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Fauci’s Quagmire: Snopes to the Rescue
Reprising the disastrous assumptions of Field Marshall Haig that the enemy could not sustain a war of attrition, General Westmoreland’s strategy in the Vietnam War put us on a path in which our primary goal quickly mutated into a desire to achieve the appearance of not losing while desperately looking for an exit.
Trying to appear not to lose is now the sole basis for our COVID-19 policy. “Losing” does not mean the disease spreading until herd immunity reduces it to endemic status (which was always going to happen anyway). Losing would be a forced admission that the suppression strategies failed and all the evolving, temporizing nonsense deployed to protect the illusion of effective leadership was not based on science but on vanity, a love of the spotlight, and possession of the levers of policymaking power.
We cannot even enjoy the demonstrable success of the vaccines against the severity of subsequent infection because, in the same vein as the “light at the end of the tunnel” gaffe, we were promised the vaccines would end the spread. Fauci & co. worked hard to make us fear the spread (“cases”) per se. Worse, most Americans can no longer trust the FDA or CDC for straight answers about vaccine side effects risks, effective treatments, or much else dealing with COVID-19. As with the Vietnam War, the loss of trust in government has deeply hurt the nation. The breach this time may be worse because the medical science and health guys should be the ultimate honest brokers of information.
Americans are mostly nice people (do not include me with you “mostly nice” types) who were probably prepared to forgive and forget the horrific social, political, and economic destruction of all the utterly futile mandates if the crisis could be finally brought to an end. We were encouraged to form the near-universal hope that vaccinating most people would quickly establish some kind of herd immunity and let us resume normal life. But now that it is clear that vaccines do not stop the spread, that there is no exit, no light at the end of the tunnel, and that we are resuming mandates that we now know with statistical certainty don’t work along with the prospect of endless boosters. And we must still remain in a conditioned state of fear of the number of “cases” like the Eloi hearing the Morlocks alarm sirens.
So the prospect of forgiveness and praise is receding rapidly. We are not at the point where Dr. Fauci will be scrambling onto the last chopper off the roof of NIH campus HQ. But the facade of competence and honesty is crumbling. The government-adjacent entities of social media and the MSM are working hard to forestall the reckoning.
Now that the data doesn’t really let us convincingly blame red state governors or the unmasked, the new Maginot Line of spin is that (a) the unvaxxed are clogging the hospitals and (b) we can’t let up on the mandates because those damned unvaxxed trogs won’t let us end the pandemic and the proof is: see (a). Not really steel-trap logic regarding infection numbers but it will have to do.
A paradigmatic example is how Snopes reacted to this Tweet from the estimable @ianmsc:
This trend is true almost everywhere—vaccination rates approach 90% and up and yet the number of “cases” still rises to new heights. This is. of course, not what we were promised. So, Snopes rides to the rescue of this newest variant of The Narrative and stamps this tweet “Misleading”
The funniest part of Snopes’ extensive criticism is the claim that the increase should have been shown as a mere 6,200% percent rather than 16,700% in another part of the thread, a point which is not exactly a devasting riposte but nevertheless delivered in a “so there” tone.
Snopes says screw the data–the experts still Believe, and the wrong sort of people like the tweet so it must be wrong:
The Twitter account’s many tweets about COVID-19 appeared to largely receive engagements from people who leaned toward anti-science, anti-vaccine, and anti-mask rhetoric. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), vaccines and masks are both effective in the fight against the deadly disease.
The data in the graph remains unrefuted. The point stands. Nevertheless, the “experts” believe and the anti-science MAGA hats don’t so those facts no longer matter. And, of course, here is the obligatory new official twist using hospital & death data:
The final part of the tweet read: “Hard to imagine a less scientifically justifiable policy than vaccine passports to keep others ‘safe.’” However, this missed the mark. Since the time that COVID-19 vaccines became available, the vast majority of cases, hospitalizations, and deaths have been in unvaccinated patients, according to data made available by the CDC.
