Why does it feel like every second week there's some critical Atlassian vulnerability being disclosed...
335 karma · joined November 2, 2020
1. The government is spending ~$1B a week on lock-downs JUST with Auckland at 'level 3 and 4' - something that's unsustainable.
2. The public health system has NOT been adequately bolstered in the last year to cope with the inevitability of elimination failure. This is a huge problem, as our health-care system is massively over-leveraged and critical works are grossly under-paid when compared to other countries. Australia for example offer safer working conditions and vastly more pay. Nurses in particular have been fighting for a long time via unions to improve conditions. Protests etc are banned under COVID lock-down laws. Nurses are quitting in droves.
3. Elimination was NEVER a valid response, as it required all other countries to follow suit (and no, vaccination wasn't going to result in full protection). NZ is fully dependent on trade, immigration and tourism for its economy - the notion of lock-downs was laughable to begin with.
4. The social cost has been EXTRAORDINARY
5. The mental cost has been overwhelming
6. I have contacts in government, and exploring an alternative strategy to elimination has only BEGUN to be investigated in the last few weeks. So the entire strategy has been short-sighted and arrogant.
7. Vaccination rates are still poor, despite high availability of the Vaccine.
8. Exporters are rapidly sending jobs/manufacturing/supply off shore.
9. NZ has an obesity problem, and an aging population. Both are high predictors for poor health outcomes with COVID.
10. We've spent huge amounts (across multiple dimensions) on a failed strategy, and is increasingly showing to be for no gain but delaying the inevitable while failing to prepare
In summary. We have an aging and unhealthy population, a crumbling health system bracing for an impending Tsunami, a failed strategy, a plethora of social and economic issues, low vaccination and a government who public enjoys large popularity but has made all the wrong strategic decisions in isolation.
We are on path for major disaster.
- OWS was disolved for one. Signal is now developed by the "Signal Foundation" which is a registered 501(c)(3)non-profit. - Brian Acton (ex-WhatsApp) paid $50m startup money also
> Moxie began partnering with America’s soft-power regime change apparatus — including the State Department and the Broadcasting Board of Governors (now called the U.S. Agency for Global Media)
- So what. The Senate has literally approved Signal for use as a means of communication. - The US Govt. is not unified by any stretch of the imagination, there are plenty of competing interests. Some agencies want to support freedom of information, some want to suppress it.
This smells like a hit-piece. Also, both the client and server source-code is freely available for review and has been reviewed independently.... https://proprivacy.com/privacy-service/review/signal Realistically only the client matters, as it promises end-to-end encryption regardless of how secure/non-secure transport is.
The NSA etc doesn't need to "buy" apps in this manner anyway. They just go to the manufacturer of the devices/chips/components, throw them a National Security Letter and get ring-0 exploits (or hack their way in).
Almost all the negative aspects of this current economic climate come down to:
[1] Government misspending/policy at the behests of 'special interests' and
[2] Monopolies that go untouched.
When you realize that the government creates 9/10 monopolies, and that the remaining aspect of the equation is both fiscal corruption (at worst) or incompetence (at best), you realize that more government (socialism - event 'democratic') IS NOT the answer.
True capitalism is responsible for much of the innovations, competition and successes of the 20th & 21st centuries. Sure there are aspects that it needs to answer for, and be held to account for - but that should be/is baked into the capitalist model.