World News
Scotland’s Sturgeon says safest way to spend Christmas is not to mix households, as UK leaders diverge over Covid guidance
RT – England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales have “unanimously” agreed to keep relaxed Christmas Covid-19 rules in place, the PM said, but Edinburgh and Cardiff have upped their own guidance, advising against household mixing.
Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon and Welsh First Minister Mark Drakeford have both strengthened their guidance for the festive period, amid fears that increased household mixing could cause a Covid-19 resurgence.
Under plans agreed by all four administrations, up to three UK households will be allowed to mix from December 23 to 27.
Speaking on Wednesday, Sturgeon told reporters that Scots should think carefully about their plans during the five days of relaxed restrictions, saying: “Unequivocally, the safest way to spend Christmas this year is within your own household and within your own home.”
Muslim men can sue FBI agents over ‘no-fly list’: US high court
Three men say FBI agents placed them on the no-fly list when they refused to spy on Muslim communities in the US.
Al Jazeera – The United States Supreme Court has ruled that three Muslim men can sue several FBI agents whom they accuse of placing them on the government’s “no-fly list” because they refused to become informants.
In an 8-0 decision on Thursday, the justices upheld a lower court ruling allowing the men, all US citizens or permanent residents who were born abroad, to sue for monetary damages under a 1993 federal law called the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.
The case, which began in 2013, involves New York City residents Muhammad Tanvir and Jameel Algibhah and Connecticut resident Naveed Shinwari.
They said they refused an alleged request by FBI agents to spy on Muslim communities in the US, arguing that doing so would have violated their religious beliefs.
The men claim the agents then placed or kept them on the no-fly list, a secretive US government list of people prevented from flying freely, among other restrictions, on the basis of “counter-terrorism”.
The men, who have since been removed from the list, said their inclusion prevented them from visiting family in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Yemen, harmed their reputations and cost them employment opportunities.
Secretive Switzerland-China immigration deal fuels concern
The controversial agreement allows Chinese authorities to enter Switzerland and bring back to China illegal residents.
Al Jazeera – Switzerland gave Chinese security agents free run inside its borders and the rest of Europe for five years as part of a secretive immigration agreement between the two countries, according to human rights watchdog Safeguard Defenders.
While the agreement officially expired this week, Safeguard Defenders warned that it was up for renewal in a report released on Thursday.
Will Vaccine Refusal Result in a Two-Tier Society?
Activist Post – In the wake of reports from the UK that those who refuse to be vaccinated will be denied access to certain otherwise normal activities, concerns are ramping up that refusing the jab will result in being relegated to the societal trash heap. As reported recently in Reuters regarding Great Britain, “People who refuse a vaccine for COVID-19 could find normal life curtailed as restaurants, bars, cinemas and sports venues could block entry to those who don’t have proof they are inoculated…”
As reported here the vaccine may become mandatory to go to work and as well as to travel in and from the UK.
A number of dystopian sci-fi novels predicted the eventual establishment of a two-tier society, the “acceptables” and the “unacceptables.” In Yevgeny Zamyatin’s classic WE, the “unacceptables” live outside the city limits, behind what is called the “Green Wall.” Those living outside the wall have, in fact, grown fur, a further demarcation of their social distance from their walled-in brethren.
In Eric Gonzalez-Payne’s as yet unpublished and eerily current dystopian science fiction manuscript, Ola Credit, we see an invocation of a social credit system, very much akin to what has been rolled out in China and is being covertly rolled out in the US, which is resulting in certain people being blocked from financial and medical services. The revocation of services by PayPal for numerous independent media websites, including this one, is also redolent of the creation of tiers—the fully vested and those who are not.
World Economic Forum Wants Government, Central Banks, Big Business to Help ‘Vaccinate the World’
Breitbart – The World Economic Forum (WEF) believes a management triumvirate comprising big business, central banks and government can play a “pivitol role” in the global take-up of coronavirus vaccinations.
A WEF report published Tuesday points to the personal records held by big businesses as an asset in identifying those who need the vaccinations, underwritten by banking institutions and globalist organizations like the U.N.-subsidiary World Health Organization providing “tracing apps and digital health passports.”
