Doctors for Disaster Preparedness

DDP Newsletter Vol. XL, No. 4

In the guise of promoting health and safety, the federal government has issued 200,000 pages of regulations and has 288,000 full-time federal employees engaged in regulatory activities. Every regulator destroys 138 private-sector jobs, according to an Auburn University study, and each dollar in a regulator’s salary destroys $112 of economic output. Regulatory costs devour $5 trillion, or one-fifth of our entire economy. Additionally, regulation fuels the totalitarian administrative state, strangles start-ups, and drives industry offshore. The worst offender is probably the Environmental Protection Agency (https://tinyurl.com/3zcv2n3m).

The regulations are based on published research and often claim to save thousands or millions of lives. But much of the research claims display the “Bunnies in the Sky” phenomenon: If you look long and hard enough at the clouds, you will see something. Warren Kindzierski, Ph.D., discussed the crisis of irreproducibility (falseness) of research claims in science at our 42^nd annual meeting (https://youtu.be/78sTkKrJ0bA).

Bad (irreproducible) science has crowded out good (reproducible) science in the literature, permitting governments to develop policies with no reliable evidence of public benefit or even with actual harm. In the National Association of Scholars Shifting Sands Project, Kindzierski and S. Stanley Young, Ph.D., showed how false but “statistically significant” results get established.

Observational studies have many potential sources of bias. Researchers have enormous flexibility to manipulate their data selection and analysis to get results they want. Examples include selective design, selective use of data, selective analyses, and selective reporting of results. Multiple testing multiple modeling (MTMM) bias involves using data sets with a computer to test multiple outcomes, multiple predictors, different population subgroups, or multiple statistical cause-effect models without statistical correction. This increases the likelihood of making a type I (false positive) error. Observational studies routinely perform MTMM statistical tests on a data set. One in twenty results (5%) could be “significant” (a false positive) even when the null hypothesis is true. Other terms for this type of bias in published literature are data dredging, fishing expeditions, multiplicity, or multiple comparisons.

Randomized studies reduce, but do not eliminate all sources of bias.

An analysis of MTMM determines the SearchSpace, the number of possible hypothesis tests. One study of links between various foods and diseases had 20,000 possible hypothesis tests, of which 1,000 could have been “significant” false positive tests with P < .05. This provides ample opportunities to fish for spurious correlations.

A P-value plot—which graphs P-values from studies included in a meta-analysis vs. their rank order—can distinguish a null or uncertain effect from a true positive. This method in petroleum refinery workers showed a null effect for chronic myeloid leukemia risk but a positive one for mesothelioma risk.

By this method, EPA’s claims of deleterious effects of small particulates (PM_2.5) on all-cause mortality, heart attacks, or asthma attacks cannot be substantiated, as James Enstrom, Ph.D., M.P.H., has previously shown (https://tinyurl.com/58e2c75d).

P-value plots of studies of health outcomes of eating red and processed meat showed a null association with cardiovascular mortality, breast cancer incidence, and colorectal cancer incidence, and claims concerning all-cause and all-cancer mortality are shown to be uncertain and unproven.

Concerning COVID response measures, Young and Kindzierski found null effects of public masking on respiratory illness, or of lockdowns on mortality. However, an association between lockdowns and domestic violence was validated.

Claims of “implicit gender and racial bias” are extremely challenging to evaluate. A computer-based speed-response test referred to as the Implicit Association Test (IAT) developed by researchers at Harvard is extremely important as it forms the scientific framework of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI). P-value plot testing showed no association between the IAT and real-world microbehaviors.

Young and Kindzierski’s method shows that extremely costly and intrusive regulations are largely based on false results, even if promoted as “evidence-based” and “data-driven.”

‘POST-TRUTH SCIENCE’

We are constantly being exhorted to “trust the science.”

As William Briggs, Ph.D., points out, “Academics Blame Lower Trust in Scientists on Everything but Bad Scientists” (https://tinyurl.com/mnjmf3u8). “Science is the understanding of the nature of world. Controlling the world via this understanding is not science, but something else. Confusing the two leads to scientism.”

The science that the public is allowed to see is limited by “fact-checkers,” such as Science Feedback and other members of the International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN), who allegedly generate and disseminate misinformation. Meta, owner of Facebook (3 billion worldwide users), explicitly relies on IFCN-approved organizations (https://tinyurl.com/47pdxek4).

“Trusted” publications such as Scientific American are rife with fraud such as “citation sorcery.” That is, the cited sources do not support the claims that are made. For example, references backing the claim that mask protection has been “validated over decades” have nothing to do with viruses. Or an oft-cited “study” turns out to be an opinion piece or a brief letter (https://tinyurl.com/5u79jbdm).

