Society's ChildS


Stock Down

Food shortages now 'inevitable' due to labour crisis, industry warns

factory worker
Workers across the supply chain are in short supply.
Worsening supermarket food shortages are now "inevitable" in the coming weeks as labour shortages across the food supply chain approach crunch point, the sector has warned.

Chronic driver shortages have been compounded by shortfalls across other low-paid sectors including harvesting, manufacturing and packaging, and the supply chain is creaking under the pressure.

Trade bodies, logistics firms and suppliers all warn that the continued reopening of the economy combined with the start of the summer holidays will see a tipping point in supermarkets' ability to keep shelves fully stocked.

Comment: See also:


Fire

They looted businesses during Black Lives Matter riots. Their charges were dropped and storeowners aren't happy

store empty sign
© TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP via Getty Images
Last summer, as the Black Lives Matter movement protested and rioted across the country in response to the police-involved death of Minneapolis resident George Floyd, businesses in numerous U.S. cities were ravaged and looted.

NBC News reported that prosecutors in the Bronx and Manhattan have decided to drop burglary and looting charges against hundreds of rioters, angering store owners who had their businesses destroyed.

"I was in total shock that everything is being brushed off to the side," Jessica Betancourt, whose eyeglass shop was one of the businesses looted, told NBC.

Comment: Color us completely unsurprised. Punishing these criminals means there will be fewer around for the next round of riots.

See also:


Airplane

SOTT Focus: An Essential Journey: My Experience of International Travel in Covid Times

travel during covid 1
I had not planned to travel abroad this year, especially after the UK government's announcement in early 2021 that foreign holidays were forbidden. Even heading towards the airport with an intent to go on a foreign holiday could result in a £5000 fine or imprisonment! Surreal.

Where we live in London under a flight path to Heathrow, we notice that although there are fewer flights, they have not ceased completely. So how do people travel? It's not something I have thought about.

One day at the end of April I receive a message that my elderly father's condition is critical. Within an hour I am looking at flights back home in Eastern Europe and checking the UK government travel 'advice' webpages.

I say 'advice' but that word belongs to the past. Today, 'command' might be more appropriate. According to the government, only "essential" international travel is permitted for named valid reasons; 'medical and compassionate' is the category which applies to me.

Attention

COVID-19 might be over, but viral infections in Israel are surging

covid virus
© NIAID-RML/FILE PHOTO/HANDOUT VIA REUTERSThis undated transmission electron microscope image shows SARS-CoV-2, also known as novel coronavirus, the virus that causes COVID-19, isolated from a patient in the U.S. Virus particles are shown emerging from the surface of cells cultured in the lab.
The corona crisis might be over, but all over Israel adults and children are getting sick with viral infections in a phenomenon that is unprecedented for this time of the year, according to several medical professionals.

"We have never seen anything like this," said Dr. Tal Brosh, head of Infectious Disease Unit at the Samson Assuta Ashdod Hospital. "We've been monitoring viral infections in the hospital, which of course is just the tip of the iceberg of what is going on in the community, as for each hospitalized patient, there are many more out there. Since the spring, we have been seeing an increasing number of respiratory diseases, and since May there has been a surge in RSV cases."

RSV, or respiratory syncytial virus, usually appears in the winter together with the influenza, and is especially serious for very young children and older, vulnerable adults.

"We usually see it disappearing in the summer, but if we consider the numbers now, it looks like winter in previous years," said Brosh. "During the winter 2020-2021, we did not see one individual case of RSV."


Comment: Is this the tip of the iceberg? Given that Israel was one of the early adopters of the mass vaccination campaign (along with high compliance rates) and one of the dangers of these mRNA "vaccines" is compromised immune systems, it is very likely that we'll be seeing many more cases of viral infection in the months to come.


Comment: They're blaming the return to normal life. That may be a factor, but the elephant in the room is a population now vaccinated with experimental mRNA 'vaccines'.

See also:


Pistol

Shocking video shows masked gunman opening fire on NYC sidewalk

nyc bronx shooting
A 10-year-old girl and her kid brother were trampled and nearly shot when their trip to buy some candy became a first-hand look at the city's escalating gun violence, according to cops and chilling video.

At least a dozen shots whizzed by the terrified children as the black-masked gunman repeatedly aimed for his fallen target — who knocked the kids down while trying to escape.

The shocking footage shows the 5-year-old boy's legs shaking in fear at one point amid the bloodshed.

Miraculously, neither child was hit.

The mayhem occurred on Sheridan Avenue near Mt. Eden Parkway — right outside the little kids' apartment building — just before 7 p.m., police and sources said.

The shooter fled on a scooter, cops said.

Comment: See also:


Pistol

Chicago alderman says gangs are responsible for Chicago problems, not racism, as Mayor Lori Lightfoot claimed

lightfoot
© Scott Olson/Getty Images
A Chicago city official heavily criticized Democratic Mayor Lori Lightfoot's claim that racism was to blame for the challenges facing the city, declaring it a "public health crisis."

Lightfoot on Thursday blamed "systemic racism" for the hardships minority residents face in the city, pledging to use millions of dollars in grants from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for combatting alleged systemic racism, which she called a "public health crisis."


