VACCINES: NVIC NEWSLETTER

ACIP: 2018-2019 Flu Vaccine  44 Percent Effective  By Theresa Wrangham Republished below in full unedited for informational, educational and research purposes:

SEE: www.nvic.org The February 2019 meeting of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) saw new committee members introduced and changes to public comment enacted.  New Code of Conduct for ACIP Public Comment Sessions ACIP changed their public comment rules for public meetings, due to the recent increase in individuals with concerns about vaccine safety and vaccine policies traveling to ACIP meetings to make a public comment. These changes include an increase to 75 minutes for public comment sessions noted on the agenda, and instituting a blind lottery when there are more individuals signed up to give comment than there is time. Written public comments will also now be published on the Regulations.gov website.   Influenza Vaccine Only 44 Percent Effective CDC reported to ACIP that influenza infection activity during the U.S. 2018-2019 influenza season has been average with the 2009 H1N1 influenza A virus continuing to cause most lab confirmed cases. Across many U.S. states, currently there is a very high rate of influenza-like-illness (ILI). However, typically about 80 percent of ILI during the flu season is due to respiratory infections caused by other types of viruses and bacteria.  CDC interim estimates on the overall effectiveness of this season's influenza vaccine is approximately 44 percent for all age groups.This means that, for the estimated 20 percent of Americans likely to become infected by type A or B influenza, the vaccine is only 44 percent effective. Read this referenced commentary and make a comment here.