On important questions such as “Where did COVID come from?” Science magazine has played the Three Wise Monkeys (see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil) and has attacked and defamed scientists who pointed out scientific fraud and misconduct (https://tinyurl.com/42ehbh6u).

One method of introducing bias, “P-hacking,” occurs when researchers collect or select data or statistical analyses until nonsignificant results become significant. A method that uses text-mining demonstrates that p-hacking is widespread throughout science. Authors Megan Head et al. nevertheless conclude that “its effect seems to be weak relative to the real effect sizes being measured,” and that “p-hacking probably does not drastically alter scientific consensuses drawn from meta-analyses” (https://tinyurl.com/mybzvscv). Their study does not consider the SearchSpace.

Consensus results, however, in the hands of regulators have multibillion-dollar and life-and-death consequences. The consequence of safety-first, no pollution is not weighed against the consequence of not being able to make steel or antibiotics.            

Or the fact that there is no “post-truth” science.

DDP Newsletter November 2024, Vol. XL, No. 6

When political and/or economic collapse is threatening, an age-old method for a regime to maintain its grip on power is to start a war.

While the incoming Trump regime is unpredictable, President-Elect Trump said his priority was to stop the killing in Ukraine. However, without a crushing military defeat, Russia is not going to give up its proclaimed objectives. And it is Ukraine that is being crushed. Russians are advancing relentlessly on the ground in Ukraine, a succession of U.S. and NATO Wunderwaffen having failed to change the game (tinyurl.com/5n92u8yp).

A loss in Ukraine would be a disaster, according to Western reigning authorities (https://tinyurl.com/mr64ydh5). Former Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Gen. Mark Milley said, “What’s at stake is the global international security order that was put in place in 1945” (https://tinyurl.com/5n8968n4). Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki stated, “Failure in Ukraine could be the beginning of the end of the golden age of the West” (tinyurl.com/mru2cv95). Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Ukraine’s defeat would be the end of the West’s postwar hegemony (tinyurl.com/2sz783b8).

The Biden regime authorized striking into Russian territory with long-range missiles—which can only be operated by U.S. personnel. Both U.S. ATACMS and British Storm Shadow missiles have attacked Russian targets. It is not clear how many were destroyed by Russian air defenses or how much damage was done, but it was likely unspectacular (https://tinyurl.com/y9t372rd).

Former Russian president and prime minister Dmitry Medvedev has declared that NATO and the U.S. are now at “full war” with Russia (https://tinyurl.com/3b23s7aj). On Nov 19, after the U.S. had authorized what Russia views as a major escalation, Putin signed a decree updating Russia’s nuclear doctrine. This stares that a nuclear strike could be justified in case of “aggression against Russia and its allies by any non-nuclear state…with the support of a nuclear state.” This would be “considered a joint attack by both countries on Russia.” Putin added that “a ‘critical threat to sovereignty’ posed by conventional non-nuclear weapons would also be seen as valid grounds for a nuclear response and that Russia reserved the right to use nuclear weapons in case of aggression against close ally Belarus” (https://tinyurl.com/2xnds3hd).

In retaliation for the NATO attack, Russia struck the Dnipro Yuzhmash aerospace manufacturing facility with a newly developed hypersonic Oreshnik (“Hazelnut tree”) intermediate range ballistic missile. Some accounts say the underground working part of the facility was turned into dust. This suggests that the Oreshnik submunitions crashed at hypersonic speed into the workshops and simply pulverized them. There was no particular need for high explosives to do the job (https://tinyurl.com/ssmzb593).

Putin claims that NATO has no means to stop such a missile and that the military is picking targets in Ukraine from a list of decision-making centers, industrial production sites, and military facilities. NATO has no analogues, and none will appear soon, he states. Russia has several more such missiles available now, and serial manufacturing has begun (https://tinyurl.com/3b9cnmsb).

The Oreshnik attack is not featured on news.google.com, and Western experts downplay its significance, according to a report on Reuters (tinyurl.com/e6swthsz). This said that the missile was no big deal, could be intercepted, and was possibly being used more for psychological effect. As Will Schryver states, “Reuters wants everyone to know…Putin is just talking tough to sow unfounded fear of Russian military might” (https://tinyurl.com/27pm72ue).

Despite the Oreshnik attack, the U.S. and its Ukrainian “orderlies” launched 13 more ATACMS missiles into Russia. The Russians claim to have shot down 10 of them and acknowledge the loss of an S-400 radar unit and its crew. The Russian Ministry of Defense reported today that five ATACMS launch vehicles were destroyed by a volley of Iskander missiles, and that additional Iskander strikes, directed against apparently known concentrations of US/NATO personnel in Ukraine, “neutralized” about 40 Americans and nine French personnel (https://tinyurl.com/4y58as9t).

