To be clear, I am neither ‘pro’ nor ‘anti’ vaccination. A vaccination is a medical intervention. In the old (pre-hysteria) days, prior to March 2020, any doctor would confirm that any medical intervention should be based on a risk -v- reward analysis.......

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Every modern effort to crush free speech begins as a crusade against "disinformation." China's massive Internet censorship apparatus was initially justified as an effort to control the spread of false information, and the Chinese state still describes it that way.

Censors begin by claiming that they only want to control the spread of deliberate falsehoods and push back against propaganda campaigns. They always begin by saying their primary concern is disinformation spread by hostile foreign powers. China constantly says that to this day.

The definition of "disinformation" begins to expand as the censors seek more power. Soon they aren't just going after DELIBERATE falsehoods pushed by malevolent conspiracies - they're suppressing everything from honest mistakes to predictions and "wrong" opinions.

It soon becomes clear that the censorship rules - like all other rules in totalitarian societies - are not applied evenly. The ruling party and its friends are judged much less harshly than dissidents. They get far more latitude to make unfounded statements or outright lies.

The censors move on, suppressing not just "disinformation" or demonstrably false statements, but even completely true statements that lack some vital "context." The censors declare that even pure truth is deceptive when it's not packaged and delivered "correctly."

Human, local, oriented, taken, and iterative, these are the change-harvester's bywords. In iterative change, we not only accept the reality of gradual stepwise refinement -- changing what we've already changed before -- we actually anticipate it and take advantage of it.

Before we begin: Folks, I know many are celebrating last week's results . I see them as one small pass towards the change I seek. Take a short break, then it's back to work?

Black lives matter.
Voting rights matter.
Women matter.

Stay safe, stay strong, stay angry, stay kind.

(And a *second* prefatory note: I've been not writing for six weeks. It was a combination of several factors, including illness, distraction, and the need to finish a gig. I'm happy to be back at content, now, but also very nervous. Bear with me while I regain my sea legs.)

With iteration, I think a great starting point for the concept is to watch just about any youtube video where a skilled artist draws a realistic rendering. What you will see almost inevitably is a direct implementation of iterative change.

The strokes begin quite broadly, faintly indicating the broad contours of the subject. Experience is relevant here: those who are most familiar with drawing that particular kind of subject, will make contours that seem "right" more quickly than those less experienced.

I have been working on pandemic outbreaks for 15 years.

There is a misunderstanding of the difference between the response in much of the West, versus successful countries (including New Zealand and Australia).

Summarizing:

1.Reactive versus proactive and goal oriented.

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2.Mitigation (slowing transmission) versus elimination (stopping transmission)

3.Gradually responding to increasing levels of infection by imposing greater restrictions which enables the infection rate to grow (red zone strategy), …

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versus starting with high restrictions to arrest transmission and relaxing restrictions only when the number of new cases is so low that contact tracing or localized short term action can stop community transmission (green zone strategy, including localized "fire fighting").

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4.Trying to keep economic activity and travel as open as possible but perpetuating the economic harm and imposing yoyo restrictions, versus making an initial sacrifice of economic activity and travel in order to benefit from the rapid restoration of normal economic activity.

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5.Focusing attention on few individuals resistant to social action because of shortsightedness or selfishness, versus recognizing the vast majority do the right thing if given clear guidance and support, which is what matters for success, as elimination is a robust strategy.

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Faith Without Works is Dead!

Jam2:17 NLT - “So you see, faith by itself isn’t enough. Unless it produces good deeds, it is dead and useless.”

There is a growing message and doctrine in the church that seems to discountenance works and suggests that the only thing we need ...

... as Christians is just to ‘believe’ in Christ and that lack of good works does not affect one’s faith in Christ. My brother and sister, this is big lie from the pit of hell. It doesn’t matter who is saying it or how big their ministry is, it goes against the scriptures ...

... and is against the Truth.
Our opening scripture tells us that it is not enough to simply believe in Jesus; there must be accompanying works to prove it. In fact, Jam2:19 says even demons believe that there is one God and His only begotten Son is Jesus.

However, they don’t obey Him or submit to His will. In order words, submission to the Lordship of Jesus Christ and the total will of God is the proof of faith. Jesus said “not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will ...

... of My Father in heaven.”(Matt7:21) and “for whoever does the will of My Father in heaven is My brother and sister and mother.” (Matt12:50).

Rom3:28 NIV - “For we maintain that a person is justified by faith apart from the works of the law.”