Category: DDP Newsletter

DDP News – Vol. XXXVI, No. 1

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, face masks for the public have been advocated or required in various places in the world, but the demands to force everybody, even children, to comply in the U.S. have become frenzied as this is being written in early July.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) floated the thought that the epidemic might be over, as all-cause mortality had peaked and returned to normal. But then surges of “cases” were reported in Florida and the border states of California, Arizona, and Texas—along with a surge in testing. A “case” is a person with a positive test, even if apparently well. Governors were criticized for re-opening too soon, and began forcing still-surviving businesses such as gyms to close. And various jurisdictions began to impose mask requirements.

Continue reading “Masking”

DDP Newsletter – May, 2020, Vol. XXXVI, No. 3

Many people’s lives are dominated these days by concerns about the coronavirus pandemic. Many refuse to go anywhere if not absolutely necessary. Some “quarantine” or disinfect their groceries, and shower and wash their clothing after doing an errand. Are the masks, “social distancing,” and obsessive-compulsive behaviors necessary—or protective?   Evidence for benefit from the drastic measures is nonexistent to thin. There are many unknowns, but some observations can be made:

If there is coronavirus in the vicinity, you have some on you. In an unpublished experiment, a harmless chemical compound resembling material found in viral coats was radioactively tagged and applied near the mouth or on the palm of two “spreaders.” They carried on normal social interactions with several test subjects who were doing library research—talking, looking at papers, etc. The subjects washed their hands frequently. At the end of several hours, all had radioactively tagged material on face, hands, and clothing.

Continue reading “COVID-19 Protection”

DDP Newsletter November 2019, Vol. XXXV, No. 6

China: Military and Economic Dominance

Celebrating the 70th anniversary of Communist Party rule, advanced Chinese weaponry paraded through Tiananmen Square in October 2019. The message to the world is that Beijing has no intention of ceding military leadership to America or any other country.

High-tech innovations, many stolen from the U.S., include stealth combat aerial drones, unmanned underwater vehicles, hypersonic missiles, and the road-mobile DF-41 intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), with a 7,500-mile range. The Pentagon has identified hypersonic missiles and systems to defend against them as among its highest priorities, writes Larry Bell. Lockheed Martin expects to test flight its first prototype missiles in 2020. China has reportedly completed seven successful tests (tinyurl.com/rjg5a9o). These “unstoppable” missiles  are “igniting a new global arms race,” writes R. Jeffrey Smith (New York Times 6/23/19, https://tinyurl.com/y2nberq2).

The Chinese seek to dominate by other means as well. Under the Obama Administration, China’s state-owned Cosco Shipping Holdings signed a 40-year lease with the City of Long Beach in 2012 for control of America’s second largest and most automated container-handling operation. In 2017, the Trump Administration put a national security hold on Cosco’s acquisition of a former U.S. Navy port facility. As of May 2019, the Communists are no longer in control of the Port of Long Beach (https://tinyurl.com/tpqap9z). Still, China operates six of the world’s ten busiest container ports, and the Chinese government has also funded the construction and operations of 43 ports in 35 countries under its “One Belt and One Road” (OBOR) strategy (https://tinyurl.com/yy7akrb5).

The State of California under Governor Jerry Brown and now Gov. Gavin Newsom is partnering with China on “climate change” research, such as battery storage, despite concerns about intellectual property theft (https://tinyurl.com/r82mzlc).

Continue reading “Threats for the 2020s”

DDP Newsletter, September 2019, Vol. XXXV, No. 5

Of all the potential mass casualty events that could affect the United States, the most devastating cause is biologic. Biologic agents, unlike radioactive fallout, have a  doubling time, not a half-life. Whether the agent comes from a deliberate biologic warfare attack, or the natural emergence of a novel virus, the results could be devastating.

In 1918, more people died in the first 11 months of the influenza pandemic than in 4 years of the Black Death in the 1300s. Yet despite spending $80 billion on a National Biologic Defense, the U.S. is arguably no better prepared than it was in 1918, state Steven Hatfill, M.D., Robert J. Coullahan, and John J. Walsh, Jr., Ph.D., in their new book Three Seconds until Midnight, available on amazon.com.

Because of air travel, more people packed into dense urban areas, and greater dependence on technological infrastructure and just-in-time inventories, the population may be even more vulnerable now. There could be mass casualties even among uninfected people because of lack of essential services.

Continue reading “Pandemic Preparedness”

DDP Newsletter July 2019 Vol. XXXV, No. 4

As the number of  parents who decline to follow the CDC’s “recommended” schedule of mandatory vaccines creeps upward, the pressure to remove exemptions is growing. More than 100 bills are being pushed in 30 states that would strip out religious, philosophical, and medical exemptions.