“Workplace norms and employers that encourage pandemic-time discipline, even after the vaccination programs kickoff, will play a pivotal role in driving continued positive outcomes,” the report posits.
The WEF call came just hours after the Catholic church argued such a vaccine program should not be feared or countered – rather, treated as a natural course of global events.
The WEF paper goes on to say relying on employers is a natural solution, “Given that this is adult vaccination at a scale which we have not done ever before, it is only natural that the workplace will emerge as one of the key hubs for evangelizing and expanding vaccination cover.”
It then points to what it believes the combination of tech, big government, and globalist organizations can achieve:
Governments, central banks and organizations like W.H.O. are hugely supported by enterprises joining the good fight. Public-private partnerships, adopting the ‘all hands-on deck’ approach, have served us tremendously well even as corporations fight their own battle to protect employees, redeploy capabilities to help new pressing needs, steady cashflows and keep the economy running.
From contact tracing apps, digital health passports, technology for safer public spaces, vaccine discovery, logistics capabilities for vaccine distribution to massive philanthropic funding for community support, enterprises are truly partnering nations struggling to tide things over through these trying times.
The WEF urges big businesses to play their part, saying “employment records can serve as a rich source of demographic data – age, ethnicity and occupation, for example – to continue to support equitable vaccination coverage.”
Whether or not there is ever a total acceptance of the vaccine is a problem even the World Economic Forum admits to.
The report concludes “public hesitancy towards vaccination, brought on by a fear of side-effects, is rampant.
“In a June 2020 survey, conducted by the World Economic Forum’s COVID Action Platform, only 71.5% of participan
U.S. News, Politics & Government
Video: Senate holds hearing on election fraud
Watch the Senate’s first federal hearing on “election irregularities”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSPQWemeSfk&feature=emb_title
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, said while announcing the hearing that “a large percentage of the American public does not view the 2020 election result as legitimate because of apparent irregularities that have not been fully examined.”
The goal of the hearing is to “resolve suspicions,” he added.
Trump fires back after McConnell recognizes Biden’s victory: ‘Too soon to give up’
Fox – It took more than 14 hours, but President Trump finally publicly responded to a speech by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell in which the Trump ally and fellow Republican congratulated President-elect Joe Biden on his White House victory.
“Mitch, 75,000,000 VOTES, a record for a sitting President (by a lot). Too soon to give up. Republican Party must finally learn to fight. People are angry!” Trump wrote on Twitter early Wednesday morning, as he re-tweeted an article from the Daily Mail that was headlined “MAGA turns on Mitch.”
The story spotlighted quotes and tweets from high-profile Trump supporters who blasted McConnell after he made his comments on the floor of the Senate recognizing Biden’s victory. McConnell, the longtime GOP senator from Kentucky who has led the Senate for the past six years, gave his speech the morning after the Electoral College formalized Biden’s victory over the president in last month’s election.
McConnell also asked his Republican colleagues in the Senate not to try and contest the election results on Jan. 6, when a joint session of Congress formally accepts the Electoral College count. While some strong Trump allies in the House plan to call for a debate, McConnell’s move effectively ends any hopes of a last-minute reprieve for the president. A majority of both houses of Congress would be needed to upend the election results.
Julian Assange Has Formally Requested a Pardon From President Donald Trump
Gateway Pundit – Julian Assange formally requested a pardon from President Donald Trump on Tuesday morning, the Gateway Pundit can now reveal.
People from across the political spectrum have called on President Trump to pardon the WikiLeaks founder, citing the importance of the freedom to publish.
Assange’s fiancé Stella Morris, the mother of his two young children, has previously called for a pardon — but a formal request was not filed with the White House until this week.
Assange is imprisoned in the United Kingdom pending a decision about his extradition to the United States where he faces charges under the Espionage Act for his publication of the Iraq and Afghan War Logs. If convicted he could face a maximum sentence of 175 years for the “crime” of publishing material that the US government did not want the population to know.
