COVID VACCINE HOW DOES IT WORK?

 There is a great deal of fear and misinformation circulating about the new vaccine.  

Too many people are simply fearful of the new Phizer / BioNTech  vaccine a collaboration between American Phizer company and German BioN tech.  That is unfortunate since a vaccine will be effective only if a good majority of the population is vaccinated.  I offer here my very simplified version of a highly complex process to help those who are not certain that they should take this step. 

 The word “vaccine” is derived from that for “cow” or  la vacca”.  Why?  

In the 18^th century cows were the source of the vaccine.  Deadly small pox plagues date back to the ancient Egyptians and has infected humans with horrible deadly consequences for thousands of years with a mortality rate which often killed one third of the people infected. Furthermore, those who  survived were often cruelly disfigured with many deep pockmark scars.   These ugly telltale scars figured in the way a vaccine was finally developed for the disease. 

In ancient China, where such plagues are common even in modern times , physicians took note of the fact that survivors of the disease, easily identified as those who had the disfiguring marks on their faces, were protected from a repeat infection. 

 The Chinese  began a form of “vaccination” in which a scraping of the pus from the pustule of an infected person was rubbed  into a scratch  on the skin of another individual. This inoculation of disease germs into the skin  would cause an eruption at the site.  The inoculated person contracted a milder form of the disease.  The vaccinated person was protected from the full force of the disease yet was still faced with with a 3% mortality rate! (Today Covid 19 has a fatality rate of @ 1.4% and we consider that level very threatening. )  But for the ancient Chinese inoculation was a good deal. The inoculation with pus decreased the possibility of death from 33 per 100 down to  3 out of 100.  This was a great improvement.   But one can understand  that the persistent mortality figures for those who were vaccinated  were the outstanding reason why these vaccinations  w ere feared and avoided. 

Centuries later in England, where small pox was a frequent and feared visitor, it was often noted  that milk maids and cow herders were almost all free from the disease and as well the scourge of the all too common, disfiguring pock marks. 

Very few  of these dairy workers  ever contracted or died of the disease.  Early on physicians  of that era ( one was Edward Jenner in 1796) made a connection between the fact that cows were often infected with a mild disease called “cow pox” and milk maids (who were in close daily contact with cows for milking)  often contracted  the same illness. But as a result of that infection, they were it seemed  protected from the much more deadly and disfiguring  “small pox”.  

To later investigators it was clear that what was happening.  The introduction  of disease germs into the human body caused a physiological reaction. The body recognized the cow pox virus as an “invader” and it created antibodies to attack and kill these invading organisms.  These same antibodies were then ready and primed to attack and kill the very similar but more deadly small pox germs if and when they entered the body. 

 Late in the 18^th  Century  Dr. Jenner popularized the practice of “vaccination” by taking a bit of pus from the pustule on the skin of a sick cow infected with cowpox,  make a scratch on the skin of the person to be inoculated and  smear the pus into the wound.  The “vaccinated” person did get sick, but only with a mild-disease....perhaps a few pustules and a mild fever.   They would recover, but were then protected from the fearful, deadly and disfiguring small pox. Jenner concluded that  that those who had been inoculated or “vaccinated” with cow pox had produced and army of antibodies primed to attack any similar appearing invader organisms. 

Here in the American colonies of that era, Benjamin Franklin the autodidact, scientist,  publisher, politician and polymath was well aware of and an advocate for the process of vaccination to protect the people from small pox. Franklin experienced the “plague” as a young man when small pox ravaged Boston in 1721.  

During the 1775 plague however, Benjamin Franklin was unable to convince his wife, that their son Benji should be vaccinated.  Franklin regretted his hesitation to the end of his days when little “Benji”, his dearly loved and only legitmate son —succumbed to the disease.  

An outbreak of small pox  during the Revolutionary War from 1775 to 1782 threatened to weaken and decimate the American troops and end the glorious uprising prematurely, but  George Washington (who also had first hand knowledge of this disease ( and scars to prove it) made the  bold decision to inoculate all of his Continental Army troops with cow pox.  Though there were many who were fearful of the process, most troops obeyed the command and the feared impact of the plague on battle readiness did not impact the Continental forces as some had feared. 

So with this history,  it is clear that though vaccinations are effective,  the associated  negative results have had an oversized impact on public perception —and these have been remembered more than the overall successes.

 But this new “vaccine” from Phizer is something as different from Jenner’s cow pox vaccinations and our own flu and polio vaccines  as  today’s most advanced Tesla electric car is from the old Ford “Model T” of which the only similarity is that both vehicles have four wheels.

The Phizer BioNtech vaccine does not use weakened viruses or parts of the SARS Covid 19 virus to create a form of the virus to inject into the patient to generate the   antibody reaction.  It’s labs have no covid virus and there is no chance of contamination. 

The ingenious researchers have created a protein from “scratch” that mimics the chemical make up of the now so familiar spikes on the “corona” of this now infamous spike-crowned virus.  

