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About stuartbramhall

Retired child and adolescent psychiatrist and American expatriate in New Zealand. In 2002, I made the difficult decision to close my 25-year Seattle practice after 15 years of covert FBI harassment. I describe the unrelenting phone harassment, illegal break-ins and six attempts on my life in my 2010 book The Most Revolutionary Act: Memoir of an American Refugee.

AI Fundamentally Surveillance Technology

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Image Credits: Kimberly White/Getty Images for TechCrunch

Devin Coldewey

TechCrunch

Why is it that so many companies that rely on monetizing the data of their users seem to be extremely hot on AI? If you ask Signal president Meredith Whittaker (and I did), she’ll tell you it’s simply because “AI is a surveillance technology.”

Onstage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2023, Whittaker explained her perspective that AI is largely inseparable from the big data and targeting industry perpetuated by the likes of Google and Meta, as well as less consumer-focused but equally prominent enterprise and defense companies. (Her remarks lightly edited for clarity.)

“It requires the surveillance business model; it’s an exacerbation of what we’ve seen since the late ’90s and the development of surveillance advertising. AI is a way, I think, to entrench and expand the surveillance business model,” she said. “The Venn diagram is a circle.”

“And the use of AI is also surveillant, right?” she continued. “You know, you walk past a facial recognition camera that’s instrumented with pseudo-scientific emotion recognition, and it produces data about you, right or wrong, that says ‘you are happy, you are sad, you have a bad character, you’re a liar, whatever.’ These are ultimately surveillance systems that are being marketed to those who have power over us generally: our employers, governments, border control, etc., to make determinations and predictions that will shape our access to resources and opportunities.”

Ironically, she pointed out, the data that underlies these systems is frequently organized and annotated (a necessary step in the AI dataset assembly process) by the very workers at whom it can be aimed.

“There’s no way to make these systems without human labor at the level of informing the ground truth of the data — reinforcement learning with human feedback, which again is just kind of tech-washing precarious human labor. It’s thousands and thousands of workers paid very little, though en masse it’s very expensive, and there’s no other way to create these systems, full stop,” she explained. “In some ways what we’re seeing is a kind of Wizard of Oz phenomenon, when we pull back the curtain there’s not that much that’s intelligent.”

Not all AI and machine learning systems are equally exploitative, though. When I asked if Signal uses any AI tools or processes in its app or development work, she confirmed that the app has a “small on-device model that we didn’t develop, we use it off the shelf, as part of the face blur feature in our media editing toolset. It’s not actually that good… but it helps detect faces in crowd photos and blur them, so that when you share them on social media you’re not revealing people’s intimate biometric data to, say, Clearview.”

“But here’s the thing. Like… yeah, that’s a great use of AI, and doesn’t that just disabuse us of all this negativity I’ve been throwing out onstage,” she added. “Sure, if that were the only market for facial recognition… but let’s be clear. The economic incentives that drive the very expensive process of developing and deploying facial recognition technology would never let that be the only use.”

[…]

Via https://techcrunch.com/2023/09/25/signals-meredith-whittaker-ai-is-fundamentally-a-surveillance-technology/

Lancet Study Shows mRNA From COVID Shots Contaminates Breast Milk

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mrna covid shots breast milk feature

A peer-reviewed study published Sept. 19 in The Lancet provides “pretty conclusive proof” that mRNA from the COVID-19 vaccines migrates into breast milk, according to internet lecturer John Campbell, Ph.D. — despite claims by regulators, public officials and doctors that the mRNA in the vaccine would stay localized at the injection site.

A new peer-reviewed study provides “pretty conclusive proof” that mRNA from the COVID-19 vaccines migrates into breast milk — “probably for the first 48 hours after vaccination,” according to internet lecturer John Campbell, Ph.D.

Campbell, a retired emergency room nurse, teacher and author of two nursing textbooks, reviewed the study, published Sept. 19 in The Lancet, in a video presentation.

According to the study, the breast milk of 10 of 13 women who took the vaccine tested positive for mRNA up to 45 hours after the vaccine was administered.

The study confirmed the transportation of the synthetic mRNA lipid nanoparticles to the mammary glands via the bloodstream or lymphatic system, leading to its presence in breast milk, Campbell said.

“This is consistent with other studies, so there’s no real debate about this anymore,” he added.

The study did not investigate the effects of the contaminated breast milk on infants, Campbell said.

A study last year in JAMA Pediatrics produced similar results.

Regulatory bodies failed to disclose risk

According to Campbell, regulators, public officials and doctors worldwide initially claimed the mRNA in the vaccine would stay localized at the injection site.

For example, mothers were reassured by the Academy of Breastfeeding Medicine (ABM) in a statement released on Dec. 14, 2020, that the vaccine lipid was unlikely to enter the bloodstream and reach breast tissue.

“If it does, it is even less likely that either the intact nanoparticle or mRNA transfer into milk,” the ABM said.

The American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology had — and continues to promote — a similar message.

Referring to the lipid nanoparticles carrying the mRNA, Campbell said, “If these people had gone to the bother of talking to anyone who specializes in pharmacokinetics … they would have said, ‘Well, with this size particle, it’s … almost certain to be distributed everywhere.’”

