Bernays, the father of spin, worked diligently all his life, in the field of public persuasion or mass propgaganda.  "Bernays dominated the PR industry until the 1940s, and was a significant force for another 40 years after that. (Tye) During all that time, Bernays took on hundreds of diverse assignments to create a public perception about some idea or product."  His success is beyond his wildest imagination, today all his methods of brainwashing are passed down to all PR organizations.  The level of intense propaganda Americans have absorbed over the many decades, is indeed equal to their living in a state of drug induced permanent virtual reality.  Is there hope for the American mass to ever mature and use their God given minds to reason independently of their guardian media and government?     I dare say NO, NOT AT ALL.  No mass is.   A mass is no less dense than a mass of dead meat.   Not at our late date of this passage in history, will a people raised in affluence or the illusion of it, lift themselves out of the Faustian stupor of their bargain.  They will go the way of Rome, tacitly, compliantly, obediently, like sheep to the slaughter--with their vaccines, of course, and "peace of mind," little understanding that vaccines are useless when the bugs of pestilence mutate constantly.     

By BILL SANDERSON and JEREMY OLSHAN November 2, 2005 --
 
Thousands of New Yorkers yesterday mobbed a city clinic to get free shots ­ many driven there by a fear that bird flu is on its way.

The turnout amazed health officials, who held the mass inoculation in Chelsea as a public service and as a training exercise in the event of a real pandemic.

"I've never had a flu shot before in my life," said Tony Juliano, 52, of Chelsea, who waited in the long line.

"There's a lot of talk about bird flu and the flu in general and it just raised my awareness overall," Juliano added.

Even though health officials said the flu vaccine does NOTHING to prevent the avian flu, many insisted it gave them some peace of mind.

"I know it's a different strain, but I find this shot protects you from a lot of other things, too," said Jessica Thompson, 28, a musician.

Peter Robinson, 45, said, "I always get a shot anyway, but with the bird flu I don't want to take a chance."
 

The massive turnout caught city officials off guard.

"We were worried we wouldn't have enough people," said Dr. Isaac Weisfuse, deputy health commissioner.

"If there is ever a need to vaccinate a very large portion of the city, this will help assess our ability."

Hundreds read the newspaper and chatted on their cellphones as they waited ­ some as long as two hours ­ for their numbers to be called.

Doctors around the city told The Post they've had to explain to their patients that the avian flu is not in the United States ­ and that the flu shot will NOT help   even if it were.

In Washington, President Bush announced the federal response to the avian flu threat.

The president's plan includes $2.8 billion to step up development of technology (here we get Rumsfeld’s coffers filled  jm) to make flu medicines more readily available, $1.5 billion to build up a vaccine stockpile, and another $1 billion to stockpile medications for those who contract the illness.

But maybe the most important part of the president's plan is a $644 million allocation to ensure that government is ready for an outbreak, public health experts said.

Dr. Thomas Frieden, the city's health commissioner, said federal government needed to do more.

Planning will be especially important in New York, a place visited by people from around the world.

"We are one of the very first places in the U.S. that are going to be struck," said Dr. Martin Blaser, president of the Infectious Disease Society of America and chairman of the medicine department at NYU School of Medicine.

If New York is hit, schools, theaters, businesses and other places where people congregate might close, and airplane flights and public transit might be shut down or scaled back.

"One of the things to do to slow down an epidemic is to lower social interactions . People would be staying home a lot more," Blaser said. [ it’s called a quarantine jm]

"There would be a large number of casualties, and we would have to be able to take care of all these sick people," he added. "A lot of these things require planning and money."

Experts said that lost in all the worrying about the avian flu is the real danger of the garden variety flu, which kills more than 2,000 New Yorkers each year.

"Avian flu may never happen," deputy city health commissioner Weisfuse said. "But regular flu is going to happen every year. And people should get their shots."

Flu shots are available from your family doctor, or at free city clinics. Call 311 for more information.

Perry Chiaramonte contributed to this story.
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http://money.cnn.com/2005/10/31/news/newsmakers/fortune_rumsfeld/?cnn=yes


Rumsfeld's growing stake in Tamiflu
Defense Secretary, ex-chairman of flu treatment rights holder, sees portfolio value growing.
October 31, 2005: 10:55 AM EST
By Nelson D. Schwartz, Fortune senior writer

NEW YORK (Fortune) - The prospect of a bird flu outbreak may be panicking people around the globe, but it's proving to be very good news for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other politically connected investors in Gilead Sciences, the California biotech company that owns the rights to Tamiflu, the influenza remedy that's now the most-sought after drug in the world.

Rumsfeld served as Gilead (Research )'s chairman from 1997 until he joined the Bush administration in 2001, and he still holds a Gilead stake valued at between $5 million and $25 million, according to federal financial disclosures filed by Rumsfeld.

The forms don't reveal the exact number of shares Rumsfeld owns, but in the past six months fears of a pandemic and the ensuing scramble for Tamiflu have sent Gilead's stock from $35 to $47. That's made the Pentagon chief, already one of the wealthiest members of the Bush cabinet, at least $1 million richer.

Rumsfeld isn't the only political heavyweight benefiting from demand for Tamiflu, which is manufactured and marketed by Swiss pharma giant Roche. (Gilead receives a royalty from Roche equaling about 10% of sales.) Former Secretary of State George Shultz, who is on Gilead's board, has sold more than $7 million worth of Gilead since the beginning of 2005.

Another board member is the wife of former California Gov. Pete Wilson.

"I don't know of any biotech company that's so politically well-connected," says analyst Andrew McDonald of Think Equity Partners in San Francisco.

What's more, the federal government is emerging as one of the world's biggest customers for Tamiflu. In July, the Pentagon ordered $58 million worth of the treatment for U.S. troops around the world, and Congress is considering a multi-billion dollar purchase. Roche expects 2005 sales for Tamiflu to be about $1 billion, compared with $258 million in 2004.

Rumsfeld recused himself from any decisions involving Gilead when he left Gilead and became Secretary of Defense in early 2001. And late last month, notes a senior Pentagon official, Rumsfeld went even further and had the Pentagon's general counsel issue additional instructions outlining what he could and could not be involved in if there were an avian flu pandemic and the Pentagon had to respond.

As the flu issue heated up early this year, according to the Pentagon official, Rumsfeld considered unloading his entire Gilead stake and sought the advice of the Department of Justice, the SEC and the federal Office of Government Ethics.

Those agencies didn't offer an opinion so Rumsfeld consulted a private securities lawyer, who advised him that it was safer to hold on to the stock and be quite public about his recusal rather than sell and run the risk of being accused of trading on insider information, something Rumsfeld doesn't believe he possesses. So he's keeping his shares for the time being.

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