Canadian Covid Tribunals: Recommendations not Laws

A few days ago I wrote "FDA: Liar, Liar Pants On Fire".

The gist of this is that the FDA claims its position on Ivermectin was only a "recommendation" and therefore the FDA is not liable for any lawsuits as a result of actions taken on behalf of these "recommendations".

Perhaps, I thought, this is just one lawsuit, one instance.  So perhaps I was mistaken.

Unfortunately for those impacted, there is now foreign confirmation of this.

I watched a portion of the live stream identified by https://substack.com/inbox/post/86378102. (Thanks to the Unconditional Jessica blog on substack for sharing the video link!)

"This Wednesday, November 23, 2022 at 9:00 am (Eastern Standard Time), there will be a tribunal hearing in the case of Drs. Phillips, Trozzi, and Luchkiw. In my expert opinion, the overwhelming weight of the peer-reviewed scientific literature shows that these are doctors that had incredible foresight and courage at a time when their views were considered unpopular by less critically thinking physicians. Their abilities to practice medicine have been restricted by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario. Personally, I am keen to observe if this will be a COVID-19-related legal decision that is made based on the weight of the scientific evidence. If so, it will be a conspicuously rare occurrence in Canada where COVID-19-related legal decisions have been made based on anything but the evidence. In this country, legal proceedings can be overseen by the public" [underline mine].

Below is a live feed from Ontario - not sure how long it will be on, or if there will be a recorded video after the hearing is over.

So what's important about this video?

The key takeaway here is that, in Canada, the defense of these doctors by their lawyer is that the Canadian health authorities (the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario above) did not and do not have the authority to enforce anything but the law.

And, as it turns out, the only thing the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario for Covid did was to make "recommendations."  Recommendations on how to treat Covid.

Thus, according to their lawyer, there is simply no case against these doctors because going against a "recommendation" is not illegal.  The lawyer made a persuasive case all the way up to the Canadian Supreme Court doctors have the freedom to treat patients as they see fit so long as they do not violate the law.

Therefore actions taken against the doctors to interfere with their practice of medicine are in fact the crimes.

I do not know when the "results" of these hearings will be made public but I hope it will be soon.

So, to my original post.

Indeed, the defense of the FDA and CDC will be they must made recommendations.

On the other hand, private and public agencies that interfered doctors treating patients (as well, I believe, private and public agencies interfering with business operations, food preparation and delivery, etc. etc.) are going to end up being liable for damages to these doctors, individuals and business.

Twitter: Bathroom Stall Wall of the World

As a young child born middle end of the twentieth century I vividly recall visits to public restrooms.

Malodorous, un-flushed remains, empty and vandalized toilet paper dispensers, runs of toilet paper strewn across the floor and into the urinals, horrifying uncleanliness, smashed and broken porcelain.  Something to be avoided at almost all costs...

But there was, almost always, a singularly interesting and even inspiring aspect: the messaging (or perhaps artwork) on the walls of the stalls.

"For a good time call Jennifer 999-9999" (No area code needed in those days.) 

Messages about bodily functions, broken heartedness, art, poetry and so on.

The most important aspect of this, with regard to Twitter, is of course, the "anonymous" aspect of it all.

Who was it, exactly, that had (perhaps biblical) knowledge of "Jennifier"?

Of course, you could never know.  

Sure, you might suspect someone, perhaps even a dear, close friend, of having the courage to deface your favorite stall by observing stall use and wall changes day to day.  But really, you never knew for sure who had written what or why they had written it.

Like the modern Twitter you were exposed to a variety of artwork, poems and other "free" content foisted upon you by legions of unknown "benefactors".

On day one of Twitter's creation I marveled at the shear genius of

• Limiting text to a mere 140 characters (just like the limit your Bic pen imposed if you tilted your pen from a seated position to write on the stall wall).  
  
  
• The cleverness of ensuring no one really knew who was writing what.  
  
  
• The implicit deniability associated with the fact that your phone or computer was never totally under you full control 24 x 7 365.  
  
  
• The obvious uses for clandestine messaging.
  
  
• And all without the danger of actual, physical excrement being in play at any point during the communication.

Indeed, the brilliance with which Twitter was able to capture the true essence of bathroom stall wall communications was unparalleled.

But, unlike the stall walls of old, Twitter, through clever use of computers created a virtual infinity mirror effect providing limitless stall walls for everyone in the world to see and use.

Today the history of bathroom stall communications (back even to Roman times) and Twitter pale in the light of what many "moderns" think about Twitter.