Trump asking about potential special counsel to investigate Hunter Biden after Barr resignation
Fox – President Trump is talking to advisers about asking for a special counsel to be appointed to continue investigating Hunter Biden, the son of President-elect Joe Biden, according to a report.
The news, reported by the Associated Press, comes as Trump’s days in office dwindle and questions swirl about how a Biden administration would handle the ongoing Justice Department investigation into Hunter Biden. The president-elect has dodged repeated questions about the investigation into his son since it became public this month.
Hunter Biden said in a statement last week that the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Delaware is investigating his “tax affairs” and that he is taking the matter “very seriously” and is “confident” he handled his affairs “legally and appropriately.”
According to the Associated Press, Trump has spoken with White House Counsel Pat Cippalone and chief of staff Mark Meadows about whether he should push to have incoming Acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen appoint a special counsel on the matter. Rosen is taking over the Justice Department after Trump said earlier this week that Attorney General William Barr is leaving the department.
The president said in a tweet that his relationship with Barr “has been a very good one.” But the resignation came on the heels of Trump expressing outrage that the investigation into Hunter Biden had not been made public before the presidential election.
Michigan election irregularities prompt deeper investigation by oversight panel
Fox – Michigan panels granted subpoena powers to continue election probe
Michigan’s legislation bodies granted the state’s Senate and House oversight committees subpoena powers Tuesday, allowing state officials greater range to investigate allegations of irregularities in the 2020 presidential election.
“I’ve maintained that it is vitally important as we go forward in Michigan to ensure our election procedures are transparent, efficient and trustworthy when people go to the polls,” state House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Matt Hall, a Republican, said in a statement. “This stance isn’t a partisan one. It’s something we all should strive for.”
The resolution passed by both the House and Senate, with one Senate Democrat reportedly crossing party lines, allowed subpoenas to be issued to Susan Nash, the Livonia city clerk, and Detroit City Clerk Janice Winfrey, for all “information and communications” relating to the Nov. 3 election.
The counties are being asked to hand over all information used by the Absentee Voter Counting Board, hard drives, all communication between poll workers, the list of workers hired to be adjudicators, scanners, and voting machines, according to the subpoenas obtained by Just The News.
Hall told Fox News prior to the Dec. 2 hearings that the intention of the oversight committees was not to overturn the election results, which showed Democrat Joe Biden beat President Trump by 154,188 votes in the Great Lake State.
150 Minnesota businesses vow to defy COVID-19 restrictions: ‘An illegal and unlawful order’
Fox – A group of restaurant owners in Minnesota are not backing down as the state may adopt new coronavirus restrictions.
“When they did our first shutdown, it didn’t feel right in my gut that they were doing this and I went to other business owners around me and said, ‘Would you open up with me?’ and they were too afraid and, of course, at that time, the virus was still very new,” Jane Moss, owner of the Boardwalk Bar & Grill, told “Fox & Friends.”
Gov. Tim Walz is expected to give an update on his decision for the expiring COVID-19 restrictions this Wednesday. According to CBSN, several business owners are defying the restrictions whether he permits them to reopen or not.
Moss is part of the Reopen Minnesota Coalition, an effort that began in the spring, consisting of 150 bars, restaurants, gyms and other businesses that plan to defy coronavirus restrictions even if the governor extends his latest orders.
“We just didn’t know if we would even have a workforce because of the unemployment benefits that they were getting at that time — the extra $600 a week, so we waited it out. And, but, this second one is killing us.”
Economy & Business
McConnell, Pelosi both optimistic that budget, coronavirus relief deals are near
McConnell would not commit to a dollar amount for a deal that some project could cost around $1 trillion
Fox – Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell voiced optimism for deals on both general spending and on coronavirus stimulus Tuesday night, after he and other congressional leaders ended their talks for the evening.
The lawmakers face a Friday deadline for passing a spending plan to avoid a government shutdown and are also seeking an accord to provide aid – both to small businesses hammered by coronavirus-related disruptions and to millions of Americans who’ve lost their jobs because of the pandemic.
McConnell told reporters on Capitol Hill that Republicans were getting “closer and closer” to an agreement with two top Democrats, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.