Never mind that this misses the point about infection spread. It is those damned unvaxxed who are keeping it going. But the Narrative can’t handle that truth and also stupidly maneuvered itself out of eligibility for credit for what the vaccines actually do accomplish because we must fear the number of “cases” even if we are in an age and health demographic at minuscule risk.
Lost in the shuffle is the fact that despite various mandates and enormous vaccination rates, COVID still finds and kills its intended victims at the same rate everywhere. Vaxxed or unvaxxed, shouldn’t the overall death toll be a lot smaller by now if any of this had worked? Will the new spin twist hold as the percentage of deaths and hospitalizations among the vaxxed rises (as it must) or will it be about how those damned un-boostered types are keeping it going? Will people continue to tolerate this farce?
Maybe if the Great Barrington guys had set policy, there might have been some reduction in deaths as a result of a more intensively targeted protection strategy but nothing much appears to stop COVID, so who knows. In any case, The Great Barrington approach would not have required constant lies to justify hideously costly failures to achieve unattainable goals as has the Fauci quagmire.
Published in General
Terrific post.
The next Republican presidential candidate, whoever that is, should run on a promise to permanently remove Mr. Fauci from government service.
It is definitely worse. The CDC and FDA literally trusted with the health and life of all Americans. They are not just incompetent, they are corrupt and would rather Americans die than they admit fault or decline some Pharma payoff. Scientists and researchers don’t have a Hippocratic oath to “do no harm” and it clearly shows. Vietnam was based on lies, but most people would not have cared, if there was not a draft. Look at Iraq.
Oh great. That means we only have three more years of having to listen to this idiot. How about some of the “leaders” in congress do something about him now?
It feels to me that we are re-living the era of Lysenkoism. The Russians (and Chinese) went all-in for 2 generations on a bad theory of non-genetic inheritance. The commie politics trumped science with religious zeal. Tens of millions starved and all eastern science suffered. I fear the current grip of commies/corporatists that have captured our government and media take a generation to overcome. Ike warned us. When you read below think about that time Fauci said, “I am the science.” Fauci lied and people died.
A primer from Forbes:
Right?
Actually, it’s probably the case that neither the President nor Congress can fire the fellow — even if they were so inclined. He’s a high-level federal employee, protected by a raft of civil service protections that Congress helpfully carved in stone.
However, I’m sure an incoming President could tell him to sit down and shut up.
There is nothing in civil service law that says you have to listen to some clown just because he’s hard to fire.
I am still awaiting someone (anyone? Preferably more credible than Dr. Fauci or the CDC) to explain the PUBLIC health benefit of a Covid vaccine mandate (how it matters to others if I have received a Covid vaccine), IF (as I keep hearing, even from public health officials) people who have received a Covid vaccine spread the virus as much as those who have not received a Covid vaccine. “Reducing overloading of the medical system” is not a genuine public health benefit since we now have almost two years of data showing that isn’t a realistic concern. “For your own good to ensure you don’t get as sick as you might” is also not a PUBLIC health benefit.
The picture in Vermont looks like the picture in Massachusetts.
It’s so weird to see this. It’s like watching a play in which the actors in the forefront are performing one thing while the actors in the background are performing the exact opposite. “So-and-so is a wonderful and nice person” while So-and-so is axe-murdering someone in the background.
It’s like the reporter talking about the “peaceful protests” in front of the stores that are in flames behind her.
It’s surreal.
It makes one question every historical account of every event in human history. If historians have used the prevailing media, everything we think we know about those events may in fact be entirely wrong. :-) :-)
Only if the media were Lefties.
Spot on. The only justification for a mandate would be to stop the spread.
The fallback will be that the unvaxxed are placing an undue burden on medical facilities. Despite the claims of the innumerate, hospital capacity has not been overwhelmed by this last wave of “cases” according to Johns Hopkins data below. I guess we should also reject AIDS patients who abuse drugs or are sexually promiscuous, diabetes patients with poor dietary habits, psychiatric treatment for obsessive leftist loons, pedestrians who failed to look both ways, cardiac patients who don’t exercise regularly, and anyone else who could have mitigated or prevented their health issues in any way.
The Narrative is crashing and burning.
