Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - September 28, 2022


Ep 686 | Yes, COVID Vaccines Affect Breastmilk & Periods


Episode Stats

Length

41 minutes

Words per Minute

163.29977

Word Count

6,704

Sentence Count

403

Misogynist Sentences

12

Hate Speech Sentences

15


Summary

A new study shows that trace amounts of MRNAs from the COVID vaccine are now showing up in breast milk. Also, the Washington Post is finally reporting that the vaccine is affecting women s cycles after we heard for so long that this definitely was not happening. And the Nord Stream pipeline going from Russia to Europe is suffering from unexplained leaks that is affecting the continent. And so we are going to talk to one of our favorite guests about what exactly that means and what the consequences will be.


Transcript

00:00:00.000 A new study shows that trace amounts of mRNAs from the COVID vaccine is now showing up in breast milk.
00:00:10.300 Also, the Washington Post is finally reporting that, yes, the COVID vaccine is affecting women's cycles
00:00:19.740 after we heard for so long that this definitely was not happening.
00:00:24.380 Also, the Nord Stream pipeline going from Russia to European countries is suffering from unexplained leaks that is affecting the continent.
00:00:35.220 And so we are going to talk to one of our favorite guests about what exactly that means and what the consequences will be.
00:00:43.920 We've got all of this and more today.
00:00:45.620 Of course, this episode is brought to you by our friends at Good Ranchers.
00:00:49.760 Go to GoodRanchers.com slash Allie.
00:00:52.160 That's GoodRanchers.com slash Allie.
00:00:54.380 All right.
00:01:04.760 Before we get into the interview that we have for today, I wanted to make sure that I talked about this new revelation,
00:01:12.120 this new study in the scientific community that says that trace amounts of the COVID vaccine,
00:01:19.080 mRNAs, were found in breast milk.
00:01:22.960 And now they are cautioning women who are breastfeeding babies under the age of six months,
00:01:31.340 that if they get the vaccine, they should not breastfeed their babies for two days after that,
00:01:39.000 because that's totally feasible, right?
00:01:40.800 You can just stop breastfeeding your baby for a couple of days.
00:01:44.260 All right.
00:01:45.060 Here's what The Daily Wire has reported.
00:01:46.920 A new study published Monday revealed trace amounts of COVID vaccine mRNAs were found in the breast milk of some lactating women.
00:01:55.740 The Journal of the American Medical Association, an international peer-reviewed general medical journal published since 1993,
00:02:04.120 released the study to the public and has now issued a warning for women breastfeeding infants younger than six months.
00:02:09.300 So just as an aside, don't worry, it's only babies under six months.
00:02:14.980 So apparently something magical happens on the night that your baby goes from five months,
00:02:20.900 30 days to six months that it's totally okay for your six-month-old baby to be taking in these trace amounts of this vaccine through your breast milk.
00:02:32.020 Caution is warranted regarding breastfeeding infants younger than six months in the first two days after maternal COVID-19 vaccination.
00:02:39.980 The Journal said in a tweet, that is just transphobic nonsense.
00:02:44.680 Don't they know it's supposed to be chest feeding?
00:02:46.760 And you can't say maternal.
00:02:48.760 You have to say parental.
00:02:50.960 Officials said that despite believing it is safe to breastfeed after maternal COVID vaccination,
00:02:56.380 they did not test the possible cumulative vaccine mRNA exposure.
00:03:01.100 After frequent breastfeeding in infants.
00:03:04.140 In addition, the potential interference of COVID-19 vaccine mRNA with the immune response to multiple routine vaccines
00:03:12.700 given to infants during the first six months of age needs to be considered.
00:03:17.480 The study reads, it is critical that lactating individuals.
00:03:21.080 There it is.
00:03:22.400 There it is.
00:03:23.080 We got the trans inclusion.
00:03:24.880 It is critical that lactating individuals be included in future vaccination trials
00:03:30.120 to better evaluate the effect of mRNA vaccines on lactation outcomes.
00:03:36.120 The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the FDA, held off on approving vaccinating infants younger than six months
00:03:42.800 until more data on how it could impact their immune system became available.
00:03:47.700 So this study came out on Monday saying, oh, shoot, actually, actually, we've got amounts of the vaccine
00:03:55.360 that are getting through breast milk probably, probably shouldn't get through to babies that are under six months.
00:04:01.660 Now, this is after mothers who have been breastfeeding their babies who are under six months old
00:04:07.680 have been told for many months now that it's perfectly safe.
00:04:12.360 Don't be a conspiracy theorist.
00:04:14.340 Don't be a science denier.
00:04:17.060 Oh, what you want you and your baby to die?
00:04:20.420 You need to get this vaccine.
00:04:22.440 There is no evidence that this is going to harm you or harm your baby in any way.
00:04:27.040 In fact, we were told explicitly that the vaccine could not cause any damage
00:04:34.300 or was not passing through in any detrimental way to babies who are being breastfed.
00:04:41.980 And yet, if you look at the CDC website that is up right now, that was last updated July 14th, 2022.
00:04:48.940 It says this COVID-19 vaccination is recommended for all people six months and older.
00:04:54.580 This includes people who are pregnant, people who are pregnant.
00:04:57.580 I wish there was a shorter word for that.