Now let's consider "Verified’ anti-vax accounts proliferate as Twitter struggles to police content".  This sad tome tells the woeful tale of how, without Twitter's crack (no pun intended) staff content moderators Twitter users will be exposed to "health misinformation".  They particularly lament the fact that your $7.99 USD "verified account" gives you absolute power over the minds of endless lemmings gathered to lap up content at the shores of the Twitter misinformation information sea.

From the link: “There’s a sense of legitimacy that comes with it [the $7.99 account],” said Barry. “By verifying this anti-vaccine account, they’re kind of verifying all of the misinformation it shares … it makes people think, ‘Oh, well, this is a verified account. This must be true.’”

Seriously?

"I saw it on the internets - must be true..."

No, dear Twitterati, no one but you, apparently, actually believes Twitter to be more than a clever simulation of a bathroom stall.

The article goes on and one about how "anti-vaccine" and "anti-science" posts, including, of course, those from the British Medical Journal (BMJ) and other scientific publications.  See this BMJ link, as an example, covering "Myocarditis and pericarditis risk after covid-19 vaccination."  Indeed, the authors, Jing Luo, assistant professor and  Walid F Gellad, professor, seem to have not gotten the "misinformation" memo as they conclude "... a large body of reviewed studies continues to suggest that mRNA covid-19 vaccines are associated with a rare but heightened risk of acute myocarditis and pericarditis. These risks are highest in young males shortly after the second dose. ..."

Perhaps their Twitter accounts were suspended?

And did I find this article on Twitter?  No, of course not!

It came via "MedPage Today" - a popular medical rag that writes constantly about woes and misery of billion dollar corporations and government agencies and their failure to control everyone's thoughts, lives and health.

God forbid Eli Lilly's stock drops because someone thinks they now have a conscience or Robert F Kennedy Jr speak freely...

Certainly Elon Musk has his work cut out for him.

The only way Twitter can make its way out of the bathroom and on to some at least minimal legitimacy is to require actual verification of its users: driver license or other id. (Of course, it's easy enough to verify yourself the source or author of information, but I suppose this is beyond the reach of the average lemming.)

If you want true, verified content, demand actual links to sources, CVs, resume's, etc. turn on "child mode" and you'll be safe.

Just like you would expect from an actual, may they rest in peace, news organization.

If you want me to live in your "child mode" you can forget it...

There are far too many other "sources of truth" at this point to really care one way or the other about Twitter.  And that's the real problem Musk faces...

Perhaps Musk, like a modern Hercules, can flush out the modern Augean Stables of Twitter.

Only time will tell.

FDA: Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire!

Back in June, 2022 three US doctors (Robert L. Apter, M.D., FACEP, Mary Talley Bowden, M.D. and Paul E. Marik, MBBCh, M.MED, FCCM, FCCP) sued the FDA.  These doctors were disciplined over their use of Ivermectin to treat the Covid.  (Lawsuit here.)

According to these doctors the FDA said, at the time of the disciplining and still says on their web site as of this writing, that (see horse image right/below as well):

• The FDA has not authorized or approved ivermectin for use in preventing or treating COVID-19 in humans or animals. Ivermectin is approved for human use to treat infections caused by some parasitic worms and head lice and skin conditions like rosacea.
  
  
• Currently available data do not show ivermectin is effective against COVID-19. Clinical trials assessing ivermectin tablets for the prevention or treatment of COVID-19 in people are ongoing.
  
  
• Taking large doses of ivermectin is dangerous.
  
  
• If your health care provider writes you an ivermectin prescription, fill it through a legitimate source such as a pharmacy, and take it exactly as prescribed. 
  
  
• Never use medications intended for animals on yourself or other people. Animal ivermectin products are very different from those approved for humans. Use of animal ivermectin for the prevention or treatment of COVID-19 in humans is dangerous. 

The FDA, according to the suit, also said a number of other similar things.

According to the doctor's lawyer on Epoch Times (link here):

From the linked FDA web page.

“The FDA has made public statements on ivermectin that have been misleading and have raised unwarranted concern over a critical drug in preventing and treating COVID-19,” Marik told The Epoch Times. “To do this is to ignore both statutory limits on the FDA’s authority and the significant body of scientific evidence from peer-reviewed research.”

Fast forward to today.  We are in Federal court.  Here's what the FDA attorney's have to say (source here):

“The cited statements were not directives. They were not mandatory. They were recommendations [underline mine]. They said what parties should do. They said, for example, why you should not take ivermectin to treat COVID-19. They did not say you may not do it, you must not do it. They did not say it’s prohibited or it’s unlawful. They also did not say that doctors may not prescribe ivermectin,” Isaac Belfer, one of the FDA.

Just a "recommendation" - right...  What you "should do".  That's a directive, not a request, especially when you are the biggest bully on the block...

