That’s a conventional version of what happened.

And yet, we keep hearing of early voices of dissent at the time that didn’t get a hearing.

The problem of figuring out whether and to what extent people acquiesced to tyranny is an important one. It is complicated by accumulating evidence that the government worked with tech and media, and therefore with the main way people get their news, to actively suppress contrary voices, even when they came from recognized experts of great credibility.

Did you see the movie The Big Short? It is based on a book by Michael Lewis. Both celebrate short-selling contrarian Michael Burry of Scion Capital. Back in 2006, he began to see strange features of the housing bubble. These financial products called mortgage-backed securities (MBSs) packed highly-rated mortgage bonds with terribly-rated ones. The more he looked, the more he was convinced that a massive housing bust was on the way.

He shorted the market, even going to the point of pushing various financial firms to create funds that did just that even when they didn’t previously exist. Very few believed there was a bubble in housing because all the experts, including the head of the central bank, said otherwise. The whole system was propping up a fake market.

Burry, who is a trained physician, believed it was going to fail. He had looked at the details instead of trusting the experts. And he turned out to be correct, perhaps early but correct eventually. The movie and book present him as a hero for being willing to go against the crowd and the experts both.

The lesson: we should all be more like Burry. Even since the telling of this story, he has been valorized as a person of great wisdom. Never trust the experts, the system, the conventional wisdom, the madness of crowds. Do your own research like Burry did!

When the lockdowns began in March 2020, it turns out that Dr. Burry joined Twitter solely for the purpose of denouncing what was going on. He sent emails too, to Bloomberg. Burry wrote them right away:

Stay-at-home policies need not be universal. COVID-19 is a disease that is somewhat lethal for the obese, the very old, the already-sick. Public policies have no nuance because they want to maximize fear to enforce compliance. But universal stay-at-home policies devastate small and medium sized business and indirectly beat up women and children, kill and create drug addicts, engender suicides, and in general create tremendous misery and mental anguish. These secondary and tertiary effects are getting no play in the prevailing narratives.

Among his statements on Twitter:

Americans must not abide. Government restrictions are doing orders of magnitude more damage to the lives of Americans than COVID could ever have done on its own.

Roughly 2.8 million people die in the US each year. The worst estimates for COVID would add less than 10% to that total. Consider this as the media implies Americans are dying at multiples of normal rates. Compassion is not incompatible with facts.

Unconscionable. Let’s put today’s horrific jobless claims in perspective. This is not the virus. This is the response to the virus killing the US and global economy, with all accompanying human tragedy. I present America’s initial jobless claims over the decades.

15 million mortgage defaults? An unemployment rate exceeding 10%? Social unrest can be expected as it passes 20%. Unthinkable in America. Just two months ago the economy was great. A virus shows up that kills less than 0.2%, and the government does THIS?

COVID like all coronaviruses will not easily engender durable herd immunity, and vaccines will prove elusive. We must learn to live with it – which means universal treatment with available drugs and no hysteria, i.e. NO LOCKDOWN!

He later took down the tweets and deleted his accounts, maybe out of despair of making any difference. We don’t know. Nor do we know how many retweets or likes he received or what the comments were, simply because they are no longer there. (If anyone can figure out how to find this, please let me know; I’ve checked every outlet.)

Given Burry’s status as a genuine contrarian expert, in the midst of a grotesque policy without precedent, you might have thought that the media would be all over him. He would be on all the talk shows. Experts would address his claims, refuting them or backing them.

What happened instead was: nothing.

In those days, I was desperate to find voices of disagreement. I really could not find any. I felt very alone. So too, as it turns out, did many others. There were many of us, as it turns out. We just couldn’t find each other. Or maybe certain algorithms were in place that prevented us from finding each other.

There seemed to be this strange trend alive at the time. The recognized experts of the past were all swept away. Many had their accounts deleted. They were replaced by new experts about whom we knew almost nothing or who had severely compromised reputations, like Anthony Fauci.

An example is Devi Sridhar, who advised the Scottish government. More than anyone else, she was granted astonishing amounts of airtime throughout the UK. She was a proponent of the idea of “Zero Covid” through lockdowns and, later, vaccines. She now admits that this was an error, that we do indeed need to live with the virus. But her book from that period she still promotes on all her social media accounts.

Did they have any track records we could check? How do we know these people are real experts? These were questions hardly anyone asked.

How is it that Sridhar was the go-to expert whereas other experts were throttled, blocked, denounced, canceled, and deleted? Perhaps because she worked for the Gates Foundation? It’s impossible not to become a conspiracy theorist to some extent as you look at this situation.

There is no reason to go all the way to October with the experts who wrote the Great Barrington Declaration. They faced extreme attacks. But really the attempts to curate the public mind and engineer a consensus began as soon as the lockdowns took effect.

The same agency that meddled so heavily in information curation was also the agency that broke up the workforce between essential and nonessential, and later on dismissed the risks of absentee ballots even though their internal memos reveal vast awareness. That would be the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency or CISA. Created in 2018 and practically invisible to most Americans, this small agency exercised enormous power over what we knew and what we heard.

Meanwhile, we’ve been hearing about many dissidents who were trying to speak out early on and could not get a hearing, many of whom now write for Brownstone.

Think how different 2008 would have been with the same level of speech control. Markets would not have corrected toward reality so quickly. It’s one thing for a truth to be unpopular or unconventional; it’s something else to be actively suppressed.

Looking back, one really does wonder what the reality was in those early days after lockdown. No question that mass formation played a huge role. No question that people gave in and complied far more than they should have. But what if government had not been collaborating with tech and media and just allowed the free flow of information? Might the lockdowns have ended much sooner simply because people could have heard a different point of view?

We’ll never know. This does serve as a cautionary note against a wholesale condemnation of the world for failing to stand up to tyranny. Maybe many people did stand up, in whatever limited way they could, but simply faced a system that prevented them from getting a hearing.

Published under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
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The primary instruments for this consolidation are a WHO Pandemic Accord and a series of far-reaching amendments to existing International Health Regulations (IHR). The target date for finalising both the IHR Amendments and the new Pandemic Accord is May 2024.