NVIC In The News

Following is a selection of media articles published between Feb. 26 and Apr. 3, 2019 that include NVIC's perspective or information. Measles Outbreaks Lead States to Reconsider Vaccine Exemptions. "Proponents of vaccine exemptions argue that parents should be able to make their own decisions regarding their children's health. "We believe that stripping vaccine laws of personal belief exemptions is a violation of human rights, including freedom of thought, conscience and religious belief," said Barbara Loe Fisher, co-founder and president of the National Vaccine Information Center." The Hill Feb. 26, 2019.  Exemption Debate."A hundred cases of measles in a population of 320 million people does not constitute a public health emergency," said Barbara Loe Fisher, co-founder and president of the National Vaccine Information Center. "[These cases] should not be used to justify eliminating the legal right to exercise informed consent to vaccination," she told Axios. World Magazine Feb. 28, 2019. States Move to Restrict Parents' Refusal to Vaccinate Their Kids. "Nobody should sit in judgment of another person's religious and spiritual beliefs," says Barbara Loe Fisher, a spokesperson for the National Vaccine Information Center, a group that lobbies against mandatory vaccination and thinks parents should have a choice. "No person should be allowed to force someone to violate their conscience when they're making a decision about the use of a pharmacological product that carries a risk of harm." NPR Feb. 28, 2019. As More Parents Join the Anti-Vax Movement, States Are Scrambling to Make It Harder to Opt Out of Vaccinating Your Child. "Barbara Loe Fisher, co-founder and president of the National Vaccine Information Center, one of the oldest and most well-established anti-vax groups, told INSIDER her organization is supporting more bills in the current legislative session than ever before - 61 out of 140 vaccine-related bills across 31 states. "There is no question there are more families than ever involved now," she said. "This is a parental rights and human rights and civil liberties issue." INSIDER Feb. 28, 2019. State Lawmakers Pushing for Laxer Vaccine Rules Despite Measles Outbreaks. "Across the country, lawmakers have introduced more than 130 vaccine-related bills in over 30 states, at a pace that could set a new record, according to the National Vaccine Information Center, a vaccine-skeptical group that closely tracks vaccine legislation. The center said legislators filed 160 bills in 41 states during 2015, setting a record later broken by 2017's 184 bills in 42 states... Barbara Loe Fisher, who founded the National Vaccine Information Center, contends the animosity about vaccines is "part of a larger culture war that's going on in this country. It's about the right to autonomy, the natural right to self determination. We have freedom of thought, freedom of religious belief." Politico Mar. 3, 2019. Even With Measles Outbreaks Across the U.S., At Least 20 States Have Proposed Anti-Vaccination Bills. "Barbara Loe Fisher is the co-founder and president of the National Vaccine Information Center, one of the leading organizations advocating for vaccination exemptions. The group tracks vaccine-related bills. And this year, there are more such bills that the center can get behind than there have been since it began closely monitoring state legislation in 2010, Fisher said. "There are a lot of legislators who are thoughtfully looking at this issue," she said. "The National Vaccine Information Center has lent its support to bills in Iowa and Hawaii that seek to add a conscientious belief exemption, according to its website. It's also urging people in Arizona to support bills in the state House and Senate that would make it easier to get exemptions from vaccines and require doctors to provide information about the potential risks of vaccines...Fisher, of the National Vaccine Information Center, says her organization will keep pushing for vaccination exemption laws. "I don't know how long it's going to take to reform these vaccine policies and laws," she said. "But I know that people are becoming involved, and they want to be part of vaccine policy." CNN Mar. 6, 2019.   With Vaccine Misinformation, Libraries Walk A Fine Line. "If Amazon is going to be leaned on by the government to censor certain kinds of information," said Barbara Loe Fisher, co-founder and president of the National Vaccine Information Center, which advocates against mandatory vaccination, "then it could well extend at some point to cleansing the libraries of information that does not align with government policy or medical policy." Undark Magazine Mar. 22, 2019.  Pan's Bill Would Further Restrict Vaccine Exemptions for Schoolkids. "Sen. Richard Pan (D-Sacramento) introduced SB 276 at a Sacramento news conference Tuesday. Pan, a pediatrician, says the bill would combat doctors fraudulently writing medical exemptions for children so they can attend schools. SB 276 opponent Barbara Loe Fisher the president and co-founder of the National Vaccine Information Center, opposes Pan's legislation. "Under narrow federal vaccine guidelines, almost no health condition qualifies for a medical exemption. Since there is no longer a personal belief exemption allowed for children to attend school in California, the bill will pave the way for state health officials seeking a 100 percent vaccination rate to achieve that goal, but at what price?" Fisher told GV Wire via email.  "She also expressed concern about government overreach. "Forcing physicians to violate their professional judgment and their conscience is a form of state-sponsored tyranny that should not be part of public health law in any state," Fisher said." GV Wire Mar. 26, 2019.  Forcing Vaccination on Every Child Undermines Civil Liberties. In this essay, NVIC co-founder and president Barbara Loe Fisher addressed the question, "Where should society draw the line between requiring vaccinations for children and allowing parental freedom of choice?" She said, "Science is not perfect, doctors are not infallible, and medical interventions come with risks, which is why parents have the power to exercise informed consent to medical risk taking on behalf of their minor children" and added, "When parents question the risks and failures of a commercial pharmaceutical product being mandated for every child, the answer is not more force but better science and respect for the informed consent ethic." A counterpoint view was provided by Dan Salmon, PhD, of Johns Hopkins University. Leaps Magazine Mar. 28, 2019.  Some Lawmakers Support Vaccine Bill Amid Rockland's Ongoing Measles Outbreak [in New York]. "The National Vaccine Information Center is a Virginia-based non-profit that supports the right for individuals to make informed, voluntary health choices for themselves and their children. NVIC President Barbara Loe Fisher says the Rockland state of emergency is government overreach. "Is this the kind of public health emergency that warrants this kind of action? We're not talking Ebola. People are not dying in the streets," says Loe Fisher says. "This is a very serious precedent that's being set."    "This is a human rights issues. It has to do with, whether or not in America we are going to have the right to autonomy, the right to exercise our conscience, our religious beliefs and our informed consent rights when it comes to using, in this case, a pharmaceutical product that is liability-free, as of 2011, and be able to make these decisions," says Loe Fisher. "And NVIC will continue to defend civil liberties and the informed consent rights of Americans." WAMC Radio (NPR) Mar. 28, 2019.  There are nearly 400 reported cases of measles in the US. What are states doing about it? "Still, organizations like the National Vaccine Information Center can give the impression that parents are risking their kids' lives by getting them vaccinated.President Barbara Loe Fisher said the NVIC, which she co-founded in 1982 under the name Dissatisfied Parents Together, merely advocates informed consent and does not make recommendations related to immunizations.Asked about the government's duty to protect its citizens through public health policy, Fisher said: "Are you saying that a public health law that requires a certain minority of individuals to risk their lives, sacrifice their lives, for the rest is a moral law when they're not given the choice of whether or not they're going to participate in that sacrifice? That's not a moral public-health law.'' "Fisher points out more than $4 billion has been paid out by the compensation program, but according to CDC figures, 3.4 billion doses of covered vaccines were distributed in the U.S. from 2006 to 2017, and 4,250 compensated claims were adjudicated. That comes out to 1.25 paid claims for every million doses. "Nevertheless, Fisher says the anti-vax movement will continue to grow, and she sees it as part of a fight for civil liberties. "Today everybody knows somebody who was healthy, got vaccinated and was never healthy again,'' she said, "and that's the reason this issue is not going to go away no matter what kind of laws and no matter what kind of censorship is applied.'' "Nate Smith, director of the Arkansas Department of Health, is among the NVIC's many critics, calling it "an anti-vaccination group'' and saying part of what makes organizations like it dangerous is they can appear to provide legitimate information. "Sometimes they present things in ways that are very reasonable, but then other times they make statements that are patently false,'' Smith said. "So it's very difficult for someone who doesn't have a background in vaccination science or in public health to discern.'' USA Today Apr. 3, 2019.