00:05:00.180 Breastfeeding, trying to get pregnant now or might become pregnant in the future.
00:05:04.780 CDC also recommends COVID-19 vaccines for infants six months and older.
00:05:09.740 Who's mother?
00:05:10.780 Wow, they used the wrong who's.
00:05:13.020 Come on.
00:05:13.820 I guess that shouldn't surprise us.
00:05:15.280 It's W-H-O-S-E when you're talking about possessive, not apostrophe S.
00:05:21.100 And an older whose mother, mother, so inconsistent here.
00:05:26.100 I can't even get through this without talking about like the inconsistency.
00:05:30.260 Whose mother was vaccinated or had a COVID infection before or while pregnant.
00:05:36.580 So if you are pregnant or were recently pregnant, the CDC site says you are more likely to get
00:05:41.760 very sick from COVID-19 compared to people who are not pregnant.
00:05:44.580 Additionally, if you have COVID-19 during pregnancy, you are at increased risk of complications that
00:05:49.360 can affect your pregnancy and developing baby.
00:05:51.720 And so, of course, of course, a lot of people are going to be pressured into this.
00:05:55.320 Of course, a lot of people are going to be shamed and told that you're not a good mother.
00:05:59.960 You're not taking care of yourself.
00:06:01.340 You're not taking care of your baby if you don't get this COVID-19 vaccine while you are
00:06:05.700 pregnant or postpartum.
00:06:06.760 Getting a COVID-19 vaccine, the CDC site says now, can help protect you from getting very
00:06:12.380 sick from COVID-19.
00:06:15.260 There's no stipulation.
00:06:16.460 There's no caveat.
00:06:18.120 There's no point here that says, hey, you know what?
00:06:20.860 We just don't know enough yet to say that this is perfectly safe for breastfeeding moms.
00:06:27.340 We don't have enough evidence quite yet to say that this is going to be healthy for women
00:06:35.180 who are pregnant and they're developing babies.
00:06:37.260 So let's just kind of wait and see.
00:06:39.520 You know, that's all they had to say.
00:06:41.480 I'm not mad that things change based on more data, based on more studying.
00:06:46.720 I mean, human beings are fallible.
00:06:48.460 And of course, people are going to make errors or we're just not going to have enough information
00:06:55.460 to draw certain conclusions at certain points, but maybe a little bit of humility at some
00:07:00.720 point by the scientific and medical community or most people or a lot of people in it, including
00:07:06.580 Anthony Fauci, would have really gone a long way from the CDC, from the NIH to just say,
00:07:14.460 you know what, maybe we shouldn't be threatening to take away people's livelihoods when it comes
00:07:20.440 to this vaccine, especially when it comes to mothers, because we just don't know enough
00:07:26.380 yet to be mandating this and to be shaming people into this.
00:07:30.820 And maybe we shouldn't be encouraging OBGYNs and nurses to pressure these women into getting
00:07:37.800 this vaccine because we just don't quite have the data yet.
00:07:41.080 That's all I'm asking.
00:07:41.840 I'm not asking that scientists and that doctors get everything right the first time.
00:07:46.760 I'm not even asking that of someone with as much responsibility and as much impact on
00:07:52.400 public policy as Anthony Fauci.
00:07:55.020 I'm just asking for a little humility, a little bit of admission in the beginning that we're
00:08:02.840 still looking at this and it is perfectly logical for people, but especially mothers who
00:08:08.900 are pregnant or breastfeeding to say, you know what, I'd like a little bit more information
00:08:12.680 on this before I make my decision.
00:08:16.260 And for doctors and for scientists and for people in the media, for friends to take a
00:08:21.180 step back and say, you know what, that's wise.
00:08:23.680 That's that's prudent.
00:08:24.860 If we look at the statistics surrounding the seriousness of COVID and the lack of data in
00:08:33.500 a lot of ways that we have on the vaccine, especially when it comes to certain populations,
00:08:37.700 that actually makes a lot of logical and rational sense for you, mom, to take a step back and
00:08:43.000 maybe don't do this.
00:08:44.320 But that's not what happened.
00:08:46.320 That's not what happened.
00:08:47.840 People were shamed.
00:08:49.540 People lost their jobs.
00:08:50.720 People quit their jobs so they wouldn't be forced to take this vaccine.
00:08:54.660 I know women who did not want to get the vaccine, but they were postpartum, very vulnerable,
00:09:00.400 emotional state or they were pregnant and they were told by their doctor, if you don't get
00:09:05.960 this, you are likely to die.
00:09:08.060 Your baby is likely to die.
00:09:10.100 But if you do get this postpartum mom still in the hospital being stitched up, then you will
00:09:16.460 pass immunity on to your child.
00:09:18.720 Isn't that what a good mother would do?
00:09:20.440 They didn't want to, but they felt like they were manipulated and they did.
00:09:24.720 And now we're told that maybe it actually is a little bit harmful.
00:09:27.800 And it doesn't say in this particular study that the vaccine is harmful for developing
00:09:33.920 babies in the womb.
00:09:37.100 It doesn't say in particular that it's harmful for pregnant women.
00:09:40.700 But I think we can use like a little bit of deductive reasoning again.
00:09:44.560 There's at least enough information now to take a step back for someone to have just a
00:09:49.440 little bit of freaking humility and say, ooh, maybe we don't know.
00:09:54.620 Maybe we don't know.
00:09:55.800 Maybe we should look at this a little bit harder.
00:09:58.480 Maybe we should wait just a little bit before saying that pregnant women should be taking this.
