Sunday, June 7, 2020

BLM got 33 Million from Soros since 2016

From Influence Watch:

Black Lives Matter (BLM) is a movement ostensibly seeking to reform police conduct especially as it involves use of force against African-American suspects and civilians. The movement has been criticized for appearing to tolerate violent demonstrations in its name,[1] for stoking racial tensions, [2] and for creating an unsafe environment for police.[3] Other critics say BLM pushes a left-wing extremist agenda under the false appearance of a moderate reformist movement.[4]
In 2014, “the movement gained significant traction after the fatal shooting of Michael Brown,”[5] becoming a “diverse and loosely-connected coalition”[6] of groups rooted in the rejection of police violence but each seeking to rectify their own perceived injustices.[7] In 2016, the “Movement for Black Lives,” a BLM umbrella organization, released a political platform which consisted of numerous far-left policy proposals, including socialized medicine, the immediate legalization of prostitution, the immediate pardon of all drug offenses with reparations paid to those convicted of drug offenses, and the restructuring of tax policy to create a “radical and sustainable redistribution of wealth.”[8]
BLM has been criticized for taking a see-no-evil approach to violence and extremism within and surrounding its ranks. While the movement’s lack of structure makes it extremely difficult to attribute bad acts to specific BLM groups, there are numerous incidents of BLM-associated persons[9] committing acts of violence and lawlessness, particularly violence against police.[10] This was most on display surrounding the 2016 murder of five Dallas police officers by a terrorist who claimed to support BLM.[11][12][13]
Liberal funders such as George Soros, Rob McKay, and other Democracy Alliance donors have given millions of dollars to groups associated with the movement, which have in total raked in over $133 million.[14] 

Founding

Black Lives Matter originated in 2013, following the trial of George Zimmerman, who was acquitted of murder on grounds of self-defense for killing Trayvon Martin, a 17-year-old African-American youth. Contesting the controversial verdict, left-wing author and labor organizer Alicia Garza coined the term “Black Lives Matter”[15] in protest. Activist and art college instructor Patrisse Cullors and Black Alliance for Just Immigration executive director Opal Tometi helped popularize the phrase as the social media hashtag “#BlackLivesMatter.”[16][17]
In 2014, “the movement gained significant traction after the fatal shooting of Michael Brown” by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri.[18] Controversies surrounding Brown’s death and the authorities’ handling of the case are seen as “the national tipping point” that brought BLM to public consciousness.[19] After Brown’s death, “Dream Defenders, an organization co-founded by Working Families Party activist and Occupy Wall Street organizer Nelini Stamp, popularized the phrase “Hands Up – Don’t Shoot!” (referring to the apparently false claim that Brown had his hands up as if to surrender peacefully when he was shot[20]) which has since become BLM’s widely recognized slogan.”[21][22]

Organizational Overview

From the outset the originators of the BLM movement “made social media – and specifically the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter – a centerpiece of their strategy.[23] As a result, the growth of the movement offline was directly linked with the online conversation.”[24]
Currently there is a “contentious distinction” over what Black Lives Matter is.[25] “There are at least two versions of BLM. There’s the BLM network founded by the three black female activists who created the #BlackLivesMatter hashtag. Then there’s the BLM Movement, a more amorphous collection of racial justice groups.”[26]
Where the BLM Network is structured and has 34 chapters,[27] the BLM movement is decentralized and relies “almost solely on local, rather than national, leadership.” [28]  The movement “eschews hierarchy and centralized leadership.”[29] According to one of the BLM originating activists, Patrisse Cullors, the movement’s “organizing is often spontaneous and not directed by one person or group of people.”[30]
The Black Lives Matter Movement’s collection of groups has come to take a variety of forms and political shapes, from groups that favor protest and have no intention of supporting candidates, to others that have begun lobbying candidates and elected officials on legislative issues, to others “hoping to use money to make a difference in elections.”[31]

