AI needs to be regulated. The vacuous White House has stepped in to save the day by appointing the even more vacuous VP Kamala Harris to head the task force. What’s wrong with this picture? What could possibly go wrong? The least intelligent will try to understand the most intelligent and rein it in from destroying humanity. ⁃ TN Editor
The White House has revealed that they are ready with a plan to regulate AI. The effort will be led by VP Kamala Harris. The idea is to get companies like Google, Microsoft, and ChatGPT’s founder OpenAI, to participate in a public review.
The White House has outlined its strategy to tighten down on the AI race, amid mounting fears that technology may disrupt society as we know it. The Biden Administration described the technology as ‘one of the most powerful’ of our time, but said, “But in order to exploit the benefits it brings, we must first limit its hazards.”
The goal is to establish 25 research institutions around the United States in order to obtain assurances from four businesses, including Google, Microsoft, and ChatGPT’s founder OpenAI, that they will ‘participate in a public review.’
Many of the world’s brightest minds have warned about the dangers of AI, specifically that it could destroy humanity if a risk assessment is not conducted immediately. Elon Musk and other tech titans are concerned that AI may soon outperform human intellect and think for itself.
This implies it would no longer require or listen to humans, giving it the ability to steal nuclear codes, cause pandemics, and trigger world conflicts.
Vice President Kamala Harris, who has the lowest popularity rating of any VP, will oversee the containment effort as ‘AI czar’ with a $140 million budget. In comparison, the Space Force has a $30 billion budget.
Harris met with officials from Google, Microsoft, and OpenAI on Thursday to explore ways to mitigate such possible hazards.
The White House said in a statement, “As we shared today with CEOs of companies at the forefront of American AI innovation, the private sector has an ethical, moral, and legal responsibility to ensure the safety and security of their products.”
“And, in order to safeguard the American people, every firm must follow current laws. I’m looking forward to the follow-through and follow-up in the coming weeks.” Each company’s AI will be evaluated this summer at a hacker event in Las Vegas to check if it adheres to the administration’s ‘AI Bill of Rights.’
The November release of the ChatGPT chatbot sparked a renewed discussion over AI and the government’s role in monitoring the technology. There are ethical and cultural problems since AI may create human-like text and phoney visuals.
These include distributing harmful content, violating data privacy, amplifying existing bias, and – Elon Musk’s favourite – destroying humanity.
“President Biden has been clear that when it comes to AI, we must place people and communities at the centre by supporting responsible innovation that serves the public good while protecting our society, security, and economy,” reads the White House announcement.
“Importantly, this means that businesses have a basic obligation to ensure the safety of their goods before they are deployed or made public.” According to the White House, the public review will be carried out by thousands of community partners and AI specialists.
Professionals in the industry will test the models to evaluate how they correspond with the principles and practises defined in the AI Bill of Rights and the AI Risk Management Framework.
Biden’s AI Bill of Rights, which was released in October 2022, lays forth a framework for how the government, technology corporations, and individuals may collaborate to create more accountable AI.
The measure has five principles: safe and effective systems, protections against algorithmic discrimination, data privacy, notice and explanation, and human alternatives, considerations, and backup.
The White House stated in October, “This framework applies to automated systems that have the potential to meaningfully impact the American public’s rights, opportunities, or access to critical resources or services.”
The White House’s plan of action comes after Musk and 1,000 other technological executives, including Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, signed an open letter in March.
Musk is concerned that technology will evolve to the point where it will no longer require – or listen to – human intervention. It is a widely held fear that has even been acknowledged by the CEO of AI, the company that created ChatGPT, who stated earlier this month that the technology could be developed and used to commit ‘widespread’ cyberattacks.
Pills that can help a person reverse the effects of aging could be on the market in the next five years, according to an expert.
Sam Altman, 37, was revealed to have funded biotech startup Retro BioScience to the tune of $180million last month. He is the latest in a long line of Silicon Valley billionaires to throw their considerable wealth behind the science of aging.
Amazon’s Jeff Bezos is reported to have invested $3billion in life-extension startup Altos Labs. PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel invested in the Methuselah Foundation, which has the goal of making ’90 the new 50′.
With all these resources being thrown at curing aging, Andrew Steele, the author of the 2020 book ‘Ageless: The new science of getting older without getting old’, believes pills to prevent aging may be on pharmacy shelves within five years.
He points to existing medications — such as the diabetes tablet metformin – that could be retooled as anti-aging treatments in the ‘very, very near term’.
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Sam Altman (left), founder of ChatGPT creator OpenAI, has invested in a life-extension biotech. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos (right) funded Atlos Labs and its research into life extension for $3billion
Tech billionaire Peter Thiel invested in the Methuselah Foundation, hoping to great exceed the average person’s lifespan
Steele said: ‘With these billionaires, I’m sure some of them are doing it purely for personal gain — they’ve got all this money and they can’t possibly spend it in a single human lifetime.
‘But… if you’re a savvy investor, you can see that anti-aging medication is a huge business opportunity because the potential market is every living human.
‘I think it’s going to be the biggest revolution in medicine since the discovery of antibiotics — and as a savvy business person, you want to be on the leading edge of that revolution.’
While aging does not directly kill people, older people are at risk of many deadly diseases such as Alzheimer’s, heart disease and cancer.
Around 100,000 people die from age-related diseases every day, according to the World Health Organization.
Mr Steele says: ‘Aging is the greatest humanitarian challenge of all time.
There are ’20 to 30′ companies developing new drugs known as ‘senolytics’ which kill aging cells in the body, he explained.
