Shares of Intuitive Machines plummeted once again in premarket trading following the announcement by the space exploration company that its Odysseus moon lander is expected to lose communication capabilities today.
“Flight controllers intend to collect data until the lander’s solar panels are no longer exposed to light. Based on Earth and Moon positioning, we believe flight controllers will continue to communicate with Odysseus until Tuesday morning,” Intuitive Machines wrote in a post on social media platform X.
Flight controllers intend to collect data until the lander’s solar panels are no longer exposed to light. Based on Earth and Moon positioning, we believe flight controllers will continue to communicate with Odysseus until Tuesday morning. Image credit: NASA/Goddard/Arizona State… pic.twitter.com/FFt8CXZPIC
Intuitive Machines posted an image of the lander on the lunar surface. While landing late last week, the lander tipped over when it touched down. This landing position means the solar array cannot be properly deployed, and antennas are pointed toward the moon’s surface, slowing communications down with operators on Earth. Without power, the lander’s heaters won’t work, so it might not survive the frigid lunar night.
Images from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera team confirmed Odysseus completed its landing at 80.13°S and 1.44°E at a 2579 m elevation. After traveling more than 600,000 miles, Odysseus landed within 1.5 km of its intended Malapert A landing site, using a contingent… pic.twitter.com/CaMSSO4Gfb
Shares are down as much as 27% in premarket trading in New York. From the high of nearly $14 a share before the landing last Thursday, shares have crashed 67%.
“There is a lot of retail activity driving volatility in the stock right now, and probably shorting associated with that … would be helpful to get more color on the reliability of (moon lander) comms,” Canaccord Genuity analyst Austin Moeller said.
New research suggests increasing the interval between vaccine doses or using a single dose may significantly lower the risk of heart inflammation caused by mRNA COVID-19 vaccines. Yet some cardiologists are concerned about asymptotic myocarditis and say any risk of heart inflammation in a population group that’s not at risk of experiencing severe COVID-19 is too much.
In a February peer-reviewed paper published in NPJ Vaccines, researchers in Hong Kong observed a significantly lower cumulative incidence of carditis, or heart inflammation, among adolescents who received their second vaccine dose more than 56 days after their first dose compared with those who received their second dose within 21 to 27 days. A second analysis showed that increasing the time between the first and second vaccine doses decreased the risk of heart inflammation by 66 percent. Researchers compared the risk of carditis between standard and extended interdose intervals in 12- to 17-year-olds who received two doses of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine.
Among 143,636 adolescents who received at least one dose of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine, 130,970 (91 percent) received a second dose. Approximately 43 percent of these adolescents received their second dose at an extended interval. During the study period, a total of 84 adolescents were hospitalized for conditions related to heart inflammation within 28 days of the second vaccine dose. After implementing exclusion criteria, 49 cases remained and were attributed to COVID-19 vaccination.
The incidence of heart inflammation was higher in males than females.
In a subgroup analysis among male adolescents, the incidence of carditis was significantly lower in the extended interval group compared with the standard group, with 22 versus 88 cases per million, respectively. In contrast, the incidence of heart inflammation was similar among females vaccinated at standard and extended dose intervals.
The researchers said their findings are consistent with other studies that show young males are at a higher risk of mRNA vaccine-related heart inflammation, although the absolute risk is low and that an interval between vaccine doses greater than 56 days could help reduce the risk of heart inflammation in adolescents.
Cardiologist: Vaccinating Healthy Adolescents Is ‘All Risk’
Pediatric cardiologist Dr. Kirk Milhoan told The Epoch Times that he doesn’t necessarily disagree with the study’s findings, but even a small risk of heart inflammation for adolescents who are not at risk from COVID-19 is too much.
“Before we do any procedure like a medicine, vaccination, or surgery, I look to see if the benefit outweighs the risk or if there’s any benefit at all. A recent paper out of the Cleveland Clinic showed that with more vaccines comes an increased risk of experiencing COVID-19. Once data is available from a reputable study, we must then ask if there’s any benefit to vaccination for the majority of people,” he said.
Referencing the current Hong Kong study, Dr. Milhoan said researchers only looked at myocarditis among hospitalized patients, but he is concerned about people with silent myocarditis from the COVID-19 vaccine, which is why he checks troponin levels. Even a slightly elevated troponin level can be indicative of heart damage.
“If you spread out the doses of the Pfizer product, which has a pseudo mRNA that may have asked the body to make a spike protein we now know is cardiotoxicand directly correlated with myocarditis, fewer people got hospitalized, but people still got hospitalized,” Dr. Milhoan said.
“If you get a large dose of toxin very close together, that’s probably harder on your body than if you spread it over time, but what I believe is that we don’t need the vaccine for this very, very healthy cohort that doesn’t have trouble with COVID. We’re basically giving them all risk even if it’s less risk with no benefit,” he added.
