Showing posts with label Tom Woods. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tom Woods. Show all posts

Saturday, November 28, 2020

"Lockdown Science: we have no idea what we're doing, but if something brings people pleasure, we should probably discontinue that."

"Don’t ever be intimidated by public health officials.  These were the kids who by and large weren’t bright enough to get into medical school.”


A must-listen presentation by Dr. Thomas Woods.  One of Tom's best; perhaps his very best.  Here are his show notes

130 million people are at risk of dying of starvation from the lockdown alone.  How many babies born this year or last year have never seen a human face?  

Driving people to despair--is that saving lives?  

Lockdowns science: we have no idea what we're doing, but if something brings people pleasure, we should probably discontinue that.  and if something causes great inconvenience or even pain, we should probably do that.   

Don’t ever be intimidated by public health officials.  These were the kids who by and large weren’t bright enough to get into medical school.”

from Lord Sumption, former Supreme Court Judge:

Money is not just for plutocrats.  You and I and the editor of the Guardian and the driver of the Number 9 bus and the archbishop of Canterbury and the cashier at the supermarket all value and depend on money.  Not just in the sense that it pays our wages and pensions, hundreds of thousands of businesses are going under.  Millions are moving from jobs to universal credit.  A thriving economy that we are now throwing away, is the source of our security and the foundation of our children’s future.  We would do well not to sneer at it.  Poverty kills too.  And when it does not kill, it maims physically and mentally and socially.  Do we really want to be, he continues, “the kind of society where basic freedoms are conditional on the decisions of politicians enthralled to scientists and statisticians, where human beings are just tools of public policy?  A society in which government can confine most of the population without controversy is not one in which civilized people would want to live.  Regardless of their answers to these questions, is it worth it?  My own answer is no.  Guidance is fine.  Voluntary self-isolation is fine and strongly advisable for the more vulnerable; most of them will do it by choice.  But coercion is not fine.  There is no moral or principled justification for it.  What sort of life do we think we are protecting?  There is more life than the avoidance of death.  Life is a drink with friends.  Life is a crowded football match or a live concert.  Life is a family celebration with children and grandchildren.  Life is companionship, an arm around one’s back.  Laughter or tears shared in less than 2 meters.  These things are not just optional extras; they’re life itself.  They’re fundamental to our humanity, to our existence as social beings. 

from Tom Woods:

People living in an irrational field already have their representatives—the entire entertainment world, the media, all the political class.  The rest of us have almost no one.  People whose family members died because their procedures were indefinitely postponed or who lost a loved one to suicide or who’ve had everything they’ve poured their hearts into, crushed and destroyed, they have no one.  Elderly people dying of social isolation, who are told: “they can see their grandkids through a window” or over Zoom.  But who think they themselves can best judge what life they want to live likewise have no one to speak for them.  You may have heard the case in Colorado at FairAcres Manor [in Greely, Colorado].  People in wheelchairs holding signs saying, “Would rather die of COVID than of loneliness.  We’re prisoners in our own home.  Or give us freedom.” One of the administrators at that nursing home said they want to be able to hug their grandchildren, they want to be able to hold the hands of their loved ones. And one of the residents said we did this because one of the things we look forward to is a simple hug.  It gives us meaning.  The physical and mental health toll is staggering, and no one is allowed to mention for fear they’re being told they want grandmothers to die.  No one will speak for them except you.  People will hate you for this.  Automatons who can do nothing but repeat CBS news talking points will think you’re terrible.  The rest of us will consider you a hero.  With every speech you give, every article you write, every social media post, every attempt to resist, you’ll be a hero.  There’s nobody is coming to the rescue.  You must be the voice of the voiceless because if it isn’t you, it will be no one.   

Here are the resources Tom provides via email:  

Resources for COVID Rationality

Here is the list of resources I gave a room of 100 state legislators from around the country to help them get the full picture of the virus and the government response.

Twitter accounts to follow:

@ThomasEWoods (naturally!)

@AlexBerenson

@PhilMagness.

@jhaskinscabrera

@kerpen

@MartinKulldorff

@yinonw

@Hold2LLC

@OBusybody

@AJKayWriter

@boriquagato

@covid_clarity

@covidtweets

There are many, many more. I have found these to be excellent aggregators of information, however.

