The Suppressor Reports
Methods, Verdict Categories, and the Duty of Witness
The descriptive motto for this substack is “Witness and Thought, amid the Bipartisan Suppression of the Covid-vax Catastrophe.”
Now as to the thought, I’ve no worries of having too little to say, or of my spirit shying away from saying it. My political-philosophy instincts kick in, and so I’ll keep on thinking about what the Suppression is, and how to define it. I also want to see to what extent older thinkers, such as the dissident ones like Solzhenitsyn, Havel, and Arendt, and the “Postmodern conservative” ones like Lawler, Percy, Lasch, and Tocqueville, can be used to explain the newer forms of totalitarian despotism, forms which creepily develop within liberal democracy, and which have been threatening to take over. And I want to think about whether we need to, or can, formulate a new form of conservatism in response.
As for the witness, part of that is and will continue to be about the Covid-vax catastrophe itself. In that mode, this stack will be like a lot of other Covid-dissident ones: as newer information about the harms and deaths comes out, I will try to make you aware of the most important parts of it. As I’m not medical-science nor a statistics expert, though, I won’t be doing that sort of reporting myself.
Rather, my main duty in witness is going to be about the Suppression of the story. And, as I don’t hold out any hope of getting the Pravda-like organs of Democrat-led-media (“MSM”) to change their ways, I will focus on the organs of conservative media, as well as on the non-media political leaders of conservatism. They are the Suppressors it is my mission to disturb, convict, and bring to repentance.
After all, the secondary motto of Dissident Conservative, put at the head of its opening post, is “The acceptance of Suppression is the betrayal of Conservatism.”
And in this area, my writing will have nothing of the usual pleasure an intellectual can get from lucidly describing present threats and future dangers.
For this aspect of my witness means naming names, and bringing charges against my natural allies, in some cases against persons I know and have friendly relations with. I will usually surprise them with these charges, and in some cases, I will even be in the position of having to wrest the eyes of persons in outright denial towards harsh truths.
Do you see this man, and his pain?
The “good conservative warriors” I’ll be confronting are largely unaware of the distress and anger of Covid-vax victims like this, or, if they happen to see a sample of it, they are used to assuming it must be due to the actions of their enemies the leftists or RINOs.
So I have the lovely task of saying to them, “This fellow’s pain and outrage could as rightly be directed at you. For on this issue, you have joined the mainstream media, and the mainstream of respectable elite leadership, in denying that there is any issue here which leaders are obliged to discuss, or to call for investigation of.”
I have the lovely task of saying, “You are guilty. You are suppressors. And here are the receipts.”
A natural first reaction to anyone who does this is offense. Over and over, I will experience, when I don’t just get the icy silent treatment which insiders utilize against supposed “nobodies” deemed unworthy of addressing them, surprised and defensive reactions. I will have the joy of interacting with generally decent persons in those unique moments when they act indecently, i.e., when they assume the worst about a new acquaintance, namely, myself.
Part of my task, I guess, will be to just take and manage that as best I can.
The Suppressor Reports: Verdicts
Soon, I will publish the first of what I hope will become twice- or thrice- monthly segments, the Suppressor Reports. These reports will collect the “receipts” I just spoke of. Modelled on pieces I did about the Suppression of the Covid-vax harms story by The Claremont Institute and The Federalist, they will document just how little reporting of the story, or even mentioning of it, has been occurring. Each report will deliver a judgment: is the outlet, organization, writer, editor, or politician in question, i.e., the subject of the report, guilty of suppression?
Five verdicts will be possible: 1.) Exempt from Judgment, 2.) Suppressor, 3.) Enabler, 4.) Inadequate Truth-Teller, and 5.) Truth-Teller. I want a framework which makes a couple of less-damning verdicts available, though I predict that the vast majority of subjects I look into are going to get the simple one of Suppressor.
Exempt from Judgment
Why might judgment be inapplicable in some cases? In “What Suppression Is Not” I indicated that cover-up and censorship are actions distinct from suppression, and more importantly, that writers who are not general and regular pundits, or outlets which are specialized in a way which would make Covid-19 topics unnatural for them, cannot be rightly regarded as Suppressors of this story. Similarly, ordinary citizens, that is, persons who do not have a role in punditry, journalism, and politics of at least some potential influence, cannot be. Thus, reports that learn this about their subjects will deliver the Exempt from Judgment verdict.
And here I must repeat what I have long said: most politicians, even though the sin of Suppression begins in journalism and punditry, will not be exempt from judgment. Most holders of, or contenders for, legislative office (and of certain executive offices), from the state-level on up, are legitimate subjects for examination, because they have multiple ways they could be sounding the alarm about the Covid-vax harms story, or denouncing media which suppress it.
For the present, at least, I will not be considering to what extent purely academic or religious leaders should be judged on this issue.
Suppressor
Recall the definition I’ve put forth before: Suppression is the refusal by an editor, journalist, pundit, or politician, to publish or discuss content relating to a story of major public import, in violation of their duty to serve the citizenry.
