Another Communiqué from the planet Neptune

Vincent J. Curtis

28 May 21

RE: Social Media and the attack on civic imagination.  Hamilton Spectator of today’s date.

“Shhhhh,” hissed the radio.

“Quiet everyone!” shouted the editor.

A communiqué from the planet Neptune was coming in.  Call sign “One Trick Pony,” the Neptune bureau chief, was sending.

As usual, the message was garbled and came across as confused nonsense.  In his Sunday sermon, some preacher explained in uncomfortable detail the findings of his deep and extensive research on the cat-house at the edge of town.  Things went on there that no decent person had ever seen or heard of.  It all sounded nonsensical, and some in the congregation were convinced that the preacher had been smoking the wrong kind of tobacco, so outlandish were his descriptions.

Racist, anti-government, and Trump-based lies were practiced everywhere.  But this was more than an assault on facts, evidence, and truth, ladies and gentlemen; no, a Fox News, Breitbart, Newsmax, OAN, and other toxic cultural appropriators were representing a new front in the war to use social media to (gulp!) depoliticize people!  They would discredit critics who would oppose blue supremacy and authoritarian nationalism!  And we all want authoritarian nationalism, don’t we people!

The preacher then demonstrated the depth of his research by revealing that he read The Stormer and watched (gulp!) Tucker Carlson!

The editor had heard enough, and ordered the young reporters out of the room, so indecent had the reporting become.  After another half-hour of intense listening, the communiqué ended and the smirking, somewhat disheveled  editor said “I could use some of that!”

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Airbus launching new satellite system

Vincent J. Curtis

11 May 2021

When you think of Airbus, most people think of it as an aircraft manufacture famous for its A300 and A200 series commercial aircraft, fighters like the Eurofighter and multipurpose military aircraft such as the C295 and MRTT.  But Airbus is more than that.  It is also a world leader in satellite systems and geointelligence data and products. 

Airbus advanced its space system capabilities on April 29, 2021, when an Arianespace Vega rocket launched from French Guiana, arced over the Atlantic Ocean and delivered into earth orbit the first of four new satellites which together will form the Pléiades Neo constellation. The new optical satellite constellation will enable Airbus to provide a second-generation of geo-intelligence data services.  The second satellite of the Pléiades Neo series is expected to be launched this summer.

The Pléiades Neo imagery is very high resolution - 30 cm - with a geomatic accuracy of less than 5 meters.  The new satellites deliver 6 multispectral channels.  The constellation has a nominal lifespan of ten years.

The Pléiades Neo constellation was entirely funded, designed, manufactured, and is owned, and operated by Airbus. It is intended to provide commercial and institutional customers with high-resolution imagery that can be combined with Airbus’ proprietary analytics.  Each of the four satellite can cover up to 500,000 sq. km per day, for a total of 2 million sq. km per day coverage.  The images will be made available on Airbus’ OneAtlas digital platform, which will allow Airbus’ customers immediate access to both freshly acquired and archived data, combined with Airbus’ extensive analytics.  The analytics include object identification, change detection, and activity monitoring.

The Pléiades Neo constellation will work in conjunction with Airbus’ existing fleet of Earth observation satellites that includes the TerraSAR-X, TanDEM-X, and NovaSAR radar satellites; and optical satellites that include the original Pléiades series (2 satellites), SPOT (2 satellites), DMC constellation (4 satellites), and Vision 1 (1 satellite).

The Pléiades Neo constellation incorporates laser inter-satellite links (ISL) that provides connectivity to the SpaceDataHighway (EDRS) geostationary satellites. The use of ISLs accelerates the tasking process enabling urgent image acquisition within 30 to 40 minutes of a tasking request.  The combination of both high resolution and fast reactivity provide fast tempo, actionable intelligence.

“The Pléiades Neo constellation will definitively boost the 30 cm imagery market, bringing a lot of innovation and coverage capacity to the commercial and government end uses” said François Lombard, Head of Intelligence at Airbus Defense and Space.

Airbus lists the key features of the Pléiades Neo system as: provides the highest commercial resolution combined with accurate geolocation; reactive tasking and rapid delivery; up to 2 million sq km coverage per day; mono, stereo, and tri-stereo acquisition capability; and 100 percent commercial resource availability.  The benefits of these features include: information delivery in a drastically reduced timeframe; rapid coverage at a regional scale; extensive monitoring; and a leveraging with Airbus’ suite of analytics for automatic detection and object identification.  According to Airbus, the user benefits from immediate access to Pléiades Neo and the entire Airbus constellation, either straight from the users Direct Receiving Station or through the Airbus digital platform OneAtlas.

The potential applications of the imagery and analytics include: defense and intelligence, law enforcement, maritime; oil, gas, mining, and energy sectors; agriculture, forestry and environment, land use administration, mapping, transportation and engineering; 3-D modelling, and aviation.

