Sunday, October 31, 2021
04 October 2021 “Religion and Science: Towards COP26” Pope Francis
Vatican News is funded in whole or in part by the Vatican City government. Wikipedia
Saturday, October 30, 2021
Sincere Christianity Needed
The world needs evidences of sincere Christianity. Professed Christianity may be seen everywhere; but when the power of God's grace is seen in our churches, the members will work the works of Christ. Natural and hereditary traits of character will be transformed. The indwelling of His Spirit will enable them to reveal Christ's likeness, and in proportion to the purity of their piety will be the success of their work.
There are in our world many Christian workers who have not yet heard the grand and wonderful truths that have come to us. These are doing a good work in accordance with the light which they have, and many of them are more advanced in the knowledge of practical work than are those who have had great light and opportunities.
The indifference which has existed among our ministers in regard to health reform and medical missionary work is surprising. Some who do not profess to be Christians treat these matters with greater reverence than do some of our own people; and unless we arouse, they will go in advance of us.
The word which the Lord has given to me for our ministers and our churches is, “Go forward.” “All power is given unto Me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world.”
Testimonies to Ministers and Gospel Workers, pp.416,417.
Biden attends Mass in Rome
Key updates
G-20 leaders formally endorse new global corporate minimum tax
A memorable photo at the first in-person G-20 in two years
Boris Johnson, other world leaders arrive for G-20 summit in Rome
Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi welcomed leaders from the world’s 20 richest economies on Oct. 30, ahead of a key two-day summit in Rome. (Reuters)
By Chico Harlan,
Seung Min Kim,
Annie Linskey and
Jeff Stein
Today at 2:00 a.m. EDT|Updated today at 1:07 p.m. EDT
Before a formal dinner among the Group of 20 leaders, President Biden attended a Saturday Vigil Mass at a church near the U.S. Embassy in Rome.
Here’s what to know
- This is the first in-person summit of leaders from the G-20 economies in two years.
- The G-20 has formally endorsed a new global minimum tax designed to prevent big companies from shifting profits to low-tax countries.
- The summit is noteworthy for its absences. Chinese President Xi Jinping, Russian President Vladimir Putin, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and new Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida are not attending in person.
On Monday, leaders will travel from Rome to Glasgow, Scotland, for the far bigger United Nations climate conference known as COP26.
Biden attends Mass in Rome
By Chico Harlan1:07 p.m.
President Joe Biden walks out of St. Patrick’s Church after attending Mass in Rome on Oct. 30. (Evan Vucci/AP)
Before a formal dinner of the G-20 leaders, President Biden attended a Saturday Vigil Mass at a church in Rome near the U.S. Embassy.
Biden is a regular churchgoer, but his attendance Saturday drew increased attention, coming one day after he met with Pope Francis. After that meeting, Biden told reporters that the pontiff had called him a “good Catholic” and said he should continue to receive Communion.
The Vatican did not provide its own version of events about that aspect of the meeting between Francis and Biden. But Biden’s comments were enough to cause outcry among U.S. Catholic conservatives, some of whom have argued that the president should be barred from the holy sacrament because of his support of abortion rights.
Biden was attending Mass at St. Patrick’s Church, which House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited several weeks ago after her own meeting with the pontiff. In Pelosi’s case, she was forced to leave Mass early because of encroaching protesters rallying against Italy’s mandating a coronavirus vaccination pass for all workers.
Before a formal dinner of the G-20 leaders, President Biden attended a Saturday Vigil Mass at a church in Rome near the U.S. Embassy.
Biden is a regular churchgoer, but his attendance Saturday drew increased attention, coming one day after he met with Pope Francis. After that meeting, Biden told reporters that the pontiff had called him a “good Catholic” and said he should continue to receive Communion.
The Vatican did not provide its own version of events about that aspect of the meeting between Francis and Biden. But Biden’s comments were enough to cause outcry among U.S. Catholic conservatives, some of whom have argued that the president should be barred from the holy sacrament because of his support of abortion rights.
Biden was attending Mass at St. Patrick’s Church, which House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited several weeks ago after her own meeting with the pontiff. In Pelosi’s case, she was forced to leave Mass early because of encroaching protesters rallying against Italy’s mandating a coronavirus vaccination pass for all workers.
CENTRAL BANKS WILL GAIN 'ABSOLUTE CONTROL' OVER OUR MONEY THROUGH DIGITAL CURRENCY...
BANK CHIEF SAYS CENTRAL BANKS WILL GAIN 'ABSOLUTE CONTROL' OVER OUR MONEY THROUGH DIGITAL CURRENCY - AND THE VATICAN IS BEHIND IT ALL!
NEWS UPDATE - 19th October 2021
In a meeting that took place in October 2020, discussing the role Central Bank Digital Currencies play in facilitating payments, the General Manager of the Bank for International Settlements, Agustin Carstens, revealed just how much control central banks will have over our finances through digital currencies:
"In cash, we don't know who's using a $100 bill today and we don't know who's using a 1,000 peso bill today. The key difference with the CBDC [Central Bank Digital Currency] is the central bank will have absolute control on the rules and regulations that will determine the use of that expression of central bank liability, and also we will have the technology to enforce that." (source)
Do you see what he said there? They cannot control the use of cash because they don't know WHO is using it. But with digital currency, the central banks will have absolute control over the use of that money and have the technology to permit, or not permit us to 'buy and sell.' Does that sound like Revelation 13? Does it sound like they are preparing for the no buying or selling of those who refuse the mark of the beast? Oh yes! It's coming friends. And who is behind it all? Well, we reported in July of a scheme taking place called the 'Council for Inclusive Capitalism.' And take a look at who is part of this council and who is the one guiding it:
The Rothschilds, the Rockefeller Foundation, the Ford Foundation, Visa, Mastercard, Bank of America, etc, etc. And guided by who? THE VATICAN! (source)
Founder of the 'council', Lynn Forester de Rothschild said ... "This Council will follow the warning from Pope Francis to listen to 'the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor' and answer society's demands for a more equitable and sustainable model of growth." (source)
Do you see who is behind all of this? It is the Papal Church of Rome. God revealed in the books of Daniel and Revelation that the Papal Church of Rome would be that apostate power in which the whole world would be deceived into worshipping. "All roads lead to Rome" as the saying goes! This 'cry of the earth' is nothing but a huge deception of the Roman Catholic Church to get the world to bow to her coming Sunday rest law, in direct opposition to the 7th day Sabbath rest of our heavenly Father. And this is what Revelation 13 said would happen, that "the earth AND them which dwell therein will worship the first beast" (vs.12). What do we hear all about today? THE EARTH - Climate change, etc. Very little about Jesus Christ and the fact that He is soon coming to DESTROY this earth. The world is being deceived into following the dictates of Papal Rome, rather than the Word of God.
But there is something that needs to be done to stop those of us who refuse the mark of Papal Rome from 'buying and selling.' And that is to get rid of cash and gain CONTROL over our money. This is where the central bank digital currencies come in, and as the bank chief above said, they will have 'absolute control' over our money. So when we refuse the mark of the Papal beast, the banks will simply be able to electronically block our finances at a press of a button. Everything we see taking place today is in preparation for the coming Sunday law mark of Papal Rome. And great persecution is coming for God's faithful ones, which is why we must seek to be ready now by surrendering all to Jesus, so we will have the faith to stand.
But there is an even GREATER DECEPTION coming to make the world think that these things are from God. The 'deadly delusion', 'signs and wonders', 'fire from heaven', spiritualism, 'people rising from the dead', 'healings', 'miracles' - all from Satan to deceive the world!
This is why we must seek and heed the TRUTH of God's Word, as Satan is yet to perform mighty signs and wonders to deceive the world into thinking that these things are from God. We were warned that even the Protestant churches would grasp the hand of Papal Rome and spiritualism, which is happening now and Satan would use them to DECEIVE the world into accepting the mark. Through the false teachings of Sunday sacredness and the immortality of the soul, Satan is going to be able to use the churches to deceive the world. So I urge you to seek the TRUTH that is in Jesus Christ and be not deceived by the so many false teachings of the churches today.
Yes, persecution is coming for those of us who stand true to Jesus Christ. But fear not brethren, as the Lord has promised He will take care of us, if we are faithful and true to Him.
Isaiah 33:16 ...'He shall dwell on high: his place of defence shall be the munitions of rocks: bread shall be given him; his waters shall be sure.'
Pope calls for 'urgent' response to climate crisis at COP26
The Pope earlier this month joined nearly 40 religious leaders in an appeal to government leaders at COP26 for "urgent" action to reduce emissions. Source: AAP
Pope Francis said in a message released ahead of the COP26 summit that leaders must respond "urgently" to the climate crisis.
"The political decision-makers who will meet at COP26 in Glasgow, are urgently summoned to provide effective responses to the present ecological crisis," the Pope said in a message played on BBC radio, translated from Italian.
He added that this would "offer concrete hope to future generations".
He concluded by stressing that every individual can play a part in "changing our collective response to the unprecedented threat of climate change and the degradation of our common home".
The Pope earlier this month joined nearly 40 religious leaders in an appeal to government leaders at COP26 for "urgent, radical and responsible action" to drastically curb greenhouse gas.
READ MORE
Queen Elizabeth cancels plans to attend COP26 climate summit in person
The 84-year-old Pope is not going to the crunch talks aimed at fighting the climate emergency. The Vatican is sending a delegation led by secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin.
Francis is set to meet several world leaders as they attend a G20 summit in Rome before heading to COP26.
The Pope will hold audiences with US President Joe Biden, who is a practising Catholic, and South Korean President Moon Jae-in on Friday. The next day he is due to meet Indian President Narendra Modi for the first time.
Pope Francis said in a message released ahead of the COP26 summit that leaders must respond "urgently" to the climate crisis.