In mice, these drugs cause elderly animals to become lively and healthy suddenly.
‘Many of these drugs are drugs that we already understand and use for different purposes, so we don’t have to develop new medications,’ Mr Steele said.
An example of a senolytic treatment is the combination of datasinib, used for chemotherapy, and quercetin, a molecule found in fruits and vegetables.
Used together, they remove aged ‘senescent’ cells responsible for many of the problems associated with aging.
Another potential general anti-aging drug is metformin. First approved in 1994 for type 2 diabetes, the drug has shown promise extending lifespans by improving blood vessel health.
‘Some of those companies are trying to develop new and more effective drugs that could do the same thing better,’ the author said.
‘That’s the sort of thing that’s very, very close to clinical realization. And I’d be shocked if in five years we don’t have some senolytics in the clinic.
‘It probably won’t be for aging at first. It’ll be for a specific disease – and maybe in 10 years, we’ll use it for aging.
‘These things are very, very near term.’
Jeff Bezos’s investment in Altos Labs — the biggest biotechnology company launch of all time — is a longer shot, Steele believes.
Dr Andrew Steele is the author of Ageless, a new book on life extension (Tran Nguyen)
The firm specializes finding and developing cell therapies that can halt and eventually reverse the process of aging.
Mr Steele says: ‘This relies on a process called cellular reprogramming. It’s been shown to work on cells in a dish, and there’s some evidence it works in mice – but it’s an incredibly complicated piece of science.
‘It’s like science that seems to have fallen through a wormhole from the future – and even if it does work, do we have the biological applied understanding in the 2020s to turn that into a workable treatment?’
When Altos Labs was announced, Elon Musk quipped on Twitter about the Amazon mogul: ‘If it doesn’t work, he’s gonna sue death!’
With labs launching in America and Cambridge, the company is reputed to pay scientists poached from the world’s top universities salaries of up to a million dollars a year.
Steele says that, realistically, treatments we are likely to see in the near term will extend ‘healthspan’ by dealing with age-related diseases — delaying the onset of problems such as dementia.
Dr Cathy Slack, a biologist from the University of Aston, in the UK, agrees, telling DailyMail.com: ‘The goal is to increase the number of years of healthy lifespan rather than extending the late-life period of poor health.’
She said there are now ‘many’ published studies that show that genetic or environmental changes can extend a healthy lifespan.
She says: ‘Many of the biological systems that have been shown to play a role in healthy aging in these animal models are also present in humans and perform similar functions – so there is every reason to believe that these same processes are impacting on human aging.
‘The ultimate goal is really to try and manipulate these systems during human aging to maintain health and quality of life.’
Dr Slack believes that successful treatments are likely to be a combination of drugs and lifestyle changes – and look holistically at all the diseases that afflict people in later life.
She says: ‘Historically, we have viewed the various diseases associated with older age as distinct entities – so research tends to focus on each one rather than looking at them more holistically together as a direct consequence of biological aging.
‘We already know that there are lifestyle changes that will help to maintain multiple aspects of heath during aging.
‘Exercise, for example. But supplementation with drugs that target multiple physiological parameters of aging could have a huge impact on quality of life for older adults.’
September 12, 2022, U.S. President Joe Biden signed an “Executive Order on Advancing Biotechnology and Biomanufacturing Innovation for a Sustainable, Safe and Secure American Bioeconomy.” This executive order makes biotechnology a national priority across agencies and branches of government. Similar legislation has been introduced in the U.K.
In late March 2023, Biden expanded on this premise in a “Bold Goals for U.S. Biotechnology and Biomanufacturing” report. According to this plan, the food industry is now to be led by biotech, and the “improvements” we can look forward to are more lab-grown meats and bioengineered plant foods
Rather than investing taxpayer dollars in regenerative agriculture, which is what could really solve our problems, government is instead backing a whole new industry of fake foods, from lab-grown meats to large-scale insect production
Two cell-based lab-grown meat companies have now received the green light to produce and sell fake chicken in the U.S.
Meanwhile, a Food Hazards Identification report by the British Food standards Agency and Food Standards Scotland, published in March 2023, warns there are “considerable gaps in knowledge” when it comes to cell-based meat production, and many potential hazards
September 12, 2022, U.S. President Joe Biden signed an “Executive Order on Advancing Biotechnology and Biomanufacturing Innovation for a Sustainable, Safe and Secure American Bioeconomy.”1
This executive order makes biotechnology a national priority across agencies and branches of government. As noted in this order, biotechnology will also be used to “improve” food security, sustainability, and agricultural innovation in the U.S.:
“The Secretary of Agriculture, in consultation with the heads of appropriate agencies as determined by the Secretary, shall submit a report assessing how to use biotechnology and biomanufacturing for food and agriculture innovation, including by improving sustainability and land conservation; increasing food quality and nutrition; increasing and protecting agricultural yields; protecting against plant and animal pests and diseases; and cultivating alternative food sources.”
Support of Bioengineered Fake Food Is Now White House Policy
In late March 2023, Biden expanded on this premise in a “Bold Goals for U.S. Biotechnology and Biomanufacturing” report.2 According to this plan, the food industry is now to be led by biotech, and the “improvements” we can look forward to are more lab-grown meats and bioengineered plant foods.