Because the data is commercial and unclassified, users such as the CAF could share it with allied powers during its international operations, according to Airbus.  The imagery is complementary to space-based radars presently used by the CAF.  Airbus says it can bring space based optical and radar surveillance capabilities to the CAF’s space based surveillance project called DESSP. It is actively engaged in the development of solution concepts that address the future Earth observation  requirements of DND and the Canadian Space Agency.

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Manitoba goes for the really stupid

Tougher Manitoba lockdown measures

Vincent J. Curtis

21 May 21

Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister is about to prove that he’s as stupid and as thuggish as he looks.  It is well documented in the scientific literature that lockdown measures have negligible effect on controlling the spread of the virus.  Pallister gave further proof of this by imposing lockdown measures on Manitoba at the beginning of the latest wave, and now finds that he has impose different measures in a so-far unavailing effort to slow the spread.

That doesn’t mean he’s going to lift the measures that have proven ineffective; oh no, he’s going to place restrictions on outdoors activities as well.  It is well-known that the virus is transmitted through the air.  Fresh air is the key to slowing the spread, by replacing contaminated indoors air with fresh outdoors air as an example.  Pallister seems to think that Manitoba’s fresh outdoors air is loaded with the virus.  He thinks the virus can accumulate in outdoors air, and to prevent the spread outdoors, he has to impose restrictions on outdoors activities.

As the April, 2021, modelling study by M.I.T. shows, the virus is transmitted by susceptible people breathing enough contaminated air, and air can only get sufficiently contaminated if trapped indoors.  Mask-wearing outdoors is absurd, and restricting outdoors activities is foolish – people should be outdoors breathing fresh air.

Throughout Canada, government authorities are fixated on thuggish lockdown measures because too many egos and reputations are at stake if they admitted they had been wrong all along.

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Dr. Adelsteinn Brown: Talking through his hat

Vincent J. Curtis

21 May 21

Dr. Adelsteinn Brown may look impressive and sound intimidating, but the image of the doctor on page one of today's Hamilton Spectator was of a man talking through his hat.  As I have repeatedly demonstration, lockdown measure have had no effect on the progress of the pandemic in Ontario.  It ebbs and flows in accordance with its nature.  The shape of the cases curve shows no “flattening” or sharp drops, or any other deviation from the characteristic shape of a pandemic curve that could be attributed to the intervention of man.

When Brown says, “if we’re careful and cautious we can maintain this momentum – and this momentum is what gets us to a good summer.” he is talking nonsense and trying to take credit where no credit is due.  He is offering both carrot and stick: if a fourth wave develops, the wicked and undisciplined people of Ontario will be punished with lockdown again.

What will stop a fourth wave is a high percentage of vaccination.  But while encouraging vaccination by negative re-enforcement (you’re stupid if you don’t), the authorities offer no positive re-enforcement, such as exempting the vaccinated from lockdown measures and mask-wearing.  Vaccines either work or not, and the authorities act as if they don’t know.  This ambivalence creates no confidence, and is yet another sign of the incompetence with which Ontario has been led through the crisis.

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The Anti-Hate Summit

Vincent J. Curtis

20 May 21

(This is a continuation of the story that began with "The plank in their own eye."  An organizers and training conference is being held in Hamilton through the weekend under the auspices of a group called "End Hate in the Hammer" or some such.)

Winston Churchill defined a fanatic as a person who won’t change his mind and can’t change the subject.  The purpose of the anti-hate summit is to turn fanatics into pajama boys, who wear pajamas, drink hot chocolate, and talk about the need to end hate and racism.  The program includes how to have a “difficult conversation” about racism with family members.

This is a clown show from start to finish.  In the first place, what they define as hate and racism are highly peculiar, subjective, and not very perceptive.

The authority on hatred and anger is, of course, Aristotle, who addressed the differences among and between hatred, anger, and enmity as follows:

“As for enmity and hatred, it is evident that they must be examined in the light of their contraries. The causes which produce enmity are anger, spitefulness, slander.  Anger arises from acts committed against us, enmity even from those that are not; for if we imagine a man to be of such and such a character, we hate him. Anger has always an individual as its object, for instance Callias or Socrates, whereas hatred applies to classes; for instance, everyone hates a thief or informer. Anger is curable by time, hatred not; the aim of anger is pain, of hatred evil; for the angry man wishes to see what happens; to one who hates it does not matter. Now, the things which cause pain are all perceptible, while things which are especially bad, such as injustice or folly, are least perceptible; for the presence of vice causes no pain. Anger is accompanied by pain, but hatred not; for he who is angry suffers pain, but he who hates does not. One who is angry might feel compassion in many cases, but one who hates, never; for the former wishes that the object of his anger should suffer in his turn, the latter, that he should perish.”

The clown show will, in the end, create more anger and enmity than it will end, and will do nothing to touch hatred.  Indeed, it is evident that they are the haters themselves, because of their wish for evil on those they deem to be haters and whom they do not know.