"The political decision-makers who will meet at COP26 in Glasgow, are urgently summoned to provide effective responses to the present ecological crisis," the Pope said in a message played on BBC radio, translated from Italian.
He added that this would "offer concrete hope to future generations".
He concluded by stressing that every individual can play a part in "changing our collective response to the unprecedented threat of climate change and the degradation of our common home".
The Pope earlier this month joined nearly 40 religious leaders in an appeal to government leaders at COP26 for "urgent, radical and responsible action" to drastically curb greenhouse gas.
READ MORE
Queen Elizabeth cancels plans to attend COP26 climate summit in person
The 84-year-old Pope is not going to the crunch talks aimed at fighting the climate emergency. The Vatican is sending a delegation led by secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin.
Francis is set to meet several world leaders as they attend a G20 summit in Rome before heading to COP26.
The Pope will hold audiences with US President Joe Biden, who is a practising Catholic, and South Korean President Moon Jae-in on Friday. The next day he is due to meet Indian President Narendra Modi for the first time.
Friday, October 29, 2021
World religious leaders make recommendations to G20 Summit
By Universe Contributor
- October 28, 2021
By Amy Griffin
This weekend the leaders of the world’s major economies will gather in Italy for the G20 Summit.
Bologna, Italy is a city with roots tracing back to the bronze age and is known for being home to the oldest university in the world. This year, it was also home to the G20 Interfaith Forum.
Each year, the Interfaith Forum convenes in the country that will later host the G20 Summit for leaders of the world’s major economies — this year’s summit will start this weekend in Rome.
At G20 Interfaith Forum 2021, religious and political leaders as well as scholars met in September to discuss recommendations to the larger G20 Summit. They focused on global agendas, especially the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals.
W. Cole Durham Jr., president of the G20 Interfaith Forum Association, said the Sustainable Development Goals can “really only be achieved if there is cooperation and synergy (between the government agencies) and the religious sector.”
The Interfaith Forum contains specific working groups, which tackle issues including poverty, public health, gender equality, refugees and humanitarian aid.
The Anti-Racism Initiative is a new addition to the forum. The group is led by Audrey Kitigawa, president and founder of the International Academy for Multicultural Cooperation and Divine Mother of the Light of Awareness International Spiritual Family.
“Transformation will come about when faith leaders themselves are able to openly and honestly address the mindsets, the attitudes created through racial bias,” Kitigawa said.
The G20 Interfaith’s recommendations to the leaders focused on healing health, social, and economic fractures. They proposed worldwide action on education, inequality, racial discrimination and climate change, specifically focusing on the most vulnerable communities.
“I wish every person would be respected at least as much as we respect temples, cathedrals, mosques, shrines because human beings are sacred,” Ganoune Diop, Secretary General of the International Religious Liberty Association, said.
Despite an especially tumultuous past two years worldwide, religious leaders feel there’s reason to keep the faith. “While we may never live to see the fruits of our efforts, I have great faith and hope that we will,” Kitagawa said.
The next Interfaith Forum will follow the G20 Summit to Indonesia in 2022, where interfaith leaders will again convene to identify worldwide needs.
The keynote speeches from the 2021 forum will premiere on the G20 Interfaith YouTube channel on Saturday at 9 a.m. Mountain Time.
US media barred from Biden's meeting with Pope Francis
By Christian Datoc
October 29, 2021 - 9:35 AM
President Joe Biden met with Pope Francis at the Vatican Friday morning, but U.S. media traveling with the president were not granted access to the event.
The Vatican additionally canceled the live broadcast, a decision protested by the White House Correspondents' Association, and the reporters, photographers, and television crews traveling with the president on his second European trip were barred from participating. The Vatican did provide a handful of photos of the visit and a heavily edited video of Biden and first lady Jill Biden touring the facilities.
The Biden journey: An unsteady course
In one shot, Biden hands the pope a presidential challenge coin and claimed that he is the "most significant warrior for peace I've ever met" and that his late son, Beau Biden, "would want me to give this to you."
According to reporters traveling in the presidential motorcade, Biden joked and shook hands with papal officials upon arrival.
"It’s good to be back," Biden said while shaking hands with officials. "I’m Jill’s husband."
The White House's official readout of the face-to-face meeting, the second between a Catholic president and the pope, noted that "President Biden thanked His Holiness for his advocacy for the world’s poor and those suffering from hunger, conflict, and persecution" and "lauded Pope Francis’ leadership in fighting the climate crisis, as well as his advocacy to ensure the pandemic ends for everyone through vaccine sharing and an equitable global economic recovery."
"The engagement between the two was very warm when the delegation arrived in the room," one White House official added of the lengthy visit. "There was laughter and clear rapport between President Biden and Pope Francis."
The meeting itself lasted for roughly 90 minutes. Former Presidents Donald Trump and Barack Obama both met with Pope Francis for roughly 30 minutes and 50 minutes, respectively.
Following his meeting with the pope, Biden led an extended bilateral meeting with the Holy See's Secretary of State Cardinal Parolin. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, national security adviser Jake Sullivan, and a number of other U.S. officials also took part in the meeting.
In one shot, Biden hands the pope a presidential challenge coin and claimed that he is the "most significant warrior for peace I've ever met" and that his late son, Beau Biden, "would want me to give this to you."
According to reporters traveling in the presidential motorcade, Biden joked and shook hands with papal officials upon arrival.
"It’s good to be back," Biden said while shaking hands with officials. "I’m Jill’s husband."
The White House's official readout of the face-to-face meeting, the second between a Catholic president and the pope, noted that "President Biden thanked His Holiness for his advocacy for the world’s poor and those suffering from hunger, conflict, and persecution" and "lauded Pope Francis’ leadership in fighting the climate crisis, as well as his advocacy to ensure the pandemic ends for everyone through vaccine sharing and an equitable global economic recovery."
"The engagement between the two was very warm when the delegation arrived in the room," one White House official added of the lengthy visit. "There was laughter and clear rapport between President Biden and Pope Francis."
The meeting itself lasted for roughly 90 minutes. Former Presidents Donald Trump and Barack Obama both met with Pope Francis for roughly 30 minutes and 50 minutes, respectively.
Following his meeting with the pope, Biden led an extended bilateral meeting with the Holy See's Secretary of State Cardinal Parolin. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, national security adviser Jake Sullivan, and a number of other U.S. officials also took part in the meeting.
Poll: Fauci lied, resign
By Paul Bedard
October 27, 2021 - 12:05 PM
Nearly half the nation believes that COVID-19 czar Anthony Fauci lied about funding virus testing in China, and almost as many want him dumped from the post he’s held for 37 years.
In the latest Rasmussen Reports survey, 49% said he has not told the truth about U.S. funding for “gain-of-function” research.
When asked if he should be forced to resign as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, 46% said yes and 40% said no.
The survey followed the recent release of a memo suggesting the United States supported and funded virus testing in China, where it is believed COVID-19 started or was developed.
It prompted a new round of calls, led by Sen. Rand Paul, to fire Fauci, beloved by his fans but despised by critics of mask and vaccine mandates.
Rasmussen said the release of the National Institutes of Health memo that appeared to contradict Fauci’s denial that federal funds had been used to fund controversial research in a Chinese laboratory cut into his credibility.
“The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that only 33% of likely U.S. voters believe Fauci has told the truth about U.S. government funding for gain-of-function virus research. That’s a decline from June, when 40% believed Fauci had told the truth,” the analysis said.
As with all polls about Fauci, partisanship plays a role. For example, he remains popular among Democrats. Only 24% believe he should be ousted.
But among Republicans, 67% want him forced to resign.
The survey followed the recent release of a memo suggesting the United States supported and funded virus testing in China, where it is believed COVID-19 started or was developed.
It prompted a new round of calls, led by Sen. Rand Paul, to fire Fauci, beloved by his fans but despised by critics of mask and vaccine mandates.
Rasmussen said the release of the National Institutes of Health memo that appeared to contradict Fauci’s denial that federal funds had been used to fund controversial research in a Chinese laboratory cut into his credibility.
“The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that only 33% of likely U.S. voters believe Fauci has told the truth about U.S. government funding for gain-of-function virus research. That’s a decline from June, when 40% believed Fauci had told the truth,” the analysis said.
As with all polls about Fauci, partisanship plays a role. For example, he remains popular among Democrats. Only 24% believe he should be ousted.
But among Republicans, 67% want him forced to resign.
NIH Removes Language on ‘Gain-of-Function’ From Website...
Dr. Francis Collins, the head of the National Institutes of Health, is seen in Bethesda, Md., on Jan. 26, 2021. (Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images)
COVER-UP
NIH Removes Language on ‘Gain-of-Function’ From Website Amid Criticism Over Funding Chinese Research
By Zachary Stieber
October 25, 2021 Updated: October 27, 2021
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) altered a key portion of its website last week around the time it disclosed to Congress that experiments it funded in China met the definition of gain-of-function.
The federal agency had a detailed explanation of gain-of-function research on its site, noting that the term refers to any research “that modifies a biological agent so that it confers new or enhanced activity to that agent.”
But the explanation was wiped between Oct. 19 and Oct. 21—possibly ahead of the NIH’s most recent disclosures on Oct. 20 about research it funded in China that increased the potency of a virus by modifying it.
The updated page now says, in its only reference to that type of research, that research involving enhanced potential pandemic pathogens (ePPPs) “is a type of so-called ‘gain-of-function’ (GOF) research.” It claims that “the vast majority of GOF research does not involve ePPP and falls outside the scope of oversight required for research involving ePPPs.”
Oversight involving research on ePPPs is governed by a framework (pdf) issued by the U.S. government in late 2017, on the same day the NIH lifted its yearslong funding pause on most gain-of-function research.
There’s no definition of gain-of-function inside the framework. The only mention of it refers people to a list of examples of activities that would and would not be considered to involve ePPPs. That list was last available in May 2017, according to an Epoch Times review.