Heart Inflammation Is Higher Due to Asymptomatic Cases
Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine was first made available in Hong Kong in June 2021 with a recommended dose interval for adults and adolescents of 21 days. After a local pharmacovigilance study in January 2022 showed an increased risk of heart inflammation among adolescents who received two vaccine doses, the Department of Health in March 2022 recommended the interval between the first and second vaccine doses be increased to 56 days.
Although the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) originally recommended a three-week interval between the first and second COVID-19 vaccine doses, it recommended the interval be increased in 2022 to eight weeks for Pfizer and Moderna to reduce the risk of heart inflammation.
In a Feb. 15 hearing by the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic, Dr. Peter Marks, director of the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, said myocarditis, or heart inflammation, is one of the “rare” adverse events the agency identified with COVID-19 vaccines, but with “mitigation strategies in place,” the occurrence has decreased.
“After the first COVID-19 vaccine where the primary series given two doses three or four weeks apart, there was a risk in the younger age range of males that was about 1 in 10,000 to 1 in 20,000 individuals got myocarditis. Now, with the spacing out of the vaccines, that risk is almost undetectable,” Dr. Marks told the committee.
“There was a signal for myocarditis or pericarditis only after the primary vaccination series with the Pfizer mRNA vaccine in those 12 to 17 years of age, and that now that signal is not being seen more recently. So I think we’ve learned something with how to deploy the vaccines and I think that’s why the CDC … has changed their recommendations for how they be used,” he added.
In an email to The Epoch Times, cardiologist Dr. Peter McCullough said he believes Dr. Marks and the FDA have failed to keep up with the evolving medical literature on COVID-19 and vaccine-induced myocarditis.
After reviewing multiple peer-reviewed publications on myocarditis, Dr. McCullough made the following conclusions:
1. Vaccine myocarditis occurs in about 2.5 percent of vaccine recipients per administration—and half of the cases are asymptomatic.
2. The incidence of myocarditis is heavily influenced by age and gender, with young men ages 18 to 24 being most at risk.
3. COVID-19 vaccine-induced myocarditis is fatal in cases examined at autopsy.
First M1 Abrams Tank Destroyed In Ukraine Shortly After Appearance On Battlefield
Russian forces claim they have successfully destroyed an American-supplied M1 Abrams main battle tank for the first time, coming two full years into the Ukraine war, outside the captured city of Avdiivka in the Donetsk region.
The US-made advanced tank was reportedly taken out by a kamikaze drone or loitering munition launched by Russia’s 15th Motorized Rifle Brigade. Russian state media accounts made the announcement Monday and published video purporting to show the destruction of the M1 Abrams main battle tank.
“Footage circulating online purports to show the vehicle with a large column of fire rising from its turret,” RT wrote. “It was reportedly targeted by a FPV suicide drone and sustained at least one hit from a shoulder-mounted anti-tank grenade launcher.”
The attack is said to have happened in or near the village of Berdychi, which lies northwest of Avdeevka. Ukraine forces are reportedly in retreat from the city after Russia’s recent capture of it last week.
The introduction of Western main battle tanks into Ukraine appears to have made little or no actual difference in giving Ukraine a tactical advantage.
Instead, starting last spring Russian media widely circulated images showing German-made Leopard 2 tanks burning. And then in September the first UK-supplied Challenger 2 was destroyed.
Below: the widely circulating new footage purporting to show the first destruction of an Abrams main battle tank in Ukraine…
🇷🇺⚡️🇺🇦 BREAKING: The first American M1 Abrams Tank has been destroyed in Ukraine 🪖 pic.twitter.com/dsSKsjKj5z
So to some degree, these tanks being lost in battle has become a humiliation for Ukraine’s Western backers, and is at the same time an immense PR victory for the Russians.
Ironically it was only last Friday that Business Insider reported on the first Abrams spotting on the battlefield:
Newly released video footage offers a first look at the heavy US-made Abrams tank in combat in Ukraine.
When the US delivered the tanks to Ukraine last fall, it added significant capabilities to Ukraine’s ground forces. It comes with challenges as well, but the American-made tank is widely considered to be among the most capable in the world.
Over a year ago the Kremlin warned: “If a decision to transfer to Kiev M1 Abrams is made, American tanks without any doubt will be destroyed as all other samples of NATO military equipment.” Other Russian officials have since warned that Abrams tanks will “burn” on the battlefield, according to TASS.
Ukraine has reportedly received 31 Abrams tanks in total, but there are reports not all of them have been deployed to the battlefield yet. Ukrainian operators had to undergo at least six months to a year of specialized training from US advisers, but it’s also possible these tanks were prematurely rushed to the battlefield with crews unprepared for direct battle.
