JoNova
A science presenter, writer, speaker & former TV host; author of The Skeptic's Handbook (over 200,000 copies distributed & available in 15 languages).
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Statistics
The Federalist papers have wisdom about these matters. Discussions can be driven by facts and wisdom or else by passions. It’s good to have multiple viewpoints represented, but only up to a point. After that, the bigger the body, the higher the percentage of less-skilled people, and the more the actual decisions will be driven by a few folks who are somewhat hidden.
I almost wonder how much the early Congress was helped by the fact that only a few of their constituents could afford to come to Washington.
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Doonesbury.
https://www.gocomics.com/doonesbury
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Acting President in Venezuela.
https://www.rt.com/news/630514-venezuela-names-acting-president/
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RT.COM is banned and blocked in the Democratic Peoples Realm of Britain, by the orwellian Office For Censorship Obedience & Manipulation (OFCOM), for reporting about the consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, and standing up for right-wing Christians in the Ukraine, and not having Laurence Williamson editing Trumps speeches to make him look violant and not supporting peace. BBC News edit warning– Real news will have a link to unedited material, showing that lefties are violent, not Trump or Russia.
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RT is easily accessed via you tube. Tass can be directly accessed as can the kremlin.
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Marco Rubio live on NBC News just admitted that Cuba is the Trump Administration’s next target. And gave a few reasons to justify why, saying it was Cuba and Cubans propping up Maduro.
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I don’t think he meant military target.
Cuba has been teetering on the edge of collapse for the past decade. In the last few years in particular, they have had trouble keeping their electrical grid up and running, and that was Venezuelan oil providing 1/3rd of their energy needs. I wonder how long the current government can last once that spigot is turned off? And that’s before accounting for whatever oil (and lucre) they were getting from Iran, which may have trouble keeping up with shipments/payments in the near future as their own government is on the verge of collapse. It’s not a good time to be an island nation that depends on a ‘ghost fleet’ of internationally sanctioned tanker ships to keep the lights on.
The Trump administration can just sit back and eat popcorn for a while in regards to Cuba. See how things shake out of the next year or so with so many lifelines cut, then decide if they want to let nature take it’s course or give events a little nudge before his term expires.
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Somewhere in there was the suggestion that there are an awful lot of Cubans in America… what if they are a fifth column of sabotage experts? Mexicans the same, there must be enough Latinos to create havoc in the Empire’s homeland if they wanted to.
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Cuba is part of Trumps strategy to smash Beijing’s belt and road initiative in the western hemisphere.
‘China and Cuba experience good mutual relations, including through being members of the Belt and Road Initiative. China has partnered with Cuba to upgrade the rail network, host military facilities, and other initiatives.’ (wiki)
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…and it takes both Venezuela and Cuba off the table for the next Cuban missile crisis, annoying the EU yet again.
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Video:
Street interviews asking New York Leftists will they host Somali immigrants in their homes.
https://youtu.be/bEOLt3raKqM
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I don’t need to watch it to know the results.
NIMBY is a particular attribute most associated with those that are for open borders.
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Video about a simple way Gothic cathedral engineers could prove with physical models whether the proposed order of building walls and flying buttresses would work – to confirm their calculations. (Since the forces generated by the vaulted ceilings were pushing laterally.)
The point of flying buttresses was to be able to make the internal walls tall and thin with large stained-glass windows to allow huge amounts of light so thick walls were not possible. The support structure had to be externalised and lateral forces transferred to flying buttresses and piers.
https://youtu.be/WiX2amY7G-I
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Just think how much easier it would have been if they’d used steel beams and columns instead.
Sometimes the bleeding obvious is missed just to create work for stonemasons.
/s of course. They couldn’t have used steel beams back then, it was only in later years that china started trade with the west. A fact that can be corroborated by the amount of near new junk found in landfills.
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Or just sculpt rather than build.
https://va.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_t7ymouotQa1y82kbt.mp4
How…
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How…?
I can guess that they started from the top down and cut away anything that wasn’t meant to be there.
“I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.” Michelangelo
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Means how did they do it so well with such primitive tools…
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It looked like a soft limestone or maybe a tuff. You can carve that with a bone antler if you’ve got the time.
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My first thought was that they cleared a rectangular channel around the perimeter of the base which was likely made from the top, with workers scaling up or down out the channel until it reached rock bottom. Once, the channel was established, they started sculpting the columns and central structure.
It’s an amazing piece of carved architecture that doesn’t get as much recognition as a place such as Petra.
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As long as they weren’t using cheap Chinese steel…like they did at the Kew recreation centre.
https://www.vibewire.com.au/?p=256677
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Just think that TDS is so severe among the Left that they side with a narco-terrorist, not the suffering people.
Don’t forget the original charges against Maduro came from when….?
Thursday, March 26, 2020
O’Biden could have cancelled them if he disagreed with them.
Gulag AI says:
Even O’Biden wanted Maduro captured.
Why is it so bad when TRUMP does it when O’Biden wanted to do EXACTLY the same thing
And why is the Lamestream Media too lazy to report this?
