A 92-year-old woman was pushed to the ground by a random young man walking by her in Manhattan last week. Surveillance video footage obtained by the New York Post shows the elderly woman walking with a pushcart at 3:30 p.m. on Friday along Third Avenue in the Gramercy Park neighborhood. The man was walking toward…
Big Tech companies, once seen as creating world-changing platforms that gave voice to the voiceless are actually beholden to government censorship — especially in China.
The video-conference company Zoom reportedly “announced Thursday that it would help the Beijing government crack down on activists within that country, and would only draw the line at blocking users outside of mainland China,” Salon reported June 15. Zoom confessed that it had helped derail three Zoom “meetings and suspended or terminated the host accounts associated with the three meetings.”
Forbes observed that the controversy first erupted when Zoom made the choice to “ban three users organizing memorials to mark the Tiananmen Square massacre at the request of Beijing.” These activists were commemorating the anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protests, which were infamously crushed by the Chinese communist government.
Going forward, Zoom promised in a June 11 blog post that it “will not allow requests from the Chinese government to impact anyone outside of mainland China.” Zoom also mentioned it will develop technology that “will enable us to remove or block at the participant level based on geography." In short, while China does not have the power to censor people in Western countries, Zoom made it clear that it will censor citizens of any country if their governments declare it to be the law.
Zoom explained that while it laments China’s harsh oppression of free speech, it will enforce its laws nonetheless.
Zoom’s blog post made a feeble attempt to express the company’s hope “that one day, governments who build barriers to disconnect their people from the world and each other will recognize that they are acting against their own interests, as well as the rights of their citizens and all humanity.”
Even so, Zoom declared in its blog that it indeed took action against Chinese activists that were calling out the Chinese regime for its crimes against humanity:
“In May and early June, we were notified by the Chinese government about four large, public June 4th commemoration meetings on Zoom that were being publicized on social media, including meeting details. The Chinese government informed us that this activity is illegal in China and demanded that Zoom terminate the meetings and host accounts.”
While Zoom may have strategically tried to salvage some of its moral credibility in its blog by reinstating these activists’ accounts, it still prevented them for having a high-profile event marking a national tragedy at the hands of their brutal regime:
“Recent articles in the media about adverse actions we took toward Lee Cheuk-yan, Wang Dan, and Zhou Fengsuo have some calling into question our commitment to being a platform for an open exchange of ideas and conversations. To be clear, their accounts have been reinstated, and going forward, we will have a new process for handling similar situations.
Amazon is deploying AI known as “distance assistants,” which will warn the company’s warehouse workers if they get too close to their co-workers as the company continues its battle against the Chinese virus.
The new era of the Chinese virus comes with new AI technology, as people now apparently need machines to help them behave in a less “natural” manner, according to the vice president of Amazon Robotics, Brad Porter, who published a blog post on Tuesday.
“Given social distancing isn’t always natural, this team set out to use augmented reality to create a magic-mirror-like tool that helps associates see their physical distancing from others,” wrote Porter.
Amazon’s new AI, dubbed the “Distance Assistant,” uses machine learning models to differentiate people from their surroundings, combined with depth sensors and an AI-enabled camera to track an employee’s movements and give them feedback in real time, letting them know if they are violating the suggested “social distancing” guidelines.
A green circle, showing appropriate social distancing, can be seen encompassing each individual on a TV screen. The circles will then become red if a person gets closer than six feet to someone else, alerting them that they are not an appropriate distance away.
“The on-screen indicators are designed to remind and encourage associates to maintain appropriate distance from others,” said Porter. “Nothing is more important than the health and well-being of our employees and we’ll continue to innovate to keep them as safe as possible.”
Amazon compares the Distance Assistant to radar speed checks on the road that alert people if they are driving too fast.
The AI is currently live at a “handful” of Amazon buildings, according to Porter, who added that the company will be “deploying hundreds of these units over the next few weeks.”
“We are also beginning the process to open source the software and AI behind this innovation so that anyone can create their own Distance Assistant,” added Porter.
While the blog post did not clarify whether or not it is mandatory for warehouse workers’ movements to be tracked throughout the day, the Verge reports that workers “will have no choice but to be tracked in this way if they want to keep their job.”