Put him in a special room somewhere, like those incompetent and/or dangerous teachers we hear about occasionally, who can’t be fired.
Or just tell him to wear a mask. A soundproof mask. All the time.
An air-proof mask would be even better. Problem solved.
Racist.
What, Fauci isn’t white? Is CNN lightening him too?
Well, okay. Good point.
Homophobe.
Peter Navarro said he asked Trump to fire Fauci twice. Both times, the heads of CDC, NHS, HHS, and FDA intervened. Trump’s media people said it would be a disaster. Trump did not have the guts to fire all of them, but that surely would have gotten him impeached. Makes you appreciate DeSantis even more.
Trump certainly got the ball rolling. If DeSantis becomes President, he’ll owe a lot to Trump. We all do, even those who don’t realize it.
Strictly speaking, Fauci was correct, though maybe if I saw his full statement in context I’d change my mind.
How could that be “correct” when he expressly said the case numbers were going to be expressly linked to vaccination percentages? He said that multiple times. Please produce/describe/ invent a “context” in which this was correct. While you are at it, find a country (a) where there was no recent surge despite (b) high vaccination rates.
He was saying stuff like this:
That big sloped line sure “resembles” a surge to me. He was making the argument in June when the country was at least 50% fully vaccinated. The last surge started a month later even as vaccinations continued to increase. That surge should not have happened according to Fauci.
Last summer he repeatedly sold the idea that more vaccines meant fewer cases. You can’t seriously be making the argument that (a) there was any ambiguity in that claim or (b) that there is any spin, interpretation or planet where that claim proved correct.
First I want to know if he said that. Then we can go from there. I don’t necessarily believe it if someone says he said that, any more than I believe it if people tell me that Trump said this or that.
Believe it! Old Bathos referenced the quote by Fauci in his last comment linked to the word “Source.” It is right there on video in the interview on CNN.
Thank you. I listened to it. Sounds like a typical politician who left plenty of caveats and conditions in his statements so that he couldn’t be shown to be wrong. It also confirms my policy of not listening to people like him, and listening to people who are close to the research instead. I’d rather listen to someone I can learn from.
Exactly. Covid-19 Vaccines are no longer a public health issue. It is a personal health issue. I encourage everyone to get vaccinated or a booster if they haven’t had a confirmed covid case in the last 9 months. However, you getting it doesn’t protect me it just protects you.
Congratulations on having your post listed on lucianne.com! And, thank you very much for such a fine analysis of–the word you selected could not possibly be improved upon as a perfect descriptor of where we are right now with regard to these issues– our current quagmire. Concerning the member —@thereticulator— who observed that he chose to listen to those close to the research over the “politician class” I note that I agree with his approach even though his test for admissible evidence seems to be quite a bit higher than mine. That said, because I do want to see something more solid in the way of evidence, I have just ordered Bobby Kennedy, Jr.’s new book taking, if you will pardon a painful pun, the mask off of the Potemkin person known as “Dr.” Fauci” and have pre-ordered Dr. Scott Atlas’ new book, out in December, which apparently shows what a Confederacy of Dunces that whole task force was, including Birks, the Scarf Lady, and others!
Thanks again for this excellent post; I hope many more see it now that it has been listed on one of the major news aggregators.
Sincerely, Jim
And now the media is trying to staunch any further hemorrhaging of the favorite narrative that being unvaxxed will allow your immune system to protect you comes word that Africa, where only 6 % of the populace has been vaxxed, is now responsible for the very latest, most pandem-icky variant of them all. (I guess we will need yet another two weeks to flatten the curve.)
Odd that last year, Trump could not mention that China was the origin of COV 19, as that was racist, but picking on “the Dark Continent” is fair game for any and everyone on The Left.
However the officials in Bottswana are trying to flesh out the story, so that we in the West can arrive at the truth. The letter below summarizes the finding that all four “carriers” of the new variant were travelers to Africa, who were fully vaccinated:
We really have no way to know what is happening in terms of whether hospital beds are made up of vaccinated or unvaccinated people.