00:10:03.460 Reuters in July, July of 2021 published this very confidently.
00:10:21.320 No traces of mRNA vaccines end up in mothers' breast milk.
00:10:25.500 A small study suggests the COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna deliver a synthetic version of
00:10:31.580 messenger RNA molecules designed to instruct cells to build replicas of the coronavirus spike protein.
00:10:36.740 While these beneficial antibodies may pass from mothers to infants via breast milk, isn't that great?
00:10:41.500 The milk does not contain the mRNA itself, dummy.
00:10:47.080 Researchers found in their analyses of 13 breast milk samples from seven vaccinated women.
00:10:52.240 Wow, what a huge sample size.
00:10:53.820 Thank you so much.
00:10:55.040 The World Health Organization recommends that breastfeeding mothers be vaccinated against COVID-19
00:11:00.700 and does not advise stopping breastfeeding afterwards.
00:11:04.380 Well, thank you so much to Reuters.
00:11:07.740 Thank you so much, Pfizer.
00:11:09.060 Thank you so much, scientific community, for your confidence.
00:11:13.500 I mean, I was called a science denier.
00:11:16.380 Thankfully, when I was pregnant last time, my youngest was born in April of 2021.
00:11:24.220 And if you'll remember, that was like right at the height of pressure to get the vaccine.
00:11:29.660 Thankfully, my providers did not pressure me to get it.
00:11:33.620 But there was, I mean, there was pressure in the hospital.
00:11:36.280 There was just pressure in general to get the vaccine.
00:11:41.340 And again, like your quality of motherhood in many of these cases is being judged based
00:11:49.020 on whether or not you get the vaccine.
00:11:50.760 And I didn't.
00:11:51.540 I didn't.
00:11:52.160 I didn't want to.
00:11:54.080 I didn't feel comfortable with it.
00:11:56.540 Both when I was pregnant and when I was postpartum, I still am not.
00:12:01.260 I still haven't been vaccinated.
00:12:03.080 I don't know if I've ever said that like completely explicitly, but I'm not.
00:12:07.760 Didn't want to.
00:12:08.740 Got COVID.
00:12:09.400 Whole family got COVID.
00:12:10.780 It sucked.
00:12:11.420 I won't lie.
00:12:12.660 But we got over it and I never felt comfortable with it.
00:12:16.200 I always wanted more information.
00:12:17.760 I always wanted more data, especially though, while I was pregnant and breastfeeding.
00:12:25.040 And so I feel, I mean, I'm sad, but I do feel a little bit vindicated.
00:12:32.460 I do feel like, okay, I'm really glad that I went with that.
00:12:36.820 I'm really glad that I stuck with my choice.
00:12:39.660 And I'll be honest, like there were moments while I was pregnant last time, 2020, 2021,
00:12:44.560 where I thought, you know, maybe I should just get it.
00:12:50.140 Maybe I should.
00:12:51.520 Like, maybe it is the smart thing to do.
00:12:54.040 Like, I don't, if this really is that much more dangerous and deadly for pregnant women,
00:13:00.060 then maybe I should just get it.
00:13:01.860 I personally am glad that I did.
00:13:03.900 Now, I know that there are many of you out there who did.
00:13:06.740 And you and your baby are perfectly fine.
00:13:08.900 And you're glad that you got that.
00:13:10.360 And that is fine.
00:13:11.480 That is fine.
00:13:12.340 I don't, I don't judge you.
00:13:14.320 I'm not mad about that.
00:13:15.880 That is perfectly fine.
00:13:17.600 What I am mad about and what I don't expect to get any apology for, either to me or to
00:13:23.820 all of the other people who, who bore the brunt of this is the gaslighting and the manipulation
00:13:31.400 and the bullying and the pressure to get something that we did not want to get.
00:13:36.060 And we knew at that time that we really didn't need it.
00:13:40.800 Okay.
00:13:41.080 I'm not speaking for everyone.
00:13:42.620 I'm not saying that no one needs it or no one should get it.
00:13:48.040 But again, all I'm asking for is like a little bit of humility that trust the science is a
00:13:55.220 nonsensical phrase.
00:13:57.380 It doesn't, it, it, it defies all logic.
00:14:00.500 It defies actually like what science is.
00:14:03.120 You don't trust the science.
00:14:04.400 You test the science.
00:14:05.600 That is what science is by nature.
00:14:10.060 So when Dr. Fauci says people who deny me or people who question me are actually denying
00:14:17.580 science or questioning science, that is someone who has a God complex.
00:14:21.220 I think that's true of a lot of people at the CDC, a lot of people at the NIH, a lot of people
00:14:26.700 in the media, a lot of people in our medical industrial complex, a lot of people at these
00:14:32.580 pharmaceutical companies.
00:14:33.760 And they just couldn't bear to say, we don't quite know yet.
00:14:38.680 And who knows, honestly, the damage that that might have done.
00:14:43.240 Like, is there, are there going to be reparations to the babies that may have suffered from this,
00:14:47.700 whose moms thought that they were taking good advice from their doctor and, and Dr. Fauci,
00:14:52.720 and maybe now their baby is harmed in some way, probably in ways that we will never fully know.
00:14:57.820 Will there be payback?
00:14:59.200 Will there be some kind of sorry for that?
00:15:02.600 Doesn't sound like it.
00:15:03.680 Doesn't seem like it.
00:15:04.760 Because remember, the people, what's really, it breaks down to people on the left, but it's
00:15:11.440 people who followed the mainstream progressive position at the first, whether it was lockdowns
00:15:18.200 or whether it's, you know, mandating vaccines or whatever it was, like they will never be held
00:15:26.620 accountable for the consequences of their lives.