Political Platform

In 2016, a coalition of over 50 organizations known as the Movement for Black Lives released a wide-reaching and in-depth platform detailing the coalition’s policy demands.[32][33][34] This platform was known as the “Vision 4 Black Lives” and laid out six far-left policy planks/demands pulled largely from the 1996[35] Black Panther Party ten-point program.[36][37]
The Atlantic criticized the extremist parts of the platform as “elements unpalatable to most major politicians and people,” such as extensive “reparations” that could “limit its potential to sway large audiences.”[38] The platform denounced the U.S. military, characterized Israel as an “apartheid state,” demanded extensive redistribution of financial resources, and insisted upon the socialization of broad sectors of the American economy.[39] It also demanded “special protections for trans, queer, and gender-nonconforming people … a call for free education for black people, and a proposal to implement black economic cooperatives.”[40]
The “Vision 4 Black Lives” platform was sharply criticized by the Jewish community[41] because the platform condemned the American alliance with Israel and claimed that the U.S., through this alliance, “is complicit in the genocide taking place against the Palestinian people.”[42] The platform “also drew criticism for its support of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement,” which seeks to economically isolate the Jewish state.[43]
Demonstrating the friction between the various black activist groups operating under the Black Lives Matter Movement’s banner, in August 2015, Campaign Zero put forth their own policy platform and notably did not sign the subsequent “Vision 4 Black Lives” platform.[44]  Meanwhile, the agenda of the influential BLM group Black Youth Project 100 calls for many extremely leftist ideals such as reparations, a living wage, paid sick leave, a guaranteed living income regardless of employment, and a government-funded “baby bond” for all newborns.[45]

Criticisms

WORSENING RACE RELATIONS

Critics blame BLM for worsening race relations in America.[46] Even family members of Jamar Clark, who was shot by police in 2015, have urged BLM to settle the protests because “there’s a fine line between protesting a cause and hurting the community.”[47] One of BLM’s originating activists, Alicia Garza, has argued that black people cannot be racist, because “Racism is a system” rather than the act of merely judging people based on race. [48][49]

CREATING HOSTILE ENVIRONMENT FOR POLICE

Some commentators have argued that recent increases in crime and violence against police are the result of a so-called “Ferguson effect,” named for the city that saw the first large Black Lives Matter demonstrations after the death of Michael Brown in 2014.[50][51] In response to Federal Bureau of Investigation findings that homicides of police officers have risen since then, some observers identified Black Lives Matter protests as a contributing cause to an anti-police environment.[52]
The FBI released a report that found that 28 percent of those who used deadly force against police officers “were motivated by hatred of police and a desire to ‘kill law enforcement,’ in some cases fueled by social and political movements.”[53] The FBI reported that the perpetrators of attacks on police in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and Dallas, Texas stated they were “influenced by the Black Lives Matter movement.”[54] The Dallas attack occurred at the end of a BLM protest “when a gunman who had a vendetta against white cops [killed] five and injured several other on-duty officers.”[55]
Adding to the concern that BLM encourages anti-police violence are statements by BLM endorsing historical extreme-left anti-police terrorists and those who enable them. On the death of Cuban Communist dictator Fidel Castro in 2016, the Black Lives Matter Network published a piece defending “El Comandante,” singling out the regime’s sheltering of fugitive convicted cop killer Assata Shakur (also known as Joanne Chesimard) and other violent black radical extremists for special praise.[56]

TACTICAL CRITICISMS

Black Lives Matter has faced numerous criticisms of its tactics, from both potential allies and adversaries. The movement’s focus on confrontation and its apparent see-no-evil approach to violence by its supporters have been extremely controversial.[57][58]
Barbara Reynolds, a veteran of the 1960s civil rights movement and an author, writes that many civil rights activists agree with BLM’s goals but “fundamentally disagree with their approach.” According to Reynolds, BLM uses “confrontational and divisive tactics” marked by boorish rhetoric and profanity, and rejects proven protest methods, which make it “difficult to distinguish legitimate activists from the mob actors who burn and loot.” Reynolds argues that while 1960s-era civil rights activists used “loving” and “nonviolent” means to win allies and mollify enemies, the BLM Movement uses “rage and anger.”[59]
Reynolds argues that while “the civil rights movement valued all human lives, even those of people who worked against us,” BLM focuses too narrowly on “black pain and suffering,” shouting down “those who dare to utter ‘all lives matter.’” She argued that in order to “win broader appeal [the BLM Movement] must work harder to acknowledge the humanity in the lives of others.” [60]
Black Lives Matter operations have been largely known for their extremism. Daunasia Yancey, a Black Lives Matter activist says, “We’re a radical organization, with radical politics, and we have radical tactics. There’s no way of softening that.”[61] BLM marches in Baltimore,[62] Atlanta, Miami,[63] Los Angeles,[64] and Oakland took over interstates, forcing those cities to shut down roads.[65] Numerous BLM demonstrators were arrested for chaining themselves to subway trains in San Francisco, to the irritation of otherwise-sympathetic locals.[66]
The BLM Movement has also received wide coverage of its protestors interrupting and agitating 2016 Presidential candidates Hilary Clinton,[67] Bernie Sanders,[68] and Donald Trump.[69] BLM originator Patrisse Cullors said the reasoning behind the protests of the Democratic Party is that the Democrats have “milked the Black vote while creating policies that completely decimate Black communities.”[70] Critics argue that Black Lives Matter “has become a movement about instilling fear — sometimes in politicians, sometimes in ‘white people,’ but mainly and most significantly in police.”[71]