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Trump really went and did it, while Biden no doubt figured it was intended mostly for appearance sake.
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It is probable that the drugs/oil are the public reason/excuse for the Venezuelan action. Especially when the main suppliers of illicit drugs into the US is not Venezuela.
More likely it has to do with the MIC and the US requirement for rare earth metals, and to throw a spanner in the works of Russia and China that had plans to acquire them.
Reference:- “The Venezuelan Oil Narrative is PURE THEATRE” Renegade Resources
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My belief is the Venezuelan attack had more to do with limiting China’s growing influence in South America. There were real concerns that Maduro was going to allow China to build military bases there, including missile launchers – on America’s doorstep.
Echoes of the Cuban missile crisis in the 1960s.
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Interesting talk this morning by Roderic Navarro – not sure about name spelling. Young politician in the opposition to Maduro.
He mentioned that his Hispanic language, deeply Catholic country was deliberately flooded by arabic-speaking Iranians (?).
If true, wonder why – may be they vote correctly…
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Echoes of Crimea pre 2014 when Ukraine wanted to join NATO and host their warships etc in Sevastopol.
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IMHO it is more about making sure China does not get the oil … rather than because the USA really needs more oil.
They don’t want Venezuela to start looking towards China for support, because then the US has no influence.
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You know that fracking produces only light crude, the US needs the heavy dark crude for American refineries.
Canada has plenty of this heavy crude, but as relations are not too good between old allies, its strategically clever but dangerous geopolitics.
Trump wants the western hemisphere and China’s BRI is standing in the way. So I imagine Taiwan is no longer on the agenda.
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They “need” it for American refineries?
Huh? What nonsense.
You think the USA will be out of business if they don’t get the input which happens to be convenient for a few refinery operators?
Hey, didn’t you predict that Xi would be in prison by now? You should start to get tired from being wrong all the time.
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Not nonsense Tel. Despite many thinking the US is oil independent, they do import heavy oils that help them refine vital diesel product. Their own light weight oils alone are not ideal for that task. Access to Venezula crude (which also comes with a raft of its own problems) would give them diversity/continuity of supply , but not at a show stopper as you say.
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The diesel is useful but can come from many sources. To say that the entire US economy pivots on one specific grade of oil import is ridiculous.
Who cares about “not ideal for that task”?! … that’s also ridiculous … most things most of the time in industry are not ideal. Pretty much nothing in economics is ever ideal.
We are supposed to believe that the USA “needs” (yes, check the conversation, that was the word used) one specific oil import from only one place in the world, and because why? Because perhaps some refinery somewhere might be 2% more efficient than otherwise.
Have a long think about what argument you are putting forward here.
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They’ve been after those fields for years:
Venezuela explained in 3 minutes
https://youtube.com/shorts/xCWh-D9LJN0?si=3aMIs0JWNZULYUb3
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So what.
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PS The lamestream media only reports the narrative they are given!
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Naaah John,
They’re quite happy to be selective about it – run together a few words from paragraphs at opposite ends of a speech, drop a qualifying phrase and talk about houses rather than kw…
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Trump has two great superpowers. First, he totally dominates the attention economy and drives media narratives around the entire globe just by being himself. Media companies can’t stop covering him, no matter what he does. Second, he turns his opponents into unthinking reactionaries who are incapable of exercising critical thought about ANYTHING he does. They just reflexively scream in unison ‘Orange Man Bad’ and will abandon any and all previous convictions they may have held before Trump made his move.
Six years ago, they were calling Trump a coward and a Quisling for not going after Maduro hard enough. Well, it doesn’t get much harder than staging a Delta Force raid and snatching the guy from his bed in the middle of night. Yet every last one of them has now flipped-flopped into Orange Man Bad for scooping up Venezuelan dictator.
https://x.com/mazemoore/status/2007555911339126836
Meanwhile, Venezuelans all over the globe are dancing and crying with joy over the scumbag being gone. It’s not just expats living in America. It’s EVERYWHERE. But somehow Democrats have convinced themselves that the smart political move is shaking their finger over the legality of the raid (which is patent nonsense since Daddy Bush already set the precedent with the Noriega snatching in 1990) rather than embracing the possibilities of the new paradigm. That said, I suspect they’ll come to their senses after midterms when Trump takes nearly 100% of the Venezuelan-American vote. Any chance they ever had of turning Florida back into a purple state died with their lack of support for this move.
https://twitchy.com/eric-v/2026/01/04/venezuela-libre-maduros-arrest-has-venezuelans-around-the-world-dancing-in-the-streets-n2423529
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1/3 of Venezuelans left. What that means is that the expatriate Venuezuelan population is 50% as big as Venezuela. That’s phenomenal. No wonder there is world wide celebration.
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So there’s no supporters of Maduro. I have nothing but disdain for Maduro and Socialists in general but this doesn’t end here. What do we know? not much. The media even less.
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I suspect that the extraction was so clean with no casualties that a lot of Venezuelans even in the police and military want to see the resurrection of their own country. The incursion likely had the direct support of some the upper echelons.
