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Stefan Simanowitz Profile picture
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27 Dec, 7 tweets, 6 min read
1/. On New Year’s Eve last year, I sent a post-midnight cartoon to friends with a message saying hold on tight & enjoy the ride & a Rilke quote: “And now we welcome the new year. Full of things that have never been."

Nothing could have prepared us for what lay in store. #COVID19
2/. We’d hardly had a chance to recover from our hangovers before US assassinated General Soleimani, dramatically escalating tensions with #Iran

Until 20 January & Trump's departure, a danger of "Rapture-believing" hawks launching strikes on Iran remains.
3/. At the time of the Iran airstrike - while @BorisJohnson was holidaying on a private Caribbean island with his pregnant girlfriend - another crisis was brewing: #COVID19

@MattHancock says he knew about COVID at the v start of January & informed the PM.
4/. Despite knowing about #COVID19 at the start of the year, the govt did nothing to prepare & later falsely claimed #COVID was “an invisible mugger”, that lockdown was delayed “to stop people getting bored” & that “no one knew about asymptomatic spread”!
5/. Britain was given the greatest gift any country could have wished for in the circumstances: a two-month head start...& yet:

Test & trace - disastrous
Care home protection - 2mths late
PPE shortages
Closing borders - 3mths late
Lockdown - 2 weeks late
Face masks - 4mths late
6/. It made no sense!

How & why had Britain knowingly got itself into this dire situation?

I started digging

The discovery of the PM's #TakeItOnTheChin comments (5/3) led me to the #HerdImmunityScandal which in turn led me to a key SMOKING GUN: the PM's #GreenwichSpeech (3/2)
7/. Over the last 9 months, I traced this story both forwards - to see where it was carrying us - & backwards, in search the source(s).

Along the way I stumbled on dozens of hair-raising ‘front page stories’ but only #TakeItOnTheChin & the #CareHomeScandal made the front pages.

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More from @StefSimanowitz

Stefan Simanowitz Profile picture
25 Dec
1/. “Sometimes I feel like I’m seeing it all at once, & it’s too much. Then I remember to relax, & stop trying to hold onto it & then it flows through me like rain, & I can’t feel anything but gratitude - for every single moment of my stupid, little life.”
2/. This clip👆shows the journey of the Hubble telescope, ending at the Pillars of Creation in the Eagle Nebula - 6,500 light years from earth

The pillars are made of hydrogen & dust. The tallest is one 1000x taller than our solar system

“Peace on Earth & goodwill to all man.” Image
3/. “If you’re going to try, go all the way.
There is no other feeling like that.
You will be alone with the gods, and the nights will flame with fire.
You will ride life straight to perfect laughter.
It’s the only good fight there is.”

(Charles Bukowski, Factotum, 1975) Image
Read 4 tweets
Stefan Simanowitz Profile picture
23 Dec
1). THOSE WE'VE LOST IN 2020

Terry Jones, @montypython, not only filled the world with laughter, but also fought against injustice.

In 2003, ahead of the Iraq war his article exposed not only the illegality but the absurdity of an invasion & in 2005 he almost ran against Blair.
2). Andrew Mlangeni, who died aged 95, was the last surviving member of the Rivonia trial convicted & jailed for 26 years with Mandela

In 2018, aged 88, he came to @fisahara film festival

Six grueling days in a desert refugee camp

I only saw him smile!
3/. Another Rivonia defendant, Denis Goldberg who spent 22 years in prison after being sentenced with Mandela died, also died this year, aged 87

This clip shows him back in the courtroom where he & Rivonia defendants expected to be sentenced to death.
Read 9 tweets
Stefan Simanowitz Profile picture
22 Dec
1/. A few weeks after the #Brexit referendum, I tweeted that it felt as if Britain had cut itself adrift & that we were floating, rudderless, on a raft with a donkey (our leaders), a monkey (our future leaders), a hyena (the scavengers) mayhem) & a vicious tiger (the far right).
2/. Brexit, if felt, had unleashed a dark genie from a bottle & would not go back in...and looking back, perhaps - like Trump in the US - that was the intention

Democracy, which depends on shared truths, was in retreat, & autocracy, which depends on shared lies, was on the march
3/. We’d had enough of experts

Facts were bundled aside by opinion & national pride was whipped into patriotic fervor with rampant slogans about sovereignty & taking back control

Reasoned argument & gentle humour could do nothing against this onslaught.
Read 6 tweets
Stefan Simanowitz Profile picture
22 Dec
The Prime Minister of Britain
In this clip👆, @BorisJohnson tries to laugh it off - a tactic that has worked for him all his life - but then he realises no one is laughing any more

We know he ruffled his hair just before the briefing

We know he doesn’t believe what he says

It’s not funny. It’s sinister.
THREAD 👇
Read 7 tweets
Stefan Simanowitz Profile picture
21 Dec
"The govt assured us that the #COVID datastore would be unwound at the end of the pandemic & the data destroyed. They also said any extension would go out to public tender.

All of that has now turned out to be false"
@maryftz & @cori_crider #PalantirPlan.
opendemocracy.net/en/ournhs/cont…
2/. The #PalantirPlan was first properly revealed after another legal challenges by @openDemocracy & @Foxglovelegal in the UK & @nytimes in the US

They revealed that Palantir ‘won’ contracts at the same time to run #COVID19 data stores for the NHS & HHS
3/. Unfortunately, the detail of how much of the UK’s ‘health data’ is being collated by #Palantir has been redacted from the contract

What possible reason could there be for wanting to keep these hidden?

The answer lies in the #PalantirPlan.
#COVID19 #coronavirus #COVID20 ImageImageImageImage
Read 5 tweets
Stefan Simanowitz Profile picture
21 Dec
1/. Extraordinary!

Sir Patrick Vallance yet again washes his hands entirely of any responsibility

Here, @PippaCrerar asks why the whole country isn't in lockdown

“The Tier decisions are not for me,” he says. Really?!

It’s a system designed to ensure the buck stops with no one
2/. I’m not a body language expert, but @uksciencechief’s habit of adjusting his glasses, looking away & um-Ing & ah-ing whenever he’s asked a penetrating question is getting wearily familiar.

Here is Vallance being questioned by @Jeremy_Hunt in May.
3/. In July, Vallance claimed he couldn't remember which date SAGE called for lockdown!

"The 18th or the 16th, I don't remember” he said

SAGE’s @JeremyFarrar says it was 13th

If these people’s memories are so bad now, imagine what they will be like in 2022 at a Public Inquiry!
Read 7 tweets

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