This Week in the Guardian #13

Every week we like to highlight three or four stories that go full-Guardian, but don’t require an entire article of refutation.

We encourage reader-participation here, so if you come across something you feel should be included in the next edition either post a link below, or send us an e-mail.

“Vaccine nationalism” stands in the way of an end to the Covid-19 crisis

This is fairly brief and fairly obvious. Essentially, national sovereignty is bad, autonomy is bad and global bodies, like the WHO, should be in charge. The entire pandemic has had an under-current of Global Government – it was literally suggested several times, including by Gordon Brown – and this is just another brick in that wall.

There are a couple of off-handed admissions which are interesting to note, first there’s [our emphasis]:

But [Russia’s vaccine is] unlikely to work – most vaccines don’t.

Remember that. It’s perfectly true, but a lot of the time people pretend it isn’t.

And then there’s the discussion of the UK already pre-ordering 340 MILLION doses of vaccines which have not been tested and, as noted above, probably won’t work. Assuming it’s over £3 per dose, we’re talking at least 1 billion pounds of tax-payer money being spent on a “solution” which probably won’t work.

Nice work if you can get it.

Not all elections are created equal

Donald Trump is questioning postal ballots again (and he’s right to, they are notoriously easy to manipulate). The response to him doing this, in the Guardian and elsewhere, is that he is “damaging public trust in democratic institutions”. This has been said many times.

The suggestion, made in the press and never by Trump himself, is that the incumbent POTUS might refuse to recognise the result of the election should he lose.

This was mooted in 2016 as well, the press all laid into Trump for suggesting the polls were rigged. Trump was “damaging democracy”, and “putting people in danger” we were told, before Hillary lost and spent four years telling everyone Trump cheated.

It’s just interesting to note the double standard. Juan Guaido refusing to recognise the election of Maduro in Venezuela is fine. And that today in the same paper, the Belarusian “opposition” claiming their election was fixed is “brave”. But anybody suggesting OUR elections might be rigged – even in a country with a known record of voting irregularities – is immediately attacked and dismissed.

The lady doth protest too much, methinks.

21 Brilliant Ideas to Remake the World

The Graun’s got a brand new section filled with brand new ideas. OK, not brand new ideas – one world global government and NATO-backed protests in our designated enemy states have definitely been suggested before – but ideas nonetheless.

Blocking and reporting people who disagree with you, instead of “engaging with their hate” isn’t a new idea either, it’s just most of us grow out of it by the time we leave primary school.

One big, government-backed social media network that allows the state to harvest all your private data and then use it to better society? I suppose that’s a bit of a new idea, but I’m not sure I like it very much. “Facebook are selling your private data, you’d be better off giving to the government for free” I don’t find a very persuasive argument.

My personal favourite is putting a hard limit on how much people are allowed to travel by air. You see, if everyone is only allowed to fly, say, five times a year, then those people who “choose not to fly” (see: poor people) can make money by selling their flight credits to people who want to fly more than five times (see: rich people).

Classicly unhelpful neo-liberal “altruism”. Leveraging the desperation of poor people and the earnest belief of environmental campaigners into a barter system that only benefits the rich, and will have absolutely no impact on air travel at all. Brilliant.

Bonus: “The New Normal” isn’t just about Covid19

This week’s bonus section takes the form of a challenge. Simply put, how many mainstream articles have you read which in some way compare, parallel or equate the coronavirus “pandemic” with some other pressing issue – most especially the environment or climate change.

Since the start of the pandemic the Guardian has had literally dozens of articles doing this.

They have two more at least this week.

One about planning future cities to be able to withstand “future pandemics and climate change” and one, more unsettlingly, about “thinking past the end of our lives” and trying to plan a world for our descendants which “priotises wellbeing and happiness” over living standards (essentially, we should get used to being poorer, but enjoying it more).

The signs are there, when the pandemic ends the “new normal” will stay with us – to prevent future pandemics, save the environment and halt climate change.

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All told, a busy week for The Guardian. And we didn’t even cover the near-constant attacks designed to undermine free speech on the internet, or the hasty and incredibly predictable re-brand of Kamala Harris.

Did we miss anything? Tell us about it in the comments below, and keep an eye out for articles that should go in the next issue.