Today’s Must-Reads – 4 July 2024

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The WHO: Building a Permanent Pandemic Market. In the face of a potentially industry-ending slew of patent cliffs, Big Pharma has begun acquiring biotechnology companies to stave off collapse. To get these drugs to market, the industry is pursuing the only solution left for their dying model: a full takeover of the WHO to capture the global regulatory system. The problem begins with the looming financial threat that the top 20 Big Pharma companies face: from now until 2030, $180 billion in sales will be at risk.
Our Version of a Theocratic State. Brazil is the only country in the world mandating Covid-19 vaccines for children aged 6 months to 5 years. In the end, the arguments of those who support this are similar to those of Islamic State members.
Why the Mystery of Consciousness Is Deeper Than We Thought. Despite great progress, we lack even the beginning of an explanation of how the brain produces our inner world of colors, sounds, smells and tastes. A thought experiment with “pain-pleasure” zombies illustrates that the mystery is deeper than we thought.
The UK is about to enter a nightmare much darker than anyone yet realises. A Labour landslide with the Lib Dems as the official opposition will turn us into a Left-wing one party state. The next few years won’t merely be “a little bit worse”, as many delusional voters of a centre-Right persuasion have sought to convince themselves. The imminent Labour ascendancy will be truly calamitous. Every conservative nightmare will come true, and more besides. The Left-wing stormtroopers who are about to seize the keys to No 10 will enjoy almost unimaginable power, and will be far more competent at wielding it to annihilate their enemies than the Tories ever were.
Ants perform life saving operations — the only animal other than humans known to do so. The researchers found that Florida carpenter ants (Camponotus floridanus) identify limb wounds on their nestmates, then treat them with either cleaning or amputation. “When we’re talking about amputation behavior, this is literally the only case in which a sophisticated and systematic amputation of an individual by another member of its species occurs in the animal kingdom,” study first author Erik Frank, a behavioral ecologist at the University of Würzburg in Germany, said in a statement.
Move Over, Disaster Capitalism–Make Room for Addiction Capitalism. We’ve all heard of Disaster Capitalism: the Powers That Be either initiate or amplify a crisis as a means of granting themselves “emergency powers” which just so happen to further concentrate the nation’s wealth and power in the hands of the few at the expense of the many. Addiction Capitalism is the term for the last-ditch / desperation method of guaranteeing sales and profits when everybody already has everything: reduce the quality so everything fails and must be replaced, and addict your customers to your product or service which–what a surprise–only you or your cartel provide.
This Wouldn’t Be the First Time an Incumbent Stepped Aside. Here’s What Happened Last Time. Any move to replace Biden just four months before the election carries considerable risk. The party can ill afford to pass over its sitting vice president, Kamala Harris, who represents a core Democratic constituency as a Black woman — but Harris consistently underperforms in polling. But it’s not like we haven’t been here before. On March 31, 1968, Lyndon B. Johnson stunned the nation when he announced that he was pulling out of that year’s presidential election.
Built to order – Scoping the Coming Crisis. The salient facts in the situation are (a) that material economic growth has long been decelerating towards contraction, and (b) that decision-makers remain determinedly engaged in wholly futile efforts to reinvigorate the material economy with monetary tools. These factors are already being manifested in a series of disturbing trends. The policies of ‘the elites’ are aimed, not surprisingly, at increasing the wealth of a minority, but these accessions of riches are purely paper in form, and cannot survive severe financial correction.
The Presidential Dilemma. The dilemma is not limited to Trump and Biden. All of us face it. Biden cannot win despite all of the theft mechanisms the Democrats have institutionalized. A stolen election requires a close election in order to hide the theft. But the polls show no such close election. In order to use the fraudulent electoral means put in place, the Democrats need a candidate that the media can present as neck-in-neck with Trump. Even if Democrats had such a candidate, the Biden Crime Family cannot risk Trump taking office. In the event that Trump has learned not to appoint his most dangerous enemies to the highest offices, Biden out of power faces the risk of a real investigation of his and his son’s suspect business affairs, which appear to boil down to influence peddling.
Hurricane Beryl is a Natural. Hurricane Beryl shows what nature can do. Is it a man-made climate change example? NO! The climate is always changing. Man’s input just may come in third in order of importance. If you are in shock and awe over Beryl, that’s on you. As sea surface temperatures are like August, the atmosphere will act like August when given the right conditions. Those conditions this year are in the Atlantic Basin. But perspective and the total picture is something not in vogue today. In everything, crucial facts are hidden. And the huge, massive elephant in the room is that the busiest basin in the world is running less than 20% of average and has a record slow start in the eastern Pacific and 3rd slowest in the west. Globally, that is a huge deal.
Things can only get worse – Britain is about to be remade in the image of our deranged cultural elites. We need to be clear-eyed about what this Labour restoration means. The gloating from the great and good makes clear that the elites view a Starmer victory as an escape from the post-Brexit interregnum. As a repudiation of populism. As a repudiation of what they snottily dismiss as the ‘culture war’. As a repudiation of those few years in which the concerns of ordinary people – on gender, migration, Net Zero – were the stuff of political debate. While the Tories have proven themselves to be limp, ineffectual and often-sincere battlers against metropolitan groupthink, Labour is, without question, its primary political vehicle. It is the parliamentary wing of the new elite. The slow capture of our institutions by greens, identitarians and technocrats – in spite of (and sometimes because of) our Conservative rulers – will now become even more entrenched.
The Reason Biden Was Permitted to Debate Trump. Joe Biden was sent to the podium as the sacrificial lamb of the DNC. His handlers knew his condition, and no amount of preparation, layup questions, or alterations from the liberal media could have improved his performance. Even Donald Trump seemed concerned that Joe Biden would keel over at any moment. There is a reason the Democrats agreed to this debate — they are setting up the stage for a candidate swap.
Varying Interpretations of Truth, or Truth as a Social Construct. In this age of relativism, where one often hears reference to “your truth” and “my truth,” there are so many varying interpretations of truth that the concept of truth itself seems devoid of meaning. It is fashionable to see the concept of truth as indistinguishable from opinions or preferences. For example, Mari Fitzduff writes that “for many of us, far from our beliefs being “true,” they are actually born out of a particular social context, allied to physiological needs such as a differing neural sensitivity to threats and the greater certainty that a group can provide. Thus, beliefs are often what is termed “groupish” rather than necessarily true”.