Funding

The BLM Movement founders have connections to large “radical Left organizations.”[72] The connection to the Left has provided the BLM Movement with two “big bets” needed to have an influential social movement.
It is estimated that groups associated with the BLM Movement have taken in $133 million since 2013. Organizations associated with liberal billionaire George Soros are said to have provided at least $33 million to various BLM movement groups since 2016.[73]
In 2015, the fundraising club Democracy Alliance, led by liberal donors like George Soros and Taco Bell heir Rob McKay, recommended “its donors step up check writing to a handful of endorsed groups that have supported the Black Lives Matter movement.” [74] BLM Movement groups which received support from the Democracy Alliance were the Black Youth Project 100, the Center for Popular Democracy, the Black Civic Engagement Fund, Color of Change and the Advancement Project.[75]
Additionally, the Ford Foundation and the Borealis Philanthropy created the Black-led Movement Fund,[76] a funding vehicle for the Movement for Black Lives, the coalition of groups responsible for the extremist “Vision 4 Black Lives.”[77] The fund has received “pledges of more than 100 million dollars from liberal foundations and others eager to contribute.”[78]

References

Posted by at

Barbarians At The Mall

What can be done about the current wave of urban riots? The obvious answer is, sad to say, not much. Public officials with only a handful of exceptions are paralyzed to respond with the necessary force lest they be accused of brutality and provoke yet more rioting and violence. There is some good news, however. Evolution matters—homo sapiens have adapted and survived worse. Protecting society from chaos is far from hopeless though not immediately. Solutions are possible and need not cost a fortune or require draconian social engineering to domesticate a violent under-class.
Let’s start with architectural adjustments, bricks and mortar fixes to use a currently popular term, are guaranteed to perform as advertised for the simple reasons that rich people for millennia have successfully protected their property from violent rabble. We already possess formulae. Medieval castles with their moats and drawbridges, stone walls and narrow windows may not have been totally secure, but hard to imagine today’s screeching social justice warriors looting it. Urban planners of yesteryear knew how to safeguard a city—think Washington, DC and Paris–where a few well-placed troops could block unruly mobs marching on the capital. County seats in American Midwest towns typically have solid stone fortress-like, easily defended courthouses, built on hills, obviously designed to prevent debtors from seizing and then burning their mortgages (think Shays’ Rebellion).
This anti-looter architectural style has long been visible in “diverse” neighborhoods populated by a criminally inclined clientele. The distinctive and highly functional style features bars on the windows, cashiers secure inside bullet-proof plexiglass cages, and security cameras everywhere. Signs warn patrons that they are on camera and when these businesses close for the day, they are protected by steel shutters. Potential troublemakers know full well that the counter clerk is often armed, most cash is kept in an inaccessible safe and a large German Shepard frequently keeps the clerk company. Occasional news accounts tell of clerks shooting a would-be robber, so stick-ups are relatively rare.
If the threat of mass looting becomes commonplace, this “ghetto” defense style is easily extended to more mainstream establishments albeit with better optics. In a word, commerce would be “hardened.” Target, pharmacies and even liquor stores can build fortress-like stores with slits smash- proof glass windows and a single impenetrable steel blast front door that can be closed by remote control from company headquarters, if necessary. As with Medieval castles, employees can flee via hidden passageways and safely re-emerge blocks away. Totally secure “safe rooms” might be available if the staff and lingering customers are caught by surprise.
The modern mall—including downtown versions–will be totally re-designed to be entirely surrounded by windowless brick or concrete walls with a small number of quickly sealable entrances. Mall stores that have past histories of attracting looters—those selling sneakers, electronics, cell phones, for example, would be segregated to one section and if a riot occurred, a steel gate would be deployed to isolate them (high-priced Michael Jordans can be displayed only one shoe at a time with the second shoe kept at a secret off-premises location). Parking lots in the suburbs would have fewer points of entry and could quickly be closed to prevent the feeding fests that occur once it became known that a looting party was in progress. Access from public transportation, often the source of troublemakers, could be re-configured so as to better control entry.