There’s no point being the master of nothing and there is nothing, no one left to rob once the Cocaine money stops. Since the end of democracy a new generation of people has appeared, people who have only known abject poverty, disease like tuberculosis and lack of opportunity and food. It’s a disaster like Germany after WWII without the Marshall plan, desolation. And threats of a war with America is a joke for their military. No one in the military wanted a war they could not possibly win. And the older people well remember a wealthy, healthy, educated rich first world country.
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The reason Venezuela is so poor is because Chavez, and the Maduro pledged to keep Venezuelan oil management in Venezuelan hands. US oil companies were kicked out, and have been trying to get back there for decades.
And so, Venezuela was cut off from all international banking and monetary transfer facilities, leaving only trade deals with China and Russia to move oil. ( ie, the so-called oil ‘black market’ )
There will now be some more money for this generation of Venezuelans, but the resources will be rapidly depleted, with most of the profits going into the hands of the US oil corporations and the international banking entities.
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And, that’s not a post in support of Maduro, who seemingly was a crook who stole elections., and oppressed dissenters.
But, we should take at face value that Trump’s immediate comments were about taking the oil, and all evidence is that this has been a major goal for a long time.
There are vast profits to be made, and, of course, if the world’s largest known oil reserve was ever traded freely on currency other than the USD it would be then of the USD and the US economy.
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If only Trump would arrest that grub Zelensky on his next visit to the White House.
Legitimate elections in Ukraine! The “war” is over.
With the added bonus of the heads exploding of every “leader” in the EU.
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Zelensky – a clown who overnight became a statesman when life demanded.
Trump – a Bigman, turning into Puft Man.
Ghostbusters 1984.
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So Zelenzky is a grub for not being paid puppet of Moscow, like all his predecessors in the role, and being President of Ukraine when Putin decides to invade.
My, you have some strange standards.
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Sheesh! Where to start..
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OK, try starting, otherwise you have no case.
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Z man is the thieving puppet of NATO.
Grub barely covers it.
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Ain’t life getting complicated in here:
But, I think I get it:
“Zelensky is a crook, and Putin is a wronged man of great virtue, who deserves to keep his spoils of war”
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‘And why is the Lamestream Media too lazy to report this?’
Its history.
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Far left/eco nuts cause German power cut in freezing weather.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c78v984ywgeo
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They should be found and charged with terrorism and any other appropriate charges.
People die from cold, not heat from supposed global warming.
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See David Maddison’s comment quoting Gulag AI: “the Biden administration maintained and even increased the pressure on Maduro. … the Biden administration increased the reward for information leading to Maduro’s capture”.
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Yet today all the former Biden flacks are bemoaning Trump ‘deposing’ a national leader, ignoring that their own boss (or whoever was using the autopen that day) put a bounty on his head and indicted him as a drug lord.
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The Democrats were playing within international law, Donnie gave the finger to all that.
The US is a rogue state on the world stage, no different to Russia.
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“The US is a rogue state on the world stage, no different to Russia.”
Hey! You stole my post!
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USA is a member of the rules based international order. However no one seems to be able find the rule book and they seem to change constantly without notice!
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Really? In reality the rules are easy to find and they don’t change.
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I think James is facetiously referring to the reality of the rules being applied. Which side wants to wave the rule book when it suits them to, and waive the rules when it suits them too.
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you give James too much credit.
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And yet strangely enough, despite how easy it is to find … you could not provide a link.
Well, talk about unhelpful!
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I don’t owe you anything tel.
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Copied from Farcebook, attributed to Andrew Bolt but I couldn’t find the original reference so I don’t know who wrote it.
.
[Seems to also be posted on a Rita Panahi page by a Facebook user, with no attribution. – Raquel]
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“When strong leadership confronts evil, evil loses ground.,,When weak leadership appeases it, it grows.”
This not about strong or weak leadership. Official Australian foreign policy is publicly antisemitic as declared in the United Nations by Penny Wong. From both Australia and South Africa. We have officially declared Israel does not have the right to exist. How more anti Semitic can you get?
It’s an posture by Albanese, like unreliables, where facts flatly contradict what the Prime Minister and ministers are saying. “Tell them what they want to hear and when we get power we do as we like.” That quote from Adam Bandt is the mantra of Labor and the Greens today. Albanese is not in denial. He has made his policy as clear as it could possibly be. And yet the official story is that all social problems are due to an entirely mythical extreme right.
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G’day TdeF.
Going through my old files and found something from Peter Carson which may be of interest to you.
No links because he died suddenly** and his blog was quickly cancelled.
He considered recent Climate Change was due to geological forces. I think these would be of interest to you.
My question is how to get these to you? Via Joanne?
** or not so suddenly as he was an invalid for many years.
Unfortunately I didn’t get the questions/answers to the 5 articles.
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Jo would be best. Thanks.
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“the official story is that all social problems are due to an entirely mythical extreme right.”
Well, he’s correct, the public in Albo eyes are nearly all Far Right, only his Far Left sycophants are in the middle ground with him.
