The online world should not be a wild west where bots and bigots and trolls and others are anonymously going around and can harm people and hurt people, harass them and bully them and sledge them. That is not Australia.”
– The increasingly ridiculous Scott Morrison, pretending to be passionate about something again
Nov 26 (Reuters) – Novavax Inc said on Friday it had started working on a version of its COVID-19 vaccine to target the variant detected in South Africa and would have the shot ready for testing and manufacturing in the next few weeks.
The company’s COVID-19 shot contains an actual version of the virus’ spike protein that cannot cause disease but can trigger the immune system. The vaccine developer said it had started developing a spike protein specifically based on the known genetic sequence of the variant, B.1.1.529.
“The initial work will take a few weeks,” a company spokesperson said. Shares of the company closed up nearly 9% on Friday.
Strange. Omicron was first reported to the WHO 72 hours ago. It was officially designated by WHO 24 hours ago. And Novavax is already saying a ‘vaccine’ will be ready in a fortnight – less time than home brew companies advise customers to ferment amber ales and light lagers. Sure. I’ll have that injected into my body. Not.
It’s just a great riff. It’s a great hook. Keith Richards plays those first two notes, everyone is on their feet, everybody’s clapping, dancing, singing. When I hear it, my first thought is: long live the Rolling Stones.”
Almost three-quarters of the eligible children spread across 30 Central Australian and Barkly Aboriginal communities have not received the two doses of vaccine needed to protect them from the deadly coronavirus, according to official government data.
Figures updated this week and seen by The Australian reveal that in places such as Aputula, Yuelamu and Willowra, just one child has received their first vaccine dose, and none received their second. Vaccination is offered to children aged 12–15 years.
The Territory’s covid death toll is 0. The risk to children is virtually 0. These are the facts.
Trump further diminished the U.S. in the eyes of the world by expanding his travel ban. This new “African Ban,” is designed to make it harder for black and brown people to immigrate to the United States. It’s a disgrace, and we cannot let him succeed. https://t.co/oePD5eSAWY
WHAT do James Bond, Mick Jagger and Tim Paine have in common? They have all been run over at the intersection of New Old-Fashioned Values and Old New-Fangled Sensibilities. More on that below. Let’s start with the auto-da-fé in whose flames religious authorities just burned Australia’s cricket captain. While it’s true that aroused males don’t always make prudent decisions – Mother Nature’s way of hampering childless bachelorhood, I guess – nor, let’s be frank, do randy females. How else to explain the forlorn army of single mothers pushing prams in every mall from Bunbury to Bundaberg? God bless the babies but if all were planned I’m a Cubist.
I press that comparison to the point of indelicacy for a reason. You hope the national conversation can’t possibly get any worse and then you see Paul Murray discussing a cricketer’s penis this week with Bronwyn Bishop. What next, John Howard on the Brazilian? In The Australian, Helen Trinca explains why men “feel the need to flaunt” their genitals. Her conclusions are admirable but a more interesting column would be on why women feel the need to flaunt their expertise on what all men feel. Both ladies are right that Paine acted foolishly and wasn’t thinking with his head. Not the big one, anyway. Ho ho ho. But he hasn’t committed any crime, nor – thankfully – adultery of the kind formerly committed habitually by our future King. His marriage is safe, according to reports – and, more authoritatively, his wife. Enough with the tut-tutting.
I was moved, as I’m sure many people were, when he tearfully apologised and resigned. But I was left wondering, OK well, there’s a missing voice here and it’s the alleged survivor of this alleged misconduct.”
So why did Paine fall on a stump’s business end? Why did he feel compelled to preemptively cancel himself Kim Hughes-style? Why has he announced an indefinite leave of absence from all cricket? Before answering those questions, here are two more: why has the Rolling Stones’ frontman retired Brown Sugar and why is it the mission of pop culture prigs to erase the 007 you know and possibly love? The answer for ‘conservatives’ is that woke killjoys obsessed with ‘misogyny,’ ‘patriarchy’ and ‘white privilege’ mean to supplant customary freedoms with a ‘safe’ and ‘diverse’ culture. That the latter dispensation is a revolting Maoist empowerment scam may be taken as read. But not so the hallowed status of Jagger lyrically ravishing slave girls or Sean Connery bedding every woman he encounters between hearing M’s orders and detonating a villain’s lair. These were both gratuitous rebellions against prevailing social mores.
We on the right call it cognitive dissonance when the left gets tangled up in its own contradictions. They mocked the Hays Code, we laugh, and now they’ve written their own. But conservatives used to believe in dignified limits and now find themselves lamenting the censorship of rock ’n roll louts and Fleming’s debonair lech. This, then, is the postmodern war zone all of us seem to inhabit and the one Tim Paine wandered into. Progressives don’t want to be seen as prudes but as guardians of equality. Conservatives don’t want to be seen as prudes but as sticklers for solidity. He may not be a political adept but the ex-skipper was bright enough to know what was coming. Short of setting Veritatis splendor as a text for all school seniors – which I would happily do – I have no normative prescriptions for a way out. Except forgiveness.
PRETTY soon, the virus will be clever enough to convert to Islam and spread to Britain and Europe by boat. Police will even give it a hand at the beaches. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Scott Morrison is sending this letter to every Australian home to tell them – in a round-about way – that the ‘vaccine’ shots they were compelled to receive are useless and only a ‘booster’ will save them. I note that the final paragraph refers to the importance of accepting “boosters,” plural. Doubtless, officials believe Australia’s antipodean summer is a strategic advantage Europe did not have, entering winter prior to the dispersal of the “extra protection.” Which – when you think about it – means Australians are now the largest control group in the history of medical experimentation. We are being promised in writing – promised – that becoming fully be-boosterated will completely trounce covid-19 by June. If you believe that, I have an AUKUS submarine on Gumtree that’s priced to sell.
It’s just a great riff. It’s a great hook. Keith Richards plays those first two notes, everyone is on their feet, everybody’s clapping, dancing, singing. When I hear it, my first thought is: long live the Rolling Stones.”
I was moved, as I’m sure many people were, when he tearfully apologised and resigned. But I was left wondering, OK well, there’s a missing voice here and it’s the alleged survivor of this alleged misconduct.”