An NIH spokeswoman confirmed that the webpage, a “backgrounder” on the framework, was altered last week, around the same time the disclosures were made.
The information concerning gain-of-function “was being misused/used incorrectly (and still is) and creating confusion (and still is),” the spokeswoman told The Epoch Times in an email.
“The backgrounder was updated to provide clarity on the scope of the framework,” she said.
The NIH Office of Communications and Public Liaison made the decision to alter the page, according to the spokeswoman. She noted that a separate page still gives details on gain-of-function research, but it doesn’t contain nearly as much information about what exactly the type of research is as the other page did.
RELATED
Dr. Francis Collins Stepping Down as Head of NIH
The Epoch Times has submitted a Freedom of Information Act request for all communications and other internal NIH documents concerning the alteration.
The agency’s outgoing director, Dr. Francis Collins, and one of its top officials, Dr. Anthony Fauci, are under heightened scrutiny for their funding of research in China during and after a pause in funding of most gain-of-function research.
The new disclosures, some experts say, showed the funding did go toward GOF research, which runs counter to what Collins and Fauci told members of Congress in Washington during public hearings earlier this year.
While Collins and Fauci are standing by their statements, Fauci shifted his defense on Oct. 24, saying the experiments didn’t meet the definition of “gain-of-function research of concern”—after earlier claiming they were not gain-of-function at all.
Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), a strong critic of the NIH, said on Twitter that the webpage change is concerning.
“Persistent propaganda is a problem for propagandists. How long until [the government] outlaws internet archiving or reposts of internet archives?” he wrote.
Twitter user Jeremy Redfern first identified the NIH’s update.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) also took notice of the update, writing, “What does the NIH have to hide?”
The NIH and other health agencies have altered other pages during the COVID-19 pandemic.
For instance, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently changed the definition of a vaccine from “a product that stimulates a person’s immune system to produce immunity to a specific disease, protecting the person from that disease” to “a preparation that is used to stimulate the body’s immune system against disease.”
A spokesperson for the agency previously told The Epoch Times that the earlier definition “could be interpreted to mean that vaccines are 100 percent effective, which has never been the case for any vaccine, so the current definition is more transparent.”
Meiling Lee contributed to this report.
The Epoch Times has submitted a Freedom of Information Act request for all communications and other internal NIH documents concerning the alteration.
The agency’s outgoing director, Dr. Francis Collins, and one of its top officials, Dr. Anthony Fauci, are under heightened scrutiny for their funding of research in China during and after a pause in funding of most gain-of-function research.
The new disclosures, some experts say, showed the funding did go toward GOF research, which runs counter to what Collins and Fauci told members of Congress in Washington during public hearings earlier this year.
While Collins and Fauci are standing by their statements, Fauci shifted his defense on Oct. 24, saying the experiments didn’t meet the definition of “gain-of-function research of concern”—after earlier claiming they were not gain-of-function at all.
Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), a strong critic of the NIH, said on Twitter that the webpage change is concerning.
“Persistent propaganda is a problem for propagandists. How long until [the government] outlaws internet archiving or reposts of internet archives?” he wrote.
Twitter user Jeremy Redfern first identified the NIH’s update.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) also took notice of the update, writing, “What does the NIH have to hide?”
The NIH and other health agencies have altered other pages during the COVID-19 pandemic.
For instance, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently changed the definition of a vaccine from “a product that stimulates a person’s immune system to produce immunity to a specific disease, protecting the person from that disease” to “a preparation that is used to stimulate the body’s immune system against disease.”
A spokesperson for the agency previously told The Epoch Times that the earlier definition “could be interpreted to mean that vaccines are 100 percent effective, which has never been the case for any vaccine, so the current definition is more transparent.”
Meiling Lee contributed to this report.
Energy crisis will set off social unrest, private-equity billionaire warns
By Matt Egan, CNN Business
Updated 1:05 PM ET, Tue October 26, 2021
 |
New York (CNN Business)Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman warned Tuesday that high energy prices will likely set off social unrest around the world.
"We're going to end up with a real shortage of energy. And when you have a shortage, it's going to cost more. And it's probably going to cost a lot more," the private-equity billionaire told CNN International's Richard Quest at a conference in Saudi Arabia.
US oil prices climbed above $85 a barrel on Monday for the first time in seven years. Gas prices continue to creep higher, nearing $3.40 a gallon nationally, according to AAA. Natural gas prices have likewise skyrocketed, especially in Europe and Asia, prompting the shutdown of factories.
"You're going to get very unhappy people around the world in the emerging markets in particular but in the developed world," Schwarzman said at the Future Investment Initiative. "What happens then, Richard, is you've got real unrest. This challenges the political system and it's all utterly unnecessary."
Analysis: Gas prices are high. That could mess with Biden's climate agenda
Part of the problem, the Blackstone (BX) billionaire said, is that it's getting harder and harder for fossil fuel companies to borrow money to fund their expensive production activities, especially in the United States. And without new production, supply won't keep up.
"If you try and raise money to drill holes, it's almost impossible to get that money," Schwarzman said, adding that this is happening on an "extremely wide-scale basis."
Schwarzman called on governments to agree on the rules of the road so society can successfully get through the energy transition.
"There's unanimity something should be done, but how you get from where we are today to a green world is utterly undefined," he said.
'Inflation is definitely more than transitory'
The energy crisis is amplifying inflationary pressures as the world economy recovers from Covid.
Not only are gas prices costing consumers more at the pump, but the government recently projected that home heating costs will rise sharply this winter as well. Businesses are also getting hit by higher energy prices.
BlackRock (BLK) CEO Larry Fink said one of the problems is that policymakers are moving more aggressively to curb fossil fuels supply than demand.
"Short-term policies related to environmentalism in terms of restricting supply of hydrocarbons has created energy inflation, and we're going to be living with that for some time," Fink said at the conference.
The energy crisis is one reason the BlackRock boss doesn't think inflation is just a short-term problem, as the Federal Reserve and White House have argued much of this year.
"Inflation is definitely more than transitory," Fink said. "We're in a new regime."
Biden, pope to talk virus, climate, poverty at Vatican
By JOSH BOAK and ZEKE MILLER11 minutes ago
ROME (AP) — Hours after arriving in Rome, President Joe Biden will meet with Pope Francis on Friday at the Vatican, where the world’s two most notable Roman Catholics plan to discuss the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change and poverty.
The president takes pride in his Catholic faith, using it as moral guidepost to shape many of his social and economic policies. Biden wears a rosary and frequently attends Mass, yet his support for abortion rights and same-sex marriage has put him at odds with many U.S. bishops, some of whom have suggested he should be denied Communion.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki, in previewing the visit, said she expected a “warm and constructive dialogue” between the two leaders.
“There’s a great deal of agreement and overlap with the president and Pope Francis on a range of issues: poverty, combating the climate crisis, ending the COVID-19 pandemic,” Psaki said. “These are all hugely important, impactful issues that will be the centerpiece of what their discussion is when they meet.”
Biden lands in Europe ahead of COP26 climate summit
29 October 2021, 05:04 BST
Updated 13 minutes ago
IMAGE SOURCE,REUTERS
Image caption,
President Biden is in Rome for a G20 summit and heads to the global climate summit in the UK on Sunday
President Joe Biden has arrived in Europe ahead of next week's key UN climate summit, with his signature climate policy yet to pass through the US Congress.
The president's $1.75 trillion (£1.2tn) Build Back Better social welfare package includes more than $500bn of spending on green policies.
Before leaving Washington, Mr Biden described the measures as historic.
But differences among Democrats mean it is unlikely to pass before the summit.
"It's a framework that will create millions of jobs, grow the economy, invest in our nation and our people, turn the climate crisis into an opportunity, and put us on a path not only to compete, but to win the economic competition for the 21st Century against China and every other major country in the world," Mr Biden said in a TV address from the White House.
Build Back Better covers a wide range of extra funding for health and child care, education and clean energy reforms.
The green spending would seek to dramatically slash US greenhouse gas emissions by 2030, provide new tax breaks for electric vehicles and roll out installation of solar panels on American homes.
The president had hoped to have the package passed in time for the global COP26 climate summit which begins in Glasgow on Monday.
What's in the proposed spending plan?
$555bn aimed at fighting climate change, mainly through tax incentives for renewable and low-emission sources of energy
$400bn for free and universal preschool for all 3 and 4-year-olds
$150bn to build one million affordable housing units
The package is linked in Congress to a separate infrastructure bill worth $1.2tn.
The infrastructure bill has passed through the evenly split Senate, but some left-wing Democrats want changes to Build Back Better before agreeing to pass the infrastructure legislation through the House of Representatives and say both bills must be voted on in tandem. Mr Biden's fellow Democrats abandoned plans for a vote on Thursday.
Mr Biden implored Democrats during a closed-door meeting on Capitol Hill to support his legislative plans, saying he wanted to prove that US democracy still works.
House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi called on rank-and-file Democrats not to embarrass Mr Biden by revolting.
Left-wing Senator Bernie Sanders said Build Back Better was "probably the most consequential bill since the 1960s", but added that there were some major gaps in it.
The left of the party is unhappy because the plan does not include paid family leave, free community college, a large healthcare expansion, a tax on billionaires or lower prescription drug prices.
COP26 climate summit - The basics
Climate change is one of the world's most pressing problems. Governments must promise more ambitious cuts in warming gases if we are to prevent greater global temperature rises.
The summit in Glasgow is where change could happen. You need to watch for the promises made by the world's biggest polluters, like the US and China, and whether poorer countries are getting the support they need.
All our lives will change. Decisions made here could impact our jobs, how we heat our homes, what we eat and how we travel.
Read more about the COP26 summit here.
