ABYSSUS ABYSSUM INVOCAT / DEEP CALLS TO DEEP

The science behind the catastrophic consequences of thoughtless human interventon in the Covid-19 pandemic

– Geert Vanden Bossche (DVM, PhD, March 13 2021)

I am herewith postng a list of a series of publicatons that have been instrumental in providing enlightening insights on the interplay between Covid-19 and the host immune system. They provide so to speak critcal pieces of the puzzle that I have been putng together. Entre puzzles are rarely published. That’s why publicatons rarely bring solutons to complex problems. For your convenience, I have allocated the publicatons I consulted to diferent categories. As you will appreciate, I have been tapping into several disciplines. To ‘solve’ a problem as complex as a viral pandemic, one has to draw from several diferent felds, including epidemiology, (molecular) biology, virology, immunology, genetcs, vaccinology and even biophysics. Again, this is why ‘fnished’ puzzles cannot be found in science journals specifcally dedicated to a specifc feld of interest.

The publicatons atached support my scientfc interpretaton of how a natural pandemic develops and how its natural course can be profoundly disturbed by human interventon. For your convenience, I atach a synopsis of my science-based postulate below. I invite scientsts from all over the world to read it and refect on how we could shif gears and possibly intervene in ways that prevent the emergence of additonal highly infectous Covid-19 variants and eventually enable eradicaton of variants that are circulatng already.

Synopsis

I cannot emphasize enough how passionate I am about vaccines, but I cannot accept that we use vaccines which, instead of mitgatng the Covid-19 pandemic, are now at risk of dramatcally aggravatng it.

The original Covid-19 strain was only causing mild symptoms, or even no symptoms at all, in the vast majority of healthy individuals. So, before recommending administraton of any type of current Covid-19 vaccines to everyone, one should frst make sure that the vaccine will reduce the rate of morbidity and mortality below the rates one could reasonably expect when letng the pandemic run its natural course. It’s even more simple than that: if one analyses the dynamics of a pandemic caused by a natural, self- limitng viral infecton (e.g., Infuenza pandemic during World War One), it becomes obvious that the toll taken on human lives is no higher than what is strictly required for the virus to perpetuate. Without human interventon, a pandemic ultmately results in herd immunity. This potentally leaves the door open for the virus to become endemic with interspersed seasonal fare-ups (as we usually see, for example, with the infuenza virus). No pandemic has lasted longer than two years, not even Spanish fu or Swine fu and, once herd immunity is established, resurgence of the virus is controlled by our immune systems thanks to their memory of previous encounters with the virus.

Author: Geert Vanden Bossche, DVM, PhD (March 13 2021) – htps://www.linkedin.com/in/geertvandenbossche/

Hence, in order for a vaccine to do beter than the natural pandemic, it would need to expedite herd immunity. However, it’s exactly the opposite what we are seeing right now: the vaccines are not able to prevent viral spread by vaccine recipients exposed to the emerging highly infectous strains. This is preventng herd immunity from developing. Whereas at the outset of the Covid-19 pandemic, innate immunity in healthy people provided for a solid frst line of immune defense to Covid-19, this is no longer the case when highly infectous strains are increasingly dominatng the scene. Healthy subjects, including children, are now increasingly exposed to circulatng highly infectous strains while the quality or quantty of their antbodies is insufcient.

Why are the Covid-19 vaccines likely to enhance viral infectousness? It is because they are prophylactc vaccines – designed to build immunity in individuals before they get exposed to the pathogen/virus. They are not suitable at all for administraton to people during a pandemic because the likelihood that a vaccine recipient already comes under atack while not yet being endowed with a full-fedged immune response increases as the infectous pressure augments. This partcularly applies in case of highly infectous circulatng variants.

What happens when you get a vaccine? For an individual who has just received the frst dose of vaccine, his or her body will be in the process of building an immune response. It could take several weeks for the immune response to be fully developed and if you are exposed to the virus during this tme, your immune response may be too weak to efectvely fght the virus. Even though the frst dose may protect you from developing symptoms, the virus may stll be able to replicate and transmit. Exertng high immune pressure without preventng viral replicaton and transmission is a recipe for selectve viral immune escape. However, what we are now more and more observing is even more worrisome: even those who got fully vaccinated before exposure to Covid-19 are no longer controlling virus replicaton and transmission. This is because they’re now increasingly infected by more infectous variants, the spike protein of which is diferent from the one comprised in the vaccine. Hence, the virus increasingly evades the vaccinal antbody response. We have already seen this in many care homes where highly infectous variants have been spreading within no tme despite large vaccine coverage rates (i.e., up to 80-90%). The only beneft of these vaccines is that they may temporarily protect from severe disease and mortality (depending on the antgenic features of the infectng variant).

Selectve immune evasion also favors further disseminaton of highly infectous strains as mass vaccinaton is now increasingly turning vaccine recipients into asymptomatc spreaders. The later transmit highly infectous virus to the unprotected or not yet infected subjects. This is exactly the opposite of what the vaccines were supposed to do. Indeed, there is now a general consensus that the vaccines will, indeed, fail to generate herd immunity. In additon, they will also fail to eliminate the steadily increasing number of highly infectous strains because the vaccinal antbodies do no longer match with the variant spike protein of the circulatng strains whereas they’re stll hampering binding of natural antbodies to the virusi.

Author: Geert Vanden Bossche, DVM, PhD (March 13 2021) – htps://www.linkedin.com/in/geertvandenbossche/

The combinaton of immune escape and dominant circulaton of highly infectous variants is a recipe for expeditng viral resistance to the vaccine and long-lived suppression of our innate immune response against Coronaviruses in general. It is impossible to scientfcally understand how this could have a happy end. Humanity, therefore, is at crossroads. Contnuing mass vaccinaton with these ‘leaky’ vaccines (see ‘leaky’ vaccines under references from the literature) in the course of a full-blown pandemic inevitably implies that we will witness the emergence of more, more infectous variants putng people at a higher risk of severe disease.

In conclusion: while vaccinaton may help to momentarily protect an individual, mass vaccinaton of individuals during the height of a pandemic is going to worsen the global situaton by encouraging the virus to select specifc mutatons enabling it to overcome ‘suboptmal’ immunologic hurdles. As a consequence, the global populaton will likely have to deal with a worse version of the virus and a worse health-care situaton than earlier in the pandemic. We should stop using conventonal prophylactc vaccines in the ongoing Covid-19 mass vaccinaton campaigns.

Author: Geert Vanden Bossche, DVM, PhD (March 13 2021) – htps://www.linkedin.com/in/geertvandenbossche/

i Neutralizing ant-Covid-19 IgGs have high AFFINITY for S, whereas IgM have high AVIDITY for the virus; ant-S Abs may stll weakly bind to S, even though they cannot prevent binding of the virus to ACE2 (as AFFINTY of S for ACE2 is much higher than for S-specifc Abs). On the other hand, even weak binding of highly specifc IgGs to S can prevent binding of multmeric IgMs as binding of the later is not S- specifc. Indeed, multmeric IgMs don’t interact with individual antgens but bind through multvalent interactons with repettve paterns on the surface of the virus (‘ensemble efect’). So, despite their high AVIDITY for the virus, IgMs cannot outcompete S-specifc IgGs for binding to S.

Supportve references from the literature

Topic 1: Natural antbodies (B-1A cells, sIgM, natural Abs & innate immunity to CoV and Covid-19)

htps://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanchi/artcle/PIIS2352-4642(20)30131-0/fulltext doi: htps://doi.org/10.1016/S2352-4642(20)30131-0

htps://www.frontersin.org/artcles/10.3389/fmmu.2020.02139/full doi : htps://doi.org/10.3389/fmmu.2020.02139

htps://www.nature.com/artcles/s41385-020-00359-2 doi : htps://doi.org/10.1038/s41385-020-00359-2

htps://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/artcles/PMC5526850/ doi : htps://doi.org/10.3389/fmmu.2017.00872

htps://www.frontersin.org/artcles/10.3389/fmmu.2020.595535/full doi: htps://doi.org/10.3389/fmmu.2020.595535

htps://journals.lww.com/shockjournal/fulltext/2020/11000/therapeutc_potental_of_b_1a_cells_in_covid_19 .2.aspx

doi: https://10.1097/SHK.0000000000001610 htps://www.frontersin.org/artcles/10.3389/fphar.2020.01309/full

doi: htps://doi.org/10.3389/fphar.2020.01309 htps://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23692567/

doi: htps://doi:10.1111/nyas.12137 htps://www.nature.com/artcles/s41467-020-20247-4.pdf

doi: htps://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-20247-4

htps://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20948548/
doi : htps://doi.org/10.1038/nri2849 htps://www.sciencedirect.com/science/artcle/pii/S1939455120303793 doi : htps://doi.org/10.1016/j.waojou.2020.100476

Topic 2 :

– Role of natural Abs and NK cells in asymptomatc carriers

– Substantal transmission by asymptomatcally infected subjects ; protecton of asymptomatc carriers not due to Abs

htps://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.12.18.20248447v1 doi : htps://doi.org/10.1101/2020.12.18.20248447

htps://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33391280/
doi : htps://doi.org/10.3389/fmmu.2020.610300

htps://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/artcles/PMC7608887/ doi : htps://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0241536

topic 3 :
– Natural Abs facilitate MHC class I-restricted antgen presentaton

– Conserved, CoV-associated cell surface-expressed MHC cl. I peptdes htps://www.nature.com/artcles/nm933

doi: htps://10.1038/nm933 htps://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19439480/

doi : htps://10.1128/JVI.00079-09 topic 4 :

– Abs may bind to Sars-CoV-2 without neutralizing the virus/ preventng infectonhtps://www.pennmedicine.org/news/news-releases/2021/february/antbodies-to-common-cold-

coronaviruses-do-not-protect-against-sars-cov2

Topic 5 :
– Natural and vaccine-induced immune escape

htps://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.12.28.424451v1 doi : htps://doi.org/10.1101/2020.12.28.424451

htps://science.sciencemag.org/content/371/6527/329 doi: htps://10.1126/science.371.6527.329

htps://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/artcle?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.1002198 doi: htps://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.1002198

topic 6 :
– Mechanism of viral shedding and clearance

htps://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanmic/artcle/PIIS2666-5247(20)30172-5/fulltext doi: htps://doi.org/10.1016/S2666-5247(20)30172-5

topic 7 :
– Dynamics of humoral ant-Covid-19 immune response and potental for reinfecton

htps://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/artcles/PMC7641391/ doi : htps://doi.org/10.1099/jgv.0.001439

topic 8 :
Lessons learned from Smallpox vaccines and Infuenza pandemic 1918

htps://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20860482/ doi: htps://10.2217/fmb.10.98

htps://www.cnbc.com/2020/09/28/comparing-1918-fu-vs-coronavirus.html

htps://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/compare-fu-pandemic-1918-and-covid-19-cauton- 180975040/

htps://theconversaton.com/what-makes-a-wave-of-disease-an-epidemiologist-explains-141573