Last week, Lancet had to retract the most highly-touted hydroxychloroquine study to date, which was used as evidence for entire countries to change their stance on the drug. The study, which was obviously flawed on its face (I commented well before it was exposed that the groupings made no sense), turned out to be produced by a shell company, with unverified data gathered by non-scientists.
But when that study flopped, another study was immediately latched onto. It’s called the RECOVERY trials and was done in the UK. Supposedly, this study was the counter to the fake study published by Lancet.
It was the proof that “well yeah, that other study was bad, but this one got the same results.”
Well, not so much.
Edmund Fordham wrote a piece on what is an emerging controversy, in which it appears the lead of the RECOVERY trial took hydroxychloroquine for another drug, resulting in a high death rate.
Internet sleuths also got to work on the very heavy doses of the drug that were given – 2400 mg in the first 24 hours, a ‘dose fit for a gorilla’ as one critic had it. Quizzed about this, Landray defended the dosage, twice, as being usual for other diseases such as amoebic dysentery. Say again? Hydroxychloroquine is used for lupus and arthritis as well as malaria, but dysentery? As a footnote in medical history, the older chloroquine was used half a century ago in attempts to control dysentery, but Professor Christian Perronne, head of infectious diseases at Garches, France, told France Soir that it had been abandoned before 1976. Was Landray confusing hydroxychloroquine with the hydroxyquinolines, which are used for dysentery?
1,132 patients died in the RECOVERY trial, with general death rates nearly 10% higher than other country’s hospitals (the trial was randomized through Britain’s NHS). Whether giving people 3x the usual dosage of most other studies played a part is now a very real question.
Landray defended himself twice, but is now claiming he’s being misquoted. The French newspaper who quoted him denies that.
Landray explained there was no approved dosing for Covid because it was a new disease. Well, yes, but the toxic dose won’t change depending on the illness. Asked whether the UK had a maximum dose for hydroxychloroquine, Landray wasn’t sure, but opined it would be much larger, say six to ten times the trial’s dose. That makes 24 whole grams. NICE says about 490 mg per day for a 75kg adult. In France 1800 mg in a day mandates hospitalization as a poisoning. Twenty-four grams at one go would be almost certainly lethal, possibly even to a gorilla. So Landray has had notice of some hard questions on dose, which will no doubt be explained in the full report, not yet released.
In the end, though, this study is just another in a long list which completely miss the mark and it’s good that it was canceled. The effectiveness of hydroxychloroquine to fight coronavirus has always been in the early stages because of how the virus works. Doing trials on extremely sick, hospitalized patients is scientifically counterproductive because the viral infection itself is no longer the issue at that point. As the now-debunked Lancet published study counted in their data, giving hydroxychloroquine without adjacent drugs (anti-biotic and zinc) is pointless and using that data in “studies” to claim the drug doesn’t work at all is incredibly misleading. Why is that even being studied and included in any determination of its effectiveness?
Countries and doctors that report success with hydroxychloroquine already know not to give it to late-stage patients and that it’s ineffective when used alone. What they also know is that it does appear to have benefits for early-stage, non-hospitalized subjects when prescribed properly in conjunction with other drugs. Why is it so difficult for some to separate those things and focus on helping people?
On Monday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “The Story,” House Minority Whip Steve Scalise (R-LA) said that Govs. Andrew Cuomo (D-NY) and Gretchen Whitmer (D-MI) ignored federal guidelines and “forced seniors to go back to the nursing homes, even if they were COVID-positive,” and also accused New Jersey and Illinois of ignoring federal guidelines.
Scalise said, “Well, unfortunately, Martha, what we found out, and we investigated this thoroughly, a few states, about seven different states, their governors gave orders that contradicted the CMS guidelines that were coming down from the federal government. And they forced seniors to go back to the nursing homes, even if they were COVID-positive, and actually, in many cases, prohibited the nursing homes from even checking to see if they were COVID-positive, if they weren’t even able to handle them.”
Scalise continued that Cuomo “explicitly prohibited the nursing homes from even testing you for positive. This, by the way, is still going on in the state of Michigan. The governor issued an order doing the same thing, forcing those nursing home patients back. And thousands of nursing home patients died in each of these cases that shouldn’t have died.”