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Ontario reports 2400 cases

Vincent J. Curtis

20 May 21

After two successive days of daily case count numbers being below the trend line, on May 20, Ontario reported 2400 cases, a number above the trend line.  The numbers went from 1600 to 2400, a jump of fifty percent.  This behavior is a phenomenon of statistics known as “reversion to mean.”  That, and the shape of the daily cases curve being characteristic indicate that the spread of the virus in Ontario is a stochastic phenomenon.

Statistics imply no cause-effect relationship, though there may be underlying cause-effect relationships that control the stochastic behavior.  The significance of pure stochastic behavior is that the lockdown measures have had no impact whatsoever on the underlying cause-effect relationships that express themselves as COVID transmission.  The shape of the third wave (as well as the first and second waves) was determined entirely by statistics and were in no way modified by lockdown measures.  The waves would have been the same whether Ontario had locked down or not.

We shouldn’t be surprised that COVID transmission is a stochastic phenomenon since all of the modelling, from the first warning of a coming wave of death, was based on statistics.  The lesson to be learned is that lockdown and stay-at-home orders achieved nothing, except to tear-up civil rights and devastate Ontario’s finances.

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Science and facts of lockdowns - Ontario

Vincent J. Curtis

18 May 21

In January, 2021, a team of four authors from the Stanford University Department of Medicine released a paper entitled, “Assessing Mandatory Stay-at-home and business closure effects on the spread of COVID-19.”  The study found no significant benefits on case growth, meaning extreme lockdown measures were worthless for controlling the spread.

The COVID data from Ontario confirms the study’s findings.  A lockdown in Ontario is an effort to quarantine 14.7 million people, 99+ percent of whom are uninfected.  The ordinary course of a COVID infection proceeds as follows: within 5.5 days of infection, the infected person shows symptoms, and within 14 days the person recovers.  This holds true in more than 95 percent of cases.  If a lockdown worked, what effect would one see in the daily case numbers and the total active case numbers?

In theory, a lockdown stops transmission.  If a lockdown worked, case numbers might continue to grow until day 5 of the lockdown, as people infected immediately before the lockdown was imposed showed symptoms and became cases.  By the end of the first week, there being no further transmission as a result of the lockdown, daily case numbers should drop to zero and total active case numbers should begin to drop also.  By day 14 of the lockdown, a full quarantine period, both daily and total active case numbers should be at or near zero, as cases recovered and no transmission occurred.  Ontario’s data shows no such trend.

Ontario’s first lockdown began on March 13, 2020.  On April 3, 2020, Ontario reported 462 new cases, and 2165 total active cases.  April 17, 2020, Ontario reported 564 new cases and 4491 total active cases.  The peak in active cases occurred on April 25, with 5675 active of which 476 were new that day.  May 1, 2020, Ontario reported 421 new cases and 4662 active; May 15, 341 new cases and 3456 active; May 29, 344 new and 3997 active; June 12, 182 new and 3041 active; June 28, 178 new and 1889 active; July 12, 129 new and 1476 active; and finally on July 26, 2020, 137 new cases and 1558 total active cases.  As expected, no control whatsoever is found on the spread of the pandemic as a result of the March 13, 2020, lockdown.

Ontario’s second lockdown began December 26, 2020, with 2142 new cases that day and 19,688 total active cases as the starting points.  A peak occurred on January 10, 2021, with 4249 new cases and 30,074 active; January 24, 2487 new and 24,153 total active cases; February 8, 1265 new and 14,331 active; February 22, 1058 new and 10,335 active.  Again, one sees no effect of lockdown on the ordinary course of a pandemic.

Ontario’s third lockdown began on April 3, 2021, with 3009 new cases and 23,190 total active cases as starting points.  On April 17, Ontario reported 4812 new cases and 40,694 active; a peak in total active cases occurred on April 20, with 3469 new cases and 42,941 active; May 1, 3887 new cases and 37,438 active; and finally, May 15, 2584 new and 27,568 active.  Once again, nothing in the data shows the expected effect of a lockdown and stay-at-home order.  There are no sharp drops anywhere and especially none within the first two weeks of the imposition of lockdown.   This serves as confirmation of the conclusion of the Stanford University study that found no benefit in controlling the spread of lockdowns and stay-at-home orders.

Such is the science and this is the supporting data from Ontario.  However, too many reputations and too many hopes have been placed in lockdown in Ontario for either the government or the media to accept it and act upon it.

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The Manitoba lockdown is useless – the proof

Vincent J. Curtis

17 May 21

For all the warfare being conducted against the civil rights of Manitobans, none it does any good to prevent the spread of the virus.  The science is that lockdowns don’t work to prevent the spread, and the data from Manitoba is further proof.

