Retreat to Sanity

I’m new to the work of Dr. Malcolm Kendrick but a skim of his blog suggests he has many wise things to say and has written several books that I intend to read.

I was unable to find many videos with Dr. Kendrick, and some that were on YouTube have been deleted by censors, but I did very much enjoy this must watch November 2020 discussion on Covid19.

Today’s essay by Dr. Kendrick may be the best I’ve read on Covid19 and nicely articulates how I’ve been feeling of late.

https://drmalcolmkendrick.org/2021/09/03/i-have-not-been-silenced/

Despite Dr. Kendrick’s expertise, intelligence, curiosity, and determination, he has been unable to determine what is true about Covid19, and has decided to retreat to sanity.

My self-appointed role within the COVID19 mayhem, was to search for the truth – as far as it could be found – and to attempt to provide useful information for those who wish to read my blog.

The main reason for prolonged silence, and introspection, is that I am not sure I can find the truth. I do not know if it can be found anymore. Today I am unsure what represents a fact, and what has simply been made up. A sad and scary state of affairs.

… So, I have given up on COVID19. It is a complete mess, and I feel that, without being certain of the ground under my feet, I have nothing to contribute. I too am in danger of starting to make statements that are not true.

… faced with a situation where there are almost no facts that can be relied upon, from anywhere, I have officially removed myself from all discussions on the matter of COVID19.

Instead, I shall return to other areas where, whilst the truth is constantly battered and bruised, and lying in a bruised heap the corner, it is still breathing … just about alive. Sometimes it is capable of weakly raising its head and whispering quietly into my ear. I shall let you know what it says.

Before departing the arena Dr. Kendrick summarized what he believes is true about Covid19:

  • SARS-CoV2 probably resulted from gain of function research in the Wuhan lab, but we’ll probably never know for certain.
  • The current versions of SARS-CoV2 are a bit more deadly than our modern influenzas with an infection fatality rate (IFR) of about 0.15%.
  • None of the test data can be trusted.
  • It is impossible to compare the effectiveness of various strategies using available data.
  • Misinformation exists on all sides of the debate.
  • Everyone has an agenda including the fact-checkers.

I’m going to try to follow Kendrick’s lead and return my focus to the many much more important overshoot issues that are grounded in reliable science that we collectively deny.

150 thoughts on “Retreat to Sanity”

  1. File this under: You Can’t Make This Shit Up.

    Today we have a reasonably intelligent documentary producer with 3 million subscribers discussing the implications of peak oil on Saudi Arabia without mentioning human overshoot and the many dire implications of declining energy, and then with a straight face, reporting that the Saudi’s strategy for coping with less oil revenue is to promote tourism, however to succeed they must first stop butchering into small pieces dissident journalists.

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    1. File this under: You Can’t Make This Shit Up.

      I have to disagree-that’s just what they’ve done. The point of this video is summed up at the end- apparently the
      Saudis “lack the vision to kick start organic economic transformation”
      Silly Saudis it’s so easy – I am currently visioning a personal organic economic transformation into billionaire status and it’s already working. Been so busy with this visioning thing I haven’t bought a paper or my usual bottle of cider so I’m already £4.05 richer.
      Perhaps I could sell my visioning skills to the Saudis although why bother? I won’t need the money.

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  2. https://peakoilbarrel.com/opec-update-september-2021/#comment-726008

    LTO SURVIVOR 09/24/2021

    I really sense a shift in reality happening as winter approaches. With the wholesale divestment in fossil fuels by most of the Western World, we will begin the see the first signs of energy poverty in the European Union. All of those who have climbed on the energy transition train in favor of climate control are ironically going to get a crash course in the inability to climate control their own micro climates like their homes and offices. While the West believes climate change is the number one issue facing humanity vis a vis Joe Biden’s UN speech, China continues to build more coal plants to meet their energy needs. Simultaneously Biden is begging Russia to provide more gas to Europe while mulling over domestic carbon taxes and shutting down pipelines. I just read in the past few weeks Boston University and Harvard endowments are divesting their fossil fuel investments.

    I am not here to debate climate change nor the deleterious effect of carbon on our planet. I do however believe we have seen peak oil and without capital the decline in worldwide production of hydrocarbons will occur much quicker than most understand. The era of energy surplus is officially over hastened by the abandonment of the investing community ( PE, Pension Funds, Shell Oil, BP, College endowments) in replacing fossil fuel reserves in favor of windmills and solar panels and other schemes of folly.