00:15:29.460 They are always going to be remembered, at least by the mainstream media, for their valiant
00:15:35.720 intentions.
00:15:36.680 It doesn't matter that in Michigan and in New York and in California, that the rate of death
00:15:43.580 was the same as a lot of the red states that never locked down.
00:15:46.420 What really matters is that they locked down.
00:15:49.160 And apparently that was the compassionate position.
00:15:51.960 It's going to be the same thing here.
00:15:54.120 The people who make decisions in our country are never held accountable and never have
00:15:59.180 to endure the consequences of the decisions that they make.
00:16:03.240 No, those consequences rest on people like you and me.
00:16:07.060 There is another aspect of this that I want to talk about briefly.
00:16:12.140 I just saw it this morning.
00:16:13.260 It was published yesterday in The Washington Post.
00:16:15.740 And again, this is another example of COVID gaslighting, especially when it comes to women
00:16:20.380 that a lot of people are going to feel vindicated about.
00:16:23.040 Some people might feel regretful about their choice based on this.
00:16:25.820 This is according to The Washington Post.
00:16:27.960 Women said coronavirus shots affect periods.
00:16:30.660 New studies show they're right.
00:16:32.380 Really?
00:16:33.340 Because I seem to remember listening to a podcast that someone recommended to me by these two
00:16:40.080 doctors and scientists, these lovers of objective truth, that said, that doesn't even make
00:16:46.400 any sense.
00:16:47.160 It doesn't even make any sense that somehow the vaccine would affect a woman's cycle.
00:16:54.780 Because the components of the vaccine do this and are this and a woman's cycle does this
00:17:00.820 and they are not dependent on one another at all.
00:17:03.600 So it's probably just a coincidence.
00:17:05.760 I mean, it's probably just because of the stress that people are in or if you've gotten
00:17:09.660 COVID.
00:17:10.300 COVID and other people, though, did acknowledge, I will say there are people left, right, whatever,
00:17:16.640 who did say, OK, any kind of vaccine, any kind of like shock to the system has the potential
00:17:22.860 of changing your cycle.
00:17:24.860 But they would say it doesn't affect fertility.
00:17:26.920 But again, I would say we don't know.
00:17:29.100 We don't know if it affects fertility.
00:17:31.180 It might not.
00:17:32.860 But really, we don't know.
00:17:34.500 I just think that we would be a whole lot better off if more people and more people in
00:17:38.220 charge that we don't know.
00:17:39.840 And also, just remember this as just a rule of thumb saying there is no evidence for is
00:17:46.900 not the same thing as saying something's not true or something's not real.
00:17:53.220 Just because something doesn't have evidence yet because it hasn't been studied doesn't
00:17:58.180 mean that it's not true or that there won't be data supporting that one day.
00:18:08.220 So let me read you a little bit from this Washington Post, this Washington Post story.
00:18:21.840 Not long after the rollout of the coronavirus vaccine last year, women began posting on
00:18:26.400 social media about what they believed was a side effect, a side effect changes to their
00:18:31.020 periods.
00:18:31.420 Now, I will say that my friend, Gabriel Finocchio, he posted messages of women.
00:18:40.760 I think it was sometime last year or maybe it was the beginning of this year.
00:18:43.580 He posted messages from women who said this, who said, yeah, my cycle changed after getting
00:18:50.000 the vaccine.
00:18:51.020 He was kicked off Instagram.
00:18:52.780 I think he started it back up.
00:18:55.380 He was able to get another account.
00:18:56.560 But he was kicked off Instagram for sharing women's stories about this because that was
00:19:01.000 spreading misinformation.
00:19:03.060 I think I've heard it say heard it said before, and I don't remember who said it, like the
00:19:07.440 difference between the right a right wing conspiracy theory and the truth is six months, something
00:19:16.060 like that.
00:19:16.640 That seems to be true.
00:19:17.520 What starts out is this crazy conspiracy theory that like maybe COVID didn't come from pangolins
00:19:25.520 and like a wet market in China ends up being confirmed.
00:19:30.220 And it seems to be the same thing here.
00:19:32.400 A new study of nearly 20,000 women, women.
00:19:35.980 Wow.
00:19:36.720 Washington Post shows that getting vaccinated against COVID can change the timing of the
00:19:41.780 menstrual cycle.
00:19:42.680 Study was conducted for the National Institutes of Health.
00:19:46.300 Vaccinated women experienced on average about a one day delay in getting their periods
00:19:50.880 compared with those who hadn't been vaccinated.
00:19:53.820 Data was taken from a popular period tracking app called Natural Cycles.
00:19:58.220 Was this consented to?
00:19:59.520 I hope so.
00:20:00.660 This is this included women around the world.
00:20:04.200 Researchers analyzed three menstrual cycles before the vaccine and at least one after and
00:20:08.440 compared with four cycles in the unvaccinated group.
00:20:10.540 People who received two vaccinations within one menstrual cycle experienced greater disruptions.
00:20:15.760 Four day average increase in cycle length.
00:20:18.700 13% experiencing a delay of eight days or more.
00:20:23.040 I mean, that's pretty significant.
00:20:25.020 Allison Edelman, professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Oregon Health and Sciences, who
00:20:29.820 led the study said the effects were mostly temporary, only lasting one cycle before returning to normal.
00:20:37.320 No indications from this study that there was any impact on fertility.