The net effect of the proposed text for the pandemic accord and the proposed amendments to the International Health Regulations, would be to create a legal and financial basis for the emergence of an elaborate, internationally coordinated bio-surveillance regime and significantly strengthen the authority of the World Health Organisation to direct and coordinate the international response to global and regional public health threats.

It is not entirely clear why the WHO decided to negotiate a separate pandemic treaty that overlaps in significant ways with the proposed IHR amendments. In any case, most of the far-reaching changes to global health regulations are already contained within the IHR amendments, so that is what we will focus on here.

Even if the WHO failed to get a new pandemic treaty passed, the proposed amendments to International Health Regulations would be sufficient by themselves to confer unprecedented power on the WHO to direct international health and vaccination policies in circumstances deemed by the WHO to be a “public health emergency of international concern.”

The WHO wants the IHR amendments to be finalised on time for next year’s World Health Assembly, scheduled for 27 May – 1 June 2024. Assuming the amendments are approved by a simple majority of the delegates, they will be considered fully ratified 12 months after that, unless heads of State formally reject them within the designated opt-out period, which has been reduced from 18 to 10 months.

If ratified, they will come into effect two years after their announcement at the May 2024 World Health Assembly (i.e., around June 2026), as stipulated in the annex to Amendments to the International Health Regulations (2005) agreed to on 28th May 2022.

In other words, revisions to the International Health Regulations will pass by default rather than by formal acceptance by heads of State. The silence of heads of State will be construed as consent. This makes it all the easier for the revised IHR to pass without proper legislative scrutiny and without a public debate in the States that are subject to the new legal framework.

To get a flavour of how these changes in international law are likely to impact the policies of governments and citizens’ lives more broadly, it is sufficient to review a selection of the proposed amendments. While we do not know which of the amendments will survive the negotiation process, the direction of travel is alarming.

Taken together, these amendments to International Health Regulations would push us in the direction of a global public health bureaucracy with limited democratic accountability, glaring conflicts of interest, and significant potential for systematic harm to the health and liberties of citizens.

The amendments discussed below are drawn from a 46-page document hosted on the WHO webpage entitled “Article-by-Article Compilation of Proposed Amendments to the International Health Regulations (2005) submitted in accordance with decision WHA75(9) (2022).” Because these changes are being negotiated largely outside the frame of national electoral politics, the average citizens is barely aware of them.

Should these amendments come into force, States will be bound by international law, in the event of a public health emergency (as defined by WHO) to follow the playbook of health policies determined by the WHO and its “emergency committee” of “experts,” leaving far less scope for national parliaments and governments to set policies that diverge from WHO recommendations.

Insofar as national States formally consent to the IHR amendments, their sovereignty would remain intact, from a legal perspective. But insofar as they are binding themselves to dance to the tune of political actors outside the scope of national politics, they would clearly lose their freedom to set their own policies in this domain, and health policy “gurus,” instead of representing their fellow citizens, would represent a global health regime transcending national politics and operating above national law.

Under a globally coordinated public health regime, activated by an international public health emergency declared by the WHO, citizens would be vulnerable to errors committed by WHO-nominated “experts” sitting in Geneva or New York, errors which could replicate themselves through a global health system with little resistance from national governments.

Citizens have a right to know that the amended regulations as they stand would give unprecedented power to a WHO-led global health regime and, by implication, its most influential financial and political stakeholders like the World Economic Forum, the World Bank, and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, all of which are largely beyond the reach of national voters and legislators.

There are dozens of proposed amendments to the 2005 International Health Regulations. Here, I will highlight eight changes that are of special concern because of their implications for the independence of national health regimes and for the rights of citizens:

States Bind Themselves to Follow WHO’s Advice as “The Guidance and Coordinating Authority” During an International Public Health Emergency

One of the amendments to IHR (International Health Regulations) reads, “States Parties recognize WHO as the guidance and coordinating authority of international public health response during public health Emergency of International Concern and undertake to follow WHO’s recommendations in their international public health responses.” Like many other treaty “undertakings,” the means for other parties to IHR to enforce this “undertaking” are limited.

Nevertheless, States party to the new regulations would be legally binding themselves to adhere to WHO recommendations and may lose credibility or suffer politically for failing to follow through on their international treaty commitments. This may seem “toothless” to some, but the reality is that this sort of “soft power” is what drives a good deal of compliance with international law.

Removal of “Non-Binding” Language

In the previous version of Article 1, WHO “recommendations” were defined as “non-binding advice.” In the new version, they are defined simply as “advice.” The only reasonable interpretation of this change is that the author wished to remove the impression that States were at liberty to disregard WHO recommendations. Insofar as signatories do “undertake to follow WHO’s recommendations in their international public health responses,” it would indeed appear that such “advice” becomes legally “binding” under the new regulations, making it legally difficult for States to dissent from WHO recommendations.

Removal of Reference to “Dignity, Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms”

One of the most extraordinary and disturbing aspects of the proposed amendments to IHR is the removal of an important clause requiring that the implementation of the regulations be “with full respect for the dignity, human rights and fundamental freedoms of persons.”

In its place, the new clause reads that the implementation of the regulations shall be “based on the principles of equity, inclusivity, coherence and in accordance with their (the?) common but differentiated responsibilities of the States Parties, taking into consideration their social and economic development.” It is hard to know how any sane and responsible adult could justify removing “dignity, human rights, and fundamental freedoms” from International Health Regulations.

Expansion of Scope of International Health Regulations

In the revised version of Article 2, the scope of IHR includes not only public health risks, but “all risks with a potential to impact public health.” Under this amendment, International Health Regulations, and their main coordinating body, the WHO, would be concerned not only with public health risks, but with every conceivable societal risk that might “impact” public health. Workplace stress? Vaccine hesitancy? Disinformation? Misinformation? Availability of pharmaceutical products? Low GDP? The basis for WHO intervention and guidance could be expanded indefinitely.