In January 2021, the Stanford University medical center released a study of lockdown measures used around the world and compared their effectiveness to those few jurisdictions that didn’t lock down.  The study concluded that lockdowns show no effect in preventing the spread.

The normal progression of a COVID infection is that a person begins to show symptoms within 5.5 days of infection.  By day fourteen, the person has completely recovered, and this happens 95+  percent of the time.  There’s a reason the quarantine period is fourteen days.

If lockdown measures prevented the spread of infection, you would see a sharp downturn in the daily cases rate within the first week of the lockdown.  By day fourteen, the pandemic should be stopped cold.  The less effective the lockdown, the less sharp the downturn in case numbers.  Now, let’s look at some Manitoba numbers.

On April 4, Manitoba reported 67 new cases and “1.2k” total active cases.  Fourteen days later, April 18, Manitoba reported 167 new cases and 1.4k active cases.  Another fourteen days later, May 2, Manitoba reported 279 new cases and 2.1k active.  Yet another fourteen days later, May 16, Manitoba reported 532 new case and 4.6k total active.  The data proves that Manitoba’s lockdown is completely ineffective, and may actually contribute to the spread.

Manitobans accepted a tyranny in exchange for an empty promise of disease control.  Lockdowns control people, not the virus.  And that’s the science.

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More wretched hate-mongering by the young

Vincent J. Curtis

18 May 21

The Spectator’s love affair with the hate-whitey narrative reached a new low of depravity with the publication of “Asian Heritage Month is our call to action” by four evidently youthful know-nothings with partially Asian-sounding names.  They never did explain why, if Canada has such a history of racism against Asians, they still live here?  What’s so bad about Afghanistan, North Korea, Communist China, or one of the Idontgiveastans that makes Canada preferable by comparison?  I know!  It’s that Western Civilization thing, which began in Greece in the ninth century, B.C.  and that Western Enlightenment thing, begun in Europe hundreds of years ago.

They quickly run into a problem with logic.  Logic was invented in ancient Greece, the cradle of Western Civilization, by a guy named Aristotle, in case they want to look it up.  They claim that Asian migrants were working in pre-Confederation fledgling settler Canadian society – on Indigenous land!  If it’s pre-Confederation, dearies, it isn’t Canada.  Oh, and if you think its racist to suggest y’all go back to where you came from, what do you think you just intimated with the crack about “on Indigenous land”?

Yes, Canada had a Chinese head tax.  That was to prevent a country of 3.5 million from being culturally swamped by immigrants from a country of 400 million hired and imported by foreign owned development companies who wanted cheap labor.  The ignoramuses are lucky today it was done, and Canada remained British in orientation.

They mentioned the wrongful seizure of Japanese-Canadian assets by the Liberal government after WWII.  The Canadian government formally apologized and provided financial compensation for that act in the 1980s, before the youthful ignoramuses were born.  They didn’t mention that the Canadian POWs captured in Hong Kong, those that survived, were reduced to living skeletons by the Japanese, and they never received an apology or financial compensation from the Japanese government.  And Japan is in Asia!

They failed to mention that Canada accepted 50,000 Vietnamese boat people at the instigation for former Hamilton Mountain MPP John smith, and Vietnam wasn’t our war.  Canada recently accepted some 40,000 Syrian refugees, and Syria is in Asia, and Syria isn’t our war.

The pile of horse dung heaped together by this Asian gang could exhaust an hour’s worth of exploration.  But it isn’t worth it.  They’re children, they’re arrogant, and they know nothing except the hatred they were indoctrinated with in Canada’s education system.

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Lockdowns make things worse - some data.

Vincent J. Curtis

16 May 21

In December, I forecasted that Ford’s “temporary, one time” lockdown measure would actually make things worse.  That’s how things turned out, with daily cases nearly doubling within two weeks of the December 26^th order.  This current lockdown also made things worse.

A lockdown is supposed to stop the spread, like quarantining a person does.  The data ought to show a dramatic decline in case numbers within two weeks of a lockdown – if it worked.  I say lockdown measures make things worse.  Here is the official data.

On April 3, there were 23,190 active cases in Ontario, of which 796 were in hospital.  Fourteen days later, April 17, 40,694 active cases, with 2065 in hospital.  The peak in cases occurred April 21, with 42,917, and 2335 hospitalized.  May 1, after four weeks, total cases were 37,438 with 2152 hospitalized; and finally, six weeks on, May 15, 27,566 total active cases, with 1546 hospitalized.  After three successive quarantine periods, the total active cases and number hospitalized were worse than when the lockdown was declared and then followed with a stay-at-home order.

I don’t know how Premier Ford or his medical advisors can offer these numbers and say their lockdown plan worked - at all.  The pandemic ebbed and flowed according to its own nature and nothing shows the intervention of man, except perhaps to make things worse.

When is the media going to get up from the posture of worship, take notice of the data, and ask Ford’s experts for an explanation?

