Free Republic

Residents of quarantined Chinese city Xian have been desperately bartering electronics for food amid worsening fears of shortages and starvation. It comes as Yuzhou, a city of 1.2million in central China, was locked down on Tuesday after just three asymptomatic Covid-19 cases were recorded. Xian's 13 million residents have been confined to their homes since December 23 and are banned from leaving even for food and essential supplies, having to rely on local officials to drop off care packages. But in recent days residents have taken to social media to voice concern over shortages, some said they were yet to...

PARIS, Jan 3 (Reuters) - French lawmakers said on Monday they would not be cowed by death threats that dozens of them received over a bill that will require people to show proof of vaccination to go to a restaurant or cinema or take the train. The new law, which would remove the option of showing a negative test result instead of having the jabs, has the backing of most parties and is almost certain to be passed by the lower house in a vote late on Monday or early Tuesday. But the proposed tightening of the rules has caused...

Video has emerged purporting to show a police dog mauling a man at an anti-lockdown protest in Amsterdam. The footage, which was published on social media by an account called Guerrilla Reporters, appears to have been filmed during an anti-lockdown protest held in the Dutch capital on Sunday. In the video, a police dog is seen apparently biting a man’s arm as other officers used batons against the surrounding demonstrators. At the time of this reporting, the local police have not confirmed the veracity of the video, however, a report from the public broadcaster Nederlandse Omroep Stichting (NOS) features an...

PARIS (AP) — Hundreds of empty, parked cars go up in flames in France each New Year’s Eve, set afire by young revelers, a much lamented tradition that appeared in decline this year, which saw only 874 vehicles burned. The number of cars burned overnight has declined compared to New Year’s Eve 2019 when 1,316 vehicles went up in flames, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said Saturday on Twitter. Fewer arson attacks occurred because of massive police presence on cities’ streets this New Year’s Eve, enforcing law and order and restrictions on public gatherings and wearing face masks as infections driven...

COVID means fear, control, and lockdowns because we’ve allowed people to make it mean fear, control, and lockdowns. D.C. Health is giving out “Home COVID-19 Testing Kits” at libraries across the capital city. At the majority of these sites, you’ll be handed two plastic, red, white, and blue envelopes per person. “Muriel Bowser, Mayor,” they read at the bottom. “Testyourselfdc.com.” “Isn’t that wonderful!” you might be thinking, as you tear open the seal. “I want to be sure these winter sniffles aren’t COVID before I see my mother, or visit grandpa, or go away with some friends.” Inside the envelopes,...

Those weeks following the release of the Great Barrington Declaration did feel odd. On the good side, medical doctors, scientists, public health workers, and citizens all over the world were thrilled that three top scholars in fields of public health and epidemiology had spoken out against lockdowns and for a reasoned approach to Covid. They eagerly signed the document. Yes, there were some attempts to sabotage it too, with fake names and so on, which should have been a clue about what was coming. The fakes were deleted in days and new methods of confirming signatures were deployed. The document,...

“I do not see a scenario for any kind of shutdown,” New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio declared this week, as parts of New York were in fact shutting down all around him. Broadway canceled show after show. Restaurants closed their kitchens. De Blasio’s successor, Eric Adams, who will take office January 1, nixed his inauguration gala. There has been no March 2020–style universal shutdown, but New York is not back anymore, baby. For Brent Young, who runs a butcher shop and two restaurants in Brooklyn, it began last week when, one by one, staff members tested positive. “It’s...

The Public Health Agency of Canada accessed data such as cell-tower location to monitor people’s activity during lockdown, it said... The Public Health Agency of Canada accessed location data from 33 million mobile devices to monitor people’s movement during lockdown, the agency revealed this week. Due to the urgency of the pandemic, (PHAC) collected and used mobility data, such as cell-tower location data, throughout the COVID-19 response,” a spokesperson told National Post. The program’s existence was first brought to wider attention by Blacklock’s Reporter. PHAC used the location data to evaluate the effectiveness of public lockdown measures and allow the...

The nation’s recent lockdown policies and mask mandates will create a generation of children who exhibit lower IQs and signs of social brain damage, according to Dr. Mark McDonald, a clinical psychiatrist for children and adolescents, in an interview with host Cindy Drukier of a Dec. 25 episode of NTD’s The Nation Speaks. McDonald cited an Aug. 11 study by Browns University (pdf) which found that “children born during the pandemic have significantly reduced verbal, motor, and overall cognitive performance compared to children born pre-pandemic.” The masks, “zoom schools,” and lockdown mandates lead to “deprivation overall, of social contact, [of]...

