This Week in the New Normal #44

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. “Stealth Omicron” is “the most transmissible yet”

For those of you not keeping up with the Covid news, the latest variant just dropped. It’s Omicron BA.4…or maybe BA.5. Or both.

Also known as the “stealth variant” it may be “the most transmissible yet”, and can even bust through the “protection” granted by the “vaccines”, according to new research:

Research published in Nature out of Columbia University suggests that BA.4 and BA.5 are four times more resistant to antibodies from vaccines than BA.2, a subvariant that became the dominant strain in the US in April, replacing the original strain that had driven the winter wave across the country.

It is absolutely real, and not just an ad hoc explanation for all those people who dutifully got “vaccinated” three four five times, but keep “testing positive” anyway. It’s because of those pesky stealth variants – & NOT because the “test” is a meaningless lottery based on reactions to any minuscule fragment of junk it might happen to find in your system.

2. Brain-computer interface gets FDA approval

The US Food and Drug Administration has granted permission for a patient to have a computer chip surgically implanted in their brain to enable direct brain-computer interface, according to an article in Life Site News.

The patient in question is suffering from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), and the chip is designed to help them function as their motor neurons atrophy. The four other patients trialling the COMMAND Stentnode technology are all in Australia.

TESLA founder Elon Musk is reportedly researching similar technology, a device they call “Neurolink”.

The medical applications of the technology are (allegedly) potentially life-altering for millions of people suffering from degenerative diseases or paralysis, but given the rising prominence of transhumanist ideas in the mainstream it’s something to keep an eye on.

And if you doubt that, consider this article from World Economic Forum, which makes the case for chips “augmenting” human beings in the future to overcome our “limitations”:

As a society, we need to make a choice: do we want to accept human limitations associated with learning or ageing?

3. Eat ze bugs…again.

Every week with this. Always with the bug eating. This time some scientists have apparently managed to turn mealworms into a savoury “meat-like flavour” protein, which could be used to make “worm burgers” and “save the planet”.

The article in the Guardian notes that “people in Europe and North America are generally more squeamish about eating insects”, but is hopeful that a new method of “boiling mealworms with sugar” to create a “meat-like flavouring” will “bridge this gap”

Now, speaking for myself (and probably many others), it’s not that mealworms don’t taste like beef that stops me eating them…it’s that they are mealworms.

The New York Post article on the same study adds a new dimension to eating bugs – one we can expect to see a lot more of in the future – they’re not just good the planet, but actually healthy:

In fact, the critters are a great source of nutrients the body needs, similar to that of meat, according to researchers, and have been shown to reduce cholesterol and inflammation while improving heart rhythms.

No link is given to studies showing that, but don’t worry there will be plenty of them real soon.

BONUS: Crass propaganda of the week

Always a tight-fought category, but there’s no question who wins this week…

Yes, the Indy really went the “look at the soldiers saving the puppies” route. Hilariously awful.

It’s not all bad…

New Zealand hasn’t completely fallen just yet, as thousands and thousands of people took to the streets outside parliament to protest vaccine mandates this week.

A protest in New Zealand against the woke liberal fascist Jacinda Ardern. Many western governments are deeply unpopular.
This could just as easily be Italy, Holland or Germany. pic.twitter.com/ZIeWSIkQ41

— Nikolai (@Nikolai11449196) August 23, 2022

Oh yes, and Anthony Fauci retired. No clear indication why, as yet, but it’s going in “good news” until proven otherwise.

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All told a pretty hectic week for the new normal crowd, and we didn’t even mention the most blatant voter bribe in political history or twitter suspending ZeroHedge for simply reporting a fact.

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.