“It goes to your liver. It goes to your heart,” he said. “In this case, through the breasts. … It probably goes everywhere. It’s a pity we weren’t told.”

Campbell said he was “pretty cross” because such a disclosure would have reversed his decision to get vaccinated.

He pointed out that in the initial trials, breastfeeding mothers, pregnant women and infants were excluded, “yet the regulatory body still decided to go ahead and give these vaccines [to these groups] which weren’t tested.”

“That’s a question they really need to answer,” he said.

mRNA ‘hijack[s] natural process of genetic communication’

Referring to an illustration provided in the study, Campbell said synthetic mRNA can “hijack the natural process of genetic communication.”

Proposed model of biodistribution of vaccine mRNA to breast milk (BM). Credit: Nazeeh Hanna et al.

He described the mechanism of action this way:

  • The synthetic mRNA is packaged into extracellular vesicles (EVs) and secreted into breast milk. EVs are similar to the body’s own lipid nanoparticles that are naturally present in breast milk.
  • This process, a natural way for mothers to transfer RNA to their babies, is mimicked by the synthetic mRNA.
  • The synthetic mRNA lipid nanoparticles enter mammary epithelial cells responsible for producing milk.
  • The mRNA is released into the cytosol (the clear, colloidal area) of these cells and could be packaged into EVs or excreted by various mechanisms such as exosomes, along with breast milk components.
  • The EVs do not express the spike protein but serve as carriers for the synthetic mRNA.
  • The study found the mRNA in the breast milk was a degraded form with only 12-25% efficiency compared to the original vaccine.

Campbell emphasized that the only way the mRNA could get to the breast tissue would be if it were “systemically absorbed.”

mRNA vaccine manufacturing built on ‘completely flawed’ science

Speaking of other biodistribution studies, Campbell said the lipid nanoparticles could find their way to the myocardium, perhaps the vascular endothelium in the coronary vessels, creating an autoimmune response.

RNA from vaccines can produce antigens that stimulate inflammatory responses from cytotoxic T-cells. Even lipid nanoparticles can potentially cause inflammatory reactions, Campbell said.

The huge mRNA manufacturing efforts “are based on a completely flawed … fundamental scientific problem … until the liquid nanoparticle systemic distribution problem is solved,” Campbell said. “And yet, this massive investment is going ahead, looking to replace the traditional vaccines.”

According to Campbell, pharmaceutical companies are overlooking these problems because they will be able to develop new patentable products that ensure vast new income streams.

He emphasized the need for large-scale epidemiological surveys, conducted by organizations such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.K.’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, to gather more information about potential risks associated with the systemic distribution of the vaccines.

Campbell discussed the HT-29 cell line, derived from colon cancer tumors, that has been used in vitro since 1964 to study absorption, transport and secretion by intestinal cells.

The study exposed these cells to the mother’s milk, which failed to produce the spike protein. Campbell said this was inconclusive as they mimic only intestinal cells, not all other cells exposed to the mRNA.

Campbell also called for further research on the effect on newborns and for healthcare workers to have candid discussions with lactating mothers before vaccination.

Manufacturers should “give us really good reasons why lipid nanoparticles will not be systemically distributed in their new products,” Campbell said.

“Let us as a human race proceed with humility — although I don’t think there’s much chance of that,” he said.

Watch here:

Mayo Clinic: Sometimes Hydroxychloroquine Works on Covid After All

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Aaron Walker
Twitchy

Well, this is something:

Before you ask, we checked. We found the site they are referring to and it says exactly what is pictured. It says:

Advertisement

Hydroxychloroquine may also be used to treat coronavirus (COVID-19) in certain hospitalized patients. …

Hydroxychloroquine should only be used for COVID-19 in a hospital or during clinical trials. Do not take any medicine that contains hydroxychloroquine unless prescribed by your doctor.

Now, there are tons of warnings on that website that we are not quoting, and you would be foolish to take this drug without talking to your doctor, first, and without obeying his or her instructions to the letter, reading the warnings, etc. But we’re old enough to remember back when people claimed this drug never helped with the Wuhan Flu and now the Mayo Clinic is singing a different tune.

Mr. Navarro linked to the Mayo Clinic web page in question.

[…]

[…]

Via https://twitchy.com/aaronwalker/2023/09/25/mayo-clinic-hydroxychloroquine-actually-works-on-covid-n2387688

How the Original Polio Vaccine Was Made

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Dr. Joseph Mercola

Story at-a-glance

  • During the 1950s, the inactivated polio vaccine created by Jonas Salk was made using rhesus monkeys that were infected with simian virus 40 (SV40), a monkey virus that was later linked to cancer in humans
  • While Salk’s polio vaccine was considered a medical triumph of its time, its manufacturing process involved the use of not only virus-contaminated monkey kidneys but also toxic compounds such as asbestos and formaldehyde
  • After mass vaccination began, reports of paralysis and death emerged, and improperly inactivated vaccine had released live virus into 100,000 doses
  • SV40 has been linked to cancers in humans; brain tumors and mesotheliomas appear to be the most common tumors associated with SV40, with some studies showing a positivity rate of up to 60%
  • SV40 promotors have also been detected in mRNA COVID-19 shots

During the 1950s, the inactivated polio vaccine created by Jonas Salk was made using rhesus monkeys that were infected with simian virus 40 (SV40), a monkey virus1 that was later linked to cancer in humans.2

From 1955 to 1963, hundreds of millions of people worldwide — in North and South America, Canada, Europe, Asia and Africa — received the vaccines,3 which at the time were heralded as a medical breakthrough. In the archived 1956 video above, you can see a propaganda piece from that era, showing just how the ill-fated vaccine was made.