The number of illegal migrants arriving on Spanish territory in the first six weeks of 2024 is almost six times more than the corresponding period last year, official figures show.
A total of 12,262 new arrivals by land and sea were recorded up to Feb. 11 compared with 2,568 arrivals in the first six weeks of 2023 — a difference of 493 percent, according to weekly data published by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
The vast majority of arrivals are boat migrants from Africa — 12,204 sea arrivals and 58 land arrivals were recorded.
The vast majority of newcomers are exploiting the geographical vulnerability of the Canary Islands, southwest of the Spanish mainland, where 10,902 migrants have landed so far this year. The extent of the crisis can be measured by the fact this figure is up 902 percent for the same period last year — a time when local leaders on the Spanish archipelago were already sounding the alarm regarding unsustainable levels of illegal immigration.
The total number of arrivals since the turn of the year is already more than a fifth of the total figure recorded last year, despite usually being a time of fewer crossings due to adverse weather conditions, and more than a third of all arrivals in 2022.
The most current figures provided by Spain’s interior ministry as reported by La Gaceta show the trend continuing with a total of 14,084 illegal arrivals so far this year.
The Socialist government in Madrid is under pressure to contain the crisis from conservative opponents and local government leaders in the migrant hotspots who have expressed security concerns.
The number of reported rape cases in the Canaries has skyrocketed amid the immigration surge in recent years, rising in 2022 to 167 cases compared to the 91 reported the previous year — an increase of 84 percent — and more than double the 73 cases recorded in the last pre-pandemic year of 2019.
The other major issue is the saturation of public services in the affected areas with Madrid, which have needed to create additional emergency accommodation for newcomers in disused military barracks and hotels on the Spanish mainland.
Footage is now widely circulated on social media of huge lines of migrants awaiting taxpayer-funded charter flights from the Canaries to Madrid in order to be dispersed throughout the country.
WATCH: Hundreds of North African migrants lined up outside Tenerife North–Ciudad de La Laguna Airport on Thursday afternoon for their taxpayer-funded flights to the Spanish mainland, courtesy of the socialist government in Madrid.
The main Barajas airport in the Spanish capital has also had to extend capacity by 50 percent at its asylum center to accommodate greater numbers flying directly into Spain from North Africa.
🇪🇸 Madrid-Barajas airport has expanded its asylum holding area by 50 percent after an influx in arrivals led to overcrowding.
More security staff and cleaners have also been recruited due to newcomers leaving the area in a squalid condition.pic.twitter.com/9ZdpdlJaGk
Spain’s left-wing prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, conducted a working visit to the Moroccan capital of Rabat on Wednesday to discuss, among other matters, the issue of illegal immigration.
At a press conference following his meeting with the Moroccan head of state, Mohammed VI, Sánchez announced plans to invest €45 billion of Spanish taxpayers’ cash to improve Morocco’s infrastructure and economy by 2050, leading conservatives to accuse the socialist politician of favoring the African nation at Spain’s expense.
The World Health Organization is aiming to weaponize public health to advance centralized control over medicine and expand that power to anything else that it can define as a public health crisis.
During a Conservative Political Action Conference panel hosted by Jan Jekielek, a senior editor of The Epoch Times, physicians Dr. Robert Malone and Dr. Brooke Miller explained what they see as a plan to expand the centralization of medicine.
“This appears to be a power grab,” Dr. Malone, who hosts the EpochTV show “Fallout,” said during the event at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in Fort Washington, Maryland, on Feb. 24.
While the WHO and its director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, deny it, Dr. Malone said the WHO, an agency of the United Nations, is proposing an international treaty that would allow the WHO to establish treatment norms and define a public health crisis “for anything they wish.”
He said this power could be used to tell the United States what to do about matters such as energy, carbon dioxide emissions, firearms, and abortion.
“Everything falls under public health as an issue, and then they will have the authority to mandate what nation-states shall do in response to those public health emergencies,” Dr. Malone said.
States that object, he said, would be subject to potential sanctions or other actions if they don’t follow the WHO’s directives. Dr. Malone argued that this is an unconstitutional action because the federal government isn’t granted public health authority under the U.S. Constitution.
“This goes all the way down to the level of the WHO being able to stipulate what medical products or procedures you receive, what vaccines you take, what medicines you’re allowed to take,” he said.
“This is centralized medicine on a global scale.”
Both Dr. Malone and Dr. Miller lamented the shift away from patient-driven medicine toward what they called checklist medicine.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, both physicians saw how the medical world rejected the research of novel ideas and treatments for the disease and instead followed the orders of the top public health authorities.
Dr. Miller said when he was investigating treatments for COVID-19 and presented them to fellow doctors, they “didn’t want to hear about it.”
“They only wanted to follow what the central planners told them to do,” he said.
Even without a WHO treaty, Dr. Malone said, the medical profession is now becoming more centralized, and thinking outside the box is being punished.
