I didn't even know that Manning was released from the federal supermax. When did that happen?
Edit:
> The decision, made in the last days of Obama's presidency, means that Manning can be freed May 17 [2017], seven years into a prison term that has been marked by two suicide attempts and a hunger strike aimed at obtaining sex reassignment surgery.
Looks like it was 2017. I had no idea. Is Canada going to take her?
I don't think many Americans have much sympathy for Chelsea Manning. Only a very tiny bit of the trove of data that she dumped was really "whistle blower" material. Most of it was actually strategic military data during an on-going conflict. She was not in any way careful about what she was dumping. At least Snowden was careful to only release certain things.
And also the part where she tried to starve herself to force USA taxpayers to pay for her gender transfer surgery while she was serving a 35 year prison sentence for betraying them...
Chelsea Manning never betrayed me. And if we stick somebody in a cage and take away their ability to fend for themselves, we have to take responsibility for their health care.
It has never been demonstrated scientifically that gender modification surgeries are medically necessary, or beneficial in the long term. I wonder if proponents of considering it a medical necessity feel the same way about breast augmentation?
They aren't covered by most insurance programs, either in the US nor in most other countries.
Denying it is not the same as denying someone antibiotics when they have an infection.
It wasn't a Supermax prison, fwiw. A couple of different military prisons, but not Supermax. Though it did start with almost a year of solitary confinement.
Idk how isolated you were march-april-may 2020, but I was seeing a few friends and had ample access to zoom hangs and it still had a pretty big impact on my mental health. A year of solitary? Nobody deserves that. It’s torture.
Sorry, I see now that what I intended as a generalized “you” really made that seem like I was attacking you. Apologies! I just wanted to highlight to anyone reading how awful solitary is as a practice by relating it to a recent shared experience.
My wife has a misdemeanor from when she was young and can’t enter Canada for the same reason.
As a Brit, I think it’s pretty petty as she was fine to move to the UK and work there. We now live in the US where she works for a large employer and has passed numerous background checks.
Sometimes I think Canada is more interested in portraying itself as a progressive beacon to the world than actually being one.
Wow, that's a pretty lazy and misleading description of the situation.
He was stripped of citizenship and it was instated 3 times by the Canadian court system. Why? "2013 Supreme Court ruling that guilt by association is not sufficient grounds to be considered a war criminal."
What you called "sheltering nazi war criminals" I would call due process. You know, not actually punishing people unless they've been fairly judged as guilty according to the law.
I don't know much about this topic, but: Please do not use that guy as an example in your earlier post if he is not a good example. It made it sound to me as if your goal is to convince, not to lead others to truth. Instead, just point to your strongest point (the memorials, I believe).
Regarding the memorials, I could not find this in the link. Could you point me at it?
The article you link does not mention any memorials in Canada for this person - nor did they ever even live in Canada. He was shot by the Soviet security agents in 1950 in Ukraine while fighting for Ukrainian independence. ...and then his entire family was imprisoned to set an example to others.
There is also no evidence that this person committed any war crime at all. The notes in the link document that his military division committed war crimes.
Guilt by association? Collective punishment? Really?
He joined the nazi forces, infamous Schutzstaffel (SS) during WW2. He participated in killing tens of thousands of Jews (and Russians, but that doesn't count in the western world anymore).
He isn't guilty by association - he was a leader of death squadron and he is directly responsible for extermination of tens of thousands of non combatants.
Wikipedia is not 100% reliable and universal source of truth. Besides, he was a leader of the SS battalion and he got Iron Cross for his war crimes from nazies. Does such a person deserve a monument in Canada?
This is why the US makes you sign forms promising you are and were not a Nazi in Germany during the 30s/40s and were never affiliated with various terrorist groups as as part of the customs paperwork. It's unclear what US laws could apply to all those members, but lying on that form is a clear and serious felony.
When I went through my US naturalization process, I was surprised to note that while they still ask whether you were a Communist or a member of a terrorist organization, they no longer explicitly ask if you were ever a Nazi. Then again, this was under Trump.