He added that New Jersey and Illinois also ignored federal guidelines. Scalise further stated that “New York stopped reporting the data. So, we don’t know how many more thousands died.”
President Trump Signs Executive Order On Police Reform Tyler Durden
Tue, 06/16/2020 – 13:07
In keeping with the Republican plan for tackling police reform, which involves a legislative component being handled by the Senate (an effort led by the only black senate Republican, SC’s Tim Scott), President Trump signed an executive order barring police across the country from using chokeholds, and requiring the creation of a federal database of police misconduct.
The EO is part of what could become a spate of several orders as negotiations continue and lawmakers in both parties try to hammer out a compromise plan as Republicans bet that shifting public opinion on police misconduct could create space for a compromise.
The first drug to be clinically proven to reduce death rates in patients with severe cases of the coronavirus has been created by scientists, a news agency reported on Tuesday.
“Giving low doses of the generic steroid drug dexamethasone to patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19 reduced death rates by around a third among those with the most severe cases of infection,” Reuters reported. “The results, described as a ‘major breakthrough’ by scientists leading the UK-led clinical trial known as RECOVERY, suggest the drug should immediately become standard care in patients treated in hospital with the pandemic disease.”
“This is a result that shows that if patients who have COVID-19 and are on ventilators or are on oxygen are given dexamethasone, it will save lives, and it will do so at a remarkably low cost,” said Martin Landray, an Oxford University professor and co-leader of the drug’s trial.
“Since the appearance of COVID-19 six months ago, the search has been on for treatments that can improve survival, particularly in the sickest patients,” Landray said. “These preliminary results from the RECOVERY trial are very clear – dexamethasone reduces the risk of death among patients with severe respiratory complications. COVID-19 is a global disease – it is fantastic that the first treatment demonstrated to reduce mortality is one that is instantly available and affordable worldwide.”
Said Peter Horby, professor of Emerging Infectious Diseases at Oxford, said: “Dexamethasone is the first drug to be shown to improve survival in COVID-19. This is an extremely welcome result. The survival benefit is clear and large in those patients who are sick enough to require oxygen treatment, so dexamethasone should now become standard of care in these patients. Dexamethasone is inexpensive, on the shelf, and can be used immediately to save lives worldwide.”
“It is a major breakthrough,” he said.
Oxford University said in a statement:
In March 2020, the RECOVERY (Randomised Evaluation of COVid-19 thERapY) trial was established as a randomized clinical trial to test a range of potential treatments for COVID-19, including low-dose dexamethasone (a steroid treatment). Over 11,500 patients have been enrolled from over 175 NHS hospitals in the UK.
On 8 June, recruitment to the dexamethasone arm was halted since, in the view of the trial Steering Committee, sufficient patients had been enrolled to establish whether or not the drug had a meaningful benefit.
A total of 2104 patients were randomized to receive dexamethasone 6 mg once per day (either by mouth or by intravenous injection) for ten days and were compared with 4321 patients randomised to usual care alone. Among the patients who received usual care alone, 28-day mortality was highest in those who required ventilation (41%), intermediate in those patients who required oxygen only (25%), and lowest among those who did not require any respiratory intervention (13%).
Dexamethasone reduced deaths by one-third in ventilated patients (rate ratio 0.65 [95% confidence interval 0.48 to 0.88]; p=0.0003) and by one fifth in other patients receiving oxygen only (0.80 (0.67 to 0.96]; p=0.0021 ). There was no benefit among those patients who did not require respiratory support (1.22 (0.86 to 1.75; p=0.14).
Based on these results, 1 death would be prevented by treatment of around 8 ventilated patients or around 25 patients requiring oxygen alone.
The new findings follow a report this week in which National Pulic Radio said “Mounting evidence suggests the coronavirus is more common and less deadly than it first appeared.”
The evidence comes from tests that detect antibodies to the coronavirus in a person’s blood rather than the virus itself. The tests are finding large numbers of people in the US who were infected but never became seriously ill. And when these mild infections are included in coronavirus statistics, the virus appears less dangerous.
The current best estimates for the infection fatality risk are between 0.5% and 1%,’ says Caitlin Rivers, an epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security. That’s in contrast with death rates of 5% or more based on calculations that included only people who got sick enough to be diagnosed with tests that detect the presence of virus in a person’s body.