“In many states, many nations, there are now laws being enacted that physicians that speak about their opinions, their observations, which differ from the approved narrative, they’re subjected to jail time and major fines up to $200,000,” he said. “This is coming through in Canada and already is enacted in France.”
This shift, Dr. Malone said, completely ignores the Hippocratic Oath that a doctor should swear to, which compels them always to do what’s best for the individual patient.
The medical industry wants doctors to work off of a checklist and follow a set of prescribed orders, he said. Furthermore, Dr. Malone said, the breakdown of individualized care is part of a broader objective: artificial intelligence-driven medicine.
“That’s where they want to go. … standardized medicine where you’re all a number, and you are processed through the system, given a diagnosis,” he said. “Checklist-driven medicine … is what’s being taught in medical schools right now, together with ‘wokeism,’ this is what’s being pushed all the way through the system.”
Regular people need to get involved with their government to prevent the further centralization of medicine in the country, according to both doctors. Dr. Miller said citizens must not be afraid to stand up to the powerful.
“We must demand that our government not sign this treaty. And I would say go even further, we must leave the WHO and defund the WHO,” he said.
Dr. Malone said people need to get involved with their state governments, alert them of what’s happening, and urge them to resist. He also recommended forming a commission to review what’s happening within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Finally, he said, people need to seek out doctors who aren’t part of the corporate medical world.
While many doctors may not want to be involved with corporate health care, the increasing complexity of paperwork forced by the Affordable Care Act and other regulations and the allure of money make it harder to avoid.
“They work for the corporation, they don’t work for the patient,” Dr. Miller said.
Iran Has Enough Near-Weapons Grade Uranium For Almost 3 Nuclear Weapons: IAEA
At a moment the Middle East region stands at the precipice of spiraling toward a major regional war in relation to Gaza conflict spillover, the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has issued a fresh warning of ‘concern’ over Iran’s nuclear program.
IAEA head Rafael Grossi said Monday that “public statements made in Iran regarding its technical capabilities to produce nuclear weapons” have only served to increase “concerns about the correctness and completeness of Iran’s safeguards declarations.”
Grossi urged Tehran to “cooperate fully and unambiguously with the UN nuclear watchdog” after in recent years it has deactivated its nuclear program surveillance devices as well as barred inspectors while arguing that the US unilaterally collapsed the 2015 JCPOA nuclear deal.
But the perhaps most significant revelation from the IAEA contained in a new detailed report it issued is that Iran’s estimated stockpile of enriched uranium is currently at27 times the limits imposed by the 2015 JCPOA (which again is no longer functioning as an active agreement).
According to a confidential International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) report seen by AFP, Iran’s total enriched uranium stockpile was estimated at 5,525.5 kilogrammes as of February 10, up by 1,038.7 kilogrammes from the last quarterly report in November.
Without doubt, Tel Aviv will be paying close attention, given also Israel is increasingly coming into a fuller proxy war with Iran in the region, and given the daily exchanges of fire with Tehran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the weekly Israeli attacks on Damascus and Syrian territory.
But there’s an important caveat to the fresh reporting. While Iran’s enriched uranium is at this significantly higher level compared to 2015, the IAEA says the last several months have actually seen a reduction of its overall stockpile:
Iran reduced its stockpile of near weapons-grade nuclear material over the past 3½ months, the United Nations’ atomic watchdog said Monday, a surprise step likely to be welcomed by Western countries who have been alarmed by Iran’s buildup of highly enriched nuclear fuel.
Iran still has enough near-weapons grade material to fuel almost three nuclear weapons, underlining its status as a threshold nuclear-weapon state. However, by diluting some of its 60% enriched uranium in recent weeks to lower-grade material, its stockpile fell for the first time since it started producing the 60% nuclear fuel in 2021.
This could be Iran’s way of signaling that it wishes to avoid escalating tensions with Israel, also at a time the Shia Houthis continue blocking Red Sea commercial transit, especially to Israeli and US ships.
The Wall Street Journal concludes that “The reduction in 60% enriched uranium will offer some respite to the U.S. and its European partners who have grown increasingly concerned about the expansion of Iran’s nuclear program.”
The Islamic Republic’s leadership, particularly the Ayatollah, has officially denied and rejected that its seeking a nuclear bomb, issuing fatwas saying it is ‘unIslamic’. However the past years have seen a dramatic ramping up of uranium enrichment which definitely points to keeping the potential achievement of a nuclear weapon as an ‘option’.
Meanwhile, in new alarming statements Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has said Israel’s air force lacks the necessary resources to completely stop Iran’s nuclear program even if the military devoted everything to it.