“We’re making significant progress and I’m optimistic that we’re gonna be able to complete an understanding sometime soon,” McConnell said after emerging from his office around 10 p.m. ET.
McConnell would not commit to a dollar amount for a deal that some project could cost around $1 trillion.
“I’m not gonna get into details but we’re getting closer,” McConnell reiterated. “And as I’ve said all week and I’ll say again tonight – you’re tired of hearing it – everybody wants to finish. Everybody wants to get a final agreement as soon as possible. We all believe the country needs it. And I think we’re getting closer and closer.”
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said the tone of the talks has been positive.
Major US investment index to drop 10 Chinese stocks blacklisted by Trump
RT – American index provider MSCI has followed other global peers in the removal of securities of Chinese firms that have been blacklisted by the outgoing Trump administration.
In a statement, MSCI said that it will delete ten Chinese companies from its Global Investable Market Indexes (GIMI), as well as from related non-market capitalization weighted indexes and from relevant custom indexes. The move, that targets China’s top chipmaker SMIC, as well as China Communications Construction and Hangzhou Hikvision among others, is set to come into force “as of the close of business on January 5, 2021.”
The stock index said that it decided to move ahead with the decision after extensive consultations with market participants. According to MSCI, investors believed that the US’ blacklisting could effectively “challenge the investability” and limit opportunities to transact in the impacted securities.
Energy & Environment
Gates, Amazon back hydrogen plane startup
CNN – A California-based startup that promises to make zero-carbon flight a reality has just received a major vote of confidence.
ZeroAvia, a company developing hydrogen-electric technology to power aircraft, said Wednesday that it’s raised $21.4 million from investors including Amazon (AMZN), Shell (RDSB) and Breakthrough Energy Ventures, a company established by Bill Gates in 2015.
It has also secured $16.3 million from the UK government and is partnering with British Airways to help the airline speed up the switch from fossil fuels to hydrogen to power its fleet. Taken together, three-year-old ZeroAvia has announced new funding of $37.7 million in less than a week.
CEO Val Miftakhov said in a statement that the “milestone achievements are closing the gap for the airline industry to begin its transition away from fossil fuels.”
“Both aviation and the financial markets are waking up to the idea that hydrogen is the only meaningful path towards large-scale, zero-emission commercial flight,” he added.
Airlines are facing growing pressure to tackle a rapid rise in greenhouse gas emissions caused by the industry, which contributes to global warming and climate disasters. Hydrogen fuel is seen as critical to decarbonizing air transport, with the potential to reduce aviation’s carbon emissions by up to 50%, according to Airbus (EADSF), which is also exploring its potential.
Ikea selling tiny homes during COVID-19 pandemic as more Americans leave cities
Fox – The tiny home trend keeps getting bigger.
Swedish furniture retailer Ikea is the latest to launch customized trailers with everything a homeowner needs to live their best life. That includes eco-friendly features like solar panels, composting toilets and an on-demand heated water supply.
Inside, inhabitants will get a queen-size bed, fold-flat couch and storage. Home designers can outfit the space with their own furniture, or try their hand at building it themselves via Ikea.
The trailer is a customized version of RV builder Escape’s Vista Boho XL model. It’s part of the Ikea Tiny Home Project, with home prices starting at $47,550, Lonely Planet first reported.
Ikea’s first custom tiny home took just 60 days to build and was made with a focus on renewable and reusable materials, designed to be both functional and ascetically pleasing.
Science & Technology
NYPD To Deploy Robotic Dog To Combat Criminals
ZeroHedge – According to ABC7 in New York, the New York Police Department (NYPD) is set to receive a new Boston Dynamics robot dog with special features, including an arm to open doors and move objects.
“This dog is going to save lives, protect people, and protect officers and that’s our goal,” NYPD Technical Assistance Response Unit Inspector (TARU) Frank Digiacomo told ABC7.
Dubbed “Digidog,” the Boston Dynamics robot weighs 70 pounds and is able to move at a maximum 3 mph.
