Above, just one of the many billboards placed around San Diego in an effort to reach the vaccine-hesitant African-American community. Below, one of several followup billboards designed to reach a...different vaccine-hesitant demographic. “We’re not telling them anything they don’t already believe,” says Spiracy.

Needle sticks

This letter is in response to Michael Quirk’s letter (“Paralyzing notion”, Letters, September 1). First of all, have you ever seen a viral video or product so popular that customers are breaking down the doors to get it? You don’t have to PUSH this beneficial product. Which brings me to: Why are they pushing the vaccine so hard. Apparently Mr. Quirk has fallen for all the propaganda that is being spewed out.

Second, Mr. Quirk, have you read: Jabbed: How the vaccine industry, medical establishment and government stick it to you by Brett Wilcox? There are always problems with vaccines of any sort. But you won’t read it, will you? It’s obvious that you don’t do any reading at all. I am 63, a diabetic with a heart condition. I also have issues with blood clots and impaired circulation. Moderna and Pfizer have been shown to cause heart disease and Johnson and Johnson causes blood clots.

Simple arithmetic Mr Quirk. If 3 million people take the vaccine and it causes heart disease and blood clots in 1% of them, how many people now have serious health conditions from a shot that was supposed to help them? I was referred to a Dr. Jannette Grey’s office downtown: The Center for Health and Well being. A Dr. John Humiston, a medical doctor told me to take Colloidal Silver, 500 ppm with Vitamin C. I have not been sick one day for ten years. I have not taken a flu shot. I have not had the flu or any bacterial infection. It’s truly been a miracle. Why don’t you tell me just why I should take the Covid Vaccine? Will you check out what I’ve said? I dare you.

• Carol Lencine Thomas
• San Diego

Covid, continued

This is Michael Quirk, who had a letter published on September 1 in reply to Carol Lencine Thomas’s rant about the Covid vaccine (“Paralyzing notion”, Letters, September 1). In the letter you published by her last week she calls me out by name saying I “don’t read”, and that I have “fallen for the propaganda.”

An interesting assumption from someone whom I have never met and do not know nor frankly would I want to meet. Once they drink the Kool Aid it is simply useless to argue with these people. They just rant on, citing this and that imaginary statistic, with zero proof Ranting on about “1% getting blood clots and heart disease,” and people having “ serious health problems” from the vaccine.

Well Ms. Thomas, I do indeed read. I read articles from reputable sources that have proof, not right wing conspiracy believing have no proof fringe publications. The only assumptions I make about Ms Thomas is that she is certainly not going to do anything to stop the pandemic. Then again, if she does get Covid she will just join the over 80% of anti-vaxxers whom comprise admissions in overburdened hospitals. Funny, they want nothing to do with sound medical advice but run right to the hospital when they’re sick!

• Michael Quirk
• San Carlos

Big pharma’s nemesis

Do you know what the term Consensus Reality means? In a nutshell, it means what the unthinking masses believe in blindly but either has no proof or is blatantly false. For example: “I, the Lord, hate homosexuals,” or “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.” I am not saying that the Covid pandemic is false. I am just saying that telling us that the vaccine is the only solution is false.

Moderna and Pfizer cause heart disease and Johnson and Johnson cause blood clots. There is no evidence that the shots work. People who have been vaccinated can be carriers and even get sick. Now they are talking about a 3rd booster. The big Pharmaceutical companies are spending billions on propaganda for the Covid vaccine. One can only assume that someone’s lining his pockets big on profits from it. But this is the modus operandi of the pharmaceutical companies straight across the board. None of their drugs cure anything. They just alleviate symptoms temporarily. But since they don’t address the underlying causes of the disease, they disease inevitably worsens over time until you die. They lie to you with false statistics and smiling faces on TV commercials. It’s been know for decades that there are problems with vaccines. A case in point is the debate over whether childhood vaccines cause autism. I am not a doctor and I have no proof but it is my belief that is is the mercury base the vaccine is placed in that causes the problem.

No, I am not saying that we shouldn’t vaccinate children. We need to do extensive research on how to make better vaccines. Did you know that doctors are required to take drama classes in medical school? So, a bearded, white man who is dressed to look like God, the Father calls a press conference to announce it’s totally untrue that vaccines cause autism in children. This stigmatises the parents of autistic children as lunatics when they true to get more research done. They are doing the same thing with the Covid vaccine. Adequate testing has not been done. A 2- and a 5-year follow up has not been done. I have always been interested in alternative medicine and read as much about it as time would permit. But I am not a doctor. So about 10 years ago, I decided to look for a medical office that also practiced alternative medicine. I found Dr. Jannette Grey’s office: The Center for Health and Wellbeing. There I began seeing Dr. John Humiston. He is no longer there. He is practicing in Indiana. I had been searching for something natural to boost my immunity. I experimented with several herbal preparations but to no avail.