The recent shift to e-commerce also provides major opportunities for risk management. Stores like Best Buy no longer need to have piles of self-service merchandise so alluring to the grab-and-run crowd. Stores need only display a single (securely chained) model of a TV or iPhone, and if ordered, it would be delivered same day at no charge via Amazon or FedEx. Want it now? Visit the customer fulfillment center, a bunker-like building behind a ten-foot wall a half mile distant. Going cashless could also be extended and thus reduce looter incentives to damage registers and safes while providing quicker access to customer payments.
Upscale, super-pricey stores that wish to keep their present ambiance can adopt a scorched earth approach, a military strategy that undermines the enemy by preemptively destroying anything of value—food, vehicles, industrial resources—before the enemy arrives. So, if the looters are milling outside a Gucci boutique, and the situation looks threatening, the staff will immediately spray paint or otherwise mutilate everything. This is not as draconian as it may seems since ultra-luxury stores stock minimal inventory (this conveys “exclusivity”) and extraordinary high store mark-ups limit actual monetary loss. Less obvious, these firms—Dior, Chanel, Fendi, Burberry etc.—anyway dread their brand being “ghettoized” so destroying them prior to theft is a wise business choice. Would-be looters are not that stupid—who would steal a shredded Prada or a Louis Vuitton purse?
This conversion is not as costly as it may initially appear. Savvy builders favoring this anti-looting style would enjoy an advantage in today’s struggling commercial real estate market. Brick and mortar stores relying on e-commerce for partial fulfillment would be smaller with and thus would pay less rent. A powerful incentive would be reduced insurance premiums and, as an added bonus, the insurance firms would research looter behavior to advise real estate developers. City ordinances can also legally require anti-riot measures (“public safety”) just as they currently demand fire doors and automatic sprinklers. Laws might be passed to limit the number of unaccompanied minors allowed into stores at any one time to prevent a critical mass of unruly teenagers.
Meanwhile, private security would be transformed. Gone would be the ubiquitous inoffensive, elderly “mall cop” terrified of racial profiling accusations and thus unable to deter young black troublemakers. Now fight fire-with-fire: hire security whose appearances terrify young would-be hoodlums. A few well-tattooed Mexican gangbangers might make white middle class shoppers slightly uneasy, but the message would unambiguous to blacks—don’t mess! Beefy Russians with gold teeth and thick accents would also do the trick.
Looters sense cowardice. During the 1960s a pet store in New York City’s “Spanish Harlem” (actually an Italian enclave) went absolutely untouched despite days of nearby looting and burning. Not a single parakeet was inconvenienced. Everybody knew that the store was mob-owned, and the Mafia was not easily intimidated by local punks.
The catalogue of adaptive responses to the breakdown of civil society is far more extensive than depicted here. Elon Musk and others can surely improve upon Tasers, pepper spray and tear gas. What about jamming or frying cellphones? During the 1960s I recall research on generating extra low levels sound waves that would induce an involuntary bowel movement. Concentrated cat urine might work better than tear gas. These would slow down any mob. The Covid-19 pandemic illustrates how people can quickly re-locate to secure persona safety, and telecommuting may take root not to escape disease but also to avoid young men outraged over America’s historic structural racism and economic inequality.
Evolution saves lives. Not even feckless politicians and race-mongers can stop adaptions to avoid mayhem. Civilized people for millennia have successfully deterred the barbarians, so we are just reawakening dormant responses. Keep in mind that the modern style professional police force is only a little more than 200 years old, so it is hardly a core requirement of civilization.
Posted by at

