Amerika

• Smokers seem less likely than non-smokers to fall ill with covid-19
• Internal Chinese report warns Beijing faces Tiananmen-like global backlash over virus
• Trump administration pushing to rip global supply chains from China: officials
• US Treasury seeks to borrow a record $3 trillion this quarter
• American public space, rebooted: What might it feel like?
• Italian scientist says she discovered main mechanism behind COVID-19
• Man wears KKK hood while grocery shopping in California
• Heinsberg Study results published (IFR = 0.37%)
• Tanzanian coronavirus laboratory boss suspended
• Husband, father, sex worker: As adults, Afghanistan’s ‘dancing boys’ lead double lives

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• Most imported N95 face masks are ineffective
• ‘Time has come’ for universal basic income, says Sturgeon
• China interferes in Nepal to save Communist Party government
• New report says coronavirus pandemic could last for two years – and may not subside until 70% of the population has immunity
• Violent arrest raises concerns about NYPD distancing patrols
• ‘Happy hypoxia’: unusual coronavirus effect baffles doctors
• China’s long-range Xian H-20 stealth bomber could make its debut this year
• DHS report: China hid virus’ severity to hoard supplies
• Blood clotting a significant cause of death in patients with COVID-19
• Greater Manchester Police ask residents to call police if someone repeats conspiracy theories

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• U.K.’s Largest Bird of Prey Returns to English Skies for First Time in 240 Years
• ‘Don’t Buy Vegetables From Muslims,’ Says BJP MLA, Defends Remarks
  See counterpoint: COVID-19 Fans Religious Discrimination in Pakistan
• Masks Become a Flash Point in the Virus Culture Wars
• China lied about origin of coronavirus, leaked intelligence report says
• Pompeo says ‘significant’ evidence that new coronavirus emerged from Chinese lab
• Few lesbian bars remain in the U.S. Will they survive COVID-19?
• Malaria ‘completely stopped’ by microbe
• Black man shot dead while jogging in Georgia, and two months later, no arrests
• India offers land twice Luxembourg’s size to firms leaving China
• Sheriff Launches Criminal Probe of Man Wearing KKK Hood at Santee Vons

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• Under Lockdown, Parents Are Discovering Their Children Are LGBT And Dumping Them On The Street
• Australian Jewish group calls on website to stop hosting ‘Miss Hitler’ pageant
• With Looming Food Shortages, New Wyoming Law Bypasses USDA Regulations to Let Ranchers Sell Meat Directly to Consumers
• Learn from past to protect oceans
• The death of Old Europe
• Virus delays prison time for Hot Pockets heir, ex-CEO in college admissions scandal
• ‘Murder hornets’ in Washington state threaten bees and whip up media swarm
• Danish police thwart plans for terror attack
• Sweden is a model for the new coronavirus normal, says WHO
• Cat meat traders in Vietnam ‘stealing beloved family pets’ as business thrives during coronavirus

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• China refuses to let WHO take part in coronavirus investigation
• Internet Domain Watchdog Rejects Sale of Dot-Org to Private Equity Firm
• Russia bills US $660K for aid that included gas masks, household cleaning gloves
• Malta to keep migrants at sea until EU acts
• Russian State Television Pushes Conspiracy Theory Bill Gates Is Behind Coronavirus Pandemic
• Epstein had his own office, phone line at Harvard even after his 2008 conviction of soliciting sex from minors
• Women’s soccer claim of unequal pay tossed, can argue travel
• Austin police arrest 22 people in apparent rent strike protest
• False Bay’s great white sharks have vanished, and the answer may be in our fish and chips
• Europe’s relationship with China is now one of mistrust and hostility

At any exciting historical moment, and we are at one now, we have to ask the vital question of which previous time in history most approximates where we are now. For example, is this the run-up to WW1, or WW2? Another Korean War? Perhaps we are repeating the Punic Wars, or we always have been doing so.

In any case, the battle lines have been drawn. The West wants to consciously decouple from China because of its consistent bad handling and bad faith dealing over the coronavirus debacle. Whether we wear masks or not, we have reached the point where getting back to work is essential if we want to survive.

Speaking of work, many people are noticing what is missing, rather than what is there. That is, they are finding out that many of the things that they thought were important turn out to be less important. Quarantine means that you make do with a few basics and find other ways to enjoy life.

The Left wanted to use this crisis to crash the world economy and transition us to a socialist-style economy, forgetting that we already have market socialism in most first-world nations, and that market socialism — high taxes for entitlements, debt spending — has made us weak.

Even more, we are starting to look at why all of the jobs went overseas. Few will utter the answer: unions. The unions won in the 1980s through a series of court cases and strikes, and so the companies realized that strikes and lawsuits could put them out of business, and went overseas.

Was it a coincidence that the 1990s were the decade of outsourcing? Of course not. If you cannot rely on your workforce, your business will go away, so companies locked arms with the Clinton administration and sent everything to China. Thirty years later, we see that this was a terrible mistake.

As usual, democracy blunders along, trying “new” things which are known failures in both recent and ancient history, simply because people in groups make bad decisions. They opt for a compromise instead of a clear direction.

In fact, if anything marks the West during its era of decline, it would be the total lack of direction, since we have become led by our tools (economies, gadgets, democracy, ideology) instead of having the role of master to those tools. Everything is backward because we start from broken assumptions.

Those assumptions reflect human projection, or the idea by the individual that the world is a facet of themselves, instead of the other way around (we are facets of the world). This means that we have to argue from intent instead of known results, which causes us to become ideological.

Ideology in turn requires equality, since if we are setting up a symbolic reality and demanding it be enforced, that requires everyone to do the same thing, and no one to escape. Not surprisingly, this system is cratering in debt, racial violence, censorship, and soft totalitarian repression.

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