The original price tag for the proposal was $3.5tn, but it has been cut in half at the insistence of two centrist Democratic senators who could doom the bill in the Senate.
The objections by Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona have infuriated the left of the party.
On Thursday Mr Manchin and Ms Sinema issued lukewarm statements that still declined to back the president's stripped-down bill.
Video caption,
All the times the US spent big on infrastructure
The House will not vote on the infrastructure bill until next week at the earliest. Mr Biden is due back in Washington on Wednesday.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Mr Biden can still try legislative arm-twisting by phone from Rome.
COP26 is the second summit President Biden will attend in Europe. He arrived in Rome early on Friday for a weekend summit of the G20 major economies where plans for a global minimum tax will be on the agenda.
America's second Catholic president will also meet Pope Francis at the Vatican. He heads to Scotland on Sunday night.
The odd couple blocking Biden's climate agenda
All the times the US spent big on infrastructure
The House will not vote on the infrastructure bill until next week at the earliest. Mr Biden is due back in Washington on Wednesday.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Mr Biden can still try legislative arm-twisting by phone from Rome.
COP26 is the second summit President Biden will attend in Europe. He arrived in Rome early on Friday for a weekend summit of the G20 major economies where plans for a global minimum tax will be on the agenda.
America's second Catholic president will also meet Pope Francis at the Vatican. He heads to Scotland on Sunday night.
The odd couple blocking Biden's climate agenda
Thursday, October 28, 2021
Unusual secrecy attends Biden’s first meeting with Pope Francis as president
The unusually veiled meeting is stoking speculation about whether the two will discuss the incendiary debates going on among the U.S. bishops over the second Catholic U.S. president's abortion stance.
In this April 29, 2016, file photo, Pope Francis shakes hands with then-U.S. Vice President Joe Biden as he takes part in a congress on the progress of regenerative medicine and its cultural impact, held in the Pope Paul VI Hall at the Vatican. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, File)
October 28, 2021
By
Jack Jenkins
(RNS) — When President Ronald Reagan visited St. John Paul II in June of 1982 with first lady Nancy Reagan, the press trailed the distinguished group as the pontiff squired the couple and their staffers to the Vatican’s inner sanctums and looked on, according to a New York Times reporter, as “a group of 200 American seminarians and priests suddenly erupted into a prolonged roaring ovation,” followed by choruses of ”America the Beautiful” and ”God Bless America.”
No such display awaits President Joseph Biden as he arrives at the Apostolic Palace on Friday (Oct. 29) to huddle for the first time as president with Pope Francis — or at least not one visible to reporters. Instead, Biden will be greeted in the palace courtyard by a monsignor and taken inside, where the president and the pontiff will exchange greetings out of sight of the public. The press will watch Biden’s entrance from beyond shouting distance, and even the cameras that normally broadcast the pope welcoming world leaders live, the Vatican announced Thursday, will not be rolling.
The unusual clampdown surrounding what is expected to be a roughly hour-long conversation is all the more curious as this pope and president are perhaps more aligned on world affairs than any combination since Reagan met the equally anti-communist, socially conservative John Paul II. And given that Biden is a Catholic, and one who supports abortion rights for women, the odd silence has only stoked interest in what Francis will say, if anything, about the debate among the U.S. Catholic bishops over whether such a president should receive Communion.
RELATED: A look back at the history of US presidential visits to the Vatican
What has been the same from before Reagan’s day to now is that the one-on-one meeting between pontiff and president will be off the record, with no published agenda, and will be attended by enthusiastic speculation — something of a sport among Vatican observers — about what exactly they will talk about.
The safe bet this go-round is that climate change will dominate the discussion: Biden’s visit to Europe will also include the COP26 summit of world leaders to discuss climate change in Glasgow, Scotland, next week.
Experts expect Biden and Francis to discuss other overlapping interests such as the plight of migrants and refugees and the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic.
A view of St. Peter’s Square, Vatican City and Rome from the top of Michelangelo’s dome in St. Peter’s Basilica. Photo by Sandexx/Creative Commons/CC BY-SA 3.0
John Carr, co-director of the Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life at Georgetown University and a former staffer at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said Catholic teaching on such as issues as abortion and its effect on a dissenting Catholic political figure’s welcome at the Communion rail will be more of a subtext.
“I think it’s implicit, but unlikely to be explicit,” Carr said.
The issue was at the center of a heated debate among clerics at this summer’s USCCB meeting, where some prelates singled out Biden by name while discussing politicians and Communion. The bishops are slated to produce a document on Communion in general next month at their fall conference in Baltimore.
Francis, for his part, addressed the issue on his flight back from Slovakia in mid-September, when he told reporters the sacrament should not be treated as a prize and that he himself had “never denied the Eucharist to anyone!”
Kurt Martens, a canon lawyer and professor at Catholic University of America, noted a tendency among U.S. audiences “to narrow it down to the whole issue of abortion” when it comes to Biden and Catholicism. He stressed that, while abortion remains an important issue, “it’s not the issue that prevents all other communication and collaboration.”
Martens argued instead that compounding global crises only increase the need for dialogue between a president and a pontiff.
“Not meeting is not an option,” he said.
Ken Hackett. Photo U.S. State Deptartment/Creative Commons
Ken Hackett, who served as ambassador to the Vatican under former President Barack Obama, said the question of abortion will be “totally irrelevant” at the two leaders’ meeting. Hackett recalled Biden and Francis’ brief meeting at the Vatican in 2016, when the pope offered then-Vice President Biden prayers and conciliatory words about the loss of of his son Beau. On that occasion, Biden received Communion at the Vatican.
Hackett cited rare instances when popes and presidents used their meetings to pursue specific goals, as when Obama solicited the Holy See’s help in normalizing the United States’ relations with Cuba.
“This will be a conversation about things such as immigration, maybe even getting granular on Haitians,” Hackett said. He ticked off a list of potential topics: China, Taiwan, Syria and the occupied Palestinian territories.
But generally speaking, “there’s no agreement about outcomes,” he said. “It’s not a transactional thing.”
Hackett noted Biden’s tendency to “muse philosophical,” especially about the rise of authoritarianism, which has touched the pontiff’s native South America in the form of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro. “That’s the kind of thing the pope would probably like to get into: What are Biden’s thoughts on the rise of authoritarianism in the world?” the former diplomat said.
RELATED: Joe Biden, president-elect at last, was shaped by a very American Catholic faith
Callista L. Gingrich, who served as ambassador to the Holy See under former President Donald Trump, said that despite the Vatican’s minimal geographic footprint, presenting a united front with an American president can have a powerful effect. “The United States and the Holy See share one of the most consequential diplomatic relationships,” she said in a statement to Religion News Service, pointing to the relationship between Reagan and John Paul.
Ironically, the pontiff may spend most of his time with the president exhorting him on liberal causes on which the two men fundamentally agree.
On climate change, Francis will “urge the United States to continue to step up, both in terms of meeting the financial commitments but also focusing on helping the most vulnerable to adapt,” said Bill O’Keefe, executive vice president for Mission, Mobilization and Advocacy at Catholic Relief Services, the American church’s international humanitarian aid agency.
In this April 21, 2021, file photo, President Joe Biden speaks about COVID-19 vaccinations at the White House, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)
On the global pandemic, O’Keefe said, Francis can “put the pressure” on the United States to really commit to doing what needs to be done to achieve a 70% global vaccination rate, including the waiver of vaccine patents.
“On the social-economic issues there is huge synergy and I think there is an opportunity, particularly since the pope does seem to be someone who’s looking to move the ball forward with people who he encounters, and seems skilled at engaging in disagreement while still moving forward on areas of agreement,” O’Keefe said.
RELATED: With Pope Francis’ blessing, Catholics pressed Biden White House to waive vaccine patents
And the Biden administration appears willing to be moved by faith-based, and particularly by Catholic, lobbying: In May, after an aggressive push from various organizations — including liberal-leaning Catholic groups — Biden expressed openness to suspending certain intellectual property rights to promote the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines.
These commentators and others warned that, whatever the two discuss, the public will only be told that it occurred in a “cordial” atmosphere: The reality of the conversation may take years to leak in biographies and memoirs.
When it does, we will already likely know whether Biden and Francis found a way to work together to solve global problems. “At a time of global crisis, can two powerful institutions find a way to work together to make things better? That’s the question for the meeting — not, ‘What does it mean for Baltimore?’,” Carr said.
Claire Giangravé reported from Rome. Jack Jenkins reported from Washington.
In this April 29, 2016, file photo, Pope Francis shakes hands with then-U.S. Vice President Joe Biden as he takes part in a congress on the progress of regenerative medicine and its cultural impact, held in the Pope Paul VI Hall at the Vatican. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, File)
October 28, 2021
By
Jack Jenkins
(RNS) — When President Ronald Reagan visited St. John Paul II in June of 1982 with first lady Nancy Reagan, the press trailed the distinguished group as the pontiff squired the couple and their staffers to the Vatican’s inner sanctums and looked on, according to a New York Times reporter, as “a group of 200 American seminarians and priests suddenly erupted into a prolonged roaring ovation,” followed by choruses of ”America the Beautiful” and ”God Bless America.”
No such display awaits President Joseph Biden as he arrives at the Apostolic Palace on Friday (Oct. 29) to huddle for the first time as president with Pope Francis — or at least not one visible to reporters. Instead, Biden will be greeted in the palace courtyard by a monsignor and taken inside, where the president and the pontiff will exchange greetings out of sight of the public. The press will watch Biden’s entrance from beyond shouting distance, and even the cameras that normally broadcast the pope welcoming world leaders live, the Vatican announced Thursday, will not be rolling.
The unusual clampdown surrounding what is expected to be a roughly hour-long conversation is all the more curious as this pope and president are perhaps more aligned on world affairs than any combination since Reagan met the equally anti-communist, socially conservative John Paul II. And given that Biden is a Catholic, and one who supports abortion rights for women, the odd silence has only stoked interest in what Francis will say, if anything, about the debate among the U.S. Catholic bishops over whether such a president should receive Communion.