Dodgy Data Firm Behind Retracted Hydroxychloroquine Study Raises Questions Over Haphazard Decisions

From Zero Hedge:

A data analytics firm behind an influential - and now retracted Lancet study which concluded that Hydroxychloroquine is dangerous, has one employee and is headquartered in a residential house just west of Chicago. Yet its bogus data prompted the World Health Organization, the UK and France to halt clinical trial programs involving the controversial drug used to treat COVID-19.
The data firm, Surgisphere, was founded by 41-year-old Sapan Desai, an MBA who also holds a medical degree and a Ph.D. who is named on both The Lancet study and another now-retracted article in the New England Journal of Medicine. He has refused to explain how his tiny data analytics firm was able to procure their dodgy data after questions were raised over troubling inconsistencies - despite a letter to The Lancet from over 200 scientists demanding greater transparency regarding the hospitals where medical data came from, according to Bloomberg.
"There is an almighty rush to understand this new disease -- everybody is trying to get data quickly," said said Nicholas Day, a professor of tropical medicine at the University of Oxford’s branch in Bangkok. "All the journals are desperate to publish because there is a thirst to know about this disease. Therefore mistakes are made, stuff is rushed through."
Desai claims his 12-year-old company uses machine learning and artificial intelligence to automate the process of data analytics - "which is the only way a task like this is even possible," he told Bloomberg.
"It is important to understand the nature of this database," he added. "We are not responsible for the source data, thus the labor intensive task required for exporting the data from an EHR (electronic health record), converting it into the format required by our data dictionary, and fully de-identifying the data is done by the healthcare partner. Surgisphere does not reconcile languages or coding systems."
Meanwhile, a Sofia, Bulgaria-based computer scientist who performed freelance programming for Surgisphere two years ago says he has "no clue about their access to medical data."
Key questions over Desai's data include;
  • How did this tiny firm operating out of a guy's house procure an "unrealistically high number of electronic patient records in Africa" as well as their European figures "given the continent's strict rules around health privacy," according to Bloomberg?
  • Why does Desai's dataset have more patients than would appear likely given the dates and spread of COVID-19, particularly in the UK?
  • Why aren't any artificial intelligence or machine learning experts listed in the now-retracted Lancet paper?
  • Why won't Desai answer questions over whether his company has a board or a scientific committee?
  • Why does their data used in the retracted New England Journal of Medicine study include ethnic information on French patients such as skin color, when it's illegal to collect such data in France, and typically requires approval by the CNIL privacy watchdog (which told Bloomberg it hadn't received any requests from Surgisphere).
According to Desai, the official figures "could have been under-reported early on during the pandemic, thus leading to the appearance that we are over-reporting numbers when in actuality we are capturing the true total number of Covid-19 infections at the hospital level, which is the true source for this data."
Still, the Surgisphere studies were highly unusual in that they claimed to quickly assemble data from hundreds of anonymous hospitals, using numerous electronic medical records systems, under different privacy laws across many countries on multiple continents. And even more strangely, for studies that claimed a massive feat of data integration in record-setting time, they had no biostatisticians listed as authors that might have helped pull all this data together.
More typically, when medical scientists do such studies they rely on clearly named and reputable government databases in one country or state that researchers are able to access.
Surgisphere said its information comes from “a registry, with data obtained from electronic health records” of a “very specific group of hospitalized patients with Covid-19.” The company “directly integrates with the EHRs of our hospital customers,” and “has permission to include these hospitals’ EHR data in its query-able registry/database of real-world, real-time patient encounters.” -Bloomberg 
Yet, the company won't provide the names of companies or institutions which have provided data.
Desai also claims on his website that he has worked with Scotland's National Health Service 'to find data-driven solutions to high rates of post-surgical complications and infections,' when no such relationship exists.
"At no point have Surgisphere had any access to NHS Scotland data," they told Bloomberg in an email.
Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of it all is that the WHO and two entire countries halted trials of a potentially life-saving drug following the results of a single study that they failed to independently verify.
Posted by at
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)