It is the spike on the crown of the corona virus which is used to “poke” through the cell membrane of the host cell (human) in the nasal passages or lungs. Once inside the virus takes over that cell’s mechanisms and converts it into a “factory” to make new virus cells. When that invaded cell dies the newly formed corona viruses pour out to infect other cells as they multiply exponentially.  The result is that the patient gets sick—some say they feel like they were “hit by a train”—some die.

The new vaccine uses advanced genetic processes to chemically produce a protein which looks just like the protein which make up the spike on the corona virus.  The  researchers wrapped  this protein in a fatty globule (lipid) to protect it and to permit it to pass through the cell membrane of a human cell.  The cell membranes are also made of fatty lipid substances.  

Once inside the cell, this “mimic of the spike protein” is programmed to encourage  the cell to reproduce copies of itself of this spike protein.  The “protein like spikes” fill the cell and when that cell dies,  the mimic spike proteins are released into the body, which like in other cases we have described above are seen as “invaders”.  The body makes antibodies against these invader “spikes” which then  course all through the body.

The inoculated person’s blood is now primed with antibodies against the spike proteins of any invading corona virus.   They will attack the spikes on the virus and either kill it or prevent it from invading host cells. 

If infected with the SARS Corona virus, the blood cells of the inoculated individual will  recognize these spike proteins  as invaders for which they are prepared with a myriad of antibodies. They attack the spike structures and  disable the virus’  ability to invade or enter host cells and thus prevent the multiplication of the virus. 

Phizer’s vaccine is said to be 95% effective.  Do not make the mistake  Benjamin Franklin made! Go for it!!.  This vaccine can save your life. 

This Phizer vaccine is claimed to be effective against recent new strains of the virus. I suspect that the reason for this is that the Phizer antibodies are designed to target the spike proteins which are more likely to remain stable even as the genetic make up of the virus itself evolves.  

.  That is my unsupported hypothesis    A guess only. 

FRENCH GLOBAL SECURITY LAW IS APPROPRIATE, ESSENTIAL AND SHOULD BE PASSED

MODERN SOCIETIES MUST PASS LAWS TO PROTECT  BOTH POLICE AS WELL AS  THE RIGHT OF FREE SPEECH AND ASSEMBLY.   

TO FAIL IS TO DESCEND INTO MOB RULE. 

France, in alignment with its long history and intellectual traditions, in the face of modern challenges— still remains a clear thinking rational state —determined to protect itself from extermination.  This is in stark contrast with the “new America” which has become unhinged, obsessed with sexual orientation, alleged racism, pampering whining “victims” of every stripe, and feminized males who claim they are “privileged ” and should be punished for it.  

The French, in their rational Gallic wisdom and witnesses to the descent of much of America  into chaos over the violent BLM riots last year, clearly understand the  existential danger posed to the modern state by the juxtaposition of the ubiquitous iPhone and broad  access to the internet.   

In modern America, a teenager with an iPhone and a internet connection could,  by abusing the right of free speech (as in  “yelling ‘fire’ in a movie theater”) could bring down a government and a nation. We have laws which control the right to free speech they must be applied to the use of the internet too. 

France, facing threats to social stability from violent demonstrations, and recent threats from Moslem extremism, has drafted  a “global security law” which attempts to balance the issues of freedom of expression  with the need for a robust and effective police force. 

Watching from across the Atlantic, French parliamentarians were witness to how quickly a city police force formerly seen  as “a premier functioning institution”  could be turned from stalwart defenders of society and it legitimate laws into passive, armed and uniformed  observers of crime and violence and “avid avoiders” of confrontation in the wink of a camera’s eye. 

TV footage of New York’s “finest” standing by and acting as passive  “observers of crime”  or “submissive targets of spittle, bottles, bricks,  Molotov cocktails and worse” as the rioters looted and destroyed  private and public property. And in more than one case the “uniforms” had to retreat like escaping convicts from their own precinct houses, which were then burned to the ground by rioters. 

In these confrontations any police officer attempting to actually control rioters, or apprehend violent perpetrators were faced with a difficult conundrum:   “If I actually subdue and arrest this person (what I am trained and paid to do) and someone photographs me, I may be charged with ‘brutality’ may be dismissed, lose my pension, be charged with a crime, and have to hire an expensive  attorney to defend myself in court. And, if I am convicted, I might even end up in prison in close quarters with the criminals I helped incarcerate.  Or I can simply turn away, ignore the rioter torching a store, or a senior citizen being beaten by bat-wielding criminals, and go about on my way as a regularly paid unconfrontational and safe “uniformed observer of crime.”  

What decision do most officers make? Yes!  Most are likely to act  just as self defensively and rationally as the French and will protect his/her family, income and life.   

What French parliamentarians had to face was the obvious pernicious  effects this new technology would have on the French police force and on the nation’s security.   If police no longer confront criminals, they no longer a function to enforce the laws which the people and the people’s  representatives enact. Such a state descends from the rule of law to a nation ruled by mobs.  