“This robot is able to use its artificial intelligence to navigate things, very complex environments,” NYPD TARU’s Deepu John said.
This is the department’s only robot dog, and during the latest testing phase, it has been used a few times in the field. The existence of the robot came to light in late October after it assisted in a suspect’s arrest in Brooklyn.
This particular robot model, known as Spot, has been put to work in other applications this year, including work on an oil rig, nuclear power plant, car plant, and military base.
Digidog is capable of two-way communication and could also be used by NYPD to enforce mask-wearing – this was seen earlier this year in Singapore.
Virgin Galactic poised for launch from Spaceport America
Al Jazeera – Richard Branson’s space tourism company Virgin Galactic is poised for a key test flight of its two-part launch vehicle, a step that could move it closer to offering regular trips to the edge of space for the ultimate sightseeing tour.
With the launch delayed for more than a month because of COVID-19 restrictions, the company will have from December 11th through the 24th to complete the mission – the first launched from its New Mexico launch site at Spaceport America.
On the task list will be an assessment of improvements to the horizontal stabilisers and to the flight control system that enables the pilot to manipulate them.
The reusable system comprises a double-hull plane called VMS Eve that will carry the crewed passenger vehicle SpaceShipTwo Unity beneath the midpoint of its expansive wings.
Eve transports Unity high into the atmosphere where the passenger craft then separates and proceeds along a suborbital trajectory on its own power.
Health
Unlike UK, U.S. FDA Allows Pregnant and Nursing Women to Receive Experimental Pfizer COVID Vaccine
Health Impact News – The U.S. FDA has given emergency use authorization (EUA) to the experimental Pfizer COVID mRNA vaccine, a type of vaccine that has never before been authorized for use in humans.
The FDA’s EUA for the Pfizer COVID vaccine follows an emergency use authorization in the U.K. about 10 days ago.
Both governments have issued guidelines for the new vaccines, one set of guidelines for doctors and healthcare providers who will administer the vaccine, and a shorter set of guidelines for “recipients” who plan on taking the vaccine.
Even though these guidelines cover the same vaccine from the same company (Pfizer), there are notable differences.
The UK guidelines, issued by the UK Department of Health and Social Care and the Medicines & Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, give strict warnings to doctors NOT to give the vaccine to women who are pregnant or nursing, or to women planning on becoming pregnant, with a warning about potential infertility issues.
Unfortunately, the U.S. FDA’s guidelines for doctors (at the time of this writing) contain no such warning to not give the Pfizer experimental COVID vaccine to pregnant, lactating, or women trying to become pregnant.
RFK, Jr. Warned FDA Three Months Ago About Ingredient in Pfizer COVID Vaccine
Green Med Info – An investigation this week identified polyethylene glycol (PEG) as the likely reason two people in the UK suffered anaphylaxis after receiving Pfizer’s COVID vaccine. In September, CHD Chairman RFK, Jr. warned the FDA that PEG in COVID vaccines could lead to severe allergic reactions.
On Dec. 2, Britain’s Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) became the first in the world to approve a COVID-19 vaccine developed by Germany’s BioNTech and Pfizer.
A mass vaccination campaign that targeted frontline workers to receive the vaccine began on Dec. 8. Within 24 hours of launching the campaign, MHRA acknowledged two reports of anaphylaxis and one report of a possible allergic reaction.
Reuters reported late yesterday afternoon that an investigation into the anaphylactic reactions by MHRA has identified polyethylene glycol, or PEG, as the likely culprit.
Imperial College London’s Paul Turner, an expert in allergy and immunology who has been advising the MHRA on its revised guidance, told Reuters: “The ingredients like PEG which we think might be responsible for the reactions are not related to things which can cause food allergy. Likewise, people with a known allergy to just one medicine should not be at risk.”
It was also reported that PEG, which helps to stabilize the shot, is not in other types of vaccines.
The statements by Turner that “PEG is not in other types of vaccines” and that people with allergies to “just one medicine should not be at risk” are a failed attempt to provide false assurances and are patently untrue.
Moderna, Pfizer/BioNTech and Arcturus Therapeutics COVID vaccines all utilize a never-before-approved messenger RNA (mRNA) technology, an experimental approach designed to turn the body’s cells into viral protein-making factories. This technology involves the use of lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) that encapsulate the mRNA to protect them from degradation and promote cellular uptake.
The LNP formulations in the three COVID-19 mRNA vaccines are “PEGylated,” meaning that the vaccine nanoparticles are coated with a synthetic, non-degradable and increasingly controversial PEG.
COVID mRNA vaccines are not the only vehicle for PEG involvement in COVID-19 vaccine production. Researchers at Germany’s Max Planck Institute report developing a process for COVID-19 vaccine production to purify virus particles at “high yield.” The process involves adding PEG to a virus-containing liquid and passing the liquid through membranes.
On Sept. 25, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., chairman and chief legal counsel for Children’s Health Defense (CHD), notified the Steven Hahn, director of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Dr. Peter Marks director of FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research and Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases, of the serious and possibly life-threatening anaphylactic potential of PEG.
In earlier communications with Moderna scientists regarding the controversial use of PEG in the company’s COVID-19 vaccine due to the potential for life-threatening anaphylaxis and need for pre-screening for PEG antibodies prior to vaccine administration, they insisted that the existence of PEG antibodies was purely hypothetical and underserving of concern:
“Pre-screening populations based on hypothesized biomarkers, such as anti-PEG antibodies, is not a strategy currently employed in our clinical trials.”
Given the recent evidence of PEG anaphylaxis in Pfizer mRNA vaccine recipients, I wonder if FDA and vaccine manufacturers will now reconsider their position.
An extensive review of PEG therapeutics, published in 2013, documented adverse effects of PEGylation and questioned the wisdom behind the continued use of PEG in drug development. The authors concluded that “the accumulating evidence documenting the detrimental effects of PEG on drug delivery make it imperative that scientists in this field break their dependence on PEGylation.”
The statement by Turner that “people with a known allergy to just one medicine should not be at risk,” is also not true.
A 2018 study, “Immediate Hypersensitivity to Polyethylene Glycols and Polysorbates: More Common Than We Have Recognized” reports there are more than 1,000 products, including prescription drugs, that contain PEG. (See chart below for detailed descriptions of PEG containing drugs.)
The decision to allow people with other medication allergies to receive vaccines that utilize PEG in the manufacturing or delivery of the vaccine is a very risky proposition — especially given that Pfizer has said people with a history of severe adverse allergic reactions to vaccines or the candidate’s ingredients were excluded from their late stage trials.
We have no idea what the incidence of allergy or anaphylactic reactions will be once Pfizer begins global distribution of the vaccine, without such exclusions.
A 2016 study reported detectable and sometimes high levels of anti-PEG antibodies in approximately 72% of contemporary human samples and about 56% of historical specimens from the 1970s through the 1990s. The population’s increased exposure to PEG-containing products since the 1990’s makes it natural to assume that anti-PEG antibodies will continue to be widespread.
As approval of PEGylated mRNA vaccines for COVID-19 occurs, the uptick in exposure to injected PEG products will be unprecedented and potentially disastrous.
While four out of five doctors regularly prescribe PEGylated drugs, only one out of five are aware of the potential for anti-PEG antibody responses. And only a third even know that PEG is in the drugs that they are prescribing.
A Vanderbilt University researcher agrees that there is a widespread lack of recognition that PEG hypersensitivity is possible, much less that it manifests on a regular basis. While it has been recommended to screen patients for anti-PEG antibody levels “prior to administration of therapeutics containing PEG” such testing is currently only available in research settings.
In a declaration effective Feb. 4, the Secretary of Health and Human Services invoked the Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act (PREP Act) and declared Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) to be a public health emergency warranting liability protections for covered countermeasures, including vaccines.
The fact that the FDA has abdicated its responsibility for assuring the safety of COVID vaccines to vaccine manufacturers means we are on our own to study the science, and weigh the benefits and risks of all drugs and vaccines.
CHD will continue to monitor this important safety issue in an effort to keep you well informed on the science and public policies surrounding COVID-19 vaccine development.
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