Is Martin Luther’s “Plague Advice” Good for Covid?

Published January 4, 2022January 21, 2023 by Papa Giorgio

Personal Statement: J-and-J in May 2020, boosted with Covid, end of December. Raging headache for days. Like a bad cold, slight fever for 2-days, have lost all sense of smell and taste….just in time [/sarcasm] to try out my wife’s Christmas present – an air fryer.

A few thoughts on a Martin Luther quote I have seen used since 2020… first, the quote fashioned by RPT

I am only writing this post because I have just seen a similar Luther quote [albeit mine is more complete] on the Facebook of someone that should know better. One commentor noted:

False equivalency, among other logical fallacies. — C.P.

I responded thus (with a slight addition):

Really? A quote about the Black Plague?

The Bubonic plague was a deadly pandemic that wiped out a massive chunk of population in the World during the mid-1300s. In Europe alone the plague wiped out nearly 50% of Europe’s population. Some estimates even claim that Black Death wiped out around two-third of Europe’s population. According to National Geographic the plague killed around 25 million people, almost one-third of Europe’s population (National Geographic). The plague also killed half of London’s population in almost 4 years (Sciencemag). The Bubonic plague is reported to have killed an estimated 75–200 million people (Shipman). Historians report that people died rapidly. The streets were filled with corpses mounted over each other. And the priests were too scared to perform the death rites. Florence, a city of Italy, alone is reported to have 50,000 deaths out of a population of 80,000. The mortality rate was as high as 50% during the Bubonic plague era. (Joshua Mark)

….How serious is Covid-19 exactly? And how will the outcome of the pandemic differ if vaccines were mandatory rather than optional? What additional loss of life can be expected if we do not make vaccination compulsory?

That Covid-19 is serious is beyond question. But let’s look at a few markers to help us evaluate the severity of the risk to humanity.

The deadly Spanish Flu from 1918-1920 is estimated to have killed somewhere between 20-50 million people, or close to 3% of the world’s population. By contrast, Covid-19 has so far killed about 5.3 million people in two years. That represents about 0.07% of the global population.

How deadly is Covid-19? The overall infection fatality rate (IFR) of Covid has been estimated to be between 0.1% and 0.2%. Quoting from an analysis by Professor John P.A. Ioannidis of multiple studies which calculated inferred IFR by seroprevalence data:

“Interestingly, despite their differences in design, execution, and analysis, most studies provide IFR point estimates that are within a relatively narrow range. Seven of the 12 inferred IFRs are in the range 0.07 to 0.20 (corrected IFR of 0.06 to 0.16) which are similar to IFR values of seasonal influenza. Three values are modestly higher (corrected IFR of 0.25-0.40 in Gangelt, Geneva, and Wuhan) and two are modestly lower than this range (corrected IFR of 0.02-0.03 in Kobe and Oise).” (emphasis mine).

For people under 60, the IFR is much lower still. And for vaccinated people, the risk of death from Covid-19 is reduced about ten fold.

For a vaccinated person, the risk of Covid-19 is no worse than seasonal influenza.

And this was before Omicron, the new variant which looks set to become the dominant strain around the world in the coming weeks, and so far appears to cause much milder symptoms and a much lower fatality rate. Why are we still in panic mode?

Over the last two years, there were roughly 120 million all cause deaths. Only 5.3 million of those (less than 5% of all deaths) were Covid-19 deaths. Thanks to the media’s scaremongering, there are many people who seem to think that Covid-19 was the leading cause of death in 2020 and 2021. Based on historical mortality data we can estimate that deaths due to cardiovascular disease probably exceeded 40 million over the last two years, while cancer deaths are likely to have exceeded 20 million. That reality does not nullify or make light of the tragic 5.3 million Covid-19 deaths so far. But it helps to put Covid-19 in perspective. …..

— Arguing From The Other Side – Onne Vegter Sets Out The Case Against Mandatory Vaccines (December 2021)

AGAIN, this is in no way parallel to even the 1793 Philadelphia yellow fever epidemic. The city had reached about 50,000 residence, and over the course of the fever 5,000 died. That is 5% of that cities population. Comparing…

These unparalleled public health actions were enacted for a virus with an infection mortality rate (IFR) roughly similar to seasonal influenza. Stanford’s John P.A. Ioannidis identified 36 studies (43 estimates) along with an additional 7 preliminary national estimates (50 pieces of data) and concluded that among people <70 years old across the world, infection fatality rates ranged from 0.00% to 0.57% with a median of 0.05% across the different global locations (with a corrected median of 0.04%). — AIER

Back in June of 2020 I noted the following:

The CDC just came out with a report that should be earth-shattering to the narrative of the political class, yet it will go into the thick pile of vital data and information about the virus that is not getting out to the public. For the first time, the CDC has attempted to offer a real estimate of the overall death rate for COVID-19, and under its most likely scenario, the number is 0.26%. Officials estimate a 0.4% fatality rate among those who are symptomatic and project a 35% rate of asymptomatic cases among those infected^*jump, which drops the overall infection fatality rate (IFR) to just 0.26% — almost exactly where Stanford researchers pegged it a month ago. — RPT

Keep in mind in March of 2020 I noted that the rates would be from 0.03% to 0.25% — not to brag or anything, but I am in the 23-studies lane-lines of the Stanford study mentioned in June. I just couldn’t differentiate between age groups, but that was assumed as the average age of deaths.

All this is to say is that to compare such an even is at best a non-sequitur. Much like the same person’s comparing

Dr. Sarfati, with whom I agree on most things, shows unfortunately his twisted logic on vaccines — all the while calling those who disagree with his position in the slightest: anti-vaxers.”

Here is his posting:

Anti-vaxers: Is there any other vaccine in history that required three doses in a year and yet still didn’t prevent transmission of the virus it was meant to protect against?

Reality: remember your childhood vaccines which kept you safe and which you are depriving your children from.

Here are the two responses I wish to note:

S.L. – I shouldn’t respond because I am not an ‘anti-vaxxer’ (I am vaccinated with every vaccine my GP recommended), but I’d just like to comment on this vaccine schedule. I (and most people my age) received FAR less vaccinations that suggested on the above or the current schedule in Australia. I received 6 vaccinations in my first five years of life in Germany in 1970: tuberculosis, smallpox, measles, diphtheria, polio and whooping cough. Some of these were boosted ONCE. So apart from the occasional influenza vaccine (which I take when the ‘season’ looks particularly ominous) I have had perhaps 15 shots in my life. My children (born in the early millennium in Australia) had many additional vaccinations but still not as many as required above. We followed the increased schedule but spaced out and separated the MMR vaccines at the suggestion of our pediatrician at the time. We also refused the HPV vaccine for both children at 14. They were not about to be sexually active. We decided (with them) that they can choose to take the HPV vaccine as adults. Both kids (19 and 22) are healthy and have always been. Same with me – though I’ve worked in education all my life i.e.. in contact with many different people every day and exposed to every ‘childhood disease’ outbreak you can think of. I have no compelling reason to accept uncritically that vaccinations requirements should have needed to go up the way they have because someone wants to improve our health. lol.

Here is my response as well… a bit shorter:

ME – I honestly do not know. Are those doses minimized due to age? And a single or two dose be given to adults? To Wit….

To support my observational question…. well, somewhat answer it — the ATLANTIC notes the following:

….10 micrograms of RNA in each Pfizer shot, a third of the 30-microgram recipe that’s given to people 12 and older. Further down the road, pending another set of votes, authorizations, and recommendations, kids 4 and younger will get a wee 3 micrograms, a tenth of what their parents get…..

Historically, variola major [smallpox] has a case-fatality rate of about 30% (FDA | TIME). In the United States, the 1952 polio epidemic became the worst outbreak in the nation’s history. Of the nearly 58,000 cases reported that year, 3,145 died and 21,269 were left with mild to disabling paralysis.

(FLASHBACK) Dr. Kelly Victory says delta variant is far, far less lethal

So, even if say 3 adult vaccination shots are needed for such a horrible disease… to require boosters and laws regulating Covid “vaccines,” is not where the evidence leads. The fatality rates and survivability of Covid compared and an argument for vaccinations is moot. Both in the IFR, CFR, and the efficacy of these “vaccines” for Covid are the basis to reject such logic in the OP (original post).

I have also in the past questioned the death rate and other factors are wildly overcounted.

Hospitalization Numbers:

Death Numbers:

Funny Covid-19 Numbers By Date (Why Many Are Skeptical)

Two examples from this post to make a point:

Example One:

A pair of gunshot deaths that counted among COVID fatalities have earned the ire of a county coroner in Colorado. Grand County, in the sparsely-populated (but breathtaking) northwestern quarter of the state, is home to fewer than 15,000 people and has been lucky enough to endure only a handful of deaths related to the Wuhan Virus.

But of those five deaths, County Coroner Brenda Bock says two actually died of gunshot wounds.

Bock sounded furious in her interview with CBS4 News in Denver, and with good reason. Grand County’s economy is heavily reliant on tourism, and as Bock told CBS4, “It’s absurd that they would even put that on there.”