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Australian political culture is centre right and centre left, its very stable.
There are splinter groups on both sides who will never gain power.
Albo is smart enough to avoid becoming an outlier.
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Haven’t seen anything (locally) about Germany stopping oil supplies to Hungary.
Another stupid decision. Are they trying to force Hungary (and Slovakia) back to obedience with EU demands.
More likely both countries (possible Poland?) may decide to look to Russia.
Russia cut off any gas supplies to the EU but I think they may be glad to accomodate any fracture in the NATO ranks.
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Specifically to accept mass migration from Middle East countries.
I’ve long despaired of Brussels. Construction of the layers of EU Govt is such that voting just doesn’t matter. Results from voting that Brussels may not like are just put aside.
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It has been suggested that Hungary would open the borders and allow thousands of Middle East refugees access to Austria and Germany (and possibly elsewhere).
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The funny thing is, even Belgium is sick and tired of EU edicts out of Brussels. Their prime minister has been a major thorn in the side of EU leaders. Not only is he a Euroskeptic, but he’s even a Belgium-skeptic and backs the Flemish independence movement.
https://www.politico.eu/article/european-council-summit-belgium-bart-de-wever-beat-eu-machine-ukraine-funding/
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Then again you don’t hear much criticism of the EU from the conservative commentariat in Australia. Typified by contributors from Murdoch press and SKY. Hardly a peep. What passes as geopolitical comment is rehashed material from the US State Department and neo conservative opinion writers who have their self interests at heart.
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The Australian MSM sees the EU as less important than local news.
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I doubt Poland will be keen to get close to Russia any time soon !
The smell of the gas ovens linger on still .
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G3 you’ll need a link for that story.
Orban should be voted out in the Spring and Poland will never do a deal with the Putin regime.
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“Poland will never do a deal with the Putin regime.”
Not so fast… What if they were offered the big chunk of Western Ukraine that was Poland to start with? Romania might be interested in getting their countryside back too. Its a failed country now, it will never be as big as it was before Russia invaded, so why not break it up amongst the successful countries.
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That is all nonsense, sharpen your wits and squint your eyes, Poland is on the winning side.
After hostilities I see an expanded Europe with Russia eventually allowed into the club. By then the whole Russian Federation would have broken off to become independent states.
Beijing will take back their stolen lands for a fair price. Peace in our time.
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Nah
el+gordo is right. Poles have a visceral hatred for Russia. There is no scenario where they choose Russia over the EU. The EU’s encroachment on their national sovereignty annoys them at times, but they’ll stay in as long as they can get away with defying certain EU policies with little more than whinging public statements of condemnation. The EU might be full of idiots, but they aren’t drooling morons. They don’t want another Brexit, and know that if they come down too hard on disgruntled members they might spark one. So they’ll continue to make mealy-mouthed statements whining about Poland not adhering to the rules while doing nothing, and the Poles will continue to flout the toothless rules.
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There is a better than even chance that the EU will gradually break up after the war. Or be less restrictive so that all member states are reasonably happy.
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Now climate change is making migraines worse!
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-15422347/Scientists-pinpoint-reason-people-getting-migraines.html
Lack of exercise, poor diet, food additives, electronic screens etc. Of course not.
My life was ruined by migraines until 4 years ago. I still get all the usual symptoms but the acute pain phase has become a weird sensation creeping over part of my brain.
Lucky side effect of having to take beta blockers.
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From the link…
This text should have been at the beginning of the article, not the end.
Oh, and covid had nothing to do with the increase over the last 5 years?
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FWIW
“Richard Betts Fake Heatwave Deaths Claim”
“Richard Betts, Head of Climate Impacts Research at the Met Office, was wheeled out on Channel 4 News yesterday to promote their dubious “hottest year evah in UK” claim. His rather pathetic attempts to scare the public included ludicrous claims about plants and insects being confused and glaciers melting! Yes, Richard, glaciers have been melting for 200 years – were our SUVs the cause in 1800 as well?
But I cannot let him get away with one particularly outrageous claim, at about 1 min in:
.
“We had a run of three major heatwaves in the UK, which caused a lot of people to die sadly. Over 1500 people died from heat related causes alone in the summer and about three-quarters of those probably would not have died without extra supercharging of the heatwave due to climate change” ”
More at
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2026/01/04/richard-betts-fake-heatwave-deaths-claim/
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I have visited the UK twice during heatwaves and noted many people continuing to wear warm clothing while outside in the heat.
On my last visit late 1990s heatwave the hotel alongside the River Thames had the public area windows wide open wide, the air conditioning I was told was not coping. And later in the week in a hotel in Amsterdam the room hot water heating system could not be turned off, imagine sleeping there.
Many deaths from heatwaves in my opinion are avoidable with a common sense approach to keeping as cool as possible.
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FWIW – Anthony Watts
“My Twenty Years of Watching the Thermometer—and the Narrative”
”
In November 2006, when I launched Watts Up With That?, the idea was simple enough: look at the data, check the instruments, and ask whether the conclusions being drawn actually followed from the evidence. It was never intended as a career in heresy. It was, at the time, a fairly normal scientific impulse steeped in curiosity.
