How Dominic Cummings should have handled his press conference

Cummings should have done is this:

1. Pointed out the wording of the guidance/law which said that people with children in special circumstances could use their judgement and ignore the rule.

2. Every time  Cummings  was asked a question about how he justified his behaviour   he should have simply referred  the questioner to the special circumstances passage in the guidance/law. The reptiles would soon have lost interest.

3. Offered to resign if

a)  every one of the reptiles who beseiged his London  home is  fired from their job  for not observing the social distancing rules and not reemployed in the media.

b) if any member of the Commons or Lords who breaks the rules is forced to resign.

Cummings most stupid mistake was his claim that his drive to Barnard Castle was to test his eyesight. He made the classic error  of someone trying to plug a hole in a story only to find he had created a bigger hole.

However, if he had done what I propose the Barnard Castle trip would have been put on the back burner  as the politicians and the  media ran away from attacking him when their own position was threatened.  If he had to give an explanation for the Barnard Castle trip he should have said his car was playing up  on his drive to the NE  –  a knocking noise would do the trick – and he wanted to make see how the car was running before the 260 mile drive home.

This would prompt the question “Why did you not seek the help of a mechanic? ”

Best answer: because I did not want to breach the lockdown rules.”

Worst answer: there weren’t any mechanics available. ”

The worst answer is the worst answer because it leads off to another line of questioning – “What efforts did you make to find a mechanic ” and such forth.

The best answer is a simple one which leads nowhere beyond the answer itself.

Finally, I do not know what the problem is with the Cummings child, but having put the “my child has special problems” into play Cummings needed to play it to its uttermost, ie, say clearly what the child’s problem is.

 

We could be heading for a de facto identity card

Robert Henderson

The government has begun an experiment on the Isle of Wight with an app which tracks  those who have or have had the coronavirus. If successful it will be rolled out UK wide.

The app will trace your movements which is worrying enough, but it will also give a clue to who you are meeting and when and where the meetings take place.

The app  has also already be shown to be insecure.

If  the app goes nationwide an even  greater worry arises, namely, that it could become all too easily a de facto identity card with at first the population being divided in two, between those who load  the app having the de facto  ID cards being allowed to move more freely about the country and those without the  app being restricted by the present lockdown restrictions or even something more  restrictive. This of course would give a great incentive to download the app.

The next likely step would be to make using the app compulsory unless people are literally confined to their homes permanently.

Those with the app will have the most potent of identitycards, not only one which says who you are , but one which tells where you have been and who you may have met. A police state dream.

Worryingly, The Health Secretary Mike Hancock has launched the app with the claim that it is everyone’s duty to use the app.

The app is not the only worrying government development , viz:

. ” The Coronavirus Act has given the Government powers that are without precedent in peacetime, including the authority to close any building. The lesser known Health Protection (Coronavirus, Restrictions) (England) Regulations, which are the legal basis for the lockdown, are even more draconian. Their principal stipulations are that “no person may participate in a gathering in a public place of more than two people” and “no person may leave the place where they are living without reasonable excuse”. The list of “reasonable excuses” is short. ” (See below for full article)

All of this needs to be stamped on now because  virtually all the apparatus for a police state  has been given statutory force  by the Government.

Apart from the police state aspects of the technology the impracticality of the system strikes me, vz:

You download the app and go out.

Some hours later the app notifies you that have been in the proximity of someone who has the virus symptoms.

You  return home and  stay isolated for 14 days.

On the 15th day you go out .

A few hours later your  app notifies you that you have been near to someone with the virus symptoms.

You  remain home and stay isolated for another 14 days.

On the 15th day you leave your home.

You have barely walked a  few hundred yards and your app tells  you are in the vicinity of someone with the virus symptoms.

You return home to be isolated for another 14 days…

Coronavirus and the herd immunity ploy

Robert Henderson

The herd immunity ploy was obviously the most efficient  and, arguably in the long run,    the most humane course of action  because the  number of deaths and misery, both physical and psychological, may well exceed those from the present course of action.  For example, what happens with the present ploy  if  the situation has not changed after  16 weeks locked down ? Does the government keep on with lockdown interminably? Clearly that could not happen because there is a limit to what even a country with a great borrowing record  like the UK  can actually borrow. Moreover,  can anyone honestly believe that  to to keep people locked away for 4 months, 6 months and so on is practically possible? As it is we are are asking people at present to undergo a form of psychological torture. Imagine how extreme circumstances can be, for example, a family of 3 or four living in one room in a B and B.  It is inhuman.

With herd immunity the actuality might be very painful  in the short term but the experience of the likes of Sweden suggests is no worse in terms of death and much better in terms of not subjecting the population to great privation and  keeping the economy going.

There is also  a serious question over the number of which deaths can be wholly or solely attributed to the coronavisrus, for  example, there are suggestions that many of the deaths which are going into the daily count are not  due to coronavirus being the primary cause but rather acting as the last straw which broke the camel’s back.

To get a clear picture of what is happening we need answers to these questions for every claimed coronavisrus death:

1. How old was the patient?

2. What was the cause of death given on the death certificate?

3. What other illnesses and disabilities did the patient have?

4. What treatment did the patient receive in the 24 hours prior to their death?

5. Where did they die, for example, in hospital  or outside of hospital?

6. Had the patient stated that they did not wish to be resuscitated?