Paris would morph into Doge City of the 1850s.  

France, a nation served by rational parliamentarians made the realization that they must say NO to mob rule and support the police to insure the security of a peaceful functioning nation.  To do otherwise would be to cast the nation and its citizenry adrift into lawlessness and mob rule.  That would result in its citizens being “on their own” in any confrontation with an evildoer—as most resident of New York City now find themselves.  

In cites where mobs rule,  crime  goes up, foot traffic goes down, insurance costs goes up, taxes ruse, businesses abandon high crime cities, property values fall, residents relocate, taxes go up as populations decline and whole economies collapse.  

It’s clear that for a nation to survive, its police must be protected from malicious imagery published on the internet to create intentional harm to a police officer while that officer of the law is attempting to perform his or her professional responsibilities. 

About four weeks ago the French PM, Emanuel Macron announced a new Global Security law for France.  It  included a provision, Article 24, which would make photographing a police officer while in his/her  official capacity as a law officer an offense punishable  by a year in prison and/or a €50,000 fine.  

The far left and the  UN and misguided others have claimed (unwisely) the  law is “controversial” since it limits the rights of those who would report on police practices.  Though there is no limit on such reportage and in fact there are many avenues for complainants to make their case.  

What should be limited is the unwarranted invasion of a photographer into a situation of which the details of the the confrontation, the facts of the case, the context in which the actions are being taken etc. etc.  etc. These photographic invasions and internet dispersions are snippets of behavior which often have little to do with the actual facts of the case,  and are subject to be  misperceived and misused. But their most pernicious effect is on the chilling effect it has on the behavior of police. 

Perhaps sanity will return to America and our Congress will enacts a similar global security law that would protect the rights of police officers to freely and effectively function as those who are tasked with enforcing the laws the people’s representatives enact.  To do less is to submit to the mob!

ON MENHADEN AND MAN. THE BUNKER ARE MAKING THEIR FALL RUN!

 The Atlantic Menhaden (Brevoortia tyrannus) a member of the herring (Clupeidae) family is found in huge schools along our east coast from Maine to northernmost  Florida. Menhaden are  a “forage fish” and perhaps one of the most important fish species in the Atlantic Ocean.  A forage fish serves as prey and a food source for other species in the food chain. They are the first steps of the food chain (or trophic level) and serve by converting the ocean’s primary producers ( algae or phytoplankton) into edible food for larger species. And yet, despite its essential and critical import this common fish is the most under rated, maligned, misidentified, mismanaged, misused  and misunderstood fish species in our local waters.

Menhaden is one of the few species which has retained the name used by native Americans.  The term “Menhaden” is said to be a corruption of the Algonquian unprepossessing term for this species which means: “that which is used as fertilizer”.  The first colonists, who were befriended by Algonquian-speaking native Americans introduced the new-comers  to the hugely abundant Menhaden and to the fact that this fish was also essential to insure a good corn crop. The English colonists assumed it was not necessarily good for much else, and this negative view of the species has continued on though history.  ( Though later colonists in the 1800s realized that since so many other critters were consuming it, it was probably good to eat too, and began preparing it and consuming it as Europeans prepared sardines.)     

Locally , here on Long Island’s north shore, these fish are called “bunker”, short for another name for this fish: “Mossbunker”.   Like so many other local New York names and words, this term is of colonial Dutch origin.  The “horse mackerel” of the Netherlands, called by the local Dutch colonists of New York “marsbanker” has a passing resemblance to our local Brevoortia. The early Dutch colonists simply applied this name to a similar though unrelated fish. It has remained in the vernacular...shortened often to simply “bunker”. 

The Atlantic Menhaden or “bunker” is by any account an attractive fish. It is bluish black above and white below, its  silvery sides are tinged with a brassy luster.  The sea- blue color  of its dorsal surface probably makes it nearly invisible from above, protecting from   its many avian predators, while the white of its belly helps to camouflage it against predators from below. The  fins and lovely deep forked  tail are tinged with yellow. A large black spot is located behind the eye and often several smaller spots are found along its sides.   Its mouth is large with the  lower “jaw”  continuing  to a point behind the level of the eye.  The mouth is rigid and horny.  The jaws are toothless to the touch. With the mouth pried open one can observe  its “gill rakers” arising as two lines of closely spaced, soft,  pliable “comb teeth ”   likely composed of cartilage-covered! soft  tissues which apparently also exude a sticky  mucous.  The gill raker “comb teeth”  are close spaced (@ 1-2 mm apart)  and these arise from both sides of the inner jaw.  In the anterior of the mouth one observes what appears to be the developmental remnant of a short tongue. Another bulbous  double “U” shaped organ is located in the back  of the mouth, and perhaps may be used to sweep the gill rakers clean when the fish swallows the trapped plankton which has accumulated on the raker teeth. 

These gill rakers reveal why Bunker, as any fisherman knows, will not take a baited hook or a lure, since they are wholly filter feeders (animals which filter food from the water which surrounds them)  just like the great baleen or Right Whales of the North Atlantic, as well as basking sharks and even invertebrates such as mussels and oysters. 