Olmert said in an interview with The National that “We can destroy their headquarters, important projects, railways, roads, and airports .. Israel can do a lot to damage Iran’s infrastructure, but Israel has no means to be able to destroy the nuclear program of Iran.” Of course, this would involve an all-out attack by Israel on Iran, but as yet there is no evidence that Tehran is currently seeking to attack Israeli directly.
More cases of hearing and balance disorders have been observed after people received COVID-19 vaccines, according to a recent study, which asked vaccinated people to remain alert to such complications.
The Australian peer-reviewed study, published in the Vaccine journal on Feb. 22, aimed to determine whether there was an increase in “audiovestibular events” following COVID-19 vaccination in south-eastern Australia. Audiovestibular refers to conditions related to hearing and balance disorders.
“Healthcare providers and vaccinees should be alert to potential audiovestibular complaints after COVID-19 vaccination,” the authors said.
Increase in Incidences of Vertigo, Tinnitus
Researchers found a rise in vertigo and tinnitus cases after vaccination. Tinnitus is a condition that makes an individual hear sounds like humming, ringing, or rushing, in the absence of external stimuli. Vertigo makes people feel like they’re spinning, and can result in dizziness.
“Our study found an increased relative incidence of vertigo in the 42 days following mRNA vaccines, and an increased relative incidence of tinnitus in the 42 days following both Vaxzevria adenovirus vector and mRNA vaccines,” researchers wrote.
“We are the first to confirm this increased relative incidence of tinnitus and vertigo post COVID-19 vaccines,“ they stated. They speculated that the audiovestibular events may be an ”immune mediated injury” triggered by the COVID-19 vaccines.
No Rise in Cases of Hearing Loss
In the same study, the researchers reported that there was “no increased relative incidence in hearing loss” in the 42 days following any COVID-19 vaccine.
They noted that the U.S. Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) data and studies conducted on the Finnish and Danish health care registry have found “found no association between sudden sensorineural hearing loss (SSNHL) and COVID-19 vaccination.”
As such, the authors concluded that their analysis “supports the opinion that there is no increased incidence of hearing loss following COVID-19 vaccines.”
The authors pointed out a limitation—that their study could not account for any concurrent COVID-19 infections, which other studies have suggested could be associated with audiovestibular events.
“COVID-19 infection is an important potential confounder of the association between COVID-19 vaccination and audiovestibular events,” they wrote.
Figures
Researchers collected vaccine-related data from two databases in Australia, selecting 45,350 records via SAEFVIC, and 4.94 million records via POLAR, for the time period from January 2021 to March 2023.
SAEFVIC is the central spontaneous reporting service for adverse events following vaccinations in the Australian state of Victoria. The POLAR platform collects and processes general practice data on behalf of Primary Health Networks in Australia. Multiple researchers in the study declared receiving funding from the Department of Health, Victoria. SAEFVIC is funded by the department.
Out of the 45,350 SAEFVIC records, researchers identified 415 cases of vertigo, 226 incidences of tinnitus, and 76 hearing losses. From the POLAR platform, 13,924 reports of vertigo, 4,000 incidences of tinnitus, and 3,214 hearing losses were identified.
Researchers recorded the impact of two types of vaccines—AstraZeneca’s adenovirus vector vaccine and mRNA-based vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna.
The researchers found an increase in vertigo incidence following mRNA vaccines, and an increase in tinnitus incidence following both AstraZeneca and mRNA vaccines.
The reporting rate for audiovestibular events was found to be higher for AstraZeneca shots compared to the mRNA vaccines. In addition, more audiovestibular events were identified after the first dose of AstraZeneca than its second dose, while no such difference was observed for the mRNA vaccines.
Sudden Deafness
SSNHL, commonly known as sudden deafness, refers to an unexplained, rapid loss of hearing either at once or over a few days, caused by damage to the inner ear or the nerve from the ear to the brain. The condition usually affects only a single ear.
Researchers noted that some studies did find an association between Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine and SSNHL, but that the population or the effect size in those studies “was very small.”
One such study was published in February 2022—a cohort study of over 2.6 million patients in Israel. Of the 2,602,557 patients who received the first dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine, 91 cases of SSNHL were reported. Of the 2,441,719 people who received the second dose, 79 SSNHL cases were identified.
While the “effect size is very small,” the researchers of that study said their findings suggest the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine “might be associated with increased risk of SSNHL.”
Tinnitus Takes Toll on Quality of Life
Back in 2021, Gregory Poland, director of the Mayo Clinic’s Vaccine Research Group in Rochester, Minnesota, developed tinnitus after receiving his second shot of the COVID-19 vaccine. While he experienced ringing in both ears, the situation was worse in the left ear.
“It was like someone suddenly blew a dog whistle in my ear … It has been pretty much unrelenting,” he said in an interview with MedPage Today in March 2022. The outlet did not specify which vaccine he received, however it noted that, “Given his personal situation, [Mr. Poland] will look to protein subunit vaccines that are in development but not yet authorized by the [Food and Drug Administration], such as those from Novavax, Medicago, and Sanofi.”