In the featured video above, I discuss this rapidly advancing trend, and the true geopolitical incentives behind it, because the U.S. is not alone in moving in this direction. A similar plan is detailed in the U.K.’s Genetic Technology and Precision Breeding Act of 2023.3 Specific goals highlighted in Biden’s “Bold Goals” report include:4
•Increasing agricultural productivity by 28% in the next decade
•Reducing food waste by 50% by 2030
•Reducing methane emissions from agriculture by 30% by 2030 by:
1.Capturing biogases from manure management systems
2.Reducing methane emissions from ruminant livestock
3.Reducing methane emissions from food waste in landfills
As reported by Food Dive:5
“While advocates and some companies have been working to reduce methane emissions from food, cut down on food waste, increase capacity for producing alternative proteins and use bioengineering to make healthier and hardier crops and animals, goals like these have never before come from the White House …
The federal government is providing more evidence that it intends to do more than just talk about big goals. A day before the report came out, FDA gave its second tacit approval to a company using biotechnology to grow meat from cells in bioreactors.
While neither … is creating meat for consumers yet, this action shows that the federal government is moving toward making cultivated meat a reality.”
Government Supports a Failed Strategy
Among the many problems with this plan is the fact that taxpayers will now be paying for government’s funding of private corporations involved in the fake food industry. The end result is predictable. What we’ll have is a repeat of what happened with farm subsidies.
Rather than subsidizing the most nutritious foods, government farm subsidies go almost exclusively to large monoculture farms growing genetically engineered corn, soy and other basic ingredients used in processed foods. As a result, the processed food industry has grown on our dime while public health has deteriorated.
The same thing will happen here. Instead of investing in regenerative agriculture, which is what could really solve our problems, government is backing a whole new industry of fake foods, from lab-grown meats to large-scale insect production.
Cultivated Meats Get Green-Light
At present, two cell-based lab-grown meat companies have received the green light to produce and sell fake chicken in the U.S. The first, Upside Foods (previously Memphis Meats), received FDA approval for its cell-based lab-grown chicken in November 2022.6 According to the FDA’s November 14, 2022, memo:7
“We have no questions at this time about UPSIDE’s conclusion that foods comprised of or containing cultured chicken cell material resulting from the production process … are as safe as comparable foods produced by other methods.”
Dr. Uma Valeti, CEO and founder of Upside Foods, called the approval “a watershed moment in the history of food” and a “major step toward a new era in meat production.” The company has a 53,000-square-foot facility in the San Francisco Bay Area capable of producing 400,000 pounds of fake meat per year.
In March 2023, Eat Just — which has been selling its lab-grown chicken in Singapore since 2020 — also received FDA approval. The company is currently building a commercial-scale facility in the U.S. that will house 10 250,000-liter bioreactors.8 Vítor Espírito Santo, senior director of Eat Just’s cellular agriculture division, told Food Dive:9
“The Singapore approval was a big, big deal. But it’s undeniable that the U.S., the FDA approval, is something that we were looking forward [to] for many years, and I think it’s a big game changer for the industry.
We have two countries now. Hopefully now this keeps happening in more and more jurisdictions, and cultivated meat can become a reality worldwide.”
Safety Data Is Sorely Lacking
While the U.S. government is moving full speed ahead with approvals for lab-grown meats, a Food Hazards Identification report10 by the British Food standards Agency (FSA) and Food Standards Scotland, published in March 2023, warns there are “considerable gaps in knowledge” when it comes to cell-based meat production. As reported by Food Safety News March 24, 2023:11
“The purpose of the report was to identify hazards in the cultivated meat production process to help inform the FSA risk assessment process for authorization. It was also important that products do not pose any microbiological or chemical concerns. The research was based on a review of scientific literature in 2020.
There was little or no data on the final analytical composition of products, key toxicology data, nutrition profiles, product stability, allergy risk, and any recorded adverse effects when consumed by animals or humans …
The FSA report found there are several stages of development for producing cultured meat and at each one, different chemicals, biologics, media formulations, additives, and supplements are used. The contamination risk of each input needs to be assessed, as any undesirable components that remain in the final product need to be at an acceptable exposure level or be food-grade and safe.”
Potential problem areas identified by the FSA include:12,13
Contaminated reagents, air or water baths
Poorly cleaned or maintained equipment
Failing to follow cleaning protocols when culturing cells
Failing to follow good laboratory practices (GLP) and/or good manufacturing practices (GMP)
Use of antibiotics, fungicides and/or chemicals that are toxic to humans in the production
Consumption of viruses used in the manufacturing process
Cross-contamination of one cell line into another due to concomitant use of multiple cell lines
Other cross-contamination risks, such as “poor maintenance of equipment, poor cleaning regimes, incorrect storage of cells, working with multiple cell lines in one area, using the wrong cells and incorrect labeling”
New diseases and/or allergic reactions to new proteins due to using cell lines of animals not common in the local diet
Nutritional deficiencies, “as the nutrition profile could be different from what it is replacing”
As noted in the report:14
“There are many stages of development for producing cultured meat … from taking a cell line from a small vial or biopsy and increasing the culture volume stepwise in stages (proliferation), until a commercial sized bioreactor can be seeded, to differentiating the cells to final desired cell type.
Then [they are] maturing them, usually on a scaffold, to increase the protein content, and then detaching/grinding the cells with/from their scaffold to produce a final product that can be used to make meat like cells. At each stage, different chemicals, biologics, media formulations, additives and supplements are used to ensure a successful culture.”
Contamination can occur at any of these steps. Each additive also poses potential risks, both known and unknown, as various byproducts are created in the process. In the video above, I review some of the many potential dangers associated with fake meats.