Menhaden feed only on plankton, those living organisms which float just below the surface of the water in the sunlit zone.  The Menhaden swim with their mouths open in this level, through  the clouds of microscopic plankton on which they feed.  It is well  documented that the Atlantic Menhaden feeds on both phytoplankton (plants like algae) as well as zooplankton. The former is the “green grass” of the sea, and the latter, are tiny floating organisms (ostracods, copepods, tiny crabs, larvae of shellfish etc.) which feed directly on the algae. 

The phytoplankton ( green plants) use sunlight and  chlorophyll as well as the nutrients dissolved in the sea water in the presence of sunlight to produce complex carbohydrates, oils and proteins which constitute the living, floating organism.  Like any green garden plant, besides water and sunlight  they require  copious levels of nutrients such as nitrates and phosphates to flourish.  

In the open ocean, there is obviously no scarcity of water and oxygen,  but just as in our home gardens,  bright sunlight is essential. That variable is controlled by the seasons.. So we would expect blooms of algae and the filter feeder fish which feed on algae and other plankton to appear in the spring.  As expected, the algal blooms  coincide with high concentrations of nutrients in the water and the increased sunlight-duration (longer days) and sunlight-intensity ( sun higher above horizon resulting in more intense solar radiation overhead).    For these reasons schools  of Menhaden and shoals other filter feeder fish arrive in the spring,, encouraging the commercial and sports fisherman to oil up their equipment and head out to sea or shoreline. 

But these same Menhaden reappear again in the Fall.  Why?  

It seems counter intuitive. In  fall  the temperatures decline, sunlight duration and intensity are  decreasing,  and storms churn up the surface waters.  So what attracts the Menhaden back into Long Island Sound every Fall? 

The answer to that is besides water and sunlight,  green plants (like  the tomato plant in your home garden) are dependent on adequate nutrients.  After a summer of flourishing  growth a gardener would be wise to replenish the nutrients in the soil for their fall plantings.  And in this same manner the ocean phytoplankton are also dependent upon an adequate concentration of nutrients in the water column.

All spring and summer sea water nutrients are slowly used up as they are converted by algae into other organisms in the food chain—zooplankton, small fish,  and bigger fish.  These organisms which feed on the primary producers —live in the water and release metabolic wastes, which sink to the bottom, and then they are eaten by others,  or they die and sink to the bottom where further decay and nutrient releases occur. All of these processes result in nutrients sinking from the top of the water column to concentrate at depth, often out of the photic sunny zone.

But beside the fact that all summer long living organisms slowly deplete nutrients in the upper portion of the water column, but in addition, the top layer of the water column has been warming up as well.   Sunlight penetrates into the upper layer, warming it, while summer storms also tend to mix warm air into the top warm layer of water.  Warm water is less dense than the cooler deep water. The warm water forms a discrete layer which sits on top of the water column. In L I Sound it by mid summer it produces a stable  “warm water cap”  of perhaps 30 feet thick in this “layer cake effect” water column.   Below this warm water cap temperatures fall quickly, this boundary zone, where temperature  changes most rapidly is called the  “thermocline” .

 As noted above in LI Sound this boundary occurs at perhaps thirty feet ( @10 m) or thereabouts below the surface and varies from year to year.  Since the warm water is of a lower density than the deeper cooler more dense water, the two layers do not mix.  Swimmers and divers can often observe this sharp change in temperature.  It is within this upper warm layer that most of the biological activity takes place during the spring and summer seasons. 

The result of the presence of the “warm water cap” and the algal blooms and zooplankton growth which occur there is that critical nutrients for plant growth are soon depleted in this warm zone.   By late summer and early fall, nutrient levels in this upper layer are at their lowest point.  As fall approaches there is still enough light for plants to grow, but the limiting factor for plant growth  is the low level of “fertilizer” nutrients such as nitrates, nitrites and phosphates in the upper warm water layer.

But at this time in the fall, something very interesting happens—it is known as the “Fall Turnover”.  As the cool season proceeds storms churn up the top water layer, sun light decreases and air temperatures drop,  all of which tend to lower the temperature of the surface water cap. By mid November the average temperature of Sound surface waters have fallen almost 20 degrees F (11C) from their high in August.  At some point in this period of the year  the upper warm water layer cools to the temperate of the deeper water, the thermocline dyiappears and the two zones mix as the  warm water cap or “layer cake” pattern breaks down.   At that point deeper, nutrient rich, water can then mix freely with the top nutrient poor  water. This  Fall Turnover is the moving of nutrient rich bottom to thr top into sun light. This is a time for fishermen and others to mark on their calendars. 

At the time of the Fall Turnover surface water temperatures are still well above their winter minimums, nutrient levels are restored to spring levels, sunlight is still more than adequate for photosynthesis and algae are present  in the water. All these factors set the stage for  a resurgence of algal growth and a similar rise  in zooplankton populations.  That sets the stage for the return of the Menhaden which feed on these plankton blooms.  

