Hey, Democracy! Why Do You Bother to Vote?

Uncle Volodya says, “The best government is a benevolent tyranny tempered by an occasional assassination.”

“There are no nations, just large corporations
Flying the flag of the day;
From dawn of creation to civilization
Please don’t take my music away..”

From “Joe Fabulous“, by Bad Company

A quote which goes, “If voting actually made any difference, they wouldn’t let you do it” is often attributed – apparently incorrectly – to American humorist and author Mark Twain. Snopes doesn’t know who actually said it, or if anyone ever did, although there are various close versions. For instance, this rant by Robert S. Borden, from the Lowell Sun in 1976:

“Has it ever dawned on the editors that the attitudes of the 70 million projected non-voters may be very consistent with the reality that the concept of voting and electing representatives is basically dishonest and fraudulent? If voting could change anything it would be made illegal! There is no way any politicians can legally represent anyone because he was elected on a secret ballot by a small percentage of voters. He then claims to represent the people who voted against him and even those who wisely chose not to participate in such criminal activity.”

The sentiment was around long before 1976, so he certainly wasn’t the originator. But even without attribution, the notion that voting is just a pointless, slightly pathetic activity which provides the zealous and the patriotic with the illusion that their participation somehow informs and guides national leadership has been around for a long time, and has grown like jimson weed in the fertile ground of government brainlessness. More and more, the electorate is fed up with going dutifully to the polls, only to see another scion of a privileged family up there under the lights giving the clasped-hands victory sign. They see the national leadership forget all his/her promises before the air has even cooled where they were just standing, or within a couple of months when they acknowledge by God, it is going to be tougher than I thought.

Who would ever have imagined Justin Trudeau, poster-boy for quirky LGBTQ issues and social-justice causes – and eye-wateringly incompetent social-hand-grenade at everything else – would morph into an hysterical tyrant, yelling that you don’t have to get vaccinated, but don’t think that if you don’t, you will still be able to get on a plane or a train beside decent folks, and shed your COVID cooties all over them. All right, I might be paraphrasing a little. What he actually said was “If you don’t want to get vaccinated, that’s your choice. But don’t think you can get on a plane or a train beside vaccinated people and put them at risk!“

As the author of the linked reference piquantly pointed out – how does your unvaccinated proximity threaten the vaccinated? If you are vaccinated, aren’t you immune?

Perhaps this would be a good place to highlight the CDC’s latest venture into revisionist history; I’m sure everyone recalls their earlier below-the-radar reinvention of ‘herd immunity’ so that the new text made no mention of the possibility it could be acquired through natural infection and recovery – nope, it was the product of vaccination. Well, they’ve done it again; this time, to ‘vaccine’. See if you can spot the difference. Old definition.

Vaccine: A product that stimulates a person’s immune system to produce immunity to a specific disease, protecting the person from that disease. Vaccines are usually administered through needle injections, but can also be administered by mouth or sprayed into the nose.

New definition.

Vaccine: A preparation that is used to stimulate the body’s immune response against diseases. Vaccines are usually administered through needle injections, but some can be administered by mouth or sprayed into the nose.

Did you spot the difference? Yeah; a vaccine no longer has to confer ‘immunity’, only ‘protection’, which is open to a much greater degree of interpretation. Given it mitigates your symptoms if you do get infected, isn’t that ‘protection’? The brighter among you may have noticed the definitions of ‘vaccination’ and ‘immunization’ have also been modified to remove any reference to ‘immunity’. The buzzword now is ‘protection’.

Talking of the redefining of herd immunity, let’s just take a closer look at that. Because the government keeps holding out the prospect – if only a few more people will roll up their sleeves and take the gene-jab – as if it were a realistic goal. Is it? You tell me. I’ll let math-boy sum it up, because, as Geoffrey Rush said in the character of Cap’n Barbosa of “Pirates of the Caribbean”, there were a lot of big words in there; we’re nobbut ‘umble pirates.

“So, to achieve herd immunity we need to make sure that at least a proportion of of the population is immune. For an of 2.5, the higher end of the estimates for COVID-19, this means that we need to get at least a proportion of of the population immune. This translates to at least 60%…How do we do this? Well, ideally we would do it by vaccinating at least 60% of the population. In the absence of a vaccine, we can hope that this level of immunity will be achieved naturally, by people becoming sick and then immune. But because a lot of people die of COVID-19 we can’t just let the disease wash over the population, confident in the knowledge that more infections mean more immunity. “

Fair warning; the referenced site is sympathetic to herd immunity being achieved through vaccination, although at the time of writing, none was available. It has since become fashionable to pretend this is our goal through vaccinations, and that if some of those crackpot conspiracy-theorist anti-vaxxers would just think of their community for a minute, why, we’d be there.