Considering the multistep processing cultivated meats undergo, it’s simply not possible for it to be as safe as conventional meat, where the primary contamination risks are limited to slaughter, processing, packaging, distribution and storage. With fake meats, hazardous contamination can occur at any point during manufacturing, in addition to these conventional “weak points.”
Fake Meat Is Ultraprocessed Greenwashed Junk Food
Synthetic meat is the epitome of ultraprocessed food,15 and it seems naïve to think it won’t have health effects similar to other ultraprocessed junk foods. Obesity,16 Type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, cancer and depression are but a few examples of conditions known to be promoted and exacerbated by a processed food diet.17,18,19,20,21
Synthetic foods will likely be an even bigger driver or chronic ill health and early death. Ultraprocessed foods are also completely counterproductive to environmentally “green” and sustainable goals.
For example, ultraprocessed foods already account for 17% to 39% of total diet-related energy use, 36% to 45% of total diet-related biodiversity loss and up to one-third of total diet-related greenhouse gas emissions.22 So, how is expanding the manufacturing and consumption of even more ultraprocessed foods going to lower greenhouse gas emissions? As noted in a September 2022 Journal of Cleaner Production paper:23
“Ultraprocessed foods are fundamentally unsustainable products; they have been associated with poor health and social outcomes and require finite environmental resources for their production … are responsible for significant diet-related energy, [and] greenhouse gas emissions.”
And, for all the lip service paid to “equity,” increasing consumption of processed foods will actually worsen economic inequalities, as it redirects money away from small farmers and independent homesteaders to transnational corporations that rely on underpaid workers.
Ultimately, the answer to food safety and food security lies not in a biotech-centered food system that is controlled from the top down, but rather in a decentralized system that connects communities with farmers who grow real food in sustainable ways and distribute that food locally.
Strategies that can get us there were covered in the Children’s Health Defense’s March 4, 2023, Attack on Food symposium (video above). Food Sovereignty was primarily covered in Session 3, which begins at three hours and 45 minutes.
For example, Dr. John Day and Beverly Johannson shared tips on how to grow your own food and preserve the food you grow. Other helpful strategies include buying food from local farmers and farmers markets, and creating independent food hubs that cut out the middlemen.
The final session of the symposium dealt with larger societal solutions to fight back against the war on food. U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie highlighted core vulnerabilities in the U.S. food supply, which fell apart during the pandemic when farmers had to euthanize animals because they couldn’t get them processed.
Four meatpackers control 85% of the meat that’s processed in the U.S. One of them is owned by China, one by Brazil and the other two are multinational corporations. Food prices are going up while farmers are going broke. In 2017, Massie introduced the Processing Revival and Intrastate Meat Exemption (PRIME) Act,24 but the bill hasn’t moved since its introduction in the House.
The PRIME Act would allow farmers to sell meat processed at smaller slaughtering facilities and allow states to set their own meat processing standards, because small slaughterhouses do not have an inspector on staff — a requirement that only large facilities can easily fulfill — they’re banned from selling their meat. The PRIME Act would lift this regulation without sacrificing safety, as random USDA inspections could still occur.
“If a farmer wants to sell pork, beef or lamb to a consumer, as long as that consumer and that farmer and that processor are all in the same state, they’re not crossing state lines, they keep the federal government out of that transaction,” he said.
Massey has also introduced legislation to protect access to raw milk (HR 4835, the Interstate Milk Freedom Act of 202125).26 The bill was introduced at the end of July 2021, as an amendment to the 2018 Farm bill. Contact your representatives and urge them to support these bills.
The founding fathers should have included extra text in the First Amendment: “Congress shall not make any law, Executive shall not make any rule or order, Judiciary shall make no ruling” abridging freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, the right to peaceable assembly and right to protest the government for redress of our grievances.There is indisputable evidence that our own government is the driving vehicle to completely obliterate free speech in America. The Congress can rein in the Administration but unfortunately, many in Congress are complicit and even encouraging Biden and staff to intensify the attack.
The current trajectory of this war on the First Amendment will result in criminalizing speech, imposing penalties like fines, court cases and imprisonment. ⁃ TN Editor
Our government is preparing to monitor every word Americans say on the internet—the speech of journalists, politicians, religious organizations, advocacy groups, and even private citizens. Should those conversations conflict with the government’s viewpoint about what is in the best interests of our country and her citizens, that speech will be silenced.
While the “Twitter Files” offer a glimpse into the government’s efforts to censor disfavored viewpoints, what we have seen is nothing compared to what is planned, as the details of hundreds of federal awards lay bare. Research by The Federalist reveals our tax dollars are funding the development of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine-learning (ML) technology that will allow the government to easily discover “problematic” speech and track Americans reading or partaking in such conversations.
Then, in partnership with Big Tech, Big Business, and media outlets, the government will ensure the speech is censored, under the guise of combatting “misinformation” and “disinformation.”
AI and ML Technology Will Monitor Everything We Say and Read
The federal government has awarded more than 500-plus contracts or grants related to “misinformation” or “disinformation” since 2020. One predominant area of research pushed by the Department of Defense involves the use of AI and ML technology to monitor or listen to internet “conversations.”
Originally used as a marketing tool for businesses to track discussions about their brands and products and to track competitors, the DOD and other federal agencies are now paying for-profit public relations and communications firms to convert their technology into tools for the government to monitor speech on the internet.
The areas of the internet the companies monitor differ somewhat, and each business offers its own unique AI and ML proprietary technology, but the underlying approach and goals remain identical: The technology under development will “mine” large portions of the internet and identify conversations deemed indicative of an emerging harmful narrative, to allow the government to track those “threats” and adopt countermeasures before the messages go viral.