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The plank in your own eye

Vincent J. Curtis

12 May 21

RE: We must do more to fight anti-Asian racism.  Hamilton Spectator op-ed of today.

There is much evidence to support K’Annan K’Annan’s belief that white people are benighted and stupid; but most are not so stupid that they can’t distinguish among Chinese, Indian, Arab, Afghan, and Russian.  All of these are Asian; and so when (K\Annan)² speaks of “anti-Asian” racism, he should be more specific.  One question (K’Annan)² should have answered, but didn’t, is why, if Canada is so rife with intolerable anti-Asian racism, he’s still here in Canada, working as a researcher in a law firm?

Could it be that the racism in Asia towards other Asians is worse than the anti-Asian racism in Canada?  China is the most racist country on earth.  Look at what the Chinese government is doing to its Uyghur minority, its aggression against India, and new hostility towards Nepal.  India is rife not only with classism, but with religious strife between Hindu and Moslem.  Look at what Burma did to its Rohingya minority.  The list goes on.

Concerned with the speck in Canada’s eye, (K’Annan)² misses the plank in his.  The theme of “anti-Asian” racism was fomented by China to deflect attention from the fact that the global pandemic started after a lab worker at the Wuhan Institute of Virology became infected and spread the virus to the community.

Nobody’s perfect.  A newcomer ought to be grateful for the opportunities he got in Canada, accepting the good with the bad.  If we’re that bad – he can go home!

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Stop the madness!

Vincent J. Curtis

10 May 21

RE: Ford considering extending stay-at-home order

When Albert Einstein defined insanity as doing the same thing over again and expecting a different result, he must have had the Ford government and his expert medical advisors in mind.

The purpose of a lockdown is to prevent the spread of the virus.  If the lockdown were completely effective, the pandemic would be stopped cold after fourteen days, the quarantine period.  Even if the lockdown were less than perfect, you’d expect to see a substantial drop in the case numbers within a week of starting the lockdown.  Ontario’s own figures prove that lockdowns are completely ineffective.

The lockdown that began on December 26, 2020, began with 2,124 new cases; 14 days later, January 9, 2021, Ontario reported 3,443 new cases.  The lockdown that began on April 3, started with 3,009 new cases; 14 days later, April 17, Ontario reported 4,362 new cases.  Another 14 days, May 1, Ontario reported 3,369 new cases.  A week after that, May 7, well past the peak of the curve, Ontario reported 3,166 new cases, still higher than on day 1 of the lockdown.

The cases curve shows the natural ebb and flow of the pandemic.  There are no abrupt downward changes in trajectory, not even “flattening”, of new cases that one might try to associate with lockdown measures.

Lockdowns are a form of artful inactivity, looking like they’re doing something; or displacement activity – something to do to get your mind off something else.

Enough! Follow the empirical data!  Stop the madness!!

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A simple disproof that Alberta lockdowns worked

Vincent J. Curtis

10 May 2021

A disproof that lockdowns work is found in a simple thought experiment.  You start with understanding the normal progress of the infection.  A COVID infected person begins to show signs of infection within 5.5 days, and is free of the infection after 14 days; this occurs 99 percent of the time.  Now, what happens if a lockdown is imposed that is completely effective?  By completely effective I mean that transmission drops to zero.  What happens to the case count?

The daily case count may continue to rise until day 5 as those infected just prior to the lockdown show the signs of infection.  After day 5, the case count plummets to zero, since by assumption transmission ceases as a result of the lockdown.  No one became infected after the imposition of the lockdown, and everyone who was infected before the lockdown is either showing symptoms or is in the process of recovery.  By day 14 everyone who was infected before to the imposition of the lockdown is recovered, and the pandemic is stopped cold.  This is how quarantines are supposed to work.

If the lockdown is not one hundred percent effective, then the drop to zero new cases after day 5 would be replaced with a drop to a substantially lower number than the case count on day zero of the lockdown.  It could be ninety percent lower, or fifty percent lower.  It should be a substantial percentage lower if you’re going to say that “lockdowns work.”

If case counts continue to rise – even after day 14 – you have to conclude that lockdowns aren’t just totally ineffective, but may actually contribute to the spread.  And a case count higher on day 14 of the lockdown is what we saw in Alberta in March, 2020, and April, 2021.  The December 2020 lockdown was announced after the peak of the second wave, but still the numbers show little change.

Alberta’s third lockdown began April 9 with 1275 new cases, and 14 days later, April 23, there were 1510 new cases.  The second lockdown began December 9, 2020, with 1587 cases, and 14 days later, December 23, 2021, there were 1129  new cases. (The case count around Christmas fluctuated a lot.)  The first lockdown began March 15, 2020, with 9 cases, and on March 29 there were 18 new cases.  All three lockdowns saw either an increase or a negligible decline.