Consolidation of a Global Health Bureaucracy

Each State should nominate a “National IHR Focal Point” for “the implementation of health measures under these regulations.” These “focal points” could avail of WHO “capacity building” and “technical assistance.” IHR Focal Points, presumably manned by unelected bureaucrats and “experts,” would be essentially nodes in a new WHO-led global health bureaucracy.

Other important aspects of this new global health bureaucracy would be the WHO’s role in developing global “allocation plans for health products” (including vaccines), the WHO’s role as an information hub for expanded disease surveillance and research units across the world, and the WHO’s role as a a lead player in an international network of actors devoted to combatting “false and unreliable information” about public health events and anti-epidemic measures.

Expansion of WHO Emergency Powers

Under the revised regulations, the Director-General of the World Health Organisation, “based on the opinion/advice of the Emergency Committee,” may designate an event as “having the potential to develop into a public health emergency of international concern, (and) communicate this and the recommended measures to State parties…” The introduction of the concept of a “potential” public health emergency, along with the idea of an “intermediate” emergency, also to be found among the proposed amendments, gives the WHO much wider leeway to set in motion emergency protocols and recommendations. For who knows what a “potential” or “intermediate” emergency amounts to?

Entrenchment and Legitimation of an International Bio-Surveillance Regime

The old Article 23, “Health Measures on arrival and departure,” authorises States to require that travellers produce certain medical credentials prior to travel, including “a non-invasive medical examination which is the least intrusive examination that could achieve the public health objective.” In the new version of Article 23, travellers may be required to produce “documents containing information…on a laboratory test for a pathogen and/or information on vaccination against a disease.”

These documents may include WHO-validated digital health certificates. Essentially, this reaffirms and legally validates the vaccine passport regime that imposed prohibitive testing costs on unvaccinated citizens in 2021-23, and resulted in thousands and probably tens of thousands of people vaccinating just for the convenience of travelling, rather than based on health considerations.

Global Initiatives for Combating “False and Unreliable Information”

Both WHO and States bound by IHR, under the revised draft of IHR, “shall collaborate” in “countering the dissemination of false and unreliable information about public health events, preventive and anti-epidemic measures and activities in the media, social networks, and other ways of disseminating such information.” Clearly the misinformation/disinformation amendments entail a propaganda and censorship regime.

There is no other plausible way to interpret “countering the dissemination of false and unreliable information,” and this is exactly how anti-disinformation measures have been interpreted since the Covid pandemic was announced in 2020 – measures, it may be added, that suppressed sound scientific contributions concerning vaccine risks, lab origins of the novel coronavirus, and efficacy of community masking.

The joint effect of these and other proposed changes to International Health Regulations would be to enthrone the WHO and its director-general at the head of an elaborate global health bureaucracy beholden to the special interests of WHO patrons, a bureaucracy that would be operated largely with the cooperation of State officials and agencies implementing “advice” and “recommendations” issued by the WHO, which State parties have legally undertaken to follow.

While it is true that international treaties cannot be coercively enforced, this does not mean that international law is inconsequential. Under the newly amended regulations, a highly centralised public health bureaucracy would be propped up by lavish funding mechanisms and protected by international law. A bureaucracy of this sort would inevitably become entrenched and intertwined with national bureaucracies, and would become an important element of the policymaking architecture of pandemic planning and responses.

Though national States could, theoretically, bypass this bureaucracy and renege on their legal undertakings under IHR, taking a different path to that recommended by WHO, this would be rather strange, given that they themselves would have both approved and financed the regime they are boycotting.

In the face of opposition from one or more signatory States, the WHO and its partners could pressure such a State into complying with its edicts by shaming it into upholding its legal commitments, or else other States may reprimand “renegade” states for putting international health in jeopardy, and apply political, financial and diplomatic pressure to secure compliance. Thus, while IHR would operate upon State officials in a softer way than national, police-backed regulations, it would certainly not be powerless or politically inconsequential.

The impact of the new global health bureaucracy on the lives of ordinary citizens may be quite dramatic: it would erect a global censorship regime legitimated by international law, making challenges to officially sanctioned information harder than ever; and it would make international public health responses even more slavishly dependent on WHO directives than they were before, discouraging independent, dissenting responses such as that of Sweden during the Covid pandemic.

Last but not least, the new global health bureaucracy would put the fate of ordinary citizens – our national and international mobility, our right to informed consent to medication, our bodily integrity, and ultimately, our health – in the hands of public health officials acting in lockstep with WHO “recommendations.”

Apart from the fact that policy diversification and experimentation is essential to a robust healthcare system, and is crushed by a highly centralised response to health emergencies, the WHO is already riddled with internal conflicts of interest and a track record of catastrophically unsound judgments, making them singularly unqualified to reliably identify a global health emergency or coordinate the response to it.

To start with, the WHO’s income stream depends on individuals like Bill Gates who have significant financial stakes in the pharmaceutical industry. How can we possibly expect the WHO to make impartial, disinterested recommendations about, say, the safety and efficacy of vaccines, when its own donors are financially invested in the success of specific pharmaceutical products, including vaccines?

Secondly, to allow the WHO to declare an international public health emergency is to create an obvious perverse incentive: given that a large part of the raison d’être of a WHO-led global health bureaucracy is to prevent, monitor, and respond to public health emergencies, and the activation of the WHO’s emergency powers depends on the presence of an actual or potential “public health emergency of international concern,” the WHO’s Director-General has an obvious professional and institutional interest in declaring potential or actual public health emergencies.

Third, the WHO wasted no time in praising China’s brutal and ultimately unsuccessful lockdowns, continues to support the censorship of their critics, repeatedly recommended community masking in the absence of plausible evidence of efficacy, failed to warn the public in a timely manner about the serious risks of mRNA vaccines, and has entered into a partnership with the European Union to extend the discriminatory and coercive Covid vaccine certificate system globally. These are certainly not people I would trust as custodians of my bodily integrity, health, informed consent, or mobility.

About the Author

David Thunder is a researcher and lecturer at the University of Navarra’s Institute for Culture and Society in Pamplona, Spain, and a recipient of the prestigious Ramón y Cajal research grant (2017-2021, extended through 2023), awarded by the Spanish government to support outstanding research activities. Prior to his appointment to the University of Navarra, he held several research and teaching positions in the United States, including visiting assistant professor at Bucknell and Villanova, and Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Princeton University’s James Madison Program. Dr Thunder earned his BA and MA in philosophy at University College Dublin, and his Ph.D. in political science at the University of Notre Dame.