With AI and ML identifying in real-time the origins of supposed influence operations and how the messages spread, the government will have the ability to preempt the amplification of the speech, squelching even true reporting before the general populace has an opportunity to learn the news. To appreciate fully the danger this poses to free speech requires Americans to consider the use of that technology with these seven additional details.
1. Everything Everywhere All At Once
First, the AI and ML technology under development will mine every conceivable mode of conversation for the government. Consider, for example, the databases monitored by just a few of the companies the government is paying to develop this AI and ML technology.
PeakMetrics, the recipient of a $1.5 million award, tracks millions of news sites, blogs, global social platforms, podcasts, TV and radio, and email newsletters.
Omelas Inc., which received more than $1 million in taxpayer money, culls data from “the most influential newspapers, TV channels, government offices, militant groups, and more across a dozen social networks and messaging apps, thousands of websites, and thousands of RSS feeds.”
Alethea Group, which received a Phase I award of nearly $50,000 to develop a “machine learning tool for proactive disinformation/misinformation detection, assessment, and mitigation,” boasts it covers data sources including mainstream and “fringe” social media platforms, peer-to-peer messaging platforms, blogs and forums, state-affiliated media sites, “gray” propaganda sites, and the dark web.
Newsguard, awarded $750,000 by the DOD, offers two databases, including its unreliable reliability ratings database of thousands of news and information websites and a second database of purported hoaxes.
Primer, which scored a $3 million award to develop its technology, offers a database that looks to news and media data sources, publicly captured images, the dark web, cyberattacks shared by the general public, and classified—presumably for government clients—and unclassified data sources. Primer also partners with Flashpoint, which adds “Telegram, Reddit, Discord, and “the deep and dark web” to the databases mined.
2. We’re Talking Americans, Not Just Russian Bots
It is also important to recognize that the AI and ML technology under development will not just mine foreign or state-connected actors, but will monitor everyone’s speech. Both the government grants and the web pages of the monitoring companies confirm this reality.
We also know from the “Twitter Files” that the government and its fellow residents in the Censorship-Industrial Complex view the speech of Americans as related to foreign influence operations merely because the viewpoint matches what they claim is an adversary’s perspective. And we know the government pushed for the censorship of ordinary Americans.
By its nature, AI and ML technology has unlimited potential to flag problematic speech on any imaginable subject. Here, the past is prologue: Speech need not involve terrorism, acts of war, or even our electoral process for our government to consider it within its purview to fact-check. (It also need not be false; see point 4).
The “Twitter Files” and recent events provide Americans a glimpse into the breadth of the topics the government may deem harmful narratives worthy of censor—from elections, to vaccines, to runs on grocery stores. Underlying the government’s obsession with silencing misinformation, disinformation, and mal-information is the “Great Power Competition” perspective of foreign relations, under which China and Russia represent a constant threat to America’s power, influences, and interests.
With the government viewing foreign relations through the Great Power Competition paradigm, speech on any topic, touching even tangentially on America’s “power, influences, and interests,” will be fair game for censorship efforts.
3. The Great Power Competition Renders Everything Fair Game for Censorship
While to convincingly prove this reality requires a deeper exposé—coming soon—on the Great Power Competition’s connection to the government’s focus on misinformation, disinformation, and mal-information, last week Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Arizona, showcased the current thinking inspiring our leaders. During a conference call with the Federal Deposit and Insurance Corporation about the Silicon Valley Bank bailout, Kelly asked whether there was “a way to censor information on social media to prevent a run on the banks.”
Kelly’s question was “couched” “in a concern that foreign actors would be doing this,” Rep. Thomas Massie told Public, but, according to Massie, Kelly “didn’t suggest the censorship should be limited to foreigners or to things that were untrue.”
The move from the censorship of terrorism to the silencing of supposed interference in elections to censoring posts about “bank runs” follows naturally from the shift in foreign relations paradigms from the War on Terror to the Great Powers Competition. The latter views anything affecting American power or influence as fair game. We also saw this shift with the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency (CISA) proposal to consider “financial misinformation” within its purview.
The government’s censorship efforts won’t stop at supposed “financial misinformation,” however, because anything and everything journalists report and citizens discuss affects America’s “power, influence, and interest.” So, the government’s development of technology to monitor the entirety of the internet foretells a much more dangerous threat than apparent on the surface.
4. The Government Brands True Speech Misinformation
The threat to free speech stemming from the government’s monitoring of the internet is further increased by our overlords’ willingness to brand true speech “misinformation, disinformation, or mal-information” and then seek to censor it. The “Twitter Files” also exposed this reality, with our government and its lackeys seeking the censorship of true facts that might lead to “vaccine hesitancy” or reveal runs on grocery stores.
That our government would seek to silence true speech on such matters gives Americans reason to fear further censorship of true information.
5. Faulty Analysis and Biased Censors
The “Twitter Files” also revealed that censorship demands by the government, think tanks, and academic institutions relied on faulty misinformation analyses, including ones that identified innocent Americans as foreign actors. Also, many of those involved in the disinformation industry maintain left-leaning bias and a penchant for targeting conservatives.
In furthering its plans to monitor the internet for supposedly harmful narratives to silence, the government is continuing to work with biased groups, including ones that pushed faulty analyses, adding to the threat to free speech.