I mean, the question was specific to the German WWII Nazi party. The youngest person who could check yes is probably 80 if they were a 6 year old in their first year of school right before Germany surrendered, and 90 if they could make an adult decision.
Seems slightly early for it to go away, but the question did have a finite lifetime.
This bullshit again... He was illegally detained without due process, tortured and confessed to killing an enemy soldier (murder implies civilian circumstances, it was a fight with US soldiers where he was injured and fought back). He recants his confession, and even if it's true, not getting tortured is a human right. (Not getting your country invaded also, but that's a whole different matter). And he was 15 at the time. A kid getting tortured for fighting in a war that was brought to him ( he was taken to Afghanistan by his father, and the US army came to fight them)? What the fuck are you on to consider that appropriate?
We can play on words, that won't bring back his victims.
> Not getting your country invaded also, but that's a whole different matter
He was rather quick to claim Canada was "his" country despite having brutally murdered an allied soldier. Also, he was fighting "his" country pretty hard until it became convenient not to.
> We can play on words, that won't bring back his victims
I really disagree with calling a soldier on a mission, an agressive overseas mission, getting killed in action "a victim". A casualty, yes. If anyone's a victim, it's the innocent civilians getting blown up by both sides in a conflict they didn't ask for, not the combattants on either side.
> He was rather quick to claim Canada was "his" country despite having brutally murdered an allied soldier. Also, he was fighting "his" country pretty hard until it became convenient not to.
He says he did so to be extradited there so that he actually has some human rights and dignity restored, because, remember, he was tortured for actions he did when he was 15. He's still technically a war criminal if he did indeed kill the US soldier (not being a regular soldier in uniform), but the US had no jurisdiction over him, illegally detained and tortured him for an alleged crime he committed while being a minor.
Anyone involved with this on the US side should rot for life in The Hague ( of course that would never happen).
That was a sad read. I have always respected Glenn because he fights for the truth. She should not have said something so exaggerated and vague just because he associates with people she dislikes, especially since he hasn't spoken to her in many years while her statement sounds like he is a monster that has been attacking her. Very manipulative. Politics has melted the brains of so many.
"Federal officials are preparing to argue that Ms. Manning’s past crimes render her too dangerous to be allowed entry into the country. The government’s position is that she should be blocked on grounds of serious criminality."
Whistleblowing war crimes and embarrassing the US on the world stage = "serious criminality"
> The government’s position is that she should be blocked on grounds of serious criminality. Thousands of people are turned away at the Canadian border for similar reasons each year.
Like it aims to block all the other convicted criminals who apply for entry.
Her sentence was commuted and the conviction was more than 10 years ago, so it's possible to apply for rehabilitation. Immigration is seeking to preemptively block this.
Canada doesn't recognize pardons and expungements from other countries. You must wait 5 years to apply for forgiveness after your sentence has ended (which would've been in Jan 2017).
One thing I do know, is that the data sharing arrangement between the US and Canada, shares criminal records.
For both countries, pardons, commuted sentences, do not hide the transfer of information, and are meaningless. This is because each country only cares about the crime, and its own assessment of "should this person, with crime x, be allowed in".
Outside of that, a presidential commuted sentence, by its very nature, is political, not court based.
Lastly, each country puts the safety of its citizens, above the rights of foreigners to visit.
I wanted to reply with these points, before reading the article, as generic, non-case specific logic is important here.
True, but I'm at a loss to see how the safety interests of Canadians are threatened by Chelsea Manning. It's not like she's violent or carried out a crime against members of the public. The crime, being against the state, was as much political as the commutation.
I’d think that it’s not about her safety. It’s about a policy of saying “we don’t allow people with felony convictions in”. Which seems sensible to me.
There’s not an immigration service in the world who wants to choose which felonies should be enforced on a case by case basis and generally not a populace who believes that fame should get you a golden ticket.
Would I personally let her in? Sure! If I ran an immigration department? Nope.