But we wouldn’t. You don’t have to be a math whiz to see that the 60% figure for immunization is based on the high end of the estimates for COVID-19 – the author said so. What percentage of Canadians is vaccinated? As of the moment when I checked the daily-updated Vaccine Tracker, 67.766%. Oh, but wait – how many Canadians have recovered from COVID? Almost 1.5 million. I imagine some of those recovered individuals went on to get vaccinated, but it also seems reasonable that some did not, preferring to rely on acquired immunity. Probably enough to put the ‘immunized’ population over 70%.

And if you cannot achieve herd immunity with 70%, then you cannot achieve it. Probably all the readers knew that already, because while the vaxx-boosters keep up a steady background hum about how safe the vaccines are, they will admit if pinned down that they do not confer immunity. You can still catch it, and if you do you carry the same viral load as an unvaccinated person, and can spread it with the same facility as the unvaccinated. Herd immunity is just that – a wide-ranging immunity, and a vaccine which does not make you immune is no use at all in that frame of reference. I suppose you could call it ‘herd protection’, and please the clown show at the CDC, but the bottom line is that herd immunity is unattainable, and the British Medical Journal knew it a year ago.

“If confirmed, this hypothesis would have relevant implications for the treatment of COVID-19 and the development of an effective vaccine. The licensing of a vaccine against human coronaviruses has failed thus far, partly because immunised individuals could potentially be at higher risk of ADE sustained by facilitated uptake of viral antigen-antibody complexes by target cells. The approval of a vaccine against SARS-CoV-2 may encounter similar obstacles. Likewise, herd immunity would not be a possibility with COVID-19.”

Although political figures and the media repeat with metronomic regularity that we are in a ‘pandemic of the unvaccinated’, that’s just vaxxer propaganda. Israel’s recent experience demonstrated that not only can you still catch COVID if you are fully vaccinated, the vaccines do not necessarily prevent you being hospitalized, either.

Consider that example. Probably the most-vaccinated nation on the planet at over 85% of the adult population. Yet the EU has taken it off its ‘green list’, and Sweden and Portugal have banned travelers from Israel. Including the fully vaccinated. Why? Because of surging Coronavirus infections. In the most-vaccinated country on earth, not to put too fine a point on it. And about that vaccine promise, that it will protect you from hospitalization and death? The majority of those hospitalized are fully vaccinated.

But that was to be expected, quoth epidemiologist Katelyn Jetelina. The more vaccinated people in the population, the more you will hear of the vaccinated getting infected. Thank you, Doctor Obvious. In a country where 100% of the population are alcoholics, you will notice more drunk drivers.

You probably think I am just a sarcastic prick, but seriously – look at this flailing defense of the vaccines by Washington Post’s Aaron Blake. Most of the new cases are among the fully vaccinated. FOX News called the crisis a failure of the vaccines on every level, and claimed the Delta Variant had evaded the vaccine, thus there was no reason to get vaccinated. More about that later, but he’s right – the original strain has more or less disappeared entirely, and new infections are pretty much all-Delta, all the time. The Israeli Prime Minister admitted vaccination was ‘significantly less effective’ than they had first thought. But anyone who suggests the vaccines are anything less than stellar in their designed performance is a gun-jumping alarmist jackass.

Ms. Jetelina’s epidemiological contribution is discussed here in more detail. We always knew, goes the story, that there would be breakthrough infections. Well, yes, we did; as soon as it happened. The vaccines were originally supposed to be some unearthly efficacy rate in the 90th percentile, but it turned out that number is mostly engineered, and they really meant 90-something percent effective at mitigating symptoms. Anyway, returning to Doctor Jetelina – if 100% of the population is vaccinated, and there is transmission, then 100% of the infected will be among the vaccinated. It’ll just be 100% of a smaller number than if only 50% were vaccinated, or 20%, or whatever.

I suppose there’s something to that, in purely mathematical terms. But what does that actually mean for the progress of COVID in a fully-vaccinated population? That breakthrough infections will continue to occur, I suppose. And the more the virus is challenged by a specific spike-protein gene-therapy vaccine, the more likely it will mutate to a form which will evade the vaccine.

