The stories here lack quite so much funny, but very official authorities, with titles you cannot comprehend, have confirmed the high absurdity score of wrecking millions of businesses globally in the name of Public Health (Theater). These actions condemned 118 million people to food insecurity that will almost surely result in several times as many deaths due to starvation (and to younger populations) as did COVID-19 (even if you assume official numbers are not only actually fully all real, but perhaps even underestimated).

The story gets worse with inflation. Printing trillions and then more trillions of dollars to cover the costs of these deadly…public health wars on poor people…is itself monetary inflation. And unless monetary inflation magically matches the increase in value of goods and services consumed (not likely during lockdowns!), that turns into price inflation (and more people feeling food insecurity). Some of that happened chaotically in commodities markets, though prices retreated from their tops recently:

How much of that is real, and how much is manipulation? With housing prices soaring and hedge funds buying, lumber shortages exacerbated the squeeze. But how much of that was profiteering from the crisis? Numerous videos emerged showing supply held back.

Meanwhile, international shipping took a hit. We’re told that dock workers were often sick, but no metrics explain the months-long port delays. Perhaps they were deliberate as well. However, we do know that 200,000 sailors wound up stranded at sea—some for more than a year. And we can’t rescue those people? Whoever assigns priorities for humanitarian aid should be sacked and flogged immediately.

But what really puts this absurdity over the top is the Ever Given somehow got stuck in the Suez Canal at the worst possible moment since the Bretton Woods Accord.