Nearly twenty years later, that impulse requires a helmet.
As WUWT approaches its twentieth anniversary in 2026, it’s worth reflecting on how climate change went from being a hypothesis—one among many competing explanations for observed changes—to a full-fledged belief system, complete with sacred texts (IPCC reports), approved language, and the occasional excommunication.”
More at
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2026/01/04/my-twenty-years-of-watching-the-thermometer-and-the-narrative/
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The Ukrainian “I Want to Live” project aimed at Russian serviceman is worth mentioning…
Then there is the “I Want to Find” project:
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Yes, Ukraine has protests by women demanding to know what happened to their husbands, brother and sons.. They go to war and the Govt never say anything about why you don’t hear from them anymore. It one of the West’s little propaganda wars to hide the body count.
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“protests by women demanding to know what happened to their husbands, brother and sons”
It would be the same in Russia.
Maybe the Russian side is not as co-operative with details of captured/deceased or terminated Ukrainians.
Why would they add to the already known war crimes list.
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“Why would they add to the already known war crimes list.”
It wouldn’t worry them at all, like America, they think the International Court is just a Leftist organisation for political points-scoring.
They swap as many prisoners and bodies as they can, but Ukraine has very few to offer in exchange. I’m sure the NATO bodies get exchanged differently.
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That may be because of point 4 in the Ukrainian “want to live” program:
“4. Voluntary exchange for the servicemen of the Ukrainian Armed Forces held in captivity in Russian Federation.”
Maybe the Russian captives have chosen not to go back.
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‘ … why you don’t hear from them anymore.’
There is probably desertion on both sides, which cannot be easily accounted for.
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Australia’s social justice future now paralleling Venezuela’s decline:
https://enerknol.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Venezuela-crude-oil-production.jpg
It took a long time to decline. Chavez came to power in 1999. The initial decline took two years and the collapse came after Trump came to office and pushed US oil production.
Every aspect of life was subsidised by oil income until that cash cow grew old and dilapidated. The oil business eventually became unprofitable.
Today’s UN Security Council meeting will be heated. China has been investing in Venezuela to revive its oil production and been rewarded with more than 80% of the oil production going to China. US will likely promise to revive the oil industry under a new government and China will get even more oil.
If China believed in Climate Change™ and NetZero they would not be supporting oil production in Venezuela.
So this UNSC meeting is essentially about oil. What about Climate Change™. I wonder if they will start with a welcome to country!
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Most of Europe is freezing today:
https://earth.nullschool.net/#2026/01/04/2200Z/wind/surface/level/overlay=temp/orthographic=27.95,39.12,806/loc=8.874,51.492
Snow/ice has caused some travel disruptions.
If you opened the link, change the view to MSLP. You will see there is a deep low (952hPa) bearing down on Alaska. I expect it will dump a massive amount of snow on to land.
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‘The previously progressive flow has been abruptly replaced by a classic high-latitude “Greenland Block.”
‘This expansive ridge of high pressure acts as a meteorological dam, forcing a deep reservoir of Arctic air to spill southward across Europe. The result is a sustained disruption of the Polar Vortex, setting the stage for an extended period of winter weather dominance across the continent.’ (Severe Weather Europe)
12
“US will likely promise to revive the oil industry under a new government and China will get even more oil.”
Seriously??
The Yanks have Marines stationed in the oilfields or Iraq and Syria, and that oil doesn’t go anywhere near China! Venezuela’s oil will only go one place.. America! They want petrol at less than a dollar a litre, and they don’t care who they have to kill to get it.
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It’s the firefighter training ladder challenge!
https://va.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_t7vr7uv8re1vf4cr0.mp4
Almost needs Benny Hill music.
40
Either firefighters have a lot of spare time (per the rumours) or a bunch of bobsledders were looking for something to do over summer.
20
Well, as part of “Musk is literally Hitler” it appears he’s programmed his computer synthesiser Grok and his publication platform X to embarrass women everywhere. SMH declares-
“Elon Musk’s Grok AI floods X with sexualised photos of women and minors”
..and goes into great detail about how Grok can remove clothes from any photo and substitute a bikini. Someone did some very in-depth research on this, going through hundreds of photos of girls in bikinis, for science of course!
To really ram it home they’ve manage to put ‘children’ and ‘sex’ in the same sentence..
“Reuters has also identified several cases where Grok created sexualised images of children.”
…and of course Musk is The Worst because he found it funny!
” Musk appeared to poke fun at the controversy on Friday, posting laugh-cry emojis in response to AI edits of famous people – including himself – in bikinis.”
So when the Karens settle down someone might point out its not Musk’s fault, there are actually people who are behind this, and you aren’t going to stop human nature.
https://www.smh.com.au/world/north-america/elon-musk-s-grok-ai-floods-x-with-sexualised-photos-of-women-and-minors-20260103-p5nrdw.html
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Your sequencing there and inserting your own comment perhaps inadvertently makes it look like Musk found the children images funny. His laughing emoji was specific to famous people, including himself. The article does not suggest his amusement related to any child image.