That’s obviously not what Israel thinks. Instead, it’s doubling down and ordering the whole adult population over 60 to get a third shot; a booster. Of the same vaccine. Preliminary results? So far (as of August 8th), 14 Israelis who had the third shot, got the ‘heightened protection’, also contracted COVID. Two were hospitalized. So where is that heading? Plainly, the jab does not confer immunity. But we knew that. However, it clearly does not prevent the jabbed from carrying the virus and infecting others. Will this keep happening, a vicious circle of endless jabs and endless infections? No reason that I can see to imagine otherwise.

Especially considering, according to Japanese researchers, that the Delta Variant is only one Receptor Binding Domain (RBD) mutation away from acquiring complete resistance to wild-type (version 1) spike protein vaccines. More alarming by far is the part about “we found that the Delta variant completely escaped from anti-N-terminal domain (NTD) neutralizing antibodies, while increasing responsiveness to anti-NTD infectivity-enhancing antibodies.” An increased responsiveness to infectivity-enhancing antibodies is the foundation of Antibody-Dependent Enhancement (ADE), a flip-flop where your immune system actually works to help the virus to make you sick.

Many sources which discuss ADE claim it is unlikely to occur with the mRNA vaccines, for a variety of allegedly scientific reasons and in comparison with illnesses that are known to be ADE risks, like dengue. But in the next breath they acknowledge that nobody really knows what will happen, because the vaccines are still far from completion of their clinical trials. ‘Clinical trials’ which are the epitome of going-through-the-motions, since they were never serious and were always geared toward getting approval at the earliest possible second; both Pfizer and Moderna ‘unblinded’ their trial participants after only a couple of months and offered to reveal to each whether they had received the placebo or the real shot. Placebo recipients were then offered the vaccine, and all but about 10% took them up on it. As a result, hardly any trials subjects remain who are still relying on natural immunity. Nearly everyone participating in the Pfizer-Moderna clinical trials is already vaccinated with the real vaccine, and essentially no ‘control group’ remains. The outcome of the ‘trials’ is a foregone conclusion – the vaccine is wonderful, cheap at double the price and we would be in a terrible place without it. The FDA has already gone ahead and approved the Pfizer jab, in the fastest approval process in its history, although the trials will not be complete until 2023.

By now, you are probably thinking, we are being gamed. This is not a random series of reactions to a spontaneous event – this is a calculated plan, an agenda. It’s hard to imagine that, in a country or countries where just two years ago, there was a considerable degree of personal freedom, and at least tacit acknowledgement of human rights. Leaders at least pretended to be guided by public will, and by that I mean public will absent the reliance upon scare campaigns and influence operations.

Enter the SPARS Exercise.

The ‘SPARS Pandemic‘ was a 2017 exercise for Public Health Communicators, put on by the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security.

“While engaged with a rigorous simulated health emergency, scenario readers have the opportunity to mentally “rehearse” responses while also weighing the implications of their actions. At the same time, readers have a chance to consider what potential measures implemented in today’s environment might avert comparable communication dilemmas or classes of dilemmas in the future.”

I don’t want to spoil it for you because it is actually quite a riveting read. Just a quick plot summary; sometime between 2025 and 2028 – or perhaps encompassing that entire time period – a respiratory-virus pandemic breaks out. A promising vaccine is quickly developed – Kalocivir – and it is the task of President Archer’s administration and healthcare professionals to convince the public that global vaccination holds out the best hope. Strategies must be developed to counter skeptics and doubters, and messaging to reassure the public as a whole that an experimental vaccine made by a company which refuses legal liability for the use of its product is perfectly safe. Sound familiar?

The self-guided exercise features regular pauses for reflection on existing techniques and possible new inducements, such as;

1) How might federal health authorities avoid people possibly seeing an expedited SPARS vaccine development and testing process as somehow “rushed” and inherently flawed, even though that process still meets the same safety and efficacy standards as any other vaccine?

2) How might federal health authorities respond to critics who propose that liability protection for SPARS vaccine manufacturers jeopardizes individual freedom and wellbeing?

3) Once the vaccine becomes broadly available (see the chapter, “Head of the Line Privileges”), how might public health
communicators implement the “best practices” principle of enabling people to make their own informed decisions about whether to accept the novel SPARS vaccine?

4) What are the potential consequences of health officials over–reassuring the public about the potential risks of a novel SPARS vaccine when long–term effects are not yet known?