6. The Government’s Partners Are Poised to Censor
The government’s push to develop AI and ML technology to mine the internet is even more terrifying knowing that a CensorshipComplex has already been built. The “Twitter Files” revealed the breadth and depth of the complex, with every alphabet-soup federal agency working with the social media giants and an array of think tanks and academic institutions, and with the legacy media providing an assist when censorship requests went ignored.
While Elon Musk may have exited Twitter from the group, the Censorship Complex still stands tall and ready to silence the speech of those who dare dissent. This public-private collaboration makes the government’s move to monitor the internet even more threatening to free speech.
7. Those Who Could Warn the Public or Stop the Plot Are All-In
The threat is further heightened because those with the power to warn the public and demand the government stop silencing Americans’ speech are complicit. The corrupt media’s coverage, or lack thereof, of Matt Taibbi and Michael Shellenberger’s congressional testimony on the Censorship Complex proves this point. So too does the Democrats’ pathetic performance during the hearings, when they exposed themselves as enemies of free speech.
With Democrats, the legacy media, and many Republicans all in on the government’s efforts to censor misinformation and disinformation, it will be extremely difficult for the public to recognize the risks free speech faces—especially since those trying to sound the alarm have already been falsely branded purveyors of disinformation.
A chance remains, though, that enough ordinary Americans will hear the message before it is too late and demand Congress close the Censorship-Industrial Complex.
Matt Hancock discussed ‘deploying’ new virus variant to ‘frighten the pants off everyone’ as former Health Secretary demands immunity on care home deaths during the pandemic
Mr Hancock said he wanted to frighten the public into changing their behaviour
It comes as he told a top law firm he should not be help responsible for failings
Matt Hancock told aides he wanted to ‘frighten the pants off everyone’ to ensure compliance with Covid-19 restrictions, leaked messages reveal, as it emerges he told top London lawyers he should be immune from prosecution just days before the WhatsApp scandal broke.
In an online Q&A with law firm Mishcon de Reya, Matt Hancock accused those prosecuting Secretaries of State as ‘chasing tabloid headlines’ just 12 days ago, The Mirror reports.
It comes as a new swathe of messages from Mr Hancock’s WhatsApp account were revealed today, involving discussions over how to scare the public to limit the spread of coronavirus, and when to ‘deploy’ details of a new strain.
The latest set of WhatsApp exchanges show Mr Hancock and others discussed how to use an announcement about the Kent variant of the virus to scare the public into changing their behaviour.
The messages, among more than 100,000 WhatsApps passed to the Telegraph by journalist Isabel Oakeshott, show that Cabinet Secretary Simon Case suggested in January 2021 that the ‘fear’ factor would be ‘vital’ in stopping the spread of the virus.
The latest set of WhatsApp exchanges show Mr Hancock and others discussed how to use an announcement about the Kent variant of the virus to scare the public into changing their behaviour
The discussion took place in December, just three weeks before the whole of the country was placed back under lockdown rules
…
In December 2020, the exchanges show concern that London Mayor Sadiq Khan could follow the example of Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham, who had clashed with the Government over the decision to impose stringent lockdown restrictions on the region.
Mr Hancock’s adviser said: ‘Rather than doing too much forward signalling, we can roll pitch with the new strain.’
‘We frighten the pants of everyone with the new strain,’ the then Health Secretary responded.
‘But the complication with that Brexit is taking the top line,’ he said, in an apparent reference to media coverage of the UK’s EU exit.
‘Yep that’s what will get proper behaviour change,’ the adviser said.
‘When do we deploy the new variant,’ Mr Hancock said.
The conversation, on December 13, came amid concerns about the rapid spread of the virus in south-east England.
Mr Hancock announced that a new Covid-19 variant had been identified in the UK on December 14.
London and south-east England were to enter a new Tier 4 alert level, it was announced on December 19, when then prime minister Boris Johnson also cancelled a promised Christmas ‘bubbles’ policy allowing families to meet.
The entirety of England entered the third national lockdown on January 6 2021.
Messages from January 10 show Mr Hancock and the Cabinet Secretary discussing ways to ensure compliance.
‘More mask-wearing might be the only thing to consider.
‘Effectively free and has a very visible impact? Wear masks in all settings outside home and in more workplaces?
‘Am not sure that got us much further, did it? Basically, we need to get compliance up.’
Ford Motor Company filed a US patent application that shows autonomous or semi-autonomous vehicles could potentially repossess themselves if their owners miss lease or loan payments.
The idea of self-driving cars repossessing themselves might sound dystopian, but it is not surprising that automakers are considering this technology to ensure payment. Repossession is a common practice, and as we’ve described recently, cracks are beginning to form in the subprime auto loan market (read: here & here).
While this patent application was first filed in Aug. 2021 and formally published on Feb. 23, it could be years before Ford implements such a technology.
The patent, titled “Systems and Methods to Repossess a Vehicle,” explains how a future lineup of Ford vehicles would be capable of “[disabling] a functionality of one or more components of the vehicle.”
If a driver misses a car payment, the vehicle will disable air conditioning, radio, GPS, and cruise control to irritate the driver.
If the owner misses more payments, the repossession cycle will worsen. The car would emit an “incessant and unpleasant sound.” Worse, the vehicle might lock out the driver on certain days until payments are made.
And still, if the lockout doesn’t work and payments are missed, the vehicle could drive to a safe, nearby location for a repo team to seize it and avoid confrontation with the owner.
It is worth noting that filing a patent application does not necessarily mean the technology will be implemented, but the takeaway is a glimpse of the dystopic future.