Canada wasn't threatened by either of the friends of mine who weren't allowed into the country because of previous criminal convictions. The article isn't wrong when it points out that this occurs routinely. Why is it only wrong when it impacts someone with a cheering section? People will say "it isn't only wrong then!", but they're only angry... situationally.
It may be that I'm just using your comment as a convenient coat rack for my own frustration with the framing here. Canada is doing something that it has done consistently for decades without any comment from this community (or really many other communites). But then they do it to Chelsea Manning, and now we're discussing a headline "Canada aims to block Chelsea Manning".
Actually, Chelsea Manning has better odds of being let into Canada than a lot of "boring" people with felony convictions. And that's kind of a problem.
I read HN first page almost daily, for international news I read BBC, I am from Romania, Eastern Europe sand I had no idea that this happened to your friends or for other people.
Canada does not popup that much in the international news. Maybe I missed a similar article on HN were the majority had the exact oposite reaction like in this one?
You don't know, though! I mean, not everybody gets angry that easy, but many are aware that you don't have to commit a crime or do something wrong to be barred from crossing an international border.
I remember an article by a woman who was turned back from Canada because she had antidepressant medication with her.
I spent a couple years working for a company in Calgary, with a staff mostly from the US, and this was a recurring concern. It's not a thing that just started for Chelsea Manning.
No doubt! Absolutely true! We were ultimately acquired by an American company, and American immigration rules caused problems for the Canadians. My point isn't that Canada is distinctively bad; it's that this story has nothing the hell to do with Chelsea Manning.
>this story has nothing the hell to do with Chelsea Manning
I mean, no need to debate it, who knows, but I think you're exaggerating your certainty. It's possible that this has an additional political dimension, even though similar things can happen without it.
I don't think I'm exaggerating at all. Canada routinely bars entry to convicted felons from the US. Manning is famously a felon. This is what irritates me about this story; the people making the most noise about it don't care at all about the ordinary ex-convicts that Canada bars, just this celebrity.
This is a weird special pleading argument. Chelsea Manning is literally a celebrity, and that is entirely because of actions she undertook that resulted in a 35-year prison sentence. It's not a value judgement about the sentence (I'm glad Obama commuted it). It's a simple statement of fact.
How can you say I didn't justify a distinction when you compared her to "ordinary" ex-convicts, which sounds like non-celebrities?
The issue is not double standards, the issue is disagreement on what attributes are salient.
Just pretend the first two sentences of my previous comment aren't there. I don't care if you agree. The rest of it stands by itself. It's abstract and not related to these events.
Your original complaint was just "why do people only care about who they care about?" I wanted to communicate how tautological I found it.
Indeed. People are talking themselves in knots about how “unprogressive” it is that Manning is denied entry. Canada and the US recognize each other’s judicial systems, and Manning was convicted of a serious crime that has not been expunged. There is a process by which people can seek a special entry and Manning has used that while this appeal was underway. It seems like she’s trying to have CBSA declare her conviction unjust, which I feel is unjust itself. That’s not the purpose of the border service.
How would people feel if someone convicted of insider trading, an arguably much more “victimless” crime than espionage, tried the same thing? I suspect the same people who argue for Manning to be admitted would argue against the hypothetical inside trader. The only just approach is to apply the standard fairly to all people.
>The only just approach is to apply the standard fairly to all people
Surely everybody agrees with that, for everything, except that it communicates absolutely nothing about what is fair and uniform.
I have no idea whether someone convicted of insider trading would be barred, or whether they should be, or whether the average person would want them to be.
It always strikes me as weird when someone gives an example of something that they assume everybody agrees on, and it is something that surely 99.99% of the world has never thought of even once.
Friend of mine was denied entry for six months because she was born in Iran. Her family fled to Britain when she was 2. At the time she'd been living and working in the US for 10 years.
Which is not actually a right. Americans have no more a right to travel to Canada than Canadians have a right to come to the US. I venture that more canadians are probably denied entry to the US than Americans are denied by Canada.
It very much depends on who you ask. Some libertarians will say that it hasn't been that long the modern system has been in place. I think since roughly WWI?
