Laura Gilpin The Rio Grande Yields Its Surplus to the Sea 1947
Promising. But I would focus on drugs that prevent infection. Ivermectin.
• UK Scientists Identify Drugs That May Help Severe COVID Cases (G.)
The research, by the global Genetics of Mortality in Critical Care (GenOMICC) consortium, compared the DNA of 2,244 critically ill Covid patients from 208 UK intensive care units with the genetic make-up of healthy individuals in a control group. The analysis revealed key differences in five genes, named IFNAR2, TYK2, OAS1, DPP9 and CCR2, which partially explained why the sick patients became critically ill. Having identified the troublesome genes, the team was able to predict what drug treatments were likely to help. One drug that holds promise for future Covid treatment is a rheumatoid arthritis medicine called baricitinib. This reduces the activity of TYK2, which the research suggests will help reduce dangerous levels of inflammation in the lungs. Another is an antibody-based medicine that blocks CCR2 and is in clinical trials for psoriasis.
Beyond calming down the immune system, drugs may help invigorate the body’s ability to fight the virus. Some compounds are known to boost the activity of Ifnar2 and are likely to protect people from serious infections by mimicking proteins released by the immune system to fight viruses. However, these would probably need to be given early on to have a substantial impact, the scientists said. “This is a wonderful breakthrough, really, in understanding what causes the severe disease,” said Peter Openshaw, a professor of experimental medicine at Imperial College London and a co-author on the study. The findings have been shared with groups around the world who are running clinical trials to assess whether drugs that are already in use for other conditions can help save patients with severe Covid-19 disease.
Baillie said that drugs highlighted by the research should now become the top priority for inclusion in clinical trials. “Making those choices really matters,” he said. “If we choose the right intervention to try next in clinical trials then we’ll find out that it works sooner and that could save tens of thousands of lives.” The study is published in Nature. People with Covid-19 tend to develop symptoms as the virus multiplies in their body, but those who die often succumb to excessive lung inflammation which is driven by the immune system. Doctors running Oxford University’s Recovery trial discovered in the summer that the cheap steroid dexamethasone slashed deaths among patients needing supplemental oxygen by up to a third, by damping down the immune system.
But more drugs are needed to help patients who do not respond to the steroid, Baillie said. “Two-thirds of them are still dying even treated with dexamethasone, so there’s a long way to go in preventing that inflammation, and we really urgently need new targets,” he said.
“It remains to be seen how the Western media will cover the news that the UK’s flagship formula is turning to the East in a bid to improve its efficacy.”
• AstraZeneca To Collaborate With Russia’s Sputnik V On COVID19 Vaccine (RT)
British pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca has announced a partnership with the team behind the Sputnik V Covid-19 vaccine to explore the potential of combining its own experimental formula with the pioneering Russian product. The agreement, revealed on Friday morning, came after the Russian scientists took to Twitter to propose that AstraZeneca try the combination. They said it was worth experimenting with the model preferred by Moscow researchers and using two different types of injection, rather than relying on the same one twice, as AstraZeneca has done previously. In a statement to the press, the British company unveiled “a clinical trial programme to assess the safety and immunogenicity of a combination of AZD1222, developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University, and Sputnik V, developed by the Russian Gamaleya Research institute.”
They added that “combinations of different Covid-19 vaccines may be an important step in generating wider protection through a stronger immune response and better accessibility.” Responding to the news, the Russian Direct Investment Fund, which financed the Gamaleya Institute’s research, wrote that it was “an example of Russia’s proactive approach: it has not only created one of the world’s most effective vaccines to date against the coronavirus, but is ready to share Sputnik V vectors with those willing to produce vaccines using the two-vector technology.” “This unique example of cooperation between scientists from different countries in jointly fighting coronavirus will play a decisive role in achieving a final victory over the pandemic globally,” Kirill Dmitriev, the fund’s CEO added, saying that Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine is already saving people’s lives in Russia today through a large-scale vaccination programme.