At the time, Mr. Poland said there could be tens of thousands of people affected in the United States and potentially millions globally.
“What has been heartbreaking about this, as a seasoned physician, are the emails I get from people that, this has affected their life so badly, they have told me they are going to take their own life,” he told the outlet.
The World Health Organization said in 2022 (pdf) that, up to February 2021, it received 367 reports of tinnitus following COVID-19 vaccination, including 56 that were grouped with hearing losses. The majority (293 cases, or 80 percent) received the Pfizer vaccine. More than 70 percent of the total tinnitus cases were among females. Over a third of the reports were from healthcare professionals.
From the 367 cases, 97 incidents (26 percent) were recorded as serious. This included 59 cases classified as “other medically important condition,” 33 as “disabling/incapacitating,” and eight reports as “caused/prolonged hospitalization.” Two incidences were reported as “life-threatening.”
The organization also separately reported 164 cases of hearing loss, of which 104 cases (63 percent) were found among females.
In an interview with The Epoch Times, Mary, who declined to disclose her last name, said that she started experiencing tinnitus an hour after the first Pfizer shot in 2021. When she contacted the pharmacy where she was vaccinated, Mary was told that tinnitus wasn’t a side effect.
Even after taking steroid therapy as recommended by a physician, her condition didn’t improve. “I complained about it so much in the beginning … especially in the first couple of weeks,” she said. ‘I cried. I broke down.”
Despite facing difficulties, Mary could not openly discuss her concerns with her family, friends, or health providers. “I felt comfortable saying that I had tinnitus, but I was afraid to tell people that it started an hour after the vaccine … I didn’t want people to think that I’m an anti-vaxxer,” she stated.
“But it’s my own experience, and the fact that I was afraid to say that is really sad.”
Israel Attacks Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley For First Time Of War, 100km From Border
Israel on Monday unleashed a wave of airstrikes on a location in eastern Lebanon which had yet to be targeted in the war. Several attacks were conducted on the outskirts of Baalbek in the Bekaa Valley. This area hasn’t been struck by Israeli fire since the 2006 war.
The Bekaa Valley has long been considered a Hezbollah stronghold and Israel choosing to attack it signals a definite expanse and escalation of the ongoing conflict far beyond the south Lebanon border region, given it lies a full 100km from said border. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed in a statement that it struck “Hezbollah terror targets deep inside Lebanon.”
Targets hit reportedly included a convoy of trucks and sites connected to Hezbollah’s areal defense systems. At least two people were killed in the attacks, Reuters reports. The two had been working in a food warehouse run by Hezbollah.
Earlier in the day an Israeli drone was downed by Hezbollah over Lebanon. Israel’s military said the fresh Bekaa operation was in response to the earlier launch of a surface-to-air missile by the Iran-backed paramilitary group.
Social media videos reportedly from one of the strike locations in Bekaa Valley shows a damaged and burned truck and SUV amid an expanse of rubble strewn across a roadway.
Hezbollah has unleashed large waves of missiles on northern Israel throughout the day, with one missile having fallen near a synagogue close to Nazareth.
Specifically Hezbollah sources said that in response to Israel’s Bekaa attack its militants fired at least 60 rockets at an Israeli army headquarters in Golan Heights.
Hezbollah politician Hassan Fadlallah announced of the Israeli strikes reaching far into Lebanese territory, even near the Syrian border that “Its aggression on Baalbek or any other areas will not remain without response.”
Israeli bystanders filmed the following dramatic video as rockets rained down…
On Sunday, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant warned that even if a deal with Hamas is achieved in the Gaza Strip, this doesn’t mean fighting with Hezbollah will stop:
“If a temporary pause is reached in Gaza, we will increase the fire in the north separately, and will continue until the full withdrawal of Hezbollah [from the border] and the return of Israeli citizens to their homes,” he said.
Israeli Golan base targeted by massive missile barrage, sending personnel scrambling for bomb shelters…
As of last week (Feb.18), Israel had begun to strike deeper into Lebanon, expanding its strikes far beyond the border region in the south. Large airstrikes rocked a town near Sidon, which lies 60km from the border.
The Lebanese government fears the war might at any moment encompass the whole country, as it did in 2006 when Beirut International airport was bombed. Israel has demanded that the government reign in Hezbollah, but it reality it doesn’t have the power or military capability to do so, as the Lebanese Army is ill-equipped.
The State Department is expressing concerns about recent mass arrests of Tibetans in China, after the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) launched a sweeping crackdown against the ethnic group over their peaceful protests against the construction of a hydropower dam.
More than 1,000 Tibetans, including monks, were arrested in China on Friday,according to rights group International Tibet Network. The crackdown took place at Derge, a town in Dege County in Kardze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in southwestern China’s Sichuan Province.
