Today's News: February 15, 2021

World News

Covid-19: UK begins mandatory hotel quarantines for arrivals from ‘high-risk’ countries

France 24 – The UK on Monday began a mandatory hotel quarantine regime for arrivals from dozens of countries deemed “high risk” in a bid to prevent the spread of new coronavirus cases.

The new policy requires all UK citizens and permanent residents entering England from 33 countries on a wider travel ban list to self-isolate in a mandatory quarantine at approved hotels for 10 days and take several Covid-19 tests.

Other visitors from the countries currently on the so-called “red list”, which includes all South American nations, South Africa and Portugal, are currently barred from visiting under lockdown rules.

Arrivals found to have given false information about being in one of the countries 10 days before travel could receive up to 10 years in prison – which has drawn criticism for being excessive.

The government says it has signed contracts with 16 hotels so far, securing nearly 5,000 rooms near English airports, with a further 58,000 rooms on standby.

Unvaccinated citizens’ names should be DISCLOSED, new proposal by Israeli PM suggests amid slowdown in immunization campaign

RT – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has proposed a law that would allow the names of people who have not taken the vaccine to be sent to local authorities. The idea has raised concerns over possible privacy violations.

The PM said that the proposed “quick legislation” would allow local authorities to “receive data” on those who have not been vaccinated yet. The aim is to “encourage them to be vaccinated and save lives,” Netanyahu explained at a cabinet meeting on Sunday.

According to the Haaretz newspaper, the idea was approved by the country’s coronavirus cabinet and by the National Security Council. After some additional work it will be presented before Israel’s parliament.

Netanyahu said that 570,000 people over the age of 50 have not been administered the vaccine yet, which is 220,000 higher than the government’s previous estimate.

“I remind you of the most dramatic piece of data: 97 percent of deaths and 93 percent of severe cases are in this group,” the PM noted. He reported earlier this month that nearly all recent deaths were among the people who did not take the vaccine.

The ministers agreed that the data on vaccination must be protected from unauthorized access, reports said. Nevertheless, Tourism Minister Orit Farkash-Hacohen urged the government to “be cautious about harming the right to privacy of those who are younger.” She called Netanyahu’s proposal “precedents we have to be careful with.”

U.S. News, Politics & Government

NC GOP expected to censure Sen. Burr over Trump impeachment vote

Fox – The North Carolina GOP Central Committee is expected to censure Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., on Monday night over his impeachment vote — making him the latest Republican to face home state backlash after breaking with former President Donald Trump.

Three members of the committee told the Carolina Journal that they expect the resolution of censure to pass.

“I absolutely support a censure of Senator Richard Burr, NC for his vote on the impeachment of President Trump,” committee member Kyshia Lineberger wrote on Facebook on Saturday. “Senator Burr did NOT vote the will of the people and should be held accountable. This second impeachment is nothing more than a witch-hunt against a former President who is now a private citizen.”

The seven GOP senators who joined with all Democrats in finding Trump guilty on the charge of inciting an insurrection were: Sens. Richard Burr of North Carolina, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska, and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania.

Mitt Romney Could Soon Pay the Price for Voting to Convict Trump

Western Journal – Some Utah Republicans are rumbling in disgust over Republican Sen. Mitt Romney’s vote to convict former President Donald Trump during Trump’s Senate impeachment trial.

Although seven Republicans sided with Senate Democrats and voted to convict Trump, the total was far short of the number needed for conviction. Romney had also sided with Senate Democrats in Trump’s 2020 impeachment trial.

Louisiana Republicans have rebuked Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy for his vote against Trump, and pressure is building in Utah for some similar action, according to KUTV.

Democrats Receive Backlash After Giving Ilhan Omar an ‘Absurd’ Promotion

Western Journal – Democratic Rep. Rep Ilhan Omar’s rapid rise in the ranks of the House Democratic power structure has drawn criticism.

The Minnesota member of the self-styled “squad” of progressives was promoted to vice chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s subcommittee on Africa and global human rights issues, according to the Minneapolis-based Star-Tribune.

“Upholding basic human rights around the world is a core priority for me and the Fifth District of Minnesota,” Omar said in a statement. “As someone who represents a large African diaspora community and is the first African-born immigrant to serve in Congress, I am particularly excited to play a leadership role in overseeing our international aid and foreign policy on the continent.”