Many parts of China have been hit by a surge in the illness, which has particularly affected children. Northern provinces in China experienced a jump in cases for five consecutive weeks since mid-October. The news triggered global concern following China’s lack of transparency regarding the origins of COVID-19, the spread of which prompted strict public health restrictions and quarantine measures, according to a report by Newsweek.

But China isn’t the only totalitarian ruling class to suggest strict measures to control the population once again. Senator Marco Rubio, a Republican from Florida, has since urged the leader of the rulers and head tyrant, Joe Biden to ban United States travel to and from China to stop the spread of any contagions. The World Health Organization (WHO) has requested more information from China about the illness, but Rubio advised that Biden shouldn’t wait any longer before implementing the travel restrictions.

Several states in the U.S. have also reported an uptick in child pneumonia cases this week. This has further raised the alarm about the illness, although health officials alleged there is “zero evidence” that the increase is connected to China.

But the ruling class got away with completely controlling and surveilling the public before over a COVID-19 scare, a pathogen that amounted to nothing more than a common cold. We have always felt that if the tyrants feel like they could get away with another totalitarian lockdown they will attempt it.

A letter to Biden from republican rulers reads:

“We must take the necessary steps to protect the health of Americans and our economy. That means we should immediately restrict travel between the United States and the [People’s Republic of China] until we know more about the dangers posed by this new illness. A ban on travel now could save our country from death, lockdowns, mandates, and further outbreaks later.”

“The Chinese Communist Party has proven that they cannot be trusted to provide transparency about diseases originating in China,” Rubio told Newsweek. “I hope that President Biden will take our request for a travel ban seriously. A travel ban is necessary while we wait for more information about this pathogen.”

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that it is continuing to monitor the situation in China and the U.S. “Initial reports indicate that there have been simultaneous increases in a number of known respiratory illnesses, resulting in a spike in hospitalizations. We continue to monitor the situation, collaborating with global health partners,” a CDC statement said.

Sound off about this post and video on the End Medical Tyranny Substack.

Sources are reporting that upwards of 50 percent of people who got jabbed for COVID were sickened by the shots – or are still sick with no end in sight. Eight out of 10 jab recipients, especially including those who got at least one “booster” shot in addition to the primary series, are suffering complications that could end up disabling them.

According to Dr. Peter McCullough, every single person who got even just one COVID jab is now experiencing some kind of problem or series of problems related to the heart – whether they realize it or not. Those who do realize it often discovered it by surprise when they suffered an unexpected cardiac arrest or inflammatory reaction like myocarditis.

As time goes on and the bodies of the fully vaccinated degrade even further, there will likely come a point when a critical mass of sick people creates enough of a public health scare that the infamous “quarantine camps” are opened and filled with the “sick.”

New York is said to have its quarantine camps ready and waiting for the political green light to start loading up the boxcars, so to speak, and delivering prisoners to their bunks. Other states are reportedly doing the same, often quietly.

(Related: President Biden has been dropping hints that a second round of medical martial law is coming soon to the United States.)

DeSantis’ “no vax” bill for Florida a Trojan Horse: it’s actually a forced vax bill

Believe it or not, Florida under Gov. Ron DeSantis is another state where residents face the same forced quarantine situation that New Yorkers do under Gov. Kathy Hochul. DeSantis is a Republican and Hochul is a Democrat, demonstrating once again that tyranny is a bipartisan effort in America.

Hochul’s forced quarantine measures are at least clearly outlined as such, DeSantis’ is hiding behind a so-called “no vax” bill that, upon closer investigation, is actually a forced vax bill in disguise.

As stated directly in DeSantis “no vax” bill, the government of Florida can now issue an order for an individual:

“… to be examined, tested, vaccinated, treated, isolated, or quarantined for communicable diseases that have significant morbidity or mortality and present a severe danger to public health. Individuals who are unable or unwilling to be examined, tested, vaccinated, or treated for reasons of health, religion, or conscience may be subjected to isolation or quarantine.”

The DeSantis “no vax” bill goes on to state that if an individual in Florida is deemed to be a “danger to the public health,” he or she can be apprehended by the State Health Officer and forced into isolation or quarantine, just like the New York bill.

Many conservatives have been fooled by the contradictory rhetoric of DeSantis over the years, but the guy is a tyrant who is arguably worse than Hochul and other Democrat governors. At least New York does not have an “antisemitism” bill in place that squelches the First Amendment, this being another plank in DeSantis’ Florida tyranny regime.

“If there is no practical method to isolate or quarantine the individual, the State Health Officer may use any means necessary to vaccinate or treat the individual,” the DeSantis “no vax” bill further states about how Floridians can now be force-vaccinated if the state deems that there is no way to isolate or quarantine them.

More related news coverage about the controlled demolition of America can be found at Collapse.news.

Sources for this article include:

• AllNewsPipeline.com
• NaturalNews.com

(Article cross-posted from Reclaim The Net)

This unelected intergovernmental organization, which wields significant influence over its 193 member states, recently published the final draft of its Political Declaration of the United Nations General Assembly High-level Meeting on Pandemic Prevention, Preparedness and Response.

The final draft contains several agreements from heads of state and government to crack down on lawful speech. Additionally, it contains pledges from these heads of state and government to back two instruments that will give the UN’s World Health Organization (WHO) enhanced powers to target “misinformation” and build out its surveillance networks.

These instruments, the international pandemic treaty and amendments to the International Health Regulations (2005), have been in the works since 2021 and despite facing major pushback, are on track to be completed by May 2024.

The final draft of this political declaration is being developed for the UN’s High-Level Meeting on Pandemic Prevention, Preparedness and Response which will take place on September 20, 2023 in New York. The political declaration outlined in this draft will be finalized at this meeting.