    Our way of life is going to change rapidly and dramatically. It sure would have been nice to have addressed this energy transition about 50 years ago. The current global economy and in increasing per capita wealth was created by cheap fossil fuel. Will it be sustained by this energy transition and if not how will the world cope with less electricity, food, transportation, water, heating and cooling our micro environments? It looks like the EU may get a tiny taste of our future this winter. Buckle up.

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    1. Actually, I believe some people tried to address this energy crisis 50 years ago. BUT, in the U.S. the majority hated Jimmy Carter’s attempt to conserve energy and they voted in climate change denier/environment hater Ronald (Morning in America) Reagan. I also think Limits to Growth and Population Bomb were about that time. Denial and Optimism Bias are wonderful things if you are not facing a finite planet.
      AJ

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    1. Excellent find Perran!

      He asks: Why are deaths increasing, with less deadly variants, high vaccination rates, and vaccines that are effective at reducing sickness?

      I love intelligent people that observe interesting things and then search for an explanation with an open mind.

      He’s over my pay grade on Covid so doubt I have anything worthwhile to add but here are a few thoughts.

      His thesis is, I think, is similar to that of Dr. Bossche. Strange that he didn’t mention Bossche. I’m currently betting they’re both right. Our flu vaccines are apparently also leaky which is why (I think) they’re administered BEFORE the flu season begins.

      Other possible explanations for some of the observed data might be:
      – Perhaps the vaccines are less effective than everyone assumes and what we are observing is actually a periodic seasonal cycle
      – Perhaps Covid is more widespread than assumed and deaths with Covid are being recorded as death due to Covid to strengthen the agenda of the “health care” system that doesn’t actually care about our health.

      One final thought, pushing vaccination on people who have recovered is yet anther method being used to skew the data in favor of vaccines. People with strong immunity get an unnecessary vaccine and then get added to the “success”.

      P.S. Trying to chase down more work by this guy. I see Twitter has banned his account. Social media is fucked.

      P.P.S. Skimming his blog. It’s awesomesauce. Will be monitoring on a regular basis.

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  4. From a newer post 3 days ago by el gato malo…

    I like his attitude: Pure data driven truth seeking. No agenda. Good intentions.

    https://boriquagato.substack.com/p/are-covid-boosters-accentuating-covid

    are covid boosters accentuating covid deaths in israel?

    this is a rough theory and it’s one i am 100% sure nobody wanted to hear.

    we were all rooting for vaccines to work here as they have so many other places. but this is a new vaccine type and we’re seeing all sorts of new issues. never in human history has a vaccine been given to so many with so little testing. so, the testing is happening now in societies all over the world. and it’s worth remembering that this was a choice, not a necessity.

    it was, in my view, quite reckless and and the fact that we’re having these discussions and seeing such possibilities as these are the direct result of the choice to push a never before used in humans vaccine type with a history of bad side effects into a billion people on the basis of a few months of testing where 6-10 years would have been more normal.

    and clearly, those pushing these mRNA vaccines got quite a lot wrong.

    it’s clearly non-sterilizing and that alone is cause for serious alarm because leaky vaccines can have dire societal effects. these vaccines do not add to herd immunity and may be worsening spread and even intensifying overall pandemic.

    but they also look seriously immuno-suppressive for ~14 days post admin of D1 and it looks more and more like D3 works the same way.

    if this is so, boosters are a VERY dangerous game to play, especially in times of high disease prevalence.

    and if this is so, we need to know.

    this is public health, not a wubbie to pull over our heads.

    will keep tracking this and see where it leads…

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    1. Another 2 days ago…

      https://boriquagato.substack.com/p/winter-is-coming-and-the-vaccine

      winter is coming, and the vaccine narrative is about to shift

      this is not at ALL what one would expect if vaccines were working to stop deaths and hospitalizations (as they seem to be in UK, albeit at closer to 50% VE than the 90’s promised) and with a much lower CFR variant (delta) now predominant. and no, low delta CFR does not look to be a function of vaccines.

      i hate to keep landing here and really, truly want to be wrong, but this keeps pulling me back to the “vaccinated superspread hypothesis” which is exactly where we all wish we were not:

      – the current surge in covid deaths is caused by the vaccinated.
      – the covid vaccines are extremely leaky and may well accelerate contracting and carrying covid.
      – they allow for very high viral loads to go unnoticed and generate a new and severe asymptomatic spread vector to where none existed before.
      – the high viral loads lead to greater contagion. they may lead to greater severity (but this data is iffy and contested)
      – vaccine campaigns cause superspread events because vaccination leads to a 2 week window of 40-100% more covid risk that then gets counted as “unvaccinated” because the definitions are bad.
      – this combination makes those vaccinated with one dose or more into superspread bombs.

      this is still, i want to stress, a hypothesis and one i hope fails to prove out, but i can still find no better fit to this data and it remains, to my great dismay, the best explanation i can find. (and i’ve been bouncing it off an awful lot of people)

      proving this out would mean that vaccines have rekindled a fading pandemic, that they are making it worse, not better, and that they and the bigger hammer theory that will emerge from the political mess are going to mean that the northern latitudes are REALLY in for it this winter.

      and that’s not a political or epidemiological climate that ANY sane person wants.

      i’d much rather get dunked on by monica than dunk on her because that’s a better world to live in, but the data is the data and it does not care how much any of us would like a wubbie and clutching one to keep real live monsters away will harm us, not help us.

      so, we keep digging and we keep learning.

      again, my thanks to all those who are helping. the truth is in here. somewhere.

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  6. That might be the last from me for a short while. I really think I need some internet detox. Thanks for putting me onto Ivor Cummins. I’ve really enjoyed listening to his knowledge on heart health.

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  10. https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/behave-normally-uk-transport-minister-tells-britons-queuing-fuel-2021-09-26/

    BP said nearly a third of its British petrol stations had run out of the two main grades of fuel on Sunday as panic buying forced the government to suspend competition laws and allow firms to work together to ease shortages.

    Lines of vehicles formed at petrol stations for a third day running as motorists waited, some for hours, to fill up with fuel after oil firms reported a lack of drivers was causing transport problems from refineries to forecourts.

    Tim Watkins explains what’s going on:

    https://consciousnessofsheep.co.uk/2021/09/26/the-march-of-folly/

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    1. From Mr. Watkins post: “Crucially, unlike fossil fuels, there is more than enough uranium (and thorium if anyone can commercially breed uranium from it) to potentially power and grow the global economy. ”

      Mr. Watkins is usually spot on most things. But does the statement above seem correct?

      He does note later their is no replacement for diesel. I don’t know how you build thousands of reactors – the numbers required to replace fossil fuels – in a world of continuously declining diesel fuel availability.

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      1. I agree with you. In addition, the reserves of uranium are murky every time I’ve checked so I don’t know what is the reality. Thorium is a promising dream that will remain a dream until someone builds a full size commercial reactor. The cash and diesel required to build enough nuclear reactors to make a difference is I suspect more than we can afford and I worry that with dysfunctional governments and uncivil society that will result from degrowth the safety risks of nuclear reactors are too high.

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        1. I agree with you that the risk of nuclear is unacceptable. Even perennial optimist (NOT) Guy McPherson of NBL thinks nuclear is a non-starter because in any scenario where the grid goes down we end up with 400+ Fukushima/Chernobyls. And the grid is going to have problems as we decline.
          AJ

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            1. Back to normal, no residual problems (other than old age, senility, collapse and perennial denial). I of course worry about having had the J&J vax. No boosters for me – why would I? I must have some inate immunity now? Don’t know what to think about long term risk from the vax, so much competing “science” on both sides. Thanks for asking.
              AJ

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  11. Lots of stuff going on that smells like the downside of peak oil (aka human overshoot) except no one other than those of us with defective denial genes calls it that.

    Most call it peak demand, or the green transition, or the great reset, or QE/ZIRP.

    Wolf Richter calls it a crackdown on emissions.

    Note that the Chinese government is targeting the high tech companies first.

    https://wolfstreet.com/2021/09/26/suppliers-in-china-for-apple-tesla-intel-nvidia-qualcomm-nxp-infineon-ase-tech-forced-to-halt-production-amid-chinas-energy-crackdown/

    Suppliers in China for Apple, Tesla, Intel, Nvidia, Qualcomm, NXP, Infineon, ASE Forced to Halt Production amid Energy Crackdown

    Amid China’s many crackdowns is a crackdown on energy consumption, motivated by a slew of reasons, including most pressingly, spiking prices for coal and natural gas, particularly Liquefied Natural Gas. China is the second largest importer of LNG behind Japan. As Europe and Asia compete for supply, the price of LNG for November delivery to Japan and Korea has exploded to $27.45 per million British thermal units on the NYMEX, up from the $6-range a year ago (chart via CME Group).