Only 1.8% of the US population lives in nursing homes but over 40% of the coronavirus deaths were in these centers.
This is ONE OF the biggest scandals of the year and the Liberal Media WILL NOT report on this.
On Monday Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA) called on Democrat governors in New York, New Jersey, California, Pennsylvania and Michigan demanding they explain why they ignored protocols and forced COVID-19 patients into nursing homes.
Just sent letters to the Democrat governors of NY, NJ, CA, PA, and MI demanding they explain why they ignored protocols and forced COVID-19 patients into nursing homes.
Presidential candidate Joe Biden appears in a new Planned Parenthood advertisement, promising the abortion giant the full support of his presidency.
On Monday, the Planned Parenthood Action Fund formally endorsed Mr. Biden’s candidacy and Planned Parenthood acting president Alexis McGill Johnson described the upcoming race as “literally a life and death election.”
“We felt like we can’t endure another four years of Trump; we have to do everything we can to get him out of office,” Ms. McGill Johnson said.
In the ad, Mr. Biden promises to expand women’s healthcare, a Planned Parenthood euphemism for abortion.
“It’s a simple proposition, health care is a right not dependent on race, gender, income, or zip code,” Biden stats. “As president I’m going to do everything in my power to expand access to quality affordable health care for women, especially women of color.”
Mr. Biden fails to mention that currently “women of color” are already the preferred targets of Planned Parenthood’s attentions. In the United States, black babies are aborted at more than three times the rate of white babies and abortion is the number one cause of death of blacks in America.
By functional standards, abortion is the most racist institution in the United States. Among white women, there are 138 abortions for every 1000 live births; among blacks, there are 501 abortions for every 1000 births. This means that blacks are aborted at 3.6 times the rate of whites.
In the ad, Biden goes on to promise to promote abortion both domestically and abroad.
“Together we’re going to reverse the global gag order, the domestic gag order, restoring the Title X program,” Biden continues.
“We will protect women’s constitutional right to choose, and I am proud to stand with you in this fight,” Biden said.
As Mr. Biden continues solidifying his relationship with Planned Parenthood and the abortion industry, he is simultaneously guaranteeing a pitched battle with the U.S. bishops over his abortion promotion. The Roman Catholic Church, to which Mr. Biden belongs, considers abortion to be murder and attaches its highest penalty — that of automatic excommunication — to anyone who “procures a completed abortion.”
Last fall, a Catholic priest in South Carolina denied the former vice president Holy Communion during Sunday Mass because of his staunch position in favor of abortion.
“Sadly, this past Sunday, I had to refuse Holy Communion to former Vice President Joe Biden,” said the pastor at Saint Anthony Catholic Church, Father Robert E. Morey. “Holy Communion signifies we are one with God, each other and the Church. Our actions should reflect that.”
But being denied Communion may be the least of Mr. Biden’s problems.
Among important demographic groups, Catholics make up nearly 25 percent of U.S. voters and in 2016 played a key role in sending Donald Trump to the White House, with the abortion issue looming large in many voters’ minds.
Catholics voted for Donald Trump in 2016 by a larger margin than for any other Republican candidate in the five elections of the new millennium, according to a Pew Research Center study, and some Catholic Democrats fear that the margin could be even greater in 2020.
In the lead-up to the 2016 elections, Denver Archbishop Samuel J. Aquila insisted that life issues — and especially opposition to abortion — must take absolute precedence in deciding for whom to vote.
“Catholics in good conscience cannot support candidates who will advance abortion,” he wrote in the diocesan newspaper, the Denver Catholic.
The Democrats’ platform is “aggressively pro-abortion, not only in funding matters, but in the appointment of only those judges who will support abortion,” Aquila wrote.
Other bishops singled out the Catholic former vice-presidential candidate, Tim Kaine, for special reproach because of his public support for abortion, a phenomenon likely to repeat itself this fall.
In October 2016, Archbishop Joseph Naumann of Kansas called Kaine a “cafeteria Catholic” and questioned how he could claim to be “personally pro-life” while affirming his support of Roe v. Wade and consistently voting to keep abortion-on-demand legal.