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Welcome to your daily dose of curated news and insights from across the globe!

Subscribe now

The WHO: Building a Permanent Pandemic Market. In the face of a potentially industry-ending slew of patent cliffs, Big Pharma has begun acquiring biotechnology companies to stave off collapse. To get these drugs to market, the industry is pursuing the only solution left for their dying model: a full takeover of the WHO to capture the global regulatory system. The problem begins with the looming financial threat that the top 20 Big Pharma companies face: from now until 2030, $180 billion in sales will be at risk.
Our Version of a Theocratic State. Brazil is the only country in the world mandating Covid-19 vaccines for children aged 6 months to 5 years. In the end, the arguments of those who support this are similar to those of Islamic State members.
Why the Mystery of Consciousness Is Deeper Than We Thought. Despite great progress, we lack even the beginning of an explanation of how the brain produces our inner world of colors, sounds, smells and tastes. A thought experiment with “pain-pleasure” zombies illustrates that the mystery is deeper than we thought.
The UK is about to enter a nightmare much darker than anyone yet realises. A Labour landslide with the Lib Dems as the official opposition will turn us into a Left-wing one party state. The next few years won’t merely be “a little bit worse”, as many delusional voters of a centre-Right persuasion have sought to convince themselves. The imminent Labour ascendancy will be truly calamitous. Every conservative nightmare will come true, and more besides. The Left-wing stormtroopers who are about to seize the keys to No 10 will enjoy almost unimaginable power, and will be far more competent at wielding it to annihilate their enemies than the Tories ever were.
Ants perform life saving operations — the only animal other than humans known to do so. The researchers found that Florida carpenter ants (Camponotus floridanus) identify limb wounds on their nestmates, then treat them with either cleaning or amputation. “When we’re talking about amputation behavior, this is literally the only case in which a sophisticated and systematic amputation of an individual by another member of its species occurs in the animal kingdom,” study first author Erik Frank, a behavioral ecologist at the University of Würzburg in Germany, said in a statement.
Move Over, Disaster Capitalism–Make Room for Addiction Capitalism. We’ve all heard of Disaster Capitalism: the Powers That Be either initiate or amplify a crisis as a means of granting themselves “emergency powers” which just so happen to further concentrate the nation’s wealth and power in the hands of the few at the expense of the many. Addiction Capitalism is the term for the last-ditch / desperation method of guaranteeing sales and profits when everybody already has everything: reduce the quality so everything fails and must be replaced, and addict your customers to your product or service which–what a surprise–only you or your cartel provide.
This Wouldn’t Be the First Time an Incumbent Stepped Aside. Here’s What Happened Last Time. Any move to replace Biden just four months before the election carries considerable risk. The party can ill afford to pass over its sitting vice president, Kamala Harris, who represents a core Democratic constituency as a Black woman — but Harris consistently underperforms in polling. But it’s not like we haven’t been here before. On March 31, 1968, Lyndon B. Johnson stunned the nation when he announced that he was pulling out of that year’s presidential election.
Built to order – Scoping the Coming Crisis. The salient facts in the situation are (a) that material economic growth has long been decelerating towards contraction, and (b) that decision-makers remain determinedly engaged in wholly futile efforts to reinvigorate the material economy with monetary tools. These factors are already being manifested in a series of disturbing trends. The policies of ‘the elites’ are aimed, not surprisingly, at increasing the wealth of a minority, but these accessions of riches are purely paper in form, and cannot survive severe financial correction.
