The swamp that is ‘The News’ – covid, budget: swamps are everywhere
I didn’t, honestly, guv – I didn’t look at the MSM yesterday (Sunday)! I picked up the gossip about Rishi’s plans only from various blogs. However – I was incandescent then and am still bouncing off the ceiling in anger, for example when I read that the opinion-polled lemmings were all ‘happy’ with ‘moar taxes’, especially for the NHS, and that they’re also keen on that tax for ‘online deliveries’.
Who the fluff are they thinking will pay this ‘little extra’? They themselves will! And that’s not taking into account the local taxes – rising because: “Covid!” – and the energy bills: rising because that’s what they do, regardless, and never mind all the green piousness BJ and his female handler in No 10 spread around.
The worst however, the very worst is that none of those so keen on more taxes actually understand what is going on here – not the polled lemmings, not the ’economists’. They don’t get that we, who’ve first been put into lockdown prison without our consent, are now going to be forced to pay the costs of that imprisonment. The ‘leaks’ about no windfall taxes on those who’ve profited have sunk below the surface – it’s ‘online deliveries’ which might be taxed. Do these ‘moar tax’ lemmings not understand that it’ll be us who’ll pay for that, not the companies?
As for those brainwashed lemmings who’d like to make all of us hand over even more of our money to the already bloated Sacred Cow: words simply fail me! The point to keep in mind is that Sunak and BJ will of course use the findings of that opinion poll to justify the tax rises which are coming. ‘You asked for it’, after all.
According to more leaks, Sunak will keep going his covid-relief measures like furlough until June 21st when, allegedly, we’ll be let out. There’s also an ‘outcry’ by female business leaders who demand that the ‘beauty industry’ and the fashion industry ought to get special treatment. Give me strength!
To round up this excursion into the Budget-Tax-Swamp, I’ll just point out that the ‘green shoots’ of economic recovery some experts have detected – people are buying things on their credit cards – will vanish like snow in April. It doesn’t seem to occur to those ‘experts’ that people are buying now because they anticipate that prices will go up, thanks to all those little extra covid-taxes. The outlook for us peasants out here isn’t jolly, that I can predict without a degree in economics, thus the mini-spending spree. We may be plebs but we’re not stupid!
In any case – how do we know we’ll be rid of Lockdown anyway? The headlines in this morning’s covid papers are about ‘The Hunt for the Brazilian Mutant’ – the one of which we must really be very afraid because allegedly the jolly good vaccines won’t protect from that – no, don’t ask how they know. So now there are six (!) patients with that mutant and the covid authorities want to find the very first one who brought this covid variety to our shores:
“Health officials are hunting for a mystery Covid patient thought to be one of the first in the UK to have a Brazilian variant that may spread more rapidly and respond less well to vaccines. […] Public Health England (PHE) has admitted it has no idea who one of them is, nor where the person was tested. Health officials have begun a scramble to try to find the person and track down hundreds of passengers on a series of connecting flights into the UK from Brazil earlier this month.” (paywalled link)
No, we’re not told if those unfortunates are all in hospital, we’re only told that Ms Yvette Cooper MP (Lab) – we remember her as an inveterate Remainer – blames this on the ‘inadequate quarantine measures’ of the covid politburo. Her statement is priceless – she said:
“The Brazil variant was first identified a month before one of these cases was brought in on Feb 10 and many weeks after the Prime Minister was warned that indirect flights were a problem, yet the Government delayed putting stronger measures in place.” She said there were far too many holes in the current hotel quarantine system, which only covers one per cent of travellers, […]” (paywalled link)
Oh if only BJ had listened to that Labour MP! Every passenger from every flight from anywhere would’ve been put into quarantine an no mutant would’ve entered! So now PHE and the lockdown fanatics are scrambling to play covid detectives. Well, they better get a move on because continental MSM have murmured about mutants found in Turkey or Nigeria.
I bet that “we” can find many more, if only we’d look more closely and made an effort. After all, being able to deal with new mutants is one of the conditions for giving us back our freedom and thus these mutants must be found to convince us that we need to keep staying at home. Rishi will pay for it, won’t he!