The lack of a "right" to enter a country could be compared with the modern lack of a right for pedestrians to walk in middle of most streets. Now and then some people get quite bitter about that.
I have no idea, after reading. I wish I knew if the delays were standard (eg, backlog), and so on.
I also wish I knew how others in this situation fare. As a Canuck, I want no special treatment for anyone, pro or against, but just the job done correctly, and that means fair, compared to how others are treated / the law.
Is her lawyer using the media / spinning things, to try to help the case? Maybe.
1. On 2017-09-22, Ms. Manning attempted to enter Canada but was denied by the border guards. [0]
2. On or about On 2017-09-25, Ms. Manning received a letter from the Canadian government detailing why she was previously denied entry.
3. Ms. Manning and her lawyers files an appeal to the Canadian Immigration and Refugee Board. A tribunal hearing is scheduled for 2021-10-07. Let's call this hearing "Hearing A".
4. While Hearing A was still pending, the Canadian government allowed Ms. Manning entry for a few days into Canada in 2018.
5. Both sides (the Canadian border official side and Ms. Manning's side) are able to argue their case before Hearing A. The title of this news story refers to the fact that the border official side plans to put forth an argument in Hearing A.
The fact that she was allowed despite rather well known criminal charges and jail time points to rather high likelyhood of her appeal being successful. I think that is highly unusual.
This is probably just a campaign to generate some favourable publicity.
As someone who is neither in Canada, nor a Canadian citizen, would she even have jurisdiction to appeal to a Canadian court?
Can anyone in the world file a case with the Canadian Supreme court and be heard? They would need to have some sort of legal standing to appear before the court.
Did she even break any Canadian laws? Or is it equivalent to blocking Navalny from entry on the grounds that he was convicted and imprisoned (on phony charges).
> any Canadian who admits to smoking pot (now legal in Canada)
Also completely legal, for recreational use, in 6 of the 10 US states that border Canada, and legal for medicinal use in 9 of the 10 states, Idaho being the only hold-out.
People seem to forget that at a federal level, marijuana is still a Schedule I drug and is illegal to possess; if the feds decided suddenly to remember that, all hell could break loose at any moment. The guys guarding the border don't get their paychecks from Madison or St. Paul or Olympia or Albany, they get them from Washington, DC.
That doesn't quite justify it. Even Schedule I drugs are still legal to possess with a proper prescription from a doctor. There's prescription methamphetamine (Desoxyn), for example.
As such, would the US object if I took THC under prescription in an in-patient medical context in another country, and then attempted to enter?
And if they wouldn't object, then why would they suddenly object if I didn't get prescribed the THC, but rather purchased it over the counter, under advisement of a doctor? (After all, this is how most legal, OTC medications work. Doctors in outpatient settings don't prescribe you e.g. aspirin; they just tell you to "take two aspirin and call me if it doesn't feel better." They assume you can get your own aspirin without their help.)
That's not correct under current federal law. Doctors can't write prescriptions for Schedule I drugs. They can only legally be used with special permission for research.
Alright, so does that mean that if you’re a foreign citizen; and while you’re in the US, you volunteer to be a test subject for a pharmacological research program; and they give you a Schedule I drug as part of that research; then you can be deported for taking it?
No that wouldn't be grounds for a criminal conviction and thus wouldn't trigger deportation proceedings. Note that for clinical trials of controlled substances the researchers generally directly administer the drug in a secure facility. So legally the test subjects are never technically in possession of a controlled substance.
> Even Schedule I drugs are still legal to possess with a proper prescription from a doctor. There's prescription methamphetamine (Desoxyn), for example.
No they're not. Desoxyn is only legal with a prescription because methamphetamine is a schedule II drug, not a schedule I drug.
Nah, they just take regular dextroampehetamine - methamphetamine is particularly neurotoxic.
There probably is some shadowy special-forces division that gets the cool stuff but I gather that even amongst the USAF's endurance fighter squadrons you won't see much stimulant use: it's too much of a liability, and the services really don't want human-liabilities piloting hundred-million-dollar supersonic death-machines.