The empirical evidence is not just that lockdowns are totally ineffective, it is that lockdowns may contribute to the spread.  The case curve/graph shows no impact on its shape as a result of lockdown measures.  There is no sign of "flattening" or of an unexpected drop to a new level in any of the waves, which are quite obvious in shape.

The natural rhythm of the pandemic, as seen by the waves in the cases curve, eventually results in falling case counts.  It would be wrong, therefore, to attribute a fall in case counts after day 14 to successful lockdown measures.  That it is so attributed is an example of the logical fallacy of post hoc ergo propter hoc.

Lockdown measures need to be ended immediately.  They are offense to Charter rights and may actually contribute to the spread of the virus.

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A simple disproof that Ontario lockdowns worked: sure to cause unrest!

Vincent J. Curtis

8 May 2021

A disproof that lockdowns work is found in a simple thought experiment.  You start with understanding the normal progress of the infection.  A COVID infected person begins to show signs of infection within 5.5 days, and is free of the infection after 14 days; this occurs 99 percent of the time.  Now, what happens if a lockdown is imposed that is completely effective?  By completely effective I mean that transmission drops to zero.  What happens to the case count?

The daily case count may continue to rise until day 5 as those infected just prior to the lockdown show the signs of infection.  After day 5, the case count plummets to zero, since by assumption transmission ceases as a result of the lockdown.  No one became infected after the imposition of the lockdown, and everyone who was infected before the lockdown is either showing symptoms or is in the process of recovery.  By day 14 everyone who was infected before to the imposition of the lockdown is recovered, and the pandemic is stopped cold.  This is how quarantines are supposed to work.

If the lockdown is not one hundred percent effective, then the drop to zero new cases after day 5 would be replaced with a drop to a substantially lower number than the case count on day zero of the lockdown.  It could be ninety percent lower, or fifty percent lower.  It should be a substantial percentage lower if you’re going to say that “lockdowns work.”

If case counts continue to rise – even after day 14 – you have to conclude that lockdowns aren’t just totally ineffective, but may actually contribute to the spread.  And a case count higher on day 14 of the lockdown is what we saw in Ontario in January and April, 2021.

Ontario’s third lockdown began April 3 with 3009 new cases, and 14 days later, April 17, there were 4362 new cases.  The second lockdown began December 26, 2020, with 2124 cases, and 14 days later, January 9, 2021, there were 3443 new cases.  The first lockdown began March 15, 2020, with 42 cases, and on March 29 there were 211 new cases.  All three lockdowns saw more cases on day 14 than on day zero.

The empirical evidence is not just that lockdowns are totally ineffective, it is that lockdowns may contribute to the spread.

The natural rhythm of the pandemic, as seen by the waves in the cases curve, eventually results in falling case counts.  It would be wrong, therefore, to attribute a fall in case counts after day 14 to successful lockdown measures.  That it is so attributed is an example of the logical fallacy of post hoc ergo propter hoc.

Lockdown measures need to be ended immediately.  They are offense to Charter rights and may actually contribute to the spread of the virus.

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Feelings

Vincent J. Curtis

8 May 21

RE: Cops challenging pandemic laws just feels wrong.  Spectator editorial of May 8, 2021.  VE Day!

When the Ford government at the beginning of the latest lockdown said police were empowered to stop and ask people why they weren’t at home, nearly every police force in the province said it wouldn’t enforce that provision.  The Spectator said nothing.  The fact that police are noticing that draconian regulations claimed to control the virus violate Charter rights is a good sign.  Never mind the BIPOC, LGBTQ+, and other special needs  communities, the lawsuit shows police are aware of their responsibilities towards everyone; and there are a lot more police in sympathy with the suit than you think.  “Just following orders” was the excuse given at Nuremburg.

But what about the lockdown, does it even work?  The latest one began April 3, and was supposed to last for three successive fourteen day quarantine periods.  On the first day, Ontario reported 3009 new cases.  One quarantine period later, April 17, Ontario reported 4362 new cases – the situation actually got worse!  At the end of the second quarantine period, May 1, Ontario reported 3369 new cases, still worse than on day one.  Ontario had nothing to show for all the orders and bullying.  On May 1, 2020, Ontario reported a mere 421 new cases, and was still under the lockdown declared in mind-March.

Lockdowns and masking orders have done nothing to control the spread.  Lockdowns have flattened no curve.  Just look at the cases curve!  The lockdowns have been failures, but too many egos and reputations are at stake to try something else.

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Livin’ in a dream world

Vincent J. Curtis

7 May 21

RE: Ontario COVID trend dips lower.  Hamilton Spectator 7 May 21

The report that Ontario’s average daily COVID rate dipped from 4,348 in the middle of April to 3,369 in the first week in May is proof of nothing.  It takes 5.5 days for an infected person to show symptoms, and 14 days for a full recovery, which happens over 99 percent of the time.  There’s a reason quarantine orders are for 14 days.