The Presidential Dilemma. The dilemma is not limited to Trump and Biden. All of us face it. Biden cannot win despite all of the theft mechanisms the Democrats have institutionalized. A stolen election requires a close election in order to hide the theft. But the polls show no such close election. In order to use the fraudulent electoral means put in place, the Democrats need a candidate that the media can present as neck-in-neck with Trump. Even if Democrats had such a candidate, the Biden Crime Family cannot risk Trump taking office. In the event that Trump has learned not to appoint his most dangerous enemies to the highest offices, Biden out of power faces the risk of a real investigation of his and his son’s suspect business affairs, which appear to boil down to influence peddling.
Hurricane Beryl is a Natural. Hurricane Beryl shows what nature can do. Is it a man-made climate change example? NO! The climate is always changing. Man’s input just may come in third in order of importance. If you are in shock and awe over Beryl, that’s on you. As sea surface temperatures are like August, the atmosphere will act like August when given the right conditions. Those conditions this year are in the Atlantic Basin. But perspective and the total picture is something not in vogue today. In everything, crucial facts are hidden. And the huge, massive elephant in the room is that the busiest basin in the world is running less than 20% of average and has a record slow start in the eastern Pacific and 3rd slowest in the west. Globally, that is a huge deal.
Things can only get worse – Britain is about to be remade in the image of our deranged cultural elites. We need to be clear-eyed about what this Labour restoration means. The gloating from the great and good makes clear that the elites view a Starmer victory as an escape from the post-Brexit interregnum. As a repudiation of populism. As a repudiation of what they snottily dismiss as the ‘culture war’. As a repudiation of those few years in which the concerns of ordinary people – on gender, migration, Net Zero – were the stuff of political debate. While the Tories have proven themselves to be limp, ineffectual and often-sincere battlers against metropolitan groupthink, Labour is, without question, its primary political vehicle. It is the parliamentary wing of the new elite. The slow capture of our institutions by greens, identitarians and technocrats – in spite of (and sometimes because of) our Conservative rulers – will now become even more entrenched.
The Reason Biden Was Permitted to Debate Trump. Joe Biden was sent to the podium as the sacrificial lamb of the DNC. His handlers knew his condition, and no amount of preparation, layup questions, or alterations from the liberal media could have improved his performance. Even Donald Trump seemed concerned that Joe Biden would keel over at any moment. There is a reason the Democrats agreed to this debate — they are setting up the stage for a candidate swap.
Varying Interpretations of Truth, or Truth as a Social Construct. In this age of relativism, where one often hears reference to “your truth” and “my truth,” there are so many varying interpretations of truth that the concept of truth itself seems devoid of meaning. It is fashionable to see the concept of truth as indistinguishable from opinions or preferences. For example, Mari Fitzduff writes that “for many of us, far from our beliefs being “true,” they are actually born out of a particular social context, allied to physiological needs such as a differing neural sensitivity to threats and the greater certainty that a group can provide. Thus, beliefs are often what is termed “groupish” rather than necessarily true”.

Give a gift subscription