Fun-fact: the Nazis used meth, then known as "Pervatin" - but then they also mixed it with cocaine and oxycodone and called it "D-IX" - sounds like quite the party: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D-IX
As the kids say, "Dude, this is America." Why would merely having a prescription and a reasonable excuse help you with the border patrol? Maybe you'd get a sympathetic guy that day and maybe you wouldn't.
Because I'm pretty sure you can bring pretty much any prescribed drug in its labelled dispensed container — even the Desoxyn! — with you over the border into the US. So it'd be weird if THC was an exception to that; and doubly weird if just having ever been prescribed THC was worse for you than literally carrying a pill bottle full of meth in your bag.
>you can bring pretty much any prescribed drug in its labelled dispensed container — even the Desoxyn! — with you over the border into the US.
>So it'd be weird if THC was an exception to that
As others in the thread have already mentioned, Desoxyn is schedule 2, while Cannabis is federally schedule 1 (with lower schedule number being more restricted).
So no, THC isn't an exception, it is a part of the same rule system. The one in which schedule 2 drugs have more legal privileges than schedule 1 drugs.
Last I checked both meth and heroin were schedule II - which sort of has always been one of the craziest things about US drug policy. It’s almost entirely a political control thing
I know a guy who had two DUI arrests, but still has no trouble getting into BC. His trick was to get a lawyer to argue them down to reckless driving convictions. Proof that single digit millionaires actually do have access to the legal system I suppose.
My (at the time, future) brother-in-law caused us to be held up at the border in Blaine, WA heading into Canada about 10 years ago. A few years prior to that, he had been busted for using a fake ID at a bar to buy booze when he was a minor. Canadian customs were apparently aware of this, and after about an hour of waiting, the border agent said - and this is verbatim - "I'm trying to see if there's a reason this won't let us allow him in, but I'm not finding anything yet."
Our vehicle was searched during that time as well, and about 30 minutes later they finally let all of us enter. Nice to hear we aren't the only folk who have dealt with a similar issue.
It seems very clearly worded. They agent was attempting to determine if the action would restrict entry (not let us allow him him), but it was still be investigated (I'm not finding anything yet).
Correct. It seemed that the agent thought that that issue was grounds to prevent entry but wasn't positive, and was doing their due diligence to confirm as much.
I read that quote in exactly the opposite way, with "this" being the computer system and that the agent was trying to find a way to LET the person into the country.
I responded to the initial comment in this particular thread with my own anecdotal experience[0]. At no point were we asked about anything related to his fake ID charge, prior convictions, etc.
They simply ID'd us, asked us where we were heading and why, then told us to pull aside. They knew already.
You’re being snarky, but the reason they just ask you is so that if you’re caught lying they can deport you for the lie, rather than having to try to deport you for whatever you did.
At one point, Chelsea Manning was the core of a progressive movement, with aims for positive change and progress. Now, even as an activist myself, it's hard to see her as anything other than a politically driven rogue who's clearly lost their bearings of right and wrong in relation to their original activism.
Banning entry for a whistle blowing crime when the country where the crime happened wrote off the sentence is more important to me than her movement between progressive hero to outsider.
Calling out her crimes and placing them on the same level of rape, murder speaks to a disinformation campaign that gets unleashed but those in power.
I have no clue what her message is but why is it _so dangerous to those in power that they would try to shut her down?
>Calling out her crimes and placing them on the same level of rape, murder speaks to a disinformation campaign that gets unleashed but those in power.
What makes you think she was compared to murderers and rapists? Comments elsewhere in this thread says that people with DWIs get stopped at the border as well.
Commutation is not a pardon. Canada lines up US charges with Canadian ones, we like the US, regard disclosing classified info as a serious crime that bars one from entry.
It’s not a disinformation campaign it’s the law, you and I may not like it but it’s been this way for a long time. They aren’t singling out Manning.
There are numerous articles that discuss this article in turn. The short version: Many current members of the ACLU are advocating to take up progressively-aligned cases specifically instead of civil liberties causes generally.
