Eastern Approaches—Alex Thomson
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Alex Thomson of ukcolumn.org. Geopolitics, Christianity, education, constitution.
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Welcome to 22/2/22. At the top of the hour, it will be 4 am Moscow time and we shall see what comes of Zhirinovsky’s prediction.
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The response to the Füllmich Grand Jury in video upload comments thus far has been entirely proportionate to most quality free media endeavours of the past decade.

20% “Ohmyohmyomy this is the best thing ever. What is it again?”

10% “This entertainment is only of Grade B quality, and I insist on watching exclusively Grade A, you bungling amateurs.”

10% “OO FUNDS YOO THEN EH? ANSA ME THAT EH?!”

20% “Name the Joos, you snivelling cowards!”

10% “I don’t trust that guest. Used to have, like, a job in the system. Can’t trust anyone who used to have a job in the system, innit.”

30% didn’t appear in comments; were actually absorbing the material
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Ukraine and Russia are on the verge of kicking off a potential World War, and they're not declaring martial law. In Canada all it takes is a few trucks protesting covid tyranny and the system basically declares martial law.
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As Putin said a few hours ago à propos of the Ukraine, “Patriotic sentiment has been stripped of national character and now tends to undo the sovereignty of the nation.”
Britain did the same to Sinn Féin in the 1990s.

https://t.me/IrelandArchive/2171
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When will Putin recognise the sovereignty of the People’s Republic of Alberta?
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Which Telegram philosopher should the constitutionalist movement dispatch to report on the ground from Donbass for the pithiest unmetropolitan aperçus?
Anonymous Poll
29%
The Irish Farmer
56%
Morgoth
6%
Canada First
10%
One of those sweet homesteaders from the Rockies
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Enabling Act sitting on a maple leaf:

Trudeau announces the crime of being an MP who fails to “trust the Government to make incredibly momentous and important decisions at a very difficult time”.

https://t.me/CanadaFirstOfficial/5128
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Forwarded from Awakening Faith (Caroline Klug)
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Eastern Approaches—Alex Thomson
https://t.me/MorgothsReview/2366
If you cross The Last Doctor in Aleppo (White Helmets) with The Only Gay in the Village (Llanddewi Brefi), you get the BBC mind game of 2022:

The Last Transvestite out of Lugansk
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Small jurisdictions can turn on a sixpence. Tyranny today, liberty tomorrow.
Forwarded from Brees Media
Hi Anna and the AVP team,
 
I wanted to share with you an update about the Covid Pass in Lithuania. I'm sure you're busy with UK Covid developments and following the Canadian protest situation. Yet, I hope - and think - that this update from Lithuania could nonetheless be interesting for you.
 
If you remember, my wife and I were banished from society in Lithuania because we refused the authoritarianism of the Covid Pass. We emailed a lot about it in the autumn, and you were very kind to share much information I wrote.
 
The Pass was imposed in September, banning people without a Pass from almost all public indoor areas (including food, filling stations for the car, clothes, books, toys, libraries, banks, government buildings...).
 
It finally ended: the Pass was suspended this month.
 
I posted a Twitter hread describing the Pass, segregation, and how the manner of "loosening" is laying the foundation for embedding the Pass as a permanent tool in society:
https://twitter.com/gluboco/status/1495829237823164418
 
Success-->Permanent
I wrote the Twitter thread in order to fight the Pass becoming permanently embedded into society.
 
Politicians - in Lithuania and throughout the EU - are already declaring the Pass a massive success. "The Pass gave us freedom! The Pass saved us from lockdowns!"
 
The bureaucrats are using the declarations of success to justify planning for the Covid Pass until - at least - the autumn of 2022 (Germany, Italy), until June of 2023 (the EU travel Pass), until 2024 (Austria), and indefinitely (many EU leaders).
 
For me, vaccination is just a subset of the bigger problem: authoritarian control.
 
I'm happy that Pass restrictions are gradually loosening in Europe. But it's for the wrong reasons.
 
The Pass isn't wrong because of business losses. Or wrong because of hospitalization rates, case rates, severity of Omicron, social division, vaccine efficacy, or whatever metric. Or even about bodily autonomy, although that's big.
 