“Few back then grasped that these vaccines might also be a huge, inadvertent, uncontrolled experiment in interspecies viral transmission,” a 2004 article in The Lancet noted.4

1950s’ Propaganda Reveals How Polio Vaccine Was Made

While Salk’s polio vaccine was considered a medical triumph of its time, its manufacturing process leaves much to be desired. “Welcome to modern vaccinology. A hilariously unscientific process predicated on insane barbarism, rife with fraud and immense hubris,” Inversionism wrote on X, formerly Twitter.5 The investigative journalist detailed the polio vaccine’s manufacturing process outlined in the video as follows:6

1. “Put all the glassware inside a hot steam bath or sterilize it.

2. Import Macaca mulatta monkeys from India for the experiments.

3. Prepare a mixture called “medium 199” — containing 2% calf serum, 200 units/ml penicillin, 200 g/ml dihydrostreptomycin and 50 units/ml Mycostatin (nystatin Squibb); the pH of the medium was brought to 7.0 by the addition of a NaHCO3 solution.

4. Euthanize the monkeys, remove their kidneys, and then place the kidney into a tube and hand mince it with scissors into small bits.

5. After the kidney tissue was weighed and decapsulated, they put the tissue in a centrifuge tube where they washed it in a phosphate buffered saline and placed in a trypsinization flask. Trypsin enzymes break down the proteins, which were then centrifuged at 800-1000 RPM for 10 minutes to separate the tissue and cells.

6. The kidney cells are then mixed with the medium 199 and incubated (fermented, rotted essentially) at 37C for 6-8 days. By the end of the 6-8 day period, the bottles and tubes were covered with a “confluent sheet of cell growth.”

7. Once the medium 199 is exhausted, half is siphoned off to be replaced by fresh medium 199.

8. They then add the “polio virus” for the first time. 3 different strains supposedly, with no other details on source, isolation process, or genome determination.

9. The bottles continue to rock for 4 days in the solution culturing, fermenting, decaying, and then it’s ready for harvesting.

10. Scientists then visually look at the vials under a microscope to do a “titration test” to discern how much live virus is in the solution, hand counting particles that could be ANYTHING. (very scientific …)

11. Next is filtration, the most egregious part. They filter the solution first through porcelain filters (heavy metal risk), and then through MULTIPLE SHEETS OF ASBESTOS to drain out any kidney tissue or stray bacteria.

(This part of the process is not disclosed in the video, but is detailed in the original paper on the polio vaccine process. They made multiple trivalent vaccine pools, with some having additional additives like sodium bisulfite, along with parabens, a known carcinogen and endocrine disruptor).

12. Now rabbits, monkeys, guinea pigs, and chickens are injected with the “live virus” vaccine solutions7 … to ensure it’s free of other pathogens.

13. Now the “climax” of the process as they call it, inactivation. This is where they mix the vaccine solution with formaldehyde, and then let it sit together for 66-68 hours. The narrator then hilariously says “then what remains can only do good, can provide humans with protection of paralytic polio.” “The enemy of man can now become his servant.”

14. Then the process of mass distribution. They get these massive tanks and mix in all the solutions, adjuvants, chemicals, and ingredients for mass production and “preservation”.

15. Before mass administration, they do a couple experiments on mice and monkeys to ensure the vaccine is creating enough “polio fighting antibodies” in humans.

16. The remainder of the process details the various “tests” they do as the vaccine lots are distributed, before really turning up the propaganda and showing President Eisenhower’s son receiving the polio vaccine.”

Paralyzed Children, Deaths Reported Following Vaccination

By 1954, a large-scale study of Salk’s polio vaccine, which included 1 million children, took place. April 12, 1955, Salk declared the shots to be safe and effective. In addition to being given widely throughout the U.S., by 1959, 90 countries were using it.8 But there were signs of problems from the start.

After mass vaccination began, some subjects became paralyzed in the limb where the vaccine was given. Recalls of 250 cases of the shots from two laboratories ensued following the reports of parasitic illness.

“There were also reports of paralysis and death in several children,” Singapore Medical Journal reported. “Investigations showed that improperly inactivated vaccine had released live virus into more than 100,000 doses of the vaccine.”9

[…]

Americans Kept in the Dark About Monkey Virus in Polio Shots

It was 1959 when the late Bernice Eddy, a researcher at the National Institutes of Health, conducted a study, injecting hamsters with the rhesus monkey kidney substrate used to make the polio vaccines. The majority of them developed tumors.11

“Eddy’s superiors tried to keep the discovery quiet, but Eddy presented her data at a cancer conference in New York. She was eventually demoted, and lost her laboratory,” The Atlantic reported,12 but soon after researchers with Merck pharmaceutical company identified the cancer-causing virus in rhesus monkey kidney cells, naming it SV4013 because it was the 40th monkey virus discovered.