“Would you want to go to a county that has really high death numbers?” she asked, presumably rhetorically. “Would you want to go visit that county because they are contagious? You know I might get it, and I could die if all of a sudden one county has a high death count. We don’t have it, and we don’t need those numbers inflated.”

Bock told CBS4 that because the victims had tested positive for COVID-19 within 30 days of having been shot, the county classified them as “deaths among cases.”

That’s a curious definition, but one required by the national reporting rules created by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention….

(PJ-MEDIA)

That is literally 40%!

Example two:

Just one more of the many examples I could share is the New York Times getting 40% wrong of their “died from Covid-19 under 30-years old” front page news story. Mmmm, no, they didn’t die of Covid.

Another four-zero. Just sayin.

First Omicron Death (With or Of)

Promises, Promises

I.E., if masks work, why don’t they work? If lockdowns work, why don’t lockdowns work?

I think these stories are related to the non-sequitur nature of the OP… in that it is a false equivalency:

Martin Luther would surely be on the “keep society open” side considering the evidence.

Fauci and Walensky Bow To Science (Finally)

Published January 4, 2022January 8, 2022 by Papa Giorgio

The reason I believe they admit these two facts that conservatives have been saying for over a year is that [coupled with the shorter isolation time-period] the Biden Administration is trying to make the cyclical spread of Covid (which moves just like the flu) in the blue states not seem as bad as when Florida had it. So the press bemoaned Florida and DeSantis when they had a supposed 25% of the nations cases. (See CLASH DAILY for newest statement conservatives have known since the beginning) Well, New York has almost 30% now. (See PJ-MEDIA for comparison). So bowing to keeping the economy going and not continually piss people off is the rational, which should have been the thinking to begin with (DAILY WIRE | NEW YORK POST). We know Fauci lies, and in fact, Hugh Hewitt points this out well in his challenge to Dr. Fauci retiring from his debacle [since HIV days] (100% FED-UP). Indeed, why can’t Dr. Fauci stop lying? (RED STATE)

This “Faucism” applies to adults as well… work injuries, appendix issues, etc.

Stephanopoulos Claims Clinton Supporters Didn’t Riot After 2016 Election

Published January 3, 2022January 3, 2022 by Papa Giorgio

After the Daily Caller clip, I delve deeper into these misconception about the 2016 and 2020 election with Larry Elder’s Sacramento Bee interview when he was running for governor. (That file can be found HERE)

DAILY CALLER:

“George Stephanopoulos suggested Sunday that even though Hillary Clinton supporters did not recognize the 2016 election as legitimate, they did not take the ‘same action’ as Trump supporters after the 2020 election.

[….]

Stephanopoulos interjected that Hillary Clinton supporters ‘did not take the same action.’ Police arrested more than 200 rioters in Washington, D.C., in January 2017 as riots ensued immediately after President Trump’s swearing in ceremony. Four businesses underwent “significant damage” due to vandalism, six police officers sustained minor injuries, and one limousine was torched on Inauguration Day, NBC News reported at the time.

Trudeau: Unvaccinated Canadians Are “Extremists” and “Racist”

Published January 3, 2022 by Papa Giorgio

It is funny, because the people who think like this are the real extremists.

The Cults, Language, Revelation, and Secularism (1999)

Published December 29, 2021January 30, 2024 by Papa Giorgio

I dug this gem out of my Microsoft Word due to a conversation on my Facebook. I was planning on going a different direction but after I found this from about 1999 via a debate in a forum on what is still SPACE BATTLES… it was late 99 or early 2000 that I cut my teeth on the Internet via Space Battles. I kept most of my debates from the 4 or so years I was on the forums there… at least my responses. This is one of those early debates — the main point here is that secularism is a religion. (I may add some media when I see fit):

SKEPTIC, YOU SAID:

I don’t know how you can say Jimmy Jones and the Branch Davidians weren’t believers in absolutism and God.

This is easy to say. Both rejected the God of the Bible, period. They were not Christians, period. They were cults who had sex with multiple partners and were power hungry and changed meanings of plain and clear scripture to get their way. This is important, because when anyone deals with a cult member, they need to realize that there is a language barrier. For instance, when a Mormon says he or she believes in Jesus, is this the same Jesus Christianity has preached for 2,000 years? How a bout the Jehovah’s Witness when they say they believe in Jesus?

JESUS

Mormons believe that Jesus is not God, but a god, they are polytheists. They believe that Jesus was born first in heaven in a spiritual body via sexual relations between “Heavenly Father” (God in Mormon terms) and one of his many wives. Lucifer also was a son born by “God” sticking his dingy in one of his wives. By the way, God was once a man like us, and now resides on the planet Kolob (according to the Pearle of Great Price – one of many added Mormon scripture). And be sure that all mentioned here have to take away, change, or add scripture to get their theology to work – just like Hitler and his cronies.

(SEE ALSO: “MORMON GLOSSARY: WORDS HAVE MEANING“)

Jehovah’s Witness’s believe that Jesus was the first created being, that is, Michael the Archangel. Jehovah (God) then created all things THROUGH Michael the Archangel. When Michael came to earth in bodily form he was known as Jesus. And now is not Jesus any longer, but once again under the name and title Michael the Archangel, the first-born.

Jesus, according to the historic Christian faith is God, the creator of everything in heaven and on earth. He is not bound by time-space; for unlike the two before mentioned perversions of plain scripture, Jesus is the Creator of the space-time continuum. He is God Almighty.

SALVATION

Both Jehovah’s Witness’ and Mormons believe that the sacrifices given on the cross by “Jesus” was only in remission of Adam’s original sin, opening the way for these sincere persons to “work” their way into heaven or “salvation.” Jehovah’s Witness’s believe that 100 hundred hours a week of going door-to-door or standing in front of donut shops handing out booklets will one of the many rules sufficient enough to allow them to be resurrected here on earth to live forever more (only 144,000 get to go to heaven). Mormons don’t drink caffeine, cuss, marry in the temple, wear special undergarments, tithe, all in the hopes of making to the “best” heaven.

Christianity teaches that we can do nothing to please God, all our good works are like leaves in the wind, they blow away. Salvation is a gift that only can be fulfilled by an immutable, perfect, gift… man can never attain this in his finite state. Salvation is through Christ alone. This is one of the many proofs that Christianity is divine, that is, if this were a man-made religion, man would have made it conquerable. So like Mormonism and Jehovah’s Witness’ religious construct of lists of items to do for salvation to be attainable, Christianity has no such list. If man had made Christianity, there would be something we could do to please God for our salvation, in fact, we cannot. Christianity is unconquerable by man. (sorry, back to the point).

So when a Jehovah’s Witness or Mormon come to your door and say, “we believe in Jesus,” or, “we believe in salvation,” and, “we are followers of Christ, therefore we are the true Christians,” you can break through the fog by understanding what is meant by terms used.

(From a debate with a J-Dub):

The main problem is that the Watchtower gives ALL truth that is to be believed by the Jehovah’s Witness. I will show an example, and I quote the founder, Charles Taze Russell:

If the six volumes of SCRIPTURE STUDIES are practically the Bible, topically arranged with Bible proof texts given, we might not improperly name the volumes THE BIBLE IN AN ARRANGED FORM. That is to say, they are not mere comments on the Bible, but they are practically the Bible itself….

Furthermore, not only do we find that people cannot see the divine plan in studying the Bible by itself, but we see, also, that if anyone lays the SCRIPTURE STUDIES aside, even after he has used them, after he has become familiar with them, after he has read them for ten years – if he then lays them aside and ignores them and goes to the Bible alone, though he has understood the Bible for ten years, our experience shows that within two years he goes into darkness. on the other hand, if he had merely read the SCRIPTURE STUDIES with their references, and not read a page of the Bible, as such, he would be in the light at the end of two years, because he would have the light of the Scriptures.

Even if you’ve read the Scripture Studies for ten years, and you lay them aside and read the Bible for two years alone, you enter into darkness?!

This is a revealing quote.

It shows how brainwashed Jehovah’s Witnesses are to the fact that the ruling council and president of the Watchtower Society dispense nothing but truth and reality while the rest of humanity who points out the misquotes and misrepresentations are shunned as devils (almost literally).

I will go out on a limb here and say, “if the devil were to create a religious group that undermines the true message in the Bible, would the devil require someone to read the Bible by itself… or would the devil want to add something to it that would interpret everything within?”

Same goes for our current discussion.

When Hitler uses the words Christians, Jesus, church, and the like, you know he had changed the Biblical absolutes to fits his relativistic pantheism/paganism that we know he believed. If Hitler came to our door today passing out tracts talking of Jesus’ non-Jewish heritage and that he was going to finish what Jesus couldn’t, namely the extermination of the Jews, then we would know that this is not Christianity, not absolutes, but fascism at it most perverted. Remember what a philosophy major once said:

“Everything I have said and done in these last years is relativism by intuition…. If relativism signifies contempt for fixed categories and men who claim to be bearers of an objective, immortal truth… then there is nothing more relativistic than fascistic attitudes and activity…. From the fact that all ideologies are of equal value, that all ideologies are mere fictions, the modern relativist infers that everybody has the right to create for himself his own ideology and to attempt to enforce it with all the energy of which he is capable” — Mussolini

Mussolini, Diuturna (1924) pp. 374-77, quoted in A Refutation of Moral Relativism: Interviews with an Absolutist (Ignatius Press; 1999), by Peter Kreeft, p. 18.