The real contortion is describing mRNA gene therapy, that is non-sterilizing, and requires frequent boosters, as a "vaccine". Can you think of any other vaccine you have taken that works like this?
Of course, this is novel tech. So perhaps we should expect a few differences. But typically HN is more appropriately skeptical of such innovations and would not cheer on government mandates that require them for 12 year olds immediately after FDA emergency authorization ends.
The characterization of mRNA as "gene therapy" is really a master-stroke of propaganda from the anti-vax movement considering that mRNA vaccines never enter the cell nucleus and that they replace the traditional vaccine technique of literally inserting viruses into your body -- you know, the things that specialize in attacking and rewiring your cells.
mRNA technology isn't new, but even if it was, it's still wild to claim that a delivery mechanism that's less invasive than traditional vaccine techniques is somehow magically more dangerous.
Also, tons of existing vaccines require boosters, and not all vaccines produce sterilizing immunity -- the COVID vaccines are not unique in that regard.
Asserting that "mRNA technology isn't new" is a master-stroke of propaganda from Pfizer lobbyists who know damn well we have no idea what the effects of this will be, long-term, on the general population, and particularly on 12 year old children. We are implementing this at scale without a placebo group, consequences be damned. The placebo group from the trials was vaccinated long ago, in early winter 2020, well before the usual schedule that is typically deemed acceptable.
Studies looking into well-documented severe side effects, such as myocarditis and pericarditis (that we did not know about when we started vaccinating in winter 2020), as well as a litany of menstrual issues for women, have been given 5+ year runways while we all act as test subjects.
For individuals who are at-risk for COVID-19 (a small minority of the population), these vaccines make a lot of sense. For the rest of us the jury is still out and it's extremely dispiriting to see intelligent people neglect the (frankly terrifying) history of overzealous American pharmaceutical intervention and experimentation.
On the subject of boosters, it's quite disingenuous to compare the tetanus booster shot that you need once a decade, to a treatment you need 2-3 times per year, as is
currently case with the available mRNA covid vaccines.
Then again, tetanus is not a viral infection. I'm having trouble finding a single instance of viral vaccine that requires regular boosters. I certainly have never received any. And have never had any recommended by my doctor, nor was I required to have any to work, participate in public life, fly on an airplane, etc, in my adult life.
Edit: heading to bed soon and rate limited so responding to yunohn below:
1) Clearly you have not looked at the statistics for age-stratified IFR. We have had restrictions that some think have protected them from infection but that is largely irrelevant. 30% of the population was never able to lock down because they were providing medical care, keeping the electricity running, etc, and we know from these individuals that people under 65, without complications like severe obesity or diabetes, are extremely unlikely to have severe or life threatening covid cases.
2) Yes I have heard of the flu shot. Every year they come up with a new formulation that targets the viral mutation that they predict has happened over the past year. Are you under the false impression that covid boosters have been modified for the delta or mu variants? They have not. Israel is re-vaccinating its entire population with the exact same Pfizer vaccine it started with last winter. This is an apples to oranges comparison you're making. One that does not bode well for the long term effectiveness of the shots we all received in April.
> individuals who are at-risk for COVID-19 (a small minority of the population)
What do you mean by this? You’re saying COVID affects only a minority? Are you also forgetting that this pandemic is raging despite so many people WFH? Imagine post-WFH when the economy reopens and life is more “normal”.
> I'm having trouble finding a single instance of viral vaccine that requires regular boosters
> Asserting that "mRNA technology isn't new" is a master-stroke of propaganda
It's not new, mRNA technology has been around for decades.
> For individuals who are at-risk for COVID-19 (a small minority of the population)
The absolutely wild cognitive disconnect here between saying that people shouldn't be scared of a novel virus who's long-term affects are generally unknown, but that they should be very scared of a decade old technology that, and I repeat, is less invasive than traditional vaccines.
Tell me that you're bad at risk analysis without actually telling me you're bad at risk analysis.