00:20:42.080 Yes, because, again, that's not what this study actually studied.
00:20:45.940 Researchers don't know exactly why the vaccine seemed to affect menstrual cycles.
00:20:51.520 But Edelman said that the immune and reproductive systems are linked.
00:20:55.400 OK, and that inflammation or a strong immune response could trigger menstrual fluctuation.
00:21:00.100 OK, so maybe it's no big deal that I'm totally open to that possibility.
00:21:04.420 Maybe it's no big deal at all.
00:21:05.860 Maybe it is just that it's causing inflammation.
00:21:07.860 That's what the vaccines do.
00:21:09.280 That's what lots of different vaccines do.
00:21:11.320 And as your body is adjusting to that inflammation, just like the just like your body adjusts to
00:21:16.100 inflammation that comes from other causes, your cycle is just temporarily disrupted.
00:21:20.640 Everything goes back to normal and it's all good.
00:21:22.700 That is that could be what it is.
00:21:26.960 And maybe for some people, for some women, it is still worth it to get vaccinated.
00:21:32.920 But knowing what we know again, again, like wouldn't the better position to be all right.
00:21:39.020 Some women don't want a disruption of their cycle because we do not know yet how this could
00:21:45.840 affect other parts of their reproductive system.
00:21:48.240 If it is affecting your cycle, if it is affecting in some ways your reproductive health, isn't
00:21:55.260 it just logical to say that maybe there is a possibility, even if it's a tiny possibility,
00:22:00.480 that it could affect your fertility?
00:22:03.280 Like, isn't that a possibility?
00:22:05.900 Let's just say that it is.
00:22:07.880 And if that possibility is out there, because we know that there is an effect on the menstrual
00:22:13.060 cycle by these vaccines, we should not be pressuring women to get it who don't want to get it.
00:22:19.560 No more doctors pressuring, no more politicians pressuring.
00:22:23.440 Like, you will remember that the president of the United States said that companies with
00:22:28.680 100 employees or more must force their employees to get this vaccine or those companies will face
00:22:39.260 inordinate, unaffordable fines.
00:22:43.060 So that means pregnant employees.
00:22:46.920 That means women in their childbearing years, the president of the United States wanted to
00:22:52.060 make sure that you were forced, if you worked for one of these companies, to get this vaccine
00:22:56.480 that we now know has an effect on breastfeeding, comes through the milk, and we now know has
00:23:02.880 an effect on the cycle.
00:23:03.940 So, again, let's just take a step back, have a little bit of humility, and just say, we don't
00:23:14.820 quite know.
00:23:16.440 We don't quite know.
00:23:19.000 There's also another part of this study.
00:23:21.400 The study also found that breakthrough bleeding, so I'm guessing this is probably defined as like
00:23:26.920 spotting in between periods.
00:23:29.120 Not fun.
00:23:30.660 Breakthrough bleeding was reported by 39% of women on gender-affirming hormones.
00:23:39.300 Wow.
00:23:39.880 I am, my mind is, so on testosterone.
00:23:42.980 So these are actual women trying to be a man, very confused about this language.
00:23:50.080 Our world is crazy.
00:23:51.320 So 39% of those women found that they had breakthrough bleeding.
00:23:56.540 71% of women on long-lasting or reversible contraceptives, so like a birth control pill or something,
00:24:03.120 that actually stopped the period.
00:24:04.440 They had breakthrough bleeding, so they're not supposed to be bleeding.
00:24:07.180 They were bleeding.
00:24:07.620 66% of post-menopausal women, so that's women who were supposed to have stopped having a period
00:24:12.340 after they got the COVID vaccine.
00:24:14.420 They started bleeding again.
00:24:16.220 Not great.
00:24:17.220 Not great.
00:24:18.720 Again, I think science is wonderful.
00:24:21.060 I think modern medicine is wonderful.
00:24:23.040 I am thankful for scientists.
00:24:25.720 I could never be a scientist.
00:24:27.420 I am very thankful for scientists.
00:24:28.920 I'm very thankful for modern medicine.
00:24:30.580 I am very thankful for so many of the developments that technology and science and medicine have
00:24:37.440 brought us over the past century, especially.
00:24:41.980 I mean, it's really incredible how many lives that has saved.
00:24:46.140 But when you replace God with science and say that we must trust the science, we must follow
00:24:53.680 the science, we must do what the scientists say no matter what, or else you're going to be
00:24:58.160 punished by the government, or else you're going to be excluded from society.
00:25:04.180 You're going to be unable to basically provide for yourself or your family or engage in your
00:25:10.380 community at all.
00:25:12.320 That's going to lead to some really, really scary repercussions for people.
00:25:19.240 And it has.
00:25:20.100 And it has.
00:25:21.180 Especially that now we know that there is potentially a lot more harm that is being done
00:25:26.680 by these vaccines than we originally were told.
00:25:30.960 Don't just trust the science just because someone tells you to.
00:25:35.840 Ask critical questions.
00:25:37.400 And those who did are feeling a little bit vindicated right now.
00:25:42.140 And again, if you did get this vaccine, I'm not trying to guilt you.
00:25:45.880 I'm not trying to make you feel bad about that.
00:25:48.440 I'm just saying that, again, we should all, especially those who tried to use this to kind
00:25:56.780 of hammer people over the head, have some humility and ask some questions the next time
00:26:02.820 one of these so-called solutions comes around for a so-called emergency.