Suppression is thus defined by actions or the lack of them.
Early on in the Suppression, I was open to considering certain claims of innocent ignorance, confusion, etc., as partly excusatory. But we cannot read minds and hearts, and by now, everyone who has had a duty to know about and look into the evidence of widespread Covid-vax harms has had ample opportunity. We are obliged to assume that those of them still ignorant of the story have chosen their ignorance.
Now there must be different levels of villainy among our Suppressors, but these reports will not seek to determine them. Some probably were bribed to Suppress, with money or implicit promises of career opportunities. Some held stock in the companies which would benefit from the Suppression. Perhaps some were pressured by Deep State operatives, or Trump’s lieutenants, via bribes or threats. Some knew early on the immoral nature of what they were doing, whereas some remain confused to this day, though again, they often choose that confusion. Some intended to Indefinitely Suppress from early on, others unthinkingly stumbled towards that, perhaps initially due to sincere trust of expert Covid-vax defenders in our top institutions, or due to strategic judgments about what would be necessary for Republican electoral victories in 2022, and then again, in 2024.
My Suppressor Reports will not seek to sort out those degrees of villainy, nor the degree of guilt incurred when a member of an outlet was ordered—explicitly or implicitly—to Suppress, and he complied, even if he did so unwillingly.
Rather, the organization or individual will simply be pronounced a Suppressor, or not.
And when it is an organization which is pronounced a Suppressor, the assumption will be that every individual working there with any involvement in decision-making or content production is one also. Basically, if they could have understood what was happening, and could have threatened to quit in protest but didn’t, the verdict of Suppressor falls on them when it falls on their organization.
Enabler of Suppression
These are cases where the subject might be classified as borderline exempt, or as an inadequate truth-teller, but we have solid grounds to think that they could be opposing the Suppression if they wanted, but are choosing instead to enable it. Enablers range from those who privately thank me for my speaking out against the Suppression, but who only have a questionable excuse for themselves not doing so, to those who we might classify as the allies or friends of the Suppression—these latter aren’t doing the dirty work of institutional silence themselves, but they want it to be done.
Inadequate Truth-Teller
This is going to be a much trickier judgment to deliver, but it will be necessary. This last year, I’ve noticed certain figures who cannot count as Suppressors, since they have mentioned in public their awareness of basic aspects of the story, but who are not discussing or following-up on the story enough, that is, in proper proportion to its seriousness. The most important example of this is Tucker Carlson, but there are others I am beginning to wonder about also. They are making it far too easy for others to keep on Suppressing, and thus approach the Enabler category, even though they tell some truths.
As recently as August ‘24, I was so grateful to any conservative who had enough bravery to puncture the silent wall of Suppression with even just a couple of holes, that I assumed they were with me in demanding that the whole wall be brought crashing to the ground. But with some, I increasingly notice a hesitation to keep going on this topic, and even when they acknowledge that conservatives do have a key role in the Suppression, an unwillingness to be specific about who is doing it, and what actions constitute it. Non-specific whines like “No-one is talking about this!” are part of the Inadequate Truth Teller’s game. He gets to remain on the fence, even if he seems to be cheering on our side, and leave the hard confrontations to others. If the dissidents are utterly defeated and the Suppression continues for decades, he has left open for himself a path back into “respectable” conservatism or Trumpism.
Truth-Teller
I have not devised the Inadequate Truth-Teller category in order to pressure every non-Suppressor to sound and act like yours truly. If any outlet or person which could potentially suppress the story is instead reporting or talking about it fairly regularly, I categorize them as a Truth-Teller. Anyone who keeps on raising the possibility that the claims made by the dissidents about the Covid-19-vax-harms might be true, even if only in part, or who otherwise keeps publicly talking about the ever-developing body of evidence, deserves to be judged a Truth-Teller. This is the case even if they do not join me in naming names, in using a term like “Suppression,” nor in regarding the Suppression as a fundamental betrayal of conservatism and liberal democracy.
In other words, a Truth-Teller does not need to be a Dissident Conservative. Living up to the basic Liberal Democratic duty on this issue to foster Open Journalism and free discussion of public affairs is sufficient.
Genuine Truth-Tellers differ from Inadequate ones in never seeming to be tactically walking away from the issue. If there is a lull in their reporting on the story, or talking about it, it is because there is a lull in new dissident evidence, or because new stories in other areas are naturally taking up more airspace.
Hallmarks of the Truth-Teller are the reporting of specific numbers, and the mentioning of specific dissident experts. Precise vocabulary is another. We seldom find the Truth-Teller railing against a vague set of malefactors like “the Covidians.” Nor does he blur key distinctions, such as the one between opposition to the CV-19 vax-mandates, and opposition to the CV-19 vaxxes themselves.
The Suppressor Reports: Methods
So, I’ve indicated what the Suppressor Reports will do. Now, it’s time to indicate how they will do it.