RELATED: A look back at the history of US presidential visits to the Vatican
What has been the same from before Reagan’s day to now is that the one-on-one meeting between pontiff and president will be off the record, with no published agenda, and will be attended by enthusiastic speculation — something of a sport among Vatican observers — about what exactly they will talk about.
The safe bet this go-round is that climate change will dominate the discussion: Biden’s visit to Europe will also include the COP26 summit of world leaders to discuss climate change in Glasgow, Scotland, next week.
Experts expect Biden and Francis to discuss other overlapping interests such as the plight of migrants and refugees and the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic.
A view of St. Peter’s Square, Vatican City and Rome from the top of Michelangelo’s dome in St. Peter’s Basilica. Photo by Sandexx/Creative Commons/CC BY-SA 3.0
John Carr, co-director of the Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life at Georgetown University and a former staffer at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said Catholic teaching on such as issues as abortion and its effect on a dissenting Catholic political figure’s welcome at the Communion rail will be more of a subtext.
“I think it’s implicit, but unlikely to be explicit,” Carr said.
The issue was at the center of a heated debate among clerics at this summer’s USCCB meeting, where some prelates singled out Biden by name while discussing politicians and Communion. The bishops are slated to produce a document on Communion in general next month at their fall conference in Baltimore.
Francis, for his part, addressed the issue on his flight back from Slovakia in mid-September, when he told reporters the sacrament should not be treated as a prize and that he himself had “never denied the Eucharist to anyone!”
Kurt Martens, a canon lawyer and professor at Catholic University of America, noted a tendency among U.S. audiences “to narrow it down to the whole issue of abortion” when it comes to Biden and Catholicism. He stressed that, while abortion remains an important issue, “it’s not the issue that prevents all other communication and collaboration.”
Martens argued instead that compounding global crises only increase the need for dialogue between a president and a pontiff.
“Not meeting is not an option,” he said.
Ken Hackett. Photo U.S. State Deptartment/Creative Commons
Ken Hackett, who served as ambassador to the Vatican under former President Barack Obama, said the question of abortion will be “totally irrelevant” at the two leaders’ meeting. Hackett recalled Biden and Francis’ brief meeting at the Vatican in 2016, when the pope offered then-Vice President Biden prayers and conciliatory words about the loss of of his son Beau. On that occasion, Biden received Communion at the Vatican.
Hackett cited rare instances when popes and presidents used their meetings to pursue specific goals, as when Obama solicited the Holy See’s help in normalizing the United States’ relations with Cuba.
“This will be a conversation about things such as immigration, maybe even getting granular on Haitians,” Hackett said. He ticked off a list of potential topics: China, Taiwan, Syria and the occupied Palestinian territories.
But generally speaking, “there’s no agreement about outcomes,” he said. “It’s not a transactional thing.”
Hackett noted Biden’s tendency to “muse philosophical,” especially about the rise of authoritarianism, which has touched the pontiff’s native South America in the form of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro. “That’s the kind of thing the pope would probably like to get into: What are Biden’s thoughts on the rise of authoritarianism in the world?” the former diplomat said.
RELATED: Joe Biden, president-elect at last, was shaped by a very American Catholic faith
Callista L. Gingrich, who served as ambassador to the Holy See under former President Donald Trump, said that despite the Vatican’s minimal geographic footprint, presenting a united front with an American president can have a powerful effect. “The United States and the Holy See share one of the most consequential diplomatic relationships,” she said in a statement to Religion News Service, pointing to the relationship between Reagan and John Paul.
Ironically, the pontiff may spend most of his time with the president exhorting him on liberal causes on which the two men fundamentally agree.
On climate change, Francis will “urge the United States to continue to step up, both in terms of meeting the financial commitments but also focusing on helping the most vulnerable to adapt,” said Bill O’Keefe, executive vice president for Mission, Mobilization and Advocacy at Catholic Relief Services, the American church’s international humanitarian aid agency.
In this April 21, 2021, file photo, President Joe Biden speaks about COVID-19 vaccinations at the White House, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)
On the global pandemic, O’Keefe said, Francis can “put the pressure” on the United States to really commit to doing what needs to be done to achieve a 70% global vaccination rate, including the waiver of vaccine patents.
“On the social-economic issues there is huge synergy and I think there is an opportunity, particularly since the pope does seem to be someone who’s looking to move the ball forward with people who he encounters, and seems skilled at engaging in disagreement while still moving forward on areas of agreement,” O’Keefe said.
RELATED: With Pope Francis’ blessing, Catholics pressed Biden White House to waive vaccine patents
And the Biden administration appears willing to be moved by faith-based, and particularly by Catholic, lobbying: In May, after an aggressive push from various organizations — including liberal-leaning Catholic groups — Biden expressed openness to suspending certain intellectual property rights to promote the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines.
These commentators and others warned that, whatever the two discuss, the public will only be told that it occurred in a “cordial” atmosphere: The reality of the conversation may take years to leak in biographies and memoirs.
When it does, we will already likely know whether Biden and Francis found a way to work together to solve global problems. “At a time of global crisis, can two powerful institutions find a way to work together to make things better? That’s the question for the meeting — not, ‘What does it mean for Baltimore?’,” Carr said.
Claire Giangravé reported from Rome. Jack Jenkins reported from Washington.
Wednesday, October 27, 2021
The Covid Program 1 - The Run-up To Release
First published at 06:04 UTC on October 27th, 2021.
TheAlternativeHypothesis
Video talking about some dubious run-up facts to the release.
Support:
https://www.subscribestar.com/ryan-faulk
bc1q9w8dnhxxa8ymf6g24t8mt07t5jflyj87z26cxf
=== Sources ===
Fauci Predicting Virus: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNXGAxGJgQI
WHO Finances https://www.who.int/about/finances-accountability/reports/results_report_18-19_high_res.pdf?ua=1 https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/politics/does-bill-gates-have-too-much-influence-in-the-who-/46570526 https://sci-hub.se/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30298-1
WHO leadership April 2020: https://web.archive.org/web/20190418043128/https://www.who.int/dg/who-headquarters-leadership-team
https://s.rfi.fr/media/display/22fb1820-f9a0-11ea-9ad9-005056bff430/02%20Uncanny_similarity_of_unique_inserts_in_the_2019-n.pdf
Trump's executive order: https://web.archive.org/web/20210120202030/https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/executive-order-modernizing-influenza-vaccines-united-states-promote-national-security-public-health/
Anti-vax book use: https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=anti-vax&year_start=1800&year_end=2019&corpus=26&smoothing=3&direct_url=t1%3B%2Canti%20-%20vax%3B%2Cc0#t1%3B%2Canti%20-%20vax%3B%2Cc0
Anti-vaxxer book use: https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=anti-vaxxer&year_start=1800&year_end=2019&corpus=26&smoothing=3&direct_url=t1%3B%2Canti%20-%20vaxxer%3B%2Cc0#t1%3B%2Canti%20-%20vaxxer%3B%2Cc0
Anti-vax search term: https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=today%205-y&geo=US&q=anti-vax
Anti-vaxxer search term: https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=today%205-y&geo=US&q=anti-vaxxer
Event 201 scenario: https://www.centerforhealthsecurity.org/event201/scenario.html
Tuesday, October 26, 2021
Monday, October 25, 2021
Fauci Pushes Back After New Documents on US-Funded Virus Research in China Fuel Criticism
Dr. Anthony Fauci is seen in New York City in a file photograph. (Jeenah Moon/Getty Images)MORE
AMERICA
By Zachary Stieber
October 25, 2021 Updated: October 25, 2021
Top American health officials who critics say misled Congress with claims regarding U.S.-funded virus research in China are pushing back after documents were released appearing to show that the United States did pay for gain-of-function research, contrary to the officials’ testimony.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) sent the documents last week to lawmakers. They show that the NIH funded research that increased the function of coronaviruses and MERS, experts said.
Dr. Francis Collins, the head of the NIH, and Dr. Anthony Fauci, who heads one of the institutes, told Congress earlier this year that the agency did not fund gain-of-function research.
Critics said the new documents were further proof Collins and Fauci misled Congress.
“In the letter they acknowledge that yes, the viruses did gain in function, they became more dangerous. So they’ve created a virus that doesn’t exist in nature to become more dangerous, that is gain-of-function,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), a doctor, said on an “Axios on HBO” episode released Sunday.
“You take an unknown virus, you combine it with another virus and you get a super virus. You have no idea whether it gains functions or loses function, that’s what the experiment is, but I don’t know how anybody could argue that that’s not gain-of-function research,” he added later.
Fauci, though, is insisting that his testimony to Congress was not undercut by the agency’s disclosures.
AMERICA
By Zachary Stieber
October 25, 2021 Updated: October 25, 2021
Top American health officials who critics say misled Congress with claims regarding U.S.-funded virus research in China are pushing back after documents were released appearing to show that the United States did pay for gain-of-function research, contrary to the officials’ testimony.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) sent the documents last week to lawmakers. They show that the NIH funded research that increased the function of coronaviruses and MERS, experts said.
Dr. Francis Collins, the head of the NIH, and Dr. Anthony Fauci, who heads one of the institutes, told Congress earlier this year that the agency did not fund gain-of-function research.
Critics said the new documents were further proof Collins and Fauci misled Congress.
“In the letter they acknowledge that yes, the viruses did gain in function, they became more dangerous. So they’ve created a virus that doesn’t exist in nature to become more dangerous, that is gain-of-function,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), a doctor, said on an “Axios on HBO” episode released Sunday.
“You take an unknown virus, you combine it with another virus and you get a super virus. You have no idea whether it gains functions or loses function, that’s what the experiment is, but I don’t know how anybody could argue that that’s not gain-of-function research,” he added later.