Meanwhile, to make us feel properly scared, The Times has yet another report on the ‘heartbreak’ caused by ‘Long Covid’ (link, paywalled). The Germans have already set up a clinic for them, having found 400 sufferers between 20 and 40 years of age who can’t go on with their normal life. One of them – don’t cry, and don’t laugh, you heartless so-and-so’s! – forgot to close the tap in her kitchen and flooded her flat because of ‘Long Covid’. Goodness gracious me!
Someone pointed out in the comments that this is precisely like that ‘Yuppie Flu’ which struck our country. That was in the 1980s and while some of us remember this perfectly, we cannot expect our ‘health & science’ editors to recall events that far back in history. I recall though that doctors were harshly telling sufferers that it was ‘all in their heads’ and they better get a grip. How times have changed …!
Let’s finish today’s news from the covid swamp with a beautiful report in the DM, according to which unvaccinated police officers don’t want to police the masses going to beaches and parks any longer. It’s an outcry to please get Plod vaccinated now, or else:
“Ken Marsh, the chairman of the Metropolitan Police Federation, said on Sunday that his members no longer want to regulate the law. ‘Police don’t want to police this. We have had enough of this. It is not policeable. It is not manageable,’ […] Currently police officers have to regularly break coronavirus restrictions to continue their duties – including flouting the two-metre rule when apprehending uncooperative suspects. Mr Marsh has said that the union is seeking legal action as to whether officers could refuse to break rules in the line of duty unless they receive their vaccines.” (link)
We are of course not told how many police officers are off sick with covid, caught ‘in the line of duty’ when policing all those lockdown rule breakers. That would lead to other inconvenient questions, such as ‘don’t the masks work?’, since plod is of course muzzled up, or perhaps to wondering if those ‘asymptomatic covid spreaders’ aren’t actually spreading covid after all.
I leave you with a beautiful example which illustrates the famous statement of the German Pastor Niemöller which you can read here. It’s about the now well-known censoring of opinions on social media. To his amazement a certain Mr Daniel Hannan found a piece on covid and liberty which he’d written for the John Locke Institute removed from that institute’s facebook page (paywalled link). Well, I cannot recall that Mr Hannan stood up for any of those who were similarly censored, for example such eminent scientists like Prof Carl Henegan.
Now that it happened to himself, Mr Hannan is mildly outraged. Perhaps he might ponder that Niemöller quote and think out loud about the fact that Freedom of Speech is for all, not for a select elite, chosen according to social media moguls.
Mind you, I won’t hold my breath waiting for Hannan to take a stand.
KBO!
Photo by WhatsAllThisThen 
Frederica. I can quite understand you not trusting this government or any of our MPs bar one or three.
I still think basically, all the governments across the western so called democracies, just went into Panic Mode. We know ours was driven by Media, Sage, Ferguson, etc. And W.H.O. certainly didn’t help.
Hancock has thoroughly enjoyed his taste of power. Boris always enjoys being in the limelight.
There have been various proddings from the back benches. There has been outcry on line. Even idiots must know they can not spend, spend, spend, forever.
The Dictatorship, to my mind IS beginning to crumble. They got it wrong and are forced to face that fact and back out as best they can.
Dont see how a plod can catch anyhting ( least of all a villan) sitting in the traffic in an air con car.
Stop Press : saw overweight BAME plodess trying to ride a bicycle up a slight incline .. wobble and puff …that will have the drug dealers worried.
Wevet Cooper? Wants the borders closed ? there was a Labour MP of the same name who wanted to accept an unlimited number of ayslum seekers.
Is there an imposter Zooming in ?
“Meanwhile, to make us feel properly scared,”
Look at the Guardian today. UK industry is destroying the planet. Well if you believe the CO2 warming effect of 30% of 1.2% is significant (the total CO2 emissions generated by industry in the UK is equivalent to the annual increase_ in China’s emissions) and that the world is warming at the rate ‘projected’* by the warming models rather than at half the rate as measured by balloon thermometers and satellite sensors then I suggest you shouldn’t be allowed out without an adult. No comments allowed of course, Like the recently greenie mania inflicted by their new owners on the Daily Express the replies would not reflect their need to find a new Project Fear.