PRESIDENT BIDEN’S FIRST 50 DAYS Hat Tip: Rip McIntosh   PRESIDENT BIDEN’S FIRST 50 DAYS Marvin L. Covault, Lt Gen US Army, retired March 16, 2021  As I begin this, President Biden has completed 50 days in office. Time for an assessment. Keystone Pipeline: Within the first few hours he shut down the Keystone pipeline construction, put thousands of workers and their families without a paycheck, and, without warning, enraged Canada, our most trusted ally, neighbor, and largest trading partner. Instead of “transporting” 800,000 barrels of petroleum a day by carbon-free pipeline, we will be using carbon-belching trucks and trains. BTW, an 84-car train will carry 60,000 barrels of oil; one tanker truck hauls 210 barrels. Who is doing the math in the oval office? The important thing is, it negates a Trump win. Suspension of new oil and gas leasing and drilling permits on public land: Just on “public land?” That doesn’t sound so bad until you consider that in eight western states, 97% of the oil and gas extraction is from public lands. Secondly, it has taken over 60 years for the U.S. to regain oil independence. The geopolitical ramifications of returning to imported foreign oil are too mind-blowing to comprehend. Final point: the impact of Keystone and public land drilling prohibition has had an immediate impact; The price of crude oil and gasoline at the pump in the US has risen sharply. Winners and losers. Winners are Russia and Iran; both were suffering economically with oil their principal export; rising crude prices has given them a reprieve. Losers; every person and business in the US suffers economically when gas prices go up. This is a colossal failure of reasoned thinking but it negates a couple more Trump wins. Border Wall immediate shut down: Another 5000 jobs immediately lost. Additionally, Border Protection Acting Commissioner Mark Morgan said the shutdown will cost taxpayers billions of dollars. Also consider that 270,000 tons of unused steel bollards are on hand. Wouldn’t it make sense to just finish out the existing, funded contract? No, they needed to wipe out another Trump win. Immigration “reform”: The on-going humanitarian and national security crisis on the Mexican border was absolutely predictable with the advent of democrat catch-and-release policy, AKA open borders. There were nearly 100,000 illegal immigrants in February, up a whopping 97% over February 2020, and predictions from border control officials is that it will get “much worse.” Drugs crossing from Mexico to the US: Drug seizures from January to February, 2021: cocaine increased 13%, methamphetamine up 40%, and heroin up 48%. Fentanyl seizures are up 360% from a year ago. Good work by the border folks, but, undoubtedly, unknownquantities successfully crossed the border and have been distributed across the nation. Cartel-produced cocaine heavily laced with China-produced fentanyl will kill many Americans. Open-border fallout. I have said this before but it is worth repeating; all of these illegal immigrants can be categorized as follows: All are unemployed and additionally many are also criminals, drug dealers, gang members, cartel operatives, Covid-19 carriers, sick, in need of major medical care, children who need free education in Spanish and those previously deported. Open borders wipe out another Trump win, and that’s good for America? Another view of the problem: look out your window and watch the buses go by. As Pem Schaeffer recently pointed out, 2000 busloads of illegal immigrants dispatched across the U.S. arriving in your town to be greeted, fed, and housed. And for how long? And that’s just the February arrivals. There are more to come, millions more. Why? Because the border is open. Thank you, President Biden or Chief of Staff Klain, or Kamala or Susan Rice or whoever the hell is in charge. And, BTW, when the bus arrives in East Overshoe, Montana, the Covid carrier on the bus has probably infected most of the other 49 passengers. Just deal with it America, open borders are just what we need now, right Mr. President? Stop all ICE operations for 100 days: Of the 85,958 illegal aliens removed from the U.S. interior in 2019, more than 75 percent, 64,991, had criminal convictions. Another 13,498 had pending criminal charges. Using this database, on average, ICE deported 215 criminals per day. Biden’s 100 -day shut-down will keep 21,500 criminals in our communities who could have been/should have been deported. What is the purpose? Net gain for America, zero. “Preventing and combating discrimination on the basis of gender identity or sexual orientation”: Of course, transgender individuals need and deserve society’s full support and understanding.But, does that include destroying women’s sports as we have known it forever? Consider this: Olympic, World, and U.S. Champion Allyson Felix’s 400 meters lifetime best of 49.26 seconds was bettered in 2017, more than 15,000 times by men and boys around the world. In swimming 13–14-year-old boys are faster in races of 200 meters or less than the women’s world records. There is no longer a level playing field in women’s sports thanks to our president’s pandering to a democrat identity political group. Defunding Police: HR 1280, “The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act”, a seemingly innocent title, passed the House a couple of weeks ago without a single Republican vote. The wording buried in its 66 pages would cost police departments hundreds of millions of dollars. But perhaps even worse is the provision that limits “qualified immunity”; that is, a long-standing policy that protects government officials from civil lawsuits for their conduct on the job. Now how are cities going to recruit the best and brightest? When Republicans tried to add an amendment to HR 1280, saying “……. condemns calls to ‘defund,’ ‘disband,’ ‘dismantle,’ or ‘abolish’ the police”, 219 Democrats voted against it. If it passes the Senate, Biden will sign it; and this will make America safer while current violent crime stats are going off the charts? To further put this ridiculous law into context, while in 2019 the U.S. violent crime rate fell for the fourth straight year, and property crime fell for the 18th straight year, the National Commission on Criminal Justice reported a “steep increase in rates of violent crimes in the early summer of 2020 has continued through August across a broad range of American cities.” Homicide rates between June and August increased by 53 percent over the same period in 2019. The 2020, crime wave began with the George Floyd riots and police defunding actions in major cities. Led by BLM and Antifa thugs, the killing, burning, and looting of thousands of small businesses raged across America. Recall Kamala Harris’ reaction to the rioting, “They’re not gonna let up, and they should not.” Election “reform”: H.R. 1, For The People Act of 2021 recently passed by the House of Representatives is a complete disaster. It certainly is not an act that is “for the People”; it is a bill specially designed to prescribe, from the federal level, the detailed implementation of the worst of the states’ 2020 election rules, procedures, and results. Many agree that the passage of HR1 strikes such a serious blow to one of our most sacred rights, free and honest elections, that it threatens the very existence of our Constitutional Republic. Some of the requirements: Automatic voter registration, ban witness signature requirements, states must allow mail-in ballots and ballot-harvesting, prevents removal of ineligible voters from voter rolls, forces states to allow voting without an ID. Here is what will happen if this law is passed. Poorly maintained voter registration rolls in most states are the launch point for many types of voter fraud. For example, Judicial Watch won a federal lawsuit requiring Los Angeles County to remove an estimated 1.5 million ineligible voters from its voter rolls. In 2020, all of those 1.5 million ineligible voters would have received a mail-in ballot. HR 1 will require ineligible voters to receive a mail-in ballot. With HR1 and now S1, if passed, states’ rights on elections procedures will all be superseded by federal law. All the pieces will be in place so that the results of future elections will be determined by which party can out-fraud the other. House and Senate democrats are calling this the most significant legislation in decades. Workers’ rights demolished: The House just passed the miss-named bill, “Protecting the Right to Organize Act”. Despite the name its provisions are, quoting the Wall Street Journal, “brazenly opposed to giving workers choices.” WSJ continued, “The legislation, which President Biden has promised to sign if passed by the Senate, would be the most significant overhaul of private-sector collective bargaining laws since the 1940s. It would effectively repeal right-to-work laws on the books in most states which allow employees to decline union membership and not pay union fees.” This is blatant democrat pandering to an identity group. Mr. President, where does individual liberty fall in this scenario? Middle East misguided policies: Former Secretary of State John Kerry (perhaps the worst in history) has been and still is obsessed with Middle East Policy. His/Obama’s/Biden’s view is that nothing positive can happen in the Middle East until the Palestinians are satisfied. FYI Kerry/Biden/Obama, Hamas is a terrorist organization and since 2006 has been the de facto governing authority of the Gaza Strip, current-day Palestine. Hamas is a Palestinian Islamist political organization and militant group that has waged war on Israel since 1987 and is committed to Israel’s destruction. In 2019 Iran agreed to pay Hamas $30 million monthly in exchange for intelligence on Israeli missile capabilities. The Obama/Biden/Clinton/Kerry approach to Middle East policy clearly explains their openly non-support of Israel. Four years of hard, imaginative work by the Trump administration changed everything. Post-Trump, most Middle East nations (Iran and Iran-supported terrorist nations excluded) now, for the first time since the 1948 creation of modern-day Israel, no longer view Israel as their enemy. Quite the contrary, many Middle East countries, led by Saudi Arabia, have seen the light that Iran’s goal is Middle East hegemony and they, Iran, are the greatest threat to Middle East peace. Saudi Arabia’s very cool view of Obama/Biden/Clinton/Kerry morphed into a great respect for Trump’s America and its view of Middle East issues. From that transition, the Saudis took on critical efforts in their area, namely military action against the Houthi terrorist organization which waged a successful coup in Yemen in 2014. Yemen remains one of the primary fronts in the global fight against terrorism and extremism. With U.S. assistance, Saudi Arabia has led a coalition of nine nations against the terrorist network in Yemen. Without the Saudi effort, it is quite possible that the Houthis would have successfully transformed Yemen into a terrorist operational and training safe haven with deadly consequences for the United States and the international community. So, where is President Joe Biden on all this? In another knee-jerk I’ll-show-you-Trump action, he is planning to remove the Iran-backed Houthi terrorists from the Global Terrorist list. Unbelievable. To add insult to injury, Biden has put a hold on Trump-negotiated arms sales to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates worth billions of dollars. Have they lost their minds? Bail out cities and states: Under the guise of Covid relief, Biden pushed through a $1.9 trillion package that included hundreds of billions of dollars to bail out financially mismanaged democrat-led cities and states. While at least two-thirds of the states are financially stable and have substantial rainy-day reserve funds, taxpayers will now be paying the bills for those governors and mayors who will not take the steps necessary to become fiscally responsible. Is there some sense of Biden unity in all that? Disincentivized unemployed: Biden claims the $1.9 trillion giveaway will lift people out of poverty. His view of value-added defies human nature. Once the government is willing to give you a living income, where is the incentive to work? What’s coming next? $15 minimum wage: Biden will not give up on a $15 minimum wage irrespective of the facts: First, a one-size-fits-all approach makes no sense with the cost of living drastically different from state to state. Secondly, tens of thousands of small businesses across the country are barely hanging on because of Covid. Kicking them in the gut while they are down only adds insult to injury. Experts expect at least 1.4 million low-wage workers will become unemployed; a Biden view of putting working families first. Cut defense spending: Biden will follow the lead of Presidents Carter, Clinton, and Obama all of whom gutted the forces reducing combat readiness to dangerously low levels. It’s easy to cut but it is a long hard road to get readiness back to acceptable levels when we need it. Our allies and enemies alike, carefully watch our combat readiness and act/react accordingly. Nothing deters enemy intent to do harm more than fully combat-ready U.S. forces. Gun control: I’m fine with some changes; no one needs a weapon in three days. Extending background-check timing to 10 days or a couple weeks is OK as long as the system is designed to effectively identify those who absolutely should not have a weapon. Also, no one needs a 30-round magazine. The problem with gun control, as the democrats see it, is that “control” is synonymous with “no guns”, period. Increased taxes: Biden and the democrats continuously use this easy sound bite; “the very wealthy should pay their fair share.” That thought, soak the rich, is appealing to many. What Biden will not do, even with a teleprompter, is define “fair share” and discuss the details/potential negative ramifications. For example, in 2017, the top 1% of taxpayers paid more income taxes than the bottom 90% combined. Included in the bottom 90% are the 44% who paid zero federal income tax. Is that not a “fair share” by the rich? Biden hypocrisy: Next to Covid, “white supremacy” seems to be his new favorite topic. He never seems to pass up an opportunity to inject “those domestic terrorist white supremacists” whenever possible. Yes, there are white supremacists in America. Yes, they are a threat. Yes, they need to be dealt with. But, consider that on the other end of the radical political spectrum is Antifa. It is these violent anarchists who led the murder, looting, burning rampage across America for months on end last summer. Biden will not mention Antifa; he will not even acknowledge that they exist. His definitive exclamation during a presidential debate last fall was, “Antifa is an idea, not an organization.” FBI Director Wray has testified before Congress saying, “Antifa is a real thing.” He went on to say, “we have any number of properly predicated investigations into what we would describe as violent anarchist extremists and some of those individuals self-identify with Antifa.” The trial concerning the death of George Floyd is ongoing. The defense will present two meaningful arguments. One, the knee-on-the-neck was an acknowledged and accepted method of constraint taught by the Minneapolis Police Academy. Secondly, the defense will show that Floyd had a fatal level of fentanyl in his system and died of an overdose. If the jury believes that, cities across the country will burn and Antifa will be at the forefront of the murder and mayhem. What then will Biden and Kamala say and do? Bottom line: President Trump threw a giant monkey-wrench in the Obama/Biden machine that was designed to, “transform America.” That democrat 2009-2016 transition included federal domination of policies and procedures affecting every American, thereby stomping on States’ and individuals’ rights. Big government was their answer to every issue.  Nothing in Biden’s first 50 days has been made clearer than his belief that it is OK for big government, big bureaucracies, and a regulation-nation to dominate we-the-people. Hang on to your hat America, there is a lot more of the nonsense suggested above to come. What happened to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”? What has happened to Biden’s inauguration-day impassioned plea to trust him to be president, “for all the people”? Do President Biden and his handlers have no clue that all those Trump policy reversals have infuriated 75 million Trump supporters? Do they actually believe they can unite America with a soft voice, teleprompter statements, and recriminating remarks about President Trump every time he gets behind a microphone? Has the president already forgotten about uniting America or did he never really mean it in the first place? Actions always speak louder than words especially when they are the actions of the president of the United States. And that is just the first 50 days of the Biden Administration.God help us. Marvin L. Covault, Lt Gen US Army, retired, is the author of VISION TO EXECUTION, a book for leaders, a columnist for THE PILOT, a national award-winning local newspaper in Southern Pines, NC and the author of a blog, WeThePeopleSpeaking.com.

