☕️ Coffee & Covid ☙ Friday, March 25, 2022 ☙ THE SANCTIONS DIET 🦠

A new scarient is making the rounds but Fauci says don’t worry; new challenges for airlines; an unexpected retirement; NATO adventurism; a Biden sanctions diet.

Good morning C&C team! It’s Friday. I hope everyone is having a nice pandemic today. In the roundup: a new scarient is even more transmissible than Omicron, but Fauci says don’t worry; airlines face new challenges as fuel prices take off; the world’s top female tennis champion suddenly and unexpectedly retires; Nigeria avoids Covid somehow; it turns out NATO has been helping Ukraine build up its military for years; Biden says we’ll be going on a sanctions diet; and ex-CIA chief Leon Panetta says The War is really between the U.S., NATO, and Russia.

🗞*COVID NEWS AND COMMENTARY* 🗞

🪳 The media has a new variant for everyone to worry about: stealth Omicron. Also labeled “BA.2,” stealth Omicron is even worse — or better — than regular Omicron, depending how you look at it. Fortune described the new variant in an article yesterday headlined, “‘This Virus Has Fooled Us Before’: Here’s How Fauci Predicts Stealth Omicron Will Spread Across The U.S..”

Before I get to the story, I have to stop and rant for a minute. Why would Fortune think we care AT ALL what Fauci does or doesn’t predict? What has that repulsive rodent ever got right before? About ten minutes ago he was predicting a “winter of suffering and death” and instead the pandemic ended. Dummy.

Anyway. Fauci says stealth Omicron is 50% to 60% more infectious than regular Omicron, which is hard to imagine. It seemed like EVERYBODY caught Omicron over a two or three-week period earlier this year. I guess if you managed to miss it somehow, BA.2 will make sure you get your turn. But the new variant is harmless like normal Omicron, staying out of the lungs.

But the most interesting part of the article was when Fortune admitted, “According to the CDC, roughly 95% of the U.S. population over the age of 16 has developed antibodies against COVID, due to a combination of vaccination and prior infection.” Ninety five percent is a lot. And just who are these lucky five percent, anyway?

Fauci said he doesn’t think the stealth Omicron will set the U.S. back, given those high levels of existing immunity, which are effective against the new variant.

But still. Get the jab, of course. Because $cience!

🔥 Bloomberg explained the hits keep coming for the airlines in an article yesterday headlined, “Soaring Airfares Shock Travelers After Pandemic Bargains.” More expensive tickets — the predicable result of skyrocketing fuel prices — make it even harder to get customers back. Bloomberg warned the higher prices “could imperil the travel industry, which is still recovering from the pandemic’s precipitous drop in demand.”

No kidding. There aren’t enough mask lovers around to fill airplanes, which caused the first drop in demand, and now it’s getting even worse as leaping prices make it more expensive to fly.

So, Joe Biden is going to wind up getting the masks off of planes after all, by creating these giant gas price hikes.

💉 Australian tennis star Ashleigh Barty, the top-ranked women’s tennis player in the world, announced her retirement this week at 25 years old. Ashleigh acknowledged that many people won’t understand her sudden decision to retire at the pinnacle of her career. Her explanation wasn’t specific, but she referred generally to physical limitations. “I don’t have the physical drive, the emotional want and kind of everything it takes to challenge yourself at the very top of the level anymore. I think I just know that I’m absolutely … I am spent. Physically, I have nothing more to give,” she explained.

So. I know what you’re thinking. Stop thinking that. It’s definitely not the safe and effective jab. How dare you.

🔥 Nigeria, with only 4.4% fully jabbed out of its 206 million people, reported zero deaths and only 87 cases this week. Weird. Wouldn’t it be great to have a well-funded government health agency that could investigate stuff like this and figure out how the clever Nigerians are avoiding stealth Omicron? Maybe we’ll have something like that someday.

🚀 *THE MINORITY REPORT* 🚀

🚀 At a press conference Wednesday, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg admitted that the West has been meddling in Ukraine for years: “Since 2014, [NATO] Allies have trained Ukraine’s armed forces, and significantly strengthened their capabilities…Providing anti-tank and air defence systems, drones, fuel and ammunition. As well as financial aid…The Ukrainian Armed Forces today is much bigger, much better equipped, much better trained, much better commanded. They have much better logistics than they had back in 2014.”

Building up Ukraine’s military seems like something Russia might not like very much. One of Putin’s chief complaints has been that NATO has been doing exactly that. But the narrative denies that, calling Putin a dangerous liar, don’t even listen to those lies. But Secretary General Stoltenberg appears to have just confirmed Putin’s claims that NATO has been building up military assets in Ukraine since 2014.

If this is true, wouldn’t that give Putin a valid complaint? Remember, we clamped down on Russia when it tried to put missiles into Cuba. Maybe one day we’ll get the whole story on Ukraine, who knows?

🔥 Ex-CIA chief and former U.S. defense secretary Leon Panetta said some very interesting things about The War at a press conference he held in between NATO meetings in Brussels this week, according to lots of non-corporate media platforms. I had to go to ABC Australia for a citable source.

According to the many reports, Panetta described The War in Ukraine as a “proxy war” between NATO and Russia. “The reality is that NATO and the United States, are now, without question, in a proxy war with Russia,” Panetta told reporters. Oh, great.

I’m not sure which is more interesting, that Panetta admitted what Putin’s been saying, that Russia is in “reality” fighting with NATO, not Ukraine, or that the U.S. media is blacking out Panetta’s comments for some reason. Maybe Panetta is spreading misinformation?

What’s Leon Panetta doing in Brussels anyway?

🔥 Later, at his own press conference, Joe Biden warned sternly that the Russia sanctions are producing worldwide food shortages, but don’t worry, it’s totally worth it. “With regard to food shortages … it’s going to be real. The price of these sanctions is not just imposed upon Russia. It’s imposed upon an awful lot of countries as well, including European countries and our country as well.”

It’s okay, we all needed to lose a few pounds anyways, right? Biden just announced food shortages that are going to affect the U.S. as a result of BIDEN’S sanctions. The sanctions that weren’t voted on by Congress? Am I allowed to ask if we can vote on this first?

Biden says that worldwide food shortages are just “the price of these sanctions.” In other words, we’re buying the sanctions with food shortages. If the First World experiences food shortages, what happens in the Third World? The implication is that mass starvation is an acceptable trade off to get Russian out of Ukraine. But why?

Then, a reporter asked Biden this question: “Sir, deterrence didn’t work. What makes you think Vladimir Putin will alter course based on the action you’ve taken today?”

Biden answered: “I did not say that in fact the sanctions would deter him. Sanctions never deter.”

Sanctions never deter?? Wait. Just wait. First, for weeks Biden has been telling us that we HAD to do sanctions — to deter Russia. That’s what he SAID. And next, if Biden is saying that sanctions never deter, then exactly what are the sanctions FOR? Who are they punishing with worldwide food shortages that are the price of sanctions? Because if they’re not punishing Russia, then they’re just punishing US. Why? WE didn’t invade Ukraine.

Have a fabulous Friday, and I’ll see you back here tomorrow morning for another quick vacation update. Then next week we’ll be back on the regular C&C schedule.

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