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Fauci, DC Mayor Muriel Bowser Rejected Trying to Sell Vax Door-to-Door in Awkward Video
Dr. Anthony Fauci and DC Mayor Muriel Bowser got roundly rejected when they went door to door pitching the COVID-19 vaccine at the height of the pandemic, newly unearthed video shows.
A clip from the upcoming episode of PBS’ “American Masters” series shows Fauci, 82, and the Democratic mayor making the rounds in the Anacostia neighborhood in June 2021, Fox News reported. “They’re sort of the disenfranchised group that we’ve got to reach out to,” Fauci says to the camera, referring to the residents of the historically black neighborhood where vaccination rates were low.
One man greeted the duo with a heavy dose of skepticism. “So, I’m not going to be lining up taking a shot on a vaccination for something that wasn’t clear in the first place,” he tells the top doc and Bowser. “Nine months is definitely not enough for nobody to be taking no vaccination that you all came up with,” he says when Fauci tells him how long it took to develop the jab.
He remains unconvinced and expresses misgivings about various incentives that were offered at the time to people who agreed to be vaccinated. “When you start talking about paying people to get vaccinated, when you start talking about incentivizing things to get people vaccinated, it’s something else going on with that,” he says.
At least 60,000 DC residents contracted COVID-19 despite getting the shot, according to the city’s website.
Social Media Is Devastating Teens’ Mental Health. Here’s What Parents Can Do.
If we are serious about addressing the alarming worsening of teens’ mental health, we must reduce their social media use.
The connection is well-established. Abundant research has linked depression and self-harm to the frequency of social media use. And a new study from the American Psychological Association shows that cutting back helps teens feel better. Companies are aware of this; Facebook executive-turned-whistleblower Frances Haugen revealed that the company’s own research found that the use of their platforms was linked to anxiety, depression and body image issues in teens.
Indeed, social media is creating a “perfect storm” for girls, Jelena Kecmanovic, a psychotherapist and adjunct psychology professor at Georgetown University, told me. “Their tendency to be a perfectionist and hard on themselves during their tween and teen years gets magnified thousands of times in the online culture of comparison,” she said.
Pediatrician Michael Rich, who co-founded and directs the Clinic for Interactive Media and Internet Disorders at Boston Children’s Hospital, explained to me that he treats teens who “struggle with physical, mental and social health issues” from excessive social media use. He has seen straight-A students’ grades plummet and young adults struggle to forge relationships after entering college.
Democratic Senator Presses Tech Companies About AI’s Threat to Teens
Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) has written a letter to the executives of major tech firms raising concerns about the danger artificial intelligence technology poses to younger users and asking for more information about safety features after a series of disturbing reports.
Bennet noted that social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Google and Snap are moving quickly to harness generative artificial intelligence by developing AI personas and exploring how to fuse AI into texting and image-sharing apps.
Bennet acknowledged what he called the technology’s “enormous potential,” but warned, “the race to integrate it into everyday applications cannot come at the expense of younger users’ safety and wellbeing.”
His letter comes at a time when a growing number of lawmakers in both parties are paying more attention to the potential dangers posed by social media platforms such as TikTok, a popular video service that some policymakers want to ban entirely.
DeSantis Unveils Plan to Battle Biden’s ‘Efforts to Inject a Centralized Bank Digital Currency’
Governor Ron DeSantis (R-FL) revealed a proposal on Monday meant to combat the possible implementation of a central bank digital currency by the Federal Reserve and the Biden administration.
Critics of a potential central bank digital currency note that the asset, which would be managed by the Federal Reserve and tethered to the value of the dollar, would create opportunities for government surveillance and control of private citizens.
DeSantis proposed legislation that would ban the recognition of central bank digital currencies, whether from the federal government or an overseas central bank, as money under Florida’s Uniform Commercial Code. “The Biden administration’s efforts to inject a Centralized Bank Digital Currency is about surveillance and control,” DeSantis said in a press release.
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell has said that his “mind is open” to a central bank digital currency and added that he was “legitimately undecided” on whether the “benefits outweigh the costs.” Monetary policymakers recently conducted a simulation with Citi, Mastercard, BNY Mellon, and other companies to determine the “feasibility of payments between financial institutions” using the technology.
New York School Vaccination Rules Left Intact by Supreme Court
The U.S. Supreme Court refused to consider forcing New York to give more children medical exemptions from the state’s school vaccine requirements. The justices, without comment, turned away an appeal by parents who claimed the state violated their constitutional rights when it put in place stricter rules for medical exemptions in 2019.
The new rules require exemptions to be based on a nationally recognized standard of care, such as those contained in guidelines issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The Supreme Court has repeatedly turned away challenges to state and local vaccine mandates for schoolchildren and government workers.