    In addition to the spike in energy prices, there are the government’s efforts to reduce emissions and to tamp down on the growth of energy consumption. To that effect, China has imposed a number of policies on provinces and cities. The crackdown on bitcoin mining falls into this category.

    This crackdown on energy consumption, handed down from Beijing to provinces and cities, is now taking the form of suspensions or reductions of industrial electricity supply that manufacturers in numerous industries are hit with, including key facilities that produce components for Apple, Tesla, Intel, Nvidia, Qualcomm, NXP, Infineon, and ASE Tech, along with many smaller manufacturers. They’re now under orders to temporarily halt production.

    The provinces that haven’t lived up to Beijing’s demands to reduce total energy consumption are having to hand out suspensions of industrial electricity supply; they include the provinces of Liaoning, Jilin, and Heilongjiang, according the Nikkei Asia. Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Guangdong, and other provinces are subject to restrictions on industrial electricity supply.

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    1. TonyH explains…

      https://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-sept-24-2021/#comment-726326

      I have often thought that Chinese government actions in the energy arena have been misinterpreted by many in the West. Chinese coal production has been on a plateau of 3.5GT per year since 2011. It represents about 60% of total energy consumption in China and more coal than the entire rest of the world is able to consume. The Chinese mine as much coal as the rest of the world, from reserves only half the size of the US. The average depth of mines is now 600m. Chinese coal is growing more expensive. Gail Tverberg has written about the prospects of a peak in Chinese coal production in the near future.

      Not only has it proven difficult for the Chinese to increase coal production, but the sheer scale of their energy consumption makes it difficult to substitute other fossil fuels. They would need the entire world’s production of natural gas to supplant coal as the dominant energy source. Domestic natural gas production is only a minor addition to their total energy needs and the scale of their energy needs makes it unlikely that LNG could provide anything more than a minor addition.

      So Chinese actions in the energy arena need to be interpreted in this context. Their attempts to integrate renewable energy into their grid is heralded by many in the West as embracing an energy transition to Green energy. But to Chinese leaders it has the more practical function of reducing coal consumption in coal burning power stations – stretching a resource that is close to its realistic limits. Wind and solar power allow coal plants to act as backup powerplants. This cuts their fuel consumption by a third. There has been criticism of China in its continuing construction of coal burning powerplants. But new coal powerplants are ultra critical units, with very high steam temperatures and thermal efficiency of 45%. They replace older saturated steam plants, with efficiencies lower than 30%. And the capacity factor of Chinese coal is falling, as powerplants are increasingly used as backup plants and fuel shortages often leave less efficient units standing idle.

      Chinese policy can be understood as an increasingly desperate struggle against coal depletion. They are expanding nuclear capacity as rapidly as possible, with the lofty goal of constructing 1TWe of fast neutron reactors by 2100. But their nuclear build capacity will take decades to build up to that level. They are therefore using every means available to them to stretch the benefits of their limited coal production, until new nuclear reactors can be built at a rate that comfortably exceeds the decline rate of coal production. The fact that they are searching for ways of cutting power consumption (bit coin for one), suggests that they may be falling behind in this race.

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  12. A reader who wishes to remain anonymous sent me a couple excellent links on Covid:

    https://off-guardian.org/2021/09/22/30-facts-you-need-to-know-your-covid-cribsheet/

    They make 30 intelligent points and still missed one of the most important: the gross incompetence and/or crime of ignoring proven early treatments.

    Isn’t it remarkable that our “leaders” never discuss or debate any of these points?

    Also remarkable is how comparatively unintelligent the messages from our health organizations are.

    30 facts you NEED to know: Your Covid Cribsheet

    You asked for it, so we made it. A collection of all the arguments you’ll ever need.

    We get a lot of e-mails and private messages along these lines “do you have a source for X?” or “can you point me to mask studies?” or “I know I saw a graph for mortality, but I can’t find it anymore”. And we understand, it’s been a long 18 months, and there are so many statistics and numbers to try and keep straight in your head.