I have a pretty precise idea of this when it comes to punditry and journalism outlets, or journalism-adjacent organizations, as well as with individual pundits or journalists. The remainder of this piece will describe the method to be used in those cases, and then briefly comment on how reports on political leaders ought to be conducted.
A.) Hand Counting of Titles, Subtitles, and Mentions, back to January 2022.
Step-one: The investigator goes through the archives of the subject, looking for headlines or other markers that a piece is directly or indirectly addressing the claims of Covid-19 vax-harms. This is difficult with podcasts, but when segment subtitles are provided it becomes manageable. Since what we are looking for is open discussion of the claims, a subject’s agreement or disagreement with them is essentially irrelevant, so long as the reporting on them has not been twisted into systematic misrepresentation. Thus, a count of the number of pieces which in some non-dismissive way address the story is made. This is the Covid-vax Harms Mention Count.
Step-two: The investigator counts the number of all pieces, on every current affairs topic, published by the subject in this period. This is the Total Count.
The investigator may need to remove “feature-y” stories from the Total Count, and with punditry outlets of a more academic, arts-and-culture, or specialized cast, he may need to remove all pieces in those categories also. For example, for an outlet which does general commentary, but which has a particular focus on foreign policy or constitutional law issues, all pieces on those topics may need to be removed from the Total Count. For otherwise, the resulting Percentage could be misleading. In other words, we can only hold an outlet responsible for reporting/commenting on the Covid-vax harm story according the proportion of general current-affairs pieces it publishes in comparison to other types of pieces—if that proportion is low, we must adjust our counting accordingly.
Step-three: using the two counts, a Percentage, of all Covid-vax harm mention pieces within the Total Count of standard news or news commentary pieces, is established. An outlet or individual which falls below 2% is in most cases judged a suppressor.
This 2% percentage is a key factor in the overall judgment, and it could change once I obtain more experience doing these reports, but for now, it seems a good rule of thumb that for a story which should be the Story of the Century, and which is pretty regularly developing, one-out-of-fifty pieces is the minimal evidence needed to demonstrate that one is not seeking to suppress it.
Step-four: Consideration of Other Factors. If the percentage is below 2%, the investigator tries to notice if there were actions or pieces of particular bravery by the subject. For example, if an outlet was bold and above 5% in a few months of early 2023, quite regularly reporting on the story when very few others were, that might outweigh it overall arriving at 1% over four years.
AI-Counting of the Same: Each of the first three steps are taken, but instead of doing it by hand, the investigator queries AI to do the labor-intensive work. I additionally hope AI will help myself—or other investigators—to catch mentions of the topic not signaled by any headline or subhead.
I commit to always do some hand-counting work with every report of mine. For I assume AI will miss certain items, and know it is unable make the more fine-tuned judgments about the general tone of the pieces in question. Overall, I will be testing the reliability of AI tools for this kind of work as I proceed. With the larger punditry outlets, and particularly with journalism outlets, the sheer amount of needed title-skimming would make doing all of it by hand, and in many cases even doing more than 10% of it that way, impossible. Were a donor to make it possible for me to set up a team of researchers, and to publish reports in a venue likely to get more traction than substack, the situation could be different, of course. (Though I would never want to make such research-direction the main item of my work.) For now, I will be proceeding in the mixed way described here.
Note on the Time-Frame: I begin the counts in January of 2022 simply because that is when more extensive dissident reports of widespread Covid-19 vax-harms emerged. For example, reports on the Burkhardt autopsies only began to circulate in alternative media in December of 2021, and reports on the Hirschman clots only began to in January of 2022. The situation in 2021 was far too confused to hold pundits or journalists responsible. I salute anyone who was sounding the alarm in early- or mid-2021, but most of us were still totally in the dark.
B.) Adjusting the Count Method to Politicians:
Basically, I will apply the same Count procedure to a legislator’s or a candidate’s website, press-releases, speeches, and bill-proposals. I have never tried this, so I’m not sure how well it will work. I anticipate four problems. First, some politicians provide the public with a lot of statements, others little—that will make it difficult to compare. Second, I am aware of no reliable method by which one might track the number or content of a politician’s speeches. Three, bill-tracker databases are often difficult to use, even though the simple metric of “did a legislator sponsor or not sponsor” is potentially available in them. Finally, most politicians gravitate toward slogan-y yet vague language which straddles key distinctions, and more generally, they have more ways to elude responsibility than media types do.
It may be that looking only into the websites of legislators and candidates, and then counting away, will be the only possible method here. Ideally, what I would want is a set telephone interview arranged with every politician investigated. As such interviews would in most cases be way beyond my bandwidth capacities—I have a day job, and don’t have a journalist’s habits/skills--, I’ll have to see what else I can pull-off.
I welcome communications from anyone who would like to help-out with the reports here, to try doing something similar on their own channel, or to steer me to additional methodological refinements and tools.