Vaccine Freedom Wall: Parent Reports Insurance Companies Bribing Pediatricians to Deny Care to Unvaccinated Kids

Post a report if you were bullied, threatened or punished by a doctor, government official or employer for making a vaccine choice on the Cry for Vaccine Freedom Wall. Following is a recent report posted on the Vaccine Freedom Wall in March 2019:    "My children were seeing a pediatrician in Canton, MI. We had been traveling 25+ miles away because we had already been refused care at several pediatrician offices in the area, even though we have an approved state waiver for vaccinations. We had been seeing this pediatrician for over a year and the pediatrician accepted that we do not vaccinate. One day, we were at the pediatrician for a sick visit for one of my children and were told that [my children] could no longer be patients if we were not going to vaccinate. Per the pediatrician, the insurance companies were not going to pay her for the other patients if she did not have everyone in her practice vaccinated. How is that even legal? That is bribery." NVIC's website provides visitors with many ways to access, report and share information about vaccination, including information about personal experiences with vaccine risks and failures. On NVIC.org, you can:   File a vaccine reaction report describing a vaccine reaction, injury or death with NVIC's 36-year old  Vaccine Reaction Registry.   Post a vaccine reaction report describing a vaccine reaction, injury or death and include a photo or video on the online Memorial for Vaccine Victims.   Post a vaccine failure report if a vaccine failed to protect you or your child from disease on the Vaccine Failure Wall.

Listen to NVIC Podcasts on Vaccine Science, Policy & Law

You can take NVIC's information with you and listen to commentaries on vaccine science, policy, law and informed consent at home, when exercising, commuting in your car or anywhere you have a cell phone or other electronic device that plays podcasts. The length of podcasts range from a few minutes to 75 minutes and the text of podcasts with references can be read on NVIC.org. Download NVIC commentaries on podcast here.

GODLESS AMERICA? FAITH COULD KILL LIBERALISM, BUT LIBERALISM IS KILLING FAITH

GODLESS AMERICA? FAITH COULD KILL LIBERALISM, BUT LIBERALISM IS KILLING FAITH 

BY SELWYN DUKE

SEE: https://www.thenewamerican.com/culture/faith-and-morals/item/31945-godless-america-faith-could-kill-liberalism-but-liberalism-is-killing-faith?vsmaid=4140&vcid=3987; 

republished below in full unedited for informational, educational and research purposes:

“The only foundation for ... a republic is to be laid in Religion. Without this there can be no virtue, and without virtue there can be no liberty,” warned Founding Father Benjamin Rush. We’re losing that foundation, however, with yet another survey showing that irreligiosity has been burgeoning in America — especially in recent years. Yet with church attendance being one of the best predictors of voting patterns, what does this portend for our nation’s political and cultural future? And how can the atheistic descent be halted if few understand its actual causes?

The latest data was provided by the General Social Survey, which “has tracked a broad swath of American trends since 1972,” informs the Daily Mail. Summarizing the study’s recent findings, the paper writes:

• The number of people who have no religion has risen 266 per cent — one third of the population — in three decades

• People with no religion accounted for 23.1% of the U.S. population in 2018

• By comparison, Catholics make up 23% and Evangelicals account for 22.5%

• The three are now statistically tied as the largest religious groups in America

• Meanwhile, mainline Protestant Christianity has seen a 62.5% decline in believers since 1982, to now account for just 10.8% of the U.S. population



Other research has, unsurprisingly, shown similar results. For example, a 2018 Pew Research Center survey found that America’s “pagans” now actually outnumber her Presbyterians.

