Comments by "Dale Crocker" (@dalecrocker3213) on "DW News" channel.

  1.  @harukrentz435  It didn't help much when the Delta wave hit in the summer, did it? Masks didn't stop that - nor in India or Singapore or Vietnam. Something did though - any ideas?
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  2. The offensive is already under way. It just needs the ground to harden in the north for the Russians to come pouring in from their own border and that of Belarus. It is hard to see how the Ukrainians can avoid losing at least Donbass, and even possibly suffer total military defeat. They have fought like lions, but the time is surely near when they must surrender.
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  3.  @ricardoabh3242  All Omicron victims so far seem fully vaccinated. We don't know yet how unvaccinated people will get on, because there do not seem to be any cases as yet. People recovered from Delta can get Omicron apparently, but again symptoms are mild.
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  4.  @Just_another_Euro_dude  Yep, NATO didn't do too well in Afghanistan did it? And Ukraine is certainly reaping the rich rewards of trying to join NATO and the EU.
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  5. It depend how you define herd immunity, surely? It doesn't mean that the disease will be wiped out, merely that sufficient people will be immune to ensures viruses will find their pathways to new hosts difficult to find and that therefore the number of people infected will be manageable.
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  6. Data on deaths from all causes is very alarming.
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  7.  @borabay91  First of all, I'm not trying to manipulate anyone. All I'm saying is that people who claim such things as "the unvaccinated are taking up the hospital beds" are clearly wrong. For the reasons that you clearly state, it would be impossible for it to be otherwise. Having said that, the assertions in the preamble to the actual statistics are not beyond question. They rely on imponderables such as actual population demographics (which are not known in anything like precise detail) and a guess as to what death and hospitalisation rates would be like if people were not vaccinated to the degree that they are. The only unarguable items of data which we have available are the numbers of people who die from all causes, and the number of people who are vaccinated. And juxtaposing these two is where anomalies and puzzles occur. Deaths from all causes are increasing, regardless of covid and regardless of the number of people vaccinated. Furthermore peaks in anomalous deaths are occurring shortly after vaccines rollouts. This, on the face it, does call into question the whole effectiveness of the vaccine programme as an instrument to reduce mortality. I do urge you to check Professor Fenton's videos on this subject. He has only recently issued a shorter version of the work he and his colleagues have carried out but even the longer one is quite intelligible to the layman. All I can say is that their conclusions have given me considerable food for thought.
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  8. As a tactic it worked extremely well. The large NATO-funded Ukrainian army is near enough destroyed dealing with the target it was presented with, and Ukraine is no longer in a position to retake Crimea and Donbass - which is what its new army was created to do.
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  9. The vaccines only recognise a tiny amount of the viral genome -about 1%. Recovery from an actual infection should provide far greater immunity via memory cells.
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  10. Are you seriously suggesting that wearing masks would have affected these figures to any great degree? If masking and lockdowns were the magic bullets they are supposed to be then Sweden ought to be above the rest, should it not? In fact, very much like the UK, Sweden had a very large elderly population, many in their nineties, protected from death by free and efficient healthcare systems. It was these who have suffered the brunt of the pandemic. The UK masked and enforced lockdowns. Sweden of course did not.
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  11.  @slappyfun  This is a common misapprehension. There are so many trillions upon trillions of Covid 19 viruses in the world that it is a statistical certainty that all viable strains already exist. They only come into prominence when exterior circumstances change, providing small differences with an advantage.
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  12.  @КристинаЙорданова-р8л  He's a politician. He lies.
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  13.  @quito787  I'm trying to be neutral, but I have to say that Russia has very real reasons for taking the actions it has and, more importantly, a quick Russian victory is the only way this dreadful war can be brought to a rapid conclusion.
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  14.  @rowaystarco  Not so. Russia has the capacity to bomb Ukrainian cities into dust, as it did in Syria.
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  15.  @rowaystarco  Because they're cheap.
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  16. Natural immunity lasts. Vaccine immunity doesn't.
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  17. Ukraine is going to be left in the lurch. Good.
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  18. ​ @davidchang5265  Perhaps they wouldn't MIND that much, but because of its relatively low existing Russian population it would be troublesome to administer- unlike Donbass No, I think probably Kherson's biggest value for the Russians is amount of losses Ukraine will suffer trying to retake it.
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  19.  @musiconabudget3712  Could be right. The Dnieper is a natural division.
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  20. @evren That's not likely! They want Crimea and they want Donbass. Everywhere else is just a killing field.
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  21.  @user58553  Perhaps they wouldn't MIND that much, but because of its relatively low existing Russian population it would be troublesome to administer- unlike Donbass No, I think probably Kherson's biggest value for the Russians is amount of losses Ukraine will suffer trying to retake it.
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  22.  @Omega0850  I don't see what's immature about it. If anything, it's all this gung-ho support for poor little Ukraine which is adolescent. I'm 74 by the way.
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  23. The more the Ukrainians milk this the more it looks as though it was them what dun it. They have at least as much to gain from this as the Russians. Probably more.
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  24. By the Indian strand do you mean the very fine beaches at Goa?
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  25. They totally ignored them in the Middle Ages. Why should they behave any differently now?