00:26:08.380 All right.
00:26:09.020 That's all I've got with that.
00:26:10.680 And now we are going to move into our conversation.
00:26:15.440 But first, let me tell you about our next sponsor.
00:26:29.120 Ross, thank you so much for joining us.
00:26:31.180 I think this is your third time on.
00:26:33.940 You're great at explaining the complexities of everything that is happening.
00:26:38.520 What is the Nord Stream pipeline?
00:26:40.540 Is this different than Nordstrom, the department store?
00:26:43.020 It's a little bit different.
00:26:45.920 One moves natural gas.
00:26:48.200 One sells dresses and silverware.
00:26:50.800 And I don't know.
00:26:51.260 I'll be honest with you.
00:26:52.000 I've probably never been in a Nord Stream in my life.
00:26:53.860 Got it.
00:26:54.400 So your expertise is Nord Stream pipeline.
00:26:57.720 Tell us what's going on.
00:26:58.740 Why are people talking about this?
00:27:01.380 Yeah.
00:27:01.560 So the first Nord Stream opened up a little over 10 years ago.
00:27:04.620 And the idea is that it would, so Gazprom, the Russian energy giant, was a big part of
00:27:11.120 that.
00:27:11.320 It's a major partner in that.
00:27:12.440 And you had a couple of European entities as well.
00:27:14.900 And it essentially connects natural gas flows from Russia into Northern Europe for consumption.
00:27:20.820 And it is a major pipeline.
00:27:23.540 It's quite enormous, actually.
00:27:25.060 And then about six years ago, they wanted to start building Nord Stream 2, which would
00:27:32.040 double the throughput of natural gas from Russia into Europe.
00:27:36.420 And so, of course, a lot of companies that depend on natural gas, it's fertilizer manufacturers,
00:27:40.980 vitamin manufacturers.
00:27:43.540 You know, anything that basically utilizes natural gas as energy feedstock or as a raw material
00:27:48.080 in the production the way nitrogen fertilizer does, would have been really dependent on that.
00:27:53.120 It was the cheapest and most abundant source of energy available.
00:27:56.100 And at a time when Europe was really focused on decarbonization, on getting away from coal
00:28:02.200 or even things like nuclear, which, you know, has a zero carbon footprint, but was still
00:28:06.600 worrisome to a lot of people.
00:28:07.900 Natural gas seemed like a really great transitional fuel.
00:28:10.760 But it also increased European dependence on natural gas.
00:28:13.760 It locked out other European manufacturers of the natural gas market or reduced the market
00:28:18.940 share that they would have been able to tap into.
00:28:20.600 You know, Norway has a mega natural gas company as well that would have been able to make
00:28:25.580 use of it.
00:28:26.700 So, and really, I think what people realized is that it is a tool of political leverage from
00:28:35.060 Putin in Europe.
00:28:36.720 And so that was where kind of the initial concerns about it.
00:28:38.940 But now the concerns are setting aside Putin's ability to influence Europe by controlling natural
00:28:45.760 gas flows.
00:28:47.500 Now that natural gas is gone, the pipeline does appear to be offline completely and permanently
00:28:54.760 so from some reports.
00:28:57.680 And the question now is what's next for Europe?
00:29:00.080 So what happened?
00:29:01.080 Why were people talking about this yesterday?
00:29:03.100 I saw that CNN reported that there were mysterious leaks and that CNBC said that sabotage is suspected
00:29:09.780 after unexplained leaks found on major Russian gas pipelines.
00:29:15.260 There's a lot of speculation on Twitter about who did what and how this happened.
00:29:22.200 So what is going on there?
00:29:24.700 There's a lot of game theory calculations.
00:29:27.400 If you're really looking at the flow of natural gas and what it means to the various stakeholders
00:29:31.560 involved, I can argue both sides of it because I'm of two minds.
00:29:37.100 There is one side that says that entities inside the EU, possibly even inside NATO, that are
00:29:45.000 very worried about and frankly sick of Russian control of European and transatlantic affairs
00:29:51.920 be in control of the natural gas flows into Europe.
00:29:56.380 They just took matters into their own hands and said, we're going to rip the Band-Aid off
00:29:59.740 and this pipeline is going to go and we will figure out what to do next.
00:30:04.200 But we have to break the dependence in a very kinetic way.
00:30:10.160 You've got some people that the Scandinavian countries, Poland, for example, have shown
00:30:14.800 little regard, increasingly so, for what Germany thinks.
00:30:17.960 And Germany, of course, is the one that's most dependent on these natural gas flows.
00:30:22.820 So it's going to be somebody that's probably not aligned with Germany's agenda, or at least
00:30:27.460 has said we're willing to ignore Germany as the largest economy in the EU and take our chances.
00:30:34.200 The other side of it is, and this is the side that a lot of other people have argued against,
00:30:38.340 is there's a compelling case that Russia could have done to themselves, but in such a way
00:30:43.560 that you would increase the infighting and tension and suffocation, if you will, of the
00:30:49.980 European economy by not having access to this natural gas at all, by forcing them to import
00:30:55.700 more supplies to bring in more from Norway, but that they weren't maybe ready to do that.
00:31:02.180 And that makes sense if you consider that for Russia, there is an economic offset on the
00:31:08.860 other side, the ability to push more natural gas, more energy product into China, into the
00:31:16.440 Central Asian nations, to buyers that would benefit from a sudden surplus of supplies that