California leads the nation in removing all except rare medical exemptions. Until this year, physicians could write medical exemptions at their discretion. However, because a few “rogue” physicians were allegedly writing too many or “illegitimate” exemptions, it is becoming virtually impossible to obtain one, so that parents of children with risk factors will now have the choice of risking a serious adverse reaction or removing their child from public or private school. The full impact of the law will not be seen until it is implemented in 2020, but parents are already receiving messages like this one:

Continue reading “Vaccine Nation”

DDP Newsletter May 2019 Vol. XXXV, No. 3

Drug addiction is devastating. Drug dependence may be unavoidable—as with insulin-dependent diabetics. Modern medicine depends on the availability of life-saving drugs. And the U.S. now depends on China for most drugs. The U.S. even lacks the capacity to produce penicillin, as Rosemary Gibson reveals in her book China Rx: Exposing the Risks of America’s Dependence on China for Drugs.

In 1988, Oak Ridge National Laboratory published Expedient Antibiotic Production: A Final Report. This includes a how-to guide to build/rebuild antibiotic production facilities if they were damaged or destroyed. It has a map of the location of such production facilities in relation to a possible nuclear attack on industrial or military facilities.

Continue reading “Drug Dependence”

DDP Newsletter March 2019 Vol. XXXV, No. 2

In November 2018, Michigan became the 10^th state to legalize recreational cannabis use. More than 200 million Americans live in states that have legalized marijuana for medical or recreational use, writes Alex Berenson (WSJ 1/4/19). One powerful push is the desire for tax revenue that might otherwise go to neighboring states. The New York City Comptroller’s Office estimated that legalizing marijuana for persons over age 21 could yield $1.3 billion annually at State and local levels. The Comptroller also touted reduced costs of law enforcement and the societal benefit of having fewer people, especially young black males, damaged by the impact of a criminal conviction (tinyurl.com/y68cjevf). E-mailed tips on the best cannabis stocks to buy anticipate more widespread legalization.

Continue reading “Health Effects of Marijuana”

DDP Newsletter January 2019 Vol. XXXV, No. 1

What most people have seen of Antifa is an occasional street demonstration, or a “woke” group of college students hanging out in coffee shops. In North Carolina, Antifa helped in the attack on memorials such as Silent Sam, a statue of a Confederate soldier. But beneath the theater of “protests” and occasional violent outbursts is a fairly high level of organization and funding by outside groups that are skilled at directing the masses, with the goal of sedition, not reforms.

Continue reading “Street Wars in the U.S.”

DDP Newsletter November 2018 Vol. XXXIV, No. 6

For decades, the American homeland has, by deliberate policy, been left virtually defenseless. The civil defense of the 1950s has been dismantled—only government elites are protected. We have only limited strategic anti-missile defenses. We have been relying on our status as the “world’s only superpower” to deter aggression by the threat of certain retaliatory annihilation. But what if American military supremacy is past, as Dr. Donald Miller argued at the 2018 meeting of DDP (https://tinyurl.com/y96dg8wd)?

In all the frequent reminders of the “911” disaster, two observations that are seldom discussed are: (1) The U.S. was apparently incapable of protecting Manhattan and the Pentagon from four hijacked airliners. Where was NORAD? Why no scrambled fighter jets? (2) Then our retaliatory strike against the alleged perpetrator (Afghanistan, which was purportedly harboring Osama bin Laden, who turned out to be in Pakistan) has us mired in a 17-year stalemate in the “graveyard of empires.”

During our 2017 tour of the National World War II Museum in New Orleans, I asked the docent about the vaunted “strategic triad.” He agreed that it certainly isn’t a triad now. At least the bomber aircraft are missing. The Strategic Air Command used to have nuclear-armed bombers on constant alert, and, as I recall, at least one airborne at all times.

Continue reading “A Defenseless ‘Superpower’?”

DDP Newsletter September 2018 Vol. XXXIV, No. 5

To climate warriors, carbon is black, even when green in plants or invisible as CO₂, and wind turbines and solar panels are green. These supposed ecophiles are generally against the reliable renewables, which require building dams or incinerators. “Green,” UNreliable energy sources get an undeserved pass on environmental impact.

The U.S. has so far managed to export the environmental degradation and human costs of mining rare earths and other necessary components of photovoltaic panels, wind turbines, and battery storage, but end-of-life costs are mounting.

The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) estimated that solar panel waste, about 250,000 metric tonnes in the world at the end of 2016,  could reach 78 million metric tonnes by 2050 (Forbes 5/13/18, https://tinyurl.com/y8z5m7ar). A veteran solar developer said: “Contrary to previous assumptions, pollutants such as lead or carcinogenic cadmium can be almost completely washed out of the fragments of solar modules over a period of several months, for example by rainwater.” Toxic metals can be leached from broken panels because of natural events. In 2015, a tornado broke 200,000 solar modules at the Desert Sunlight solar farm in southern California. In Puerto Rico, Hurricane Maria broke the majority of the panels in the nation’s second largest solar farm.

Continue reading “Green Health Hazards”