According to Barbara Loe Fisher, co-founder and president of the National Vaccine Information Center, in a presentation before the U.S. House of Representatives in 2003:14

“Sadly, the American people were not told the truth about this in 1960. The SV40 contaminated stocks of Salk polio vaccine were never withdrawn from the market but continued to be given to American children until early 1963 with full knowledge of federal health agencies.

Between 1955 and early 1963, nearly 100 million American children had been given polio vaccine contaminated with the monkey virus, SV40.”

Did SV40 in Vaccines Cause Cancer?

While there wasn’t an “epidemic” of cancers that followed the widespread administration of polio vaccines contaminated with SV40, which suggests the virus alone may not be causing the cancers, researchers noted “it seems possible that SV40 may act as a cofactor in the pathogenesis of some tumors.”15

As further reported in Oncogene, at least three independent scientific panels agreed “there is compelling evidence that SV40 is present in some human cancers and that SV40 could contribute to the pathogenesis of some of them.”16 Brain tumors and mesotheliomas appear to be the most common tumors associated with SV40, with some studies showing a positivity rate of up to 60%.17

For instance, research published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1992 revealed that half the choroid plexus tumors and most of the ependymomas studied contained a segment of T-antigen gene related to SV40. “These results suggest that SV40 or a closely related virus may have an etiologic role in the development of these neoplasms during childhood,” the researchers wrote.18

In 2002, meanwhile, The Lancet published evidence showing SV40 is significantly associated with some types of non-Hodgkin lymphoma after detecting it in 42% of non-Hodgkin lymphomas tested.19 And in a 2004 review of the then-available evidence, it’s noted:20

[…]

What Else Is Lurking in Vaccines?

While the SV40 polio vaccine contamination occurred decades ago, the controversy continues, as does the potential for present-day vaccines to be contaminated.

Research by cellular and molecular biologist Judy Mikovits, Ph.D., showed that many of our vaccines are contaminated with gammaretroviruses.21 How did this happen? In short, vaccine viruses were replicated and grown in animal cell cultures that were already contaminated with retroviruses. In other words, the root of the problem stems from the use of contaminated cell culture lines, similar to the problems with the original polio vaccine.

Meanwhile, microbiologist Kevin McKernan — a former researcher and team leader for the MIT Human Genome project22 — assessed the nucleic acid composition of four expired vials of the Moderna and Pfizer mRNA COVID-19 shots. “DNA contamination that exceeds the European Medicines Agency (EMA) 330ng/mg requirement and the FDAs 10ng/dose requirements” was found.23

In addition to the spike protein and mRNA in COVID-19 shots, McKernan’s team discovered SV40 promotors.24 McKernan explains that in many cases, when tumors are sequenced they’re found to contain sequences from SV40 and other viruses, which can integrate into your genome, causing disruptions and instability that can trigger the cell line to grow out of control.25

In the case of COVID-19 shots, he says, “The concern is if this DNA integrates the genome, one portion of the SV40 sequence is an SV40 promoter, a very strong promoter, which means it drives transcription wherever it lands in the genome.

If this happens to drop itself in front of a proto-oncogene [a gene that has the potential to cause cancer] and drives a lot of expression off of a gene that’s known, if you hyper-express it and turn the cell cancerous, then we have a concern that DNA is in fact doing that.”26

McKernan and colleagues have tried to spread the word about SV40 promotor and components in COVID-19 shots, but the media continue to try to discredit their findings,27 much like occurred with SV40 in the original polio vaccines. Further, as for why the SV40 promoter and enhancer are in COVID-19 shots in the first place, it’s again related to the plasmid growth medium, which in this case is E. coli.28

[…]

Via https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2023/09/26/how-the-original-polio-vaccine-was-made.aspx

Mission to Free Assange: Australian Parliamentarians in Washington

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Dr. Binoy Kampmark

Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce, Labor MP Tony Zappia, Greens Senators David Shoebridge and Peter Whish-Wilson, Liberal Senator Alex Antic and the independent member for Kooyong, Dr. Monique Ryan, are to be viewed with respect, their pluckiness admired. They came cresting on the wave of a letter published on page 9 of the Washington Post, expressing the views of over 60 Australian parliamentarians.

“As Australian Parliamentarians, we are resolutely of the view that the prosecution and incarceration of the Australian citizen Julian Assange must end.”

This is a good if presumptuous start. Australia remains the prized forward base of US ambitions in the Indo-Pacific, the spear pointed against China and any other rival who dares challenge its stubborn hegemony. The AUKUS pact, featuring the futile, decorative nuclear submarines that will be rich scrapping for the Royal Australian Navy whenever they arrive, also makes that point all too clear. For the US strategist, Australia is fiefdom, property, real estate, terrain, its citizenry best treated as docile subjects represented by even more docile governments. Assange, and his publishing agenda, act as savage critiques of such assumptions.

The following views in Washington DC have been expressed by the delegates in what might be described as a mission to educate. From Senator Shoebridge, the continued detention of Assange proved to be “an ongoing irritant in the bilateral relationship” between Canberra and Washington. “If this matter is not resolved and Julian is not brought home, it will be damaging to the bilateral relationship”.

Senator Whish-Wilson focused on the activities of Assange himself. “The extradition of Julian Assange as a foreign journalist conducting activities on foreign soil is unprecedented.” To create such a “dangerous precedent” laid “a very slippery slope for any democracy to go down.”