00:31:23.700 was going to Europe that's now going the other way.
00:31:26.120 We don't know for sure that those buyers would have exist, that China and Russia maybe are
00:31:30.880 polluting, but both scenarios very much are within the realm of possibility here.
00:31:38.220 What we do know for sure is that it's offline and that Europe is kind of casting about wondering
00:31:43.660 what do we do next.
00:31:45.060 So what do you think about Biden in February saying there will no longer be a Nord Stream 2,
00:31:50.480 we will bring an end to it.
00:31:52.940 And then the reporter says, how will you do that exactly since the project and the control
00:31:56.880 of the project is within Germany's control?
00:31:59.240 And he says, I promise you we'll be able to do it.
00:32:03.480 And so some people are like, OK, that's a little ominous.
00:32:07.620 Did the U.S. somehow have a hand in this?
00:32:10.820 I've seen a lot of back and forth about that.
00:32:13.420 So I'm going to do what I always do when it comes to public statements from this particular
00:32:20.440 president and throw the entire salt shaker over my shoulder instead of just a couple
00:32:26.860 grains of salt.
00:32:27.720 You know, it's framing it that way certainly does make it seem like there could have been
00:32:32.800 a nefarious plot afoot.
00:32:34.560 Reports, you know, Der Spiegel, you know, ran an article recently that said, you know, the
00:32:39.960 CIA tried to warn German authorities and Nord Stream officials that there were several
00:32:45.180 weeks ago that there was a risk, imminent risk to the pipeline.
00:32:48.300 If such is the case, then then tipping our hand that way probably means that we were not
00:32:54.340 involved, even if we had some knowledge of it.
00:32:58.460 The benefit to the U.S., though, in that scenario, if the U.S. was in some way complicit with it,
00:33:04.180 is that the U.S. does have an abundance of natural gas.
00:33:06.380 It's easier for us to export it to Europe than to, so to speak, export it to ourselves
00:33:11.280 on liquid natural gas carriers because of the Jones Act.
00:33:14.740 So, yeah, American export of natural gas to Europe has been up and certainly will continue
00:33:19.760 to be because of this.
00:33:22.200 But for Biden saying, you know, we guarantee, my sense is that he was probably referring to
00:33:27.380 the way in which Trump was able to stymie or stop construction of Nord Stream 2, which
00:33:32.780 was a mix of giving and taking of incentives with regard to Germany and to NATO and to the
00:33:39.280 EU to compel them economically to stop construction of the project.
00:33:44.020 When you're talking about an actual attack, right, where you've got, you know, small boats
00:33:50.120 and you've got teams of divers that would be going down there, you've got submarines that
00:33:53.800 have the ability to attack infrastructure, you know, undetected until the attack's already
00:33:58.380 done, when you're talking about that level of state cooperation and support, I doubt
00:34:05.120 if we had any involvement that, you know, Biden, such as he is, would have tipped our hand
00:34:09.560 to it.
00:34:10.660 My sense is, is that he was referring to, you know, severe economic sanctions to stop
00:34:15.320 the project the same way Trump was in.
00:34:18.800 Which is also bad.
00:34:19.460 Which is also very bad.
00:34:20.500 Which is also bad.
00:34:21.940 And I know we don't have to get into all of this.
00:34:23.600 We talked about this recently with another guest about, about the assault on, um, on
00:34:30.040 nuclear energy, um, and also natural gas that it really doesn't make a whole lot of sense
00:34:35.980 even from, uh, uh, a climate change perspective, which again, kind of makes it seem like it is
00:34:43.820 more nefarious than actual, um, you know, any actual attempt to help the environment.
00:34:51.640 And so, I mean, I'm with you in that.
00:34:53.680 I don't know.
00:34:54.340 I have no idea.
00:34:55.360 U.S.
00:34:55.760 Involvement.
00:34:56.300 Of course, I hope that that's not true.
00:34:59.060 But the fact that the Biden administration could even possibly be cheering on any kind
00:35:03.660 of ending to this project is troubling to me.
00:35:05.740 Um, neither the pipeline, neither pipeline was delivering commercial gas at the time of
00:35:20.900 the leaks.
00:35:21.320 Yet both, given both lines were still pressured and each has the capacity to pipe around 165
00:35:26.520 million cubic meters of methane heavy gas per day.
00:35:29.300 Leaks of this size are a severe safety environmental hazard, especially should Russia not stop pumping
00:35:34.120 gas into the system.
00:35:35.520 Depending on the scale of the damage, the leaks could even mean a permanent closure of both
00:35:39.740 lines.
00:35:40.480 What would be the consequences of that for Europe?
00:35:44.360 Well, Europe would have to immediately replace that energy supply to the extent possible.
00:35:49.440 In Germany's case in particular, one very notable example, it's one I've talked publicly
00:35:54.720 about is BASF.
00:35:56.840 Uh, when Russia first invaded Ukraine, uh, the, the next move that came out of Germany
00:36:03.340 was a number of companies that are dependent on Russian natural gas, uh, saying this could
00:36:07.900 impact production of products X, Y, and Z.
00:36:10.780 Uh, in the case of an industry I'm very familiar with, vitamin production was, uh, severely impacted.
00:36:15.660 An immediate warning went out from BASF, uh, about shortages, uh, of materials that were
00:36:20.620 produced, uh, using natural gas as a key input.
00:36:23.980 And so that's been, you know, Germany and Europe's worries all along is, is, is, is