Ontario’s lockdown and stay-at-home order ought to have wrung a large percentage of the daily case load out of the system within the first 14 days.  If lockdowns and stay-at-home orders controlled the spread.  But they don’t; the science says they don’t, but Ontario is doing it anyway.

To claim that less than 23 percent of the case load has been wrung out the system because of lockdowns is an example of the logical fallacy of post hoc ergo propter hoc.  At this rate it will only take another nine weeks to get below a thousand cases a day, and by then everyone over the age of 12 should be vaccinated.

Too many reputations are on the line for Ontario to change course into something sensible, like what Florida did.  We will look back on this period as an example of the colossal failure of central planning and control.  Instead of giving people the information and letting them act on it, the central planners imposed a mind-numbing ideology on everyone, at get cost.

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What science?

Vincent J. Curtis

5 May 21

RE: Illegal protests should have consequences.  Hamilton Spectator editorial of May 5, 2021.

When the science is against you, go with the law.  When the law is against you, go with raw emotion.

Had the Stoney Creek freedom protest been protesting the death of George Floyd instead, the Spectator wouldn’t say a word about punishing the organizers.  “Their raw emotion was for a good and righteous cause, and that’s all that mattered!”  But because they were protesting to get their own freedom back, and being largely “white folks,” they need the book thrown at them.  Large gatherings outdoors are against the law!!

Except, well, there’s problems with the law.  The “health” orders were not democratically passed by a legislature, and regardless, they’re contrary to the Charter, which is why people were protesting to get their freedom back.  Their freedom from lawfare.

The Floyd riots last year turned out not to be “spreader” events, because they occurred outdoors.  That’s what you call “empirical evidence” in science lingo.  Outdoors activities with large crowds are okay.  Then, last month, a modelling study from MIT determined that the reason outdoors activities are safe is because the virus can’t accumulate outdoors, and a body needs to inhale a certain minimum amount of the virus to get infected.  The empirical evidence and theoretical modelling constitute the science that shows restrictions on activities and size of crowds outdoors are without scientific basis.  They’re bunkum, in plainer English.

There is no scientific or constitutional basis to limit gatherings outdoors.

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Of rodeos and protests

Vincent J. Curtis

4 May 21

The first clue was the George Floyd riots last year.  Scores of thousands of maskless people in dozens of cities around the world rioted, looted, burned, shouted, and chanted – and none of these turned out to be “super-spreader” events.  Here was empirical evidence that outdoor gatherings were safe, no matter how large.

Last month came an MIT modelling study on the indoor transmission of the virus.  It was based on the observation that an uninfected person needed to inhale a certain amount of virus for them to become infected.  But the virus can’t accumulate outdoors; transmission was only possible outdoors if an infected person sneezed rudely into the face of an uninfected person.

The theory and the empirical evidence are that outdoors gatherings, no matter how large, aren’t spreader events.  That’s the state of the science, and if anybody disputes these findings, they need to produce findings of their own.  Opinions and handwaving to the contrary doesn’t cut it.  But that’s all the medical authorities and other assorted tyrants in Canada and the U.S. have to go on.  Then, it’s not “follow the science” but “obey the law.” i.e. our police enforced arbitrary orders.

It is said that Jason Kenney is royally annoyed at the protest-rodeo in Bowden, AB, last weekend.  Instead of asking his health authorities to prove the event caused spreading, he’s looking to punish cowboys who weren’t blindly obeying anymore.

If your authority is founded upon “the science,” you’ve got to follow it wherever it leads.

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Courts declaring on matters of science

Vincent J. Curtis

6 May 21

RE: Hamilton police constable among group behind constitutional challenge. Hamilton Spectator 6 May 21.

The Supreme Court of Canada opened the worm-can when it foolishly declared an opinion in science to be true as a matter of law.  Now we see the courts being asked to declare other opinions on matters of science to be true as a matter of law.

It is true as a matter of science that masks are worthless when worn outdoors as a means of preventing the spread of COVID-19.  Last month’s MIT study confirmed that.  But worthless is not the same as ineffective.

It is unnecessary to claim that masks are completely ineffective in avoiding or preventing transmission in order to make a case against the constitutionality of restricting interprovincial travel, the practice of one’ religion, and peaceful gathering.  Those restrictions plainly are contrary to the Charter, and the Section 1 statement that no right is absolute still requires the government to make the iron-clad case in court proving that rights must be limited in the case in question.  The onus is not on the plaintiffs.

A good case can be made that most masks are quite ineffective, but that isn’t the same as completely ineffective; and the category of mask includes the N95 and NIOSH-approved respirators, so not all masks are ineffective, because some are.

I have little hope for the case because no court wants to be accused of being responsible for the deaths of thousands.

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They all fall to hardball – politics, that is

Vincent J. Curtis

4 Feb 21

Mark Norman, Julie Payette, Jonathan Vance - three people with things in common. One commonality is their spectacular falls from grace.

