This Week in the New Normal #91
Our successor to This Week in the Guardian, This Week in the New Normal is our weekly chart of the progress of autocracy, authoritarianism and economic restructuring around the world.
1. Climate Gaslighting Continues
Last month, we were told, was the warmest April on record. When there was a groundswell of people saying “No it wasn’t”, the Telegraph went full gaslight with this headline:
Cold April may be all in your head
Today we’re in the exact same position again, with Sky News reporting it was the warmest May on record:
…despite it fairly evidently not being. It has been unseasonably cold and damp, but I suppose we all just imagined that.
2. NYT Endorses “Lab Leak” Theory
The New York Times published a long article by Dr Alina Chan earlier today, headlined:
Why the Pandemic Probably Started in a Lab, in 5 Key Points”
It’s just one more step in lab leak’s journey from fringe narrative to mainstream alternative, and it’s yet another piece of evidence that it’s nothing but a fallback position.
We told you this would happen.
Here are our final words on the matter, from 2022:
There was NO NEW DISEASE!
There were the old flu symptoms, there was a new name, and there was a crappy test.
And that is all.
This is the one admission the establishment will never make, because it totally breaks their narrative.
Kills it stone dead.
Every other “admission”, debate or idea – “lab leak”, early treatment, government panic, “we underestimated natural immunity”, “the vaccine trials were misleading” – can eventually be brought back around to justifying lockdowns and other authoritarian “public health measures”.
If not for Covid, then for the next “pandemic”.
3. The “liberal” defense of CBDCs
This is actually a story from two weeks ago but it’s important enough to merit its place. Leftist Economics professor and politician Yanis Varoufakis has written a defense of Central Bank Digital Currency for Project Syndicate:
Who’s Afraid of Central Bank Digital Currencies?
In it he argues that CBDCs will actually be better for ordinary people by breaking the power of major banks like JPMorgan by enabling citizens to deal directly with the central bank.
I won’t go into a point-by-point refutation here, except to point out his arguments elide important facts – such as the fact that central banks are usually private institutions just as much as retail or commercial banks, and that CBDCs are potentially a lot more than just digital money
It’s a sign of an argument made in ignorance or bad faith that he doesn’t once use the word “programmability” one single time.
This will be the sales pitch for CBDC from certain sectors, that they are “anti-Capitalist”.
BONUS: Re-run of the week
Donald Trump has promised to release the JFK, 9/11 and Jeffry Epstein files once he’s elected…
…if that sounds familiar it’s because he did the same thing last time too. I’m sure he means it now.
*
All told a pretty hectic week for the new normal crowd, and we didn’t even mention the Netherlands’ new Prime Minister being an unelected intelligence officer or Mexico’s newest President, a climate scientist who used to work for the UN.
There’s a lot of change in the air, a lot of agendas in the works, if you see a headline, article, post or interview you think is a sign of the times, post it in the comments, email us or share it on social media and we will add it to the next edition.
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