The Pass is wrong because it's fundamentally wrong. Because segregation and authoritarianism are wrong.
 
Sadly, it's now been normalized for half a year that Europeans need government approval to exist in society. Hundreds of millions of Europeans have accepted that government can turn on and off your right to shop, work, travel based on *individual behavior*.
 
As you know, precedent matters very much in law and politics. In the future, European judges, politicians, and bureaucrats will use the example of the Covid Pass to justify future uses: "Well, hundreds of millions of Europeans accepted the Pass in 2021-22, so therefore, it's acceptable now". It sounds stupid and crazy - coercion isn't consent, after all: forcing someone to use the Pass in order to earn money and buy food isn't the same as broad approval - but that's really how the law works in Europe.
 
So with the Twitter message, my wife and I hope to document life under segregation of the Pass in order to counter this story of success.
 
If you think the Twitter post is worthwhile, I'd appreciate if you could share it, draw attention to the Covid Pass banishment, and help fight against the Pass becoming permanently embedded into society.
 
Two additional tidbits for you
I thought to add for you in this mail some point which aren't in the thread but which I thought might be interesting for you in the UK, because of your work organizing businesses to fight the Covid Pass, as well as your long experience and deep ties with media:
- David Frum and shut out from international media
- The loss of support from businesses for the Pass
 
David Frum
In October, the US journalist/commentator David Frum mocked the idea that the Pass is leading to authoritarianism:
 
"To enter Spain from Portugal, you upload proof of vaccination in advance of your flight. You receive back a QR code. Upon  disembarking the plane, the QR code is scanned. It takes not even 10 seconds  This is the supposedly dystopian world of the "vaccine passport." (https://twitter.com/davidfrum/status/1444254875911659522)
 
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Forwarded from Brees Media
As someone who was already banished by the Covid Pass in Europe, I invited Mr. Frum to visit my family in Lithuania to see the reality of the Covid Pass regime. (https://twitter.com/gluboco/status/1444728554395156482)
 
He never responded.
 
The international media abandoned us. For 5 months, we were banished from society. No clothes, no books. Limited on food and gas. No income.
 
And the international media barely covered it. And definitely did not explain the reality.
As you know - perhaps as well as any person - the media has ignored major Covid Pass stories, and misreported when they do discuss it. Deflect, dismiss, deceive. It's very sad.
 
So for 5 months, I continued to try to contact Mr. Frum, as well as other well-known journalists, in order to draw attention to the incredible transformation in European society.
 
But nothing.
 
The irony of the media ignoring Covid Pass banishment is that if you now search for Lithuania and the Pass, the main source in the international news about it is... me.
 
That's crazy.
 
The impact of the Pass on business
I thought you'd be interested in the impact which businesses exerted to stop the Pass.
 
What changed to end the Pass in Lithuania?
 
It wasn't a rediscovered love for freedom.
 
Instead: frustration at record case numbers, arbitrary rule changes almost weekly, and requiring the Pass for 12-year olds.
 
But most importantly: loss of business support.
 
Many EU countries are now loosening restrictions a bit around Covid and the Pass. But in general, the looser countries are loosening and the stricter countries are still very strict: Italy, Cyprus, Greece, France, Latvia, Estonia, more...
 
Of them, Lithuania was one of - if not the - strictest countries. Food, banks, filling stations, all stores, government offices, essentially every indoor building... that's pretty much all society banishing people.
 
So Lithuania's reversal is interesting. It's a complete, 180-degree turnaround. No other strict EU country has instantly turned around like this (e.g., the Scandi countries dropped the Pass, but they were not nearly as strict as Lithuania). In contrast, the strict EU countries aren't turning around completely and instantly; instead, they're either gradually "loosening" and/or they're setting a future date or threshold for stopping the Pass, e.g. France, Italy, Austria.
 
What changed in Lithuania to cause such a fast and instant reversal was the loss of business support.
 
Business support was crucial for the Pass. They're the ones enforcing it, after all. The government presented it to businesses in stark terms: "Either Covid Pass. Or lockdown." So, businesses chose to comply with the Pass. No big business stood against the regime of banishment.
 