How about this Mr. FDA for "consequences" of your "recommendations" (just a few of many):

https://www.abc27.com/news/top-stories/doctor-accused-of-mass-prescribing-ivermectin-hydroxychloroquine-fired-by-pa-hospital/

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/04/us/pennsylvania-doctor-ivermectin-fired.html

https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/26/us/covid-ivermectin-arkansas-doctor/index.html

(Note on the last one - it mentions the "FDA Warning" - hmmm - see how some interpret "should do" - I wonder what that exact warning was?)

Funny how, when under oath, things become a bit different clearer.

(Remember, we are following the science here...)

Jared Kelson, the plaintiffs attorney, told the court that informal claim “doesn’t explain the language they actually used: ‘Stop it. Stop it with the ivermectin.'”

The FDA’s posts, comments, and actions “clearly convey that this is not an acceptable way to treat these patients,” Kelson argued.

We also know the government, including the FDA, were in cahoots with Facebook and other big tech social media companies (see my post on this here).

Words and actions have consequences, Mr. FDA.

Today we also know, from situations like Honduras about which I reported here, that Ivermectin works in this context.

From this more recent Epoch Times article:

“Plaintiffs have also not shown that any of their claimed injuries are fairly traceable to defendants’ statements because their injuries were caused by independent third-party conduct that was not a predictable response to those statements,” Belfer, an FDA lawyer, said in response to Kelson.

Belfer noted that the FDA’s pages say people can use ivermectin if their health care provider prescribes it, argued the statements “did not bind the public or FDA, did not interpret any substantive rules, and did not set agency policy,” and said the FDA’s position could change in the future if new data become available.

“They also do not have legal consequences for anyone but simply provide nonbinding recommendations to consumers,” he said.

Just take a look at the FDA vaping media (see https://www.fda.gov/media/159410/download) and its consequences.  No more vaping, period.  Sure, the FDA is just "making a recommendation"... Destroying entire industries and increasing use of combustion tobacco - but no matter...

Attorney Kelson disagreed: “If the government is going to label ivermectin a horse medicine or a horse dewormer and promulgate the idea that it is only for animals, then the natural correlation is that doctors who prescribe it are horse doctors or quack doctors, which has played out,” he said. “That is enough of a harm to get into court,” or have the motion to dismiss rejected, he said.

“The government engaged in a singularly effective campaign here to malign a common drug that has been used for a very long time and has been dispensed in billions of doses. It’s one of the most famously safe drugs in the history of human medicine. And when people did exactly what the FDA said to ‘Stop it. Stop it with the ivermectin,’ I don’t understand how that would not be traceable back to the FDA,” Kelson said.

It will be interesting to see what the judge rules...

星漢燦爛•月升滄海, Deadwind, Dehli Crime and all that...

If you are like me then very likely you are disgusted and/or bored by the nonsense spewed by Hollywood.

There are, however, many good things to watch created in foreign countries (so long as you can tolerate subtitles).

What's so interesting to me is how each country addresses story telling.  Outside the US things are quite traditional - at least as far as what I am interested in watching.  Law and order in most other countries depends on honor.  You don't see trials nor do you see people weaseling out of their responsibilities.  Honor is important outside the US, and if these shows are any indication, it won't be going away anytime soon.

Here's a list of a few:

Love Like the Galaxy (星漢燦爛•月升滄海)

(Available on Viki. Viki is something like an Asian Netflix.  An annual subscription is around $100 USD.  Wikipedia link.)

This is more or less a romance in ancient China with elements of war and strategy.  There are some excellent action scenes as well.  This is every bit as good as something like Game of Thrones without all the gratuitous sex and violence.  Yes, there is some war related blood but it's not the be-all end-all of the movie.

What you'll see: thoughtful dialog, excellent plot and screenplay, over all very good film/production quality, excellent acting.

What you won't see: Woke nonsense, naked bodies, sexual situations, famous stars.

Deadwind

(Wikipedia link.)

This is a Finnish crime drama that follows a female detective (Karppi) and mother of two through the ins and outs of drug and other Finnish crime.  What's interesting here is the plot - a lot of twists and turns and unexpected sequences of events.

What you'll see: thoughtful dialog, some story-appropriate violence, excellent plot, over all very good film/production quality, excellent acting.

What you won't see: Woke nonsense, naked bodies, sexual situations, famous stars, flashy production.

Dehli Crime

(Wikipedia link.)

This is a hard core crime series (I prefer Season 2 but Season 1 is also quite good - but a bit more graphic).  It's an excellent portrayal of what the city of Dehli is like.  Again, the justice model is very interesting compared to the US.  

What you'll see: thoughtful dialog, some story-appropriate violence, excellent plot, over all very good film/production quality, excellent acting.