This is what Hitler did, Mussolini, Joseph Smith, Charles Taze Russell, Jim Jones, David Koresh, and all others who relativize God’s plainly stated truth to fit their particular needs or situation. And in doing so, they must change, reject, or add to the Bible or the historic Christian faith in order to do so.

SKEPTIC, WHEN YOU SAID:

That I agree with! Claiming a personal revelation can hid a host of evils. But it seems like the religious are more likely to do that then a humanist…. I am also arguing that a humanist who believes he contains within himself the ultimate determination of what is moral, would not do the things that these people did without, at least, the recognition that he is being evil. These nazis, Branch Davidians, terrorists, and kool aid killers are all more dangerous because they believe they are doing good.

I almost fell out of my chair. The Communists killed many, many millions believing they were doing good? God revealing this is not mandated by Mao is it? Special revelation isn’t only from God. One needs only to read the Humanist Manifesto’s or the Communist Manifesto to see revelation without God. Huxley called evolution a religion without revelation. However, there can be revelation in non-belief. For instance, consider the following excerpt from a letter written by Charles Darwin in 1881:

“I could show fight on natural selection having done and doing more for the progress of civilization than you seem inclined to admit…. The more civilized so-called Caucasian races have beaten the Turkish hollow in the struggle for existence. Looking to the world at no very distant date, what an endless number of the lower races will have been eliminated by the higher civilized races throughout the world.”

Charles Darwin, Life and Letters, I, Letter to W. Graham, July 3, 1881, p. 316; cited in Darwin and the Darwinian Revolution, by Gertrude Himmelfarb (London: Chatto & Windus, 1959), p. 343.

Or:

“At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate and replace the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes … will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilized state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro or Australian and the gorilla.”

Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man, 2nd ed. (New York: A. L. Burt Co., 1874), p.178.

How a bout this:

“No rational man, cognizant of the facts, believes that the average negro is the equal, still less the superior, of the white man. And if this be true, it is simply incredible that, when all his disabilities are removed, and our prognathous relative has a fair field and no favour, as well as no oppressor, he will be able to compete successfully with his bigger-brained and smaller-jawed rival, in a contest which is to be carried on by thoughts and not by bites. The highest places in the hierarchy of civilization will assuredly not be within the reach of our dusky cousins, though it is by no means necessary that they should be restricted to the lowest. But whatever the position of stable equilibrium into which the laws of social gravitation may bring the negro, all responsibility for the result will henceforward lie between Nature and him. The white man may wash his hands of it, and the Caucasian conscience be void of reproach for evermore. And this, if we look to the bottom of the matter, is the real justification for the abolition policy.”

Thomas Huxley, Lay Sermons, Addresses and Reviews (New York: Appleton, 1871), pp 20-1.

One more before I head to humanism:

“The stronger must dominate and not mate with the weaker, which would signify the sacrifice of its own higher nature. Only the born weakling can look upon this principle as cruel, and if he does so it is merely because he is of a feebler nature and narrower mind; for if such a law [natural selection] did not direct the process of evolution then the higher development of organic life would not be conceivable at all…. If Nature does not wish that weaker individuals should mate with the stronger, she wishes even less that a superior race should intermingle with an inferior one; because in such a case all her efforts, throughout hundreds of thousands of years, to establish an evolutionary higher stage of being, may thus be rendered futile.”

Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, translator/annotator, James Murphy (New York: Hurst and Blackett, 1942), pp. 161-162.

These seem very revelational, just revelations from nature.

John Dewey, signer of the Humanist Manifesto I, says this regarding education:

education is the fundamental method of social progress and reform…. In this way the teacher always is the prophet of the true God and the usherer in of the true kingdom of God.

John Dewey, Education Today, “My Pedagogic Creed,” (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1897), p. 15, 17.

You see, John Dewey argues that “scientific” education has made the notion of the supernatural “incredible,” and anticipates “the coming of a fuller and deeper religion” – Humanism. Dewey viewed public education as the vehicle to promote this “deeper religions.”

We certainly cannot teach religion as an abstract essence. We have got to teach something as religion, and that means practically some religion…. It is their business to do what they can to prevent all public educational agencies from being employed in ways which inevitably impede the recognition of the spiritual import of science ands of democracy, and hence of that type of religion which will be the fine flower of the modern spirit’s achievement.

Ibid – 1940 edition.

My point as I continue on here is that men are made for revelation, if God’s is thrown to the wayside, some other revelation will take its place. Roy Wood Sellers is also a signer of the Humanist Manifesto I, he says:

The center of gravity of religion has been openly changing for some time now from supernaturalism to what may best be called a humanistic naturalism…. There have been many steps forward in the past, for every age must process its own religion, a religion concordant with its knowledge and expressed of its problems and aims…. The coming phase of religion will reflect man’s power over nature and his moral courage in the face of the facts and possibilities of life. It will be a religion of action and passion, a social religon, a religion of goals and prospects. It will be a free man’s religion, a religion for an adult and aspiring democracy.

Roy Wood Sellers, The Next Step In Religion (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1918), foreword.

Here Sellers makes the case for atheistic, naturalistic Humanism as the next world religion, or revelation. Again:

But the humanist’s religion is the religion of one who says yea to life here and now, of one who is self-reliant and fearless, intelligent and creative. It is the religion of the will to power, of one who is hard on himself and yet joyous in himself. It is the religion of courage and purpose and transforming energy. Its motto is, “What hath man not wrought?” Its goal is the mastery of all things that they may become servants and instrumentalities to man’s spiritual comradeship. Whatever mixture of magic, fear, ritual and adoration religion may have been in man’s early days, it is now, and henceforth must be, that which concerns man’s nobilities, his discovery of, and loyalty to, the pervasive values of life. The religious man will now be he who seeks out causes to be loyal to, social mistakes to correct, wounds to heal, achievements to further. He will be constructive, fearless, loyal, sensitive to the good wherever found, a believer in mankind, a fighter for things worth while…. The religion of human possibilities needs prophets who will grip men’s souls with their description of a society in which the righteousness, wisdom and beauty will reign together…. Loyalty to such an ideal will surely constitute the heart of the humanist’s religion…. If religion is to survive, it must be human and social. It is they who insists upon a supernatural foundation and object who are its enemies. Man’s life is spiritual in its own right. So long as he shall dream of beauty and goodness and truth his life will not lack religion.

Ibid., p. 212, 215-216, 225.

Curtis W. Reese likewise signed the Humanist Manifesto I, he says quite plainly:

Within the liberal churches of America there is a religious movement which has come to be known as Humanism…. There is a large element of faith in all religion. Christianity has faith in the love of God; and Humanism in man as the measure of values…. Hypotheses, postulates, and assumptions in their proper realm are comparable to faith in the realm of religion. In this way I speak of the faith of Humanism.

Edited by Curtis W. Reese, Humanist Sermons, preface and “The Faith of Humanism,” (Chicago: Open Court Publishing Company, 1927), p. v, 39, 40

One last quote, as I could go on ad infinitum, another signer was Charles Francis Potter, he plainly states:

[Humanism] is a new type of religion altogether…. Is Humanism a religion? It is both a religion and a philosophy of culture…. Education is the most powerful ally of humanism, and every American public school is a school of humanism. What can the theistic Sunday-schools, meeting for an hour once a week, and teaching only a fraction of the children, do to stem the tide of a five-day program of humanistic teaching.

Charles Potter, HUMANISM: A New Religion (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1930), p. 3, 114, 128

You can see that one revelation, say, “God exists,” is replaced with another that says, “God does not exist.”

Here is a quote from the famous 1961 court case, Torcaso v. Watkins:

Among religions in this country which do not teach what would generally be considered a belief in the existence of God are Buddhism, Taoism, Ethical Culture, Secular Humanism and others.

See: Washington Ethical Society v. District of Columbia, 101 U.S.App.D.C. 371, 249 F.2d 127; Fellowship of Humanity v. County of Alameda, 153 Cal.App.2d 673, 315 P.2d 394; II Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences 293; 4 Encyclopedia Britannica (1957 ed.) 325-327; 21 id. at 797; Archer, Faiths Men Live By (2d ed. revised by Purinton), 120-138, 254-313; 1961 World Almanac 695, 712; Year Book of American Churches for 1961, at 29, 47.

“Secular Humanism” is official atheism… BTW. It is a religion according to law, and why there are atheist (secular humanist) chaplains in the military.

Humanism is revelation, and just as “absolute” as the other.

Paul Kurtz says, “Humanism is a philosophical, religious, and moral point of view.”
Dewey states, “Here are all the elements for a religious faith that shall not be confined to sect, class or race…. It remains to make it explicit and militant.”