Liberal Senator Alex Antic emphasised the spike in concern in the Australian population about wishing for Assange’s return to Australia (some nine out of 10 wishing for such an outcome). “We’ve seen 67 members of the Australian parliament share that message in a joint letter, which we’ve delivered across the spectrum”. An impressed Antic remarked that this had “never happened before.  I think we’re seeing an incredible groundswell, and we want to see Julian at home as soon as possible.”

On September 20, in front of the Department of Justice, Zappia told reporters that, “we’ve had several meetings and we’re not going to go into details of those meetings. But I can say that they’ve all been useful meetings.” Not much to go on, though the Labor MP went on to state that the delegation, as representatives of the Australian people had “put our case very clearly about the fact that Julian Assange pursuit and detention and charges should be dropped and should come to an end.”

A point where the delegates feel that a rich quarry can be mined and trundled away for political consumption is the value of the US-Australian alliance. As Ryan reasoned, “This side of the AUKUS partnership feels really strongly about this and so what we expect the prime minister [Anthony Albanese] to do is that he will carry the same message to President Biden when he comes to Washington.”

The publisher’s brother, Gabriel Shipton, also suggests that the indictment is “a wedge in the Australia-US relationship, which is a very important relationship at the moment, particularly with everything that’s going on with the US and China and the sort of strategic pivot that is happening.” Assange, for his part, is bound to find this excruciatingly ironic, given his lengthy battles against the US imperium and the numbing servility of its client states.

Various members of Congress have granted an audience to the six parliamentarians. Enthusiasm was in abundance from two Kentucky Congressmen: Republican Senator Rand Paul and Republican House Representative Thomas Massie. After meeting the Australian delegation, Massie declared that it was his “strong belief [Assange] should be free to return home.”

Georgian Republican House member Marjorie Taylor Greene expressed her sense of honour at having met the delegates “to discuss the inhumane detention” of Assange “for the crime of committing journalism,” insisting that the charges be dropped and a pardon granted. “America should be a beacon of free speech and shouldn’t be following in an authoritarian regime’s footsteps.”  Greene has shown herself to be a conspiracy devotee of the most pungent type, but there was little to fault her regarding these sentiments.

Minnesota Democrat Congresswoman Ilhan Omar also met the parliamentarians, discussing, according to a press release from her office, “the Assange prosecution and its significance as an issue in the bilateral relationship between the United States and Australia, as well as the implications for freedom of the press both at home and abroad.” She also reiterated her view, one expressed in an April 2023 letter to the Department of Justice co-signed with six other members of Congress, that the charges against Assange be dropped.

[…]

Via https://www.globalresearch.ca/mission-free-assange-australian-parliamentarians-washington/

Natural Gas Industry Threatens Gulf Coast Fishing Communities

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liquified natural gas lng berwick fishing feature

By Shannon Kelleher

Louisiana’s growing liquefied natural gas industry is disrupting generations-old fishing communities along the Gulf Coast with tanker traffic, habitat loss from dredging and air pollution from leaks.

[…]

Berwick comes from a long line of crabbers dating back to the 1820s when his ancestors first arrived in the heel of the Louisiana boot — the state’s southwest corner.

“Thirty years from now I want my children to be able to say, ‘this is my home, this is where eight generations of Berwicks have lived,’” he said.

But this simple dream is in danger from a growing threat facing Berwick and others who contribute to — and depend on — the $1.5 billion fishing industry along Louisiana’s Gulf Coast.

The fossil fuel industry has identified the Gulf region as a key site for expanding liquified natural gas (LNG) export terminals.

Eight new terminals are planned for southwest Louisiana alone, with a total of at least 16 new LNG projects anticipated for the Gulf region in the coming years.

The terminals take in gas from transmission pipelines, cool it to a liquid and store it for overseas exports. LNG is considered the cleanest of fossil fuels because it produces less carbon dioxide than coal and oil.

Industry groups, including the Center for LNG, claim the fuel is vital to a clean energy future, with the potential to provide energy security and “lift people out of poverty.”

But environmental groups and concerned residents call the claims “greenwashing,” citing emissions of the potent greenhouse gas methane and other air pollutants associated with LNG facilities, leakage, and emissions along its supply chain. They also point to a history of alleged shoddy operating practices that jeopardize public health and safety — all forced on communities with little consent.

And for Louisiana’s Gulf Coast in particular, critics say the rise of the LNG industry is threatening to wipe out a way of life that has endured for generations and exacerbate the suffering of Gulf communities already plagued by climate-driven disasters.

[…]

An LNG export boom

Most existing LNG and planned terminals are situated along the Gulf Coast, perhaps in part due to the region’s oil- and gas-friendly regulatory environment.

The U.S. recently became the world’s largest LNG exporter following an increase in global prices for methane gas after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which led to 45 long-term contracts to export U.S.-produced methane overseas, according to a 2023 report by environmental and consumer advocacy nonprofits.

But while the industry claims U.S. LNG exports will help support national security in Europe, the report finds that more than three-fourths of the LNG stipulated in the new contracts will be shipped to Asia or commodity traders.

The Biden administration has largely supported U.S. LNG exports, which generated $35 billion in revenue through September 2022 — more than four times the revenue generated in the same period in 2021.

