Coronavirus Pandemic

[Letters]

You've repeated what you have repeated so many times before. I've dealt with it many times before. How many times will suit you?

I don't know what you're talking about. Which part of my post do you actually disagree with?

The narrative is falling to pieces in front of your eyes.

What narrative? That Covid is deadly for everyone and we all need to hide under our beds? That's a straw man. No-one who has looked at the data believes that.
As I said, there may have been some hysterical over-reactions. But the push back against that is now that this was just a sniffle and no action was necessary.
Why is everything so binary with you? There's a huge middle ground between "we needed to lock everything down for a year" and "it was just a sniffle".
You seem to be claiming the latter, but you are using meaningless data to justify it.
Not many people died just from Covid. OK, so what? There's a significant percentage of the population who are elderly and/or have comorbidities and are thus at risk. Should we have just thought "sod 'em, they shouldn't be so old or ill!". Should we have tried to just protect them and let the rest of us get on with it? That's an approach I think makes sense in principle, but in practice in a complicated interconnected society it's not simple to do that.

But you claim it's because the state has been following data (that is being discredited as we speak by the very same organisations that blasted it out 24/7) and it's perfectly reasonable restrictions are being lifted (not that we were talking about restrictions, but whatever).

They have clearly been following the data. If you look at the data and when restrictions have been imposed and relaxed then the correlation is clear.
That doesn't mean I think they've got things right. Shutting down the country for a year was an overreaction which will cause more harm than it did good.
But I do think some response was required.

It's just another one of those wild coincidences that Boris the libertarian has leaped into action at this particular moment.

Of course it isn't. He's finally under some real pressure, it looks like there might actually be some consequences for him this time (although gut feeling is he's going to get away with it. Again). So sure, the timing of this announcement is suspicious. But the point you are repeatedly failing to acknowledge is that the restrictions have come and gone as the situation has changed. Your claim was that this was a slide into totalitarianism - checkpoints, curfews, the army on the streets. That didn't happen. It was never going to happen. Because our government aren't interested in controlling or oppressing us in the way you suppose - that's the underlying assumption which you are wrong about and that's what led you to the wrong conclusions.

So many coincidences. A few people got rich. Happens. Again. And again. And again. It's the constancy of coincidence, that makes it so commonplace. Really. There's nothing to see.

You've said this a load of times and every time I've responded the same way so I guess I'll do so again. No, of course it's not a coincidence. Of course any situation like this will be used by certain people to enrich themselves.
Who are you arguing against here?

[Niall_Quinn]

According to the "meaningless" data (that has been sanctified and made holy) the average age of people dying from covid was 81.5 yrs, beyond the average life expectancy.

[Letters]

It’s not the data you look at when considering whether Covid demanded a response
When such a large percentage of the population are at risk because of age or the infamous “underlying health conditions” that needs to be considered.
It’s not just about deaths either, I’ve related the conversation I had with an ICU doctor. The people in his ward last winter weren’t all elderly but they were putting pressure on his ward that he’d never seen before. That has an effect.

As I’ve said, I think the response was all wrong, but I think there needed to be one.

[Niall_Quinn]

God almighty. The endless drone about a single ICU doctor. On the one hand you talk data (apart from the bits you need to be "meaningless"), on the other it's anecdotal. The data (even the official stuff) confirms the death rate in people under 64 with no other conditions is miniscule. This became known quite rapidly as real doctors from Italy started speaking out. They told us those at risk were the elderly, especially those already in poor health. We knew that at a very early stage of the game.

So governments all around the world threw sick people into care homes, culled the elderly and then forced mandates and drugs from criminal organisations on the healthy. That's not just the "wrong" response, it's criminal negligence at best and premeditated at worst. $1,000 per second. That's the profit being reaped by the drug pushers, according to one report today. Another "unfortunate" mistake. The doctors at Oxford wanted to give the vaccine away, then Billy Gates swept in and locked it all down, set up the revenues streams and then restricted access to the wealthy economies. These aren't minor mistakes and the consequences are enormous, the ones we can guess at and the ones yet to materialise.

The CDC then told us the actual death rate in the States followed a similar pattern, and more recently confirmed that natural immunity is at least as effective (if not better) than the experimental drugs.

Meanwhile all the fucking nurses were dancing on TikTok, the NHS was barring the door to cancer patients and the BBC was celebrating a 150K death toll as it explained how deadly the mild cold Omicron is. FFS! This is so bad it had to be by design.

At the very least, if we go with your incompetence theory, everyone involved should be sacked (because they are a clear and present danger to the rest of us) and prosecuted, so we can be sure this was just a series of mistakes and not deliberate. Or would even that be too much? Should they all walk free, bank their immense profits and then take the wheel again to drive us to the next emergency?

This is absolutely ridiculous. How has it come to the point where so many people can look at this devastating shambles and think a stiffly worded letter of complaint or a different tick in a mock election is the best way forward? I guess these are the same people who think the world's about to flood and the only think that can stop it is to transfer more wealth to the 0.1%

[Letters]

On the one hand you talk data (apart from the bits you need to be "meaningless"), on the other it's anecdotal.