Chesterton said,

“When a man ceases to believe in God he does not believe in nothing, he believes almost in anything.”

And so it is.

2021 EXCERPT

This is from APOLOGETIC PRESS:

Humanism is a religion, and the Supreme Court defined it as such in 1961 (Torcaso v. Watkins, 1961; the word “religion” or “religious” occurs 28 times in the first Manifesto, 1933). While the initial Manifesto is specifically religious, the subsequent humanist documents are not. However, the democratic humanism of the Secular Humanist Declaration (1980), and the “planetary” humanism of Kurtz’s Humanist Manifesto 2000, do not contradict the major premises of the first Manifesto.

The initial Manifesto most plainly declares humanism to be a religious enterprise. The very first section (or article) states: “Religious humanists regard the universe as self-existing and not created” (1933, emp. added). Religionists familiar with the goals and practices of secular humanism may be surprised at the high praise of traditional religion in this seminal treatise:

Religions have always been means for realizing the highest values of life. Their end has been accomplished through the interpretation of the total environing situation (theology or world view), the sense of values resulting therefrom (goal or ideal), and the technique (cult) established for realizing the satisfactory life…. [T]hrough all changes religion itself remains constant in its quest for abiding values, an inseparable feature of human life (Humanist…, 1933, Preface, parenthetical items in orig.).

So the secularist’s problem is not with religion per se, but with religious beliefs and practices that are antithetical to certain humanist norms and objectives. Secularists reject “salvationism,” which they regard as based on mere “affirmation” (Humanist…, 1973). Practically all religion other than humanism falls into the category of religion that humanism would oppose. So, religion must be restructured into a humanist “faith” or belief system.

The first Manifesto unveils the humanists’ desire to reshape modern religion. “The time has come for widespread recognition of the radical changes in religious beliefs throughout the modern world. The time is past for mere revision of traditional values…. Religions the world over are under the necessity of coming to terms with new conditions created by a vastly increased knowledge and experience” (1933, Preface). In a sense, humanists see themselves as saving people from theistic religion: “There is a great danger of a final, and we believe fatal, identification of the word religion with doctrines and methods which have lost their significance and which are powerless to solve the problem of human living in the Twentieth Century…. Religious humanists regard the universe as self-existing and not created” (Preface-Section 1).

Because theistic religion is so “out of date” according to secularists, a mammoth adjustment is in order. Religion of practically every kind must be eliminated or restructured.

Today man’s larger understanding of the universe, his scientific achievements, and deeper appreciation of brotherhood, have created a situation which requires a new statement of the means and purposes of religion. Such a vital, fearless, and frank religion capable of furnishing adequate social goals and personal satisfactions may appear to many people as a complete break with the past. While this age does owe a vast debt to the traditional religions, it is none the less obvious that any religion that can hope to be a synthesizing and dynamic force for today must be shaped for the needs of this age. To establish such a religion is a major necessity of the present. It is a responsibility which rests upon this generation (Humanist…, 1933, Preface).

Humanists seem to have as their primary religious activity expunging God from society and the minds of people (see “Humanists Praise…,” 2007; “‘Church Polling Place…’,” 2006). Only when God is out of the picture may humanists convert all humans to the religion of humanism (and this is precisely what they intend to do; see Ericson, 2006; Lyons and Butt, 2007).

(READ THE REST)

N.Y.C.’s Covid Detention Bill

Published December 27, 2021January 2, 2022 by Papa Giorgio

New York Reportedly Drops COVID Detention Bill, For Now | But We’re All Crazy for Worrying About It

Items referenced:

More Covid and Vaccine Related Studies and Stories

Published December 27, 2021December 27, 2021 by Papa Giorgio

Here’s a video compilation of the original vaccine narrative (aka promise) from early 2021. https://t.co/e82wKb17to pic.twitter.com/W1yRxPkKyI

— Dr. Martyupnorth® – Independent Fact Checker ?? (@Martyupnorth_) December 17, 2021

FIRST, some studies showing how vaccines impede spreading and heart issues…. then some stories.

myocarditis

This first article is via FLOPPING ACES, and is worth reprinting some of it herein:

This was the key figure in a Nature Medicine paper published on Dec 14, 2021. It showed clearly that myocarditis after vaccination (in this case, Moderna dose 2) was higher! than myocarditis after sars-cov-2 infection for people <40.

But the story does not end there…

[Graphic To The Right]

There were a few remaining issues. While the denominator for vaccines is known with precision, the true number of infections is unknown. Many people don’t seek testing or medical care. So the red bar above will be shorter if you used a sero-prevalence (aka the correct) denominator. The authors needed to fix this.

The other problem is that this analysis lumps together men & women, while men have the greatest risk. Well, the authors are back with a new pre-print to fix this point, and here is what they find.

It is now clear for men <40, dose 2 and dose 3 of Pfizer have more myocarditis than sars-cov-2 infection, and this is true for dose 1 and dose 2 of Moderna.
Pfizer boosters (Dose 3) have more myocarditis for men <40 than infection.
Myocarditis post infection is more common as you get older, in contrast with myocarditis post vaccination, which is more common as you are younger (reverse gradients)

But the truth is STILL WORSE than these data.

If the authors fixed the denominator for viral infection (i.e. used sero-prevalance), it would look even worse
If the authors separate men 16-24 from 12-15 and 25-40, it would likely look worst in 16-24 age group.

But regardless, these findings already clearly dispel the true misinformation online: Yes, sorry to break it to you, vaccines can have risks of myocarditis EXCEEDING risks of myocarditis from infection. Pls stop saying otherwise…..

(READ IT ALL)

INCREASED INFECTION RISK

This other story comes by way of RED STATE and deals with how vaccines increase the risk of contracting Omicron:

……In South Africa, nearly every early case of Omicron was in fully vaccinated people, despite only 23.8% of the population being vaccinated at the time. While that data would suggest that vaccinated people are more likely to be infected with Omicron than the unvaccinated, I stopped short of saying that because it was still very early in the spread of Omicron and the data could change. What was clear, though, was that South Africa was in the midst of an outbreak of a new and more transmissible variant.

Again on December 13th, I tackled this myth that Omicron was going to make it worse in the US, by updating that data out of South Africa, this time showing that there was even more data to suggest that not only was Omicron nowhere near as severe as the fear-nibarbital consuming cultists want you to believe. With an astounding 1100% increase in cases, South Africa only had an 8.32% increase in deaths. Again, at the time, South Africa’s vaccination rate was below 25%. Meanwhile, the United States, with more than double the vaccination rate of South Africa, has nearly twice the new caseload and five times the rate of death from COVID than that of South Africa. That data would suggest that being vaccinated makes you more likely to be infected with Omicron than being unvaccinated.

Making such a bold claim was something I still held short of actually doing as I feared earning the undeserved eye of social media fact-checkers, who could ban the link or label it as misinformation. It wouldn’t be the first time a vaccine has made the situation worse either, as admitted by Anthony Fauci early in the pandemic. As I reported December 15th, Fauci said during a Facebook Live event with Mark Zuckerberg in March 2020 that vaccine development must include the potential that vaccines could make people worse. While I had my suspicions that the vaccine may actually make you more likely to be infected with Omicron than being unvaccinated, I was careful to make sure that I made clear I wasn’t specifically stating that.

“Yet, while I claim that the vaccine lacks the efficacy they suggest it has, I have never said that the vaccines could make it more likely that you’re infected with COVID-19.”

Fauci went on to state that vaccines which he supervised the development of, “actually made individuals more likely to get infected.”

Now, data from a new study suggests negative effectiveness, that is the very thing Fauci warned as a potential: a higher likelihood of being infected with Omicron than if you had simply been unvaccinated, 90 days after being vaccinated. The study, entitled “Vaccine effectiveness against SARS-CoV-2 infection with the Omicron or Delta variants following a two-dose or booster BNT162b2 or mRNA-1273 vaccination series: A Danish cohort study,” shows that both mRNA vaccines maintained a better than 50% effectiveness against previous variants of COVID-19, that effectiveness drops to nearly zero 60 days after the vaccine is administered and actually provides a negative response after 90 days. In fact, initial vaccine efficacy against Omicron for both vaccines tested was below that of the effectiveness against Delta after more than 90 days.

When factoring for the confidence interval, both vaccines show a potential of causing negative effectiveness after 30 days, and the data show that only the Pfizer vaccine has results that indicate a positive effect for the first thirty days. Moderna’s vaccine consistently shows the potential of cause in negative results, that is, a higher likelihood of infection, from the date of vaccination forward.

(READ IT ALL)

STORY TIME

These should be taken with the above for a deeper understanding.

USS Milwaukee

Coronavirus Outbreak Sidelines Ship Whose Crew Is Fully Immunized, Navy Says

A coronavirus outbreak aboard the USS Milwaukee, whose entire crew was “100 percent immunized,” has forced the ship to remain in port after a scheduled stop in Cuba barely one week into its deployment, the Navy announced Friday.