While UN political declarations aren’t usually legally binding, they do wield significant legal influence. According to the UN, declarations “represent the dynamic development of international legal norms and reflect the commitment of states to move in certain directions, abiding by certain principles.”

The proposed speech crackdowns are outlined in several sections of the final draft of this political declaration.

In section OP35, the heads of state and government agree to “take measures to counter and address the negative impacts of health-related misinformation, disinformation, hate speech and stigmatization, especially on social media platforms” and counter “vaccine hesitancy in the context of pandemic prevention, preparedness and response.” Additionally, section OP42 includes an agreement to combat “misinformation.”

The UN member states back the pandemic treaty in section OP15 and agree to encourage the Intergovernmental Negotiating Body (the group that’s responsible for drafting and negotiating the pandemic treaty) to conclude their negotiations on the “WHO convention, agreement or other international instrument on pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response” (the full name of the WHO’s pandemic treaty).

Not only do UN member states give explicit backing to the pandemic treaty and push for it to be finalized but they also encourage the Intergovernmental Negotiating Body (INB) to prioritize the “need for equity.” Equity is framed by its proponents as something that encourages fairness but critics have warned that equity policies can lead to bias and the injection of “radical ideology.”

The support for the amendments to the International Health Regulations (IHR) is contained in section OP16 of the final draft. This section encourages the working group that’s focused on these amendments to continue its work with respect to the intended finalization date of May 2024.

This political declaration is one of the many ways the UN is tightening its grip on speech. This year alone, it has started building a “digital army” to fight against “deadly disinformation”, encouraged people to snitch on each other for “hate speech”, and claimed that censoring “disinformation” and “hate speech” will protect “free speech.”

The UN has also consulted with several governments and blocs on their censorship work. Specifically, it has attended multiple “disinformation sessions” with a UK government censorship agency and held discussions with the European Union on how to address “disinformation” on digital platforms.

This is where discernment and prayerful reckoning must come into play. The tyranny du jour that’s rising around us is medical in nature as Pandemic Panic Theater 2.0 ramps up, just as many of us have been predicting for a while. The good news is we’re already seeing many patriots and skeptics ringing the alarm bells about the “election variants” of Covid-19 that are magically popping up ahead of 2024. The bad news is the vast majority of “normies” are getting gaslit by corporate media propaganda fearmongering.

Part of me thinks the powers-that-be must have something bigger cooked up. Are they going to simply rely on a rinse-and-repeat version of 2020 knowing the pushback will be much more fierce this time? Am I overestimating this “massive” pushback from the people? It’s easy to complain on social media but harder to apply when real lockdowns, mask mandates, and new “vaccines” and “boosters” hit the shelf.

I struggled with putting my thoughts together for this column because it seems we’re facing the overestimate-vs-underestimate conundrum. If we get as many people as possible prepared to ignore and protest the coming lockdowns, what happens if the calculus changes? For example, what if they roll out a variant that’s actually worthy of concern? Do we risk losing credibility and possibly costing lives by telling people to ignore the lockdowns, only to find out that they’ve unleashed an actual killer coronavirus?

Fear cannot drive us. I can second guess everything and paralyze myself thinking the adversaries are too smart, but that means inaction. Therefore, if I’m going to err then it’ll be on the side of freedom. Could they be planning something bigger than Covid-19 for us? Absolutely. But if we make plans to play it safe then we might as well sign over all of our rights immediately. Therefore, we must move forward with the working theory that they’re just going to try to play us for fools again with gaslighting and propaganda instead of unleashing an actual deadly disease.

In short, I’m not going to overthink it. Liars are going to lie so let’s move forward assuming Pandemic Panic Theater 2.0 will be nothing more than Kabuki.

What does that really mean from a practical perspective? It means we need to get organized at the local level. There isn’t a legitimate way to fight what’s coming on the national level. As for the states, we need to push red state legislators to fight all mandates and we need to assume all blue states will fall in line giddily with renewed medical tyranny. But at the local level, we can make a direct impact on our own lives, the lives of our families, and the communities around us.

Many cities and counties have groups that are (or at least were) already organized to push back against lockdowns. If they’re still active, we need to join them and help to advance them. If they’re inactive, we need to activate them. If you can’t find an appropriate one in your area, consider getting with peers and launching anew. I met one of my sponsors, “Our Gold Guy” Ira Bershatsky, because of his involvement with a group fighting medical tyranny in a Southern California city. They met every Sunday in a park with guest speakers and calls to action. It’s time for such groups to become active again.

It’s also time to talk to friends and family about this. Credibility comes with being right, so telling your “normie” relationships that lockdowns are coming back to establish control factors ahead of the election might cause some of them to roll their eyes today, but they’ll be more inclined to listen to you once it comes to pass. It makes sense to discuss it now so that when it happens we can be a knowledgeable guide to tell the “normies” how to properly respond.

The rise of medical tyranny must be met with far more pushback than we offered in 2020. Fear prevented freedom from winning back then. It cannot be allowed to do the same in 2023 and beyond.

Sound off about this on my Substack.

For full disclosure, I consider Dr. Tenpenny to be a friend. We’ve done several hours worth of interviews over the years. We share a strong trust in the Bible and a healthy distrust of the Medical Tyranny Industrial Complex. Her attorney is also a very good and trusted friend.

Here’s Renz laying out what’s at stake:

In an egregious assault on the 5th & 6th Amendments the Ohio Medical Board has suspended Dr. Sherri Tenpenny’s medical license without even a pretense of due process. So absurd was this action that the assistant AG from the #REPUBLICAN #Ohio Attorney General’s office literally argued in an open hearing that @BusyDrT does not have a right to know what she’s been accused of & that due process in the courts would “breakdown the processes of investigations.”

We are calling for legislative reform in Ohio & for the #GOP Governor – Mike DeWine – and GOP AG David Yost to state for the record whether they believe licensed professionals like doctors and lawyers should receive due process before their rights are taken away.

To be clear, this is really an action to censor Dr. Tenpenny for speaking out about COVID and the #vaccines. The state medical boards appear to be acting on behalf of the corrupt #Biden admin to continue to censor people. PLEASE HELP GET THIS OUT. #WeThePeople MUST stand against this corruption. Full interview below.