And sadly, no one in Lithuania was able to organize a network of businesses to stand firm against the Pass.
 
But the support from business vanished when their profit was hit by several problems at the same time.
 
Retailers' problem #1: customers.
 
When the Pass was imposed society-wide in September, retailers estimated that customer traffic and revenue immediately dropped by about 25%. It never recovered. A loss of 25% of customer traffic - for 5 straight months - was hard for the retailers to accept.
 
Retailers' problem #2: costs.
 
The government created the Covid Pass. But it was businesses which had to pay the bill for technology and staff to enforce it. Estimates are that it cost retailers 300 eur per door, per month; in other words, a store with two entrances would pay around 600 eur per month to control the Pass.
 
For the big retailers, the cost of the technology, machines, and staff for the Pass totaled more than one million euros each.
 
Retailers' problem #3: inflation.
 
Inflation soared in Europe. And within Europe, Lithuania was the highest: in December, inflation for food reached 11.5%, the highest level in 13 years.
 
In January, neighbouring Poland cut tax on food and gas to offset inflation.
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Forwarded from Brees Media
Lithuanian retailers worried: with customer flows already down 25%, how much more would be lost to cross-border shopping? Poland has no Covid Pass...
 
And with this background, the positive test result numbers soared. The government planned and legislated the banishment of people without the Covid Pass. Positive test results were at their low. After the Covid Pass was imposed, the number of positive test results soared, reaching record highs in the last month.
 
So with profits down and cases up, business support for the Pass crumbled. Businesses lobbied the government: What's the point of the severe losses in profit caused by the Pass if autumn cases are the same as 2020-21 when there was no Pass, and winter cases are three times higher? [I included in the Twitter thread a chart showing the timeline of positive test results juxtaposed against the development steps of the Covid Pass: https://twitter.com/gluboco/status/1495832658512945165. It's striking.].
 
Majority approval by the public and unquestioning cheerleading by media supported the Pass thru months of protests, appeals from parents opposed to the Pass for children, and a constitutional lawsuit.
 
But pressure from big business was too much.
 
And that's why it seems politicians in Lithuania suspended the Pass so quickly, so completely, and ahead of any other strict EU country.
 
The upshot? The Lithuanian Retailers' association reports that retail stores overall have seen 10-15% increase in revenue in the first week after the Pass was suspended. Clothing stores were particularly high: 30% increase.
 
(If you're interested in the details, please let me know. I can send you links to sources and help with translations).
 
----------------
 
Conclusion
I'd like to thank you again for your kind help to draw attention to the Covid Pass in Lithuania.
 
And as for our family... our third child was born recently.
 
Pregnancy during banishment isn't ideal. But at the end, the birth was fine. Mother and baby are great. And father is happy that he can buy supplies for them now with no restrictions. :-)
 
We don't have jobs yet. Can't return to our previous jobs; death wishes against us and all that.  But we're getting by. Life finds a way.
 
And what was the first thing we did when the Pass was suspended?
 
The library, of course :-)
 
After 5 months of banishment, we finally took our kids to the library again.
 
They were so happy. We were so happy.
 
Our kids' happiness meant that they jumped and bounced and rolled around and played with books and enjoyed life.
 
And in our case, our happiness meant that we tried not to cry - or at least, not cry too much - as we read stories to them :-)
 
If you recall, during the 5 months of banishment, we weren't allowed to enter the library in any way. We were only permitted to pick up a pre-ordered book from a side door, in a corridor that connects off the back of the parking lot.
 
So it was wonderful to finally enter the library again. Of course, I'm not grateful. It should never have come to this. And we'll never thank bureaucrats for "giving" us rights that they stole from us.
 
But nonetheless, we were happy that after 5 months of segregation and banishment, we finally were able to use the library again.
 
We entered thru the front door. Just like everyone else.
 
Thanks for your support so far in the fight against the Covid Pass. Now, we must keep fighting in order to ban it forever, everywhere.
 
Never again.
 
- Gluboco
 
 
Our happiness meant that we tried not to cry - or at least, not too much - as we read stories to them :-)
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