But Fox News host Pete Hegseth found Omar’s elevated status hard to swallow.

“The idea that Ilhan Omar is even on the foreign affairs, foreign relations committee, is absurd,” Hegseth said Friday during an appearance on “Fox News Primetime” with host Mark Steyn.

“Now she’s a vice chair of a subcommittee,” he said. “This is the modern-day Democrat Party — anti-Americanism writ large.”

“It’s kind of like if Eric Swalwell of Fang Fang fame was on the Intel Committee,” Hegseth also said. “Oh wait, he is, isn’t he?”

Oregon Promotes Program Focused On ‘Dismantling Racism In Mathematics,’ Says Finding The Right Answer A Sign Of White Supremacy

Daily Wire – The Oregon Department of Education is promoting a program for teachers that seeks to “disman[tle] racism in mathematics,” alleging that focusing on finding the right answer is a symbol of white supremacy.

Fox News reported that the ODE sent out a newsletter last week that mentions a “Pathway to Math Equity Micro-Course” that will occur on February 21. The course, according to Fox, is designed for middle school teachers to make use of a toolkit for ‘dismantling racism in mathematics.’

The newsletter encourages teachers to sign up for the training, which the New York Post previously reported includes a section with 14 things associated with “White Supremacy Culture,” including perfectionism, objectivity, and individualism.

Objectivity is described in the workbook accompanying the training as “the belief that there is such a thing as being objective or ‘neutral.’” The program’s toolkit also encourages teachers not to focus on a single correct answer, but to “come up with at least two answers that might solve this problem” and to “Challenge standardized test questions by getting the ‘right’ answer, but justify other answers by unpacking the assumptions that are made in the problem.”

The toolkit also asks instructors to “center ethnomathematics” in multiple ways, one of which is to “identify and challenge the ways that math is used to uphold capitalist, imperialist, and racist views.”

Economy & Business

Elon Musk wants top dogecoin holders to sell most of their coins

Daily Mail – Elon Musk says he now wants major holders of the meme-based digital currency Dogecoin to sell most of their coins just five days after revealing he had bought some of the cryptocurrency for his son.

The billionaire tweeted late Sunday that he felt too much concentration in Dogecoin was the ‘real issue’ – meaning a small number of people are holding much of the currency.

‘If major Dogecoin holders sell most of their coins, it will get my full support. Too much concentration is the only real issue imo,’ Musk tweeted.

Hours later, he added: ‘I will literally pay actual $ if they just void their accounts.’

The value of Dogecoin, which was created based on a popular dog meme, has dropped off in recent days after surging as much as 137 percent in a week when Musk started tweeting about it.

Dogecoin’s price was at $0.060908 – up 4.2 percent in 24 hours – as of Monday morning.

Musk first tweeted about Dogecoin back on February 4, which prompted the the cryptocurrency’s price to surge and sparked concern over the billionaire’s ability to move markets.

The Tesla CEO revealed last Wednesday that he had purchased an undisclosed amount of Dogecoin for his son X Æ A-Xii, who he shares with musician Grimes.

‘Bought some Dogecoin for lil X, so he can be a toddler hodler,’ he tweeted alongside a video of his son sitting on the floor.

Hodl is a phrase used in the context of cryptocurrency to refer to buy-and-hold strategies.

It is not clear how much cryptocurrency Musk purchased, or when he bought it.

His relentless tweets about the currency included a picture of a rocket soaring past the moon with the caption ‘Doge’ and an image from the Lion King that showed himself holding up the dog from the doge meme.

‘Dogecoin is the people’s crypto,’ another tweet read. ‘No need to be a gigachad to own.’

‘No highs, no lows, only Doge.’

Dogecoin has the same technical underpinning as better-known cyrptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, but is little used and had long traded for less than one cent.

It was created in 2013 and based on a then-popular internet meme of a Shiba Inu dog.

Musk has previously drawn sanctions for the Securities and Exchange Commission for his tweets about Tesla, where he is CEO and a major shareholder.

He settled with the SEC over the complaints, which were spurred by a tweet musing about taking the company private and another sharing production projections.

Publicly traded companies are regulated in how they provide forward-looking statements, in order to ensure investors have equal access to news that can move share prices significantly.

Cryptocurrencies are not regulated in the same way and Musk’s tweets about dogecoin are unlikely to be a violation of any law or regulation, regardless of whether he owns the cryptocurrency.