An unspecified “portion” of the Milwaukee’s 105-person crew is isolated aboard the ship at Naval Station Guantánamo Bay, according to Cmdr. Kate Meadows, a spokeswoman for U.S. Naval Forces Southern Command. The Navy does not disclose infection counts “at the crew/unit level,” she said in an email.

Some of the personnel who tested positive for the virus have displayed mild symptoms, Meadows said. Officials have not determined whether the highly transmissible omicron variant — which has demonstrated an ability to evade coronavirus vaccines, leading to a surge in breakthrough infections — is responsible for the Milwaukee’s outbreak…..

(WAHINGTON POST)

While there has been an amazing amount of soccer player deaths since forced vaccinations, here are four deaths just in a week:

SOCCER DEATHS

Four young international soccer stars died this week after suffering a sudden heart attack.

Croatian footballer Marin Cacic, Oman international player Mukhaled Al-Raqadi, Egyptian goalkeeper Ahmed Amin, and Algerian football player Sofiane Loukar all died this week, the COVID world reported.

(GATEWAY PUNDIT)

In fact, if this look at past deaths is accurate… all the evidence points to a change recently…. which would be vaccinations:

An investigation of available data shows that worldwide football / soccer match cardiovascular deaths in 2021 are 278% higher than the 12-year average, and analysis further indicates that the vast majority of excess mortality in the UK this year has been due to cardiovascular, immunological and neurological damage caused by the Covid-19 injections.

[….]

SUMMARY:

If you combine –

The 8 year clinical study paper of Dr Steven Gundry given to the American Heart Association in Boston showing that vaccinated people have a 127% increase in Cardiovascular risk
The whistleblowers evidence given to Dr Malhotra
The Analysis of Dr Campbell requiring MRI scans to confirm the results of Dr Gundry, which scans exist according to the whistleblower of Dr Malhotra
The 178% increase in cardio vascular football player deaths this year compared to the 12 year average and many have not even had the vaccine. So the true danger to the vaccinated players is much higher.
The 2:1 ratio of cardiovascular deaths found in the vaxxed compared to the unvaxxed in the original Pfizer clinical vaccine trial
The totally unacceptable yet admitted rises in heart attacks and strokes and myocarditis and pericarditis in children who hitherto have not suffered from such malaises.
The addition of the heart attack drug Tromethamine to children’s Pfizer vaccinations.

Then you are dragged to the inescapable conclusion that mRNA vaccines more than double the heart attack risk in sedentary people and more than triple the rate of heart attacks in athletes (since many wisely remain unvaccinated).

Add to that the extensively documents reduction in effectiveness of vaccinated immune systems; which suggests the fully vaccinated are developing a new form of vaccine induced acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, then you have a charming little cocktail that leaves with about as much chance of extending your life as a large dose of Midazolam.

(DAILY EXPOSE UK)

NURSES SPEAK OUT

The CONEJO GUARDIAN reports:

Ventura County nurses from different sectors and specialties are coming forward to blow the whistle on what they deem serious lapses in local health care practices, mostly related to COVID-related protocols, “vaccine” mandates and politically and financially motivated bullying of medical staff, which these health care workers say is seriously compromising the general quality of local care.

The Guardian spoke with multiple nurses of various ages and at different stages in their careers, all of whom work in medical care settings or hospitals in Ventura County. Each preferred to speak under a pseudonym for now. Each described seriously declining standards of care, atmospheres of intimidation and fear in hospitals, and distrust and disillusionment among medical professionals.

“Before COVID, nurses, staff and the community were confident in treatment modalities and in doctors’ competencies,” says one nurse. But now, “People are confused.”

“They’re very confused,” agrees a veteran Ventura County nurse. “I think doctors are confused.… I don’t think the community’s confident. I’m not.… Because where’s the truth?”

Angela, a nurse for more than 25 years, confirms that in her hospital’s emergency room, they say they are seeing more heart problems in young adults, which are never reported to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) as potential adverse reactions to COVID “vaccinations.”

Another nurse, Jennifer, says ER nurses privately say they are seeing “all the clotting, bleeding and things you would expect from the vaccine six months later — brain bleeds, heart attacks in younger 50-year-olds. No doctor will admit this is from the vaccine. They won’t make the VAERS report.”

When Daniel asked fellow nurses and practitioners if they report to VAERS, they looked at him like, “What’s that?”

“I’ve seen people in their thirties [with these problems], and the doctor’s just like, ‘Oh, you have s—y genes,’” he says. “I’m like, are you kidding me?”

In an updated article, more nurses are speaking out:

After the Conejo Guardian’s report on alarming trends in Ventura County hospitals, more nurses have come forward to affirm the rise in unexplained heart problems, strokes and blood clotting in local vaccinated patient populations. They also say doctors refuse to consider that these could be adverse reactions to Covid shots.

Sam, a critical care nurse at an ICU in a Ventura County hospital, came forward because, “I’m tired of all the B.S. that’s going on,” he told the Guardian. “It’s crazy how nobody questions anything anymore.”

(GATEWAY PUNDIT)

BOOSTER DEATH

This story is about a journalist bragging about getting his booster, with unfortunate side-effects., Take note, I do not post these stories with any sense of glee… just a growing concern of our gullibility:

Sad news is coming from the NY Times as Deputy Asia Editor Carlos Tejada has died from a heart attack. In their 700+ word article discussing his life and career, they mentioned how he died but omitted one extremely important detail.

Tejada, 49, received his booster shot the day before his death. Independent Journalist Alex Berenson reported on his SUBSTACK:

On Dec. 16, in Seoul, South Korea, he received a Moderna mRNA/LNP “booster.” No clinical trials have ever been conducted to examine the safety or efficacy of mixing various types of these vaccines, and Carlos did not give informed consent, as the consent form was in Korean, a language he could not read. He joked that Omicron should “hit me with your wet snot.”

FIRST FROM CARLOS ON HIS TWITTER FEED

THEN HIS WIFE TWEETING ON HER DECEASED HUSBAND’S TWITTER

(UNCANCELLED NEWS)

CBS News’ “Face The Nation”

This isn’t going unnoticed… that is… the failed “super omnia salutem” type policies of the reign of health tyranny are finally drifting into the Sunday shows.

(Latin) super omnia salutem (English) health above all else

This comes by way of RED STATE:

Most of the time, the panel or roundtable portion of any weekly Sunday political program is a lively exchange among the moderator and the panelists. But that wasn’t the case during one segment of CBS News’ “Face The Nation” this week.

As the show does once a year, it convened a panel made up entirely of the news division’s correspondents, ostensibly to review the big stories of 2021 and make some predictions about where those storylines will go in 2022 and beyond.

“They will be paying for our generation’s decisions the rest of their lives”: @JanCBS explains why she thinks 2021’s biggest underreported story was the devastating impact of COVID policies on children pic.twitter.com/AUU1f6AFNi

— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) December 26, 2021

[….]

But at some point in the segment, the panel sat in stunned silence for over a minute-and-a-half, as one of their own spoke the truth about how damaging the lockdowns and other governmental measures have been to our nation’s children. And it’s implicit in her answer that the media is not off the hook for the blatant lack of reporting about it.

[….]

Notice in the video that Brennan was the only one to acknowledge any of what Crawford said, when the reporter mentioned the “mental health crisis among kids,” leading into her sharing that staggering statistic on suicide rates among girls.

RedState has reported on the ways schools have treated children, which verge on child abuse in how they’re implemented. I also previously reported about cities closing skateparks by filling them in with trucks full of sand. And I doubt anyone will soon forget the images of what Crawford described — the playgrounds across the country closed and their gates secured with locks.

Yes, as CBS News’ tweet read, the reporter outlined “the devastating impact of COVID policies on children.” But the unspoken word in that sentence is “Democrat.” It’s been mostly Democrat governors and other officials — elected and unelected — who have imposed the harshest policies during the pandemic, including the ones devastating our young people. It’s not even close.

[See also POWERLINE]

SILENCE TELLS ALL

If this administration knew different and had the health victories they claim…. you would expect the opposite of this lack of openness:

Press Records Show Joe Biden Is The Least Accessible President In Modern History

….Biden also has the distinction of setting the presidential record for the most number of days (64) without holding a single news conference since taking office. The next highest president on that list is George W. Bush, who waited 33 days before giving his first press conference. Former President Donald Trump held his first press conference just 27 days into his presidency.

Biden is now on record as having held six solo “press conferences,” but even that number is misleading, considering that he almost exclusively calls on pre-selected reporters (who need to be granted access to the East Room by his handlers) and often appears to have the answers to their softball questions written down ahead of time.

As of Nov. 20, Biden had held just nine combined solo or joint press conferences in his first ten months in office, and he still has yet to step foot inside the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room, where more reporters would be able to ask him questions. By comparison, Trump held 21 combined solo or joint press conferences in his first year in office, including a whopping 35 solo press conferences in 2020…..

(THE FEDERALIST)

Let’s Go Brandon!