Europe is taking the war threat far more seriously. An estimated 5.2 million copies of a crisis preparedness pamphlet are set to be delivered to Swedish households in the next two weeks, with the text available in multiple languages online. Citizens are advised to be ready with a stockpile of food and emergency supplies, including baby food, medicine, and hygiene products. There are diagrams of expedient shelters. Finland has also published its own online crisis preparedness brochure, warning that as of the last government survey in September, only 58% of Finns have adequate emergency supplies at home to ride out a crisis. Norway published its own printed pamphlets earlier this year on how citizens could manage by themselves for a week in the event of a national crisis, including war (https://tinyurl.com/5h7vrtm7). Germany is preparing to convert metro stations, offices, and public buildings into bomb shelters. The Federal Office for Civil Protection is identifying suitable structures and developing an app to guide the public to nearby shelters (https://tinyurl.com/n99a5y2s).

MIDDLE EAST FRONT

Shortly after Israel and Hezbollah announced a temporary ceasefire, Turkish-backed rebels launched a shock offensive against Syria that reached past the gates of Aleppo. Many factors may have contributed to re-bleeding in the “frozen” Syrian civil war (https://tinyurl.com/y6432u4u). According to Simplicius, Israel, having failed to defeat Hezbollah, has gone to Plan B, which is to eliminate Iran’s ability to resupply Hezbollah via Syria. To do that, Assad must fall. Showing Israel’s handprint on the attack, the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) was hit with a major “exploding beeper and radio” attack, wounding many SAA servicemen—a perfect replay of the same attack on Hamas earlier. Russia has evidently sent reinforcements to Syria, weakening its efforts in Ukraine.

The incursion followed weeks of Israeli strikes into Syria itself, likely the preparatory forewarning in anticipation of this offensive.

Ukraine’s calling cards were also visible, Simplicius states, with the Syrian terrorists’ usage of FPV (first-person view) drones in the attacks, and their choice of yellow and blue head and arm bands. Ukrainian field commanders have been spotted among the militants. Ukraine, with the U.S., has been training members of the Hayat Tahir al-Sham  (HTS) terrorist group, and actively recruiting them to fight in Ukraine.

“It’s clear that the conflict is taking on a global proportion of interconnectivity, a true ‘world war’” (https://tinyurl.com/m3m9rtsy).

Is World War III already here?

DDP Newsletter Vol. XL, No. 3

A current invisible scary threat, impossible for people to verify for themselves, is endocrine disruptors (EDs) lurking in the water. This topic first appeared in the National Library of Medicine PubMed data base in 1995, reached a maximum of 1,088 citations in 2019, and still occurs almost 1,000 times/y, dozens of times in association with plastics.

The term was coined at the 1991 Wingspread conference, a rebranding of the more benign term “endocrine modulators,” explains Steve Milloy (tinyurl.com/4ssdrfjj).

On Aug 23, 1994, the endocrine-disruptor scare was reported in the New York Times in an article titled “Pesticides May Leave Legacy of Hormonal Chaos.” Referring to some wildlife populations, Theo Colborn, the activist who convened the Wingspread conference, stated: “I’d say we are on a fast track to extinction…. You would expect the same thing to happen to human populations.” Colburn, a pharmacist, earned a Ph.D. in zoology at age 58 (ibid.).

Continue reading “Endocrine Disruptors”

DDP Newsletter Vol. XL, No. 5

In the devastation caused by Hurricane Helene in western North Carolina, many people were asking this question. Accusations first about absence and then about slow deployment and malfeasance are widely disseminated and officially denied. Also, sensationalist theories assert that the storm was man-made or steered for a nefarious purpose, such as to affect the election or to wipe out those who oppose lithium mining in this area. Counterintuitively, influencers who promote such allegations claim to belong to the political side that was always highly skeptical about “man-made climate change.”

What is the true situation?

Whatever it is, it is not new. During Hurricane Katrina, people asked the same question, and the passage of S.3721, the Post-Katrina Emergency Management Reform Act of 2006 (https://tinyurl.com/8jyctvar) seemingly made no difference.

FEMA operates like any other corrupted bureaucracy: response will be slow and encumbered with red tape. There will be conflicts with local and state authorities and volunteers. As one person who did public relations for the agency during disasters described it, “FEMA sends in the money truck.” An official photo from North Carolina shows a neat trailer with staff to help people fill out forms. So far, a relatively paltry $4 million has been paid directly to families and individuals in the week after Hurricane Helene, reports Larry Bell, and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas has warned that his $640.9 million FEMA storm relief budget is now just about tapped out for the rest of this season (https://tinyurl.com/9a4rrwtz).