Then there’s the end of civilisation stories. There’s a short story I wrote some time ago and shoved in one of my Amazon collections about deflecting an incoming planet buster, so I’m a little sensitised to the obviously forced increase in reports of meteors, near miss comets etc. My bet is Elon Musk’s PR department is nudging opinion to increase demand for a ring of projectiles in orbit around the planet. Handy work if you’ve got your own space programme.
*they don’t do predictions, just projections.
JF
Hittile. I played with various drives, explosive nuke, steam, laser chute…
Yeah well Julian, we know some are stupid enough to believe CO2 is destroying the planet. Including her beside Boris. As for meteorites, that one has been tried before hasn’t it.
You may have missed my explaining that I’m 76yrs. old in failing health and really can’t get out there and do anything to help with the elections we are allowed.
The Mad Dictators look to me like they are getting more and more ridiculous. Something is bound to give soon.
JF, such an explosion of questions. First I would say, without elaboration, that the question of percentage value of a vaccine is entering the realms of ‘un-informed consent’. I am siding on the basics of nature rather than putting my trust in big pharma. That is the ability of the immune system. Naturally evolved over thousand if not millions of years the immune system is far more capable than the development of drugs by men in white coats and hobnailed boots. The CO2 scandal as we well know is so flawed with corruption and hypocrisy that it does not stand up to the scrutiny of the most simple of analysis.
Our idea of challenging the AGW issue was somewhat overtaken by Covid-19 and now we see the connecting of the two issues. Well actually that happened some time ago.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/a-warming-climate-may-produce-more-drug-resistant-infections/
Your response with regard to vaccine efficacy demonstrates our abdication of our responsibilities with regard to health. The same has occurred with regard to education and again more importantly with regard to governance. This is our downfall. The downfall of the Western civilisation. We have got lazy, apathetic and stupid.
My concern here is that I can continue to trust on the objective opinion of those who can still think and criticise what is happening. I am therefore concerned for the wellbeing of those same people.
Your mention of Hittiles is very pertinent to the surveillance environment we have entered.
To disagree is not a conflict it is a challenge where the outcome involves a ‘win-win’ through debate.
Now we will wait for the next spike of stimulation from our dear editor.
At the present time ,there is a Volcano in Southern Italy ,kicking out a rather large portion of ,”Greenhouse Gases”, is there a section in the ,”CO 2 guide to destroying the planet “,where this is accounted for and what subsection would it be included in.
This is good news. I am surprised the video is still on YouTube.
What is especially good is that this drug, unlike Ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine+zinc, works, apparently very effectively and quickly, for the later stage of the infection, when most patients are spiralling downwards towards probable death. Early stages, yes, but there are 29 patients out of 30 who now believe in miracles.
So with a combination of appropriate application of these three cheap and simple drugs, who, apart from Bill Gates and the WEF and the Left and the green zealots, needs the ‘vaccine’ programme?
https://joannenova.com.au/2021/03/has-israel-found-the-cure-for-covid/
How stunningly stupid this is all getting. We are being herded and many if not a majority cannot see it. Surely it is clear with the strawmen confusion and bad science. The corruption of our politicians, judiciary, educationalists scientists etc. etc. is shocking. Do they put fear of losing their jobs or prestige before the wellbeing of people about them and basic common sense? Do we need to recalibrate our understanding of intelligence? Who can we trust?
Niemöller’s statement can be read as an academic would read a book but does the meaning sink in? I was influenced by George Steiner ‘Language and Silence’ where he wrote “The blackness of it did not spring up in the Gobi desert or the rain forests of the Amazon. It rose from within, and from the core of European civilisation. The cry of the murdered sounded in earshot of the universities; the sadism went on a street away from the theatres and the museums.”
One disappointment for me is when friends and family tell me sometimes with pride that they have had the jab. What can one say? We have to be thoughtful of feelings and future relationships. There is a divide opening up.
Friends or maybe I should say acquaintances once frightened now have a buoyant confidence because they have had the jab. Do I tell them they have taken an unnecessary risk with an experimental vaccination that will not give them immunity but may do something else to them? Do people want to be on lifelong medication? Simple, known medication may be one thing but we are entering a whole new ball game.
A lot of people do want to be on lifelong medication. I call it the ‘curse of antibiotics’. The doctor has pills which will cure all so if you are not on them you are missing out. Damn good for drug companies too. I recall that on average European men over 60 are on five or so medications.