00:36:28.720 does restriction of natural gas, direct flows of Russian natural gas that come directly into
00:36:33.680 Germany?
00:36:34.200 Does it cripple some of their biggest and most companies, Mercedes-Benz as well, right?
00:36:38.140 So if there is a replacement or standby capacity of additional natural gas, whether it's imported
00:36:44.620 from the United States, whether it's the new pipeline that's running from Norway through
00:36:48.500 Denmark into Europe, uh, if they're able to kind of piecemeal things together long enough
00:36:52.760 to solve the energy riddle over the next 18 to 24 months, uh, then the impact to Europe
00:36:57.460 will actually be, uh, I hate to say this, but a net positive in this regard because it
00:37:02.400 fully decouples Europe from a country that has proven it is willing to manipulate energy
00:37:07.620 and human lives, uh, as a means of getting its way from on the global political scale.
00:37:12.580 It will also push Russia and China more closely together, uh, will, will cause, you know, firmly,
00:37:18.380 I guess, bifurcate, if you will, uh, the two global factions into, uh, sort of an anglospheric
00:37:24.360 European West, uh, and then the countries that are part of that.
00:37:28.220 And then, you know, what, uh, you know, Valina Chakarrova, who is a fantastic, uh, academic,
00:37:33.360 uh, and strategist in Europe, what she calls the dragon bear sphere of influence.
00:37:37.620 Which is a China, Russia led sphere of influence that others will define themselves by, and
00:37:42.460 particularly in Asia and Africa, uh, that I think is the most likely outcome of this as
00:37:47.200 we will probably see a unraveling of the current transatlantic order, uh, shuffling around where
00:37:54.380 the Baltic States and Poland, Scandinavian States, I think move more to the forefront.
00:37:59.420 You'll see Germany and France probably minimized a bit, uh, as a result of this.
00:38:03.560 And you will see, uh, Russia and China and those countries, uh, move more firmly in alignment
00:38:09.820 from a political and from a commodity and economics.
00:38:13.340 Yeah, I see what you're saying.
00:38:15.040 And that's something that Trump said a couple of years ago when he was kind of laughed at
00:38:18.960 when he said, look, it's not good that Germany is relying on a country like Russia, uh, for
00:38:24.740 their energy.
00:38:25.420 And everyone laughed at him in the room and said, that's ridiculous, but that's exactly
00:38:28.500 what's happened.
00:38:29.060 And that has partly caused this problem here.
00:38:31.980 So you're saying in the long run, by decoupling those two countries, that could be a good thing
00:38:37.900 for Germany because they never should have been relying on Russia in the first place.
00:38:41.960 And that bifurcation can actually be good, but there's going to be some suffering like
00:38:45.980 in the short term, right?
00:38:47.580 As they transition into other sources of energy, it just doesn't look like there's an easy way
00:38:52.180 to do that.
00:38:52.880 Well, humans are creatures of incentive, right?
00:38:56.180 And we respond to pain.
00:38:57.680 We respond to pleasure.
00:38:58.620 We respond to good things and bad things, but always in somewhat predictable ways.
00:39:03.760 And in this particular case, uh, you know, I think the report came out last night here
00:39:07.080 in the U S that Germany had come out this morning, their time and, and said, well, the
00:39:11.400 plain sunset of certain nuclear capacity, we're not going to, uh, proceed with that.
00:39:15.680 We're going to continue to use, uh, that nuclear capacity for, for an additional time.
00:39:20.620 Um, it really, the, the, the best thing about this, my view is that it is forcing maybe for
00:39:27.320 the first time for a lot of people, a real reckoning of what is the cost of ESG?
00:39:32.340 What is the cost of clean energy?
00:39:34.760 What are the trade-offs and the incentives or disincentives associated with it?
00:39:38.580 Because to this point, we've been able to kind of chug along in this fairy tale and, and
00:39:43.320 particularly in the European side to say that, yeah, we can transition to perfectly clean
00:39:46.880 energy and renewables, solar and wind and all these things.
00:39:51.560 And now they're, but, but they were able to do these things and to kind of lie about that
00:39:56.100 and the benefits of these things, because they always had enormous quantities of natural
00:40:00.400 gas and, and nuclear to, uh, to kind of hold up everything while they, while the transition
00:40:06.900 was slowly ongoing to better renewables.
00:40:08.860 The reckoning is here now, uh, if those pipelines are permanently off, Europe now has to face
00:40:14.880 a very stark, very realistic choice of, is it going to continue to pursue this, this ESG
00:40:20.200 agenda, this, this all clean, everything agenda, or is it going to have to kneel to reality a
00:40:24.740 little bit and admit that natural gas and nuclear must be a part of that transition for the indefinite
00:40:31.160 future?
00:40:31.540 Yeah.
00:40:32.440 And that's really going to make or break it.
00:40:34.200 Obviously the United States faces the same decision, um, in a, in a different way, but
00:40:40.780 with the same kind of consequences.
00:40:42.600 Well, thank you so much for especially bringing it to that last point, because man, that part,
00:40:48.060 the ESG, the denial of reality, uh, of reality when it comes to clean energy is connected to
00:40:53.940 so many other things in our political and cultural sphere.
00:40:57.700 So thank you so much for breaking that all down for us.
00:41:00.420 I really appreciate it.
00:41:02.120 Thank you.
00:41:02.700 Thank you.