Joe Biden Agrees: “Let’s Go Brandon”

Published December 24, 2021January 2, 2022 by Papa Giorgio

(Jump To Conversation About Video) CNN’s Jeremy Diamond reported to Twitter on Friday that during a call between President Joe Biden, First Lady Jill and children who were calling into NORAD to track Santa, a dad spoke up at the end of the all and said “Let’s go Brandon,” to which the President said “Let’s go Brandon, I agree.” Video actually exists of this incredible moment when the President echoes the sentiment “Let’s go Brandon” and the First Lady laughs. (POST MILLENNIAL)

I just (12-25-2021) combined the two calls:

RUMBLE — Here is the Father’s call and the Presidential side combined for a real time experience. The original video of the father is HERE | And the video used of the President is HERE

JONATHAN TURLEY has written well on the phrase…. here is a partial excerpt:

Below is my column in The Hill on the growing “Let’s Go, Brandon” movement, which is a unique response to what many people view as a bias media. It is the modern equivalent of the adoption of “Yankee Doodle Dandy” by colonists in using what was a contemptuous expression as a rallying cry of defiance.

Here is the column:

Roughly 250 years ago, a political insult by British troops during the American Revolution was converted into a rallying cry by the colonials. “Yankee Doodle Dandy” was intended to mock the Continental Army as unsophisticated dandies, but the maligned militiamen turned it around to mock the British after defeats like Yorktown. The song is a lasting example of how symbols of contempt can become symbols of defiance.

In a curious way, “Let’s Go Brandon!” has become a similarly unintended political battle cry. It derives from an Oct. 2 interview with race-car driver Brandon Brown after he won his first NASCAR Xfinity Series race. During the interview, NBC reporter Kelli Stavast’s questions were drowned out by loud-and-clear chants of “F*** Joe Biden.” Stavast quickly and inexplicably declared, “You can hear the chants from the crowd, ‘Let’s go, Brandon!’”

Stavast’s denial or misinterpretation of the obvious instantly became a symbol of what many Americans perceive as media bias in favor of the Biden administration. Indeed, some in the media immediately praised Stavast for her “smooth save” and being a “quick-thinking reporter.” But the episode was reminiscent of a reporter standing in front of burning buildings during last year’s riots and calling them peaceful protests. Indeed, even the original profane chant seemed directed as much at the media as Biden — creating an undeniable backdrop to news coverage.

The three-word slogan is now emblazoned across tee-shirts, coffee mugs and even billboards. An anti-Biden “Let’s go, Brandon!” hip-hop song hit the top of the charts on iTunes; soon, there were four such songs with the same refrain. The top song was banned on sites like YouTube and Instagram as spreading “harmful false information.” Yet the effort to bar people from listening to the song only fueled the interest and the movement.

The media’s reaction has fulfilled the underlying narrative, too, with commentators growing increasing shrill in denouncing its use. NPR denounced the chant as “vulgar,” while writers at the Washington Post and other newspapers condemned it as offensive; CNN’s John Avalon called it “not patriotic,” while CNN political analyst Joe Lockhart compared it to coded rhetoric from Nazis, the Ku Klux Klan and ISIS.

The more the media has cried foul, however, the more people have picked up the chant………

FB CONVO

JIM G. started out the conversation thus:

I put a laugh emoji on his reply because JIM G. was the #1 #NeverTrumper in my feed. He was a HUGE fan (still is probably) of the Lincoln Project (Red State, TownHall, American Thinker, American Thinker, Twitchy, PowerLine, Powerline, RPT, New York Times, etc.) and spread every article from WaPo and NYT and other MSMs regarding Russian Collusion and the Steele Dossier he could (Real Clear Investigations, Yahoo News, New York Post, The Federalist, New York Post, The Federalist, Breitbart, Law Enforcement Today, Washington Examiner, Fox News, The Federalist, The Federalist, iHeart, Etc).

So, to speak to me about Roman’s 13, which he rips from it’s context to suit his immediate purpose (probably with David French in mind: Red State, Washington Times, Big League Politics, American Mind, American Spectator, Capstone Report, Got Questions, etc.) is laughable to say the least.

So now that you know a bit of the years long MSM peddling, Let’s continue…. referencing his history I ask (I correct some of our misspelling):

RPT: JIM G. what is wrong is spreading lies about a duly elected President and a cockamamie Russian scheme that turned out to be a lie…. as you were told for years. Your continued spreading about, say, the Trump Tower meeting, and I even think you were on board about the Trump contacts with a Russian bank. Those are lies that were a large web of you maligning a sitting President even though many (myself) showing connections to Glenn Simpson and others. Just that example is a far greater faux pas that saying, “let’s go Brandon.” All sin is not equal JIM. And your sins according to Romans 13 are the egregious ones to note.

And for spreading what was known early on to be lies spread by the media, I noted a Scripture that should concern JIM G.

RPT: Proverbs 25:1: “Telling lies about others is as harmful as hitting them with an ax, wounding them with a sword, or shooting them with a sharp arrow.”
JIM G: there was a Trump Tower meeting with Russians during the election. What the motives an intent of those representing Trump were are not clear and remain disputed. As for Trump contacts with a Russian bank, I’m not sure what it is that I said that you perceive was a lie. I never once knowingly said something about Trump that I believed was untrue. If you think you know of a specific time in which I did, I would appreciate you pointing it out so that I can apologize. I mean that sincerely Sean G.

[More on Trump Tower below, but in many conversations on my wall and his I noted much of it over the years]

JIM G. responds: there was clear evidence that Trump welcomed Russia’s efforts to help him get elected and I saw loads of Russian propaganda on social media aimed at helping Trump. Those are not lies.
I respond, RPT: you said: ” there was clear evidence that Trump welcomed Russia’s efforts to help him get elected and I saw loads of Russian propaganda on social media aimed at helping Trump. Those are not lies.”
_______________________
President Donald Trump rejects the narrative that Russia wanted him to win. USA Today examined each of the 3,517 Facebook ads bought by the Russian-based Internet Research Agency, the company that employed 12 of the 13 Russians indicted by special counsel Robert Mueller for interfering with the 2016 election. It turns out only about 100 of its ads explicitly endorsed Trump or opposed Hillary Clinton. [About 50 endorsed Hillary and opposed Trump.] Most of the fake ads focused on racial division, with many of the ads attempting to exploit what Russia perceives, or wants America to perceive, as severe racial tension between blacks and whites.
__________________________
This is not what the investigation (a) showed, that Trump was knowingly welcoming any illegal actions. (b) Nothing about what you just said matches any of your despicable rhetoric for years on Facebook. And (c) not a single vote was shown to have been changed. Even Obama’s own guy noted that, Jeh Johnson.

This is no small belief based on what was then known to be lies and now supported with arrests, FOIA requests, and the like. But to be clear,

Nothing comes close in size, scope or harm to the republic than the years-long effort to cripple Donald Trump’s presidency by claiming he conspired with an enemy state to steal the 2016 election and then do its bidding as commander-in-chief. (REAL CLEAR POLITICS)

A BREAK HERE FOR MY AUDIENCE.

Let us deal with the Trump Tower meeting. I had commented on JIM G’s Facebook wall some portions of the below as most of the information known about the meeting were public even then. JIM G. merely referenced WaPo and the NYT and CNN and other sources he posted were wrong). Here are some examples for the reader:

TRUMP TOWER

The infamous meeting at Trump Tower did not focus on Clinton dirt but on Magnitsky Act, newly released FBI memos show.

(April, 2020, JUST THE NEWS | PJ-MEDIA) …The most scintillating information Mueller’s team ascribed to [Russian translator Anatoli] Samochornov in the report was a tidbit suggesting a hint of impropriety: The translator admitted he was offered $90,000 by the Russians to pay his legal bills, if he supported the story of Moscow attorney Natalia Veselnitskya. He declined.

But recently released FBI memos show that Samochornov, a translator trusted by the State Department and other federal agencies, provided agents far more information than was quoted by Mueller, nearly all of it exculpatory to the president’s campaign and his eldest son.

Despite learning the translator’s information on July 12, 2017, just a few days after the media reported on the Trump Tower meeting, the FBI would eventually suggest Donald Trump Jr. was lying and that the event could be seminal to Russian election collusion.

Samochornov’s eyewitness account entirely debunks the media’s narrative, the FBI memos show.

“Samochornov was not particularly fond of Donald Trump Jr., but stated Donald Trump Jr.’s account with Veselnitskya as portrayed in recent media report, was accurate,” according to the FBI 302 report on its interview of the translator. “Samachornov concurred with Donald Trump Jr.’s accounts of the meeting. He added ‘they’ were telling the truth.”

[….]

Solomon notes that “the belated release of the FBI interview report under a Freedom of Information Act request is likely to raise serious questions among congressional oversight committees about why the information was suppressed in the Mueller report, why the FBI kept it quiet for two years while Trump Jr. was being politically pilloried, and why the news media has failed to correct its own record of misleading reporting.”