    So, to deal with all these requests, we decided to make a bullet-pointed and sourced list for all the key points. A one-stop-shop.

    Here are key facts and sources about the alleged “pandemic”, that will help you get a grasp on what has happened to the world since January 2020, and help you enlighten any of your friends who might be still trapped in the New Normal fog.

    https://probabilityandlaw.blogspot.com/2021/09/all-cause-mortality-rates-in-england.html?m=1

    A comparison of age adjusted all-cause mortality rates in England between vaccinated and unvaccinated

    Norman Fenton and Martin Neil

    The UK Government’s own data does not support the claims made for vaccine effectiveness/safety.

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  13. https://www.thedesertreview.com/opinion/columnists/indias-ivermectin-blackout—part-v-the-secret-revealed/article_9a37d9a8-1fb2-11ec-a94b-47343582647b.html

    On August 25, 2021, the Indian media noticed the discrepancy between Uttar Pradesh’s massive success and other states, like Kerala’s, comparative failure. Although Uttar Pradesh was only 5% vaccinated to Kerala’s 20%, Uttar Pradesh had (only) 22 new COVID cases, while Kerala was overwhelmed with 31,445 in one day. So it became apparent that whatever was contained in those treatment kits must have been pretty effective.

    Each home kit contained the following: Paracetamol tablets [tylenol], Vitamin C, Multivitamin, Zinc, Vitamin D3, Ivermectin 12 mg [quantity #10 tablets], Doxycycline 100 mg [quantity #10 tablets]. Other non-medication components included face masks, sanitizer, gloves and alcohol wipes, a digital thermometer, and a pulse oximeter.

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  14. https://boriquagato.substack.com/p/the-number-of-single-vaxxed-people

    the number of single vaxxed people strongly predicts covid deaths

    i think we’re onto something here. this looks like a strongly predictive variable for deaths, it’s clear which variable is leading which, and we have strong independent clinical basis to presume such a relationship.

    and it lets us start to formulate a hypothesis with good backtested validation and the ability to make simple, testable predictions about the future.

    – if the size of the single vaccinated cohort keeps dropping, so too should deaths and they should follow at about a 5 day interval.
    – “number of vaccine doses” can rise and not drive a further rise in deaths.
    – it’s not about “overall doses,” it’s about “first doses.” (because that’s where the worry window is)
    – further, booster doses will act like first doses (as they have been in israel) and will cause rises in covid deaths like initial doses did.

    so there’s the the model and the forward prediction.

    and now, we wait and see if it proves out, because THAT and only that is the real test of a model.

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        1. I’m like that with swearwords – extra emphasis means it’s more true haha. I did see a study once that people who swear are more honest. I’m a professional writer so some grammar/punctuation things bother me more than is healthy. But I do appreciate good intel no matter what form it’s in 😉

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  15. Chris Martenson seems to have come to the same conclusion as I have. Time to step up preps.

    Ongoing supply chain problems seem to be worsening rather than improving. Now there are emerging energy shortages around the world. China shut down a bunch of factories yesterday because of electricity shortages. Gasoline shortages in the UK. Natural gas shortages predicted for all of Europe this winter.

    If our idiot leaders can’t handle COVID wisely, they sure as hell won’t be able to handle the implications of energy shortages.

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    1. Rob, I agree, the news on and off the headlines is really starting to give the impression that the current global human system is hitting limits.

      If that is true, what happens to that system from here? (Dr. Dennis Meadows said LTG may not be a good predictor of things after collapse starts. )

      So, is it going to be a long slow road to perdition? Or a rapid dissolution of the current energy production, geopolitical, and social system down to a new lower set point, and a few years on that plateau?

      What are your thoughts on prepping Rob, for those of us who choose to remain in place and deal with what comes now?

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      1. Everyone has different priorities, resources, needs, etc. so it’s hard to generalize. What helped me was to create a spreadsheet with things I use grouped into categories. Then close your eyes and think about how that thing is made, where it comes from, and what life would be like without it. A plan specific for you will emerge.

        One example, my days of travel are done so I need to find healthy pleasure near where I live and my thing is hiking. I bought some spare hiking boots as explained here:

        preptip: Save Your Sole

        Another example, I eat rice most days. It’s delicious, inexpensive, keeps forever, we don’t grow it in Canada, and I don’t want to eat potatoes every day, so I bought some extra rice.

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  16. Very good thread on global economic problems by Panopticon today. Skimming his headlines you can see how everything is connected.

    https://climateandeconomy.com/2021/09/29/29th-september-2021-todays-round-up-of-economic-news/

    “Half of China’s provincial jurisdictions mandate rationing of electricity, but poor communication and unclear timeline leave angry public in the dark. One local government warns that entire power grid at risk of collapse if electricity is not rationed.”

    “China is in dire need of more coal, and it’s willing to pay ‘any price’ to secure more of the world’s dirtiest fossil fuel – which means other countries risk literally being left in the coal dust.”

    “India’s coal stockpile dangerously low as inventories dry up, lowest since November 2017.”

    “Mining meltdown: Iron ore price slump sends shockwaves through industry as fall in demand from China catches market by surprise…

    “China is banning the export of phosphate, a major component of commercial fertilizer, through 2022 [not good for food prices, of course!]”

    “Major U.K. industries from food processing to utilities were already reeling from the effects of Brexit, a supply-chain crisis and record surge in energy prices. The sudden disruption to road-fuel supplies threatens to spread that pain even deeper into the economy, leaving small businesses, care workers and taxi drivers unable to do their jobs.”

    “European Energy Prices Surge to Records as Supply Crisis Spreads. European energy markets from natural gas to carbon permits jumped to records early on Tuesday as the shortage of supplies will only get worse just as the winter season starts.”

    “… for a multitude of reasons, U.S. shale is in no position to bail out Europe. Indeed, supplies are so tight that Americans are staring down their own supply squeeze — and the accompanying sky-high utility bills.”

    “The surge in global gas prices due to shortages in Europe has pushed Asian LNG to records for the time of year. That’s forced Pakistan to pay the most ever for spot shipments to top up supply under long-term contracts, or even forgo them altogether.”

    “Why global food prices are higher today than for most of modern history… Global food prices shot up nearly 33% in September 2021 compared with the same period the year before… Based on real prices, it is currently harder to buy food on the international market than in almost every other year since UN record keeping began in 1961.”

    “Oil’s climbed to more than $80 a barrel for the first time in three years… Food prices are also advancing, driven in part by crop failures in Brazil, with a benchmark UN index up 33% over the past 12 months.”

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  17. “Credit impulse” is a term used by economists to describe net changes in debt. An engineer more accurately calls it “debt acceleration” because it is the rate of change of debt velocity. Debt acceleration is one of the best predictors of economic health because citizens experience it as a change in their standard of living.

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  18. A few observations on the global situation- scratch the surface and it seems there is more to the decision by Australia to cancel its submarine deal with France and ink a new one with the US and UK than is immediately apparent.

    My guess is the decision is connected to military concerns not just about challenges in the Asia Pacific region but also about the looming problem of climate change, the prospect of proliferating failed states and future waves of climate refugees in the Northern hemisphere. Also it’s a more logical arrangement as the members of the new trilateral partnership are also members of the Five Eyes intelligence alliance.

    There is growing awareness by the military (see G. Dyers “Climate Wars”) that everything is happening a lot faster than the climate models predicted and we are hitting critical thresholds, hence the pivot to the Southern Hemisphere. It’s not just tech billionaires headed South.

    The Pentagon and the UK Ministry of Defense are hedging their bets. Future breakdowns in BAU in the Northern Hemisphere could affect not just the functioning of conventional subs (supply chain problems – chip shortages, lack of mechanical parts, fuel interruptions etc) nuclear subs can go for years without refueling, but Everything and so the Southern Hemisphere – Australia, NZ , Antarctica and quite possibly the southern most reaches of S.America will become increasingly strategically important.

    We are starting to see the pieces on the game board shift in very interesting ways in response to emergent problems.

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    1. Interesting speculation. I was thinking that Australia might be worried about China’s depleting coal reserves and the fact that Chinese citizens cannot afford higher electricity prices, and therefore what China might do in desperation to get more cheap coal.

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      1. Yes certainly, you are right about China’s depleting coal reserves. They have to use rolling blackouts to deal with electrical demand. Also at issue are critical minerals needed so essential to chip manufacturing and the global climate economy. Quad leaders are uniting to weaken Chinese dominance over rare Earth minerals. The US has no industrial capacity to produce rare earth magnets and rely on Chinese imports. It’s a national security issue for the US and COVID has exposed vulnerabilities in the supply chain. Here is a new awareness and urgency. The hope is to develop sources of supply in Australia.

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          1. Yes absolutely. Pharmaceuticals, mechanical parts-you name it & many other products that Western companies need to keep their production lines going. Supply chain managers have grossly underestimated the risks of supply chain failure. Developing new sources of supply that are both reliable and reasonably priced will be a long slow process.

            As a footnote, China has been making major investments in railways and ports in several African countries to ensure supply of raw materials. The US as far as I know has neglected similar types of investments.

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            1. Re: weapons – the Chinese may not make our weapons but I wouldn’t be surprised if the US military gets chips or other critical components from them. After all, I read that Federal law enforcement agencies in the Biden administration are reportedly purchasing surveillance drones from China that have previously been labeled a potential national security threat by the Pentagon. And the U.S. Secret Service and the FBI have recently acquired surveillance drones from DJI.

              It always struck me as weird that we allowed drones made by Shenzhen-based company DJI to proliferate in the North American market. Seems like a potential security issue. An opening for them to collect land information data on pipelines, utilities and other critical infrastructure. The ppl making these purchasing and security decisions can’t all be idiots, I guess they know what they are doing. Or maybe beggars can’t be choosers and DJI is the only game in town.

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          2. Sorry Rob, I didn’t read the first part of your question carefully re the vulnerability “to” China. Right now they need coal. Energy. Anything they can get their hands on to keep their economy running . They are pushing up against limits same as the rest of the planet. And if they can’t meet their customer obligations that obviously makes them vulnerable on many different fronts.

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        2. …and yes I imagine Australians are worried about the Chinese because they are bullies. They’ve meddled in Australian internal politics, hoovered up all their PPE in the early days of the pandemic after those horrible bush fires and internationally they’ve gotten into territorial disputes in the South China Sea, put the Uyghurs in concentration camps, stolen billions of dollars of intellectual property and generally shown themselves to be bad global citizens. They would take Australia’s coal if they could get away with it. Or strong arm them somehow.

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      2. Rob – what are your thoughts on the current coal situation? Do you think Australia will strand these assets to aid global emission cuts? Or do you think the pressure to keep the lights on will win the day? There is a lot of contradictory information /chatter on the subject. Currently China is snubbing Australian coal but that could change as these things do when reality sets in. I’ve read about Australia doubling down to continue extracting fossil fuels despite growing pressure to cut carbon emissions. They are being pulled in two directions at once. Pretty sure that renewables aren’t going to cut it in the short term. I wish it were otherwise.

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        1. I don’t know. I’m not very knowledgeable about the coal market.

          My guess is that some countries with good intentions backed by political will, like Germany, will strand some coal reserves until the economic pain of their citizens becomes so great that they are forced to reverse course. In the end I expect we will have burned everything, including the forests, that is economically feasible to burn.

          It seems Australia is not in the group of countries with good intentions so they will probably not even pause their coal exports.

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  19. Tim Watkins today with an excellent nuanced view of the UK gas shortages.

    https://consciousnessofsheep.co.uk/2021/09/29/a-crisis-of-affordability/

    This cannot go on forever of course. But it won’t be temporary media circuses like the current fake fuel shortage in the UK which bring matters to a head. Rather, it will be the slow grind of declining energy supplies – and the lack of viable alternatives – as fossil fuel extraction peaks even as extracting economies such as Russia and Saudi Arabia require more of what is left for domestic consumption.

    Fourteen years of central bank stimulus and low interest rates, together with the temporary US fracking bubble they largely helped to inflate, allowed the false narrative that rising stock and bond prices meant we were out of the woods. Between 2015 and 2017, the fall in oil prices had even ushered in a tiny sliver of growth in the real economy – although not enough to halt the retail apocalypse. But the rise in oil prices from 2018 as global oil production peaked for the last time reversed the process. And, ironically, had it not been for the huge crash in real economy activity brought about by the pandemic, the headwinds which we are now experiencing would probably have hit us in 2020.

    The temptation is to rush out and predict the end of industrial civilisation immediately. But it is worth heeding John Maynard Keynes’ lament that: “The stock market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent.”

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  20. Just finished Dr. Malcolm Kendrick’s book “The Great Cholesterol Con: The Truth About What Really Causes Heart Disease and How to Avoid It”.

    It’s brilliant evidence that the health care industry attracts people of subpar intelligence and ethics, which is also confirmed by Covid.

    https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1016105.The_Great_Cholesterol_Con

    Rubbishing the diet-heart hypothesis, in which clinical trials ‘prove’ that high cholesterol causes heart disease and a high-fat diet leads to heart disease, Malcolm Kendrick lambastes a powerful pharmaceutical industry and unquestioning medical profession, who, he claims, perpetuate the concepts of good and bad cholesterol.

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  22. Unusual wild storm here last night. Other strange weather events around the world. No doubt just a coincidence.

    https://climateandeconomy.com/2021/09/30/30th-september-2021-todays-round-up-of-climate-news/

    “It’s a week past the autumn equinox, and the first snows have fallen in the Rockies and the mountain peaks of New England. But in Hazen, N.D., the mercury soared to the century mark [100F] Tuesday afternoon.

    “According to several climatologists, that 100-degree reading is the highest temperature observed so far north on the planet this late in the calendar year. The scorching temperature comes after a tie for the hottest summer on record in the Lower 48 states.”

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  23. Here’s a mother of a conspiracy theory on Covid, which I normally ignore, except this guy is really bright and appears to be expert in the domain he’s speculating about.

    https://boriquagato.substack.com/p/were-some-folks-a-little-too-prepared

    i doubt that moderna or pfizer or biontech were actually doing or funding research in wuhan. they are not that crazy nor careless. BUT, i do suspect both were aware of it through NIH pals and their euro equivalents. everyone at the core of these industries keeps an eye on whoever is doing the “neat stuff” (especially the “naughty stuff” that can only be done one place)

    i’m really struggling to believe this got done that fast without a BIG head-start. none of the other mRNA projects have worked like this. it’s not some fundamental property of the medium.

    i suspect there is a helluva story (or a visit form the black helicopters one night) for a journo really willing to dig into just how this mRNA tech arrived just in time in 2 separate places, both tied to folks tied deeply to wuhan.

    was moderna a biotechnology launderer for the NIH?

    even john grisham would sit slack-jawed in awe at this plotline.

    so look, maybe it’s something, maybe it’s a lot of provocative nothing in a small world social graph. but it sure looks like fertile ground for more digging and it does not require a grand conspiracy, just a bunch of folks who has been working on some dangerous stuff all acting in their best interests and on non-public knowledge it’s quite likely they had.

    i wonder if the true story will ever be written.

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    1. A commenter on this blog asked a question that has been bugging me for a long time:

      they can develop a whole new vaccine in mere months but they haven’t once updated it with a newer S protein to restore its effectiveness against Delta

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      1. From over on Naked Capitalism: You might say, “Well, the drug companies will soon have a booster that targets Delta.” Notice that they are instead offering boosters that are the same as the original shot, as in is designed to combat the Wuhan variant. The lack of any apparent plan to develop Delta or other variant-specific shots does not appear to be due to development or approval delays, but instead the span of variants. As GM explained:

        It has been noted for some time that the mutations in Delta/B.1.617.2, on one hand, and B.1.351/Beta and P.1/Gamma, on the other, are orthogonal to each other. And there have been other mutational paths too, but those did not rise to significant prominence.

Which is essentially evolution into distinct serotypes, and is one big reason why we are still injecting the original Wuhan strain vaccine into the arms of people instead of a variant-specific one — the antigenic distance between the Wuhan strain and each of these variants is lower than the antigenic distance between some of them, thus the original vaccine gives the best breadth of coverage.2

        See here for where I snipped that from: https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2021/09/vaccine-only-mandates-as-a-manifestation-of-the-bizarre-civil-war-stoking-impulses-of-the-professional-managerial-class-in-the-us.html

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  24. Dr. Kevin Anderson, one of the few wise climate scientists, explains that we have talked so long about fantasy solutions, like carbon capture and storage, that we now believe they are real, and as a consequence we have very little chance of staying below 3-4 degrees of warming this century. I think that means most of civilization is done.

    Anderson says we need to change the narrative, but I observe he didn’t discuss the only thing that might help with all of our overshoot problems: rapid population reduction. Greta Thunberg also doesn’t focus on population reduction.

    Anderson’s mostly talking about, and demonstrating at the same time, our genetic tendency to deny unpleasant realties. Any good path forward must start with an awareness of Varki’s MORT theory.

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