Later that same month, Bishop William Murphy of Rockville Centre on Long Island, told Catholics that support for abortion “should disqualify any and every such candidate from receiving our vote.”
“Support of abortion by a candidate for public office, some of whom are Catholics, even if they use the fallacious and deeply offensive ‘personally opposed but . . .’ line, is reason sufficient unto itself to disqualify any and every such candidate from receiving our vote,” he said in a letter that was read from the pulpit at every Sunday Mass in the diocese.
“Many issues are very important in our society today,” the bishop said. “But none of them can eclipse the centrality of human life, especially innocent human life in the womb or at the end of life.”
“Above all and over all, the number one issue more fundamental and crucial than any other is abortion – that is the direct taking of innocent life,” he stated.
Given Mr. Biden’s full-blown embrace of abortion-on-demand, many Catholic bishops will feel obliged in conscience to make similar statements as the November elections approach. At this point it seems difficult to imagine that Biden will be able to draw votes from serious Catholics, for whom the right to life is paramount.
In the face of recent announcements from companies dropping their ads from his show, Fox News Channel’s Tucker Carlson was unfazed by the liberal thought police as he delivered a 17-minute-plus opening monologue Monday night speaking truth to the power of the Black Lives Matter movement. He called out their bullying tactics, manipulation of our moral values, and the brutalization of anyone who even offered mild criticism of the group.
At one point, speaking about the normal rules of our political system, Carlson noted that “Black Lives Matter wants to run the country, therefore, you can freely criticize Black Lives Matter.” “If the leaders of Black Lives Matter are political actors, and they are, then by definition you are allowed to have any opinion you want to have about them,” he said before ominously arguing that the rules had been changed.
“Imagine a world where you are punished for questioning the behavior of the president or for insulting your local mayor. You probably can’t imagine that. It’s too bizarre. It’s un-American. But that’s where we are right now,” he warned. “You can be fired from your job if you disobey. Many Americans have been.”
And he had evidence, people who had lost their jobs and called racist for offering just mild criticism of the group and their tactics (click “expand”):
On Friday, for example, the principle of a public school in Windsor, Vermont was dismissed from her job for posting the following words on her personal Facebook page. Quote, "While I understand the urgency to feel compelled to advocate for black lives, what about our fellow law enforcement? Just because I don’t walk around with a BLM sign, should not mean I’m a racist." End quote.
Unfortunately, the principal’s boss disagreed. The superintendent of Windsor schools describe the quote you just heard as, quote, "Outright racist." Windsor, Vermont, by the way, is more than 97 percent white.
Also on Friday, an economist called Harald Uhlig lost his job at the Federal Reserve Bank ok Chicago for daring to offer milder criticism that that. On Twitter, Uhlig noted that Black Lives Matter had, quote, "just torpedoed itself, with its full-fledged supportive #DefundThePolice.” Now is the time, Uhlig, noted, quote, “for sensible adults to enter back into the room and have serious, earnest, respectful conversations about it all.”
That was a racist statement, the Federal Reserve concluded, so they fired Harold Uhlig. We can give you many other examples of the same thing happening. There are a lot of them.
“Black Lives Matter now enjoys almost complete immunity from criticism,” Carlson added.
While many liberals (who likely had never watched his show) were calling him racist for his criticism of Black Lives Matter, Carlson expounded on a simple truth: “Yes, black lives do matter, that is a statement of fact and no decent person doubts that is true because it is.”
He went on to preach that virtue by noting that we all were children of God:
And it is true precisely because every life matters. We are all human beings, every one of us. We have souls, skin color is irrelevant to moral value. Until recently, this was considered obvious. Saying it was regarded as a virtue. All lives matter equally. All of us were created by God. And in the end, all of us will die. Nothing can change that, not wealth, not fame, not race. Every life is precisely as valuable as every other life.
“By the way, that idea forms the basis of the Christian faith. It’s the entire premise behind our founding documents,” he recalled. “And yet, suddenly, thanks to Black Lives Matter, you can no longer say it out loud. Affirming the fundamental equality of all people is now considered hate speech.”
Further noting that we’re in “a dangerous moment” and that BLM’s policy demands had seen a surge in support, Carlson urged: “If you strongly disagree with something, say so. Otherwise, it’s much more likely to happen.”