Ryan Burge, an Eastern Illinois University political science professor who analyzed the recent data, told the Mail that one reason for the higher “nones” (people without religion) figure could be that — with irreligiosity in vogue and the stigma attached to it now gone — people are less afraid to openly embrace it.

This may be a factor, of course. Yet the basic question is: Why would irreligiosity’s stigma have diminished drastically unless religiosity has diminished proportionately? Stigmas are corollaries of values. For when certain things are valued, their opposites are devalued; and when those certain things are valued less, their opposites are devalued less.

In reality, studies and personal experience both make evident that religion has waned worrisomely in the West. While there are a number of reasons for this, the main one is little known. As I explained last year, the

rejection of Christianity is wholly logical ... given our descent into moral relativism. I often cite a Barna Group study showing that, in 2002 already, only six percent of teenagers believed in Truth (absolute by definition) and that they were most likely to make “moral” decisions based on feelings.

How is this relevant? Moral relativism holds that what we call “morality” is determined by the man; what this actually means, however, is that morality (properly defined) doesn’t really exist — only man’s preference does.

This strikes at Christianity’s very heart because it renders the sacrifice on the cross incomprehensible. After all, if there’s no Truth and all is preference, there is no sin. If there’s no sin, there was no reason for Jesus to die for us. This means there is no need for salvation and, hence, no need for Christianity.

So given the relativism the young have been marinated in, their behavior is entirely rational. Why, if I believed all was preference, just a flavor of the day, why would I constrain my impulses with the Christian moral standard or any other? I should rather be a hedonist.

This is the matter’s crux. People sacrifice for principles, not preferences.

Burge also mentions that many Americans are rejecting traditional Christianity because of its teaching prohibiting homosexual behavior. He’s correct, and this brings us to the effect (planned?) of our Great Sexual Heresy in general and the homosexuality agenda in particular.

Think about what the sexual devolutionaries do, which is to portray rejection of homosexual behavior as bigotry. Insofar as people believe the church’s teaching is analogous to rejection based solely on skin color — if “homophobia”=“racism” — authentic Christianity=the KKK. Of course, I don’t believe this, but it is how people imbued with homosexuality doctrine will view it.

This explains why this tactic is ideal not just for homosexuality activists but all anti-Christian agitators. The more you can cast the church as a fire-and-brimstone purveyor of our newly minted bigotry, the more you push it into the hate-group category in modernists’ minds (note that overseas “hate speech” laws often prohibit criticism of homosexuality). And since the church cannot bend on definitive teaching, it can do nothing to extricate itself from this category. It’s brilliantly devious — some would say devilish.

Another faith-killing force, a devilishly seductive one, is the desire for eternal absolution. The disobedient child inside man doesn’t like being told “No!” He doesn’t like all the thou-shalt-nots. Christianity does one thing religion is supposed to do: It upholds a non-negotiable standard of behavior, reflecting the Truth, informing that sin really is real and that we really are wrong when indulging it.

Thus, the more people are married to sin, the more they’ll have to justify — and the more, then, that they’ll have an emotional vested interest in attacking what condemns that sin: Christianity.

Given this, a sure way to get people to divorce the church is to wed them to sin, is to seduce them into it. Interestingly, this is precisely what our society does.

Far from developing in children what Greek philosopher Plato called an “erotic” (meaning not sexual, but passionate) attachment to virtue, we stoke their passions with vice, via sexual messages in entertainment, the media, and elsewhere; inappropriate sex education in schools; sexual-liberation “philosophy”; co-ed dorms and lewd sexuality classes in college; and the sexual devolutionary agenda in general. In fact, if you wanted a paradigm for destroying faith, the modern West would be it.

The good news, from the Everything You Know Isn’t So file, is that faith is only declining in the West; in fact, religiosity is projected to increase worldwide during the next few decades. As an example, these 2016 statistics show that Catholicism’s adherents are increasing at a rate slightly greater than that of population growth.