Then the surface waters are rippled from below and sparkle in the sun as  the subsurface movement of vast impressive schools of Menhaden —the Bunker— begin the fall run.  As boats approach the densely packed blue back dorsal surfaces of bunker schools descend to deeper water and then raise again to continue their open mouthed pursuit of plankton during their  fall run in the Sound.  The huge schools, hundreds or thousands of feet across. enter the estuaries and bays where they furrow the water like cat’s paws of wind. .  They attract predator fish such as Weakfish, Bluefish, Striped Bass and  mammals such  as seals, and in early days even dolphins and toothed whales.  But the massive number crowding into tight harbors and shallow water often reduces water oxygen concentrations, and some fish die or become disoriented and strand on shore. Others are attacked by predators from above and below.  With such large numbers in the water many die and waves wash them to shore. 

During the fall, fisherman and beach walkers often observe large numbers of Menhaden  dead or dying along the strand lines of our north shore Long Island  beaches.  Over several excursions counting stranded fish and estimating distances covered I reckon that tens of thousand s of fish are stranded on our Long Island beaches each time the Menhaden make their seasonal runs.

Though the number estimates of stranded fish  seems like a lot of “dead fish”, it is only a tiny fraction of the the commercial landings of this important, nay critical, forage fish species which is so important over such a an extensive geographic range comprising all of the Atlantic east coast,  Some recent data (Wikipedia: Atlantic Menhaden dl: 12/2020) indicate that commercial purse seiners in 2015 were permitted to  take  approximately 200,000 metric tons off this fish, or roughly 400,000,000 pounds ( or about that many individual one lb fish). Other estimates indicate as much as 500,000 metric tons or half a million metric tons of fish were landed annually in earlier dates.  

The federal agencies which partly control commercial fishing as well as commercial fishermen themselves suggest that the stocks of menhaden are not “overfished”.  There is a technical definition for this term.  But one does not have to be an expert on fish management to understand that by removing the huge numbers (in hundreds of thousands of  tons) of a major forage fish from the coastal ocean to make fish oil, lipstick, animal feed, and fish oil pills —simply  denies this same  amount of hundreds of thousands of metric tons of of food resource to  the many species which have evolved over the millennia to depend on the menhaden as a source of sustenance. Clearly, if we remove this much food from the sea,  we must expect we are denying food to other species and thus must expect a decline in those species of fish and other creatures which depend on that species for survival.  

Keep in mind all wild species live on the knife edge between bare survival  and starvation. Even very small changes in population of a first line forage fish such as the Atlantic Menhaden can be expected to have a deleterious effect on those species which have evolved over thousands of years to depend on the seasonal abundance of these fish.  Thus we must expect such species as the weakfish, striped bass, bluefish, seals, dolphins, and other species which depend on bunker for sustenance to respond by falling in population levels. 

There is no “free lunch” in the sea.  There is no “excess fish stocks” which we can remove without effect on the entire ecological system. In nature every species is part of a tightly connected food web of predator and prey, of food and energy distribution  Change the system somewhere and you will alter the system.  The alterations may be irreversible and catastrophic to certain dependent species.  

So when a fisherman asks: Where did the stripers and bluefish go?  The answer may be: “Sorry but we made a choice, we chose  lipstick and fish oil supplement pills!  

Make your choice.Which would you rather have?

*

FRENCH GLOBAL SECURITY LAW PROTECTS POLICE AND ALL CIVIL SOCIETY

 FRENCH “GLOBAL SECURITY” LAW PROTECTS POLICE AND ALL CIVIL SOCIETY  

WITHOUT SUCH LAWS WE TURN PARIS AND NEW YORK INTO  “DODGE CITY” 

Recently, the French parliament has proposed and green lighted a “global security” law which aims to protect the police from those who would maliciously photograph officers while in the conduct of their duty.  The law would impose a stiff fine and or a jail sentence of as much as a year in prison on offenders. 

A casual observer might wonder what is the motivation? 

The French are a practical people who suffered through being the battleground of two world wars and have a long national history, punctuated by violence, uprisings, civil unrest stemming from their past colonial history etc. etc.  The citizenry suffered through their violent past and understand the importance of balancing the two cardinal objectives of any functioning central government: to keep the peace and enforce the laws of the state, as well, to protect the right of peaceful politicalr protest. 

There is a fine line that every functioning state must adhere to. It has to protect the rights of all its citizens to live in a law abiding  and orderly nation where citizens can conduct business and live in peace and security, and on the other hand it must also protect the rights of free assembly and free speech guaranteed to its citizens. 

Sadly, the French and the rest of the world at large have been witness in recent  months to fearful violent events in the USA where the excesses of officials of local and state governments ignor3d their function to keep the peace and enforce laws and under pressure from rioters undermined police function in an attempt to protect not only peaceful demonstrators  but even those who stooped to lawlessness,arson, looting, and horrible acts of violence.  .