Also from the article:
This suggests that X was actively removing images.
60
The fish oil scam
Eighty-three percent of fish oil supplements tested in New Zealand exceeded recommended oxidation limits. Only 8% met all international standards for freshness. More than two-thirds contained less than 67% of the EPA and DHA claimed on the label—eicosapentaenoic acid and docosahexaenoic acid, the two omega-3 fatty acids that give fish oil its purported health benefits—and some products contained as little as one-third.
When omega-3 fatty acids oxidize, they don’t simply disappear. They fragment into the same categories of harmful compounds that make rancid seed oils dangerous: lipid peroxides, aldehydes like malondialdehyde and 4-hydroxynonenal, and other reactive oxygen species. These molecules are chemically reactive—they don’t sit inert in your body. They attack cell membranes, damage mitochondria, denature proteins, and trigger inflammatory cascades. They are implicated in cardiovascular disease, neurodegeneration, and accelerated aging. In other words, oxidized fish oil may contribute to the very conditions it is marketed to prevent.
The fish oil supplement industry has taken the most oxidation-prone fats in nature and subjected them to standard commercial processing and storage conditions that reliably degrade them. The rancidity statistics from New Zealand, North America, Australia, and South Africa are not surprising. They are what the chemistry predicts.
https://www.theburningplatform.com/2026/01/04/fish-oil-supplements-are-a-scam/
Tins of sardines, not pills, piled high at my end!😁
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Scientists found a way to help the brain bounce back from Alzheimer’s
By studying several mouse models of Alzheimer’s alongside human Alzheimer’s brain tissue, researchers identified a critical biological weakness at the heart of the disease. They found that the brain’s inability to maintain healthy levels of a vital cellular energy molecule called NAD+ plays a major role in driving Alzheimer’s.
In animal studies, keeping brain NAD+ levels in balance prevented Alzheimer’s from developing. Even more striking, restoring NAD+ balance after the disease was already advanced allowed the brain to repair damage and fully recover cognitive function.
https://scitechdaily.com/scientists-found-a-way-to-help-the-brain-bounce-back-from-alzheimers/
I have some in my cupboard next to the sardines. 😁
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But! In there
“Why This Approach Differs From Supplements
Dr. Pieper cautioned that this strategy should not be confused with over-the-counter NAD+-precursors. Studies in animals have shown that such supplements can raise NAD+ to dangerously high levels that promote cancer. The approach used in this research relies instead on P7C3-A20, which helps cells maintain a healthy NAD+ balance during extreme stress without pushing levels beyond their normal range.”
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FWIW
DDG Assistant response to “Biden’s $25,000,000 for Maduro capture”
“The Biden administration offered a $25 million reward for information leading to the capture of Nicolás Maduro, the Venezuelan president, due to charges of narco-terrorism and drug trafficking. This reward was part of ongoing efforts to address the issues of drug trafficking and corruption linked to his regime.
BBC, The White House”
And
“most political issues nowadays can be explained by understanding that american leftists dont have positions, they have oppositions.
their entire belief system is defined by negation of whatever the right supports.
this is why portland chants “free maduro” while actual venezuelans celebrate in the streets.
they’re not pro-venezuelan or pro democracies, or pro tyrant, or pro maduro, they’re simply anti-american-right.”
https://x.com/IterIntellectus/status/2007710391715918043
Via https://instapundit.com/766877/#disqus_thread
So is the real opposition caused by the thought that Trump might be able to claim the $25 million?
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The Franfurt School of Cultural Marxism have their Critical Theory. It supports everything from the Left and attacks everythng from the Right 🙂
10
From elsewhere
“Will the Left argue that it was signed by autopen and therefore not valid?”
30
Are you serious or just tr0lling?
10
FWIW – around that
“THE PROBLEM IS ALWAYS JUST THAT TRUMP IS DOING IT:”
“I was told the problem was that we were killing narcoterrorists rather than using force to detain and prosecute them.
Turns out detaining and prosecuting them wasn’t acceptable either.”
https://x.com/sunnyright/status/2007518741190557988
Via https://instapundit.com/766877/#disqus_thread
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https://i-med.com.au/articles/patient-information-national-lung-cancer-screening-program
Currently, it’s for those:
– aged between 50 and 70 years
– show no signs or symptoms of lung cancer
– have a history of at least 30 pack-years of cigarette smoking
– be still smoking or have quit in the past 10 years.
Would love to see this expanded to those who have worked in environments where exposure to asbestos or silicon-rich dust has occurred.
50
“Would love to see this expanded to those who have worked in environments where exposure to asbestos or silicon-rich dust has occurred.”… and downwind of any atomic testing sites for a few thousand years.
30
It would be interesting to include some sample people with a lifetime exposure to mulga country dust too
30
Ian,
People get radioactivity to their bodies just from existing somewhere on the globe, somewhat more when flying at high altitude, because we all live in a radioactive background. Potassium decay gives gamma radiation. The Thorium and Uranium decay chains surround all of us.