Similar reporting at Real Clear Investigations notes well:

(March of 2020, REAL CLEAR INVESTIGATIONS) …..Whatever the suspicions raised by the Trump son’s emailed response, “If it’s what you say I love it,” the meeting didn’t live up to the billing, judging from what the translator told the FBI. Bureau notes show he told agents, “There was no discussion of the 2016 United States presidential election or Collusion between the Russian government and the Trump campaign.” The agent notes also state, “There was no smoking gun according to Samochornov. There was not a discussion about ‘dirt’ on Hillary Clinton. Samochornov did not think Hillary Clinton was mentioned by name.”

Samochornov told the FBI that the meeting was 20 minutes long and focused on the Magnitsky Act, which imposes financial sanctions on wealthy Russians, and related matters. He recounted that Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort was apparently so uninterested in the topic that he used his cellphone under the table throughout, and “five to seven minutes after it began” Trump adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner left. FBI notes also record that “Samochornov was not particularly fond of Donald Trump Jr., but stated that Donald Trump Jr.’s account of the meeting with Veselnitskaya, as portrayed in recent media reports, was accurate.”

Fourteen of the 448 pages of the Mueller Report are devoted to laying out in great detail the chronology and circumstances of the Trump Tower meeting. There are no mentions of Samochornov’s flat denial of collusion or his corroboration of Trump Jr.’s description of the meeting as benign, even though report footnotes list the translator’s FBI interview nine times with little elaboration.

The contents of Samochornov’s “302” – the form used by the FBI to report and summarize agent interviews – were first flagged this month by “Undercover Huber,” a pseudonymous Twitter account dedicated to following Trump-Russia news (not to be confused with Justice Department official John Huber, who was tasked with investigating potential FBI misconduct during the 2016 election). The document, with agents’ names redacted, was posted by the FBI under a federal judge’s order to release on a monthly basis 302s underpinning the Mueller Report, following a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit brought by CNN and BuzzFeed.

Samochornov told the FBI that Veselnitskaya had dangled one piece of potentially partisan political information before the Trump officials – the claim that business associates of William Browder, the American businessman behind the passage of the Magnitsky Act, had made illicit donations to Democratic campaigns. Interview notes state that “Samochornov did not know if the donation(s) were made directly to the Clinton campaign, the Democratic National Committee, or a political action committee.”

This allegation, which was trumpeted by Russian President Vladimir Putin, was false. In November of 2017, Reuters reported that Fusion GPS – the Washington, D.C., opposition research firm paid by the Clinton campaign to compile the debunked Steele “dossier” used by the FBI to obtain warrants to spy on the Trump campaign – had provided Veselnitskaya with the bogus Browder-connected dirt before the Trump Tower meeting

Speculation about Russia collusion involving the Trump Tower meeting abounded in media accounts throughout the 2018 midterm elections, raising questions about whether the Mueller team should have disclosed the translator’s information. Mueller did speak out to correct faulty reporting on another matter that appeared damaging to the president, shutting down a BuzzFeed report alleging Trump had directed his lawyer Michael Cohen to lie to Congress.

The Justice Department declined to comment on the assertions in Samochornov’s 302.

The Mueller Report contains information that supports Samochornov’s credibility. It reports that the translator was involved in civil litigation with Veselnitskaya on an unrelated matter. At one point, Samochornov said, the organization that hired him to work with Veselnitskaya on repealing the Magnitsky Act offered to pay $90,000 worth of his related legal fees – if he would corroborate certain statements made by Veselnitskaya.

“Samochornov declined,” the Mueller Report states, “telling the Office that he did not want to perjure himself.”

The FBI’s 302 also records that he explicitly informed the FBI of his legal entanglement during his interview, and Samochornov has a long track record of working as a translator for the State Department and other government agencies on a contract basis. He has been married to Tatiana Rodzianko, a State Department employee, since 2006.

“Samochornov told the interviewing agents that he would have contacted the FBI if he thought the meeting was nefarious,” according to the 302.

REAL CLEAR INVESTIGATIONS laid out the connections between Glenn Simpson (GPS Fusion) and the people involved in the Trump Tower meeting.

(August 2018, POLITICAL INSIDER) ….In an explosive piece at Real Clear Politics, writer Lee Smith breaks down how the meeting was a setup from the get-go – from the very campaign Veselnitskaya pretended she wanted to help take down. As Lee Writes, ” the first line of evidence includes emails, texts, and memos recently turned over to Congress by the Department of Justice. They show how closely senior Justice Department officials and the Federal Bureau of Investigation worked with employees of Fusion GPS, a Washington-based research firm reportedly paid $1 million by Clinton operatives to dig up dirt on the Trump campaign.”

While Fusion GPS was employing Christopher Steele to compile his anti-Trump dossier, they were also working with Veselnitskaya. In fact, Veselnitskaya met with Fusion GPS’ co-founder Glenn Simpson the day of her meeting with Trump Jr., and the night of the day before. What could they have possibly talked about, if not the meeting?

Lee notes that while Simpson has denied under Senate testimony that he and Veselnitskaya spoke about the Trump Tower meeting, “she has publicly stated that she used talking points [in the Trump Tower meeting] developed by Simpson for the Russian government in that discussion. Kremlin officials also posted the allegations on the Prosecutor General’s website, and shared them with visiting U.S. congressional delegations.” Veselnitskaya mainly talked to Trump Jr. about removing sanctions on Russia during that Trump Tower meeting, hence the talking points mentioned.

So, Fusion was working with Veselnitskaya to help her advance Russian interests – while employing Christopher Steele to claim that it was Trump conspiring with the Russians. “Simpson approached the Clinton campaign through its law firm and said he could dig up dirt on Trump and Russia,” said one congressional investigator. “The difference between the Trump and Clinton campaigns’ willingness to take dirt on its opponent is that the Clintons went through with it and paid for it. While their source, Glenn Simpson, was working for a Russian oligarch.” The oligarch referenced is Denis Katsyv, who attended the Trump Tower meeting with Veselnitskaya.

FORBES has a good article on this as well. Again, old news refreshed:

FUSION AND VESELNITSKAYA

Veselnitskaya, a former prosecutor with ties to the Kremlin, hired BakerHostetler to help Cyprus-based, Russian-steered Prevezon Holdings in court, and the law firm hired Fusion in 2014. Businessman Bill Browder had alleged Fusion acted as an agent for Russian interests when it helped go after him as Putin tried to combat the Magnitsky Act.

Browder, head of Hermitage Capital, championed the Magnitsky Act, named for his tax lawyer and corruption whistleblower Sergei Magnitsky, who died in a Russian prison in 2009 after his investigation allegedly uncovered hundreds of millions of dollars of tax fraud implicating Russian officials.

The Justice Department alleged Prevezon laundered fraudulent money, and the company later settled for $5.9 million in what the department called “a $230 million Russian tax refund fraud scheme involving corrupt Russian officials.” Prevezon was owned by Denis Katsyv, whose father, Pyotr Katsyv, is a Putin ally.

The Justice Department unsealed an indictment against Veselnitskaya, now out of reach in Russia, alleging she’d obstructed justice over her “secret cooperation with a senior Russian prosecutor.”

The Senate Intelligence Committee report said the information Veselnitskaya offered during the Trump Tower meeting “was focused on U.S. sanctions against Russia under the Magnitsky Act” and “was part of a broader influence operation targeting the United States that was coordinated, at least in part, with elements of the Russian government.”

The Senate report assessed Veselnitskaya and Rinat Akhmetshin, who accompanied her, both “have significant connections to the Russian government, including the Russian intelligence services,” and Veselnitskaya’s connections “were far more extensive and concerning than what had been publicly known.”

The report noted they “found no evidence that Veselnitskaya used her ties with Fusion GPS to influence the contents of the dossier,” but the senators nevertheless “sought to understand the significance of Veselnitskaya’s relationship” with Fusion co-founder Glenn Simpson “because of the timing of their interactions.”

Simpson denied any foreknowledge of the Trump Tower meeting despite seeing Veselnitskaya the day before, the day of, and the day after.

(WASHINGTON EXAMINER)

So nothing the media told us about the Trump Tower meeting ended up being legitimate. And the ties to The Clinton Foundation thickens with more evidence and indictments.

KEY POINT: I do not know of a “Russian” that was touted by the MSM at Trump Tower that wasn’t connected to Fusion GPS or the Clinton’s.

And I have pointed this out since 2017.

TO RECAP THE TOWER

The meeting was arranged by a publicist (Goldstone with past ties to the Trumps) who puffed up claims of Clinton wrongdoing with the Russians in order to help the wealthy father of a Russian pop singer.. Goldstone was 100% non-political.
Goldstone made up an email that stated: “The Russian attorney, he wrote, had offered to provide the Trump campaign with “official documents and information” that would incriminate Clinton [in her dealings with Russia from p. 113 of Mueller report which has full email]. “This is obviously very high level and sensitive information,” he added, and was “part of Russia and its Government’s support for Mr. Trump.” So point of meeting was not to concoct a plan to collude with Russia but to find out past Russian dirty dealings with Clinton. [if they existed]
The real reason the wealthy Russian lawyer wanted a meeting was to find a way to repeal the Magnitsty Act which sought to punish Russian human rights offenders. The Russian lawyer who showed up knew zero about any Hillary corrupt activities with Russia and the meeting was simply a ruse to raise Magnitsky act claims.
There was no evidence that Trump knew of the meeting or was informed of it before hand. Also, of course, there was ZERO EVIDENCE of Trump and Russian govt working together. Trump sons were told of potential wrongdoing by Clinton and wanted to know what it was. Entirely legitimate whether obtained from Russian citizens or other sources.