“The decision by AstraZeneca to carry out clinical trials using one of two vectors of Sputnik V in order to increase its own vaccine’s efficacy is an important step towards uniting efforts in the fight against the pandemic.” [..] The UK media has previously drawn criticism for its coverage of Sputnik V. Earlier this week, the BBC reported that it had been “rushed out to wary Russians,” while remaining far more positive about the start of immunizations in the country using US pharma giant Pfizer’s vaccine. It remains to be seen how the Western media will cover the news that the UK’s flagship formula is turning to the East in a bid to improve its efficacy.
Warp speed approval. But more research needs to be done on vitamin D?
• FDA Authorizes Pfizer’s Coronavirus Vaccine For Emergency Use (JTN)
The Food and Drug Administration on Friday approved Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine and authorized it for emergency use in the United States. It is the first vaccine to be approved for use in the U.S., and it followed an FDA advisory committee’s endorsement of the shot for people age 16 and older. The vaccine was found to be 95% effective, with only mild side effects. Earlier Friday, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar had said that people could be receiving the vaccine as early as next Monday. It was previously approved for use in the United Kingdom and Canada. President Trump announced the approval on Twitter, thanking all the scientists and medical professionals who participated in the Operation Warp Speed project that gave rise to the fastest vaccine development in history.
Remember yesterday’s quote:
“..communities faced with epidemics or other adverse events respond best and with the least anxiety when the normal social functioning of the community is least disrupted.”
• More Than Half Of New York’s Restaurants Are In Danger Of Closing (Eater)
Across the country, restaurants have been decimated by the pandemic. But according to a new survey conducted by the New York State Restaurant Association, in partnership with the National Restaurant Association, New York restaurants are hurting more from the economic crisis in comparison to the industry nationwide. According to the survey — which polled 6,000 restaurant operators, including 238 in New York, over the last two weeks of November – 54 percent of NY restauranteurs say it is likely that they will close in the next six months if another federal relief package does not come through, compared to 37 percent nationwide. Nearly 60 percent of NY operators say they are considering going into hibernation until the pandemic is over, compared to 36 percent nationwide.
The operating landscape has been extremely tough for NYC restaurateurs throughout the pandemic. Restaurants in the city are currently operating at 25 percent indoor capacity with a 10 p.m. nightly curfew, but Gov. Andrew Cuomo has warned that indoor dining could be completely banned starting next week. Overall, the National Restaurant Association estimates that one in six restaurants across the country have already permanently shuttered due to the economic crisis amid the pandemic. If the estimate is accurate, that would mean that 8,333 restaurants, including 4,500 establishments in NYC, have permanently shut down so far, according to the New York State Restaurant Association. However, the true number of restaurant closures during the pandemic may not be fully known for years.
Warped logic:
“Just 1.43% of cases were traced to bars and restaurants. Cuomo said he opted to shutter indoor dining despite the relatively low proportion of cases because it was an area where officials “can actually make a difference..”
• Gov. Cuomo Suspends Indoor Dining In New York City (Fox)
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Friday announced that indoor dining would be shut down again in New York City, even as the state released contract-tracing data which showed bars and restaurants accounted for just 1.43% of COVID-19 cases in the three months ending in November. “Indoor dining will close in New York City starting Monday,” Cuomo announced, citing an increase in COVID-19 infections and hospitalizations. “Hospitalizations have not stabilized, and with a rising infection rate and NYC’s density, this means that indoor dining is too high of a risk,” he said. “Takeout, delivery and outdoor dining will continue.” Cuomo released a detailed breakdown of sources of COVID-19 exposure during a press briefing on Friday. The contact-tracing data was derived from a statewide analysis of 46,000 COVID-19 cases from September through November.
Private household and social gatherings were responsible for 73.84% of the cases statewide, while health care delivery accounted for 7.81% of cases and higher education accounted for slight more than 2%. Just 1.43% of cases were traced to bars and restaurants. Cuomo said he opted to shutter indoor dining despite the relatively low proportion of cases because it was an area where officials “can actually make a difference” in reducing COVID-19’s spread. But the decision drew immediate criticism from NYC restaurant groups, who have warned for months that Cuomo’s restrictions would cripple the industry. “While public health and safety must be paramount, Governor Cuomo’s announcement to once again shut down indoor dining in New York City is at odds with the State’s own data that’s been presented as driving these decisions, and it will be the last straw for countless more restaurants and jobs,” the NYC Hospitality Alliance said in a statement.