The extra load from bomb tests is so small that its mention is commonly for anti-uranium propaganda purposes.
Do you have links to any material showing human deaths or ailments from the bomb tests?
Geoff S
10
Brilliant idea to circumvent Commiefornia’s law saying that stealing less than $950 worth of merchandise from a store is not a criminal offence.
https://youtube.com/shorts/-Ggfvtzl81w
80
It’s a misdemeanor though, with up to 6 months slam and a $1k fine.
00
A cunning plan.
00
FWIW – “For the good of the planet” – surely you wouldn’t object to one next door?
“Battery Storage Fire in Warwick, NY: A Repeat Incident”
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2026/01/04/battery-storage-fire-in-warwick-ny-a-repeat-incident/
30
this was quite good. it wasnt pro or anti batteries. but he goes into detail as to how the BESS are designed.
These 2 arrays were away from residences and not huge. He is a firefighter with experience and he says they dont fight them. Just try to manage things.
00
Recent item on ZH about this topic
https://www.zerohedge.com/energy/unreported-story-grid-scale-battery-fires
10
Just heard on radio that house fires cost three times as much when the cause is lithium batteries compared to other causes. Figures were $80,000 versus $25,000 or so, IIRC.
It would be interesting to compare these dollars to the cost of home insurance and also to actual insurance damage payments after the fires. I wonder how much the insurance companies first deny the claims, then try to beat them down to a minimum: usual form.
Geoff S
10
FWIW
“A few months ago, Nobel Peace Prize Winner María Corina Machado engaged in this interview. Every Canadian and American should pay close attention to her describe Venezuela’s downfall under Democratic Socialism. Free speech was removed. Merit was replaced with nepotism. Is it any wonder why NDP’ers, Lieberals, and Democrats are angry as hell about what happened a few days ago? For them, Venezuela of the past quarter century isn’t a warning, it’s an instruction manual.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKxASnMiFys
Via https://www.smalldeadanimals.com/2026/01/04/maria-corina-machado-interview/
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‘ … describe Venezuela’s downfall under Democratic Socialism.’
From my reading the government could be termed socialist, populist or hyper-populist, but definitely not democratic socialist.
06
“From my reading the government could be termed socialist, populist or hyper-populist, but definitely not democratic socialist.”
awww… why not EG, Maduro won a rigged election, just like Biden did.. America the home of democracy, light of the free world blah blah… Biden was just better at burying the evidence of the fraud and toughing it out until the people shut up about it.
“The final conclusion to the electoral fraud was finally provided by a court judgement later in August, which confirmed the results with Maduro as the winner – without the electoral authority having published the election files produced by the voting machines to date.”
That sounds very familiar. So does this-
“..human rights violations and practices of state terrorism are due to the fact that the executive has taken control of all state institutions, coupled with widespread corruption and the weakening of public authorities, allowing the regime to act with complete impunity.”
Deep State and the Pentagon anyone? It doesn’t matter how you vote, it only matter how the votes are counted!
https://www.freiheit.org/venezuela-electoral-fraudster-president-venezuela
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IIRC, “Democratic Sociislism” was a term coined by old Mate Lenin.
Old Mate simply meant that ‘democracy’ is only really possible when everyone is equal, and thus socialism is the only real prerequisite for “real democracy”.
And of course, everyone has to believe that socialism is the light and the way – otherwise people will have different opinions, and won’t all vote “1” for Communism.
Can’t have that now, can we?
10
An interesting economics discussion:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mx9sOxgjong
The possibility of the wheelnuts being deliberately loosened on the “Holden Ute” of Oz, was being bandied about in my social circles 40 years ago. The hideous Whitlam years were still a stark memory, soon to ne painted oc ve by the faux-conservative, not very liberal Fraser fiasco, the Hawke-Keating circus-show, and so on.
And here I am; Kovided out of a long-term job by the “crisis managers”, unemployed and, because of age, unemployable. All I can do is to keep “poking the bear”, (No, Virginia, NOT like that).
31
Isn’t it understandable that economic basket case countries drive economic refugees to seek asylum elsewhere and therefore create problems for their chosen safe haven?
And that when leftist socialist totalitarian governments are corrupt and supporting the drug trade via exporting to economically secure countries, selling oil for political purposes and financial gain for individuals involved, and other intolerable activities, that on humanitarian ground and the national security of economically secure the nations being targeted should have the right to remove the problems.
Following with support for democratically elected government by the people of the failed nation?
11
“the nations being targeted should have the right to remove the problems.”
…and here we are, Russia invades Ukraine to keep NATO from its borders, USA invades Venezuela because its citizens want drugs. We have to decide if the ‘free’ world has rules-based-order or its just dog-eat-dog as its always been.
I don’t mind if its dog-eat-dog, just don’t try to BS me that we’re the righteous, moral ones in this mess. Working on this example, any bigger country can go into a smaller one and kidnap the leader, then take over the Govt. A bit like Australia and Timor, or Indonesia and West Papua…
10
The New York City subway fare is increasing to $3.