The bad news is that with church attendance being one of the best predictors of voting patterns, with regular service-goers breaking widely for the GOP and atheists being largely Democrat, our declining religiosity explains leftism’s rise — and why American Christianity’s death would portend a dark political future.

After all, to paraphrase Belgian poet Émile Cammaerts, “When people cease believing in God, it’s not that they start to believe in nothing. It’s that they’ll believe in anything” — even, and especially in our time and place, socialism.

FAITH GOLDY KICKED OFF FACEBOOK & INSTAGRAM AMID PURGE OF CONSERVATIVES

FAITH GOLDY KICKED OFF FACEBOOK & INSTAGRAM AMID PURGE OF CONSERVATIVES

‘Our enemies are weak & terrified,’ Goldy writes

BY KELEN MCBREEN

SEE: https://www.infowars.com/faith-goldy-kicked-off-facebook-instagram-amid-purge-of-conservatives/; 

republished below in full unedited for informational, educational and research purposes:

Canadian activist Faith Goldy was banned from Facebook and Instagram Monday in the latest example of censorship directed toward conservatives.

In a Twitter post, Goldy said she was booted from the two platforms, writing, “Somehow Canada’s state media had enough advance warning to get a piece out before even I found out!”

“Our enemies are weak & terrified. They forget most revolutions were waged before social media!” she added.


🚨BANNED FROM @FACEBOOK & @INSTAGRAM🚨

Somehow 🇨🇦’s state media had enough advance warning to get a piece out before even I found out!

Bookmark https://t.co/THqYwXPkus right now‼️

Our enemies are weak & terrified😂

They forget most revolutions were waged before social media! pic.twitter.com/bw9XnjLsOE

— Faith J Goldy (@FaithGoldy) April 8, 2019




In an interview with Big League Politics, the former Toronto, Canada mayoral candidate responded to the censorship, saying, “They consider me to be a ‘Dangerous Individual.’”

A Facebook spokesperson touching on the matter stated, “Individuals and organizations who spread hate, attack or call for the exclusion of others on the basis of who they are have no place on Facebook.”

The move comes after Facebook pledged to ban “white nationalism” and white separatism from the platform nearly two weeks ago.

The social media platform’s representatives are also set to testify on Capitol Hill Tuesday about how to address “white nationalism” and extremism on the site following the New Zealand terror attack that streamed live on Facebook.

Last week, Huffington Post bragged about sending a Faith Goldy video to a Facebook spokesperson in an attempt to get her banned, but the spokesperson said it did not violate the site’s rules.

Goldy was also banned from using the popular Airbnb app last week after the company said she violated their terms of service despite failing to explain how.

In a response video posted to Twitter, Goldy suggested she’d fight harder than ever before and plugged her website faithgoldy.com as a place to find her content amid massive censorship.


B O O K M A R K👇🏻https://t.co/frdHo4TgDf pic.twitter.com/vwCsEulYNu

— Faith J Goldy (@FaithGoldy) April 8, 2019




Faith Goldy joins a long list of conservatives who have been targeted by social media giants, including Alex Jones who has been kicked off every major platform.

AMATEUR HOUR IN THE DEMOCRAT PRIMARIES

AMATEUR HOUR IN THE DEMOCRAT PRIMARIES

BY DON BOYS

SEE: http://the-trumpet-online.com/amateur-hour-democrat-primaries-don-boys-ph-d/; 

republished below in full unedited for informational, educational and research purposes:

Nancy Pelosi is stuck with this bunch. Serves her right.

 donboys.cstnews.com/amateur-hour-in-the-democrat-primaries

The Original Amateur Hour was an American radio and television program in the 1940s that had similarities to the Democrat Primary. It was a popular show as its copycat television shows such as American Idol have been in recent years. Most of the Amateur Hour’s  nascent contestants went down in flames deservingly so, but a few of the winners went on to have success such as Gladys Knight and Pat Boone.

It’s amateur hour on the 2020 election cycle with many of the Democrat candidates having disqualified themselves by their personal lives (lack of character) or insane, inane, and inept political positions they have espoused.