Still, his ability to move markets at ease with his tweets has drawn both admiration and concern from observers.

Musk, earlier this month, launched a pair of potential game-changing shifts for bitcoin after Tesla announced it had invested $1.5 billion and said it will start accepting the cryptocurrency as payment for its cars in the near future.

Musk, who is a well-known supporter of bitcoin, had days earlier briefly changed the bio of his Twitter account, which has 46 million followers, to say ‘#bitcoin’.

He said a week ago that bitcoin was ‘on the verge’ of being more widely accepted among investors and in December asked if it was possible to do large transactions in the currency.

Energy & Environment

Creepy Bill Gates Now Pushing Corona Vaccines and Radical Global Warming Policies to Ruin US Energy Sector

It’s -1 degrees in north Texas today.

Creepy Bill Gates took a break from his plan to vaccinate the global community from coronavirus, a disease that predominantly affects the elderly and those with comorbidities, to push radical policies to ruin the US energy sector.

Gates wants to punish Americans with policies that will destroy US energy jobs and force importing energy from radical anti-American regimes.

Obviously, Bill Gates is not your friend.

Gates justifies his insanity by blaming America for the crisis and ignoring China.

Trending Politics reported:

The Microsoft co-founder and philanthropist praised Biden’s efforts to destroy the domestic fossil fuels industry in order to replace it with alternatives under the guise of an eco-friendly “sustainability” during an appearance on “60 Minutes” on Sunday.

During his chat with CNN’s Anderson Cooper, Gates touted what he calls a “zero carbon future” that over text 30 years will require a “global cooperation on a scale the world has never seen”. This is music to the ears of those who are rushing to dismantle Trump’s America first agenda.

The Biden regime’s commitment to tearing down America in order to “build back better” has already resulted in the loss of tens of thousands of jobs due to the cancelation of the Keystone XL pipeline, bans on oil and gas drilling leases, and the possible termination of the Dakota Access Pipeline.

Gates has been on a Fauci-like media blitz to promote his new book How To Avoid A Climate Disaster and clearly plans to exercise great influence on Biden and his climate change crusaders.

Science & Technology

‘We will not be canceled’: Social media platform Parler RELAUNCHES after being axed by Big Tech following Capitol riots

RT – Social media app Parler is back online after being booted off the servers of Amazon Web Services last month in the wake of the Capitol riots, after it was accused of allowing threats of violence to be shared on the platform.

“We will not be canceled. Welcome back to Parler,” read a post on the platform’s own account after its interim CEO Mark Meckler confirmed earlier on Monday that it is now operating via a new server.

Some of the site’s 20 million users have already logged in, with the rest expected to have access again as of Monday, he said. New users should be able to join within the coming week, Meckler confirmed.

“When Parler was taken offline in January by those who desire to silence tens of millions of Americans, our team came together, determined to keep our promise to our highly engaged community that we would return stronger than ever,” he said in a statement.

Following the bans, Parler’s then-CEO John Matze was ousted as head of the company by its board, afterwards claiming he had been met with “constant resistance” over his “strong belief in free speech and my view of how the Parler site should be managed.”

Ahead of the new relaunch, the site had briefly returned online in February, but it was besieged by technical issues.

Users who have already logged in again on Monday have reported that their previous posts look to have been deleted.

Health

501 Deaths + 10,748 Other Injuries Reported Following COVID Vaccine, Latest CDC Data Show

The numbers reflect the latest data available as of Feb. 4 from the CDC’s Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System website. Of the 653 reported deaths, 602 were from the U.S. The average age of those who died was 77, the youngest was 23.

Children’s Health Defense – As of Feb. 10, about 44.77 million people in the U.S. had received one or both doses of a COVID vaccine. So far, only the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines have been granted Emergency Use Authorization in the U.S. by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). By the FDA’s own definition, the vaccines are still considered experimental until fully licensed.

According to the latest data, 602 of the 653 reported deaths were in the U.S, and 137 of the deaths were related to cardiac disorder. Fifty-three percent of those who died were male, 44% were female, the remaining death reports did not include the gender of the deceased. The average age of those who died was 77, the youngest reported death was of a 23-year-old. The Pfizer vaccine was taken by 58% of those who died, while the Moderna vaccine was taken by 41%.