RESOURCES:

RationalGround.com

ThePriceOfPanic.com

Pandata19.com

CollateralGlobal.org (on collateral damage from lockdowns)

gbdeclaration.org (The Great Barrington Declaration)

LockdownSceptics.org (UK, but still helpful for a US audience)

MASK CHARTS:

https://rationalground.com/mask-charts/

https://rationalground.com/more-mask-charts/

https://thefederalist.com/2020/10/29/these-12-graphs-show-mask-mandates-do-nothing-to-stop-covid/

Follow @ianmSC [or Ian Miller] on Twitter for ongoing charts

My podcast, the Tom Woods Show, has featured a lot of important guests on the topic:

TomsPodcast.com


Tuesday, January 9, 2018

THE OPPOSITE OF ADDICTION IS NOT SOBRIETY; THE OPPOSITE OF ADDICTION IS CONNECTION

A MUST-LISTEN INTERVIEW ON ADDICTION


Interview is from Tom Woods Show.

Here are my notes . . . 

Anslinger was riding the fear of Latinos, a lot of parallels of today, “If you smoke cannabis you will murder your family with an axe.”  This was the reason why cannabis was banned.  
90% of crack and heroin users do not become addicted, leaving 10% or less of those who do use these drugs become addicted.  
Chemical hooks theory.  Patients recovering from serious injuries are put on heroin drugs in hospitals but they never get addicted.  If heroin is addictive, why are these folks not getting addicted?  The chemical hooks theory took place following a lab experiment with a rat.  A rat was placed in a cage with two cups–one with water only, the other laced with heroin.  Placed all by itself, the rat almost always preferred the heroin-laced water.  It’s not the drug that causes addiction, it’s the isolation.  Rat Park: lots of colored balls, other rats, lots of sex.  In Rat Park, they don’t like the drugged water.  They don’t use it very much.  In the 1970s, scientists came along and pointed out that you put the rat all alone in an empty cage, where it’s got nothing to do except use these drugs, what would happen if we did this differently?  So he built a cage that he called Rat Park. 
The opposite of addiction is not sobriety; the opposite of addiction is connection.  Places where addiction is highest is where suffering is highest.  Not a coincidence that the current addiction crisis spiked after 2008.  Core of addiction is trying to avoid pain, trying not to be present in your life.  Fundamental errors in the war on drugs.  One solution is to get rid of the drugs.  Can’t do that; they even appear in prisons.  If you could do that, that’s not the core of the problem.  War on Drugs says you stop addiction by inflicting more pain on addicts.  He gives the example of a woman in prison in Arizona where she is humiliated.  Stopping addiciton by afflicting more punishment on them.  Punishment makes suffering worse, and therefore makes addiction worse. 
Here is 
 


And here is


Marcia Powell, 48, was baked in 106-degree heat for 4 hours under Sheriff Joe Arpaio, a disciple of Harry Anslinger.  A woman cooked in a cage in Arizona kept getting arrested.  Judged by the courts to be mentally incompetent.  She was trying to kill herself, and the guards to stop her from doing that put her in an outdoor cage.  Exposed to the desert sun.  Prison guards said they forgot about her.  She screamed, she begged for water, and by the time they called for an ambulance, she had been cooked.  No one was ever criminally punished for what happened to Marcia Powell.  Because when you dehumanize someone with an addiction problem so deeply, you can brazenly murder someone with an addiction problem and it just doesn’t matter, it doesn’t get counted.  

To remedy a few addictions, see Bill Sardi's list:
Myricetin, a molecule from the Asian raisin tree, has been shown to block the cell receptor in the brain responsible for addiction to alcohol.
One of Myricetin's benefits is indicated in Alzheimer's.  Interesting.
Researchers at UCLA tested various molecules and found one that magnanimously blocked the cell (GABA) receptor on the surface of brain cells that produces alcohol craving.  [Acta Pharmacologica Sinica Aug 2014; Neurochemical Research June 2014]
N-acetyl cysteine, a sulfur compound, has been shown to reduce behavioral addictions such as gambling and physical addictions such as smoking. [Journal Clinical Psychiatry Jan 2014]
Zinc supplementation may be beneficial for those individuals who are hooked on opoid drugs (Fentanyl, morphine, Oxycontin, etc.). [Substance Abuse Treatment Prevention Policy Aug 4, 2015]
Carvacrol from oil of oregano is effective in beating back fungal overgrowth (Candida species) that creates sugar craving. [European Journal Clinical Microbiology Infectious Disease Jan 2011]
Zinc and magnesium may be helpful in reducing nicotine addiction among heavy smokers. [Addiction Research & Therapy 2012]