Fauci, though, is insisting that his testimony to Congress was not undercut by the agency’s disclosures.
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Vaccine Mandate Threatens Major Trucking Disruption, Industry Insiders Say
“Neither I nor Dr. Francis Collins, the director of the NIH, lied or misled about what we’ve done,” he said on ABC’s “This Week.”
A key issue in the arguments revolves around how the parties define gain-of-function, a type of research that generally means increasing a biological agent’s transmissibility or pathogenicity.
Fauci acknowledged using a narrower term established under a framework (pdf) issued in late 2017 after the agency lifted a funding pause on most gain-of-function research.
“Neither I nor Dr. Francis Collins, the director of the NIH, lied or misled about what we’ve done,” he said on ABC’s “This Week.”
A key issue in the arguments revolves around how the parties define gain-of-function, a type of research that generally means increasing a biological agent’s transmissibility or pathogenicity.
Fauci acknowledged using a narrower term established under a framework (pdf) issued in late 2017 after the agency lifted a funding pause on most gain-of-function research.
RELATED
Fauci, Washington's Highest-Paid Fed, Got Big Break Under George W. Bush
That term is called “gain-of-function research of concern” and entails “a small subset” of gain-of-function research projects that “entail risks that are potentially significant enough to warrant additional oversight,” according to the NIH.
“Under those conditions which we have explained very, very clearly, [the research in question] does not constitute research of gain-of-function of concern,” Fauci said. “There are people who interpret it that way, but when you look at the framework under which the guidance is, that is not the case.”
Fauci used the broader term before a Senate panel on May 11. “The NIH and NIAID categorically has not funded gain-of-function research to be conducted in the Wuhan Institute of Virology,” he said at the time.
Gain-of-function research “describes a type of research that modifies a biological agent so that it confers new or enhanced activity to that agent,” the NIH said on its website, before removing the description last week.
The Wuhan labs that comprise the institute are located near where the first cases of COVID-19 were detected in late 2019.
The newly disclosed documents from the EcoHealth Alliance, which funneled NIH grant money to the institute, outline research conducted between June 1, 2018 and May 31, 2019.
Collins, who is stepping down before the end of the year, has also pushed back against critics, telling The Washington Post that the research did not meet the definition of gain-of-function.
Some experts disagree.
“The genetic manipulation of both MERS and the SARS conducted in Wuhan clearly constituted gain-of-function experiments,” Jonathan Latham, executive director of the Bioscience Research Project, told The Epoch Times in an email.
Others have said the experiments were risky and should not have been conducted.
EcoHealth Alliance has not responded to requests for comment.
That term is called “gain-of-function research of concern” and entails “a small subset” of gain-of-function research projects that “entail risks that are potentially significant enough to warrant additional oversight,” according to the NIH.
“Under those conditions which we have explained very, very clearly, [the research in question] does not constitute research of gain-of-function of concern,” Fauci said. “There are people who interpret it that way, but when you look at the framework under which the guidance is, that is not the case.”
Fauci used the broader term before a Senate panel on May 11. “The NIH and NIAID categorically has not funded gain-of-function research to be conducted in the Wuhan Institute of Virology,” he said at the time.
Gain-of-function research “describes a type of research that modifies a biological agent so that it confers new or enhanced activity to that agent,” the NIH said on its website, before removing the description last week.
The Wuhan labs that comprise the institute are located near where the first cases of COVID-19 were detected in late 2019.
The newly disclosed documents from the EcoHealth Alliance, which funneled NIH grant money to the institute, outline research conducted between June 1, 2018 and May 31, 2019.
Collins, who is stepping down before the end of the year, has also pushed back against critics, telling The Washington Post that the research did not meet the definition of gain-of-function.
Some experts disagree.
“The genetic manipulation of both MERS and the SARS conducted in Wuhan clearly constituted gain-of-function experiments,” Jonathan Latham, executive director of the Bioscience Research Project, told The Epoch Times in an email.
Others have said the experiments were risky and should not have been conducted.
EcoHealth Alliance has not responded to requests for comment.
Sunday, October 24, 2021
Are the US Supply Chain Disruptions Deliberate?
Posted Oct 20, 2021 by Martin Armstrong
Spread the love
(Image by © Reuters / Alan Devall)
Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo may have accidentally leaked the cause of America’s supply chain issues. “The reality is the only way we’re going to get to a place where we work through this transition is if everyone in America and everyone around the world gets vaccinated,” Adeyemo admitted in an interview with ABC News. Starve them out, let the dissenters suffer, and those who bought into this agenda will turn against them. Adeyemo said that the Biden Administration has already provided “the resources the American people need to make it to the other side.” Basically, everyone should give into the vaccine mandate or face the consequences. They are masking authoritarianism as utilitarianism. The vaccine has not been mandated at the federal level in the US, yet, but it is apparent that the government plans to make life as difficult as possible for those who do not obey.
Echoing the Fed, Adeyemo said that inflation is “transitory,” and “as part of the transition we are seeing higher pieces for some of the things people have to buy… That’s exactly why the president was focused in the American Rescue Plan in ensuring on getting stimulus into the hands of the American people, so they’d be able to buy the products they need.” Yes, the government expects us, the Great Unwashed, to be thankful for their measly handouts to purchase unavailable products at an all-time high. There is a reason people have recently nicknamed the president “bare shelves Biden,” with the hashtags #BareShelvesBiden and #EmptyShelvesJoe becoming a viral sensation.
Although the Biden Administration met with the Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, which handles 40% of the nation’s goods, the promise of a 24/7 operation has not yet occurred. There is no ETA for when the ports will begin 24/7 operations either. Some ships are allegedly waiting 12 days at anchor before reaching the dock, and over 60 vessels are idled in the San Pedro Bay at the moment. With one of the nation’s busiest shopping holidays approaching (Black Friday) followed by ongoing seasonal shopping, this matter is likely to turn ugly.
Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo may have accidentally leaked the cause of America’s supply chain issues. “The reality is the only way we’re going to get to a place where we work through this transition is if everyone in America and everyone around the world gets vaccinated,” Adeyemo admitted in an interview with ABC News. Starve them out, let the dissenters suffer, and those who bought into this agenda will turn against them. Adeyemo said that the Biden Administration has already provided “the resources the American people need to make it to the other side.” Basically, everyone should give into the vaccine mandate or face the consequences. They are masking authoritarianism as utilitarianism. The vaccine has not been mandated at the federal level in the US, yet, but it is apparent that the government plans to make life as difficult as possible for those who do not obey.
Echoing the Fed, Adeyemo said that inflation is “transitory,” and “as part of the transition we are seeing higher pieces for some of the things people have to buy… That’s exactly why the president was focused in the American Rescue Plan in ensuring on getting stimulus into the hands of the American people, so they’d be able to buy the products they need.” Yes, the government expects us, the Great Unwashed, to be thankful for their measly handouts to purchase unavailable products at an all-time high. There is a reason people have recently nicknamed the president “bare shelves Biden,” with the hashtags #BareShelvesBiden and #EmptyShelvesJoe becoming a viral sensation.
Although the Biden Administration met with the Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, which handles 40% of the nation’s goods, the promise of a 24/7 operation has not yet occurred. There is no ETA for when the ports will begin 24/7 operations either. Some ships are allegedly waiting 12 days at anchor before reaching the dock, and over 60 vessels are idled in the San Pedro Bay at the moment. With one of the nation’s busiest shopping holidays approaching (Black Friday) followed by ongoing seasonal shopping, this matter is likely to turn ugly.
Taking it a step further, the Democrats are also demanding that the GOP pass the multi-trillion dollar infrastructure bill and are now using it as leverage. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg stated, “One thing that has not been talked about enough is (Moody’s) finding about how the overall ‘Build Back Better’ vision is designed to reduce inflationary pressures. So if you care about inflation, you ought to care about not just the supply chain issues, not just the infrastructure things I work on, but also the provisions in ‘Build Back Better’ like paid family leave, like making it easier to afford childcare, like community college, that are going to give us a stronger labor force and help us deal with that major constraint on economic growth.” Buttigieg also claimed that he knew with certainty that the supply chain crisis is expected to last well into 2022. Perhaps the issue will last into Socrates’ projected political Panic Cycle for 2023.
Saturday, October 23, 2021
Twitter and Square CEO Jack Dorsey says 'hyperinflation' will happen soon in the U.S. and the world
PUBLISHED SAT, OCT 23 2021 10:12 AM EDTUPDATED SAT, OCT 23 2021 10:32 AM EDT
Jeff Cox@JEFFCOXCNBCCOM@JEFF.COX.7528
Jeff Cox@JEFFCOXCNBCCOM@JEFF.COX.7528
KEY POINTS
Twitter co-founder and crypto advocate Jack Dorsey weighed in Friday on escalating inflation in the U.S., saying things are going to get considerably worse.
"It will happen in the US soon, and so the world," he tweeted.
Jack Dorsey, CEO of Twitter and co-founder & CEO of Square, speaks during the crypto-currency conference Bitcoin 2021 Convention at the Mana Convention Center in Miami, Florida, on June 4, 2021.
Marco Bello | AFP | Getty Images
Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey weighed in on escalating inflation in the U.S., saying things are going to get considerably worse.
"Hyperinflation is going to change everything," Dorsey tweeted Friday night. "It's happening."
The tweet comes with consumer price inflation running near a 30-year high in the U.S. and growing concern that the problem could be worse that policymakers have anticipated.
On Friday, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell acknowledged that inflation pressures "are likely to last longer than previously expected," noting that they could run "well into next year." The central bank leader added that he expects the Fed soon to begin pulling back on the extraordinary measures it has provided to help the economy that critics say have stoked the inflation run.