> it's quite disingenuous to compare the tetanus booster shot that you need once a decade, to a treatment you need 2-3 times per year
Oh come on, the disingenuous thing here is claiming that COVID vaccines are going to be a 3-time a year treatment indefinitely. You have to know why this is deceptive framing.
Also, it's disingenuous to compare the current debate over booster shots to the situation with other diseases that we have completely under control. We wouldn't be getting booster shots if an out-of-control unvaccinated population wasn't helping the virus mutate. And even with the mutations, the current vaccines are still incredibly effective. We arguably would not need booster shots at all if more people were vaccinated, the risk calculations being done here are partially based on the fact that even vaccinated people are being exposed to way more COVID than they ought to be, because a substantial portion of the population has apparently decided to make it their personal mission to preserve the disease.
Part of this is the fault of COVID coverage being unnecessarily gloomy: the mRNA vaccines for COVID work incredibly well, and while there may be additional benefits to booster shots, the existence of booster shots in no way means that the existing vaccines aren't doing their jobs. It just turns out if there's a really easy way to boost effectiveness that carries very few downsides, that it's worth doing that -- particularly in a world where unvaccinated populations are largely doing nothing to prevent themselves from spreading the disease. In that world I'll take an extra 5-15% protection if I can get it for free, I'm happy to get that. I'll also take an extra boost to protection against getting the virus in the first place, even if the current vaccine means it's extremely unlikely to be fatal. Getting even mild COVID is unpleasant.
Also, while we're on the subject of tetanus, this is actually a kind of apt comparison because you don't only need a tetanus booster every 10 years -- the 10 year booster is a recommended precaution based on the idea that you're not going to be regularly sticking rusty nails into your skin. If you step on a rusty nail, getting a tetanus booster immediately is recommended if you haven't gotten a shot within the last 5 years.
And boosters are also recommended in other situations, like malaria and chickenpox. No, they're not recommended to regularly happen every year, but as mentioned above A) malaria isn't currently running rampant and mutating in the United States, and B) COVID vaccines also probably aren't going to require regular boosters outside of a seasonal shot, and it's utterly disingenuous to look at an (extremely common) 2-dose initial vaccine and argue that this is equivalent to a regular vaccine schedule.
> Every year they come up with a new formulation that targets the viral mutation that they predict has happened over the past year.
No, you're way off base with this. Flu shots do lose effectiveness over time, that's why it's (generally) recommended to get the shot in mid-to-late September at the earliest. Getting the flu shot too early in the year will make it less effective for you during flu season. A flu shot will give you around 6 months of protection which... completely coincidentally, is roughly the same time table that's being recommended for current COVID boosters.
Also, the flu shots aren't always targeting completely novel strains every year, there are resurgences of the same strains across multiple years. One of the side effects of quarantining in 2020 was that certain flu strains dropped so low that we were hoping they would go extinct and we could stop vaccinating for them.
> It's extremely dispiriting to see intelligent people neglect the (frankly terrifying) history of overzealous American pharmaceutical intervention and experimentation.
Nobody is dismissing anything, but understanding the history of American pharmaceutical corruption is not the same thing as becoming needlessly paranoid about every scientific advancement, to the point where you're using words like "gene therapy" to describe a medical procedure where its single most well-known, defining characteristic is that it doesn't change your genes.
At that point this isn't about healthy distrust of the system or being prudently skeptical about new technologies, it's just a misunderstanding of what mRNA vaccines even do in the first place. And it's particularly not a healthy distrust of the system to treat the risk of vaccine complications as equivalent to the risk of long-covid complications. When we start arguing that the vaccines are more dangerous than COVID, it just becomes an inability to do math -- regardless of your age or what demographics you fit into. For the most part, for most people, even if you're in your 20s-30s, you are way less likely to experience harmful effects from a COVID vaccine than you are from COVID itself. The risks are just not the same.
Edit:
> The decision, made in the last days of Obama's presidency, means that Manning can be freed May 17 [2017], seven years into a prison term that has been marked by two suicide attempts and a hunger strike aimed at obtaining sex reassignment surgery.
Looks like it was 2017. I had no idea. Is Canada going to take her?