EMAILS SHOW MEDIA COLLUDED:

Corporate Media Damaged Our Nation in Their Attempts to Take Down a Presidency | Truth Over News

MEDIA SHOW CLEAR SIGNS OF PRESS FAILUIRES

How high does the Russia-collusion hoax rate on the scale of U.S. political scandals? Veteran journalist and author, Lee Smith, would say it tops them all. With the Watergate scandal, the American press uncovered corruption and crimes at the highest levels of government, leading to President Richard M Nixon’s resignation. Fifty years on, we find the press fulfilling a much-altered purpose. Lee, author of ‘The Permanent Coup’ and ‘The Plot Against the President,’ joins me to explain why this event represents the darkest chapter in American politics, and the media’s complicity in this.

Rewriting Lincolnian History (Dinesh D’Souza) UPDATED

Published December 23, 2021December 23, 2021 by Papa Giorgio

Both Google and Wikipedia attempt to hide the fact that Lincoln was a Republican by listing him as a member of the “National Union Party.” Is it true that Lincoln left the Republican Party to join some other party?

Now, I don’t know if this has changed within days… but Wiki is on their history [in this example] pretty well (graphic links to Wiki’s article on Abraham Lincoln, and the text is from their article on The National Union Party):

The National Union Party was the temporary name used by the Republican Party and elements of other parties for the national ticket in the 1864 presidential election that was held during the Civil War. For the most part, state Republican parties did not change their name.^[1] The temporary name was used to attract War Democrats and border states, Unconditional Unionists and Unionist Party members who would not vote for the Republican Party. The party nominated incumbent Republican President Abraham Lincoln and for Vice President Democrat Andrew Johnson, who were elected in an electoral landslide.

[1] Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., ed. History of U.S. Political Parties: vol II: 1860–1910 (1973) 2:1287.

(WIKI)

Google however doesn’t “CYA” with the “(Republican)” after The National Union Party like Wiki:

And here is a more humorous… although more true look at what our kids are being taught about Lincoln:

Scandal in Germany (Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics)

Published December 23, 2021December 23, 2021 by Papa Giorgio

The left-wing Mayor of Hamburg was caught lying to justify discrimination against the unjabbed. He claimed the unvaccinated represented 95% of COVID cases. After a Senate investigation, the actual figure was revealed to be 14.3%.

While I like their rants (Paul Watson, Mark Dice, and others) and these commentaries hold much truth in them, I do wish to caution you… he is part of Info Wars/Prison Planet and Summit News network of yahoos, a crazy conspiracy arm of Alex Jones shite. Also, I bet if I talked to him he would reveal some pretty-crazy conspiratorial beliefs that would naturally undermine and be at-odds-with some of his rants. Just to be clear, I do not endorse these people or orgs.

State Sized Chunks Land for a Zero-Carbon Economy

Published December 22, 2021August 6, 2023 by Papa Giorgio

Why were federal tax subsidies extended for wind and solar by Congress? Again. For the umpteenth time! We are against subsidies because they distort markets. Those politicians who support these market-distorting policies should at least be forced to answer the question: “How much is enough?” Taxpayers have been subsidizing wind and solar corporations for more than 40 years! These companies have gotten fat and happy on your money, and Congress keeps giving them more of it. This video is based on a Texas Public Policy Foundation report that explains why it’s long past time to stop wind and solar from stuffing their bank accounts with your tax dollars.

To give you a sense of scale, to replace the energy from one average natural gas well, which sits on about four acres of land, would require 2,500 acres of wind turbines. That is a massive amount of land. You would have to cover this entire nation with wind turbines in an attempt to replace the electricity that we generate from coal, natural gas, and nuclear power, and even that would not get the job done. (CFACT)

This is from a recent BLOOMBERG article:

At his international climate summit in April, President Joe Biden vowed to cut U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030. The goal will require sweeping changes in the power generation, transportation and manufacturing sectors. It will also require a lot of land.

Wind farms, solar installations and other forms of clean power tend to take up more space on a per-watt basis than their fossil-fuel-burning brethren. A 200-megawatt wind farm, for instance, might require spreading turbines over 13 square miles (36 square kilometres). A natural-gas power plant with that same generating capacity could fit onto a single city block.

Achieving Biden’s goal will require aggressively building more wind and solar farms, in many cases combined with giant batteries. To fulfill his vision of an emission-free grid by 2035, the U.S. needs to increase its carbon-free capacity by at least 150%. Expanding wind and solar by 10% annually until 2030 would require a chunk of land equal to the state of South Dakota, according to Princeton University estimates and an analysis by Bloomberg News. By 2050, when Biden wants the entire economy to be carbon free, the U.S. would need up to four additional South Dakotas to develop enough clean power to run all the electric vehicles, factories and more.

Earth Day 2021 is April 22nd. Therefore, eco-activist groups will be preaching the gospel of wind & solar power and the importance of biodiversity. What those trying to “save the planet” fail to understand (or more likely ignore) is that these two priorities are in direct conflict. Wind & solar require far more land than nuclear, natural gas and coal power. They are also far more destructive to regions of high biodiversity as well as large birds, bats and endangered species. As we celebrate Earth Day, let’s consider the significant environmental consequences of attempting to provide electricity through low density, unreliable sunshine and breezes.

Vice President Joe Biden aims to be the most progressive president on the issue of climate change. The man who spent most of 2020 hiding in the basement believes the future of energy is renewable energy like wind and solar. Biden should go back to the basement, watch Michael Moore’s “Planet of the Humans,” and rethink his advocacy for renewable energy. Wind and solar are not the answer, and the idea of converting our fossil fuel-based economy into renewables could be a devastating take-down to society.

Are we heading toward an all-renewable energy future, spearheaded by wind and solar? Or are those energy sources wholly inadequate for the task? Mark Mills, Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute and author of The Cloud Revolution, compares the energy dream to the energy reality.

Remember when Google joined the common sense era?

FLASHBACK

We came to the conclusion that even if Google and others had led the way toward a wholesale adoption of renewable energy, that switch would not have resulted in significant reductions of carbon dioxide emissions. Trying to combat climate change exclusively with today’s renewable energy technologies simply won’t work; we need a fundamentally different approach.

[…..]

“Even if one were to electrify all of transport, industry, heating and so on, so much renewable generation and balancing/storage equipment would be needed to power it that astronomical new requirements for steel, concrete, copper, glass, carbon fibre, neodymium, shipping and haulage etc etc would appear. All these things are made using mammoth amounts of energy: far from achieving massive energy savings, which most plans for a renewables future rely on implicitly, we would wind up needing far more energy, which would mean even more vast renewables farms – and even more materials and energy to make and maintain them and so on. The scale of the building would be like nothing ever attempted by the human race.”

Google Joins the Common Sense Crew On Renewable Energies ~ Finally! (RPT)

What It Would Really Take to Reverse Climate Change: Today’s renewable energy technologies won’t save us. So what will? (SPETRUM)
Shocker: Top Google Engineers Say Renewable Energy ‘Simply won’t work’ (WATTS UP WITH THAT)
Polluting the Beauty and Cleanliness Of Our World With Renewable Energy (RPT)
Wind and Solar More Harmful To Environment Than Helpful (RPT)

Elon Musk Sits Down with Babylon Bee

Published December 22, 2021 by Papa Giorgio

(RIGHT SCOOP hat-tip) The Babylon Bee managed to get an extensive, hour-and-a-half-long interview with Elon Musk where they discuss wokeness, Elizabeth Warren, taxing the rich, the Metaverse, which superhero Elon would be, and how the left is killing comedy. And much more, including apparently if Musk actually accepted Jesus as his Lord and Savior.

You can watch the full interview below. Don’t be turned off by the fact that it’s so long. It’s really quite interesting once you start watching it and it’s hard to stop.

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Religio-Political Talk (RPT)

"I never discuss anything except politics and religion. There is nothing else to discuss." ~ G.K. Chesterton

Author: Papa Giorgio

Is Martin Luther’s “Plague Advice” Good for Covid?

Fauci and Walensky Bow To Science (Finally)

Stephanopoulos Claims Clinton Supporters Didn’t Riot After 2016 Election

Trudeau: Unvaccinated Canadians Are “Extremists” and “Racist”

The Cults, Language, Revelation, and Secularism (1999)

N.Y.C.’s Covid Detention Bill

More Covid and Vaccine Related Studies and Stories

Joe Biden Agrees: “Let’s Go Brandon”

Rewriting Lincolnian History (Dinesh D’Souza) UPDATED

Scandal in Germany (Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics)

State Sized Chunks Land for a Zero-Carbon Economy

Elon Musk Sits Down with Babylon Bee