New York City was one of the hardest-hit areas of the country by the virus, and saw strict lockdowns that shuttered businesses, schools and restaurants. But in recent months the city has been taking baby-step attempts at reopening, with limited indoor dining and a few days of in-person schooling a week at some of the city’s public schools. New York City restaurants, which make up a key pillar of the city’s economy, were permitted to resume indoor dining at 25% capacity on Sept. 30 after months of being shut down, while schools have partially reopened this week after being shut down at the end of November.
The sides are growing further apart, as the inevitable process continues. Curious. The 18 AGs who signed with Texas are now accused of sedition.
• US Supreme Court Rejects Texas Challenge To Election (JTN)
The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday evening rejected the state of Texas’ challenge to the 2020 election results in four battleground states, extinguishing one of the last remaining hopes for President Trump’s campaign to reverse Joe Biden’s lead in those states. “The State of Texas’s motion for leave to file a bill of complaint is denied for lack of standing under Article III of the Constitution,” the justices ruled. “Texas has not demonstrated a judicially cognizable interest in the manner in which another State conducts its elections. All other pending motions are dismissed as moot.” Justice Samuel Alito filed a dissenting statement, joined by Justice Clarence Thomas. “In my view, we do not have discretion to deny the filing of a bill of complaint in a case that falls within our original jurisdiction,” Alito wrote. “…I would therefore grant the motion to file the bill of complaint but would not grant other relief, and I express no view on any other issue.”
“..yet another seditious conspiracy among the swamplings..”
• Sometimes Life Really is Like a Bad Dream (Kunstler)
If you were President DJ Trump, would you suspect that the CIA might be playing dangerous games with you (and by extension, the nation)? Are you aware that China has a 75 percent investment stake in the holding company that now owns Dominion? Are there grounds to suppose that China somehow interfered in the election? With assistance from an eager Democratic Party and the CIA?Would Mr. Trump, of all people, let such a thing stand? Especially considering the evidence that the putative “winner” of the election, Joe Biden, the kid from Scranton, PA, was up to his eyeballs, with the rest of his family, in Chinese funny-money? (Not to mention money from Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Russia, and other lands?)
Note: information about this evidence gleaned from Hunter Biden’s forgotten laptop was deliberately suppressed in October by the major newspapers and cable news stations, with help from Facebook, Twitter, and Google, along with a claque of “fifty former and current intel officials” led John Brennan, who denounced the reports from The New York Post in a public letter as “Russian disinformation” — yet another seditious conspiracy among the swamplings. Are you aware that in the weeks since the election there have been unusual movements of US military aircraft around the country, including C-130 “Hercules” troop carrier planes? And that the navy has two carrier groups out along the Pacific Coast and three strung along the Atlantic coast? That’s what I hear. Remember, the president cleaned house at the top of the Pentagon this fall, and probably not for nothing.
Sounds like preparation for something… some extraordinary executive action to prevent the national security risk known as Joe Biden from being sworn-in as president — in the absence of anything else in a strictly constitutional way that would keep that from happening, like a Supreme Court decision that would order the rare passing on of the disputed 2020 election to the House of Representatives for resolution, with a strong statistical likelihood that the body would re-elect Mr. Trump. These are the sorts of things I imagine the Supreme Court justices might be palavering about and weighing over their sherry in the comfortable back room of their august clubhouse. There is, of course, the likelihood that such a momentous decision to send the vote to the House would provoke a violent, batshit crazy response from the Democratic Party’s street warriors, BLM and Antifa — thus the C-130 flights perhaps deploying troops around the country. This time, expect the Black Blocs to get their asses kicked, and swiftly. Expect also a mind-blowing raft of arrests of political celebrities on charges like treason. Does it sound like a bad dream? Yeah, kind of does. But there it is.
“Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, the third time it’s enemy action,” as James Bond author Ian Fleming famously wrote. What would the 1600th time be?”