According to the rights groups, the dam construction project will forcibly displace residents of two villages and submerge six monasteries.
“The current status of those arrested is currently unknown,” it stated, before adding that those arrested were held at different locations throughout Dege County.
“Deeply concerned by reports of the PRC’s [People’s Republic of China] mass arrests of Tibetans protesting construction of a dam that threatens displacement of villages & destruction of monasteries,” said Uzra Zeya, undersecretary of state for civilian security, democracy, and human rights, in an X post on Feb. 25.
“[China] must respect human rights & freedom of expression and include Tibetans in the development & implementation of water and land management policies,” Ms. Zeya added. “These centuries-old monasteries are home to hundreds of Tibetan Buddhist monks & contain irreplaceable cultural relics.
“[The United States] stands with Tibetans in preserving their unique cultural, religious, and linguistic identity.”
The protests began on Feb. 14, International Tibet Network said, when at least 300 Tibetans protested at Dege County Hall. Arrests began on Feb. 22, when Chinese authorities arrested over 100 protesting Tibetan locals and Tibetan monks, the group added.
Chinese police officers reportedly used water cannons, pepper spray, and tasers to subdue protesters on Feb. 22, according to Radio Free Asia. Some of the arrested protesters were later admitted to a local hospital for medical treatment, the outlet added.
“Outrageous what’s happening in Tibet right now … colonizers stealing everything we have and yet Tibetans continuing to resist by the thousands,” Tenzin Yangzom, advocacy officer at the Tibetan Association of Boston who also works for International Tibet Network, wrote on X, formerly Twitter, on Feb. 24.
Benedict Rogers, human rights activist and deputy chair of the UK Conservative Party Human Rights Commission, took to X to call China’s repression of Tibetans “appalling and outrageous.”
“Let us not forget Tibet. Let’s #FreeTibet,” Mr. Rogers added.
Tibet
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) invaded Tibet in 1949 and forced upon Tibetans a 17-point agreement to legitimize the CCP’s rule. Despite rosy promises of Tibetan autonomy on paper, China’s communist regime has turned the region into a surveillance state and installed labor camps.
The Dalai Lama, the region’s spiritual leader, went into exile in India in 1959 after the Chinese regime brutally crushed an uprising, killing tens of thousands of Tibetans. Later in the same year, the spiritual leader established a Tibetan exile administration, officially known as the Central Tibetan Administration.
Sikyong Penpa Tsering, president of the Central Tibetan Administration, issued a statement on Feb. 24, saying that “the crackdown on non-violent protests in Derge is beyond condemnation.”
“The Chinese authorities’ disregard for the rights of Tibetans is unacceptable by any measure. The punitive acts demonstrate China’s prioritization of its ideology and interests over human rights,” Mr. Tseringa added.
“We call on the Chinese government to release all those detained and to respect the rights and aspirations of the Tibetan people. The world needs to hear the Tibetans’ voices and confront the truth of Chinese misrule in Tibet.”
The construction of the dam, a 2,240-megawatt power station located in the upper regions of the Yangtze River, will result in the resettlement of about 2,000 locals, according to Tibetan rights group International Campaign for Tibet (ICT). One of the six monasteries affected, the Wonto Monastery, has murals dating back to the 13th century, it added.
Earlier this month, House lawmakers passed the Promoting a Resolution to the Tibet-China Conflict Act (H.R.533) after a 392–28 vote. The bipartisan, bicameral legislation (S.138) has not been voted on in the Senate.
The legislation aims to “jump-start negotiations” between CCP officials and the Dalai Lama or his representatives, as the two sides have not had formal dialogue since 2010, according to a press release.
ICT Tibet President Tencho Gyatso issued a statement welcoming the passage of the House bill earlier this month.
“Today’s vote shows that U.S. support for Tibet is only growing stronger even after 65 years of China’s control and occupation,” Mr. Gyatso said. China has been playing a waiting game, hoping that the international community would eventually abandon Tibet. Clearly that is not the case.
“The Chinese government should take the hint and restart the dialogue process with Tibetan leaders. We thank Congressman McGovern and Chairman McCaul and all the representatives who helped pass the Resolve Tibet Act today.”
It is clear to me that we are increasingly being governed by an “Administrative State” instead of by our chosen representatives. Indeed, we are more and more becoming a “Regulation Nation” which is a true threat to our Constitutional Republic.
What do I mean by that?
I mean that we are being governed by regulations and rules issued by administrative agencies, instead of being governed by laws duly passed by our elected officials.
Why does that matter?
Because agencies are run by unelected, government bureaucrats who are beholden to nobody but the person who appointed them. They don’t care what the voters think or want or don’t want. They don’t need to care. They don’t need your vote to stay in power. They only have to appease the politician(s) who appointed them. If they just follow the yellow brick road, they will land on the other side of the rainbow.