It's both.
Overall, data wins. Obviously. Although you have to interpret it correctly as it can be misinterpreted to suit certain agendas.
But you asked previously if I found the data plausible. I said yes and explained why - part of the why is the anecdotal stuff. The anecdotal evidence from people I know makes the data I see plausible.
And fine, I retract the comment about the data being meaningless - it does mean something, it means that Covid isn't going to kill you on its own unless you're very old and frail. But that's not the only thing I would be looking at if I was in charge of formulating a response to Covid, or assessing whether any response was required.

They told us those at risk were the elderly, especially those already in poor health. We knew that at a very early stage of the game.

Right. This has never been in dispute. Although younger people in poor health are at risk too. A friend's wife - I don't know her age, early 50's I think - was in hospital for some time with Covid last year because she has the infamous "underlying health conditions". Fine, she didn't die, but it knocked her sideways. I bumped into a mate on Saturday. Think he's mid-fifties. He told me Covid knocked him out for a couple of months last year. I don't think he's in particularly poor health. The data on hospitalisations and excess deaths last winter and anecdotal evidence makes me think this was something which required a response. But I don't think it needed locking down the entire country for a year.

At the very least, if we go with your incompetence theory, everyone involved should be sacked (because they are a clear and present danger to the rest of us) and prosecuted, so we can be sure this was just a series of mistakes and not deliberate. Or would even that be too much? Should they all walk free, bank their immense profits and then take the wheel again to drive us to the next emergency?

I don't particularly disagree with that - or the paragraphs I haven't quoted.

This is absolutely ridiculous. How has it come to the point where so many people can look at this devastating shambles and think a stiffly worded letter of complaint or a different tick in a mock election is the best way forward? I guess these are the same people who think the world's about to flood and the only think that can stop it is to transfer more wealth to the 0.1%

Again, I don't particularly disagree but what do you think we can actually do about this?
Shelves of shelves of books will be written about all this. It will be interesting to see, when the smoke has cleared, what historians make of all this.

My main issue with you during all this was the thought that this situation was being used as an excuse to control us.
I've never seen it that way, the response has varied as the situation has. Right now it's pretty much back to business as usual - they had plenty of excuse to lock us down again with the case numbers if they really wanted to. It's lamentable how poor the response has been, but that's what you get when you elect an incompetent person because he has funny hair

[Niall_Quinn]

You can't really believe this is about Boris Johnson and the Tories. Not really. You're just saying that to try to annoy me. The other lot wanted to go full Gestapo. So I'd say if you are looking for a political (or theatrical) solution your choice is the frying pan or the fire.

If control isn't the aim then why do we always end up with more restrictions and less wealth each time one of these euphemisms hits? When coincidence can be guaranteed, when is it time to call it design? Chart the path from September 2001 through to today, stopping at each "emergency" and tell me who benefited, who paid and what our glorious leaders did to rectify and fortify our societies against repeat events.

911 (the one where a man in a cave solved a loss making property problem in New York), the war against the intangible. Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria and almost (averted by a man with funny hair) Iran. Where are they now? We know mistakes were made in Afghanistan and it was expensive and British lives were lost and possibly a few foreigners died too. British Aerospace, John Major, Tony Blair, reluctantly cleaned up (and I don't men the mess). Osama was caught and thrown overboard before anyone could grab a camera. Taliban opened scene 1, Taliban took the final curtain. Lessons learned (so the claim goes). Will never happen again, unless our vital interests in (gets map) - Ukraine! - are threatened.

What did the BBC have to say about all this?

The financial crash (the one where big finance got so rich we had to blame black people who wanted a house). Too big to fail, even though they failed spectacularly because they were too big and out of control. Banks are now bigger and more out of control than ever and precisely zero steps were taken to ensure an entire nation can never be held to ransom again. All played out in plain view. Everyone knows who stole the wealth of nations. Everyone knows who got the bill. Solution? Invite a new pig in lipstick play lead. Now the global economy resembles the world's largest dam holding back the extinction event tidal wave of printed debt that will be paid to mindlessly irresponsible criminals by our kids, their kids and every kid to come until we stop grovelling.

What did the BBC have to say about all this?

The pandemic (the one where western leaders mysteriously caught the same urge to murder old people). We're still in this one. I wonder. Who will benefit? Who will pay. What steps will be taken to... yeah, it'll be the same. Except this particular robbery has come with a twist - they're not just boosting our wallets this time. It's big pharma's stint at the trough and they are giving the banksters, Boeing and Raytheon a run for their money. The NHS here, a few thousand expensive old crocks there (probably Brexit voters anyway), small businesses (don't panic, no major corporations were harmed during the production), suicided kids, an anticipated drop in life expectancy to close the gap with that lamentably low retirement age. But nothing major. It's all good, from the only perspective that counts.

What did the BBC have to say about all this?

Not sure if the cyber pandemic is going to be a major production or mood music for the interlude. But it'll solve the problem of the impossibly unbalanced books. Just burn the books. Genius. And a nice palate cleanser for the big one...

Global warming (the one where non-melting ice and the unsinkable Maldives formalised the tried and tested). You think government is a a problem now? Wait until you experience it going global.

And what does the trustworthy David Attenborough have to say about this?

Does it really take so many experts to tell us what we already know? Even if we can't admit it to ourselves? There can't possibly be another way, because the experts told us so.

[Letters]

You can't really believe this is about Boris Johnson and the Tories. Not really. You're just saying that to try to annoy me.

Well, I'm not. If the response to this pandemic hasn't been defined by Boris et al then who has it been? They're the government.
Are you suggesting that were Labour in power the response would have been exactly the same? I don't see how that can be true given that the "other lot" as you call them have been pretty clear that they'd have done things differently as you noted yourself.
The other lot wanted more decisive action before last Christmas. They were right. Boris's "do nothing and hope it all goes away" approach worked out horribly. He went double or quits this year and seems to be getting away with it, partly because Omicron seems to be much milder, partly because we have collectively built up immunity (you can debate whether that's because of natural immunity or the vaccine, I'd suggest it's a combination of the two).

If control isn't the aim then why do we always end up with more restrictions and less wealth each time one of these euphemisms hits?

I'm interested in the "more restrictions" bit. The last Covid restrictions are being lifted tomorrow. There may be some lingering stuff but I think it's pretty much back to business as usual, isn't it? We haven't slid into the dystopian regime you imagined. What freedoms did we have 5 years ago - or 10 or 50 or however long you want to go back - that we don't have now?

You object to the principle of a government that can make a law which says you can't see your family. Well OK. But that isn't some new thing, we've always had a government that can make laws. As we've discussed, they made some laws during the War which in normal times would have seemed ludicrous and draconian. But those weren't normal times and neither have the last couple of years. The War time laws weren't permanent, neither have these been.

You object to the principle of tax. Well OK, but that's not a new thing. And less wealth, really? The tax burden will admittedly be high over the next few years to pay for the effects of the pandemic. But I'd note that a fair amount of that money was spent on stuff like the furlough scheme, millions would be worse off had they not done that. And overall aren't people better off now than they were at many points in the past? There's certainly a bigger divide between the very richest and the rest than in the past, but I don't think you get the extremes of poverty you had at some points in the past. But years of Tory rule has admittedly pushed more people towards poverty - that was already true pre-pandemic, and I don't think things were much better under Labour.

Overall, I don't think we're any less free than we have been in the past. Wealth I'm less sure about but I think in general life is more comfortable for most people than it has been at many points in history.

[Niall_Quinn]

Not even a glimpse beyond the approved BBC version of events is permitted. At least a few peers are still interested in stuff that's apparently not happening, like the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, for example. But not you. Kids won't have to wear masks in school (a crime in itself), so that means (by some reasoning I can't possibly guess at) the raft of bills and legislation sneaked or sneaking into law isn't worth a mention. Every time a taboo reality is raised it's immediately filtered out. The repetitive and predictable nature of these relentless abuses is also carefully ignored. These realities don't fit into the message of (the now less cherished) data driving a hapless (but always innocent) stumble from one cock-up to the next. It doesn't matter how many times it occurs, it's always an accident. Obviously I don't find this position in any way credible and it makes me wonder how anyone could be so gullible to give it the time of day.

But the shutters are down and reality can't find a chink.

[Niall_Quinn]

Just one of the (following "the data", or "while you weren't looking") measures the peers kicked back.

Against Government proposals to expand stop and search powers in relation to protest. It expands the types of offences that allow a police officer to stop and search a person or vehicle. The amendment would have created a new suspicionless stop and search power* which would allow a police officer to get authorisation applying to a particular place at a particular time to stop and search people or vehicles without suspicion if they believe a protest-related offence may be committed in that area. If a person refuses or obstructs being searched, they could face 51 weeks imprisonment or a fine or both.

Link provided (but don't associate me with "Friends" of the Earth:
https://friendsoftheearth.uk/latest/...an-police-bill

https://bills.parliament.uk/bills/2839

Keep an eye on it if you genuinely want to know if the restrictions have been lifted. This abomination is knocking on the door or Royal Assent. There's no chance to stop it now, but maybe some of the elements that make Stalin look like Santa Claus can be killed.

* This fundamentally, at the very core, changes the relationship between the agents of the state (the Police) and the governed (The shackled individual human being). The ONLY thing that protects you from the increasing number of bent and power crazed coppers is the last, fragile link to the common law. Couple this incomprehensible outrage with the suggestion the government should have constitutional powers to override the courts and, unless you have zero appreciation for history, every alarm bell in your head should be ringing. If not then you are probably dead already, so no worries.

[Niall_Quinn]

There's a lot of reality going on outside the confines of the BBC:
https://www.youtube.com/results?sear...uk&sp=CAI%253D

Can anyone name the other 3 bills that were sneaked through while the BBC was wildly inflating the death toll? I posted them up already and I'm sure everyone is far more interested in their (and their kids') future relationship with the state than if Boris will stay or go.

Though maybe not.

I honestly don't understand how easily the trivial is elevated and the real business of the day is buried. I can't fathom how so many people buy into it. You could just ignore it, but some people go out of their way to defend the indefensible.