A farewell to face diapers?
Biosecurity updates from COVID Russia
Greetings internet friends,
There have been many interesting Virus-related hot scoops from the Motherland so we have decided to compile a highlights reel, in blog-form, for your reading pleasure. Enjoy.
De-muzzling Russia
Like in many other countries, Russia began canceling Virus-related “public health” decrees in mid-February. By April, the “regional” cattle tag system (which covered the entire country) was gone. But mask rules and other affronts to common sense and decency remained: for example, TASS reported on April 4 that only 29 of Russia’s 85 regions had completely or partially lifted restrictions on businesses. The unfortunate truth is even though Moscow is currently embroiled in a war with the Collective West, Russian authorities continue to use the “threat of coronavirus” to impose arbitrary and ridiculous rules on the population. Not very helpful or inspiring, given the circumstances.
However, over the past week numerous regions have been shedding mask requirements and other COVID policies.
A brief (and probably incomplete) chronology of the virus decree-purging, by region:
May 31: Samara, Tyumen, Perm, Novosibirsk
June 1: Chelyabinsk, Karelia, Rostov, Yakutia, Crimea
June 2: Primorye, Kostroma, Bryansk, Orenberg, Sverdlovsk
June 3: Mordovia, Mari El, Transbaikalia, Volgograd
June 4: Saratov
Why did these twenty-or-so regions decide to toss out their face diapers? Regions need to meet three epidemiological “indicators”—based on mostly fictitious/irrelevant data—in order to qualify for a reprieve from Virus Tyranny. The federal government (Rospotrebnadzor, Russia’s agency for “human wellbeing”) has the final say on all COVID-related matters, including mandatory clot-shots (which we will discuss in a moment). In fact, before getting the go-ahead from Rospotrebnadzor dominatrix Anna Popova, Penza’s regional government stated openly that the mask regime “could not be canceled at the regional level.” Anna decides.
So what does this mean? It means if you want to stop pretending there is a Dreaded Virus haunting your region, you have to please Anna. But how do you do that? What does Anna want? Nobody knows, actually.
But for sure, one important variable in this equation is extortion.
Russia’s COVID restrictions can best be summed up as “a massive government-operated extortion racket.”
It’s silly to even talk about “canceling” mask rules in Russia because in most parts of the country they were rarely observed to begin with; face diapers were typically only worn when there was a very real and serious risk of extortion, and even then, the very trendy “chin strap” was usually enough to avoid the wrath of ruble-grubbing COVID cops.
(Easily frightened pensioners and insufferable “young professionals” religiously obeyed all the rules and restrictions, but they were always in the minority—even in liberal strongholds like Moscow.)
So, for example, in an article from September about Omsk authorities thieving 40 million rubles from residents, because “coronavirus,” the following observation was made:
In crowded places, shopping malls, transport, checks of the mask regime and compliance with other sanitary and epidemiological measures continue. But many Omsk residents wear masks only when they see police officers and Rospotrebnadzor [Anna!!!] just to avoid a fine.
Penza probably has the best virus-extortion story. It is a very good story:
Police officers drew up a protocol against a young man who was in the store without a mask.
The court reviewed the case file and determined a fine (15,000 rubles). However, it turned out that the punishment was not imposed on the violator, but on his friend. While communicating with the police, the man without a mask introduced himself as the name of his friend, who at that time was doing military service in another region.
The conscript’s mother appealed to the prosecutor’s office. Employees of the supervisory authority protested the decision of the judge, the fine was canceled.
Cool new life hack?
All of this delicious extortion brings us to our next point, which is: Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin is a smarmy two-faced weasel.
At the end of May, Sobyanin announced he would grant “COVID amnesty” to businesses and citizens. Although he insisted “administrative penalties have made a significant contribution to solving the problem of saving the health and life of Muscovites,” the mayor offered refunds to those who had fallen victim to his extortion racket. The reason? Because there are currently more pressing issues than the Virus and many Muscovites are struggling financially and have less money to steal.
We explained in a previous blog post why we thought this “amnesty” was slithery and unimpressive. Actually, instinctively we knew it was a massive scam.
Surprise: it is a scam; you only qualify for “amnesty” if your fine was issued by the city government, and not employees of Rospotrebnadzor or the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Due to the predictable and totally unsurprising nature of such schemes, “legal reasons” will prevent many Muscovites from receiving compensation. This is openly admitted in an article published on Russia’s official COVID portal:
So what’s really going on here? Our guess is that several large, extremely well-connected businesses are going to be fully reimbursed, as part of a much-needed economic stimulus, and everyone else is going to get kicked to the curb.
It’s Sobyanin. The default assumption, assuming you aren’t a shill, should always be: “this guy is trying to scam us again, isn’t he? Darn it.”
Clot-shots: the next frontier
Coercive slurry injections are still a “thing” in Russia; however, regions with 80% herd immunity (how this is calculated remains an eternal mystery) are allowed to withdraw their mandatory clot-shot rules. But only if Anna says it’s okay, obviously.
Some regions have taken a different route. Instead of dropping mandatory clot-shots upon reaching the 80% sweet-spot, they drop their herd immunity so they can keep injecting people against their will.
On June 1, Russian media reported that “mandatory vaccination of workers in a number of industries is still in force in St. Petersburg.” This is very interesting news because in February, St. Petersburg authorities boasted about reaching “100% herd immunity.” Because of science, the city’s collective immunity has dropped to 60%.
But aren’t Russians tired of all this? Yes, but it doesn’t matter. Anna must be pleased. Anna has Indicators.
Even with compulsory vaxxing in place, there’s still very little demand for this demented experimental medical procedure.
As a result, several vax-manufacturers in Russia have stopped making unproven genetic slurries; R-Pharm, the AstraZeneca-and-Kremlin-linked drug firm, has not announced any pause in Sputnik V production—which is weird and raises Questions. At any rate: Russia has a massive stockpile of shots and apparently intends to use it. We must reach “80% herd immunity,” after all.
Russia’s collective immunity is currently less than 40%, after “dropping” from nearly 60% in February/March. More needling needed. Can’t stop, won’t stop.
The good news is that starting on June 14, COVID restrictions (we are guessing this means no more PCR tests, et cetera?) will be lifted for foreign citizens entering Russia. This includes people arriving on airplanes and boats.
(The bad news is that you might get tested for monkeypox instead.)
Come visit!
Here, in the state of New York, mask wearing has become strictly voluntary, but 10% to 15% of the population is still having a hard time giving up on this "safety blanket" for adults. Notably mask wearing is more prevalent among the poorer, less educated part of the population, presumably because they have more time and habit to absorb MSM propaganda coming via TV rays. In a way I'm happy with this state of affairs, if before it was hard to tell total morons from more reasonable people apart just by their appearance, now this task is much easier.
However in Canada, my home country, liberal repressions continue at a full scale. Members of Canadian parliament are still not allowed to drop down their muzzles inside of a debate hall. Conservative caucus MP was removed from parliament building at Trudeau's orders for not disclosing her medical status. Canadians are the only people in the world that are not allowed to travel by commercial plane, train, bus or even a boat unless they are fully injected. Now federal government plans to raise the bar for a fully vaccinated status from two jabs to three. Using Uvalde, TX tragedy as a pretext, Trudeau has banned sale, transfer, gifting of any handguns across Canada. Outside of couple of independent news outlets like Rebel News and few individual bloggers Canadian media is silent on these issues.
Riley, good work. Your posts and excellent musical taste make staring into the abyss fun.