[…]

The U.S. currently has five LNG terminals operating on the Gulf Coast, in Louisiana and Texas.

Two of the Louisiana terminals are located adjacent to communities at opposite ends of Calcasieu Lake — Venture Global’s Calcasieu Pass, which started sending out export cargoes in 2022, and Sempra Energy’s Cameron LNG, which started full commercial operations in 2020. Another facility, Sabine Pass LNG, sits about an hour to the west on the Louisiana-Texas border.

Environmental groups have been opposing a federal permit for a new $25 billion export facility planned for Calcasieu Parish, Driftwood LNG, arguing that the permit failed to account for the project’s potential to damage wetlands. Earlier this month, the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans rejected their challenge.

Flaring and fire hazards

Louisiana’s LNG export terminals have triggered numerous health and safety concerns. The Cameron LNG facility has accidentally released harmful gases 67 times since its export operations began in 2020, according to a 2022 report by the Louisiana Bucket Brigade.

Almost three-quarters of these incidents have resulted from repeated failures by the same piece of equipment, the thermal oxidizers. Whenever they shut off, the plant releases methane, volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and cancer-causing benzene into the air.

While the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has found that Cameron LNG has underreported the emissions from these incidents, the report says that the company has not been penalized.

Furthermore, although the Calcasieu Pass facility has been in operation for less than two years, its tenure has been “rife with flaring and accidents,” according to the Bucket Brigade report.

Flaring, when a terminal releases and burns gases, is considered a mechanism for safety and pollution control. But if the hydrocarbons it releases aren’t completely burned, they can contribute to air pollution and pose a huge safety hazard, said John Allaire, a retired engineer and environmental consultant who lives in Cameron Parish, a little over a mile from the Calcasieu Pass terminal.

[…]

Allaire said he found that the facility flared during 84 of its first 90 days of operation. Venture Global has reported very few of these incidents to the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality, a Louisiana Bucket Brigade analysis found.

Later this year, Venture Global plans to begin construction on another facility, Calcasieu Pass 2 (CP2), next to the existing Calcasieu Pass terminal (the project has not yet been fully approved by federal regulators). A new facility, Commonwealth LNG, is set to become Allaire’s next-door neighbor.

[…]

The fires have come close to the local LNG terminals, he said, burning right up to the edges of the storm protection barriers that surround them.

He worries that improper operating practices could turn a wildfire near an LNG plant into a bigger emergency. If a piece of flaming ash carried by strong winds was swept into the plant and hit a leak source, it could catch fire, he said.

[…]

Recent fires have come within a mile or so of 10 different sites that either currently have operating LNG terminals or have been proposed or approved for future projects, said Morgan Johnson, a staff attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council.

In 2018, federal regulators forced the Cheniere Energy LNG facility 25 miles away to temporarily shut down two storage tanks after the discovery of a large crack.

“The tanks were leaking and they kept operating them and lost thousands and thousands of cubic feet of natural gas,” said Allaire. “If there had been a fire then and a flame had actually gotten in there, it would have been a disaster.”

Sometimes, when he’s at home, Allaire hears the sound of equipment alarms going off at Calcasieu Pass.

Last spring, he said he attended a meeting with a high-ranking Venture Global official. Allaire asked if the alarms meant he should shelter in place. The official, who did not respond to a request for comment from The New Lede, told Allaire to call 911 if he thinks he is in danger, he said.

[…]

According to a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission resource for landowners affected by natural gas facilities, compressor stations have gas and fire detection systems and emergency shutdown equipment “designed to ensure that in the event of an accident, the compressor station would be safely shut down with minimal risk to the public.”

Venture Global and Sempra Energy did not respond to The New Lede’s requests for comment about concerns related to their LNG facilities.

A sinking seafood industry

The Louisiana seafood industry accounts for one in every 70 jobs in the state, with shrimp bringing in $1.3 billion and crabs bringing in $293 million.

Companies are often owned by families that have lived in the region for generations, many of which are the Cajun descendants of exiles who fled French colonies in what is now Canada following the French and Indian War, according to Lori Cooke, a program coordinator for the Louisiana Bucket Brigade and a fifth-generation resident.

Just 25 years ago, the fishing industry in southwest Louisiana was thriving and the “biggest seafood provider anywhere in the world,” she said.

But today, the industry is in trouble.

“The LNG plants aren’t the only problem,” said Cooke. Warming waters and seafood imports that drive down prices also threaten the fishermen.

[…]

One local longline fisherman who has been catching red snapper and other species since the 1970s told Cooke there used to be 100 fishermen like him that went out on the water every day, she said. Now, the number has dwindled to 12 or 15. That fisherman, she said, now works construction jobs to supplement his income.

“Nobody celebrates an LNG paradise,” said Cooke, noting that fishing and other traditions are what form southwest Louisiana’s identity. “There is no LNG festival.”

At least four or five days a week, LNG tankers more massive than cruise ships make their way up and down the Calcasieu Ship Channel, said Cooke, which connects Lake Charles to much larger Calcasieu Lake and, ultimately, the Gulf of Mexico.