Former Texas Congressman Robert O’Rourke, known as “Beto” did diddlysquat in Congress and lost his recent senatorial race to Senator Ted Cruz.  O’Rourke was arrested for burglary and leaving the scene of an accident in the 1990s.  He is known for writing erotic verses about cows, and eating dirt after his loss to Ted Cruz.  (I would have eaten crow or humble pie, but not dirt.)   Beto fed his wife feces telling her it was avocado.  That says much about him and his wife.

Evidently, Beto thinks of himself as a wit and he may be half right.  He supports abolishing the Electoral College, packing the Supreme Court, and will consider reparations.  He has apologized for many zany and dumb statements, even for being born.

Joe Biden, considered the frontrunner, is almost sure he will run in 2020 but Joe has decades of heavy baggage from plagiarism to historical incompetence to aggressive dealings with girls and women.  Joe is known as “Handsy” and “Creepy Uncle Joe.”  The Gawker website published photos of what it called, “groping  moments.”  The leftist media usually does not call him to account but instead Joe is said to be “adorable” and a “classic Irish politician.”

Joe is also careless with his unscripted remarks telling an Indian-American man, “You cannot go to a 7-11 or a Dunkin’ Donuts unless you have a slight Indian accent.  I’m not joking.”  Joe has apologized for some of his dumb statements and for being a male but not for being born, as Beto did.

Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders is a front runner, although at his age, he will be limited how fast and how far he will “run.” However, everyone knows he will continue running to the left.  Bernie told his supporters via email, “Our campaign is about transforming our country,” but that’s what scares me.  He would abolish ICE.  He wants a free America transformed into a socialist state such as Laos, Venezuela, or Cuba.  Bernie does not admit that a socialist is a Communist without a gun.

Senator Cory Corker is a first term unmarried senator from New Jersey adamantly trying to convince his critics that he is not “gay.”  He proves it by dating a high-profile beauty.  Booker supports Medicare For All, the Green New Deal, abortion, LGBTQ rights, gun control, and would pack the Supreme Court. 

Senator Kamala Harris was Attorney General of California and has the reputation of sleeping her way to the top of the heap.  She was openly the mistress of Willie Brown, former mayor of San Francisco.  Kamala lied about  smoking weed in college while listening to the “music” of Snoop Dogg and Tupac.  It was untrue because Harris graduated college many years before their albums were released.  She would pack the Supreme Court and consider reparations.

Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts (born and reared in Oklahoma) entered the presidential race and released her tax records, challenging President Trump to do likewise. She supports “universal childcare, relief for student loan debt, universal health care by way of ‘Medicare for All,’ free public college, and a wealth tax….”  Warren has plans to abolish the Electoral College, abolish ICE, pack the Supreme Court, and she supports reparations. The senator lied about being an American Indian to gain a position at Harvard.  I wonder if Warren will denounce tenure as she did her Indian heritage. Warren no longer claims Native American heritage although she is often called Pocahontas by a very famous person.

Most of the Democrat candidates support reparations which is paying Blacks who may or may not have a slave history for the period of American slavery.  Would recent black immigrants receive payments, and would recent Asian and European immigrants be forced to pay their share?  What about payments to black millionaires?  The candidates are as silent as a graveyard.

The Green New Deal, brain child of Congressperson Alexandria Cortez, has been backed by all the candidates exceptJohn Delaney of Maryland.  Cortez is a lightweight completely over her head when discussing any subject, with the exception of bartending, her previous job.  I literally cringe whenever Cortez speaks about anything.  The Green New Deal would include guaranteed jobs, a push for “net-zero greenhouse gas emissions,” and a super ambiguous promise of “access to nature.”

Candidates like Senators Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren, Kirsten Gillibrand, Bernie Sanders, Cory Booker, and others maintain strong pro-choice voting records, but they don’t speak of abortion; it’s always reproductive rights, pro-choice, etc.  Not one of the 2020 candidates attended the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), this year.  AIPAC is a major lobbying group that advocates for Israel and hosted major leaders such as Vice President Pence and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The Democrat candidates, while not supporting Israel, do support the “Palestinians,” whose television station called last week for Muslims to “Scatter the enemies’ body parts, make the skulls fly in the sky.”  Hamas was launching missiles into Israel’s cities at the time of the telecast.

While the GOP in 2016 had some losers in their ranks, the Democrats are a gaggle of losers.  I considered listing the primary candidates in order of their chances to win on their merits. But since the candidates have so few merits, it is impossible to list all of them in last place.