This week's CHINESE VIRUS news (70 days and 10 weeks) - what a happy subject!!

Hi to all,

Well, this week the statistics you have been craving the whole week will not be forthcoming - at least as extensively as in past emails. Hooray, we can hear you shouting, but there's not too much reason to be cock-a-hoop - they will be back next week!!!!

The reason is that yours truly has been stricken by a very nasty head cold which has so far lasted most of the week. Getting much better now though. Of course in these fraught C Virus times, one always thinks the worst, but thankfully that is not the case, although neither of us has been tested yet. We are thinking of it. It started with a very sore throat which in turn seemed to have been started by some alcohol-based drops which unusually caused much irritation and then when it was worse we thought that was the cause, but then the head cold developed so perhaps we shouldn't have been so hasty to blame the drops. This week's email will be a brief notation of active cases together with comments together with political news - thankfully also somewhat truncated.

MUNDO - world 

Active cases are now 9,713,247 up from last week at 8,775,006 - an increase of 938,241 or 10.7%. Over the last 10 weeks the increase is

3,287,308 or 23.5%. This would, it seems to us, indicate that the C Virus is far from going away and it is something that the whole world is just going to have to live with - as we've said many times before. It also indicates strongly that the rate of increase has increased markedly compared to the whole 10 weeks. 10.7% last week compared to an average of 2.35% per week over the 10 weeks. Therapeutics and vaccines will help and will become more effective as time passes, but there is still an air of speculation about all this.

The other thing about vaccines; we will never have them, even if it means that we never fly internationally again. This obviously is a big decision with family and friends in NZ and Miami, but possibly we are getting ahead of ourselves. We hope so. These C Virus vaccines are very likely to have been tested and approved in a hasty manner under considerable political pressure - especially the Chinese ones. This makes them highly suspect and  with the probability  of infusion with animal DNA (which could alter one's own DNA), they are doubly suspect.

The other issue for us in travelling, is that most travel insurance at the moment will not cover against the Chinese Virus or C Virus derived conditions - even a heart attack as they could claim that it was caused by organ inflammation, in turn caused by the damned virus. So, with the cost of medical treatment in the US, it becomes potentially ruinous and far too much of a risk. We could take that risk for countries other than the US. And how do you establish whether a medical condition was caused by the virus or not? Insurance companies hold all the cards in these situations.

NZ for us in these circumstances is probably the only country we could safely visit right now because as NZ citizens we are covered automatically for any health costs, notwithstanding that we would have to undergo the mandatory 14 day quarantine. Here in Colombia we are fine also with our local health insurance.

ESTADOS UNIDOS - United States

Active cases are now 2,779,792 up from last week at 2,682,921 - an increase of 96,871 or 3.6%. Over the last 10 weeks the increase is 365,963 or 15.2%. All well below the World figures which no doubt indicates that it is being better controlled by the Trump Administration. Notwithstanding the anomalies (to put it kindly) in reporting, as have been well covered in previous blogs.

Last night we had the final Trump - Biden debate in Nashvillle, Tennessee. If there was a winner, we think it was marginally President Trump.  He argued convincingly on the economy and particularly the oil industry (fracking). Biden says he won't ban fracking but earlier in his campaign, no doubt to placate his lunatic left, he said he would. That, combined with the complete "phasing out" or "transitioning" of the US oil industry in general, would bankrupt America. How can you believe anything he says? So, voters have a stark choice - prosperity or bankruptcy. It's a no-brainer.

And there is now the emergence into the political discourse, of Hunter Biden's laptop which had been left with a Wilmington, Delaware repair shop and then apparently forgotten. The shop owner viewed the hard drive and was very disturbed at the contents. Emails implicating the presidential candidate, Biden, in corrupt dealings with foreign governments and soliciting funds from same. And again apparently, a collection of paedophilia which was the main motivation for the shop owner to hand the computer over to the FBI. He did not want to be found with such objectionable material in his possession.

Biden has always said that he had no knowledge of his son's business dealings with foreign governments. That was always hard to believe, given their closeness on trips on Air Force Two to Beijing and Kiev. Now there is another ex US Navy officer, Lt. Tony Bobulinski (Hunter was one too, until he was kicked out of the Navy for drug addiction), who was a business partner of Hunter. He has made a damning public statement which directly contradicts, as do the emails, Biden Senior's claims that he had nothing to do with Hunter's business dealings. There are references to how the proceeds of the bribes received from China and Ukraine would be distributed among the Biden "crime family".There are more revelations every day and it seems to us that it must result in a Trump victory as more and more evidence comes to light.The only problem now is that there are already around 50 million mail-in ballots already cast out of a possible total of 150 million. There must be some very annoyed Democrat voters who have already cast votes amid these increasing revelations.

We have been speculating about a President-elect being under a criminal indictment - what happens then? Don't think this has ever happened in US history. However, if Trump wins, as seems increasingly likely, the problem will go away and the Biden "crime family" will all be in jail - where they belong.   

When we were in Malaysia and Thailand, we always wondered how China was allowed to get away with militarising various South China Sea Islands which had been stolen by them from Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Indonesia. Now we know - bribery and corruption involving the office of the then Vice President of the United States - and the then Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton. Sedition at its worst at the top levels of the US Government. And Clinton "sold" approximately 25% of the US Uranium reserves to the Russian Federation. Not long after, Bill received an extremely lucrative speaking engagement of USD500,000 for one speech in the Russian capital. That is sedition in itself - not to mention her use of a private email server to handle top secret US Government communications. What could be the motivation for that? Maybe to make it easier for the Russians to hack into these confidential messages.     