Chapters touch on now-familiar themes, such as the vital importance of consistency in messaging between government agencies; for example, if the FDA says one thing and the CDC appears to say something different, confidence in the vaccine suffers. Of course, since this fact-finding effort was sponsored by the gub’mint, official messaging was intended to ‘quell public fear’ rather than spread it; making the public fearful was the role played by ignorant anti-vaxxers. Look, I’m getting close to telling you the whole thing, so just go read it for yourself. Bear in mind, while you’re doing so, that this exercise wrapped up just two years before the outbreak of the current ‘pandemic’.

Just a word here about natural immunity, which is that acquired by contracting an illness and recovering, at which point your body’s immune system stores a genetic snippet of that illness so that it can recognize it if it sees it again, and mount the defense which worked for it this time. The subject is complicated and contentious, with some suggestion that T-cell immunity is capable of recognizing any coronavirus, since they share many common characteristics, and triggering a defensive response. Whatever your belief, there is scientific backing for reports that naturally-acquired immunity is generally superior to vaccine-induced immunity, being both more effective and more durable.

“This study demonstrated that natural immunity confers longer lasting and stronger protection against infection, symptomatic disease and hospitalization caused by the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2, compared to the BNT162b2 two-dose vaccine-induced immunity. Individuals who were both previously infected with SARS-CoV-2 and given a single dose of the vaccine gained additional protection against the Delta variant.”

Here, under the twitchy and generally rudderless leadership of Justin Trudeau – whose father, Prime Minister from 1968 to 1984, would turn in his grave if he could see what his entitled son is doing to the country – we have gone from wash your hands to no gatherings outside immediate family to wear a face-nappy everywhere to by God I’ll make you take the jab or know the reason why. The Federal Government is flirting with vaccine mandates, under which you can be dismissed from your employment if you refuse vaccination, and the province in which I live – British Columbia – is poised to effect ‘vaccine passes’ which you will need to show (papers, Comrade?) to be allowed entry to ‘non-essential services’ such as restaurants (both patios and inside), ticketed events such as inside music concerts and movie theatres. That’s not Trudeau’s fault, and I am anxious that he not be blamed for idiocies in which he had no part; the latter was the doing of dropped-on-his-head-as-a-baby congenital genital John Horgan, Premier of British Columbia when he is not too busy playing Klaus Barbie. The aim is obvious, reflected in the gleeful missive by pretend-I’m-funny columnist Jack Knox; “The walls are closing in on the unvaccinated“. As the Irish say; would you ivver think it?

Which brings me to the subject of this post, which is don’t vote. We are on the cusp of a Federal election  that Justin Trudeau thinks he can win, and participating in the charade of voting not only has zero effect on the outcome – when there is nothing to choose from but buffoons, charlatans and clowns, you are guaranteed to get one of the three – it says you are all right with the radical oppression thus far. I don’t really hold out much hope, because a solid majority of Canadians is clearly onside with the leader dictating from the bully pulpit as long as it gets to kick you while you’re down, a display of cowardice I never thought to see from my own countrymen, and which has irrevocably altered my perception of the country where I was born, and served 39 years in its armed forces.

Voting generally does not change anything, because there is a system in ‘democratic’ countries in which children of political families are raised from the cradle to be politicians, which practically guarantees they will have about as much in common with the working man or woman as they have with South African antelope. But voting tells the leaders you are okay with what has transpired to date – at least inasmuch as you still believe you can ‘punish them at the ballot box’ – and might even tolerate more. Let’s face facts; the freedoms that were yours for nothing, less than two years ago, are gone now; as extinct as the Quagga. We are entering the Age of Technocracy kicking and screaming, and there are no freedoms – only privileges bestowed and withdrawn on the whim of the tyrant. Whatever we will have is what we can wrest from our ‘elected’ leaders, and nothing more effectively displays your displeasure than a refusal to do your ‘civic duty’. When there’s a big turnout, even when it reflects fear or fury, the politicians say solemnly, “The people have spoken”. They actually couldn’t give a tin shit what you say, apart from on election day, and it will in no way affect how they pursue their chosen agenda. They play up the issues like the election is a real potboiler, everyone’s on the edge of their seat, and then they all run out to cast their ballots like the simpleton who keeps playing 26 black on the wheel until he has nothing left to lose.

Take us out, Henry David Thoreau:

“Even voting for the right is doing nothing for it. It is only expressing to men feebly your desire that it should prevail. A wise man will not leave the right to the mercy of chance, nor wish it to prevail through the power of the majority. There is but little virtue in the action of masses of men.”