• Media, Big Tech Hunter Biden Laptop Story Not A Bug, But A Feature (Malic)
For the past four years, the mainstream media has pushed the baseless ‘Russiagate’ conspiracy theory with absolute impunity, because it catered to the narrative by the Democrats about why they lost the 2016 election and served to delegitimize Trump. Every anonymous accusation, from the Steele Dossier and “Russian bounties” in Afghanistan to the Atlantic smear piece about Trump insulting US troops, was treated as gospel truth. Meanwhile, any attempt by the president to push back was denounced as an “attack” on free press. Yet these very same paladins of “our democracy” cheered when the New York Post was censored by Twitter, in an actual attack on free speech.
Never mind that the paper was founded in 1801 by Alexander Hamilton – whom Democrats now worship as some sort of hero, because of Lin Manuel-Miranda’s musical retcon of history – there was zero collegial solidarity on display. Less than that, even: you had Jake Tapper of CNN “helpfully” advising the Post to delete their “offending” tweet in order to “end the whole thing [in] 15 seconds.” Another CNN megastar, Christiane Amanpour, had once infamously attacked Trump for “delegitimizing the press” and insisted that “an attack on one of us is an attack on all of us.” But when it came to the Hunter Biden story, Amanpour was perfectly happy to let the New York Post rot in Big Tech jail.
Asked by a Republican guest why she wasn’t actually doing journalism when it came to the Biden laptop, Amanpour indignantly responded “we’re not going to do your work for you.” The Freudian slip suggested Amanpour and CNN were busy doing someone else’s work – and it should be obvious at this point who that is. If you’re still expecting an apology, explanation of soul-searching from the Big Tech and mainstream media, you’re either terminally naive or simply not paying attention. Look at how they’re covering the Hunter Biden story, now that they have no choice. The documents were “made public – but went largely unnoticed” prior to the election, says the Daily Beast, that most mainstream of tabloids.
Notice the passive voice, as if the documents didn’t go “unnoticed” only by their readers, because the Beast and its fellow-travelers deliberately refused to notice them. Mind you, the suppression of the Hunter Biden story is just the most blatant example of media misbehavior. The partisan slant, selective reporting and “fact-checking,” and downright lies by omission are legion at this point. “Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, the third time it’s enemy action,” as James Bond author Ian Fleming famously wrote. What would the 1600th time be? Now consider that these are the very same media and Big Tech who declared Biden won the election fair and square, while dealing with any claims otherwise in the exact same manner as they did with the Hunter laptop story: label as “disinformation,” facetiously “fact-check” or censor outright.
They apparently believe they can dictate what Americans are allowed to say or think, and even determine reality itself. They believe they can get away with it because most people, even Republicans whining about how this is unfair, continue to implicitly accept this arrangement. After all, it’s one of those“forms to which they are accustomed.” I wouldn’t count on that being the state of affairs much longer, though. There appears to be a growing realization among Trump supporters that “if only the truth is told, everything will sort itself out” is a trope of 1980s Hollywood, and that the axis of mainstream media and Silicon Valley has no ethics beyond power. The end justifies the means, and the only morality is who/whom wields it. What happens to America if this realization reaches critical mass is anybody’s guess. God willing, there won’t be blood. Either way, the Axis of Deceit will have only itself to blame. Newton’s Third Law is as implacable in politics as it is in physics; the longer you trespass against reality, the harder it will push back.
“..it will start to make sense that Trump voters in Guy Fawkes masks are now roaming the continent like buffalo.”
• The YouTube Ban Is Un-American, Wrong, and Will Backfire (Taibbi)
Start with the headline: Supporting the 2020 U.S. Election. YouTube in its company blog can’t even say, “Banning Election Conspiracy Theories.” They have to employ the Orwellian language of politicians — Healthy Forests, Clear Skies, “Supported” Elections — because Google and YouTube are now political actors, who can’t speak plainly any more than a drunk can walk in a straight line. The company wrote Wednesday: “Yesterday was the safe-harbor deadline for the U.S. Presidential election and enough states have certified their election results to determine a President-elect. Given that, we will start removing any piece of content uploaded today (or anytime after) that misleads people by alleging that widespread fraud or errors changed the outcome of the 2020 U.S. Presidential election… For example, we will remove videos claiming that a Presidential candidate won the election due to widespread software glitches or counting errors.”