BREAKING: In an egregious assault on the 5th & 6th Amendments the Ohio Medical Board has suspended Dr. Sherri Tenpenny’s medical license without even a pretense of due process. So absurd was this action that the assistant AG from the #REPUBLICAN #Ohio Attorney General’s office… pic.twitter.com/ykEJMUBWSG

— Tom Renz (@RenzTom) August 12, 2023

Here’s that interview:

When patriots tell me the solutions to our problems rest in electing Republicans, I point out people like DeWine and Yost as examples of how the UniParty swamp works on both sides of the aisle. We need America First freedom defenders, not RINOs. There’s a huge difference, as Dr. Tenpenny is now learning.

Let’s get the word out. Share this with friends and family so we can get as much coverage of this story as possible. By denying Dr. Tenpenny has rights, they are attempting to sweep this under the rug. Let’s not let them. Sound off about this on my Substack.

Tomorrow, I will be discharged after 17 years of service for refusing to participate with the experimental EUA CV19 products (mask, test, injection).

Here is the official audio from UNITED STATES v 1LT MARK C. BASHAW, Judge Richard Cohen, during sentencing at my Court Martial. pic.twitter.com/2RmVLOk6ME

— Mark Charles Bashaw (@MCBashaw) June 25, 2023

General Michael Flynn weighed in on this travesty:

This young man’s treatment at the hands of the horrific leadership we have inside the armed forces right now is absolutely outrageous.

Listen to the description of this officer from the court martial convening authority in this audio recording.

Why would the military want to throw away 17 years of not only honorable but stellar service when they have completely rescinded the dangerous policies they knew at the time were dangerous policies?

This must change and will change when we have new leadership in the WH and in the Department of Defense.

DOD must ensure that our military is prepared to fight and win our nation’s wars and no longer will it be a social and cultural experiment for the woke Marxist left bureaucrats we currently have running our country.

God help us and to @MCBashaw thank you for your years of courageous, dedicated service. You’re better days are ahead!

This young man’s treatment at the hands of the horrific leadership we have inside the armed forces right now is absolutely outrageous.

Listen to the description of this officer from the court martial convening authority in this audio recording.

Why would the military want to… https://t.co/EWvOTE2qQT

— General Mike Flynn (@GenFlynn) June 26, 2023

The fight against medical tyranny isn’t over. The Biden-Harris regime continues to punish those who were smart enough to not get jabbed. We must keep fighting the good fight.

He’s correct in each of his points.

First, there can be no question that the COVID scam was used to create tyranny in globalist countries. Although the other countries overreacted, there is mixed evidence as to whether their leaders sought tyranny or whether they were just trying to exercise caution by copying the policies imposed in the globalist countries. Therefore, the level of actual force by governments varied.

Second, the globalist First World countries introduced a joint programme that was akin to the Nazi effort beginning with Kristallnacht, and there can be little doubt that this was intentional – a campaign to manufacture irrational fear and demand obedience far beyond what might have been necessary for a mere virus.

Third, whether the globalists intend to revisit COVID with a further viral “emergency” or not, that’s not really the point. COVID was a highly successful dry run into tyranny. Whether the next emergency is to be justified by a virus, warfare, or economic collapse, is immaterial. The implementation of globalism requires tyranny to succeed, and the clock is ticking on the next excuse for a lockdown.

Not surprising, then, that those who recognise that a further, more all-encompassing tyranny is on the way are likely to ask, “Where do I go? Will I be caught out, no matter where I am? If so, why not just stay where I am?”

Now that the dust has settled on the COVID scam, the answer to this quandary may be found by looking back on how COVID played out in a variety of locations around the globe. Was the outcome uniform? Or did it vary? And if the latter, was this significant enough that I owe it to my family to relocate before the next wave of tyranny is on our doorstep?”

Having tracked the behaviour in dozens of countries during and following COVID, my first observation is that there were unquestionably layers of tyranny. It became clear over time that there was a coordinated push in the First World globalist countries (the US, UK, EU, Canada, Australia, Japan, and New Zealand) – a verifiable effort to impose uniform restrictions, with uniform rhetoric by the media to back up the oppression.

This was less so in other countries. Those closest to the globalist countries tended to mimic their policies without seeming to do so with zeal. There was a mood of “We don’t understand any of this, but we want to be safe. Tell us what to do.”

Those who are the least attached to the globalist countries, either through trade or culture, tended to deviate even more from globalist diktat, in some cases defying it.

In this regard, it became clear that each country that was not fully invested in the globalist cabal tended to react in keeping with their respective cultures.

The US was, predictably, the spearhead for globalist mandates. Self-absorbed crusaders came out in force, as they do over every issue, making the US one of the worst places to be. Not only were people pressured to get each vaccination, regardless of a lack of evidence of effectiveness. Shaming of those who were unvaccinated peaked in the US, with a campaign that emphasized a Gestapo-like “Pandemic of the Unvaccinated.”

We saw something similar in the closest allies of the US – the other countries listed above.

However, the further out we ventured from the globalist centre, the more each nation reacted in accordance with its natural culture rather than with globalist diktat.

In Thailand, an orderly programme was created that most people complied with, yet there was a minimal push for greater controls. This was not surprising, as in Thailand, most people take up what the government puts in place, and the rest are on their own. There’s nothing in the limited national budget to pursue them. Thailand was, therefore, a good country to simply not take part in the imported hysteria.

Similarly, in Uruguay, most people observe a high degree of compliance with their minimally-corrupt government. Most people, therefore, went along with vaccinations, and Uruguay was one of the most highly vaxxed countries in the Americas. But Uruguayans have a strong distaste for meddling in the private affairs of others. Therefore, even with a high level of vaxxing, very few people would have the bad manners to question their neighbours as to whether they’d been jabbed, so Uruguay became a good country to live – to fly under the vaccine radar, unvaccinated.

Not ideal, but I’d settle for that.

