TREND TRACKING LESSON, PART 1: As trend forecasters understand, personal bias, wishes, hopes, wants, beliefs, and desires are personal blinders that prevent people from seeing the future.
Hard facts count. By their deeds you shall know them.
Those who believe in their news sources without question are shortsighted to what the future will bring by taking sides and ignoring counterviews.
For example, take the New York Times, which has a stellar record of selling illegal and immoral U.S. wars, such as the false “yellow cake” and “aluminum tubes” stories they promoted, which brought their audience to support the based-on-lies Iraqi War.
Still adorning its warmonger-in-sheep’s clothing, the Times is still selling shill oil.
Last Friday, regarding the failed coup led by former U.S. military men, the front-page headline in the Times read: “An Incursion Into Venezuela, Straight Out of Hollywood.”
Hollywood?
How about the headline: “Venezuela Claims U.S.-Led Coup Attempt Stopped. Eight killed.”
Then, as journalists, rather Presstitutes peddling propaganda, write the facts of who said what and let the reader decide… rather than painting over the murderous attempt.
Absent in the Times coverage is the documented track record of the long term, murderous trend of American interference in a democratically-elected government for the purpose of stealing their oil, of which Venezuela sits on the world’s largest reserves.
Go back to the January 2018 Trends Journal, when we quoted John Bolton, then-U.S. National Security Advisor, who, in an economic act of war, flatly stated, “We’re in conversation with major American companies now. It would make a difference if we could have American companies produce the oil in Venezuela. It would be good for… the people of the United States.”
Indeed, as Gerald Celente noted at the onset of the 2003 U.S. overthrow of Saddam Hussein, “Do you think we’d invade Iraq if their major export was broccoli?”
Or, the Times, in reporting the “Hollywood” coup attempt, could the self-proclaimed “Paper of Record” question if the attempt was directly influenced by the recent official U.S. policy naming President Nicolás Maduro a narco-terrorist and offering a $15 million reward for his capture?
And, yet further into the NYT article is this journalistically ignorant line: “Mr. Maduro, a leader known widely for overseeing his country’s economic downfall…”
As is well known, and continually reported in the Trends Journal, while under Maduro’s rule, the Venezuelan economy has been on the skids, but the economic downfall has been escalated by severe sanctions imposed by the U.S.
On 8 August 2019, Michelle Bachelet, the U.N. Commissioner for Human Rights, stated, “I am deeply worried about the potentially severe impact on the human rights of the people of Venezuela of the new set of unilateral sanctions imposed by the U.S. this week.”
When the Trump administration increased economic sanctions in August 2019, joined by the European Union, the Center for Economic and Policy Research reported that 300,000 Venezuelans’ lives would be endangered from lack of essential medicines and treatment directly caused by the new sanctions.
Its report stated,
“The sanctions reduced the public’s caloric intake, increased disease and mortality (for both adults and infants), and displaced millions of Venezuelans who fled the country as a result of the worsening economic depression and hyperinflation. They exacerbated Venezuela’s economic crisis and made it nearly impossible to stabilize the economy, contributing further to excess deaths. All of these impacts disproportionately harmed the poorest and most vulnerable Venezuelans.”
TREND TRACKING LESSON, PART 2: On 4 May, the New York Times cover story read: “Virus Batters Some Areas. Why Does it Spare Others?”
The article cites the Dominican Republic reports about 7,600 cases of COVID, whereas its neighbor, Haiti, has just 85. But cases are not deaths, and the death rates in both of these countries are minimal. To date, out of a population of 10.8 million, 393 coronavirus-related deaths have been reported in the Dominican Republic.
As for Haiti, with poverty levels regarded as the most severe in the western hemisphere, out of a population of 11.4 million, there have been just 15 COVID deaths.
The Times goes on to state, “Many developing nations with hot climates and young populations have escaped the worst, suggesting that temperature and demographics could be factors. But countries like Peru, Indonesia and Brazil, tropical countries in the throes of growing epidemics, throw cold water on that idea.”
It’s the facts that throw “cold water” on the Times reporting.
As for the “young factors”:
- Haiti’s median age is 23, the Dominican Republic’s is 27.3;
- Peru, with 32.9 million people and a median age of 31, registered 1,961 COVID deaths;
- Indonesia, with a population of 273.5 million and media age of 29.7, reports just 1,007 deaths;
- Brazil, with 212.6 million and a median age of 33.2, registered 11,519 COVID-related deaths.
Compare those statistics to the United States, with a population of 331 million and a median age of 38.2. Then weigh in that, aside from the vast majority of COVID deaths being among chronically ill elderly, America’s obesity rate is the other primary cause.
And add to that, in Italy, were the average age of COVID deaths is 80 years old, mostly in the highly-polluted Lombardy region, the virus struck in the winter, and the median age of Italians is 45.8 years, thus the “young factors” and warm climate are indeed factors.
Moreover, as is routine with Presstitutes selling hype, fear, and hysteria, absent is the fact, that, “For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or modest symptoms, such as fever and cough, that clear up in two to three weeks. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe life-threatening illness, including pneumonia, and death.”