Bill Gates Plots a Global Pandemic Prison State
An epic disaster like the COVID response, one might suppose, should inspire some humility and rethinking on how public health could have gone so wrong. They had their run at it but created a global disaster for the ages.
This is more than obvious to any competent observer. The next step might be to see if there are any places where matters went rather well, and Sweden comes first to mind. The educational losses were non-existent because they didn’t close schools. In general, life went on as normal and with very good results.
One might suppose the Swedish way would be vindicated. Sadly, our leaders care nothing for evidence, apparently. Their concern is for power and money at any cost. As a result, we are witnessing a concerted effort not only to double down on errors the next time but make them even worse.
The top two exhibits emerged over the weekend. New York Times: “We’re Making the Same Mistakes Again” by Bill Gates. Wall Street Journal: “What Worked Against COVID: Masks, Closures and Vaccines” by Tom Frieden (former head of CDC).
Gates deploys his privileged place at the New York Times to agitate once again for a Global Health Emergency Corps, ensconced at the World Health Organization and managed by the same people who created the pandemic response this time around. In other words, it would be the core of the global government pushing more lockdowns for the world — lockdowns to wait for another round of vaccines.
Perhaps the Most Disruptive Technology in History Is Coming and It’s Expected to Change Everything. Businesses and Marketers Need to Get Quantum Ready.
Quantum computing involves the transfer and computation of information at the sub-atomic level. According to a January 2023 article in Time Magazine as well as other sources, quantum computers can calculate millions of times faster than a personal computer.
Quantum is expected to dramatically increase the capabilities of artificial intelligence. It can process many different scenarios simultaneously, to optimize solutions to problems. Vs. today’s computer algorithms, quantum algorithms can be trained faster, you can run more hypotheses, and it’s better at determining correlations from massive amounts of data. Complex problems that would take several years for classical computers to figure out, can be solved in seconds with quantum.
The World Economic Forum estimated global public spending on quantum technology was $30 billion in 2022, with China making up approximately half, the European Union almost another quarter, and the remaining quarter spread primarily among nine countries, including the U.S., Canada, Japan, the U.K., Singapore and Israel.
In terms of private investment, the U.S. and EU lead, with 59 and 53 quantum computing startups respectively. There were only two startups in all of South America, and none in Africa.
Google Rolls Out Its Bard Chatbot to Battle ChatGPT
Google isn’t used to playing catch-up in either artificial intelligence or search, but today the company is hustling to show that it hasn’t lost its edge. It’s starting the rollout of a chatbot called Bard to do battle with the sensationally popular ChatGPT.
Bard, like ChatGPT, will respond to questions about and discuss an almost inexhaustible range of subjects with what sometimes seems like humanlike understanding. Google showed WIRED several examples, including asking for activities for a child who is interested in bowling and requesting 20 books to read this year.
Google says it has made Bard available to a small number of testers. From today anyone in the U.S. and the U.K. will be able to apply for access.
Bard and ChatGPT show enormous potential and flexibility but are also unpredictable and still at an early stage of development. That presents a conundrum for companies hoping to gain an edge in advancing and harnessing the technology. For a company like Google with large established products, the challenge is particularly difficult.
Texas Bill Limiting Power to Impose Mask, Vaccine Mandates Moves Forward
Senate Bill 29 now moves ahead in the Texas Senate. Lawmakers voted 7 to 3 to send it to the full Senate floor. The bill prohibits mask and vaccine mandates, and local governments from shutting down businesses and schools.
“The short answer is it only applies to COVID-19 and its subordinate variants. It does not apply to any future unknown virus,” said State Rep. Brian Birdwell (R-Granbury).
“I want to get the principles straight for the future so that lockdowns and mandates and vax mandates never again are visited upon the people of Texas,” said Tom Glass, Texas Constitutional Enforcement Group.
An identical bill was filed in the Texas House. Both must be passed in order for the legislation to make it to the governor’s desk.
NC House Bill Takes First Step That Would Prevent Some Government Agencies From Mandating COVID Vaccines
Winston-Salem Journal reported:
The intense debate over whether to mandate COVID-19 vaccines for certain government agencies and political subdivisions resurfaced during Tuesday’s first N.C. House committee hearing.
House Bill 98, titled “Medical Freedom Act, cleared the House Health committee after nearly 25 minutes of debate. Its next stop is House Judiciary 1 committee. Biggs presented HB98 as a bill that “gives voice to the voiceless,” particularly individuals and parents who believe or feel the COVID-19 vaccine development has been rushed and remains incomplete.
The bill would prohibit city, county and state government agencies and certain political subdivisions from requiring COVID-19 vaccinations for employees.
The bill, however, does not affect other required vaccinations for K-12 public school students, including diphtheria, tetanus, whooping cough, polio, red measles (rubeola) and rubella.
