obama, the founder of today's Ukraine, had opposed that Agreement, because he was encouraging the then-President of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, militarily to retake both Donbass and Crimea by force — or at least to attempt to do so. The "Minsk Protocol" had set up a "contact group" of representatives from Ukraine, Russia, and the OSCE (a peace-maintenance organization consisting of virtually all countries in the northern hemisphere).

The agreement's purpose was to establish direct talks between representatives of Ukraine and representatives of Donbass. Whereas Donbass was reluctantly willing to have such talks, Ukraine never was willing, at all, and signed the original document only in order to be able to qualify for more loans from The West (so as to be able to continue bombing Donbass). Ukraine bombed and has continued virtually ceaselessly to shell Donbass to conquer it, and the far-right in Ukraine control the country and have consistently threatened to assassinate Ukraine's President if he signs any agreement to establish peace-talks with Donbass. So, the President of Ukraine has been trapped between, on the one hand, the U.S. President and Ukraine's rabidly anti-Russian nazis — both of whom want the war to continue — and, on the other, Ukraine's public (who overwhelmingly want the war to end).

The OPCW has issued its first report explicitly blaming Syria's government for chemical attacks on civilians, pointing to three incidents in 2017 and saying there're "reasonable grounds" to believe the air force was responsible.

"Attacks of such a strategic nature would have only taken place on the basis of orders from the higher authorities of the Syrian Arab Republic military command," Investigation and Identification Team (IIT) coordinator Santiago Oñate-Laborde said. In the end, the ITT "was unable to identify any other plausible explanation," he added.

The chemical weapons watchdog maintains that Syrian Arab Air Force pilots flying a Sukhoi Su-22 military plane dropped a sarin bomb in southern Ltamenah on March 24, 2017. On March 25, the OPCW claims, a helicopter belonging to the Syrian Arab Air Force dropped a chlorine cylinder on the Ltamenah hospital which went through the roof and ruptured. Another bomb containing Sarin was dropped in southern Ltamenah on March 30 by an Su-22 military plane, the report said.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said a raft of US sanctions do not stop humanitarian aid from reaching Tehran, even as the UN and rights groups say the penalties are crippling Iran's healthcare system.

"I've heard people talking about sanctions. The world should know there are no sanctions that prevent humanitarian assistance, medical supplies, pharmaceuticals from going to Iran," Pompeo told reporters at a White House briefing on Wednesday, adding that the US offered to send aid but Iran refused.

Tehran has repeatedly slammed the US pressure campaign - which makes effectively impossible the bank transactions necessary to purchase vital supplies from overseas - deeming it a "historical disgrace" and "economic terrorism" that only complicates efforts to contain the fast-moving epidemic.

Yesterday Mark Sommers QC, the extremely erudite and bookish second counsel for Julian Assange in his extradition hearing, trembled with anger in court. Magistrate Vanessa Baraitser had just made a ruling that the names of Julian Assange's partner and young children could be published, which she stated was in the interests of "open justice". His partner had submitted a letter in support of his Covid 19 related bail application (which Baraitser had summarily dismissed) to state he had a family to live with in London. Baraitser said that it was therefore in the interests of open justice that the family's names be made public, and said that the defence had not convincingly shown this would cause any threat to their security or well-being. It was at this point Sommers barely kept control. He leapt to his feet and gave notice of an appeal to the High Court, asking for a 14 day stay. Baraitser granted four days, until 4pm on Friday.

I am in lockdown in Edinburgh, but received three separate eye witness reports. They are unanimous that yet again Baraitser entered the court carrying pre-written judgements before hearing oral argument; pre-written judgements she gave no appearance of amending.