“Man’s greatest difficulty is not what the Church teaches on morality; the hardest thing for the post-modern world is to believe in God.” —Cardinal Robert Sarah, 75, in his book God or Nothing. (link)        Another Move in the Chess Game    Another strange, and as yet unexplained, move inside the Vatican has been reported in recent days.    It is a move some fear is aimed at “rolling back” more traditional positions on the Church’s liturgy, positions which tended to be supported by the highly respected African Cardinal Robert Sarah (photo above), who for a little more than six years, from 2014 until February 20 this year, has headed the Vatican office which oversees the Church’s liturgy, called “The Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments.”    Cardinal Sarah offered his resignation from his post on his 75th birthday on June 15, 2020, as is customary.    Pope Francis waited about eight months, then accepted Sarah’s resignation on February 20, just under a month ago.     So Sarah is now officially retired.    But Pope Francis did not name a successor.     And, in a still more unusual move, the Pope has just ordered a “visitation” to take place, a series of “visits” to the Congregation offices by a man the Pope trusts. To do what? To talk to every official of the Congregation and to determine what work they are doing, with what perspective and attitude toward the liturgy — before naming a replacement for Cardinal Sarah.    No one in Rome knows quite what to make of this.     Is it an attempt to draw up some sort or “report card” on Cardinal Sarah’s work? Is it an attempt to prepare for a full reorganization of the staff, and work, of the Congregation? What is purpose of the “visitation,” really?    No one knows.    There are rumors, of course, whispers.     These rumors tend in the direction of suggesting that Pope Francis wishes to bring an end to efforts, favored by Cardinal Sarah, to support traditional Catholics in their love of the “old liturgy.”     That is, to prepare the Congregation to support more fully the “liturgical revolution” launched after the Second Vatican Council.     But this is only a rumor. There is no solid evidence that this is what is happening.    A few words about Cardinal Sarah.    I know him, I have spoken with him on a number of occasions, and I have a profound respect for him, for two reasons.    First, he is a man of the Church, a man of faith, a man of profound spiritual insight, a man who in recent years has spoken in a beautiful way about the centrality of Christ for all mankind, and about the innate longing for God that is a type of nostalgia in every human heart — a longing upon which any call for human brotherhood may find a solid foundation, but also a longing which, if overlooked, denied or marginalized will mean that any effort to deepen human brotherhood will inevitable be false and doomed to tragic failure.     Sarah understands these things well, and is one of the great, profound voices in our Church today.    Second, he is a man of courage.     A man with a lion’s heart, one might almost say.     A man unafraid even to die for his faith.    I say this because Sarah, born and raised in Guinea, West Africa, experienced the threat of execution and did not flinch.     After his seminary studies and ordination, Sarah was eventually chosen as his country’s archbishop under the dictatorship of Ahmed Sékou Touré, who put Sarah on a death-list. Despite the persecutions of priests and laymen, Sarah worked to maintain the Church as the one institution that was independent of the dictatorship.     Sékou Touré died in 1984.     In his book God or Nothing, Sarah rebuked the Marxist dictatorship as a utopian scheme that brought misery and death.    The French magazine Le Figaro reports that Sarah “did not hesitate to oppose the all-powerful Sékou Touré, then ‘supreme leader of the revolution’ but also a commander of violent repressions. He made the celebrated public statement: ‘the power uses the man!'”    The Historical Dictionary of Guinea commented on Sarah’s role in resisting Sékou Touré’s dictatorship, writing that the Church “managed to play a remarkable role under former Archbishop Robert Sarah in Guinea’s public life… Monsignor Robert Sarah is one of the most respected leaders among Guineans, who expressed their strong desire to see him lead the country’s political transition on various occasions between 2006 and 2010. He arguably earned much of this popular trust by speaking truth to power during the stormiest years of president Ahmed Sékou Touré’s regime, while other spiritual leaders endeavored to cater to the regime.”    Sarah was called to Rome and served as secretary of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples under Pope John Paul II and president of the Pontifical Council Cor Unum under Pope Benedict XVI.    Cardinal Sarah has been mentioned as papabile, a possible candidate for the papacy, by international media outlets such as Le Monde and by Catholic publications including Crux and the Catholic Herald.    For these reasons, the mysterious launch of this investigation into the work of the Congregation headed for six years by Cardinal Sarah seems a story worth keeping an eye on. —RM        Before naming Cardinal Sarah’s replacement, Pope Francis wants an outside review of the congregation for worship(link) by Cindy Wooden – Catholic News ServiceMarch 15, 2021    VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Before Pope Francis names a new prefect for the congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments, he has asked that an outside expert consult with the office’s staff and review its procedures.    The pope in late February accepted the resignation of Guinean Cardinal Robert Sarah, who had reached the normal retirement age of 75 last June. The cardinal had been prefect since 2014.    A French website reported on March 12 that it would be a “canonical visitation” carried out by Bishop Claudio Maniago of Castellaneta, [Italy], president of the Italian bishops’ conference’s liturgical commission and a member of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments.    In response to questions from Catholic News Service, Archbishop Arthur Roche, who has served as secretary of the congregation since 2012, had an assistant reply that “this is not a canonical visitation. Rather it is more in the nature of the consultations a diocesan bishop would have with his vicar general and others when he is appointing a new parish priest. In such an instance, the idea is to get to know the needs of the parish, the actual situation, as well as having an eye to its future direction.”    The congregation is charged with promoting the celebration of the Mass and the sacraments and fostering their correct celebration, including by overseeing the approval of the translations of liturgical books and texts.    In the draft of the new constitution for the Roman Curia, sent to bishops for comment in 2019, that task remains, but is introduced by a sentence saying, “The dicastery is dedicated in the first place to promoting the sacred liturgy according to the renewal desired by the Second Vatican Council.”    Vatican, internal visit to the Divine Worship Department before choosing the new prefect(link)    About a month after Cardinal Sarah’s retirement, Bishop Maniago, a representative of the Pope to start a series of consultations to “learn about the work of the Congregation and meet each member individually”by Salvatore Cernuzi, La Stampa (and Vatican Insider)March 16, 2021    VATICAN CITY. An apostolic visit commissioned by the Pope began yesterday morning in the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, a Department led by Cardinal Robert Sarah until 20 February. The representative chosen by the Pontiff is the bishop of Castellaneta, Claudio Maniago, president of the liturgical commission of the CEI and a member of the same Dicastery, among the supervisors of the new Italian translation of the Missal.     The visit — which, moreover, would explain the reason why the Pope did not name a new Prefect either immediately on February 20, nor in the following days — was not officially communicated, as it is an internal act.     Vatican Insider had confirmation of this, being able to view the e-mail announcing the start of the visit sent on March 12 to members and employees of the Congregation by the English Archbishop Arthur Roche, secretary of the Dicastery since 2012 and current regent following the departure of Sarah.     “The Holy Father has decided, before making appointments to the Congregation, that there should be a visit to the Dicastery by one of his representatives,” we read. “During the visit, His Excellency (Monsignor Maniago) will want to know the work of the Congregation and meet each one individually. I have already expressed to the Holy Father our openness to this visit and our sure and sincere welcome to Monsignor Maniago. There is nothing to be alarmed about in this. As you know, this style of visit is now becoming a regular occurrence at the end of the mandate of the heads of a Dicastery or at the time of a significant change.”    In reality, no such internal consultation has ever been launched in recent years for the choice of a dicastery head.     This has not happened, for example, with the recent changes of prefects to Congregations for the Evangelization of Peoples or for the Causes of Saints.     “Evidently there was something to put in order inside,” explain curial sources.     However, it is not a question of a “commissioner” — as some of Sarah’s supporters, coming from the most traditionalist circles, have suggested to emphasize the distance between the Pontiff and the Guinean cardinal — but a process to help Francis to name the new prefect and also outline an operational line for the future.     A line that perhaps deviates from the past one that has caused some problems so far.     In fact, from Divine Worship, communiqués and official documents have often been issued which have offered different interpretations from the Pontiff’s provisions, so much so as to force Francis himself to intervene personally with public corrections.     For example, in 2016 the Pope released a letter with an autograph signature to deny the fact that no changes in the orientation of church altars announced by Cardinal Sarah were in sight.     And in 2017, he sent a “Correctio paternalis” (“Paternal correction”) to the cardinal to ask him to correct restrictive interpretations that he had distributed to ultra-conservative sites and blogs of the Motu proprio“Magnum Principium” in which he spoke on the subject of translations of liturgical and biblical texts which extended the prerogatives of the national episcopal conferences.    The visit in question therefore seems aimed not at questioning Sarah’s work — for the Pope, despite everything, has always shown great esteem for Cardinal Sarah, keeping him in his office even beyond the retirement age of 75 — but rather to understand the functioning of the internal organization chart of the Dicastery.    “When changing a Prefect, it can be useful to listen to the office, to understand its needs,” they explain from within the Congregation.     Archbishop Roche, speaking to the British weekly The Tablet,emphasized that the visit of Bishop Maniago will not be a canonical visit like those launched to investigate communities or institutions in which abuses or violations of the discipline have occurred.     It could rather be compared, said the prelate, “to the consultations that a diocesan bishop would have with his vicar general and others when he appoints a new parish priest. In this case, the idea is to know the needs of the parish, the current situation, as well as having an eye on its future direction.”     It should also be emphasized that the Pope’s decision has nothing to do with the recent provisions on the celebration of individual masses in St. Peter’s Basilica for which a daily limit has been established.

The science behind the catastrophic consequences of thoughtless human interventon in the Covid-19 pandemic

– Geert Vanden Bossche (DVM, PhD, March 13 2021)

I am herewith postng a list of a series of publicatons that have been instrumental in providing enlightening insights on the interplay between Covid-19 and the host immune system. They provide so to speak critcal pieces of the puzzle that I have been putng together. Entre puzzles are rarely published. That’s why publicatons rarely bring solutons to complex problems. For your convenience, I have allocated the publicatons I consulted to diferent categories. As you will appreciate, I have been tapping into several disciplines. To ‘solve’ a problem as complex as a viral pandemic, one has to draw from several diferent felds, including epidemiology, (molecular) biology, virology, immunology, genetcs, vaccinology and even biophysics. Again, this is why ‘fnished’ puzzles cannot be found in science journals specifcally dedicated to a specifc feld of interest.

The publicatons atached support my scientfc interpretaton of how a natural pandemic develops and how its natural course can be profoundly disturbed by human interventon. For your convenience, I atach a synopsis of my science-based postulate below. I invite scientsts from all over the world to read it and refect on how we could shif gears and possibly intervene in ways that prevent the emergence of additonal highly infectous Covid-19 variants and eventually enable eradicaton of variants that are circulatng already.

Synopsis

I cannot emphasize enough how passionate I am about vaccines, but I cannot accept that we use vaccines which, instead of mitgatng the Covid-19 pandemic, are now at risk of dramatcally aggravatng it.

The original Covid-19 strain was only causing mild symptoms, or even no symptoms at all, in the vast majority of healthy individuals. So, before recommending administraton of any type of current Covid-19 vaccines to everyone, one should frst make sure that the vaccine will reduce the rate of morbidity and mortality below the rates one could reasonably expect when letng the pandemic run its natural course. It’s even more simple than that: if one analyses the dynamics of a pandemic caused by a natural, self- limitng viral infecton (e.g., Infuenza pandemic during World War One), it becomes obvious that the toll taken on human lives is no higher than what is strictly required for the virus to perpetuate. Without human interventon, a pandemic ultmately results in herd immunity. This potentally leaves the door open for the virus to become endemic with interspersed seasonal fare-ups (as we usually see, for example, with the infuenza virus). No pandemic has lasted longer than two years, not even Spanish fu or Swine fu and, once herd immunity is established, resurgence of the virus is controlled by our immune systems thanks to their memory of previous encounters with the virus.

Author: Geert Vanden Bossche, DVM, PhD (March 13 2021) – htps://www.linkedin.com/in/geertvandenbossche/

Hence, in order for a vaccine to do beter than the natural pandemic, it would need to expedite herd immunity. However, it’s exactly the opposite what we are seeing right now: the vaccines are not able to prevent viral spread by vaccine recipients exposed to the emerging highly infectous strains. This is preventng herd immunity from developing. Whereas at the outset of the Covid-19 pandemic, innate immunity in healthy people provided for a solid frst line of immune defense to Covid-19, this is no longer the case when highly infectous strains are increasingly dominatng the scene. Healthy subjects, including children, are now increasingly exposed to circulatng highly infectous strains while the quality or quantty of their antbodies is insufcient.

Why are the Covid-19 vaccines likely to enhance viral infectousness? It is because they are prophylactc vaccines – designed to build immunity in individuals before they get exposed to the pathogen/virus. They are not suitable at all for administraton to people during a pandemic because the likelihood that a vaccine recipient already comes under atack while not yet being endowed with a full-fedged immune response increases as the infectous pressure augments. This partcularly applies in case of highly infectous circulatng variants.

What happens when you get a vaccine? For an individual who has just received the frst dose of vaccine, his or her body will be in the process of building an immune response. It could take several weeks for the immune response to be fully developed and if you are exposed to the virus during this tme, your immune response may be too weak to efectvely fght the virus. Even though the frst dose may protect you from developing symptoms, the virus may stll be able to replicate and transmit. Exertng high immune pressure without preventng viral replicaton and transmission is a recipe for selectve viral immune escape. However, what we are now more and more observing is even more worrisome: even those who got fully vaccinated before exposure to Covid-19 are no longer controlling virus replicaton and transmission. This is because they’re now increasingly infected by more infectous variants, the spike protein of which is diferent from the one comprised in the vaccine. Hence, the virus increasingly evades the vaccinal antbody response. We have already seen this in many care homes where highly infectous variants have been spreading within no tme despite large vaccine coverage rates (i.e., up to 80-90%). The only beneft of these vaccines is that they may temporarily protect from severe disease and mortality (depending on the antgenic features of the infectng variant).

Selectve immune evasion also favors further disseminaton of highly infectous strains as mass vaccinaton is now increasingly turning vaccine recipients into asymptomatc spreaders. The later transmit highly infectous virus to the unprotected or not yet infected subjects. This is exactly the opposite of what the vaccines were supposed to do. Indeed, there is now a general consensus that the vaccines will, indeed, fail to generate herd immunity. In additon, they will also fail to eliminate the steadily increasing number of highly infectous strains because the vaccinal antbodies do no longer match with the variant spike protein of the circulatng strains whereas they’re stll hampering binding of natural antbodies to the virusi.

Author: Geert Vanden Bossche, DVM, PhD (March 13 2021) – htps://www.linkedin.com/in/geertvandenbossche/

The combinaton of immune escape and dominant circulaton of highly infectous variants is a recipe for expeditng viral resistance to the vaccine and long-lived suppression of our innate immune response against Coronaviruses in general. It is impossible to scientfcally understand how this could have a happy end. Humanity, therefore, is at crossroads. Contnuing mass vaccinaton with these ‘leaky’ vaccines (see ‘leaky’ vaccines under references from the literature) in the course of a full-blown pandemic inevitably implies that we will witness the emergence of more, more infectous variants putng people at a higher risk of severe disease.

In conclusion: while vaccinaton may help to momentarily protect an individual, mass vaccinaton of individuals during the height of a pandemic is going to worsen the global situaton by encouraging the virus to select specifc mutatons enabling it to overcome ‘suboptmal’ immunologic hurdles. As a consequence, the global populaton will likely have to deal with a worse version of the virus and a worse health-care situaton than earlier in the pandemic. We should stop using conventonal prophylactc vaccines in the ongoing Covid-19 mass vaccinaton campaigns.

Author: Geert Vanden Bossche, DVM, PhD (March 13 2021) – htps://www.linkedin.com/in/geertvandenbossche/

i Neutralizing ant-Covid-19 IgGs have high AFFINITY for S, whereas IgM have high AVIDITY for the virus; ant-S Abs may stll weakly bind to S, even though they cannot prevent binding of the virus to ACE2 (as AFFINTY of S for ACE2 is much higher than for S-specifc Abs). On the other hand, even weak binding of highly specifc IgGs to S can prevent binding of multmeric IgMs as binding of the later is not S- specifc. Indeed, multmeric IgMs don’t interact with individual antgens but bind through multvalent interactons with repettve paterns on the surface of the virus (‘ensemble efect’). So, despite their high AVIDITY for the virus, IgMs cannot outcompete S-specifc IgGs for binding to S.