‘Make Sunsets’, a Mexico-based startup, will launch 2kg of sulfur particles in a balloon into the stratosphere in a “rogue” move to create a “mini-volcano” effect it says could help cool the planet. The cloud of particles will reflect the sun’s rays for a cooling impact. Injecting sulfur in the sky could affect rainfall and monsoons, thus affecting crops. Effects could vary across regions, with some areas reaping benefits while others are harmed, increasing the chance of conflict.‘Make Sunsets’ is a Silicon Valley money-making enterprise to sell “cooling credits”, no matter the cost to the environment and people it can affect. Geoengineering proponents totally ignore the fact that global warming is a hoax that was devised to control people. Furthermore, aerosol injection into the atmosphere to stop global warming has been underway for some time. Controlling the weather is a profound power.
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A Mexico-based startup will next week launch sulphur particles into the stratosphere in a “rogue” move to create a “mini-volcano” effect it says could help cool the planet.
The technique, known as stratospheric aerosol injection, mimics the impact of volcanoes by using a weather balloon to release sulphur, creating a cloud of particles that reflect the sun’s rays and have a cooling impact.
It is one of several geoengineering techniques being studied as a way to cool the planet to avoid breaching internationally agreed limits on global warming.
The amount of particles that start-up Make Sunsets plans to release in coming days, up to 2kg, will make a minimal difference to overall warming.
But experts in geoengineering say the launches set a dangerous precedent for private companies or governments to interfere with the planet’s atmosphere.
The company is backed by two venture capital funds, and is selling “cooling credits” to the public for $15 (£12), which it says pays for 1g of sulphur, expected to produce enough cooling to offset a ton of carbon emissions for a year.
It released a first balloon in December in Mexico, but will next week launch from California, after the Mexican government released a statement criticising the first effort.
Co-founder Luke Isemans said the potential risks of what he is doing are outweighed by the known threat of climate change.
“I think that pretty quickly leads a rational person to an uncomfortable conclusion that we have a moral obligation to already be doing this at scale,” he told the Telegraph. “Eve
GLOBAL NON-USE AGREEMENT
The practice is so far largely unregulated, leading experts to warn of the dangers of taking action without global consensus.
If conducted on a large scale, there are concerns the technique could deplete the ozone layer, or change precipitation patterns. Hundreds of scientists have signed a call for a global non-use agreement to stop the development and potential use of all large-scale solar geoengineering technologies.
“It would basically change precipitation patterns, meaning it could mess up the monsoon, which would affect millions of people,” said Lili Fuhr, from the Center for International Environmental Law. “Basically, you’re impacting everyone on this planet, so everyone should have a say. There’s not one country or actor that can take control of the global thermostat and do it benignly for everyone else.”
Experts warn that this cheap and easy method could make it more tempting for governments to use, which could have the potential to fuel conflicts if it goes wrong.
A new bill has been introduced in Idaho that would make the administration of experimental mRNA COVID-19 vaccines illegal.
Representative Judy Boyle (R-Midvale) and Senator Tammy Nichols (R-Middleton) sponsored House Bill 154.
Sen. Nichols introduced the new bill on the 15th of February before the House Health and Welfare Committee, according to KTVB.
According to the bill text, “A person may not provide or administer a vaccine developed using messenger ribonucleic acid technology for use in an individual or any other mammal in this state.”
Nichols said during her presentation to the committee, “We have issues this was fast tracked.”
Nichols said there is no liability, informed consent or data on mRNA vaccines. She later clarified she was referring to the two COVID-19 vaccines, Pfizer and Moderna.
“I think there is a lot of information that comes out with concerns to blood clots and heart issues,” Nichols said.
Rep. Ilana Rubel, D-Boise, questioned Nichols’ statement that the vaccines were fast-tracked. She said her understanding was that the vaccines were approved and survived the testing, later approved by the FDA.
Nichols said she is finding it “may not have been done like we thought it should’ve been done.”
“There are other shots we could utilize that don’t have mRNA in it,” Nichols said.
More and more medical experts, scientists, and right group advocates all over the world are now demanding that the government should stop its COVID-19 vaccination campaign due to its devastating side effects among patients.
And yet governments still turn a blind eye to one of the most atrocious crimes against humanity.
A woman walks past a doctor’s office in New York City on July 26, 2021. (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
New medical diagnosis codes for COVID-19 immunization status have been added in the United States.
One code is for being “unvaccinated for COVID-19.”
That code “may be assigned when the patient has not received at least one dose of any COVID-19 vaccine,” the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which implemented the new codes in 2022, states in a document outlining the codes.
Another code is for being partially vaccinated or having received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine but not having received enough doses to meet the CDC’s definition of fully vaccinated.
The goal of the codes is “to track people who are not immunized or only partially immunized,” according to the CDC.
Experts say the codes don’t fit with the International Classification of Diseases, which has diagnoses for diseases and reasons for health care visits.
“They’re treating nonvaccination as if this is a hazardous exposure that therefore merits being recorded as a medical exposure,” Dr. Harvey Risch, professor emeritus of epidemiology at the Yale School of Public Health, told The Epoch Times. “That’s never been done to my knowledge.”
The CDC did not respond to requests for comment for this article.
Proposal
The CDC proposed adding the codes to the international classification in September 2021.
“People have now been having immunizations for a number of months, and these provide protection for people who are immunized, but there has been interest expressed in being able to track people who are not immunized or who are only partially immunized,” Dr. David Berglund, a CDC medical officer, said during a meeting that went over the proposal.