But wasn’t public transport going to be free in Mamdani’s glorious socialist utopia?
https://nypost.com/2026/01/04/us-news/nyc-subways-jump-to-crazy-3-per-ride-and-straphangers-arent-happy/
30
It is fascinating that the Albanese Labor Government is continuing to resist demands for a Commonwealth (Federal Government) Royal Commission into the Bondi Beach massacres and terrorism.
Considering the very large number of prominent Australians including legal profession that have contacted the Albanese Government and the on line comments continuing into the new year.
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FWIW – and still they come. Just now
“Call for resignation of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese” – 370,606
80
A “Royal Commission’ will probably be called, eventually.
BUT, not before ALL of the desired “findings” are locked in.
Straight out of “Yes, Prime Minister”.
30
For the “performance-heads”
“M5 vs. M5 Comparison Test: Which Comes Out on Top?”
https://www.caranddriver.com/features/a69839692/bmw-m5-vs-kubota-m5/
10
FYI – IF YOU ARE A WELDER IN THE METAL INDUSTRY
“Healthy 18-year-old welder nearly died of anthrax—the 9th such puzzling case
“Welder’s Anthrax” was first coined in 2022, when seven cases had been identified.”
https://arstechnica.com/health/2026/01/anthrax-nearly-kills-healthy-18-year-old-welder-amid-puzzling-pattern/
20
What timing!
Less than 24 hours after the invasion of Venezuela, the US government quietly secured a MASSIVE smelter deal to process Venezuela’s $1 TRILLION worth of precious metals.
Cost of the new facility? $8 Billion.
The Financier? J.P. Morgan…
https://x.com/barkmeta/status/2007910796312146418
Before the recent event, Venezuela was estimated to produce between 450 and 550 metric tons (approx. 14.5 to 17.7 million ounces) of silver annually.
Next up, Trump takes Mexico who produce around 20x the silver that Venezuela does.
Maybe Peru at 7x, or China at 6x.
21
And Trump just warned Mexico.
“something’s going to have to be done with Mexico”
20
JP Morgan 72% owned by Rothchilds 🙂
00
Was it JPM making considerable use of the Fed repo facility in recent days?
Something about a very large hole resulting from a silver short gone bad?
Just trying to join some dots here.
20
Dots joined.
If you are buying silver & gold as a hedge against inflation in the belief their price will be driven up as Countries demand precious metals to pay for their oil and raw material needs you are not in the 4D chess game. The USA has just taken the resource so they no longer require BRIC’S gold and silver to buy or trade something they already control. They may just demand greenbacks as payment like the good old days.
A simple view from a distant observer
20
Black Gold, Texas T and make your kin great again!
20
I thought the left ❤️ free international trade. Most countries encourage international investment [even US does] to stimulate the economy and increase employment.
10
FWIW
“Escobar: How Political Analysis Became A Target Of A.I. Fakes”
“A.I. is fast expanding as a plague all along the internet spectrum. That’s quite predictable, considering the Big Tech model for A.I. is techno-feudalism, relying on profit and mind/social control, and not on sharing/expanding knowledge and creating better conditions for a well-informed citizenry.”
“A.I. in many aspects is the antithesis of civitas. Prior to the A.I. boom, several layers of the internet had already been distorted into a series of minefields across a large-than-life sewer. A.I. – as controlled by Big Tech – in many aspects had already revealed itself as a fraud. Now it’s a weapon.
There are several channels on YouTube manipulated by A.I., stealing the image and voice by some of us, independent political analysts. A not-extensive list includes as targets John Mearsheimer, Larry Johnson, Richard Wolff, Glenn Diesen, Yanis Varoufakis, economist Paulo Nogueira Batista and myself.”
More at
https://www.zerohedge.com/ai/escobar-how-political-analysis-became-target-ai-fakes
I saw recently that there is around 5X times what “Yanis Varoufakis said on the net” as “Yanis Varoufakis actually said in the net”. Alex Mercouris recently got caught by one and he warns of the existence of fake Alex Mercouri sites as well.
20
Add VDH, Maddow, Musk and Buffett.
10
https://www.asx.com.au/
One of the top performing stocks on the ASX this week is NexGen Energy – a Canadian uranium miner.
It is kind of impossible to truly ‘follow the money’ as an individual (you can don an anorak for all your waking hours, but there is just not the capacity to keep up). If you just dip in now and then, though, there can be some insights shown…
20
Rick Will would find this article concerning rooftop solar by Roger Caiazza, the Pragmatic Environmentalist of New York, an interesting read:
https://pragmaticenvironmentalistofnewyork.blog/2026/01/03/economic-justification-for-installing-rooftop-solar-arrays-in-downstate-new-york/
When the price of grid-supplied electricity gets high enough, going with rooftop solar can make economic sense even in a place like downstate New York, USA.
20
Roof top solar is only ever made financially viable if utility supply costs increase disproportionately .
00
The humble 1966 50c coin now contains >$40 Ag at spot.
00