A lot of support for all this is also painless (supposedly) virtue signalling. I am protecting others. I note Lockdown Sceptics (p2 now) saying the Institute of Actuaries count excess deaths for 2020 70,000 odd two-thirds due to lockdown. So 25,000 odd excess deaths to explain could be covid. That’s 3-4% up on normal deaths. Amazing how the 100,000 deaths meme can whittle away in terms of extra mortality. Of course many died last year who would have died anyway.so not additions to deaths.
‘A lot of people do want to be on lifelong medication’ Michael. Yes, isn’t that strange. Well I find it strange any way. Some seem to wear it with pride like a badge of honour. Others just accept it. None seem to notice that they are given more and more medicines. No one seems to say, ‘Hang on, this can’t be right’.
Well I’ve got rid of just about all of mine anyway.
Eat a lot of veg and cut down the animal stuff and processed foods. Most things are curable or containable. Most of the drugs are symptom control not cure.
“Do I tell them they have taken an unnecessary risk with an experimental vaccination that will not give them immunity”
Do you mean that ‘they will get _no_ immunity’ rather than ‘not 100% immunity’?
JF
I Agree 100 per cent with you Kim. My exoerience has been identical. When I point out that the vaccine will not make you immune, will not stop you passing the bug on to others and you will still have to wear a mask and keep socially distanced it just doesn’t seem to register with them. It’s as if people are hypnotised.
Great comment Kim. You have asked a very pertinent question….’Who do we trust?’ I most certainly do not trust this government. I do not trust any of the ‘virtue signalling’ opposition. It is quite apparent that the politicians (barring one or three) are all singing from the same hymn sheet of ‘control’ and ’power’ and keeping their jobs at all costs. The reality of the vaccine trial is that they simply do not know what the efficacy rate or the final outcome will be! Most of the vaccine companies trial dates do not end until 2023. I just don’t fancy being a human guinea pig!!
I’ve had conversations with people who are utterly sold on this vaccine idea. They say that unless everybody gets jabbed the government won’t lift lockdown or that we will be able to stop wearing masks. My reply is that I do not think that this government will ever abrogate the powers that they have granted themselves and that they will not hesitate to use them again and again to imprison the population at the slightest whim and on the merest hint of any future infection!
A lot of money and power rides on this vaccine distribution exercise. Why else would they have refused to countenance the use of other (tested and cheaper) drugs?
The economy is shot to pieces. They are quite sanguine about that it seems. Yet now they think it’s a good time to levy the sort of taxation that will hit the working population hardest. Unless there truly is a darker reason for any of these actions, I am at a loss to understand why any of this has been brought about!
Taxing the working population.
Could it be that the population has for the past year had less opportunity to spend.
Taken as a whole most of them have not actually starved,
Deprived yes of fashionable new clothes, foreign holidays, hair do’s, pubs, mass sports, eating out, theatre, cinemas, weddings etc.
Really froth and fripperies. Nice to have but not necessities of life
So in effect, they have a load of surplus money that they don’t really need.
Why on earth not tax it off them, what’s the point of them saving, we haven’t had a generation of savers for yonks.
The majority of the population are boringly apathetic, only reason they ever break out and spend is to keep up with the neighbours.
Permanent social distancing OK!
Roger I’m sure there is a lot in what you say about the govt thinking that – people who haven’t been able to spend because the shops have been closed – will have plenty of surplus money. Thus they think why not tax them a bit more and take that surplus money off them again! I wonder if Amazon and suchlike companies have really seen a downturn in the spending habits. Ordering on Amazon is soooo easy and they sell absolutely everything and anything on their website! I dont think that this government has any reasoning thought processes available to them. They simply dont have a spare brain cell to share between them!!! Floundering out of their depth? I hope they drown in it! Country wreckers all of them!
PS in case you don’t go back to look, I loved your comment on ‘books’ and I was moved to reply in kind!
Thanks for both your comments Frederica.
I was considering answering my own tax solution myself, pointing out how preposterous , particularly as I have a friend who has a son who is a travel agent and another who has two sons pilots, presently not flying
I can see this country may be supporting such people for many years to come.
However those who now have money or are part of the government fiefdom will still just carry on as normal, it’s the mass market will take ages to recover.