The act of permitting police to be photographed and then using these evidences agasint them in a malicious manner has too often counter productive, dangerous and unwanted outcomes. It undermines the essential function of a state to protect its citizenry from lawlessness, violence and property damage. A civil productive, economically viable society can not survive in a “Dodge City”. We need an effective police force and law enforcement first. The French have made the right decision.  Order first...then justice and demonstrations can all  be possible. Nothing can be accomplished in a Dodge City. 

In Dodge City the only justice comes at the end of a baseball bat or the smoking muzzle of a gun. 

The French clearly are opposed to falling into a similar morass of riots and violence  They are a nation with a long history of respect for the law and a citizenry who too well remember the horrors  of the pitfalls inherent in uncontrolled  (even sanctioned) street violence we have seen here...

In every civil society both  the police, as well as citizens and journalists must be protected for it to continue to survive and function. The global security law of the French  parliament  is an attempt to keep these key elements in proper balance and insure that the French  police can function without fear of reprisal.  

Perhaps, some spark of intelligence may arise somewhere in our own government and result in a similar law here in the USA. 

The alternative to “global security” is police dysfunction, declining efficiency and recruitment, insufficient force level , rising anger from citizens who pay for security through taxes and receive nothing in return,  and civil unrest and vigilantism when a frightened  and armed citizenry is  forced to protect themselves—a return to Dodge City. 

WEARING MASKS DO NOT PROTECT YOU, BUT DO HELP PROTECT THE COMMUNITY AT LARGE

 Mask wearer: you are protecting others, but get little protection for yourself. 

But that is good! 

I just read a report on a Danish study examining the efficacy wearing a face Masks ( See a review and summary in the Spectator, 19 Nov 2020: “Landmark Danish Study finds No Significant Effect For Face Mask Wearers)  The authors - Carl Henefhan and Tom Jefferson) ask the question: Do face masks work?  Their conclusion: No!  They don’t protect the wearer.  

The actual research and data found in the study  (Danmask 19 trial) was conducted in the Spring of 2020, with over 6000 participants. It was a randomized, controlled trial.  One group of volunteers, wore identical masks which were supplied to each person and followed  rules about use and changing  the mask regularly.  The results (as reported by Henefhan and Jefferson)  indicate that after a month of wearing the masks 1.8% of those wearing masks had been infected, while 2.1 % of those not wearing masks  (the control) had contracted the disease over the study period.  The authors concluded that there was no significant difference between the infection rate of those who wore a mask and those who did not.  Clearly wearing a mask DOES NOT PROTECT THE WEARER FROM INFECTION. 

This study is a good example of the old adage that there is “no certainty in science”. That is until someone actually tests a hypothesis and provides hard facts.  It in this case, many of us were not surprised at the results,  given the known inefficiency of masks and as well the  very small size of the particles involved and the relatively coarse weave of the fabrics used for most face masks.  

Given the facts of how small the particles that we seek to filter out are so small and the fabric weaves are so coarse, think of this analogy.  A man walks onto a soccer (football) pitch with his golf bag. He sets up directly in front of a field goal with the obvious intending to use the netting (@ five inch openings)  of the soccer goal as a back stop for his practice golf drives.  He takes a golf tee from his bag, tees up a golf ball (@ 1.7 inches) and take a huge sweeping swing. The golfer watches as the well hit small white sphere passes cleanly through the netting, rises upward, continues climbing in height, clearing a high fence of an adjoining  neighborhood. As it fails off III begins to describe a slight draw to the left. The golfer still in his post swing pose begins to twist his body right as if to control its flight, but It missed a large tree and sadly crashes  though the  window of a near by home.  Whereupon the golfer,quickly jams his driver in his bag and slinks off. 

As a near-by observer you could have predicted the sad outcome.  Since it was clear/from the beginning that the netting could not contain the golf ball.  But some scientists want to actually prove the obvious. They are “following the science” as some politicians are beginning to utter constantly these days,  even though nary a one ever saw the inside of an introductory college chem lab. 

Yep. We pretty much knew this would happen. Aware of the actual size of the aerosols and the openings in typical fabric  masks, the reality is even more stark than this golf ball analogy.  Masks do not protect the wearer.   But they are most likely useful  in trapping a good portion of the larger droplets generated when we breathe and speak (again this is still scientifically unproven).  This capture by masks close to the source, no doubt helps limit the amount of aerosols in the air and in particular especially those originating with folks unknowingly infected with the Covid 19 infection.  Remember, that there are many asymptomatic people out there. 

Perhaps why our government and official agencies, as well as those in Johnny come lately scientist politicians in authority seem to ignore the fact that masks provide little protection against the virus for the wearer  is rooted in the sad fact that most of us find it difficult to 

WHAT DOES “CARBON NEUTRAL” MEAN?

  A few days ago, on a chilly Fall day, my grandson showed up  to help me cut up some fallen tree branches as fuel  for our fireplace. Afterward, we shared a cup of hot cocoa sitting in front of the fireplace, where as it happens we had an interesting conversation about what “carbon neutral” means. 