Supportve references from the literature

Topic 1: Natural antbodies (B-1A cells, sIgM, natural Abs & innate immunity to CoV and Covid-19)

htps://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanchi/artcle/PIIS2352-4642(20)30131-0/fulltext doi: htps://doi.org/10.1016/S2352-4642(20)30131-0

htps://www.frontersin.org/artcles/10.3389/fmmu.2020.02139/full doi : htps://doi.org/10.3389/fmmu.2020.02139

htps://www.nature.com/artcles/s41385-020-00359-2 doi : htps://doi.org/10.1038/s41385-020-00359-2

htps://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/artcles/PMC5526850/ doi : htps://doi.org/10.3389/fmmu.2017.00872

htps://www.frontersin.org/artcles/10.3389/fmmu.2020.595535/full doi: htps://doi.org/10.3389/fmmu.2020.595535

htps://journals.lww.com/shockjournal/fulltext/2020/11000/therapeutc_potental_of_b_1a_cells_in_covid_19 .2.aspx

doi: https://10.1097/SHK.0000000000001610 htps://www.frontersin.org/artcles/10.3389/fphar.2020.01309/full

doi: htps://doi.org/10.3389/fphar.2020.01309 htps://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23692567/

doi: htps://doi:10.1111/nyas.12137 htps://www.nature.com/artcles/s41467-020-20247-4.pdf

doi: htps://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-20247-4

htps://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20948548/
doi : htps://doi.org/10.1038/nri2849 htps://www.sciencedirect.com/science/artcle/pii/S1939455120303793 doi : htps://doi.org/10.1016/j.waojou.2020.100476

Topic 2 :

– Role of natural Abs and NK cells in asymptomatc carriers

– Substantal transmission by asymptomatcally infected subjects ; protecton of asymptomatc carriers not due to Abs

htps://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.12.18.20248447v1 doi : htps://doi.org/10.1101/2020.12.18.20248447

htps://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33391280/
doi : htps://doi.org/10.3389/fmmu.2020.610300

htps://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/artcles/PMC7608887/ doi : htps://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0241536

topic 3 :
– Natural Abs facilitate MHC class I-restricted antgen presentaton

– Conserved, CoV-associated cell surface-expressed MHC cl. I peptdes htps://www.nature.com/artcles/nm933

doi: htps://10.1038/nm933 htps://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19439480/

doi : htps://10.1128/JVI.00079-09 topic 4 :

– Abs may bind to Sars-CoV-2 without neutralizing the virus/ preventng infectonhtps://www.pennmedicine.org/news/news-releases/2021/february/antbodies-to-common-cold-

coronaviruses-do-not-protect-against-sars-cov2

Topic 5 :
– Natural and vaccine-induced immune escape

htps://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.12.28.424451v1 doi : htps://doi.org/10.1101/2020.12.28.424451

htps://science.sciencemag.org/content/371/6527/329 doi: htps://10.1126/science.371.6527.329

htps://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/artcle?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.1002198 doi: htps://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.1002198

topic 6 :
– Mechanism of viral shedding and clearance

htps://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanmic/artcle/PIIS2666-5247(20)30172-5/fulltext doi: htps://doi.org/10.1016/S2666-5247(20)30172-5

topic 7 :
– Dynamics of humoral ant-Covid-19 immune response and potental for reinfecton

htps://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/artcles/PMC7641391/ doi : htps://doi.org/10.1099/jgv.0.001439

topic 8 :
Lessons learned from Smallpox vaccines and Infuenza pandemic 1918

htps://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20860482/ doi: htps://10.2217/fmb.10.98

htps://www.cnbc.com/2020/09/28/comparing-1918-fu-vs-coronavirus.html

htps://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/compare-fu-pandemic-1918-and-covid-19-cauton- 180975040/

htps://theconversaton.com/what-makes-a-wave-of-disease-an-epidemiologist-explains-141573

The Uniform Determination of Death Act (UDDA): Repeal and Replace

Paul A. Byrne

Paul A. Byrne, M.D.
March 15, 2021

The Uniform Determination of Death Act (UDDA) has been adopted in all 50 states based on the recommendation of the Uniform Law Commission (ULC), although not all using identical language. Now the ULC is considering revision of the UDDA.

This is a good idea but only if the revision will correct the problems with the current UDDA replacing it with a statute that protects life until true death. A person’s death is the cessation of his own life on earth. The precise moment when his life ends is of paramount importance. There is no ground for legal presumption or for less secure criteria. The right to live is the most basic right and no one ought to shorten life or hasten death. The state is obligated to protect the individual’s right to live as long as he is able. This obligation is independent of any other interests, assuming that the person is innocent of capital crime.

The UDDA states, “An individual who has sustained either 1) irreversible cessation of circulatory and respiratory functions, or 2) irreversible cessation of all functions of the entire brain, including the brain stem, is dead. A determination of death must be made in accordance with accepted medical standards.”

The first (1) “irreversible cessation of circulatory and respiratory functions” has been accepted for eons. “Irreversible” was added by the UDDA but that had traditionally been determined by waiting sufficient time for some form of biological destruction to occur so as to be certain that death had actually occurred.

The second (2) “irreversible cessation of all functions of the entire brain, including the brain stem” also known as “brain death” and death by neurological criteria (DNC) has been, since its inception, and continues to be controversial, even if widely practiced in medicine and legally protected.

Ideal Statute Wording

An ideal statute should be worded in the negative to protect lives. The ideal statute should protect the person from being declared dead when they might still be alive. Suggested wording is, “No one shall be declared dead unless respiratory and circulatory systems and the entire brain have been destroyed. Such destruction shall be determined in accord with universally accepted medical standards.”[1]

It is essential that determination of death by neurological criteria (DNC) be understood by the general public, all clergy, doctors, nurses, attorneys, legislators et al.

In recent legal cases, loved ones of patients who were declared dead according to neurological criteria with continued beating heart, circulation, and many other signs of life, fought to protect and preserve the life of their loved one (Jahi McMath, Israel Stinson, Aden Hailu, Bobby Reyes, Allen Callaway, Miranda Lawson, Areen Chakrabarti).

The Supreme Court in NV unanimously (7-0) ruled that the case of Aden Hailu be sent back to the lower court because they were not convinced that the hospital’s use of American Academy of Neurology Guidelines (AANG) fulfilled the statutory requirement of “irreversible cessation of all functions of the entire brain including the brain stem.” The statute in NV was shortly thereafter changed to codify that the determination of DNC must be made in accordance with the AANG. The Supreme Court also questioned whether the AANG adequately measure the required “irreversible cessation of all functions of the entire brain.” The AANG although widely used are not evidence based and do not fulfill the statutory requirement of “irreversible cessation of all functions of the entire brain.”

Neurologist D. Alan Shewmon wrote, “It has long been recognized that in some cases of clinically diagnosed brain death, certain brain structures may not only be preserved but actually function, such as the hypothalamus.”[2] This is the case in patients without diabetes insipidus, low thyroid hormone, or the inability to maintain temperature control.

Irreversibility

Irreversibility is not an empirical concept, i.e., not directly observable or provable by experience or experiment. “Both destruction of the brain and the cessation of its functions are, in principle, directly observable; such observations can serve as evidence. Irreversibility, however, of any kind, is a property about which we can learn only by inference from prior experience. It is not an observable condition. Hence, it cannot serve as evidence, nor can it rightly be made part of an empirical criterion of death.”[3]

The destruction of the brain is what is convincing of irreversibility, not vice versa. “But if there is no proof of complete destruction, then any declaration that a cessation of function is absolutely irreversible is a presumption, even if well grounded, which is contingent on the current state of medical knowledge and on the availability of adequate life-support systems in the concrete circumstances. Even if the presumption is correct, it establishes … no necessary link with destruction of the brain. If it is incorrect, the patient may possibly be cured. Thus, whether right or wrong, a presumption as to the irreversibility of a lack of brain function is insufficient ground for removing a patient’s vital organs or for immediate autopsy, cremation, or burial.”[4]

Function, functions, functioning

The UDDA states “all functions of the entire brain” must have ceased. The brain has many functions, some of which continue even after “brain death” is declared. To exclude some functions and not others does not meet the statutory requirement of cessation of all functions of the entire brain.

Absence of functioning does not necessarily mean cessation of all functions.

The UDDA has sought to turn a “cessation of all brain functions of the entire brain, including the brain stem” into a general criterion of death. This is “a fundamental category mistake: to take that which functions to be simply identical with its functioning. Yet, if something irreversibly ceases to function, its existence is not necessarily extinguished thereby; it merely becomes permanently idle.[5] Nonfunction, no matter what prognostic qualifiers are used with it, is not the same thing as destruction.”[6] E.g., When an automobile is parked, it is not functioning, but the functions are still there; a driver and fuel are needed.

Importance of “destruction” of circulatory and respiratory systems and the entire brain

It is important to note that “destruction” is the only acceptable interpretation of the phrase “irreversible cessation of all functions.” Destruction indicates the loss of structural potentiality for functioning, i.e., the cessation of the organic capacity to function.

The condition or state known as “death,” once it has occurred is totally incapable of being in any way affected by medical progress. Prognosis, whether of recovery or destruction, is irrelevant to any determination of death; nor is the impossibility of even minimal recovery the same thing as death.

Accepted medical standards vs. legislating AANG as the only standard

Many sets of criteria to declare DNC have been considered “accepted medical standards” beginning with the Harvard criteria in 1968. Between 1968 and 1978 there were more than 30 sets of criteria considered as “accepted medical standards.” Lewis et al. propose a revised uniform determination of death act (RUDDA), which would effectively make the AANG and any future updates as the only “accepted” medical standard.

Importance of accurate language

Medical personnel may use language about death that is imprecise. For example, doctors may tell the patient or family that a patient who had a cardiac arrest and was successfully resuscitated had “died” but really what was observed was the cessation of the person’s circulation and respiration. The patient’s condition was obviously not irreversible. The patient may have been near to death and might have died if an intervention had not been attempted and then succeeded, but the patient was never truly dead. Many seem to be unaware or ignorant of the word “irreversible” even when using the cessation of circulatory and respiratory functions as criteria for death as in the UDDA.

UDDA – two ways to declare death

The UDDA has at least two ways to declare a person “dead.” This is not satisfactory for medicine, the law, and the general public. Very few of these have been presented with sufficient information to discern the differences that have been placed into law since the Harvard criteria in 1968, continuing with the President’s Commission in 1981 and the AANG.

Signs of life before and after DNC “brain death”

The public has not been informed that a person declared DNC, i.e, “brain dead” still has a heart beating on its own, circulation, respiration (exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide in the tissues albeit on a ventilator).

Other signs of life continue such as wound healing, which is a complicated diffuse process throughout the body of many factors circulating in the blood and interacting with cells and tissues and maintained by the liver and white blood cells.

There is urine production, maintenance of body temperature, homeostasis of many interdependently functioning organs and systems, and if the patient is a pregnant woman, even the ability to carry and nourish the baby in the womb.

All of the above do not occur in a corpse but often occur in a patient after the declaration of “brain death.” Doctors may refer to the patient declared dead using DNC as a corpse, but the patient still has signs of life unlike a true corpse.

All functions are not evaluated and some which are functioning are ignored.

Unless all functions of the entire brain are evaluated it is not possible to determine that all functions have ceased. Laboratory tests show that parts of the brain such as the hypothalamus may still function and secrete hormones needed for the body including the brain to function optimally. If a loved one has brain injury and “brain death” is being considered, it is reasonable to demand that blood tests for thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH), T3, T4, and other hormones such as adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) be done and the patient be treated since even current AANG are supposed to rule out endocrine abnormalities. The AANG do not require testing for hypothalamic-pituitary hormones nor for treatment if thyroid hormone levels are below normal. No revisions of the UDDA should allow patients with parts of the brain still functioning to be declared dead.

Currently patients declared “brain dead” might be treated with thyroid hormone after the declaration of “brain death” to benefit organs for transplantation, not for the health of the unresponsive patient. The AANG mention endocrine abnormalities but do not require blood tests or treatment to normalize low thyroid hormone levels that may occur with brain swelling and affect brain functions. Thyroid hormone is essential to life and health, especially at times when healing is necessary.

A function of the brain is to control normal body temperature. This occurs but is often ignored as demonstration of a functioning brain.

Procedure of the Apnea Test (PAT)

A function of the brainstem part of the brain is to take a breath when carbon dioxide waste product levels in the blood increase. To exclude that this part of the brain is functioning, the procedure of the apnea test (PAT) is often done or attempted.

A patient must be on a ventilator to be considered for DNC (i.e., “brain death”). To make a clinical declaration of “brain death,” the PAT may be done. The PAT may be performed after the unconscious brain-injured patient does not respond to pain stimuli or voice commands, and does not show functioning of some brain stem reflexes, but not all are tested.

The PAT includes complete disconnection from the ventilator without any breaths being given for 10 minutes or longer. This causes the waste products of carbon dioxide and acids to increase. If the patient is not observed to take a breath or gasp during this time and the arterial blood gas sample shows a carbon dioxide level of at least 60 mmHg or 20 mmHg above baseline, the patient may be declared officially “dead” by “brain death” neurological criteria.

Doctors, without notice or consent, do the PAT because they may consider it part of their “neurological exam.” However, it is more properly termed a “procedure” because the life-preserving ventilator is removed and oxygen may be administered. There are other steps in the procedure including obtaining arterial blood samples. Full and complete information should be provided so that the family has the opportunity to decline and prevent it from being done on their loved one. The PAT has no clinical benefit for the brain-injured patient, only risks, including deleterious effects on brain swelling. Adverse changes in blood pressure and the increased carbon dioxide acid waste products can make brain swelling worse. Other side effects that have been reported during the PAT are low oxygen (hypoxemia), arrhythmias, pneumothorax, subcutaneous emphysema, pulmonary hypertension, heart attack, and death. Even brief episodes of low blood pressure may adversely harm the already injured brain. Usually, deliberate increases in carbon dioxide are in direct contrast to the care of brain-injured patients. Even if oxygen is administered during the PAT, this does not prevent the potentially lethal effects of increased carbon dioxide on brain swelling. In addition, giving oxygen may depress the reflex to breathe and it may only be low oxygen to which some of the brainstem centers would respond. Purposely making the patient low in oxygen to test lower brainstem functioning would be unconscionable. The PAT does not test for the absence of all brainstem function and may cause injury to the brain.

Full and complete information must be provided to the family or surrogate so that they can decline the PAT. The NV statute does not require informing the family/surrogate or their consent for the PAT.

Reasons to repeal and replace UDDA

Life is a good. Death is the absence of life. There should be only one universally accepted medical standard for the determination of death since there is only one truly irreversible change in state that occurs when a living person changes to a true corpse.

After true death—whatever happens to the remains of the body, whether it involves putrefaction, embalming, or cremation, is describable in terms of disintegration, dissolution, and destruction of the organism that was formerly present. No one should be declared dead unless life has ceased and death has truly occurred.

Not only do some Catholics object to “brain death” but so do others of varied religious and ethnic backgrounds, such as Orthodox Jews, Japanese Shintoists, Native Americans, Buddhists, Muslims, and other Christians.

The ideal statute should protect the person from being declared dead when they are still alive. Wording the statute in the negative, which would set minimum criteria that must be satisfied before death is declared, can do this. This minimum must fulfill a change of state from alive to dead.

A model statute is: No one shall be declared dead unless the circulatory and respiratory systems and the entire brain have been destroyed. Such destruction shall be determined in accordance with universally accepted medical standards.

What can we do?

Write to the Uniform Law Commission and tell them that the UDDA needs to be repealed and replaced by “No one shall be declared dead unless respiratory and circulatory systems and the entire brain have been destroyed. Such destruction shall be determined in accord with universally accepted medical standards.” Full and complete information and the opportunity to decline or consent must be provided for being declared dead using neurological criteria.

The Honorable Samuel Thumma, Chairman
Members of the Determination of Death Act Committee
Uniform Law Commission
111 N. Wabash Avenue, Suite 1010
Chicago, IL 60602
info@uniformlaws.org
1-(312) 450-6600

Communicate the same to your federal and state legislators.

Other Resources:

Nguyen, Doyen and Eble, Joseph. March 12, 2021. Homilectic and Pastoral Review. https://www.hprweb.com/2021/03/brain-death-what-catholics-should-know/

Nguyen, Doyen. 2018. The New Definitions of Death for Organ Donation; A Multidisciplinary Analysis form the Perspective of Christian Ethics. Bern Switzerland. Peter Lang.

__________________________

[1] Byrne, Paul A.; O’Reilly, Sean; Quay, Paul M and Salsich, Peter W. 1982/83 Brain Death – the Patient, the Physician, and Society. Gonzaga Law Review. 18(3):429-516.

[2] D. Alan Shewmon, Brain Death or Brain Dying? 2012. J. Child Neurology 27 (4), 5 (2012)

[3] Byrne Paul A.; O’Reilly, Sean; and Quay, Paul M. 1979. Brain Death-An Opposing Viewpoint. JAMA 242:1985-1990.

[4] Ibid.

[5] The distinction between permanent and irreversible is used to differentiate between a patient e.g., whose circulatory arrest may be considered permanent if the decision has been made not to attempt resuscitation, even though it may be reversible if life support is administered.

[6] Byrne et al. JAMA 1979

---

Dr. Paul A. Byrne is a Board Certified Neonatologist and Pediatrician. He is the Founder of the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at SSM Cardinal Glennon Children’s Medical Center in St. Louis, MO. He is Clinical Professor of Pediatrics at University of Toledo, College of Medicine. He is a member of the American Academy of Pediatrics and Fellowship of Catholic Scholars.

Vatican Stance On Gay Unions Angers Critics March 16, 2021 Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on reaction to the Vatican document on gay unions: The Catholic Church’s chief doctrinal office, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, issued a statement on March 15 making it clear that the Church does not approve of gay unions or gay marriage. This was done with the approval of Pope Francis. This has not set well with those Catholics who have been at war with the Church’s teachings on sexuality. The German bishops, in particular, are not happy with the document. They have steadily been moving toward a Protestant church for some time, and this may force them to decide whether they really belong in the Catholic Church. On March 16, a group of dissident priests in Austria, the Parish Priest Initiative, pledged to bless gay unions—in open defiance of the Vatican—beckoning a showdown with Rome. In the U.S., so-called progressive Catholics are also angry with the Vatican’s position, but then again they have been for decades. It is important to remember that there is nothing fundamentally new about this statement: it reaffirms the Catholic Church’s teaching on marriage. Nonetheless, it is being received in some quarters as very controversial, owing in large part to the welcoming approach that Pope Francis has exhibited to homosexuals. In fairness to the pope, it is not his fault that some interpret his friendly stance as signifying an interest in changing Church doctrine. That’s their problem. To put it differently, it is one thing to say all persons possess equal dignity in the eyes of God; it is quite another to say that whatever they do is acceptable to God. Human status and human behavior are not identical. Also, this document applies equally to heterosexuals. According to Catholic sexual ethics, cohabiting men and women are involved in an illicit relationship, and this statement is very clear about their status. Yet the media have missed this point, so absorbed are they with gay rights. Many news stories on this Vatican statement are citing surveys that say a majority of Catholics approve of gay marriage. That may be true, especially of non-practicing Catholics, but it is nonetheless deceiving. There is a difference between a preference and a demand. How many of those Catholics who are okay with gay marriage are incensed that the Church has not changed its teaching? Practically none. What if the subject were corporal punishment in the schools? If a majority of Catholics favored it, should the bishops ratify their choice? This begs the question: Should the Catholic Church align its teachings to mirror survey results, or should it align its teachings to mirror Scripture? In other words, should the Church make it a priority to follow what the public desires, or should it follow God’s law? The Vatican statement reaffirming the Church’s opposition to gay unions and gay marriage concludes by noting, “the Church does not have, and cannot have, the power to bless unions of persons of the same sex.” To put it differently, the Church cannot change Scripture, and indeed has no interest in trying to do so. Its allegiance is to the pursuit of truth, not public opinion.

Meet the New President of the United States…Barack Obama.

February 22, 2021 

By Wayne Allyn Root

Hat Tip: Rip McIntosh

I’ve written thousands of columns and commentaries.This is the most important I’ve ever written.
This is my chance to play the modern-day version of Paul Revere.“The commies are coming. The commies are coming.” Yes, I am reporting a communist takeover. But the leader of this attack is not whom it appears to be.  Republicans, conservatives, patriots, and capitalists are sick right about now. We’re in shock. We can’t believe Trump isn’t president. We can’t believe Americans voted against the greatest economy, perhaps in history. And the greatest jobs picture ever. And the greatest improvement in middle-class incomes ever. And after the Covid lockdown and economic collapse, Trump produced the greatest economic comeback ever. Remember 33% GDP in Q3 2020? That was the biggest number in history. Who would vote against all that? You’d have to be self-hating and suicidal.
We also can’t believe America voted for a feeble old man with dementia who mumbles “I don’t know what I’m signing, but I’m gonna sign these Executive Orders.” And who says “There was no vaccine before I became president.” Even though he got his two vaccine shots before he became president.  We all believe the election was rigged and stolen. We all know the feeble old man now called “President” would be more at home in an assisted living home, than the White House. That man can’t be our new president.  I have news for my fellow conservatives, Republicans, capitalists, and patriots. Biden’s not the president. He’s a puppet. Yes, we have a new president. But his name is…Barack Obama.  Admit it. Now that I’ve said it out loud, it all makes sense. Obama is the real president, back for his third term, to finish the job.
Biden’s job was to stand there and look moderate, and credible, and reasonable. So as not to scare the voters. But Biden isn’t the real president. Obama is the man with the power.  Look at the radical Executive Orders, the most in history. And they all sound like Obama wrote them. This third term is “Obama Unmasked.” With Biden as the frontman, Obama can finally be himself. Obama is able to do all the radical things he never dared do as the actual president.  Look at the executive orders and new laws and policies proposed…Open borders. 
No more wall. Everyone gets in, during a pandemic, with no testing for Covid. Illegal alien felons must be released from jail. Halt to deportations. Full legalization for millions of alien lawbreakers. 
Include illegal aliens in the US census. Once into the country, give them the right to bring all their relatives in too, with no requirement for education, skills, or background checks. Ban the use of the word “illegal alien.”
*Make every action and economic policy about “racism” “social justice” and “racial equity.” Even climate change is about “racism.”
*Re-start the Iranian nuclear treaty. Give murdering Mullahs everything they ever dreamed of, and then some, endanger our best friend Israel’s existence and get absolutely nothing in return. And for good measure, wait over a month to call Israel’s Prime Minister, so the whole world knows we no longer have Israel’s back.
Kill the lucrative US energy industry and make us dependent on foreign oil from our enemies again. Kill the Keystone Pipeline. Kill oil, coal, natural gas, fracking, even permits for drilling. Re-enter the Paris Climate Agreement that kills all our jobs, while allowing China to pollute all it wants. This will decimate our economy and make us dependent on the same kind of green energy that just caused the meltdown in Texas.
*Ban the use of the term “China virus.” End the trade war with China. Give China access to the US energy grid.
Even the players in Biden’s cabinet and staff are all Obama re-treads.
Trust me, I’m Obama’s Columbia college classmate. I know how he thinks. I understand his plan. This has Obama’s fingerprints all over it. This is the Cloward-Pavan plan we learned at Columbia University, almost 40 years ago.
This is the 3rd term of Obama. In his first two terms, Obama tried his best to destroy the economy, high-paying jobs, healthcare, the US energy industry, the great American middle class, our relationship with Israel, American exceptionalism, and capitalism itself. He damaged us badly, but he fell short.  Now Obama’s back to finish the job.

    Here below, the text of a March 12 Vatican directive, issued in Italian, which has become a bit of a controversy over the past three days.     The text regulates the number of Masses allowed to be celebrated in St. Peter’s Basilica each day. Up until now, dozens and dozens of Masses have been celebrated each day at the 45 altars and in the 11 chapels of the basilica.     Point 1 says that all of these individual Masses will now be “suppressed,” and Point 2 says all of the Masses will be gathered together into four Masses concelebrated by many priests at once.     Point 3 says that all the Masses will also have lectors and readers (rather than just the priest alone).     Point 4 confirms that pilgrim groups will still be able to celebrate Mass in the chapels of the crypt, under the main altar.     Point 5 says that the “old rite” (what we commonly call the “Latin Mass”) can only be celebrated at 4 specific times each day, in one chapel, the chapel of St. Clement (Capella Clementina) — a very prestigious chapel, since it is directly in front of the stone box containing the bones of St. Peter himself (c. 30 feet under the main altar) but also a rather small and cramped chapel — and not at any altar in the upper church, where the Mass is visible to all. —RMLetter #4, 2021, Monday March 15: Masses in St. Peter’s BasilicaNew rules for celebrating Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica, issued on March 12 in a somewhat mysterious Vatican directive, are scheduled to go into effect on March 22.     But the new rules have aroused strong opposition, including from a cardinal — American Cardinal Raymond Burke — who has asked in a published letter that the new rules be immediately rescinded.     What’s it all about?    ***        ”Nevertheless, each priest shall always retain his right to celebrate Mass individually.” (Original Latin: “Salva tamen semper sit cuique sacerdoti facultas Missam singularem celebrandi.“)     —This quote above is from the Second Vatican Council’s Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy Sacrosanctum Concilium (Paragraph 57, Part 2, Point 2).     Sacrosanctum Concilium was the official Vatican II document on the liturgy and gave the general parameters, and certain specific guidelines, for how the Mass should be celebrated in order to make it more spiritually efficacious and fruitful for the life of Catholics. It was the very first document promulgated by the Second Vatican Council, at the end of the Council’s second session in the fall of 1963. After being voted on favorably by the Council Fathers, the Constitution was promulgated by Pope Paul VI on December 4, 1963.     Therefore, based on this passage, it seems that it could be argued that the Council Fathers expressly taught that a Catholic priest has and “always” should have the right to celebrate Mass by himself(“individually,” or “singularem” as the Latin states it): without a need for anyone else to be present, and also without a need to have other priests present to concelebrate the Mass.     This seems an important point to keep in mind when seeking today, almost 60 years later, the “mind of Vatican II” on such liturgical questions (link)===============    “If an individual priest wishes to offer the Holy Mass in the basilica, once the directives in question are in force, he will be constrained to concelebrate, in violation of his freedom to offer the Holy Mass individually.” —Cardinal Raymond Burke, in a statement released on March 13, opposing new Vatican directives issued on March 12 and scheduled to go into effect on March 22. Burke asked that the new directives be “immediately” rescinded (link)=====================        A battle over celebrating Masses    An unusual “battle over celebrating Masses” has emerged in St. Peter’s Basilica over this past weekend, and is now stirring concern around the Catholic world — because what happens in St. Peter’s Basilica is often seen as a “standard” for what should happen in other Catholic churches throughout the world.     If a practice is introduced in St. Peter’s, the basilica of the Pope, then bishops in cities and dioceses around the world may feel obliged, or encouraged, to “imitate” the “practice of Rome.”     That is why this story is important. It is not just about Rome, and St. Peter’s Basilica, but about the whole Catholic world.    Here is the headline of Andrea Gagliarducci‘s Catholic News Agencystory on the new guidelines for celebrating Mass issued March 12: Vatican Prohibits Priests From Celebrating Private Daily Masses At St. Peter’s Side Altars (link)    So, the first point is that the 45 altars and 11 chapels all around the edges of the basilica, which up until now — as everyone who has gone into St. Peter’s Basilica at 7 a.m. in the morning has seen for decades — have been used every morning by dozens of priests to celebrate their daily Masses, will not normally be used starting March 22(!).     The practice has been that Catholic priests in Rome, both those who work permanently in the Vatican Curia, and those who are visiting Rome, whether on their own or with a small group of family and friends, have been able on each morning to go into the basilica and celebrate Mass at one of these altars, usually on a “first come, first served” basis.     So a priest named “Leo” might go, for example, to the altar of Pope St. Leo the Great to celebrate Mass.     This practice, it seems, has abruptly ceased with this decree.    Essentially, what the new rules do is require these priests to “concelebrate” with other priests, thus gathering a number of priests together at one altar, rather than staying apart, one priest to an altar, celebrating Mass separately at dozens of different altars.     And (it seems) all of these Masses will be celebrated, not in the various languages of the universal Church, and not in the still official language, Latin, but in Italian — so (it seems to me — this may not turn out to be the case), not in Polish, or English, and so forth, but in Italian — and especially, not in the old rite, but only in the Novus Ordo, the new rite of the Mass introduced in 1969 by Pope Paul VI.     Regarding the old rite, the old liturgy will be allowed only on one altar, in the Clementine chapel underneath the basilica’s main altar, right in front of the tomb of St. Peter.     This is a place of great honor, of course; but it is also a small chapel, with room, I would guess, for 20 people at most.     This is why some observers are saying that the “old liturgy” has been “pushed underground” into a small, cramped chapel, rather than be allowed to remain “aboveground” and to be celebrated up in the main basilica, where it can be seen and heard by others in the basilica.     In recent years, an increasing number of old rite Masses have been celebrated at altars in the upper basilica, and often by younger priest, not aging ones. These “old rite” Masses at the altars in the upper basilica will no longer be permitted.    Thus, a controversy has arisen: Since there be many fewer “old rite” Masses celebrated in the basilica in the future, is this result actually part of the reason for these new directives? No one knows.     And, since there will there be many fewer Masses in total, as many priests “concelebrate” at just a four Masses, rather than individually celebrating dozens of private Masses each day, was this also desired for some theological or spiritual reason, and if so, what reason? We do not know.    Here below are several articles which will hopefully shed some light on these questions. —RM=======================    Vatican Prohibits Priests From Celebrating Private Daily Masses At St. Peter’s Side Altars (link)    By Andrea Gagliarducci    March 12, 2021    VATICAN CITY (Catholic News Agency)— A new letter from the Vatican Secretariat of State has banned the daily private celebration of Masses at side altars in St. Peter’s Basilica, effective March 22.    The regulation might seem tailored to meet COVID restrictions, as Italy prepares to tighten its pandemic measures once again. However, the new rule appears to be permanent.     The letter stresses that Lent is a time to focus on the Word of God and celebration of the Eucharist. It says the changes are intended to ensure “the Holy Masses in St. Peter’s Basilica take place in a climate of recollection and liturgical decorum.”    Until now, the 45 altars and 11 chapels in St. Peter’s Basilica have been used every morning by priests to celebrate their daily Mass. Many of them are Vatican officials who begin their day with the celebration.     The private Masses were in addition to the regularly scheduled public Masses daily at the main altars in St. Peter’s Basilica. According to that schedule, there is one Mass per hour from 9 am to noon, in Italian, at the Altar of the Chair. There is another Mass in Italian at 8:30 am at the altar of the Most Holy Sacrament, while every day at 5 pm, there is a Mass in Latin.    On Sundays, there are five Masses celebrated in Italian and one in Latin.    Under the new measures, priests have the opportunity to concelebrate the Masses at 7am and 8am in the Chapel of the Choir; and at 7:30am and 9am at the Altar of the Chair, while other Mass schedules remain unchanged. [Note: This makes a total of four Masses each day, in place of dozens.—RM]     On the feast day of a saint whose relics are in the Basilica, one of the Masses can be celebrated at the altar dedicated to that saint.    The measures also ask that the Masses have lectors and cantors.     Another change — Mass offered in the extraordinary form of the Roman Rite will be limited to the Clementine Chapel in the Vatican Grotto.    There has been a broad discussion of whether to end the practice of individual Masses, as part of a general reform of the management of St. Peter’s Basilica. However, decisions were postponed until the appointment of the new Archpriest of the Basilica, following the retirement of Cardinal Angelo Comastri, who had previously served in the role but had surpassed the normal retirement age of 75.    On February 20, Pope Francis appointed as the new archpriest Cardinal Mauro Gambetti.    However, the letter from the Secretariat of State is not addressed to Cardinal Gambetti, but to Archbishop Mario Giordana, extraordinary commissioner of the Fabric of St. Peter. This is unusual, since the Fabric of St. Peter does not deal with liturgical celebrations in the Basilica, but is instead charged with its conservation and maintenance.     The fact that the letter was released by the First Section of the Secretariat of State has also garnered attention, as the first section is a sort of Ministry of Internal Affairs, in charge of all the Curia offices’ direction and coordination, but typically not liturgical celebrations.     Additionally, the release of the letter was not accompanied by any kind of official Vatican communication. Nor was the letter signed in full by Archbishop Edgar Peña Parra, who heads the First Section of the Secretariat of State, but instead included only his initials. [Note: I do not see the initials in the image above, but evidently they are visible in some other version of this document. —RM]    These anomalies have prompted some speculation that the letter may have been forged. However, two Vatican officials who asked for anonymity confirmed to CNA that the document is real.===================    Cardinal Burke Says Vatican’s Instruction on Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica Should Be Rescinded (link)    The former prefect of the Apostolic Signatura calls it ‘a direct violation of universal Church law.’    By Edward Pentin     March 13, 2021    VATICAN CITY — Cardinal Raymond Burke has expressed his “deepest concerns” about an internal Vatican letter regarding new rules for Masses celebrated in St. Peter’s basilica, saying it is in “direct violation of universal Church law” and should be “rescinded immediately.” (link)     The five-point letter addressed to the administrators of the basilica from the Secretariat of State states that “individual celebrations are suppressed” at the side altars of St. Peter’s, and that priests and faithful coming to the basilica or Mass will only be able to take part in one of four concelebrated Masses each morning, as well as other concelebrated Masses during the day at the main altars.     The Vatican instruction, which is dated March 12 and comes into effect March 22, says that these concelebrations should have the assistance of readers and cantors, and that groups of pilgrims accompanied by a bishop or priest are now to celebrate Mass in the Vatican grottoes underneath the basilica.     Its last point states that “authorized priests” who wish to celebrate Masses in the extraordinary form, or traditional Latin Mass, can do so only in the Clementine Chapel of the grottoes, and at four set times each morning, also limited to 30 minutes.     The letter’s introduction states that being the season of Lent, which gives “greater centrality to listening to the Word of God and to the Eucharistic Celebration,” it is important for Masses to take place “in an atmosphere of recollection and liturgical decorum.”     Until now, priests have been able to celebrate individual Masses, including in the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, every morning in the basilica’s many side altars. Often the priests are Vatican officials celebrating morning Mass before their workday begins, and altars were free to be booked whenever a priest wished to celebrate Mass at them.     “It was all very free and thus encouraging attendance both of priests and faithful of all types and leanings or sensibilities,” said a priest speaking on anonymity who has individually celebrated Masses in the basilica.     The contents of the March 12 letter, which carries no clear signature but the initials of the sostituto (deputy) of the Secretariat of State, Archbishop Edgar Peña Parra, were not formally announced, nor does it have a protocol number usual for legislating the most sacred aspects of the Church’s life. According to Cardinal Burke, these deficiencies mean the document cannot represent “valid legislation for the Sacred Liturgy.”     Other anomalies include the fact that the letter came from the Secretariat of State, which is not competent for the liturgical discipline of the Church, nor was it communicated to the cardinal archpriest of the basilica but rather the extraordinary commissioner for the Fabric of St. Peter, which does not deal with liturgies in the basilica but rather its administration and maintenance.     These questions regarding the document, which have yet to be clarified by the Holy See Press Office, have led some to suspect the document is a forgery. However, sources in the Vatican Secretariat of State have confirmed its authenticity to the Register.     The Register contacted the Holy See Press Office for comment on the letter, but it has not yet responded, as the Vatican offices were closed Saturday to mark the eight anniversary of Pope Francis’ election.     For Cardinal Burke and other canonists and priests contacted by the Register, the most serious element of the letter concerns its imposition of concelebration upon priests who wish to offer Mass in the basilica — a change, they say, that pertains not only to the basilica but the universal Church, as St. Peter’s is the spiritual home for all Catholics and, they say, should be a model of liturgical discipline.     The letter, Cardinal Burke wrote in a statement to be published on his website, is “contrary to universal Church law” as it “unjustly conditions the primary duty of the individual priest to offer the Holy Mass daily for the salvation of the world.” More specifically, he and other canonists say it is in breach of both Canon 902 and Article 57 § 2 of Sacrosanctum Concilium.     “In what church more than in the Basilica of Saint Peter would a priest desire to offer the Holy Mass, which is the most perfect and fullest way in which he carries out his priestly mission?” the former prefect of the Apostolic Signatura asked. “If an individual priest wishes to offer the Holy Mass in the basilica, once the directives in question are in force, he will be constrained to concelebrate, in violation of his freedom to offer the Holy Mass individually.” Cardinal Burke added that for a priest to individually offer Mass is not only a right but brings “great spiritual fruit for the whole Church.”    Regarding its rules on celebrating Mass in the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite (which he notes the letter “falsely calls the Extraordinary Rite”), Cardinal Burke stressed that according to the Pope Benedict XVI’s 2007 motu proprio Summorum Pontificum no priest in good standing needs authorization to celebrate Mass in the Extraordinary Form.     He also wondered if, according to the letter, the basilica is restricting such Masses to only four priests each day, a provision that, if true, would be another “direct violation of universal Church law.”     Restricting Mass in the Extraordinary Form to the Vatican grottos is also a return to previous practice that existed before Summorum Pontificum.     Further criticisms the cardinal makes about the letter is its requirement that the concelebrated Masses be “liturgically animated” by lectors and cantors.     Cardinal Burke said while liturgical discipline provides for their service, it is “not their purpose to animate the Sacred Liturgy,” but rather it is “Christ alone, in whose person the priest acts,” who “animates the Sacred Liturgy.”     Given all of these reasons, he said that letter “should be rescinded immediately,” that the “thinking which underlies such a document should be corrected,” and that the underlying liturgical doctrine and discipline of the universal Church be “expounded for the faithful.”    Cardinal Burke also takes issue with the letter’s introduction, which says that the new rules are intended so that Masses in the basilica are celebrated in an “atmosphere of recollection and liturgical decorum.” This presupposes that this currently is lacking in some way, but he said this was certainly not the case “in his experience,” nor in the experience of many priests he knows in Rome and abroad who have celebrated or regularly celebrate Mass in the basilica.     The cardinal ended his statement by referring to Canon 212, which recognizes the right for the faithful to make their concerns known to their pastors for the good of the Church, and calling on the faithful, for whom the basilica is their “mother church,” and priests throughout the world, “to make known to Pope Francis and to his Secretariat of State their strong objection to the document in question.”     Some have wondered if COVID-19 is part of the reason for this proposed change, but it isn’t mentioned in the letter. Concelebrated Masses were also temporarily banned during last year’s lockdown to help prevent contagion.     However, Church sources have told the Register that this is a change some in the Vatican have been pushing for many years, going back to when Cardinal Virgilio Noè was archpriest of the basilica from 1991 to 2002.     CNA’s Andrea Gagliarducci also reported in January that a “broad discussion” among members of the Chapter of the Basilica had been taking place over whether to keep the possibility for priests and pilgrims to book individual Masses or rule that they must take part in those already scheduled. These decisions were postponed until the Feb. 20 retirement of Cardinal Angelo Comastri as archpriest, and his subsequent replacement by Cardinal Mauro Gambetti.     Gagliarducci also reported that abolishing daily Mass in Latin in the Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite in the basilica was part of the discussions but there is no mention of that in the letter.=============    “Private” Masses banned in St. Peter’s Basilica? (link)    The recent unsigned document from the Secretariat of State is yet another insult and assault on the priesthood and a glaring violation of ecclesial hospitality to laity who visit the church which is the common home of all believers.    March 13, 2021     By Father Peter M.J. Stravinskas (excerpts)    …There are many oddities connected with the document, which I wish to address presently, and then proceed to deal with the substance. Suffice it to say for now, that this decree has raised a firestorm among priests from around the world.    First of all, the document is unsigned. We have been subsequently (unofficially) informed that its author is Archbishop Edgar Peña Parra, sostituto, successor to the infamous Cardinal Giovanni Angelo Becciu…     Second, why is Archbishop Giordano an addressee?…    Third, why are the canons of the Basilica summarily informed about such an issue? Indeed, the Chapter of the Basilica has canonical responsibility and jurisdiction over that edifice and over what goes on therein. Were they even consulted? There is no evidence of that. And, if not, what about the “collegiality,” so often vaunted by this Pope? Rather, this seems like yet another bizarre, unthought-out command from Mount Olympus.    Now, why this document? Some sources claim that it emerged from the will of the Pope himself because he is supposedly “annoyed” by the crowds of people milling about the Basilica in the morning! Why should that bother him? Beyond that, one would think that any cleric (let alone the Pope) would be delighted with crowds in St. Peter’s. Another possible rationale is financial, which has some credibility since we know that the Vatican is in the hole for some $61 million this year and also because the prelate in charge of the Basilica’s upkeep is a recipient of this document.    So, what’s the financial angle? From as long ago as I can remember, going back at least forty years, the sacristy of St. Peter’s has been packed with priests desiring to celebrate Holy Mass. Each priest is given a fresh amice, purificator and finger towel (which are sent to the laundry immediately after his Mass), along with an alb, cincture, stole and chasuble (which have to be cleaned regularly and eventually replaced due to use). Of course, he is also given wine and a host as well. An altar boy is assigned to bring him to an available altar, where candles are burning and electrical lighting is provided. This can add up to a hefty sum over the course of a year. If memory serves, there is a box in the sacristy, where priests can leave a donation to help defray some of the costs; I am not sure how many even notice the box!    (…)    Now, if money is the motive behind this “instruction,” why not say it? I have no doubt that any number of individuals or organizations would be more than happy to foot the bill. Another point to consider is that if the number of pilgrims hadn’t dried up due to lack of interest in this pontificate (it is important to note that the embarrassing numbers pre-date the “pandemic”), there would be more dollars and euros in the Vatican coffers.    Now, onto more substantive dimensions of this debacle.    The decree indicates that, except for the one daily Mass in Latin at 5:00 p.m., all the other public Masses will be in Italian. The Basilica does not belong to the Diocese of Rome, the Republic of Italy, or the Italian people (whom I love dearly). St. Peter’s is the home of the Church Universal, which is the precise symbolism of the colonnade’s outstretched “arms”. Since priests will now be prohibited from offering Mass for their pilgrims,1 priests and their people (from every corner of the earth) will now have to “participate” in the Sacred Liturgy in a language unknown to them. Where is Vatican II’s “full, conscious and active participation” when you need it? Under these circumstances, not only will a priest be forced to celebrate in an unknown language (will the Eucharistic Prayer at least be in Latin?), but he will be forced to concelebrate Mass – explicitly forbidden by all the documents of the Church from the Council forward.    (…)     Francis has wanted to be recognized as the Pope of “accoglienza” (welcome). Where is the hospitality for pilgrims and their priests? Where is the fatherly support for Vatican officials who, for decades, have begun their day offering Holy Mass in the Basilica, getting a coffee and pastry on the run (with their brother priests), and then heading to their offices? Further, do Parra and the Pope realize the constraints under which pilgrim groups operate? A tour guide will give a group 45 minutes for Mass; no one will be able to wait around until the next publicly scheduled Mass, which could be more than an hour away.    (…)    Some initial reactions suggested that this was a ploy to marginalize the Extraordinary Form Mass. Ironically, this does the exact opposite as it seems that priests wishing to celebrate Mass in the Usus Antiquior [“the more ancient use” or “the more ancient rite”] can do so and, ironically, in one of the most coveted spots of the Basilica, the Clementine Chapel (directly behind the present niche which is above the relics of St. Peter, so that it correlates to the present high altar of the Basilica).    Word around the Piazza is that some of the Pope’s “magic circle” have surveyed the landscape of the Basilica in the early morning hours and have been disturbed at the sight of priests (many, very young) celebrating “alone.” They take this as evidence of the “clericalism” constantly targeted by Francis, unable to distinguish between the flaw of “clericalism” and a healthy priestly identity.    A most regrettable part of the “Francis effect” of the past eight years is that priests and seminarians (and bishops, too) have known the sting of this Pope’s regularly discharged “nastigrams” at us, which contributes in a major way to the terrible level to which priestly morale has sunk during this time. It is disheartening for a “veteran” in the priesthood like myself to have to counsel young priests and seminarians not to give up on the priesthood because of what they have witnessed in this pontificate. That perception is likewise shared by many potential candidates for the seminary, which is why we have seen those numbers dry up to a most troubling degree in the past few years.    (…)    Due to the Wujan virus, many priests discovered for the first time the celebration of Holy Mass without a congregation – and they were surprised to find it spiritually uplifting. The Pope and his “collaborators” ought to be thrilled that priests on vacation (or officials of the Curia) are so devoted to the Mass that they want to offer the Eucharistic Sacrifice whenever and wherever possible. Pope John Paul II – a Pope who didn’t simply love the priesthood but loved priests – actively encouraged priests to celebrate even alone, for their own spiritual benefit but also for the benefit of the whole Church.    When would-be liturgists or left-wing ideologues condemn “private” Masses, they demonstrate an embarrassing ignorance of the cosmic nature of the Mass. No priest ever celebrates “alone,” which is precisely why the Preface of every Mass ends by reminding all that our present act of worship is being joined by all the angels and saints. It’s the fulfillment of the vision described by the Prophet Isaiah in the sixth chapter of his book.    This document needs to be walked back: it is yet another insult and assault on the priesthood and a glaring violation of ecclesial hospitality to laity who visit the church which is the common home of all believers. This is yet another self-inflicted wound, needlessly inflicted. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” – unless your goal is “to make a mess.”    Perhaps we can launch a campaign called, “Give us back our home!” It might be a good idea to register your sentiments about this matter to our Apostolic Nuncio, so that he can pass them on to those responsible at the Secretariat of State:The Most Reverend Christophe PierreApostolic Nunciature3339 Massachusetts Ave NWWashington, DC 20008    The banning of “individual” celebrations of Mass would have troubled Cardinal Newman. St. John Henry knew the meaning, beauty and power of the Mass; it pained him greatly that he couldn’t offer it for most of the last year of his life. His sorrow for that physical inability was multiplied many times over, precisely because of his appreciation for the Mass. Reflect on these words he puts on the lips of his literary alter ego in his novel, Loss and Gain:    ”To me nothing is so consoling, so piercing, so thrilling, so overcoming, as the Mass, said as it is among us. I could attend Masses forever, and not be tired. It is not a mere form of words — it is a great action, the greatest action that can be on earth. It is not the invocation merely, but, if I dare use the word, the evocation of the Eternal. Here becomes present on the altar in flesh and blood, before whom angels bow and devils tremble. This is that awful event which is the scope, and the interpretation, of every part of the solemnity.”[End Fr. Stravisnkas]==============    Cardinal Raymond Burke: His Official Statement in Response to the New Directives    Statement on the Offering of the Holy Mass in the Papal Basilica of Saint Peter    March 13, 2021    By Cardinal Raymond Leo Burkelink    On March 12, 2021, the First Section (General Affairs) of the Secretariat of State of Pope Francis published a document containing certain dispositions regarding the offering of the Holy Mass in the Papal Basilica of Saint Peter in the Vatican. The document is addressed to the Extraordinary Commissioner of the Fabric of Saint Peter (Commissario Straordinario della Fabbrica di San Pietro), the canonical institute responsible for the care of the Papal Basilica, to the Canons of the Vatican Chapter (Canonici del Capitolo Vaticano), and to the Service for Liturgical Celebrations of the Basilica (Servizio Celebrazioni liturgiche della Basilica). Both the form and content of the document rightly sustain the deepest concerns of the faithful and, above all, of priests. The concerns pertain not only to the Papal Basilica of Saint Peter, but to the universal Church, inasmuch as the Papal Basilica of Saint Peter is, in a particular way, the spiritual home for all Catholics, and, as such, should be a model of liturgical discipline for the particular Churches.    Regarding the form of the document, there are several concerns.    1. It is an unsigned document from the First Section of the Secretariat of State, without a protocol number, legislating regarding the most sacred aspect of the Church’s life, the offering of the Holy Mass. It bears the seal of the First Section with initials. While the document appears to be authentic, that is, not forged, it cannot be retained to be a document containing valid legislation for the Sacred Liturgy.    2. The Secretariat of State is not competent for the liturgical discipline of the Church and, in particular, for the liturgical discipline at the Basilica of Saint Peter in the Vatican. Rightly, one asks by what authority has the Secretariat of State issued directives which are contrary to the discipline of the universal Church. A further question regards what process was followed to arrive at the publication of such an anomalous document.    3. Given the incompetence of the Secretariat of State in the matter, the faithful have the right to know what competent authority gave the mandate to the Secretariat of State to legislate regarding the Sacred Liturgy, that is, to issue directives regarding the offering of the Holy Mass in the Papal Basilica of Saint Peter.    4. The Papal Basilica of Saint Peter in the Vatican now has a Cardinal Archpriest, but the document in question is not officially communicated to him. Neither is any reference made to his responsibility for the liturgical discipline at the Basilica confided to his care.    The content of the document is likewise a source of deepest concerns.    1. The document supposes that the Holy Masses in the Basilica of Saint Peter are presently offered in a climate lacking, in some measure, in recollection and liturgical decorum (“di raccoglimento e di decoro”). This is certainly not my experience. I know many priests, resident in Rome and visitors to Rome, who have celebrated or regularly celebrate the Holy Mass at Saint Peter’s Basilica. While they have expressed to me their profound gratitude for the opportunity to celebrate the Holy Mass in the Basilica, they have not indicated that the climate in which they have celebrated the Holy Mass in the Basilica was in any way lacking in the reverence, recollection and dignity which befits the Sacrament of Sacraments.    2. The document imposes concelebration upon priests who wish to offer the Holy Mass in Saint Peter’s Basilica, which is contrary to universal Church law and which unjustly conditions the primary duty of the individual priest to offer the Holy Mass daily for the salvation of the world (can. 902). In what church more than in the Basilica of Saint Peter would a priest desire to offer the Holy Mass, which is the most perfect and fullest way in which he carries out his priestly mission? If an individual priest wishes to offer the Holy Mass in the Basilica, once the directives in question are in force, he will be constrained to concelebrate, in violation of his freedom to offer the Holy Mass individually.    3. Regarding the individual offering of the Holy Mass, it must be observed that it is not only a question of a right of the priest but also of great spiritual fruit for the whole Church, since the infinite merits of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass are more greatly and widely applied in a manner befitting our finite and temporal nature. It is helpful to reflect upon the teaching of the Council of Trent, regarding the situation of a priest who offers the Holy Mass without any member of the faithful receiving Holy Communion. Regarding the participation of the faithful at the Holy Mass, the Council teaches: “The holy council would certainly like the faithful present at every Mass to communicate in it not only by spiritual devotion but also by sacramental reception of the Eucharist, so that the fruits of this most holy sacrifice could be theirs more fully.” It goes on to state: “But, if this does not always happen, the council does not for that reason condemn as private and illicit Masses [can. 8] in which only the priest communicates. Rather, it approves and commends them, for they too should be considered truly communal Masses, partly because the people communicate spiritually in them and partly because they are celebrated by a public minister of the Church, not for his own good alone, but for all the faithful who belong to the body of Christ” (Session XXII, Chapter 6). It should be further observed that a priest never offers the Holy Mass alone, even if there is no one else physically present, for the angels and saints assist at every offering of the Holy Mass (can. 903).    4. With regard to the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, which the document falsely calls the Extraordinary Rite, the document refers to “authorized priests”, but no priest in good standing needs authorization to offer the Holy Mass according to the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite (Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum, art. 2). What is more, the document limits the offering of the Holy Mass according to the Extraordinary Form or Usus Antiquior of the Roman Rite in the Papal Basilica of Saint Peter to the Clementine Chapel, at four fixed times. Is it supposed, therefore, that, each day, only four priests will be permitted to offer the Holy Mass according to the Usus Antiquior in the Papal Basilica of Saint Peter? Since universal Church law permits the individual priest, in such circumstances, to offer the Holy Mass, according to either the Ordinary Form (Usus Recentior) or the Extraordinary Form (Usus Antiquior), the directive in question is in direct violation of universal Church law.    5. The document also legislates that the concelebrated Masses be animated liturgically (siano animate liturgicamente) by the service of lectors and cantors. While the liturgical discipline of the Church provides for the service of lectors and cantors, it is not their purpose to animate the Sacred Liturgy. Christ alone, in Whose person the priest acts, animates the Sacred Liturgy. Therefore, it should not be thought that the individual offering of the Holy Mass is somehow less animated, in the true spiritual sense, than the concelebrated Mass.    6. For the sake of the Catholic faith and for the good order of the Sacred Liturgy, the highest and most perfect expression of the Church’s life in Christ, the document in question should be rescinded immediately, that is, before its supposed effective date of March 22nd next. Furthermore, the thinking which underlies such a document should be corrected, while the discipline of the universal Church and the liturgical doctrine which underlies it is expounded for the faithful.    In conclusion, Church discipline recognizes the right, and indeed the duty, of the Christian faithful to make known to their pastors their concerns regarding matters which pertain to the good of the Church and, likewise, to make such concerns known to all the Christian faithful (can. 212 §3). Given the gravity of the situation represented by the document in question, it is my hope that many of the Christian faithful for whom the Basilica of Saint Peter is, in a particular sense, their mother church, and, above all, many priests from throughout the world will make known to Pope Francis and to his Secretariat of State their strong objection to the document in question.    + Raymond Leo Cardinal BURKE    Rome, 13 March 2021

The Tyranny ofWoke Capital By Janet Levy American Thinker March 15, 2021 Hat Tip: Rip McIntosh Traditional American values have long been under attack by social justice warriors, cultural Marxists advancing the insidious tenets of critical theory. Their  “long march through the institutions” has infiltrated schools, universities, entertainment, the mass media, the courts, politics, and beyond. One might assume that business, adhering to the Milton Friedman doctrine of maximizing returns for shareholders, would be insulated from their malign agenda. But that assumption is no longer valid, according to Stephen Soukup’s recent book The Dictatorship of Woke Capital: How Political Correctness Captured Big Business. He illuminates how ‘progressive’ forces have insinuated themselves into regulatory agencies, the finance industry, and corporate America, jeopardizing capital markets and the free-market system itself. The book traces the genesis of American progressivism to Richard Ely (1854-1943) of Johns Hopkins University. Believing in a confused amalgam of religion, socialism, white superiority, and a paternalistic state, Ely advocated that the state should be harnessed to fix social problems like poverty, alcoholism, racial tension, and child labor in God’s name. He never presented himself as a socialist but believed God works through the state, which should heal the ills of capitalism through labor reform and compulsory education. With little faith in the canaille to vote in society’s and their own best interests, he favored a “third way”: employing professional administrators to manage society rationally, guard against laissez-faire economics, and make socialism unnecessary. This new progressivism looked at the American state as the natural, necessary “administrator” of civic life. Political scientist Dwight Waldo, the defining figure of modern public administration, refined Ely’s ideas and propounded that public servants should be “value advocates,” “agent of change,” and stewards of “social equity, democratic administration, and proactive, non-neutral public administration.” Voters and their elected representatives were to be superseded by unelected, unaccountable experts — with ostensibly better values than the people. Though it was seen as being in violation of the Constitution, Waldo wanted a central bank with an administrative elite controlling monetary policy to maintain stability. Soukup goes on to explain how contemporary left-leaning liberalism elevates these ideas of working through institutions. While Marx presumed that history was about economic conflict, the Italian communist philosopher Antonio Gramsci argued that the key struggle was cultural. To inspire a revolution and liberate the working class, it was necessary to vanquish the church and other enablers of bourgeois culture. Herbert Marcuse, a key figure of the Frankfurt School and proclaimed father of the New Left, fused Marx, Gramsci, and Freud to conclude that capitalism crushed human capacity for creativity, spontaneity, critical thought, and oppositional behavior. The Frankfurt School became the spark for Cultural Marxism to shift its focus to Critical Theory, which aims to critique power structures and undo the cultural and psychological hegemony of the bourgeois. This philosophy paved the way for the 1960s’ radical student movement. It was these alienated youths who initiated the subversion of the American university. The idea that traditional American culture was a selfish and inhibiting bourgeois false reality took hold in academia. The “march through the institutions” had begun, spreading from the universities to the professions and other domains. At this point, according to Soukup, a major obstacle to the cultural revolution was America’s rootedness in business, with its dependence on and responsibility for structure, order, production, investment, and prosperity. But a slow change began in the 1970s, with the ideas of socially responsible investment and stakeholder interests — rather than shareholder interests — taking precedence. Religious groups had wielded such influence on businesses in the 1950-60s by avoiding “sin stocks.” But now, there was a political dimension: the clout of the shareholder was used to pressure companies to accommodate social or political goals. Over the decades since then, managers have come to focus on ethical and social issues, capital markets have become politicized, and strategic business planning is mired in conflicting ideas of social justice. Since the early 2000s, businesses have been gravitating towards incorporating environmental, social, and governance (ESG) issues into investment policy. The Big Three investment management companies — BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street — are well-aligned on ESG goals. Together holding about 22% shares of the typical Standard & Poor’s 500 company. Soukup gives readers an idea of the clout they command with the example of asset manager Larry Fink of BlackRock, who manages more than $7 trillion in passive assets and $2.5 trillion in active assets. Such firms can operate independently of the will of the people, effecting change at whatever companies they choose. Their cynicism and hypocrisy are on shameless display. BlackRock is a member of Climate Action 100+, an investor group aligned with the Paris Agreement, but is one of the biggest American investors in Communist China, the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitter. It plans to expand operations and become China’s leading foreign asset manager. Ironically, in America BlackRock speaks of sustainability goals that put our companies at a competitive disadvantage to Chinese ones. Many hedge funds are players in this politicization of capital markets: they cheer autocratic China and are harshly critical of American capitalism. Government pension funds too are politically compromised: promoting progressive activism and focusing on ESG, they end up performing subpar instead of maximizing returns for pensioners. The California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS), the largest pension fund in the U.S., has $3 billion invested in China, including in Chinese military contractors. Soukup charts how activists realized in the late 1980s that they could influence capital markets to advance their political agendas and impose their moral framework on the business world. Many powerful activist nonprofits use shareholder resolutions, disavowal of pro-business trade groups, and arbitrary reports or public ratings of companies’ social responsibility policies (such as the Corporate Equality Index) to push their own goals. Even government agencies, such as the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the CFA Institute, the Federal Reserve, and central banks are in the game. The SEC has abandoned objectivism to approve of the activist, interventionist stakeholder model; the CFA has included material on ESG in its curriculum; the Fed has set up a financial infrastructure that rewards progressive interests and sees the climate change issue as one of its fiduciary responsibilities. Several major U.S. companies contribute to the “woke capital” dictatorship. Apple, with its largest manufacturing base and second-largest consumer market in China, is a staunch ESG advocate when convenient. It donates to egalitarian causes and promotes a carbon-free future, but powers just 5% of its operations with renewables, has a planned obsolescence policy that uses minerals mined through child labor in Africa and avoids $77 billion in U.S. taxes by using slave labor in China. Disney is unwilling to displease China, one of the biggest film-watching countries, but is happy to needle state government at home for legislation that serves its woke interests.  AmazonSmile relies on the hate-mongering Southern Poverty Law Center, which defunds conservative organizations by mislabeling them as “hate groups,” to approve its charitable donations. Soukup warns that we must fight to “preserve the spirit of innovation and expression that harnesses liberty to create wealth and prosperity.” The free-market economy and the American way of life are in danger. It’s time, he says, to “depoliticize business, depoliticize markets, get back to neutral.”

Bishop,

It’s worse that most of us imagined.Please remember the message of Our Lady of Fatima.
—–FYI………

My attorney friend checked this out.
I checked this out and it appears to be accurate in terms of the General’s statement. It is very disturbing that we as a country have allowed this to happen!

---

---

Soon-to-be President Kamala Harris’ background, courtesy of General
Geoffrey B. Higginbotham

Here’s a timely editorial that exposes the hidden background of Kamala
Harris from the Combat Veterans for Congress Political Action Committee that is posted
here with permission of the author. CVFC PAC supports the election of US military combat
veterans to the US Senate and House of Representatives.

“Kamala Harris father was an avowed Marxist professor in the Economics
Department at Stanford University in Palo Alto, CA. Both of Harris parents were active in
the Berkeley based Afro- American Association; Fidel Castro and Che Guevara were the
heroes of the Afro-American Association.

The group’s leader, Donald Warden (aka Khalid al-Mansour), mentored two
young Afro-American Association members, Huey Newton and Bobby Seale; they created the
Maoist inspired Black Panther Party which gained strong support from Communist China; the
Black Panther Party served as the model for creation of the Black Lives Matter Marxist
organization Khalid al-Mansour subsequently went on to arrange financing and facilitated
for Barack Hussein Obama to be accepted as a student to matriculate at Harvard Law School.

Following her graduation from college, Harris returned to California and
subsequently became the mistress of the 60-year-old married Speaker of the California
Assembly, Willie Brown, Jr. Brown’s political campaigns were supported and funded by Dr.
Carlton Goodlett, the owner of The Sun Reporter and several other pro-Communist
newspapers. Brown was elected as Mayor of San Francisco, and strongly endorsed Harris’
Marxist political philosophy; he guided Harris’ political rise in California politics,
leading to her election as California’s Attorney General. Willie Brown, Jr was a
well-known long-time Communist sympathizer. Willie Brown, Jr. was initially elected to
public office with the substantial help of the Communist Party USA. Today, Willie Brown is
widely regarded as one of the Chinese Communist Party’s best friends in the San Francisco
Bay Area.

While serving as San Francisco District Attorney, Kamala Harris mentored a
young San Francisco Radical Maoist activist, Lateefah Simon, who was a member of the STORM
Revolutionary Movement; Simon currently chairs the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) Board.
Simon has always been close friends with the founder of Black Lives Matter Marxist
Domestic Terrorists, Alicia Garza, as well as STORM member and avowed Communist, Van
Jones. Harris has been openly and aggressively supporting Black Lives Matter Marxists;
Kamala Harris is still closely associated with Maoist Lateefah Simon and Marxist Alicia
Garza.

Kamala Harris’s sister Maya Harris was a student activist at Stanford
University. She was a closely associated with Steve Phillips, one of the leading
Marxist-Leninists on campus and a long-time affiliate with the League of Revolutionary
Struggle, a pro-Chinese Communist group. Phillips came out of the Left, and in college he
studied Marx, Mao, and Lenin, and maintained close associations with fellow Communists.
Phillips married into the multibillion-dollar Sandler family of the Golden West Savings
and Loan fortune. He funded many leftist political campaigns, and the voter registration
drives in the Southern and South Western states in order to help his friend, Barack
Hussein Obama, defeat Hillary Clinton. Phillips has been a major financial sponsor for
Kamala Harris’s political campaigns for various California elective offices.

Harris’ husband, Doug Emhoff works for the law firm DLA Piper, which
boasts nearly 30 years of experience in Communist China with over 140 lawyers dedicated to
its Communist China Investment Services branch. He was just appointed to Professor at Yale
to school future lawyers in the fine points of Communism. When she was elected to the US
Senate, Kamala Harris appointed a Pro-Communist Senate Chief of Staff, Karine Jean-Pierre.
Jean-Pierre was active with the New York-based Haiti Support Network. The organization
worked closely with the pro-Communist China/Communist North Korea Workers World Party and
supported Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the far-left Communist former president of Haiti and the
radical Lavalas movement.

Fortunately for Harris, but potentially disastrous for the Republic,
elected office holders are not subject to the security clearance process. If the FBI did a
background Investigation on Kamala Harris, she never would have passed, because of her
40-year close ties with Marxists, Communists, Maoists, and Communist China. Harris would
never have been approved for acceptance to any of the 5 Military Service Academies, been
appointed to a US Government Sub-Cabinet position, or would have been approved to fill a
sensitive position for a high security defense contractor. Yet, since Joe Biden was
elected, Harris could be a heartbeat away from being President.

The US constitutional Republic is being threatened by the People’s
Republic of Communist China (PPC) externally, and by of their very active espionage
operations within the United States. The People’s Republic of Communist China (PPC), with
1.4 billion people, is governed by the 90-million-member Chinese Communist Party (CCP),
that has been working with Russia to destroy the US Constitutional Republic for over 70
years.

The CCP operates a massive global intelligence network through its
Ministry of State Security. The CCP operates a vast intelligence network in the U.S as
well. It is made up, not merely of intelligence operatives working for the Ministry of
State Security, but it is also made up of a myriad of business and industry officials,
Chinese scholar asscociations, and 370,000 Chinese students currently attending American
universities. It also operates the Confucius Institute indoctrination and intelligence
gathering centers in the US on 67 University campuses and in seventeen K-12 Public School
Districts. The Confucius Centers are staffed by Communist Chinese intelligence operatives.
Refer to this.

Kamala Harris is now involved with the Biden Family Business, and is
supporting Joe Biden, who has worked closely with Communist China for 12 years. Joe’s son,
Hunter Biden, is the point of contact for developing the off-shore Biden Family Businesses
in Ukraine, Russia, Communist China, Iraq, Iran, etc. Hunter was provided with a $5
million non-recourse loan for the Biden Family Business to form a partnership with the
PPC; that loan was subsequently forgiven by Communist China for one dollar.

Hunter Biden was given $1.5 billion for the Biden Family Business, to
strategically purchase interests in companies in the US Military Industrial Complex, whose
technologies would enhance and improve Communist China’s defense industry. Hunter Biden
was also instructed to try to take control of US companies involved in sourcing rare earth
minerals in the United States. Hunter also received $3.5 Million from the wife of the
Mayor of Moscow for some carefully hidden reason.

The Peoples Republic of Communist China has a military of two million men,
including the world’s largest Navy. The United States does not have enough ships and
munitions to defeat China’s Navy, absent the use of nuclear weapons. There is a famous
book, Unrestricted Warfare, written in 1999 by two People’s Liberation Army colonels. It
argues that war between the PRC and the U.S. is inevitable, and that when it occurs China
must be prepared to use whatever means are necessary to achieve victory Refer to this.

If the American voters read the background information (in Trevor Loudon’s
article) on Kamala Harris, they would never support her election as Vice President of the
United States. Joe Biden is suffering from the early onset of dementia and will continue
to decline in cerebral awareness; he will never be able to fill out a four-year term of
office. Since Biden was elected, the Socialists, Marxists, and Communist who control
Kamala Harris, are planning to enact provisions of the 25th Amendment, in order to remove
Joe Biden from office, so Harris can become the first Communist President of the United
States.

Since Biden was elected, because Biden would not be up to it, Kamala
Harris would lead the effort to appoint very dangerous anti-American Leftist, Communist,
Socialists, and Marxists to fill highly sensitive positions in the Washington Deep State
Bureaucracy. She would fill all appointive positions in the US Intelligence Agencies, in
the Department of Homeland Security, in the Department of Defense, in The Justice
Department, the Department of State, the FBI, the CIA, most cabinet positions, the
National Security Council, and in the White House Staff.

American voters must alert their fellow Americans that Kamala Harris is a
very serious National Security threat to the very survival of the US Constitutional
Republic; she has been a fellow traveler of Marxists, Communists, Maoists, Socialists,
Progressives, and Chinese Communists for over 35 years. President Trump had much more
background information on Kamala Harris than we presented here, and he was correct, when
he accused Kamala Harris of being a Communist subverter.”

Geoffrey B. Higginbotham
Major General, USMC (Ret.)