The transcript is below, click "expand" to read:
Fox News Channel’s Tucker Carlson Tonight
June 15, 2020
8:03:35 p.m. Eastern
(…)
TUCKER CARLSON: It is all pretty strange when you think about it. If the leaders of Black Lives Matter are political actors, and they are, then by definition you are allowed to have any opinion you want to have about them. Black Lives Matter wants to run the country, therefore, you can freely criticize Black Lives Matter. Those are the rules of our system, but not anymore.
Imagine a world where you are punished for questioning the behavior of the president or for insulting your local mayor. You probably can’t imagine that. It’s too bizarre. It’s un-American. But that’s where we are right now. Black Lives Matter has changed the rules. And Here’s their first new rule” no criticizing Black Lives Matter. You can be fired from your job if you disobey. Many Americans have been.
On Friday, for example, the principle of a public school in Windsor, Vermont was dismissed from her job for posting the following words on her personal Facebook page. Quote, "While I understand the urgency to feel compelled to advocate for black lives, what about our fellow law enforcement? Just because I don’t walk around with a BLM sign, should not mean I’m a racist." End quote.
Unfortunately, the principal’s boss disagreed. The superintendent of Windsor schools describe the quote you just heard as, quote, "Outright racist." Windsor, Vermont, by the way, is more than 97 percent white.
Also on Friday, an economist called Harald Uhlig lost his job at the Federal Reserve Bank ok Chicago for daring to offer milder criticism that that. On Twitter, Uhlig noted that Black Lives Matter had, quote, "just torpedoed itself, with its full-fledged supportive #DefundThePolice.” Now is the time, Uhlig, noted, quote, “for sensible adults to enter back into the room and have serious, earnest, respectful conversations about it all.”
That was a racist statement, the Federal Reserve concluded, so they fired Harold Uhlig. We can give you many other examples of the same thing happening. There are a lot of them.
Black Lives Matter now enjoys almost complete immunity from criticism. This is unprecedented for an American political movement. But Black Lives Matter is more powerful than that. It has single-handedly revised their moral framework.
Yes, black lives do matter, that is a statement of fact and no decent person doubts that is true because it is. And it is true precisely because every life matters. We are all human beings, every one of us. We have souls, skin color is irrelevant to moral value.
Until recently, this was considered obvious. Saying it was regarded as a virtue. All lives matter equally. All of us were created by God. And in the end, all of us will die. Nothing can change that, not wealth, not fame, not race. Every life is precisely as valuable as every other life.
By the way, that idea forms the basis of the Christian faith. It’s the entire premise behind our founding documents. And yet, suddenly, thanks to Black Lives Matter, you can no longer say it out loud. Affirming the fundamental equality of all people is now considered hate speech. You can be fired for saying it. Again, many people have been.
This is a dangerous moment. How did we get here? In a word: quickly. It happened fast. As recently as December before the riots, most Americans did not approve of Black Lives Matter. The group was defined in the public mind by moments like this.
[Video of Black Lives Matter protesters chanting “Pigs in a blanket, fry’em like bacon.”]
CARLSON: Pigs in a blanket fry like bacon. Kill the police. They yelled that at a rally. The usual layers immediately swooped in to pretend it had never happened. The president of the Southern Property Law Center wrote an entire op-ed ordering the public not to consider Lack Lives Matter a hate group.
But people could see the truth for themselves, the video was online. A lot of facts about Black Lives Matter still reside on the internet. They have not yet been scrubbed.
The group’s signature demand is to eliminate law enforcement. When you first heard protesters scream "Defund the police" it may have shocked you. ‘That’s just crazy,’ you may have thought. A few weeks later, support for eliminating law enforcement is rising quickly in the polls. Minneapolis is already doing it. Other cities will follow.
Are you surprised? Almost no one in public life has pushed back meaningfully against the idea of defining the police. The Black Lives Matter position is the only position most people here. After a while, they believe it. Unchallenged claims must be true. That’s what most people assume and why wouldn’t they assume that? If you strongly disagree with something, say so. Otherwise, it’s much more likely to happen.
(…)
Just sent letters to the Democrat governors of NY, NJ, CA, PA, and MI demanding they explain why they ignored protocols and forced COVID-19 patients into nursing homes.