In addition to overseeing a social media platform that has 206 million active daily users, Dorsey is a strong bitcoin advocate. He has said that Square, the debit and credit card processing platform that Dorsey co-founded, is looking at getting into mining the cryptocurrency. Square also owns some bitcoin and facilitates trading in it.
Responding to user comments, Dorsey added Friday that he sees the inflation problem escalating around the globe. "It will happen in the US soon, and so the world," he tweeted. Dorsey is currently both the CEO of Twitter and Square.
It's one thing to call for faster inflation, but it may be surprising to some that Dorsey used the word hyperinflation, a condition of rapidly rising prices that can ruin currencies and bring down whole economies.
Billionaire investor Paul Tudor Jones and others have called for a period of rising inflation. Jones told CNBC earlier in the week that he owns some bitcoin and sees it as a good inflation hedge.
"Clearly, there's a place for crypto. Clearly, it's winning the race against gold at the moment," Jones said Wednesday.
But most of the major investors have not gone so far as to call for hyperinflation like Dorsey.
Source
Marco Bello | AFP | Getty Images
Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey weighed in on escalating inflation in the U.S., saying things are going to get considerably worse.
"Hyperinflation is going to change everything," Dorsey tweeted Friday night. "It's happening."
The tweet comes with consumer price inflation running near a 30-year high in the U.S. and growing concern that the problem could be worse that policymakers have anticipated.
On Friday, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell acknowledged that inflation pressures "are likely to last longer than previously expected," noting that they could run "well into next year." The central bank leader added that he expects the Fed soon to begin pulling back on the extraordinary measures it has provided to help the economy that critics say have stoked the inflation run.
In addition to overseeing a social media platform that has 206 million active daily users, Dorsey is a strong bitcoin advocate. He has said that Square, the debit and credit card processing platform that Dorsey co-founded, is looking at getting into mining the cryptocurrency. Square also owns some bitcoin and facilitates trading in it.
Responding to user comments, Dorsey added Friday that he sees the inflation problem escalating around the globe. "It will happen in the US soon, and so the world," he tweeted. Dorsey is currently both the CEO of Twitter and Square.
It's one thing to call for faster inflation, but it may be surprising to some that Dorsey used the word hyperinflation, a condition of rapidly rising prices that can ruin currencies and bring down whole economies.
Billionaire investor Paul Tudor Jones and others have called for a period of rising inflation. Jones told CNBC earlier in the week that he owns some bitcoin and sees it as a good inflation hedge.
"Clearly, there's a place for crypto. Clearly, it's winning the race against gold at the moment," Jones said Wednesday.
But most of the major investors have not gone so far as to call for hyperinflation like Dorsey.
Source
Pope Demands Silicon Valley "In The Name Of God" Censor "Hate Speech", "Conspiracy Theories"
BY TYLER DURDEN
WEDNESDAY, OCT 20, 2021 - 05:00 AM
Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Summit News,
Pope Francis invoked God in an effort to pressure Silicon Valley giants into censoring more content, including “hate speech” and “conspiracy theories.”
Yes, really.
The Pope made the remarks during a World Meeting of Popular Movements, a shadowy organization created to promote “social justice” and fight racism with the help of religious leaders.
“In the name of God, I ask the technology giants to stop exploiting human weakness, people’s vulnerability, for the sake of profits without caring about the spread of hate speech, grooming, fake news, conspiracy theories, and political manipulation,” he stated.
Pope Francis also invoked the term “post-truth,” which was invented by establishment media organs after they began to lose their monopoly on controlling the narrative following the election of Donald Trump.
The Catholic leader apparently believes it’s Christian and Godly to empower giant corporations to shut down free speech.
This is no surprise given his previous stance on free speech in response to the slaughter of the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists, when he rhetorically sided with the terrorists who murdered them in cold blood.
As we document in the video below, which Pope Francis would surely love to see banned, the Supreme Pontiff smears his critics as performing “the work of the devil.”
In reality, his every action and position has served to further the anti-Christ globalist beast system for which he is a willing puppet.
No doubt the Pope would respond to such claims by characterizing them as “conspiracy theories” and “hate speech.”
Beginning to see how this works?
Friday, October 22, 2021
CDC director: U.S. may change definition of "fully vaccinated" as boosters roll o
Oriana Gonzalez
CDC Director Rochelle Walensky. Photo: Greg Nash-Pool/Getty Images
Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said Friday the U.S. "may need to update" its definition for what it means to have full vaccination against COVID.
The big picture: The CDC and the FDA have officially approved boosters with every authorized vaccine in the U.S. for people who meet specific requirements. Walensky explained that since not everyone is eligible for a booster, the definition has not been changed "yet."
Currently, the CDC's definition is the following: "Fully vaccinated persons are those who are ≥14 days post-completion of the primary series of an FDA-authorized COVID-19 vaccine."
What they're saying: "We have not yet changed the definition of 'fully vaccinated.' We will continue to look at this. We may need to update our definition of 'fully vaccinated' in the future," Walensky said during a press briefing.
She also encouraged those eligible to get boosters: "If you're eligible for a booster, go ahead and get your booster," she said.
VICTOR DAVIS HANSON: One Man’s Anarchy Is Another’s Road To Justice
Kent Nishimura / Los Angeles Times
VICTOR DAVIS HANSONCONTRIBUTOROctober 21, 20219:10 AM ET
Sheer chaos and anarchy on the border?
Afghanistan — the most humiliating defeat in recent U.S. military history?
A labor-starved supply chain in shambles and holiday shelves emptying out?
The worst inflation in 30 years that seems soon ready to match Carter-era levels?
Gas hitting $5 a gallon with winter heating fuels soaring?
Free-for-all looting in the major cities without consequences?
Joe Biden’s policies and Biden himself diving in the polls?
Never in recent American history has any administration birthed such disasters in its first nine months.
Yet most Americans are arguing not over the sheer chaos and disasters of the Biden administration, but rather how could such sheer pre-civilizational calamity occur in modern America?
Were these disasters a result of historic incompetency? Or mean-spirited nihilism? Or a deliberate effort to create the necessary turbulence to birth a new American revolution? Or a bit of all three?
Start instead with the idea that what most Americans see as sheer ruin is not what the left-wing puppeteers, who are pulling the strings of the Biden marionette, see.
Our catastrophes are their minor glitches. For them bad polling is mostly a public relations problem of an occasional uncooperative media. Otherwise, a few broken eggs are always necessary to create the perfect socialist omelet.
The Left now controlling Washington believes that the U.S. border is a mere construct. Every impoverished person has a birthright to cross into America illegally. The 2 million who are scheduled to enter this fiscal year alone is a wonderful, if occasionally sloppy, event.
Our border calamity is their celebration of humanity and a long-overdue recalibration of ossified American demography, one that will properly warp the Electoral College to provide the necessary election result.
If you believe that a culturally imperialistic America needs to be taken down a notch overseas, then the flight from Afghanistan is “impressive” and a “success” — by how quickly and efficiently we skedaddled.
Why worry about a lost $1 billion embassy, a $300 million refit of the Bagram airbase, or $80 billion lost in military hardware and training?
Empty shelves? Boohoo.
Grasping, upper-middle-class consumers are angry that the working classes are not willing to risk COVID infection to supply them with their accustomed holiday trinkets.
So, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg intoned that the shortages mean only that the consumer class has to wait a wee bit — until Christmas Eve — to splurge on gifts.
Who worries about a little inflation? Under new monetary theory, printing dollars brings prosperity. Or as White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain put it in a retweet, inflation is a mere “high class problem” of the Peloton elite.
Only those with money worry their ill-begotten pile shrinks. But the majority without money will eventually rejoice that it is everywhere now — finally and properly “spread,” as former president and now multimillionaire Barack Obama once promised.
As AOC swore, gas and oil are going to be gone anyway in 10 years. So, if Joe Biden slashes over 2 million barrels a day in U.S. oil production, what’s wrong with that?
Didn’t Steven Chu, Obama’s energy secretary, long ago brag that when we hit $8 to $10 a gallon, we’d approach European levels of proper fuel usage? Why whine about paying over $100 to fill up, when the planet more quickly cools?
Did not Americans learn “critical legal theory” and “critical race theory?”
Or as the architect of the “1619 Project” reminded us, destroying or taking someone’s property is no big deal. Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey shrugged off torched downtown buildings; such torched stuff, he said, is mere “bricks and mortar.”
It is only a crime to “steal” over $500 of needed merchandise from a Walgreens in San Francisco because the rich who make such absurd laws never have to steal goods from a pharmacy shelf.
If racists wish to point out that African American male youths are disproportionately represented in the latest crime wave, then maybe America should be learning not to create the conditions that force them to break the law.
In sum, we are on a left-wing roller coaster headed to a socialist nirvana.
Most Americans believe it is instead an out-of-control “Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride” nightmare with incompetents at the wheel.
But the architects of such “hope and change” shrug that the occasional disturbing news that the media sometimes accidentally leaks out is merely the cost of an equitable America.
One man’s anarchy is another’s road to justice.
Keep that mentality in mind and the absurdities that are mouthed by Biden, Klain, press secretary Jen Psaki, Homeland “Security” Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Pete Buttigieg or the ravings of the Squad make perfect sense.
They are merely trying to explain to us dummies that what we think is purgatory is actually the new paradise — a promised land that, once we are properly programmed and educated, we too will welcome and thank them for our deliverance.
Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and the author of “The Second World Wars: How the First Global Conflict Was Fought and Won,” from Basic Books.
VICTOR DAVIS HANSONCONTRIBUTOROctober 21, 20219:10 AM ET
Sheer chaos and anarchy on the border?
Afghanistan — the most humiliating defeat in recent U.S. military history?
A labor-starved supply chain in shambles and holiday shelves emptying out?
The worst inflation in 30 years that seems soon ready to match Carter-era levels?
Gas hitting $5 a gallon with winter heating fuels soaring?