“FEMA is broke,” said Prof. Peter St Onge, because of spending on other priorities such as Ukraine and migrants. Quoting America First Legal, he said that “Over the last 4 years the Biden-Harris admin has steadily transformed FEMA into an illegal alien resettlement agency” (https://tinyurl.com/y5pxyjw5). Critics of this interpretation claim that subsidies for immigrants come from a “different source” and that the GOP-led House is responsible for the agency’s funding shortfall (https://tinyurl.com/4a5tn8p3).

But where are relief supplies going, and who is rescuing people?

Elon Musk accused FEMA of “belligerent government incompetence.” He claimed that FEMA was “blockading the disaster area and preventing private helicopters from delivering Starlink terminals, which connect to satellite internet service, and other supplies…. @FEMA is both failing to help AND won’t let others help” (tinyurl.com/25thtp8z).

Transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg said, “No one is shutting down the airspace and FAA doesn’t block legitimate rescue and recovery flights.” A FEMA spokesperson stated, “FEMA has helped provide Starlink terminals…. These units are supporting state and local municipalities, Urban Search and Rescue and disaster coordination” (ibid.).

[Musk noted that Starlink likely would have already been up and running in some of these areas if the Harris-Biden Federal Communications Commission hadn’t stopped a $885 million grant to SpaceX to provide broadband to rural communities in 2022. The 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law set aside $42 billion to build broadband infrastructure in rural and underserved communities, but so far, zero connection have been made.]

FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell called the “false” criticisms of the agency’s response “dangerous.” They could hinder FEMA’s recovery efforts. “It has a tremendous impact on the comfort level of our own employees to be able to go out there, but it’s also demoralizing to all of the first responders…FEMA staff, volunteers,” she told host George Stephanopoulos (https://tinyurl.com/mstnssvp).

One allegation is that FEMA refused to supply body bags and was planning to bulldoze an area without recovering the bodies. A responsive response would have been: “We did supply the body bags. All human remains will be treated with respect. Here is a source of information about efforts to identify them.” This has not been heard.

The task is enormous; volunteers are urgently needed. However, FEMA.gov urges you to “donate and volunteer responsibly.” You should register before volunteering. Unaffiliated volunteers who self-deploy might burden the community, FEMA warns.

As disaster response lags, FEMA’S new priorities, posted on its website, are: (1) Instill equity as a foundation of emergency management; (2) Lead whole of community in climate resilience; (3) Promote and sustain a ready FEMA and prepared nation.

Criswell said she made Equity her priority; then FEMA held Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) training saying the U.S. is rooted in extreme violence, and “White Supremacy is in almost every institution” (https://tinyurl.com/yrfbrb8r). In a virtual meeting in March 2023, FEMA emergency management specialist Tyler Atkins said the agency was prioritizing LGBTQ people because they are “already disadvantaged.” LGBTQ victims should receive more support because they would have been “already struggling” before a natural disaster (https://tinyurl.com/39syehx7).

FEMA BACKGROUND

DDP was originally part of The American Civil Defense Association (TACDA). Our joint meetings generally featured a speaker from FEMA—when it still concerned itself with civil defense. In the Reagan Administration, under Gen. Julius Becton, FEMA revived nuclear war defense instead of being an “all hazards but one” agency. It supported the construction of five mobile NBC (nuclear, biological, chemical) shelter displays, which appeared at DDP meetings and were taken by DDP to county and state fairs in many cities. The one made for FEMA deteriorated unused at the National Emergency Training Center until it was finally buried to use in fire-training exercises. FEMA required us to remove the medical kit as too dangerous for laypeople (the updated version can be downloaded from ddponline.org/medkit).The refurbished Arizona shelter appeared at the 2023 meeting and is now popular in Oregon at fairs and in parades. Today, the U.S. is largely do-it-yourself for all hazards as well as for civil defense.

FEMA was started by executive order in the Nixon Administration to assure the survivability of the United States government in the event of a nuclear attack on this nation. It was also assigned the task of being a federal coordinating body during times of domestic disasters, such as earthquakes, floods, and hurricanes.

Over the years, the scope of FEMA’s activities has expanded, as have its powers, through a series of executive orders. For example, E.O. 11921 of June 11, 1976, gives the federal government power over all “usable  water” (https://tinyurl.com/39wp43j3).

Only a small fraction of FEMA’s spending goes for helping U.S. disaster victims. Continuity of government—including elaborate bunkers for selected officials—is likely the highest priority. Some say that FEMA is the most powerful organization in the U.S.—or could be in case of a national crisis (real or imagined). Meanwhile, it is busily implementing the regime’s political and social priorities, as flood victims are abandoned.