Vice Admiral Mark Norman was loyal to his service and to the orders he received from the outgoing Harper government.  The Conservatives had negotiated an agreement to acquire a new and desperately needed replenishment ship for naval operations on the high seas.

A $668 million contract was let to Davie shipyard of Levis, QC, but incoming Liberal Treasury Board President Scott Brison allegedly wanted that contract for Irving Shipbuilding of his province of Nova Scotia.  Cancelling the Davie contract meant setting back the delivery date for the new vessel, and possibly not getting one at all.  Word of Brison’s alleged machinations leaked, the government was embarrassed, and Davie fulfilled its contract.

Norman was suspected of leaking, and a high profile criminal investigation took place in which it was hinted that Norman was just his side of a Russian spy.  Dirty tricks were employed by the government to defeat Norman’s legal defense.  Ultimately, the scale of the deceit and dirty tricks combined with the details of the case coming out caused the government to withdraw all charges, and Norman was allowed to honourably retire.  Brison also retired.

Norman’s actual crime?  Who knows?  We still don’t know who leaked, and whether the leak amounted to a crime.  Norman was a fall guy to bungled patronage machinations.

Julie Payette was Justin Trudeau’s pick to become Governor General and C-in-C CAF. There was no vetting.  Likewise, there was no reason for Payette to be forced into resigning.  Trudeau could simply have refused to permit an investigation.  He could have told the CBC to stifle the stories, which Conrad Black characterized as coming from disgruntled stenographers.  Payette had eighteen months to go, and for $338k in legal costs, the staff at Rideau Hall should just learn to suck it up.

But he didn’t.  It raises the question, why?  Did Payette take her constitutional powers too seriously?  Did she balk when Trudeau asked to prorogue parliament?  Did she caution Trudeau when, in the early days of the pandemic, he wanted parliament suspended for a whole year and his minority government granted unlimited spending power?  Did she threaten to invite the Conservatives to form a government if he asked her to dissolve the House and call an election?  We’ll likely never know – Payette is trying to hold onto her perks, and the drama teacher knows how to stick to the script.

Then there’s General Jonathan Vance, retired Chief of Defense Staff.  It seems like the chicks have come home to roost.  Scandalous chirpings reached the MND about Vance’s alleged decades’ long history of military conquests.  Nothing was done, nothing came of it, and Vance retired after five years of exceptionally loyal service as CDS.  Now, the chirps are public.  But why?  Vance is spent.  Is schadenfreude the principle vindicated by humiliating him, demoting him to a three star, and then retire him on a reduced pension?

Meanwhile, two jolly tars with, er, hearts of oak, Admirals Don and Juan, have been beached after tales of burying treasure emerged, leaving the CAF like the bridge of the Bismarck after a salvo from Rodney.  Trudeau’s Defense Minister, Sergeant Shultz, is taking shellfire.

After the kidnapping of the two Michaels, Vance cancelled several training programs that had been scheduled with the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (!)  In particular, Cold Weather Indoc, that would give the PLA skills for their confrontation with the Indian Army in the Himalayas.  Vance did this without asking permission, and these actions annoyed Foreign Affairs.

Vance also put his foot down when he learned in April, 2020, that some genius was arranging for the CAF to conduct info ops against the Canadian public to support Trudeau’s pandemic lockdown measures.

Trudeau let Vance twist in the wind until the probing got too close to himself, then he had it shut down.

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Systemic racism is good! (When progressives do it)

Vincent J. Curtis

1 May 21

RE: Racial priority for vaccinations make sense.  Spectator editor of 1 May 21.  We see here yet another case of special pleading by progressives: it’s okay when we do it, because we’re special!

This is where woke-progressivism leads: systemic racism is bad, except when progressives approve of it.  And they approve of it because it is harmful to “white folks.”  It is not enough to order vaccinations by risk; no, it must be done by race.  The excuse is that racialized people are at higher risk than “white folks,” so what is the point of flaunting the racial aspect except to make a show of moral narcissism?

As a further display of moral narcissism, the Spectator claims an onslaught of racist backlash to the racist policy of prioritizing by race – and fails to provide any evidence of such by publishing signed letters on the grounds that they’re racist!

White woke-progressives simply can’t look in a mirror and see a racist looking back at them.  Accusing others of being “white supremacists” (a term invented just recently) is like a plenary indulgence against the racism and self-contempt within.  Malcolm X thought white liberals worse than southern Klansmen.

It never occurs to woke-progressives that reluctance among “the racialized” (how’d that happen?) stems from a history of progressives to use Blacks as involuntary guinea pigs in medical experiments going back to the 1930s – the era when progressives believed in the genetic inferiority of Blacks.  When you’re born yesterday and think you’re pure, it just doesn’t.

Let’s not hear any more criticism of systemic racism from the Spectator, it just depends on the kind. 

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