This announcement came down at roughly the same time Hunter Biden was announcing that his “tax affairs” were under investigation by the U.S. Attorney in Delaware. Part of that investigation concerned whether or not he had violated tax and money laundering laws in, as CNN put it, “foreign countries, principally China.” Information suggestive of money-laundering and tax issues in China and other countries was in the cache of emails reported in the New York Post story blocked by Twitter and Facebook. [..] How important was that Hunter Biden story? That’s debatable, but the fact that tech companies blocked it, and professional journalists gleefully lied about it, has a direct bearing on YouTube’s decision now to bar Trumpist freakouts over the election results.
If you want a population of people to stop thinking an election was stolen from them, it’s hard to think of a worse method than ordering a news blackout after it’s just been demonstrated that the last major blackout was a fraud. Close your eyes and imagine what would have happened if Facebook and Google had banned 9/11 Truth on the advice of intelligence officials in the Bush years, and it will start to make sense that Trump voters in Guy Fawkes masks are now roaming the continent like buffalo.
“America will emerge from this coronavirus to discover what its national security experts already know. It has lost its power advantage over China.”
• Pandemic Exposes Global Fault Lines And How Australia Rose Above Them (SMH)
Instead of the official projection of a worst-case scenario of 150,000 dead, Australia has suffered 908 deaths in the pandemic to date. Every country, every state faced the same fateful moment of awesome responsibility and awful choice. The pandemic struck the countries of the world like an avenging angel, wreaking havoc on the unready and the uncaring, the slothful and the prideful, and re-ordered the world. After an uncertain start, Australia ultimately made the right choices. Its leaders, yes, but also its people. The pandemic was a severe test of leadership, and of nation-state capability, but also of social cohesion and public culture. The whole of the people had to accept some personal inconvenience for the common good. In successful countries they did; in failed ones they did not.
And the countries that met the public health test had a much better chance of meeting the economic test. Australia’s responses have elevated it into a small elite of competent countries. “Our system has performed impressively and that puts a spring in your step and makes other countries interested in you,” says the director of the Lowy Institute, Michael Fullilove. “And that’s a positive. The prestige of smaller, well governed countries has risen, mainly in our part of the world – Taiwan, Singapore, New Zealand, South Korea, Australia.” The most dramatic effects have been in the biggest powers. “Nations cohere and flourish on the belief that their institutions can foresee calamity, arrest its impact and restore stability,” Henry Kissinger said in April. “When the COVID-19 pandemic is over, many countries’ institutions will be perceived as having failed.”
One of the foremost, shockingly, is the United States itself. The virus exposed its divided political system as not just an entertaining foible but as a deep national liability. Political division paralysed policy. In many countries politics is regarded as a sport, a game. In a crisis, we now learn, politics literally is a matter of life and death for the people and of national destiny for the country. Even today, nine months on, the US cannot agree to stop the needless mass death nor agree on fiscal policy. With the daily death toll outstripping the 9/11 count, the US Congress remains deadlocked in negotiations for a second economic stimulus. It negotiates, sometimes month to month, sometimes week to week, the funding to “keep the government open”. The asinine has become the norm.
The US President is surrounded by men with guns for his protection. But they cannot defend against bovine stupidity and political obduracy. The President caught the virus. Donald Trump bears responsibility for his negligence. The pandemic spelt the end of his presidency. But he is the inheritor of America’s deepening crisis of overpoliticisation, not its author. America will emerge from this coronavirus to discover what its national security experts already know. It has lost its power advantage over China. They are not equal in every way, but China is now America’s peer. And its rival. The US is a much diminished power.
Problem solved?!
• CBO: Medicare for All Could Cover Everyone for $650 Billion Less Per Year (CD)
The Congressional Budget Office on Thursday released a report examining the costs associated with universal healthcare proposals that are based on Medicare’s fee-for-service program and found that implementing a single-payer health insurance program in the United States would not only guarantee coverage for every person in the country but would also reduce overall healthcare spending nationwide. In the words of researcher Matt Bruenig—founder and president of the progressive think tank People’s Policy Project who called the CBO’s working paper (pdf) on the topic “more exhaustive than any other recent study on the subject”—the new analysis shows that administrative costs under a single-payer healthcare system “will be lower than what even the most rabid Medicare for All supporters have traditionally claimed.”