For crabbers like Berwick, the tanker traffic, which is set to increase as more LNG terminals are built, poses a major disruption. When the ships pass by, they create giant wakes that suck crab traps out into deeper water where they cannot be retrieved. This happens all the time, said Berwick, who recently gave up crabbing in the shipping channel.

[…]

Dredging to widen the shipping channel for the LNG tankers has “pretty much changed the landscape from what it was in its natural form,” added Berwick.

While Cameron LNG says mud from the dredging has been used to create 500 acres of marsh and wetlands, local shrimpers have complained that the activity prevents them from trawling.

LNG projects could destroy 1,848 acres of wetlands, according to an analysis of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission data by the watchdog group Oil and Gas Watch.

LNG tankers could also threaten fishermen’s lives. Pilots who guide the boats through the shipping channel have warned the fishermen to stay at least two miles away from the tankers, said Cooke.

If they can see the LNG ships, they are already too close.

[…]

Via https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/liquified-natural-gas-gulf-coast-fishing/

 

 

“

She’s Doing it Again: Clinton Claims Russia Seeks to Meddle in 2024 Election

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In this Oct. 9, 2016, file photo Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton speak during the second presidential debate at Washington University in St. Louis. - Sputnik International, 1920, 25.09.2023
© AP Photo / Patrick Semansky
 
James Tweedy
Sputnik International
 
Operation Crossfire Hurricane — the FBI’s attempt to discredit Donald Trump’s election as president in 2016 — was found by a Congressional inquiry to be based on falsehoods. But Democrats and their sympathetic media continue to repeat the claims of ‘Russian interference’.
 
Failed presidential runner Hillary Clinton has repeated her discredited claims of Russian interference in US elections.
 
Clinton dusted off the 2016 ‘Russiagate’ conspiracy theory she used to explain her defeat by Donald Trump in an interview with MSNBC’s Jen Psaki — the former White House press secretary renowned for her inability to answer journalist’s questions.
Psaki claimed that Russian President Vladimir Putin had “interfered in our elections in the past” — directly contradicting the findings of special counsel John Durham’s inquiry that the claim was “uncorroborated” — and asked Clinton if she feared it would happen in 2024.
 
“I don’t think, despite all of the deniers, there is any doubt that he interfered in our election, or that he has interfered in many ways in the internal affairs of other countries, funding political parties, funding political candidates, buying off government officials in different places,” Clinton claimed.
Her tone became increasingly paranoid as she went on.
 
“He hates democracy. He particularly hates the West and he especially hates us,” Clinton ranted. “And he has determined that he can do two things simultaneously. He can try to continue to damage and divide us internally, and he’s quite good at it.”
The former secretary of state and senator, the wife of disgraced ex-president Bill Clinton, even believed that Putin had a personal grudge against her.

“Part of the reason he worked so hard against me is because he didn’t think that he wanted me in the White House,” Clinton complained. “Part of the challenge is to continue to explain to the American public that the kind of leader Putin is.”

She then reeled off a series of unproven allegations against the Russian president, including that he was responsible for the deaths of opposition figures and journalists — and interfered in the 2016 US elections to ensure she lost to Trump.
 
“I fear that the Russians will prove themselves to be quite adept at interfering, and if he has a chance, he’ll do it again,” Clinton concluded.
Durham’s report, finally released in June 2023, found that former Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) Director James Comey’s operation Crossfire Hurricane probe — oddly named after a Rolling Stones lyric — was founded on “raw, un-analyzed and uncorroborated” intelligence and should never have been launched.
It said the FBI was guilty of misconduct and was in need of reform, but did not lay individual blame on any of the numerous officials involved — from Comey to Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, two agents entwined in an extra-marital affair at the federal agency.
[…]

Values Of Used EVs Plummet, As Dealers Stuck With Unsold Cars

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By Paul Homewood

Not a Lot of People Know That

The average cost of second hand electric cars is plummeting by a “phenomenal amount” as they sit for “months on end” without any buyers.


Research by online motor marketplace, AutoTrader, revealed the average price for a used EV has dropped by 21.4 per cent this month, compared to a year ago.
Marc Palmer, the head of strategy and insights at AutoTrader, told MailOnline: “The used market will now be slower to mature. There will be fewer new EVs registered and fewer used cars coming to market.

“There will be sections of the public, especially those who are sceptical, who will want to wait.”

The expert explained that used cars are the “biggest” section of the industry, however motorists are likely to “take longer” in the switch to electric.

https://www.thesun.co.uk/motors/24099905/second-hand-ev-prices-falling-driver-lose-confidence/

According to the Mail:

Mid-month figures for September released by AutoTrader – the largest online marketplace for cars – reveal that the average price of a used EV has fallen by 21.4 per cent to £32,463.

Premium sector EVs, including Tesla, BMW, Mini and Mercedes-Benz, were hit hardest – with values falling by up to 24.1 per cent year-on-year.

The data, reported by The Times, showed that prices of second-hand premium sector EVs peaked at £51,704 last August and have since plummeted by more than £10,000 to £39,268.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12551439/used-electric-cars-price.html

The secondhand EV is between a rock and a hard place!

Increasing numbers are now coming onto the market, corresponding to the increasing number of new sales in recent years.

Yet at the same time, there seems to be little appetite from buyers. Most new EVs go either to Business/Fleet purchasers, or rich, virtue signallers. Neither sector is interested in buying second hand EVs.