The recently laid fire crackled  and snapped as the orange and yellow flames licked up brightly over  the oak logs, giving off a welcome heat.  My grandson dragged his chair up closer to the fire and spread his palms out to intercept the radiant heat.

“Pop pop, what’s it mean: ‘carbon neutral’ ?”, he asked, adding, “My science teacher said  that China has promised it will be carbon neutral by 2060?”

“Well that’s easy to explain sitting here in front of this fire”, I said. “Just look at this fire. The heat and light we feel and see  in front of us is said to be “carbon neutral”.  But if I go over to the wall there and turn the thermostat to high, the oil burner in the basement will go on and the heat produced that way is not carbon neutral. That fossil fuel source of heat pumps “new” carbon into the atmosphere.  But the wood burning in the fireplace, over here, does not.  The wood fire in the fireplace makes its heat from burning wood and is carbon neutral,  but the oil burner heat is not. 

“But why grandpa?” 

“That tree branch we just  just cut up out there, it is composed of cellulose and wood fibers.  The tree’s  green leaves produced all the parts  of the tree  from the water in the soil and the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, using the sun’s energy.  What do you call that process?

“Oh yeah!  I know— that it’s  ‘photosynthesis’”. My grandson happily and mechanically recited: “The leaves produce sugars from carbon dioxide and water,  with chlorophyll in the presence of sun light” . 

“Yes!  And  those sugars are combined to produce cellulose and other tissues that make up the tree that we are now burning in the fireplace.”

I turned to add new log to the fire, and asked,  “So what’s happening in here? In the fire pit?”

“Ahh......  burning?” 

“And “burning” is....? 

“Is that oxidation?” 

“Yes! Very good. Your teacher did well!”

I continued, “So you are saying that the wood is undergoing oxidation in the fireplace and in that process it gives off......just what? “

“ Oh yeah, I know,” he said, raising his hand as if eagerly answering a question in class. ”It’s oxidation. Oxidation is the combining  of a fuel with oxygen to give off carbon dioxide and water’.”

“Good boy!!

“ So a carbon neutral process is one in which we only return the same carbon that was in the air, right back into the air. We add no new carbon to the air.  In the fireplace the tree we are burning  absorbed carbon from the air and when we burn it to get heat and light we are returning the same carbon right back into the air in the smoke ( which carries the  CO2) that goes up the chimney.” 

“ But grandpa,  how is that different from the  ‘not carbon neutral’ carbon dioxide that goes up in the air from the oil burner chimney?”

 

“OK,  Look so when

 we burn any fossil fuel, like coal, oil ( petroleum = petro =rock, oleum = oil, thus  “rock oil”)  even natural gas, we are taking carbon that was made by trees or other green plants millions of years ago and by ancient geological processes was buried underground for those eons.  This carbon was separated from the atmosphere for millions of years until modern humans discovered these “dug up” (fossils) could burn very nicely.  Since that time they continued  digging this fossilized carbon up to provide useful heat and energy by burning it in the present- day atmosphere.”

Bringing  it into the atmosphere and then burning it in the air produces “new” carbon dioxide.  But this carbon is not really “new”.  It had just been sequestered ( separated) from the modern atmosphere for millions of years and now as a result of human need for cheap energy  it is being added to the existing burden of carbon that is presently in the air. “

“So grandpa what’s the big deal about carbon dioxide? Why is it called a “burden ”?   Is it poisonous or something?”  

No it is not “poisonous” but it does have a a special property. It is an excellent absorber of earth heat. Do you feel that heat coming off the fireplace? All bodies that are hot produce that kind of radiation.  It is called Infra Red ( IR) radiation.  The earth produces infra red radiation when the sun strikes its surfaces.  Think of the heat coming off of a shopping center  parking lot In mid summer.  It is that heat that CO2 tends to absorb.  Not the heat from the sun itself, but the radiant heat  (IR ) produced when the sun heats a surface.  It’s a simple equation— the more CO2 in the atmosphere—the more it absorbs earth heat. This heat is trapped in the lower levels of the atmosphere and acts like a heat blanket for the earth. The more carbon dioxide the hotter it get..

Since the 1850s when humans began using fossil fuels in greater and greater amounts the concentration of CO2 has been slowly and  steadily rising ( today it is 0.04% or 400 parts per million or ppm) and clearly if there is more of a gas that causes the air to warm in the atmosphere,  then we can expect the atmosphere to continue to warm up corresponding to the amount of “new” carbon we add to it.

  In just petroleum alone ( not counting coal, and natural gas) the world consumes and burns about 100 million barrels of oil per day! That’s a lot of carbon going into the atmosphere. 

So there. That is why nations and companies are now striving to become more  “carbon neutral”.  They do not want to be responsible for the bad effects of an overheated atmosphere. 

 

WHY I QUIT READING THE NY TIMES.