Dr. Humiston introduced me to Natural Path Silver Wings Colloidal Silver 500 ppm. Colloidal Silver is a trace mineral, not a drug. It’s a very strong antiviral and antibacterial. It is present in organic produce and products but largely absent in conventionally produced food. Probably the people who either don’t get Covid or get a very mild case eat organic. Dr. Humiston told me to take, at the earliest sign of symptoms, 1 eyedropper full in a glass of water with 1.000 mg of vitamin C 4X a day. For me, my symptoms have subsided by the end of the first evening. Before the Colloidal Silver, I would have the flu for 21 days and a cold for 10. There are no side effects. If you want to take a small amount daily as a preventative, you should check with your doctor. In the 10 years I have been takin it I have not been sick. I even stopped taking the flu shots.. Why should I take the Covid vaccine? Why should anyone? When I first wrote about this in a letter to the editor (“Vaccine-hesitant comes forward,” Letters, August 25), a Mr. Michael Quirk, responded making fun of me. Wouldn’t any intelligent person ask for more information about this and then try it? It’s not expensive. On rereading his letter, I realized that Mr. Quirk was so slow thinking he did not understand what I was saying. You, dear readers, are intelligent people. I would encourage you to look into this. There are three levels of sub normal intelligence. 1) You are slow thinking, know it and ask for help. 2) You are slow thinking, don’t even realize it and go through life making one serious error after another. And 3) You are so slow thinking you think you know everything and become arrogant, like Mr. Quirk. Gently reader, don’t pull a Michael Quirk.

• Carol Lencine Thomas
• San Diego

Best of the breathers

I am dismayed to see that the Let Them Breathe organization has been allowed an entry in this year’s Best Of Poll in the Local Activist or Group category. These people should not be allowed to occupy space next to the venerable Surfrider Foundation or the burgeoning Encinitas 4 Equality.

Every other group nominated is striving to create impactful, enduring change in our communities, whereas the Let Them Breathe provocateurs seek only to disseminate misinformation. They descend upon School Board and County Board of Supervisors meetings en masse, unmasked, unvaxxed, and hurling personal attacks. A bunch of White women radicalized in essential oil Facebook groups, ranting about masks in schools being civil rights and Geneva Convention violations should spend a day with the (fellow nominee) Ride For Breonna Taylor group if they want to know what injustice and oppression truly look like.

• Christy Chavis
• Poway

Underwater Navy

The three quarters of a billion dollar Bohomme Richard burned beyond repair, in San Diego Bay in 2020, and we never got much of a report, other than the ship would have to be replaced, by a much more expensive vessel----at taxpayer expense (“USS Bonhomme Richard to be repurposed as dive-in museum of recent Naval history”, SD on the QT: Almost Factual News, December 11, 2020). It seems to have been nothing more than a ho-hum moment for the Navy from what they have told us. Their security failed them and us, to the tune of all those millions of dollars.

Another more recent, botched thing, was the helicopter crash and drowning of 5 Navy personnel, training off of San Clemente Island. When the news first broke, it sounded like the helicopter had crashed far out at sea. In fact it crashed, while landing on the deck of the Abraham Lincoln. When the helicopter crashed, there was one lucky survivor, who got away from the helicopter when it hit the water.

I am just speculating, but the helicopter, likely dropped below that water surface, almost immediately, and took the crew onboard, with it. I also think the whole incident was observed by those aboard the Abraham Lincoln and all the “search and rescue” reported to the news, was to stall and placate the news media and make it appear that a serious rescue effort was made. Some of the crew on the Abraham Lincoln, likely knew the copter crew was lost almost immediately.

If they knew that the chopper crew had gone down with the chopper, they should have said so within hours of the accident, and those who lost relatives, could have been spared long hours of false hope. It sounds like the Navy faked the need for dispatching rescue efforts. The Navy now needs to fess up to this, and better yet, to figure out how to make such aircraft buoyant, if they drop into the water. You can do it! You’re the United States Navy! On a general note about the military, I take a dim view of anything that sounds like “a drum beat” to war by any sitting President.

I had that attitude during the Viet Nam War, and I had it when George W. Bush announced the first attack on Afghanistan, and later, the attack on Iraq. Each time I thought that we hadn’t exhausted all avenues to reach the goal we wanted. 50 thousand American GI lives lost to the Viet Nam conflict. 300 million US taxpayer dollars, spent for each and every day of the 20 year Afghan and Iraqi wars. The wars sure made some contractors and suppliers very rich in the process. Number One and Number Two on my most despicable contractors list are: Haliburton and Blackwater (now Academi).

• Gerald Lance Johannsen
• Carlsbad