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Mater’s Musings #1: Why the difference in approach?

This is a guest post by Mater, reposted with permission.

When you hear the Premiers indicate that we will remain under house arrest until we have zero cases and no community transmission, please keep this in mind.

The 2009 Swine flu (A(H1N1)pdm09) has been lurking around killing people during the flu season up to, and including, 2020, when deaths from any variety of flu completely, and miraculously, stopped in July of that year. That being, incidentally, almost exactly the time when Covid deaths started during the second wave in Victoria.

To summarise:
If we’d taken the same approach to A(H1N1)pdm09 as we have with Covid 19 and its variants, we would still be locked down, more than a decade later.

Remember, also, that A(H1N1)pdm09 attacks primarily the younger generations and, like all flus, tends to primarily kill those with co-morbidity factors. That, and the fact that younger people suffer less co-morbidities, would seem to be the telling factor in the death rate differences (although Covid-21 seems less deadly than A(H1N1)pdm09). The specialists seem to explain this by indicating that it is now more prevalent in the young.

“The ratio of deaths to cases in the year to date has decreased in comparison to this time last year, noting substantially lower case numbers this year and the difference in age distributions of those infected in 2021 versus 2020.”

Year to date (2020) 1 January – 1 August 2020 – Case Fatality Rate = 2.75%
Year to date (2021) 1 January – 1 August 2021 – Case Fatality Rate = 0.28%

I rest my case.

https://www1.health.gov.au/internet/main/publishing.nsf/Content/1D03BCB527F40C8BCA258503000302EB/$File/covid_19_australia_epidemiology_report_47_reporting_period_ending_1_august_2021.pdf

Whither the Right? or Wither the Right.

This is the first of what I hope will be a series of posts on the future of the Right following the collapse of the old Right positions that have held sway, really, since the 1970s. Today, Arky has the floor.

What is the Right? It is a widely assorted collection of people who can be categorised under the following:

1. Christian Right. Further divided under categories such as Catholic Right, Evangelical Right and the demoralised, disillusioned rump of what remains of the traditional protestant denominations such as Anglicans and Presbyterians.

2. The Libertarian Right. Further divided into true libertarians, free marketeer purists, and globalist pigs masquerading as libertarians.

3. RINOs. Leftists and opportunists pretending to be compassionate and reasonable versions of the right, seemingly unaware that their smug framing of themselves in this way comes with the presumption that the basic tenets of the right are mean and selfish, i.e, these are idiots, rogues, dullards and spivs.

4. Reptiles. These are the P.J. O’Rourke types who want all the taxation and ego policies they imagine belong on the right, with none of those pesky morals or beliefs which cramp one’s style. Basically sociopaths, perverts, and where they intersect with free marketeers: drug dealers and pimps.

5. Traditionalists and Nationalists. The Delcons. Allowed themselves to be bent over by every major right political party in the West and responded only with grumbling, letters to soon to be defunct papers which didn’t get published and withdrawing from volunteering at booths.

6. Pissed off old Labour and their children, befuddled traditional liberals in the American sense of the word, and Men and Women of a Practical Bent. That is anyone still trying to make a life for themselves that makes some sort of sense in the face of the current onslaught of utter insanity.

..

What possible future is there for this motley crew with few if any underpinning common interests or beliefs, other than a paralysing fear of what is currently occurring? The only possible pathway to success is some future unifying figure able to organise and galvanise most of them around the following: Countering the CCP. Late term abortions. Meaningful work. Ending the worst excesses of cronyism. Countering cultural Marxism in schools, public broadcasters, health and universities by privatising or defunding entire systems and handing out vouchers.

To do so that leader must avoid and ignore the leftist manufactured logic and word traps of: Identity politics, political correctness and anti- colonialism. And resist those on the right with obsessions about taxes, tariffs, useless foreign engagements and “free” trade. These are usually combined with some useless reflexive virtual signalling or other weirdness that no one in the category of Men and Women of a Practical Bent give a fig about.

Without some unifying religious beliefs, I’m not sure it can even be done. Trump may have come as close as any man possibly can.

Open Thread – Sunday Evening 15 Aug 2021

Nighthawks, Edward Hopper, 1942

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The shamelessness of Branch Covidian

The drive to vaccinate by hook or by crook the entire country is entering a frenzied stage in Australia. Not only is the establishment of a second class citizenry being discussed in media for the unvaccinated without blushing, but the deaths of individuals are now cunningly exploited (h/t: C.L.) to try and install fear in the unvaccinated and ground the prejudices of the vaccinated. With all due respect to the NSW health authorities, an unvaccinated woman in palliative care has nothing to teach the vast majority of the under 50s of the dangers of COVID; and frankly, neither does the vaccination status of those 70 or over, especially where they have preexisting medical conditions.

Roosh interviews Milo

A fascinating conversation between two men on different though similar religious journeys. Roosh strikes me as the more sober of the two, but I don’t think for one minute that Milo is insincere or trolling in his attempt to reject his past sins and follow the True, Good, and Beautiful. The same is true of Roosh. And given that politics is downstream of culture, this is to be welcomed and encouraged.

The Cathedral bears its fangs

We live in strange but dangerous times when even our legislative representatives are routinely censored by BigTech, acting in collusion with other state actors, when they depart from or resist the grand narrative on election integrity, mask and vaccine mandates, diversity, open borders, and the like. New Black Legends are being written as we speak, spreading calumnies relating to this or that nation’s past. There is now a coordinated attempt to stifle any resistance to the new hegemonic order emerging in the post-Cold War era both in Europe and the Anglosphere. Consider the effort being expended on the denigration of PM Orbán in Hungary merely for offering his people a reasonable alternative to liberal globalism that would not have battered an eyelid a generation ago. Do not underestimate the viciousness of this campaign; their will to power is terrible.

‘It could have been worse’

The propaganda for vaccines is reaching the point of incredulity. A vaccinated man dies and the report goes on to say that doctors suggested “it could have been worse” if not for the vaccination. Dear oh dear.

Update on site build

I’m working on fixing the site as we speak. I’ve added simple comment quicktags which are simply the html buttons that make commenting simple. I’ve added a comment report mechanism that makes moderating simpler too. I have noticed an error in the home page link on the menu which redirects to the old site [now fixed]. You can simply return to the homepage by clicking on New Catallaxy in the top left for now. If you have any recommendations let me know in the comments.