Health workers have come forward to state the hospitals where they have been working do not consider a person to be vaccinated until fifteen days after they had the jab. (Not all hospitals have administrators doing this, but some do.) Additionally, when fully vaccinated people, whose jabs were given at least 15 days before they were hospitalized, do take up beds in a hospital, their vaccination records are deleted. (And again, this happens not at every hospital, but definitely at some.)
With the passing of each and every day, it has become more and more apparent that the official narrative is about promoting A Grand Design, a design that has little to do with anyone’s health.
One of your last statements intrigued me.
“Maybe if the Great Barrington guys had set policy, there might have been some reduction in deaths as a result of a more intensively targeted protection strategy but nothing much appears to stop COVID, so who knows.”
There seems to be a suggestion of blame thrown the way of the Great Barrington guys, as those they could set policy. Actually many of that lot are setting policy at the clinics they run and oversee, with the patients who are seen in person or over Zoom session.
These drs freely write up Rx’s of HCQ and ivermectin. Although Fauci, the FDA, the CDC all are hoping Americans will fail to notice it, there are remedies that obliterate COVID. The main drawback to these remedies is how empowered the modern day equivalents of Auschwitz have become in stubbornly failing to administer the remedies, while being sure to prescribe rocephin, fentanyl, remdesivir and having the patient thrown on a ventilator.
Once in a while the deadly machinations of the hospital crowd are stymied, as they were in the following case:
Story from earlier this week:
https://rescue.substack.com/p/a-judge-stands-up-to-a-hospital-step?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=copy
Naperville Illinois judge demands hospital administrators stand back and allow COVID stricken man to have the remedy ivermectin
My comment: the early part of this article deals with how serious a case of COVID this patient was struggling against, & how determined hospital big wigs were in denying him a chance of using ivermectin, even though he was seriously ill, possibly dying. The article concludes with these paragraphs:
“Ng, who with his wife, Ying, had come from Hong Kong to celebrate their granddaughter’s birthday, was able to breathe without a ventilator within 5 days—he, in fact, removed the endotracheal himself. He left the ICU Tuesday, November 16, and, although confused and weak, was breathing Sunday w/o supplemental oxygen on a regular hospital floor. “Every day after ivermectin, there was accelerated and stable improvement,” said Dr. Bain, who administered the drug in two previous court cases after hospitals refused. “Three times we’ve shown something,” he told me. “There’s a signal of benefit for ventilator patients.”
Ng’s remarkable progress stands in sharp relief to repeated attempts by Edward-Elmhurst Health, the hospital’s managing system, to thwart the use of ivermectin. It succeeded in having the court’s initial November 1 order dismissed by claiming Ng was in better health than his lawsuit contended (he wasn’t). It then defied the Nov 5 order, saying Dr. Bain was not vaccinated (a negative test resolved the issue).
Moreover, after Ng’s treatment was complete, the hospital system filed notice that it would appeal the order that had already been carried out. It did this even though Sun Ng seemed to have benefited greatly.
Throughout this ordeal officials have speculated about when the pandemic would end and what that would take in terms of immunizations and restrictions on our activities. Most people have regarded this speculation as just that, not promises officials made to us that if we did this or that then we’d have such and such a result. But some have spoken of promises they made and then broke and lies told by officials, which is not reasonable since there’s no way that anyone could have known what exactly would happen. As the situation has developed officials have had to revise their positions in various ways, and some have viewed this uncharitably, which isn’t reasonable, either.
That’s not the FDA or CDC’s fault. It’s the fault of people who have unreasonable and unrealistic expectations and turn unrealistic expectations into outrage when they are dashed.
Regarding Vermont, that state has had a very low level of infections through this whole thing. the lowest death rate per capita of all 48 mainland states, which was most likely because of strict restrictions on activities. Once they were mostly vaccinated the rate of infection went up when the restrictions were removed in June. This rate is still lower than the other 48 mainland states, and their death rate per capita remains very low. It’s wrong to conclude that the vaccines are not working from this data or that this was somehow another promise officials broke. We knew from the outset that the vaccine protection wasn’t 100%. Most likely they are seeing far fewer infections now than they would have if restrictions were relaxed without people being vaccinated.