In the Cayman Islands, people have always expected newcomers to come in with a good bill of health or stay away, but they will vote out any politicians who dictate to Caymanians. As a result, Cayman’s government shut down tourism for a year, but no politician dared to suggest a vaccine mandate for locals for fear of losing office. (The expats were the only people attempting to shame those who didn’t get vaxxed.)

Again, not ideal, but workable.

In Mexico, the populace has a long history of distrust of authority and is inclined to defy the central government at the drop of a hat. Consequently, the Mexican Government allowed its people access to all vaccines and traditional treatments, such as Ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine, but made no edicts about their use. There were no mandates of any kind and, in fact, no testing required, even for travelers in and out of the country.

Mexico ended up being the freest country in the Americas regarding COVID.

COVID was a dry run for globalism. Those who managed to avoid the vax dodged a bullet, but, like my colleague in the opening paragraph, they were left with the understanding that, while the COVID scare may be over, the intent of globalists to impose tyranny is not. COVID was merely a dry run – a Kristallnacht that’s the first installment in a plan for all-encompassing tyranny.

As troubling as this realisation is, we can benefit from it by understanding that while the tentacles of globalism do seek to dominate all corners of the globe, they’re less effective than they’d like to be. The world at large does not perform uniformly to the globalist edict.

It matters little whether we see another manufactured viral emergency or whether the next globalist attempt at dominance is justified by unnecessary warfare or by a now-overdue First World economic collapse. The COVID scam has revealed that the worst place to be in a crisis is right at the centre of the storm – the First World.

Interestingly, Uruguay sat out two world wars and the Great Depression almost totally unaffected – they simply didn’t participate, and the country bypassed all three crises. In the colonialist period, attempts were made to colonise nearly every country in southeast Asia, yet Thailand was passed by. As such, to this day, Thais tend to ignore the edicts of the West more than any other Asian nation. Good to know.

There’s no perfect place in the world, but there are locations where the odds of being victimised by the latest Hitler, Robespierre, Idi Amin, etc., are considerably less.

Regardless of the comfort of the familiarity of our birth country, if it’s a First World country, we’re located in the centre of the storm that’s now underway.

If we establish a bolt-hole in another country, our environment will surely change. There may be no Starbucks. There may be no baseball game to watch. But there’s the likelihood that we can provide ourselves and our families with a greater possibility of a continued quality of life than by remaining in a location where a significant decline in freedoms is a near-certainty.

Article cross-posted from International Man.

First of all, there were and are vast differences in risk depending on your age and general medical history, and this was evident within weeks of the outbreak. Secondly, the data showed that 99.5% of the population would survive COVID.

So, the reality was the complete opposite of this fabricated PR campaign slogan. Had we been told the truth, we would have been told that “Most of us are safe,” rather than “None of us are safe.”

One False PR Slogan After Another

Next, the “no one is safe” slogan morphed to “No one is safe unless everyone is vaccinated.” With that, it became open season to harass, intimidate, threaten and discriminate against the unvaccinated. Every COVID case and death was blamed on them, no matter how irrational. And while the talking heads paid lip service to the desire to “save lives,” they had no qualms about wishing death on the unvaccinated.

As questions about the safety of the experimental gene transfer shots mounted, another campaign slogan was concocted: “Don’t do your own research.” At the same time, “Trust the science” was trending. What that meant was that you were supposed to trust that what you were told WAS “the science.” Actually looking at published science, that made you a dangerous moron.

One of the most egregious lies spread by mainstream media hosts and health authorities like Dr. Anthony Fauci alike was that the COVID “vaccine” would stop the spread of infection in its tracks, thereby ending the pandemic.

It was a provable lie, because anyone who had gone against the grain and done their own research knew that none of the COVID shots had ever been tested to see if they could prevent the spread of infection. The only “promise” they ever held was that they might reduce the symptoms of infection. Have any of these people apologized for spreading lies? I can’t think of one.

Even Fauci and Walensky, then-director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, stated that you could not get COVID if you got the shot. Both later got sick with COVID several times, as did countless others who fell for and vigorously promoted this false propaganda.

Still, the brainwashing continued. As hospitals filled up with “vaccinated” individuals who were supposed to be immune, the PR slogan “Pandemic of the unvaccinated” was endlessly circulated — until the reality of the situation finally became too obvious to ignore.

Then, suddenly, hospitals and health authorities simply quit keeping track of COVID hospitalizations. Problem solved. This way, they didn’t have to admit that what we had was a pandemic of the vaccinated.

Ridiculous and Arbitrary COVID Restrictions

In a March 15, 2021, article,¹ attorney at law Glenn Roper also reviewed a long list of arbitrary COVID measures that “bore little connection to health and safety” and were nothing more than “an exercise of raw government power to control its citizens.” Six of the worst offenders in this regard were:

• Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, who:
  • Forced certain stores that were allowed to remain open to block access to specific areas. Hardware stores, for example, were not allowed to sell carpet, flooring, furniture, garden supplies or paint.
  • Prohibited businesses from promoting or advertising any product other than “groceries, medical supplies or items that are necessary to maintain the safety, sanitation and basic operation of residences.”
  • Banned motorboats, jet skis and other watercraft, while allowing the use of kayaks, canoes and sailboats.
  • Prohibited residents from traveling to a second home or a vacation rental.
• Vermont Gov. Phil Scott, who prohibited people from gathering with anyone from another household, even outdoors.
• Villages in New York that banned the use of leaf-blowers, as blowing dust into the air would create “a hazmat situation.”
• Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker, who imposed a “no exceptions” mask rule. Everyone above age 5 had to wear a mask indoors and out, including when alone. While Roper doesn’t mention this, Massachusetts also required golf courses to place pieces of pool noodles in the bottom of the golf cups, to prevent you from touching the sides of the cup.
• Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, who banned all nonessential travel, including walking.
• The mayor of Louisville, Kentucky, banned drive-in church services for Easter. A federal judge reversed the ban, stating the order was something “this court never expected to see outside the pages of a dystopian novel, or perhaps the pages of ‘The Onion.’”