Comment: Ignoti nulla est curatio morbi. This money will be a complete waste as long as idiots like Lightfoot misdiagnose the problems in their cities and focus on bogeymen like "systemic racism."


"When we think about racism, many of us think about it in visible and audible forms, but the reality is the insidious nature of systemic racism has other impacts that are every bit as deep and harmful, but often ones that we can't see, like the impacts on the psyche and other impacts on our bodies that are just as, if not more deadly," Lightfoot said, as The Daily Wire previously reported.

Alderman Raymond Lopez of Chicago's 15th Ward, however, says gang violence is to blame for the problems faced by minority residents.

"Generational gang life isn't just something that's encouraged. It's almost revered in some neighborhoods," Lopez told the Washington Examiner. "If you really want to get to what is at the heart of a lot of this, it is gangs, and it is the borderline collapse of the family unit in many of our neighborhoods ... [Lightfoot] has avoided calling out gangs in our community as a source of violence in our city."

Newspaper

Warsaw gay pride parade back after backlash & pandemic, Warsaw mayor leads march

price poland
© AP Photo/Czarek SokolowskiPeople take part in the Equality Parade, the largest gay pride parade in central and eastern Europe, in Warsaw, Poland, Saturday June 19, 2021. The event has returned this year after a pandemic-induced break last year and amid a backlash in Poland and Hungary against LGBT rights.
The largest gay pride parade in central Europe took place again in Warsaw on Saturday for the first time in two years after a pandemic-induced break — and amid a backlash in Poland and Hungary against LGBT rights.


Comment: The backlash in Hungary was against LGBT propaganda aimed at children, and they recently passed a law, 157 votes to 1, making it illegal.


The year's Equality Parade came 20 years since the event was first held in the Polish capital. It was banned twice in its early years by a conservative mayor who feared it would promote homosexuality and last year it was canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski walked at the head of the parade in a sign of support for LGBT rights, joining thousands who were cheered on by others waving rainbow flags from apartment balconies and sidewalk cafes.

Sheriff

China to issue 20b yuan to farmers due to commodity price spike, financial institutions sacrifice earnings to shore up economy

china farmer rice
© XinhuaFarmers harvest rice at Jiache Village, Jiabang Township, Congjiang County of southwest China's Guizhou Province, Sept. 19, 2020.
China will hand over a one-off subsidy of 20 billion yuan ($3.1 billion) from its central finance budget to farmers to cope with rising costs of production materials due to spiking commodity prices in recent months, said a statement on Friday after a State Council executive meeting presided over by Premier Li Keqiang.

Agriculture is of high importance to social stability, the statement said and the subsidy will be issued to farmers in light of the recent spike in prices of production materials such as fertilizer and diesel oil.

The subsidy will be issued at a critical moment in the summer harvest and is aimed at ensuring farmers' willingness to produce grains.

Comment: As usual China is ahead of the curve and it's taking measures that will benefit its citizens; not only is it ensuring its people can produce its own food, it has been buying up US produce in bulk for at least a year now which should at least temporarily stave off inflation, lockdown related supply disruptions and shortages, and the accumulating crop losses due to extreme weather, as well as cattle and poultry disease outbreaks.

Meanwhile, in the West, governments dumped mountains of food and prevented migrant workers from harvesting crops:


Water

Homeless man throws water bottle at California Gov. Gavin Newsom

Gavin Newsom
© Ringo H.W. Chiu/AP
An aggressive homeless man chucked a water bottle at California Gov. Gavin Newsom during a tour of small businesses in Oakland, authorities said Friday.

Newsom was en route to NFL star Marshawn Lynch's Beastmode Barbershop and a pizza joint when the unidentified man approached his entourage, which included Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf.

The Bay Area News Group reported that the 54-year-old assailant — who hailed from nearby Berkeley — launched a water bottle at the polarizing politician before being subdued and arrested.

"This morning, the Governor was approached by an aggressive individual" read a statement from the California Highway Patrol, which provides his security. "Members of the Governor's security detail removed the Governor from the situation and the individual was arrested by CHP officers."

Newsom later quipped to reporters that the man had an unorthodox method of saying hello.

X

Israel-Palestine: How Germany's remembrance culture ignores today's war crimes

Palestinian flags berlin
© AFPBerlin Palestine protest 2021
On 15 May, around 3,000 students, activists and local Arabs gathered in Berlin's Neukolln neighbourhood for a rally in support of Palestine liberation. The atmosphere was overwhelmingly peaceful for most of the afternoon, as couples wearing keffiyehs manoeuvred small children between teenagers wrapped in Palestinian flags.

Demonstrators waved signs in English, German and Arabic as they made their way down Sonnenallee, the beating heart of Berlin's Arab quarter, where there's a family-owned cafe, shisha bar or falafel joint on almost every block.

By the time police violently dispersed the rally, citing a lack of social distancing, newsrooms throughout Germany had already decided on the narrative they would push. It was "antisemitic agitation", declared RBB, Berlin's state-funded broadcaster. An article on the website of Tagesschau, Germany's most-watched evening news programme, referred to "antisemitic protests", while the right-wing Bild announced: "Police injured at hate demo."

It was impossible to find interviews with demonstrators during, or in the days after, this protest. Instead, there were soundbites from police and senior politicians condemning those who attended, especially those with Arab backgrounds.