COLOMBIA

Active cases are now 66,922. This is less by 14,772 than the figure last week which is a reduction of 18.0%. This is of course encouraging, as the weekly decline in active cases appears to have resumed following a  worrying spike since the figure of 57,472 two weeks ago. But the weekly figures fluctuate so wildly, that it is impossible to know what to believe.

The politics continue in a spiral downwards with the latest issue being the President's refusal to meet the indigenous people who marched on Bogota to protest against the lack of progress on land reform. The government has for some time been legally required by the Supreme Court to take action over righting previous injustices/thefts, but nothing has happened. This is so disappointing, as Colombia's economy is in tatters largely as a result of the C Virus, and they need to be doing everything possible to encourage local agricultural producers and manufacturers to boost exports. But there are so many political shenanigans going on that no-one seems to have the will to do anything - except protect the lucrative Narco business. 

For a bit of light reading you could always have a look at the English language newspaper -  www.colombiareports.com - then go to "latest news" and have a look at the latest headlines:

Oct. 23rd. Indigenous take Colombia's main airport to demand end to "genocide"

Oct. 22nd. Colombia's Senate chief denied opposition right to file motion of no confidence

Oct. 22nd. Is Colombia's aviation agency trafficking for Sinaloa Cartel this time?

Oct. 21st. Three days of anti-government protests in Colombia culminate in national strike.

Oct. 21st. Colombia takes intimidation of press to a whole new level

Oct. 21st. Colombia calls to trial Police who discovered 2018 election fraud plot

Oct. 21st. Colombia refuses protection for war crime victims and witnesses

Oct. 20th. Colombia's teachers join indigenous, increasing pressure on Duque

Oct. 20th. Colombia's indigenous receive warm welcome in Bogota

Oct. 20th. The ties between Colombia's government and organised crime

Oct. 19th. Duque goes blank as Colombia's economic crisis turns catastrophic

Oct. 19th. Will a fashion show stop the mass killing of Colombia's indigenous?

Oct. 19th. MINGAI Part 3: Colombia's indigenous vs. authoritarianism

Oct. 18th. MINGAI Part 2: Colombia's indigenous vs narco-guerrillas

Oct.17th. White supremacy in Colombia Part 1: Kill the Indians 

Colombia Reports seems to be a slightly left-wing newspaper, but they certainly do seem to know what is going on and are fearless in reporting it. Some of their statistics may be a little suspect, but CR is our main source of reasonably reliable political information.

On that note, a comment about our own political leanings could be in order. We have basically a centrist political attitude and our main interest is in fairness, justice and incorruptibility. Probably an impossible goal these days. We do not like either extreme right or extreme left governments.

We support Trump in the US because he seems to be the most honest and supportive of traditional conservative values. He is certainly not extreme right.  He has also continued to do what he promised to do. And we do not believe that he is in any way corrupt. On the other hand, look at the Socialist Bidens who would sell, and have sold, their country down the river to enrich themselves. The evidence for this is compelling and has only just begun to be revealed in provable detail, as we wrote about earlier.

On the other hand, we do have an extreme right wing government in Colombia. As if that wasn't enough, they have also raised corruption to new levels. There is nothing "fair" about them. The problem is that if they are eventually supplanted by another government, either by force or normal electoral process, the rebound effect is likely to be diametrically opposite - i.e. extreme left. That will not serve Colombia well either. 

NUEVA ZELANDA - New Zealand

Active cases have risen to 66 - from 46 last week - a 43.5% increase. The reason for such a large rise in total active cases is that foreign fishing boat crews, mainly from Russia and the Ukraine, fly to NZ to man large fishing vessels in NZ's economic zone. They all tested negative before leaving apparently, but a number have now tested positive in NZ. They are all in managed quarantine and the boats are swinging round their moorings! Such hypocrisy, with the continuing ban on cruising yachts who would bring much needed work and $$$$$$$'s to Northland boatyards. The cruising yachts are much less likely to bring any kind of contagious disease than these fishing crews, or indeed superyachts that we commented on before. And of course these incidents will only increase  as NZ tries to tread a fine line between total border shutdowns and the necessity to maintain some contact with the rest of the world.

There have also been a couple of other cases arising from a technician's visit to a ship at Port Taranaki to work on its electronic systems. He since developed some symptoms and subsequently tested positive. Then he was in a hotel in Auckland and there have been some infections from there. It all just shows how easy it is for the C Virus to infiltrate and corroborates yet again our assertion that all countries just have to manage the virus with sensible precautions such as masks in confined spaces and hand washing etc. And not let the C Virus dominate our lives.

AUSTRALIA

Active cases are now 1,410 - an increase of 5 or 0.36% over last week's figures. There have been some restrictions eased and let's hope that they realise the futility and utter stupidity of draconian lockdowns.

We have to say that there does seem to be a noticeable propensity for lockdowns with more left leaning governments - such as Victoria's and many of the US states such as New York and California.     

Well, that's it for another week. Any comments - either for or against always welcome.

Lotsaluv to all our family and friends - stay well......................

Jim and Jean

Medellin - the City of Eternal Spring

Colombia.