According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle in quantum mechanics, first formulated in 1927, states that “the product of the uncertainties in position and velocity is equal to or greater than a tiny physical quantity, or constant (h/(4π), where h is Planck’s constant, or about 6.6 × 10−34 joule-second.” Or, to put it in more popular terms, the act of observation changes the nature of the thing being observed. Does it ever. Here we are, coming up on the second anniversary of “two weeks to slow the spread” of a flu-like virus most likely hatched in a Chinese...

White coat supremacy -- a major threat to freedom and democracy in America. Francis Collins, the first appointed National Institutes of Health director to serve more than one president, stepped down on December 19, leaving behind a record open to question. For example, in an October 8, 2020 email, Collins told Dr. Anthony Fauci, “there needs to be a quick and devastating public takedown of its premises. I don’t see that on line yet. Is it underway?” Collins’ target was the Great Barrington Declaration, signed by more than 900,000 epidemiologists and public health scientists to show concern about the damaging...

‘Follow the science” has been the battle cry of lockdown supporters since the Covid-19 pandemic began. Yet before March 2020, the mainstream scientific community, including the World Health Organization, strongly opposed lockdowns and similar measures against infectious disease. That judgment came from historical analysis of pandemics and an awareness that societywide restrictions have severe socioeconomic costs and almost entirely speculative benefits. Our pandemic response, premised on lockdowns and closely related “non-pharmaceutical interventions,” or NPIs, represented an unprecedented and unjustified shift in scientific opinion from where it stood a few months before the discovery of Covid-19. In March 2019 WHO held...

Well, the Dow is down 600+ points today. Bloomberg News is blaming 1) Omicron (that we already knew was gaining steam), 2) Manchin saying “No” on Build Back Better (I predict that Senate Democrats will reach an agreement with Manchin to screw over the American people after the new year begins), but not a mention of China real estate debacle or the decline in oil prices. Here is the three day decline in the Dow and the three day decline in West Texas Intermediate Crude futures. Likely declining because of an expected slow down in the economy, partly due to...

National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director Dr. Anthony Fauci said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week” that he does not see a return to lockdowns if Americans got vaccinated. Guest host Jon Karl said, “So with that, and what you have described as, you know, the way to be prudent, the success of vaccines and boosters, we are not headed towards anything approaching the kind of lockdown we saw last year, are we?”

Paris canceled its New Year’s Eve fireworks. Denmark has closed theaters, concert halls and museums. Ireland is again forcing pubs and restaurants to close at 8 p.m. And the Netherlands is expected to announce a strict new lockdown later Saturday. With coronavirus cases surging across Europe as the Omicron variant spreads, governments are imposing new restrictions across the continent, triggering plans for protests in several major cities.

COVID is over. Oh, not with Anthony Fauci. Not with the media. Not with the sour-faced Karens ... But with normal people, especially outside the big urban areas, it’s over. The Atlantic scandalized its readers by reporting ... Where I Live, No One Cares About COVID.. No one cares. ... And with good reason... especially after the experience of the Diamond Princess cruise ship suggested that COVID was a lot less scary than we were told. ... the damages wrought by lockdowns ... have been worse than those wrought by COVID itself. ... People have seen through this, and they’re...

People in Scotland have been asked to limit socialising to three households at a time in the run-up to Christmas amid concerns over the Omicron variant. First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said the advice would not apply on Christmas Day and that plans should not be cancelled. But she said people should reduce their social contacts with other households "as far as possible". Shops and hospitality venues will also be told to bring back physical distancing and screens. Ms Sturgeon said that Scotland is facing a "likely tsunami" of new infections of Covid-19 in the weeks ahead, with a "very significant"...

Have you heard a better summary of our current insanity? https://twitter.com/SebGorka/status/1470218510269878273

It would be an understatement to observe how the ruling class response to Covid has wreaked havoc on life and liberty. These God-given rights were supposed to be preserved by the government and its handlers; indeed, this basic function is one of the limited powers we the people initially granted to our overseers. Instead, the ever-more-powerful state has seen to it that both life and liberty are subjugated to the political fancies of elitists that possess neither the moral guidance nor the intellectual acumen to carry out their mission. Among the many frustrating aspects of government overreach since March 2020...

Italy is making life more uncomfortable for unvaccinated people this holiday season, excluding them from indoor restaurants, theatres, and museums starting Monday to reduce the spread of coronavirus and encourage vaccine sceptics to get their shots.Italian police have been empowered to check whether diners in restaurants or bars have a “super” green health pass certifying that they are either vaccinated or have recently recovered from the virus. Smart phone applications that verify people’s health pass status have been updated to prevent entry to concerts, movies or performances to those who have merely tested negative in recent days. The measures run...