Private buyers of second hand cars cannot afford the inflated price of EVs – if they could, they would buy a new petrol car anyway. And they are less likely to have off street parking, therefore making charging more expensive and problematic. Hence the low turnover of second hand EVs.

EV manufacturers have taken a huge risk in offering cheap PCPs [Personal Contract Purchases],* in the hope attracting buyers. These deals are ultimately based on EVs holding their value well.

With plummeting secondhand values, they and the lease companies could be facing massive losses.

What is remarkable about these reports is that the so-called experts seem genuinely surprised about all of this. It was utterly predictable all along.

One “expert”, Marc Palmer, the head of strategy and insights at AutoTrader, told the Mail that the used market will now be slower to mature, and that motorists are likely to “take longer” in the switch to electric.

And the SMMT said “A faster and fairer mass transition [to zero-emission vehicles] is threatened by the absence of support for private buyers, many of whom plan to go electric but are delaying due to concerns over affordability and uncertainty regarding the availability of a charging network.”

They have obviously been believing their own propaganda about EVs for too long.

They still do not seem to have worked out that EVs are utterly useless for most private drivers, who will refuse to make the switch until forced to.

*[In essence, PCP is like a loan to help you purchase your car, however unlike a personal loan you won’t be paying off the full value of the car unless you decide to keep the vehicle].

A History of Jewish Persecution in Medieval Europe

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Jewish Massacre at Clifford’s Tower

Episode 12 The Fourth Lateran Council and the Jews

1215: Years That Changed History

Dr Dorsey Armstrong (2019)

Film Review

In this lecture, Armstrong traces that persecution of marginalized populations (which was new to European society) that became official with the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215. For the most part it included, lepers,* Jews, Muslims, homosexuals and women.

She believes this persecutory culture (persisting to the present day) resulted from a relative shortage of land caused by the Medieval Warm Period (950-1250 AD) and the subsequent population boom. Systematic persecution gave ruling elites a justification to confiscate the lands of designated minorities. In the case of Jews, laws restricting them from occupations other than money lending, banking and rent collection made them particularly loathsome to people who owed them money. Following their expulsion from successive European countries, people who owed them money had their debts forgiven.

Historically the Romans had acknowledged Jews as good public servants and scholars, especially as they didn’t proselytize the way Christians did. As king of the Franks, Lombard and the Holy Roman Empire (768-814), Charlemagne welcomed them as merchants, traders and scholars. In England, Henry II ( 1154-89) dismissed all his Norman banking and financial advisors and replaced them with Jewish officials.

Although a minority, Jews experienced a golden age of Jewish culture in Muslim Spain. This ended in 1279, when Alfonso VIII who ruled the small Christian kingdom of Castile, ordered all the Jewish tax-farmers imprisoned. In January 1281, he ordered the rest of the Jewish population arrested while they were attending synagogue, demanding a ransom of 4,380,000 gold maravedis for their release. By the end of the 13th century, Spanish Jews were segregated into walled ghettos and only  allowed to work as money lenders and rent collectors. In 1492, when King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella “liberated” the Iberian peninsula from from Muslim rule, they expelled all Jews from Spain.

Edward I, the great grandson of Henri II, expelled all Jews from England in 1290. They were only allowed to return when England briefly became a republic in 1656,

Philippe Auguste (1165-1223) of France expelled all French Jews in 1182, except for those who managed his treasury

During several crusades, marauding crusaders staged wholesale massacres on Jewish communities in German speaking countries.

There were also Jewish massacres in York** and Bury St Edwards in 1190. In York, after setting fire to a tower where Jewish families had taken refuge, the rioters immediately went to the cathedral (where the city kept their loan documents) and burned them as well.

*As farmland became more scarce, there was increasing migration towards cities where people lived closer together and the prevalence of leprosy increased. By the 13th century, lepers were no longer allowed to inherit or bequeath land.

**The York city fathers had invited a group of Jewish money lenders to take up residence to help finance the city’s growing trade network.

Film can be viewed free on Kanopy.

https://www.kanopy.com/en/pukeariki/watch/video/12392969/12392994

Lies of Omission: 10 Stories the Media Conveniently Left Out This Week

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THE VIGILANT FOX

The top 10 stories this week from Vigilant News that the media “forgot” to tell you about.

#10 – Cattle are being injected with mRNA “vaccines,” but one beef rancher is taking a stand.

#9 – Kari Lake makes a fiery accusation against Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky

#8 – “Turbo cancers” are targeting young people — and it’s likely to get even worse.

#7 – Top cardiologist breaks down four ways the COVID-19 shots injure and kill before the European Parliament.

#6 – Top data analyst makes a chilling prediction on how the COVID conspirators will cover up their crimes.

#5 – The CDC dropped a bombshell on itself, exposing an alarming risk/benefit ratio.

#4 – Brave EU politician delivers an explosive message to the global tyrants, telling them all to ‘go to Hell.’

#3 – Oncologist unveils why fasting for 48+ hours is a potent therapy for COVID “vaccine” injuries.

#2 – Fitness enthusiasts, not just athletes, are dying suddenly.

#1 – New-found emails prove Biden White House hid COVID Vaccine Harms from the public.

Via https://substack.com/@vigilantfox