What you won't see: Woke nonsense, naked bodies, sexual situations, famous stars, flashy production.

C++: STL Climate Destruction Line by Line

I wrote this dumb little C++ test program to compare the use of simple STL vector stuff with a plain old C-style character array:

//
//  main.cpp
//  testtest
//
#ifdef BEST
#include <stdio.h>
void foo(char * x, size_t& ptr) {
    *(x + ptr++) = 23;
}
#define bar(a, b, c) *(a + b++) = c
void test()
{
      char a[100];
      size_t ptr = 0;
      foo(a, ptr);
      bar(a, ptr, 23);
}
#endif // BEST

#ifdef MIDDLE
// Type your code here, or load an example.                                         
#include <iostream>

#include <vector>

using namespace std;

void foo(vector<int>& x, size_t& ptr) {
    x.push_back(23);
    ptr++;
}

void test()
{
    vector<int> a{ 1, 3, 5};
    size_t ptr = 0;

    foo(a, ptr);
}
#endif // MIDDLE

#ifdef WORST
#include <iostream>
#include <vector>

using namespace std;

vector<int>foo(void) {
    vector<int> somev;
    somev.push_back(23);

    return somev;
}

void test()
{
    vector<int> a{ 1, 3, 5};
    vector<int> data = foo();

    a.insert(a.end(), data.begin(), data.end());
}
#endif // WORST                                                                                                            
int main(int argc, const char * argv[]) {
    for (int i = 0; i < 1000000; i++) {
        test();
    }
}

If I run this code on a Mac M1 I get (using stock clang, etc.):

% clang -DBEST -std=c++14 -O2 testtest_all.cpp -o testtest_all -lstdc++

% time ./testtest_all                                               

./testtest_all  0.00s user 0.00s system 1% cpu 0.231 total

% time ./testtest_all

./testtest_all  0.00s user 0.00s system 45% cpu 0.005 total

 % time ./testtest_all

./testtest_all  0.00s user 0.00s system 54% cpu 0.005 total

% time ./testtest_all

./testtest_all  0.00s user 0.00s system 45% cpu 0.006 total

% clang -DWORST -std=c++14 -O2 testtest_worst.cpp -o testtest_worst -lstdc++

% time ./testtest_worst                                             

./testtest_worst  0.09s user 0.00s system 30% cpu 0.290 total

% time ./testtest_worst

./testtest_worst  0.08s user 0.00s system 94% cpu 0.089 total

% time ./testtest_worst

./testtest_worst  0.08s user 0.00s system 97% cpu 0.086 total

% time ./testtest_worst

./testtest_worst  0.08s user 0.00s system 97% cpu 0.085 total

Feel free to plug the above C++ code into https://godbolt.org/ to see the gory details (some output shown above).  (Note too that the initial slow speed may be some JIT thing running on the M1 - so ignore that for the purposes here.)

This results are quite interesting: I am paying a 10x performance hit for the convenience of memory "safety" - that is - I don't run off the end of an array or something like that.

I am not worrying about cache lines or other esoteric stuff here.  Just running a dumb, simple-minded performance test.

It surely seems like we are using 10x the number of processors just so we can "write better code."

According to Quora (which is a dubious source but a source non-the-less) I would estimate there are between a half to a trillion processors running todays world.

According to this (https://www.electricrate.com/what-is-a-terawatt/) all humans use perhaps 17 terra watts (17 TW) of power.

Wikipedia thinks that about 10% of all human power is used for computers (see this).

Let's estimate 2-3 watts, on average, per processor (most are small, many are not, so we guess).  

I am sure this is not very precise but it gives you the big picture idea of how much computing costs in terms of global energy output.

Now let's imagine that we use inefficient coding systems (C++/STL) to write code for these systems.

Fixing the code to be more efficient, i.e., removing STL as we saw in the tests above, we might be able to spend 1% of humanities power on computers instead of 10%.

That's 10% of the heat and corresponding power output by the entire world.

Seems like a steep price to pay for mere code-writing convenience.

C++ and STL seem like they are costing humanity a lot, just to nobody has to learn how to prevent memory leaks or create some better language.

That means your "code base" of millions of lines is destroying the planet.

Some FORTH

Here's some history - an Atmel power controller driven by Forth.

https://lwgat.blogspot.com/2014/03/primusz-powered-by-grx-10.html

And some Forth:

https://www.inspectionmagic.com/forth/timer4_new.frt

More Horsing Around with Cookie...

 

Another visit to Rebel and Opy...

New Big Dog Walks and Bonus Horse Time...

I've been busy so here's a bunch of videos taken over the last week or so...  Check out any I missed on the youtube channel.

Cookie and the horses:

 

Walk Videos: