News Round-Up

• “Diary of an ‘Expert’ (She/Her)” – Very funny spoof by Michael Jackson in the Spectator Australia about the fact that New Zealand has only just dropped all Covid restrictions, three-and-a-half years after Covid-19 struck.
• “Long Covid Is the new AIDS” – If everything can be blamed on Long Covid, then nothing can be blamed on Long Covid. It’s all confirmation studies from here on out, writes Dr. Steve Templeton for the Brownstone Institute.
• “Heavy-handed Ulez rollout will be disastrous, small businesses say” – The Federation of Small Businesses is pleading for Sadiq Khan to show some mercy once the controversial Ulez scheme expands across London, reports the Telegraph.
• “Resentment swirls as Britain’s windiest place gears up for a green revolution” – Shetlanders are divided over the impact of the Viking wind farm on the islands’ pristine landscape, reports the Telegraph.
• “The disturbing rise of the rural Greens” – Green party eco-activists are taking over the countryside, warns Richard Rout in the Spectator.
• “Claim: Record coral reef cover hides ‘cryptic’ diversity loss” – Following the embarrassment of record coral abundance, Aussie academics now claim the reef is dying in ways which cannot be observed, says Eric Worrall in WUWT.
• “India wants the world to target per capita emissions” – The Indian Minister for Power has called for a shift in the climate change narrative from total emissions to per capita emissions of each country. Paul Homewood, writing in WUWT, doesn’t blame him one bit.
• “Britain paying up to eight times more than EU for road and rail projects, research finds” – A Britain Remade study shows that the U.K. spends up to a staggering eight times more on rail and road projects than its European counterparts, reports the Telegraph.
• “Woman given £40,000 ‘sorry’ after police burst into her home” – A woman who was forcefully arrested by South Wales Police officers after they barged into her house at 2.30am and pinned her to a wall because she’d posted gender critical comments on Twitter has received £40,000 compensation and a written apology, according to WalesOnline.
• “Why did the Tories lose interest in free schools?” – Should teachers be empowered, or take top-down instruction and forced to accept ‘oracy’, or the latest hot idea from Westminster know-nothings, asks Fraser Nelson in the Spectator.
• “NHS accused of ‘trying to erase women’ as trusts sign up to scheme” – Angry MPs have called for ministers to step in after 77 NHS trusts joined the NHS Rainbow Badge Scheme, which rewards them for dropping “gendered language” from policies, forms and signs, reports the Mail.
• “Fury over the dozens of children’s books with transgender themes” – Campaigners have condemned the dozens of books with transgender themes that are aimed at young children and are being promoted by publishers and booksellers, says the Mail.
• “Chloe Cole: ‘I was told transitioning would save me. It destroyed my life’” – American Chloe Cole, who underwent ‘top surgery’ in her mid-teens to transition from female to male, wants to be a girl again and wants Congress to stop doctors from mutilating teenage girls, says the Telegraph.
• “On your bike, Vogue – we can see what you think of women’s sport” – The only athlete on Vogue magazine’s list of powerful females is a trans cyclist with odd ideas on diversity, writes Kathleen Stock in the Sunday Times.
• “Alice Cooper let go by brand after opposing kids trans surgeries” – Alice Cooper has been dropped by a cosmetics company after he made comments opposing ‘gender affirming care’ for children, according the Mail.
• “A woke witch hunt has taken over the arts” – The National Theatre has revived The Crucible, Arthur Miller’s 1953 reaction to McCarthyism, just when we need it the most, writes Nick Cohen in the Spectator.
• “The radical humanism of W.E.B. Du Bois” – Sixty years on from his death, W. E. B. Du Bois’s writing offers a way out of the identitarian trap, says Brendan O’Neill in Spiked.
• “Ontario court rules against Jordan Peterson, upholds social media training order” – An Ontario court has ruled against Jordan Peterson and upheld a regulatory body’s order that he take social media training in the wake of complaints about his controversial online posts and statements, reports CBC News.
• “Jordan Peterson ruling empowers woke bodies everywhere to discipline members who express unpopular opinions” – The question that should have been put to the court was whether the regulator’s code of ethics overreached, says Howard Levitt in the Financial Post.
• “Musk to sue Soros’s Open Society in Irish free speech row” – X CEO Elon Musk has announced plans to sue affiliates of George Soros’s Open Society Foundations, alleging they spread misinformation to justify curbing free speech, according to the European Conservative.
• “Imperial miasma theory” – A genre of books has emerged that claims Britain’s imperial past can explain everything about Britain’s present difficulties. As its latest offering confirms, it ends up explaining nothing, writes Samuel Rubinstein in a must-read piece for Engelsberg Ideas.
• “Xi’s student spy army – and how they can be outsmarted” – The Chinese President is infiltrating British universities as he tries to make China great again. Professor Steve Tsang in the Telegraph reveals that even he was approached.
• “TikTok’s U.S. e-commerce business at risk of losing over $500 million by 2023” – Popular social media platform TikTok could potentially lose more than $500 million in the U.S. due to government concerns regarding the data privacy and security of TikTok users, reports Shanghaiist.
• “The ‘false prophet’ v the Pope: Argentina faces clash of ideologies in election” – Javier Milei, a culture war populist and sex coach who won Argentina’s open primary, is in a war of words with the “communist” pontiff as he sets his sights on becoming President, says the Guardian.
• “The Covid lie that started it all!” – Independent video creator Matt Orfalea uses archive news footage to debunk the original claim that the infection fatality rate from COVID-19 was 3.4%. Trump had it right when he said it was under 1%.

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