Similarly absurd rules can be found across the world. In South Africa, for example, government officials ruled that shops could only sell closed toe shoes (no sandals), and short-sleeved shirts could only be worn if you had a jacket or long-sleeved jersey on top.²

In Victoria, Australia, people were prohibited from venturing more than 5 kilometers from their home,³ and in Great Britain, you had to order a substantial meal if you wanted a pint of ale.⁴ In Scotland, the crowd size for public events was limited, but not for private ones, and in Peru and Panama, men and women were only permitted to go outside on alternate days.⁵

Absurd Enforcement of Arbitrary Rules

“But it wasn’t just the measures themselves that were troublesome. The enforcement of these new laws was also overzealous and absurd,” Roper wrote.

For example, in Encinitas, California, police cited 22 people for “watching the sunset” and “having picnics near the beach.” “Violations carry fines of up to $1,000 and up to six months in jail,” Roper noted.

California police officers also chased down and arrested lone paddleboarders and surfers, and in Brighton, Colorado, a man was arrested for playing with his 6-year-old daughter on a near-empty softball field.

The same insanity was taking place in other countries. A family in England was told by a policeman to go back indoors because “people died yesterday.” They were in their own front yard.⁶ All of this is extremely problematic, as it points to a breakdown of the very structure of our government. As noted by Roper:⁷

“In each case, COVID restrictions were imposed by executive branch officials — governors, mayors, sheriffs, and law enforcement — relying on broad grants of power delegated by legislatures.

The legislators did not write or vote on the restrictions themselves. Instead, it was left to the officials who are responsible for enforcing the restrictions to decide what is banned and what is allowed.

That approach is contrary to the separation of powers that underlies the American system of government. Under our system, power is supposed to be divided among different branches that check and balance each other, for the protection of our rights and freedom.

Laws are supposed to be enacted by the legislative branch. The executive branch is supposed to enforce the laws, not make them. It is that constitutional structure that helps protect our liberty and freedoms.”

Insanity on Display

Roper’s list of absurd and arbitrary COVID measures could have been far longer. Remember these images? This was how a high school band in Wenatchee, Washington, was forced to practice in early 2021.⁸

According to officials, singing or blowing into an instrument could spread the COVID virus, so high schoolers practiced holed up in one-man tents. It was mindbogglingly stupid when it first happened, and it’s not getting any less absurd with the passing of time.

Fear and the desire for safety are powerful forces. They can lead to a clamor for action — almost any action — as long as someone does something to address a perceived threat. ~ Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch

Other schools took the absurdity to even higher levels, having the kids practice wearing masks with holes cut out for their mouths.⁹

Supreme Court Justice Critiques Government

In mid-May 2023, Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch leveled harsh criticisms against government’s response to the COVID pandemic, from local to federal. In his eight-page ruling in the case of Arizona v. Alejandro Mayorkas, he stated:^10,11

“Since March 2020, we may have experienced the greatest intrusions on civil liberties in the peacetime history of this country. Executive officials across the country issued emergency decrees on a breathtaking scale. Governors and local leaders imposed lockdown orders forcing people to remain in their homes. They shuttered businesses and schools, public and private.

They closed churches even as they allowed casinos and other favored businesses to carry on. They threatened violators not just with civil penalties but with criminal sanctions too. They surveilled church parking lots, recorded license plates, and issued notices warning that attendance at even outdoor services satisfying all state social-distancing and hygiene requirements could amount to criminal conduct.

They divided cities and neighborhoods into color-coded zones, forced individuals to fight for their freedoms in court on emergency timetables, and then changed their color-coded schemes when defeat in court seemed imminent.

Federal executive officials entered the act too … They deployed a public-health agency to regulate landlord-tenant relations nationwide. They used a workplace-safety agency to issue a vaccination mandate for most working Americans. They threatened to fire noncompliant employees and warned that service members who refused to vaccinate might face dishonorable discharge and confinement.

Along the way, it seems federal officials may have pressured social-media companies to suppress information about pandemic policies with which they disagreed.

While executive officials issued new emergency decrees at a furious pace, state legislatures and Congress — the bodies normally responsible for adopting our laws — too often fell silent. Courts bound to protect our liberties addressed a few — but hardly all — of the intrusions upon them …

Doubtless, many lessons can be learned from this chapter in our history, and hopefully serious efforts will be made to study it. One lesson might be this: Fear and the desire for safety are powerful forces.

They can lead to a clamor for action — almost any action — as long as someone does something to address a perceived threat. A leader or an expert who claims he can fix everything, if only we do exactly as he says, can prove an irresistible force.

We do not need to confront a bayonet, we need only a nudge, before we willingly abandon the nicety of requiring laws to be adopted by our legislative representatives and accept rule by decree. Along the way, we will accede to the loss of many cherished civil liberties — the right to worship freely, to debate public policy without censorship, to gather with friends and family, or simply to leave our homes …

Of course, this is no new story. Even the ancients warned that democracies can degenerate toward autocracy in the face of fear.

But maybe we have learned another lesson too. The concentration of power in the hands of so few may be efficient and sometimes popular. But it does not tend toward sound government. However wise one person or his advisors may be, that is no substitute for the wisdom of the whole of the American people that can be tapped in the legislative process.

Decisions produced by those who indulge no criticism are rarely as good as those produced after robust and uncensored debate. Decisions announced on the fly are rarely as wise as those that come after careful deliberation.

Decisions made by a few often yield unintended consequences that may be avoided when more are consulted. Autocracies have always suffered these defects. Maybe, hopefully, we have relearned these lessons too.”

Gorsuch also calls for a review of the National Emergencies Act, and for state legislatures to reexamine the scope of emergency executive powers at the state level, because “Rule by indefinite emergency edict risks leaving all of us with a shell of a democracy and civil liberties just as hollow.”

• ^1, 7 Pacific Legal Foundation March 15, 2021
• ^2, 3 Traveller August 18, 2020
• ^4, 5, 6 The Sun December 22, 2021
• ⁸ Twitter Ari Hoffman February 24, 2021
• ⁹ Twitter Liz February 24, 2021
• ¹⁰ Supreme Court, 597 US 2023 Arizona v. Alejandro Mayorkas Ruling
• ¹¹ AP May 19, 2023

Article cross-posted from Dr. Mercola’s site.