According to Bruenig, “Modeling the cost of a single-payer program is relatively straightforward. You begin with the status quo healthcare system and then make educated guesses about the following questions: • How many more units of healthcare services will be demanded and supplied when price barriers are removed? • How much more efficient will health insurance administration be after the enrollment and payment systems are radically simplified? • How much money will be saved by reducing the payment rates for healthcare providers and drug companies? In its analysis, the CBO looked at several distinct single-payer designs and determined that four such systems—fully implemented by 2030—would save anywhere from $42 billion to $743 billion that year alone.
Bruenig explained that the CBO option that most closely resembles current Medicare for All proposals is the one based on low payment rates and low cost sharing, which would generate $650 billion in savings in 2030. If one were to add long-term support and services to that option, as many current Medicare for All proposals do, savings would fall to about $300 billion, he noted.
First they all bury the story, and now even NBC is after Hunter? ¿Qué pasa?
• Email To Hunter Biden Raises Fresh Questions About His Tax Dealings (NBC)
Hunter Biden’s former business partner sent him an email in 2017 saying he did not disclose on his tax returns $400,000 in income from the Ukrainian natural gas company where he sat on the board, according to a copy of the email obtained by NBC News. The message from Eric Schwerin, then president of Rosemont Seneca Partners, says Hunter Biden would need to “amend” his 2014 returns to reflect the “unreported” income, according to the copy of the email. “In 2014 you joined the Burisma board and we still need to amend your 2014 returns to reflect the unreported Burisma income,” says the email dated Jan. 16, 2017. The email goes on to note that Hunter Biden, who is now the subject of a federal tax probe, netted more than $1.2 million for the year.
The earnings include the $400,000 from Burisma as well as income from Rosemont Seneca Advisors and a legal firm. The email was made available by Rudy Giuliani’s attorney Robert Costello. Costello has said he was given a copy of one of Hunter Biden’s hard drives from the owner of a computer repair shop in Delaware. NBC News did not have access to the full drive. It is not known what, if any, action Hunter Biden took in response to the email. Federal prosecutors in Delaware are scrutinizing Hunter Biden’s business dealings in China as part of a tax probe that began in 2018, according to a source familiar with the inquiry. There’s no indication that his work for the Burisma national gas company is part of the investigation, but the email obtained by NBC News raises fresh questions about Hunter Biden’s tax affairs.
Was this the steepest street in Britain?
• £350,000 House Taken Off Market After Banksy Paints Mural On It (ArtN)
What do you do when your two-bed semi detached house that you are selling for £345,000 becomes the site of a world-famous work of art overnight? That is the conundrum now facing the Makin family whose Bristol home was adorned with a Banksy mural in the early hours of Thursday morning. Alex Makin, whose mother owns the house, tells The Art Newspaper the family is taking the property off the market while it considers its next steps. “The main thing is to try and protect the work because it’s such an iconic piece—a) because it’s Banksy and b) because of the year, it’s Covid-related,” Makin says of the work, which shows an older woman sneezing with such force her dentures have been catapulted out of her mouth. Within hours of the work being painted, Makin had the mural covered with a Perspex sheet.
He adds: “We’re not really sure what we’re going to do at the moment. It would be an amazing thing to keep in the family, but we also want to make sure it is properly protected. It’s been a fairly tough year for my mum, so this feels like a bit of light at the end of the tunnel.” Banksy’s pieces have been known to double the price of a property, while one art market specialist valued this latest piece at £3m-£5m in The Sun newspaper. However, Robert Pain, the client director of Bristol estate agents NEXA, offers a more cautionary valuation. “It’s a conundrum, though a wonderful conundrum to have: everyone wants a Banksy on their wall but does it alter what the bricks and mortar are worth?” he asks. “Ultimately, is it a work of art on brick, potentially worth a million. If so, do you remove it and spend £60,000 rebuilding the wall?”
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Street corner in Athens.
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