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→ Ursula von der Leyen’s Pfizer hypocrisy
The European Commission has fined American company International Flavors & Fragrances (IFF) and its French affiliate €15.9 million ($17.05 million) for obstructing an antitrust investigation into an alleged cartel in the fragrance industry. The Commission found that “during the inspection (in March 2023), a senior employee of IFF intentionally deleted WhatsApp messages exchanged with a competitor.” But some are saying it’s not just the corruption that smells, it’s the potential hypocrisy.
President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen has had her own problem with “lost” messages. In February 2023, the New York Times sued von der Leyen “over controversial private text messages exchanged with Albert Bourla, CEO of pharmaceutical giant Pfizer”. Those texts were allegedly the negotiations to secure a €35-billion vaccine deal.
As Thomas Fazi wrote in UnHerd at the time: “The EU’s Values and Transparency Commissioner Věra Jourová later claimed that the text messages may have been deleted, due to their ‘short-lived, ephemeral nature’.” Short-lived, ephemeral WhatsApp messages — why do those ring a bell?
→ Trans activists barricade women’s rights event in Brighton
There was widespread shock yesterday when a women’s rights event was the target of verbal abuse and threats of physical violence in one of the most progressive cities in the country.
Videos from the Let Women Speak event in Brighton show trans activists shouting “No terfs on our turf” and “Go ahead and run, you Nazi scum.” An ominous picture shows activists dressed in black with face masks holding trans rights flags near where the women were gathered. Later, attendees were led by police into a nearby shop for their safety, whereupon activists barricaded them in.
Brighton last experienced terrorism in 1984 when the IRA came to town.
Exactly 40 years on, terrorism is alive & well in the city…
In 2024, these terrorists are covered in a trans flag & have one specific target:
Women.#LetWomenSpeak#LetWomenSpeakBrighton pic.twitter.com/qhok2TQJ58
— John James (@JohnJamesNI) June 23, 2024
According to the writer Julie Burchill, Alan Baker, who calls himself “Sarah Jane”, was in attendance. Baker is “a convicted kidnapper, and attempted murderer, who claims he cut his own testicles off and ate them”. That should make everyone feel safe, then…
→ Anti-Israel demonstrators target LA synagogue
The Israel-Palestine conflict continues to drive local and national politics in the US. This time, fights broke out after anti-Israel protesters blocked the entrance to a synagogue in Los Angeles in an incident widely condemned as antisemitic.
these terrorists told us when and where they were coming. For a week, we pleaded with our elected leaders to speak up. Not one made a public statement condemning these extremists. We pleaded up with our elected leaders to protect us but LAPD told us these elected officials…4/
— Sam Yebri (@samyebri) June 23, 2024
The city’s mayor and the Governor of California, both Democrats, came out against the anti-Israel agitators. But one local man said the Jewish community had been unsuccessfully begging police and elected officials in the heavily blue area for weeks to do something to protect them during the planned demonstrations.
It’s the latest in a long string of incidents pushing Jewish voters away from the Democrats since 7 October, driven primarily by many progressives’ antagonistic view of Israel — though soft-on-crime policies which breed public disorder probably aren’t helping. With peace talks faltering, the issue isn’t going away any time soon.
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SubscribeThe law needs changing; you shouldn’t be allowed to demonstrate while totally covered like that – including Muslims and burqas.
If “No terfs on our turf” and “Go ahead and run, you Nazi scum.” aren’t “hate speech” I really don’t know what is. Not that I believe in such nonsense.
The lack of self-awareness of these protestors is astonishing. I look at that photo and read about their behaviour and I’m thinking it is actually they who are the modern day brownshirts. And they doubtless think themselves brave for intimidating innocent people. Yet they cover their faces, like the cowards they are.
Frankly, aside from any offences these crazies are committing, you do wonder if there isn’t a case for sectioning some of them.
Sadly, you should not be allowed in public with face covered etc.
Some jurisdictions did change the law in response to the KKK’s demonstrations. But blue cities are very subjective when it comes to which laws they enforce, depending on who is violating them.
A lot of foot shooting going on here with the second and third article. Radical trans activists and Palestine protestors engaged in eerily similar thuggish terrorist tactics on both sides of the Atlantic. Whatever their cause, these types of tactics aren’t going to help, and they’ll provoke a backlash that’s much larger from the much larger general public who don’t care for these tactics regardless of the cause. The Palestinian protesters are marginally more likely to be successful since, you know, antisemitism is definitely a real thing that exists.
I don’t know why we even feel the need to comment on the EU’s lack of transparency and total hypocrisy anymore. We should comment on the rare instances where it has acted in a democratic, consistent and transparent manner. These are rare events and therefore worth reporting on.