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  26. It is quite clear that the vaccines are relatively ineffective. Even if infections are caused by people believing themselves to be immune when in fact they are asymptomatic and spreading the disease, this does not account for these figures. Something else is going on. And it's very, very serious.
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  27.  @martijnstam6186  No threat to Russia?! What else is NATO for, do you suppose? (Apart from providing a ready market for arms dealers and job opportunities for senior US military of course.)
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  28.  @martijnstam6186  It'll be a bit late then, won't it? Trying to get Ukraine into NATO is what has provoked Russia into taking the action it has. It simply cannot be expected to put up with the idea of having an enemy nuclear missile base seven minutes flying time from Moscow. It is a step too far - and recognised as such even by many Western diplomats and senior military personnel. Do you realise that Russia has tried to join NATO several times? The reason it hasn't been allowed to is because NATO is basically a job creation scheme for the Western military and a goldmine for arms salesmen. The Russian Federation poses no threat to peace in the way the Soviet Union did, but it has to be treated as an enemy because NATO needs an enemy to justify its very profitable existence.
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  29.  @martijnstam6186  Has America given up its nuclear arsenal? I must have missed that.
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  30.  @muadrico  Russia merely protects its borders and its interests. It is America, through NATO, which seeks expansion.
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  31.  @jimbøb-i9q  Russia has changed its mind.
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  32. There is. Catching it.
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  33. There is no doubt that the human race is doomed if things go on as they are.. Even if ALL the recommendations in the current IPCC report are implemented (which they will not be) then temperatures are set to increase to fatal levels before the end of the century. All right-thinking people must now consider the possibility of mass suicide as the only viable solution. If enough of us kill ourselves then there is a faint chance that those who remain will survive to continue the species. He procedure must be properly organised of course. The UN instead of issuing meaningless warnings, should undertake to oversee the process. We must all die sometime. If enough of us undertake to do so en masse now then future generations (if any) will remember us as heroes (and heroines of course.)
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  34.  @unclescipio3136  I meant aggressor in terms of international law. At the same time more than ten thousand people have been killed by Ukrainian armed forces in Donbass over the past eight years. Seems pretty aggressive to me.
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  35.  @wojteks4712  Russia can now argue in terms of international law that Ukraine is the aggressor in this conflict. The bridge is Russian as are the provinces currently being invaded/liberated by the Ukrainians. They have already killed around ten thousand people there, even before the Russian annexation.
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  36.  @cameron6770  Or maybe not.
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  37.  @parabeiium7075  What's logical about escalating a war when there are diplomatic solutions available? Unless you are an arms dealer or a politician in the pay of oligarchs, of course.
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  38.  @akylrysgal6242  Oh yes.
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  39. You are confusing territorial gains with strategic advantage.
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  40.  @AD-gt6zh  I was actually referring to the battlefield situation, but to answer your questions: Turkey is blocking these bids, but even if they go through it won't matter to Russia, since Russia has no territorial ambitions in this direction. Europe will have to largely fall back on highly expensive, tanker- transported oil and LRPG, thus fuelling inflation and inevitable economic decline. Russia will sell its products to new markets such as China, India and Pacific rim countries. further eroding Western dominance of world economics.
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  41.  @AD-gt6zh  Russia wants Crimea to be recognised as part of Russia - which it historically is - and to continue to benefit from the mineral resources of Donbass, which Russia and Russians have developed. I doubt Russia will ever become a vassal state of China, but a useful partnership is likely. China has considerable manufacturing capacity, but needs gas and oil. Far from weakening Russia, there is every chance the war will strengthen it. It will benefit from new economic ties while America, $31 trillion in debt and likely to default on its debt repayments soon, is heading for a major financial burn-out which will spread to all its allies and ITS vassals. The proxy war in Ukraine can now be seen as just another military failure also.
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  42. Russia has always been ready to negotiate. Sadly, this cannot happen as long as the American puppet, Zelensky, is President.
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  43.  @bearsagainstevil  Small but with high population density, geddit?
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  44. @@craigsteddy8331 I really don't think there's much chance of that. But you never know.
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  45.  @ian7033-qj9wg  No it doesn't. What does exist however is Putin's essay on Russia/ Ukraine relations which explains the situation and its history very clearly It's available on the Internet and is really required reading for anyone with a genuine wish to understand the causes of this needless war.
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  46.  @ukie1242  No. The figures are from a official census carried out by Ukraine in 2003. Some Ukrainians have left Crimea since 2014 and some Russians have arrived.
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  47.  @domtomas1178  No Poles or Germans left.
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  48.  @bonnie7898  I misremembered the date, but as you are doubtless aware Russia has carried out two further censuses since then which show the Russian population increasing by around 17% I think since annexation. You will.doubtless suspect duplicity, but this doesn't seem unreasonable considering the circumstances.
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  49.  @bonnie7898  Most Crimeans welcomed the Russian takeover since most of them are Russians. The 2001 census- organised by Kiev - showed the population to be 60+% Russian. The two censuses taken after annexation claimed it to be 70+% Russian.. Since many Ukrainians had left and more Russians had arrived this seems quite reasonable.
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  50.  @esteemedyams  DP War and Weeb Union mainly.
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