Shockingly, some legislators are okay with this, because it allows them to escape any sort of responsibility or blame for an unpopular (or illegal) rule that is implemented by the bureaucrats sitting in the agencies (you know, the ones with no accountability to us voters). But, legislators should not only care, they should actively work to stop the Administrative State, because not only do many of these “regulations” usurp a legislator’s law-making power, but they are wholly unconstitutional!
You will remember from grade school Social Studies class that our government is comprised of three, co-equal branches: the Legislative branch (senators and assemblymembers who make our laws), the Executive branch (governors and the president who are supposed to enforce our laws), and the Judicial branch (judges and courts which adjudicate our laws). Each branch has its own powers and authorities, as bestowed upon them by our Constitution. Any power that is not delineated in our Constitution is reserved for the people. Remember my long-uttered phrase that, the Constitution was written to keep the government in check, not to keep we the people in check!
There is no fourth branch of government. There is no branch called the Administrative State. There is no authority in the Constitution to have agencies that make rules/regulations that employ the force of law. And yet, we see at the federal level as well as at the state level, Executive branches that are chock full of bloated, power-hungry agencies that have given themselves an astonishing amount of never-authorized-by-the-people power. In many cases, those powers are unconstitutional, meaning the agency did not have the authority to make the rule or do the thing they are doing (or trying to do).
Let me give you a few real-life scenarios so it’s easier to digest.
For starters, my quarantine camp lawsuit is a perfect example. For those not familiar with this case, what happened there is that the NYS Department of Health (DOH) issued an “Isolation & Quarantine Procedures” regulation. The head of the DOH is a commissioner who is appointed by the Governor. Everyone that works for the DOH is unelected. They do not need to listen to voters wants and needs. Quite presumably, if the Commissioner or any of the government workers below him don’t do the bidding of their “boss,” then their days at the DOH would surely be limited.
So, what happened in my quarantine case is that the DOH created a wholly unconstitutional regulation (Rule 2.13) that allowed them to pick and choose which New Yorkers they could lock up or lock down. That could have been forced isolation in your home, or they could have removed you from your home and put you into a quarantine facility of their choosing. For however long they wanted. With no notice. With no right to an attorney until after you were locked up. With no procedure for you to regain your freedom once you were incarcerated.
There was no age restriction, so they could have taken you, your child, your grandchild… And they didn’t even have to prove that you were sick, or that you had even been exposed to a communicable disease! Guilty until proven innocent.
The DOH gave themselves this phenomenal power. If that is unclear what I mean there, I will explain. The DOH wanted this unbridled power to be able to control 19 million New Yorkers with the stroke of a pen, but the NYS Legislature wouldn’t give it to them in the form of failed Assembly bill A416 (because the legislators knew it would be political suicide). So, the DOH simply made Rule 2.13 and gave themselves the power they wanted, anyway. No legislative consent given. No voter input had. Zilch. A clear breach of Separation of Powers. A clear affront on our Constitution. A perfect example of the “Regulation Nation” as run by an Administrative State.
This was the most unconstitutional regulation I had ever read in my 25 years of practicing law. It was an attack on the very basis of our freedom, and a dangerous chipping away at the bedrock of our free society…a government by the people, and for the people. Without question, I knew I had to stop it.
So, I sued Hochul and her DOH on behalf of a group of NYS legislators (Senator George Borrello, Assemblyman Chris Tague, Congressman Mike Lawler) together with a citizens’ group called Uniting NYS. Our argument was clear: the DOH does not possess the power to make a law, and this was surely a law, despite the fact that they called it a regulation or rule. It conflicted with the Constitution. It conflicted with NYS law. As Assemblyman Tague said at a press conference we held when we first filed our lawsuit in 2022:
This policy’s aim to forcibly isolate law-abiding citizens is reminiscent of actions taken by some of the ugliest tyrannical regimes history has ever known. It has no place standing as law here in New York, let alone anywhere in the United States. Policies as dangerous as this should be debated and scrutinized in a public setting by elected representatives, not quietly slinked through regulatory approvals.
In July 2022, the Judge ruled in our favor and struck down this stunning display of tyranny. You can read that decision here. Of course Hochul and Attorney General Letitia James appealled the court’s decision so they could try to get back that heinous power. In November of 2023, the appellate court dismissed our case for lack of standing (a true dodging of the merits of a lawsuit if I ever saw one). So, now I am appealing that calamitous decision to the Court of Appeals (our State’s highest court).
I have done numerous interviews about my quarantine lawsuit and this “Regulation Nation” phenomenon, and you can access some of those on my website, www.CoxLawyers.com. One such interview was with Steve Gruber on America’s Voice Live, and can be accessed HERE.