 WHY I STOPPED READING THE TIMES. 

HOW THE NYT ABANDONED NEWS AND JOURNALISM TO BECOME A BASE PRODUCT-FOR- SALE-ONLY 

IT IS PURPOSELY TAILORED TO A SPECIFIC CLIENTELE— A SMALL MINORITY OF OUR NATION’S READERS. 

In 1961 I graduated from college and somehow landed a great summer job with the illusriousn NYT.  In those days the paper was known as the “great gray lady” (no color adds and no comic strips) .  It was the prestige organ of journalism.  It was tasked with creating an historic record of the times.  All the great jurnos, want to be writers and commentators either worked there or wanted to.  It sold millions of copies and was published around the world. 

But that was before the great “electronic tech” revolution. In this as days almost  every literate person (or wanna be) had the times delivered to his or her office or home where one could comfortably open the paper over hot breakfast with the famous broad sheet flopping over  a steaming hot cup of coffee and its corners occasionally becoming fat stained in the near-by buttered bagel.  The bulky, hard to manage “big sheet” required gloves ( to protect one from ink stains) and an extensive knowledge of origami to be able to effectively fold the sheets and read and manage the parts you were interested in.  .    

Today the coffee and buttered bagel might be there, but there is no paper.  The reader would be staring at a small rectangle of blinking light displaying  “apps” that provide access to all forms of news information in several languages and from distant places around the world.  

The days of  “newsprint” —-that crinkly, foldable, hand staining, good for packing glassware, excellent fire starter, often spread as a table covering to serve Maryland Crab dinners and used as a surface to clean a mess of fresh caught fish—that type of newspaper —-was completely over.   

In the latter part of the last century the NYT owners were terrified, How would the near 150 year old newspaper survive in the face of falling circulation numbers?  It acted as a news source for tens of millions in the 1980s and 90s.  It informed the entire nation.  In those days it’s  profits came from selling advertisement  space in its papers.   Vast columns of “houses for sale”, big two page spreads of advert for clothes, cars and all the products a nation’a businesses sells might appear in the Times. That circulation meant that the Times could demand big sums for a full page ad. .  It made it’s profits from sale of advertisements.  The greater it’s circulation the more people of varying economic and social positions it reached the better, for it could charge more for its advert space. .  It’s news and opinion  sections were published for the benefit of a wide diverse, often national readership.  The publisher’s goal was to attract the broadest possible spectrum of readership and this correlated with their profits from of advertisement space in the paper. 

But what happens if you can no longer sell copies?  What happens when circulation shrinks by 10 to 25% as it did in the 1990s.  How can a business  survive when sales of copies drops from tens of millions to a few hundred thousand copies and advertising revenue disappears accordingly? . The answer is that  news organizations dependent on advertising sales—  folded like so many others  around the nation and disappeared. The old paradigm of great informative and “free news” paid for by advertising space in a widely circulated journal  was over. 

To survive the Times’ owners had to devise a new business plan. They settled on selling  subscriptions to a small subset of its readers. But why should these subscribers PURCHASE the Times when they could access a wide variety of information sources via internet right on their little iPhone screens and   all for free.  The Times needed to change its news and opinion philosophy from “all the news that’s fit to print” to:  only the news that pleases the subscribers. 

To inveigle this small subset of readers into becoming subscribers the Times had to TAILOR its news and opinion to attract and hold them.  The Times—is no longer the “great grey lady” the newspaper of record, the paper that publishes what actually is happening ( or as close to that goal as anyone can reasonably accomplish) but it is now a boutique publication catering to the interest, biases and preconceived notions of a small clientele—mostly of the far left, often elites of urban centers, comprising radical feminists, pro-abortionists,  socialists, the “woke” generation, BLM movement, and the LBTQ xyz so called community and other of the fringe left.   

These groups subscribe to the Times. They pay for the news they prefer to read and the Times news and opinion pages accommodate  them.  To remain in business the Times must keep these folks pleased with the “news” the paper chooses to print and the .”storyline” they prefer to read.    (The NY T recently claims about  7 million subscribers.  Those 7 million subscribers are apparently enough to keep the Times afloat and generate a profit.  

But this number is only  a fraction of its pre-1990s readership.  Today the Times reaches only perhaps 2 to 4 % of the voting public.  Thus more than 95% of voters do not read the Times or care to read its electronic pages. It can no longer boast it is the “newspaper of record”. It is now a  “niche publication”, as in ecology where that word means an organism adapted to a specific and specialized environment.  

The Times no longer provides  “news”  for those who need to be, or simply want to be informed. This is no longer the kind of real journalism that democracies  depend on  to help generate  informed citizenry, who vote based on established facts .  No!   The NYT’s “survival  business plan” is generating a product —like any commercial institution—its product is generated, modified and modulated expressly for the likes and dislikes of its subscribers and for purposes of continued robust sales. 

Yes, the President was correct.. it’s “fake”.   It is not real news. 

Use it if you like it. Leave it on the shelf if you don’t. .