“At the current time, there can be considered to be a significant modifiable risk factor for morbidity and for mortality and it can be of interest for clinical reasons, as well as being a value for public health reasons, to be able to track this.”
COVID-19 hospitalization and death rates are higher among the unvaccinated, according to data published by the CDC. The data do not take into account key factors such as age or prior infection, and other figures show the vaccinated being hospitalized or dying at higher rates in some states.
The proposal was backed by meeting participants during the International Classification of Diseases, Tenth Revision (ICD-10) Coordination and Maintenance Committee meeting.
“I definitely think we would support this,” Kristin Balint, a supervisor at Trinity Health, said. “We are currently seeing physicians documenting unimmunized for COVID-19 in our records.”
Jeanne Yoder, representing the Defense Health Agency, envisioned adding additional codes later to indicate if a person was not vaccinated against each successive variant.
The organizations of the people who backed the proposal either did not respond to requests for comment or declined inquiries.
Codes Added
Three codes were added to the classification system on April 1, 2022.
Z28.310 is for being unvaccinated. Z28.311 is for being partially vaccinated. Z28.39 is for “other underimmunization status.” All fell under a new sub-sub category, “Underimmunization for COVID-19 status.”
The codes are grouped with already-existing codes related to vaccination. They include “immunization not carried out because of patient refusal.”
Another code introduced during the pandemic is for counseling related to “immunization safety.”
“I think it would be a good idea to be able to indicate that, for whatever reason, the vaccine was refused,” Valeria Bica, a clinical documentation specialist at Nemours AI duPont Hospital for Children, said during the meeting that featured the code proposals.
“I know that we track that for families where they’ve refused to vaccinate their children, for one reason or another. And certainly we’ve tried to re-educate and to keep trying to find opportunities to give the vaccines,” she added.
The ICD was originally developed by the World Health Organization. U.S. authorities have their own version of the system. The COVID-19 immunization codes are not listed in the World Health Organization’s ICD.
All health care entities operating in the United States and covered by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act must use the U.S. version of the ICD. Coded ICD data from providers enable public health officials to “conduct many disease-related activities,” according to the CDC. The U.S. version is updated at least once a year.
The codes have multiple purposes. They let health care providers create a medical record, which can be used by future practitioners who take care of the patient. The system also facilitates billing.
An image from the CDC shows new codes for COVID-19 immunization status. (CDC via The Epoch Times)
Privacy Concerns
Dr. Robert Malone, who first highlighted the codes on his Substack blog, said the new codes were concerning in light of how not being vaccinated has been used during the pandemic to deny patients healthcare services, such as organ transplants.
“That information will end up in the hands of insurers, who will use it to make decisions about what you’re going to have to pay for your insurance policy, whether or not you’re going to be qualified,” Malone predicted.
Risch said the information could be used to perform analyses on groups deidentified data but questioned whether it would remain deidentified.
“Given how little we trust government agencies at this point and how stigmatizing, potentially stigmatizing this information is on individuals, nobody would rightly trust them to stay in their lane about using this in grouped information as opposed to individual,” Risch said. “What’s to stop the government from sharing this individual information with other agencies? With the FBI? With IRS? They say, ‘we don’t do that,’ and we say, ‘we don’t believe you.’
“And if they did it, what recourse would there ever be?”
‘Irrelevant’
The CDC in 2022 changed course and advised in COVID-19 guidelines that people were not to be treated differently on the basis of vaccination status “because breakthrough infections occur.” Breakthrough infections are infections that happen despite vaccination. The COVID-19 vaccines provide little to no protection against infection and transmission.
If any codes related to vaccine status were introduced, they should show whether a person was fully vaccinated because some of those people end up with vaccine injuries, Risch said.
Dr. Todd Porter, a pediatrician in Illinois, said that he uses the long-existing code for refusal to immunize only if a parent declines to get their children all the childhood vaccines. He also questioned the introduction of the new codes.
“I have a hard time clinically seeing the medical indication of using them,” Porter told The Epoch Times in an email.
He noted that there’s no codes for refusal to get the influenza vaccine, which is deadlier for children than COVID-19.
“Using these codes also disregards the contribution of natural immunity, which research evidence shows is more robust than vaccine immunity,” Porter said. Because of the lack of protection against transmission and infectivity, and the lack of data showing protection against severe disease in children, “an individual’s vaccination status would be irrelevant,” he added.
The globalists’ climate puppet Greta Thunberg was caught lying after she claimed police “kettled” her and others protesting at a German coal mine and video showed her being carried off by police. However, another video at the scene emerged that showed Thunberg and others smile and have a laugh while a pair of officers pose for photographers as if they’re set to take the activist in. The video got millions of views and she was widely mocked online.
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The globalists’ autistic climate puppet Greta Thunberg was caught lying after she claimed police “kettled” her and others protesting at a German coal mine.
“Yesterday I was part of a group that peacefully protested the expansion of a coal mine in Germany,” she posted on Twitter Tuesday. “We were kettled by police and then detained but were let go later that evening. Climate protection is not a crime.”
An image of Thunberg smiling while being carried by police officers went viral on Tuesday with liberal Twitter users sharing it widely.
An edited video of police carrying Thunberg was also spread online to promote the claim she was arrested for peacefully protesting.
However, video of the “arrest” soon emerged and proved Thunberg’s claim of being arrested after being “kettled” by law enforcement to be completely false.
In the footage, Thunberg and others smile and have a laugh while a pair of officers pose for photographers as if they’re set to take the activist in.