Free-for-all looting in the major cities without consequences?
Joe Biden’s policies and Biden himself diving in the polls?
Never in recent American history has any administration birthed such disasters in its first nine months.
Yet most Americans are arguing not over the sheer chaos and disasters of the Biden administration, but rather how could such sheer pre-civilizational calamity occur in modern America?
Were these disasters a result of historic incompetency? Or mean-spirited nihilism? Or a deliberate effort to create the necessary turbulence to birth a new American revolution? Or a bit of all three?
Start instead with the idea that what most Americans see as sheer ruin is not what the left-wing puppeteers, who are pulling the strings of the Biden marionette, see.
Our catastrophes are their minor glitches. For them bad polling is mostly a public relations problem of an occasional uncooperative media. Otherwise, a few broken eggs are always necessary to create the perfect socialist omelet.
The Left now controlling Washington believes that the U.S. border is a mere construct. Every impoverished person has a birthright to cross into America illegally. The 2 million who are scheduled to enter this fiscal year alone is a wonderful, if occasionally sloppy, event.
Our border calamity is their celebration of humanity and a long-overdue recalibration of ossified American demography, one that will properly warp the Electoral College to provide the necessary election result.
If you believe that a culturally imperialistic America needs to be taken down a notch overseas, then the flight from Afghanistan is “impressive” and a “success” — by how quickly and efficiently we skedaddled.
Why worry about a lost $1 billion embassy, a $300 million refit of the Bagram airbase, or $80 billion lost in military hardware and training?
Empty shelves? Boohoo.
Grasping, upper-middle-class consumers are angry that the working classes are not willing to risk COVID infection to supply them with their accustomed holiday trinkets.
So, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg intoned that the shortages mean only that the consumer class has to wait a wee bit — until Christmas Eve — to splurge on gifts.
Who worries about a little inflation? Under new monetary theory, printing dollars brings prosperity. Or as White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain put it in a retweet, inflation is a mere “high class problem” of the Peloton elite.
Only those with money worry their ill-begotten pile shrinks. But the majority without money will eventually rejoice that it is everywhere now — finally and properly “spread,” as former president and now multimillionaire Barack Obama once promised.
As AOC swore, gas and oil are going to be gone anyway in 10 years. So, if Joe Biden slashes over 2 million barrels a day in U.S. oil production, what’s wrong with that?
Didn’t Steven Chu, Obama’s energy secretary, long ago brag that when we hit $8 to $10 a gallon, we’d approach European levels of proper fuel usage? Why whine about paying over $100 to fill up, when the planet more quickly cools?
Did not Americans learn “critical legal theory” and “critical race theory?”
Or as the architect of the “1619 Project” reminded us, destroying or taking someone’s property is no big deal. Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey shrugged off torched downtown buildings; such torched stuff, he said, is mere “bricks and mortar.”
It is only a crime to “steal” over $500 of needed merchandise from a Walgreens in San Francisco because the rich who make such absurd laws never have to steal goods from a pharmacy shelf.
If racists wish to point out that African American male youths are disproportionately represented in the latest crime wave, then maybe America should be learning not to create the conditions that force them to break the law.
In sum, we are on a left-wing roller coaster headed to a socialist nirvana.
Most Americans believe it is instead an out-of-control “Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride” nightmare with incompetents at the wheel.
But the architects of such “hope and change” shrug that the occasional disturbing news that the media sometimes accidentally leaks out is merely the cost of an equitable America.
One man’s anarchy is another’s road to justice.
Keep that mentality in mind and the absurdities that are mouthed by Biden, Klain, press secretary Jen Psaki, Homeland “Security” Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Pete Buttigieg or the ravings of the Squad make perfect sense.
They are merely trying to explain to us dummies that what we think is purgatory is actually the new paradise — a promised land that, once we are properly programmed and educated, we too will welcome and thank them for our deliverance.
Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and the author of “The Second World Wars: How the First Global Conflict Was Fought and Won,” from Basic Books.
You can reach him by e-mailing authorvdh@gmail.com.
©2021 Tribune Content Agency, LLC
Dr. Fauci Predicted a Pandemic Under Trump in 2017 | NowThis
YET, FAUCI IS STILL GRACING YOUR FLATSCREEN DAILY, AND REMAINS A FREE MAN...
Dr. Anthony Fauci Received Big Pay Increase To Prevent Pandemics
Oct 20, 2021, 04:33am EDT
Dr. Anthony Fauci Received Big Pay Increase To Prevent Pandemics
In a January article published at Forbes, our auditors at OpenTheBooks.com found that Dr. Anthony Fauci was the highest paid federal employee, earning $417,608 (2019).
Dr. Fauci is still the top-paid federal employee earning $434,312 in 2020. Fauci is the Director of the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and current Chief Medical Advisor to the President.
Fauci out-earned the U.S. president ($400,000); four-star generals in the military ($282,000); and roughly 4.3 million other federal employees.
Now, new documents released via our Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests from the NIH tell us a lot more. Dr. Fauci received a big pay hike for his biodefense research activities. In other words, Fauci was paid to prevent future pandemics.
The documents released to our non-profit organization OpenTheBooks.com reveal that Dr. Fauci was approved for a “permanent pay adjustment” in excess of his regular salary in December 2004, during the George W. Bush Administration.
From 2004 through 2007, Fauci received a 68-percent pay increase from $200,000- to $335,000-a year. This award was permanent and carried forward through 2020.
Fauci’s permanent pay raise was to “appropriately compensate him for the level of responsibility… especially as it relates to his work on biodefense research activities.”
However, critics say that Fauci was funding research that was actually creating pandemic pathogens in labs that, if leaked or if fell into the wrong hands, might create the very human pandemic they were trying to prevent.
Released here, for the first time, is a portion of NIH’s response to our OpenTheBooks FOIA request. These documents highlight Fauci’s central role in pandemic preparedness funding and biodefense strategies in the years leading up to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Included in the NIH production is a letter, date stamped December 15, 2004, from Dr. Raynard S. Kingston, the then-Deputy Director— which was approved and signed by Dr. Elias Zerhouni, the NIH Director under George W. Bush. The letter reads:
“This is to request that the current retention allowance [(b)(6) redaction] for Dr. Anthony S. Fauci be converted to a permanent pay adjustment in the amount [(b)(6) redaction] over his base pay of [(b)(6) redaction] in order to appropriately compensate him for the level of responsibility in his current position of Director, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), National Institutes of Health (NIH), especially as it relates to his work on biodefense research activities.”
Redactions labelled (b)(6) under federal FOIA, fall under a large range of categories protecting the employee’s personal information. These redacted items are likely dollar figures, including his salary at the time, which apparently NIH still deems redaction worthy – even 17 years after the fact.
We have already posted his salary back to 2010, but our auditors at OpenTheBooks.com discovered Fauci’s salary records as far back as FY2004. It’s settled transparency law that Fauci’s compensation falls under open records law.
So, why is NIH redacting financial information from 2004 that is 17-years old? Perhaps the answer is in the numbers…
Dr. Anthony Fauci Received Big Pay Increase To Prevent Pandemics
WASHINGTON, DC - APRIL 08: Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and ... [+] GETTY IMAGES
In a January article published at Forbes, our auditors at OpenTheBooks.com found that Dr. Anthony Fauci was the highest paid federal employee, earning $417,608 (2019).
Dr. Fauci is still the top-paid federal employee earning $434,312 in 2020. Fauci is the Director of the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and current Chief Medical Advisor to the President.
Fauci out-earned the U.S. president ($400,000); four-star generals in the military ($282,000); and roughly 4.3 million other federal employees.
Now, new documents released via our Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests from the NIH tell us a lot more. Dr. Fauci received a big pay hike for his biodefense research activities. In other words, Fauci was paid to prevent future pandemics.
The documents released to our non-profit organization OpenTheBooks.com reveal that Dr. Fauci was approved for a “permanent pay adjustment” in excess of his regular salary in December 2004, during the George W. Bush Administration.
From 2004 through 2007, Fauci received a 68-percent pay increase from $200,000- to $335,000-a year. This award was permanent and carried forward through 2020.
Fauci’s permanent pay raise was to “appropriately compensate him for the level of responsibility… especially as it relates to his work on biodefense research activities.”
However, critics say that Fauci was funding research that was actually creating pandemic pathogens in labs that, if leaked or if fell into the wrong hands, might create the very human pandemic they were trying to prevent.
Released here, for the first time, is a portion of NIH’s response to our OpenTheBooks FOIA request. These documents highlight Fauci’s central role in pandemic preparedness funding and biodefense strategies in the years leading up to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Included in the NIH production is a letter, date stamped December 15, 2004, from Dr. Raynard S. Kingston, the then-Deputy Director— which was approved and signed by Dr. Elias Zerhouni, the NIH Director under George W. Bush. The letter reads:
“This is to request that the current retention allowance [(b)(6) redaction] for Dr. Anthony S. Fauci be converted to a permanent pay adjustment in the amount [(b)(6) redaction] over his base pay of [(b)(6) redaction] in order to appropriately compensate him for the level of responsibility in his current position of Director, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), National Institutes of Health (NIH), especially as it relates to his work on biodefense research activities.”
Redactions labelled (b)(6) under federal FOIA, fall under a large range of categories protecting the employee’s personal information. These redacted items are likely dollar figures, including his salary at the time, which apparently NIH still deems redaction worthy – even 17 years after the fact.
We have already posted his salary back to 2010, but our auditors at OpenTheBooks.com discovered Fauci’s salary records as far back as FY2004. It’s settled transparency law that Fauci’s compensation falls under open records law.
So, why is NIH redacting financial information from 2004 that is 17-years old? Perhaps the answer is in the numbers…
Dr. Anthony Fauci year-over-year salary growth, 2004-2020 OPENTHEBOOKS.COM
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