OPINION:
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the millionaire government pensioner who left a trail of human wreckage behind him from scores of vacillating media interviews pushing junk science, will undoubtedly face some tough questions from Congress. Those whose lives were forever harmed by his maniacal manipulation of the COVID-19 pandemic will likely be left wanting.
He was the face of America’s pandemic response and the personification of our constitutional crisis. Dr. Fauci may not end up being prosecuted, as many believe he should, but the methods he and countless others in the public health complex sanctioned deserve to be at the forefront of our national conversation in this election cycle.
Dr. Fauci’s appearance before Congress is an opportunity, particularly for Republicans, not to make this a one-day spectacle but to launch a full-throated campaign to remind Americans that President Biden and his far-left allies threatened democracy and lives by empowering actors such as Dr. Fauci.
It’s an opportunity to expose the seedy and dangerous underbelly of the federal government and how unaccountable leftists, squirreled away for decades in executive agencies, are a threat to our freedom.
Dr. Fauci personifies the threats to democracy Mr. Biden is so fond of discussing. His abuses of power should be another millstone hung around the neck of Mr. Biden as he struggles to win reelection.
Dr. Fauci drove widespread fear and panic when science should have called for risk stratification and reasonable safeguards. Dr. Fauci’s approach amounted to gross experimentation with the lives, livelihoods and liberties of every American.
He relished the attention, posing for photos and magazine spreads while Americans needlessly died alone or lost their income because of his junk medicine. He even had a devotional candle with his face on it in his office.
While then-President Donald Trump became captured by the public health bureaucracy and was dealing with a novel situation in the first months of the pandemic, he quickly came to the realization that the economy needed to open, people needed to get back to work, schools needed to be in normal session, and COVID-19 needed to be treated as a highly manageable virus.
Regrettably, he expressed those views clumsily or combatively and frequently failed to exhibit the kind of compassion Americans expect from their chief executive in an emergency. Nevertheless, within a few months, Mr. Trump knew that the prescriptions Dr. Fauci and others were pushing would lead to permanent injury.
While Mr. Trump, albeit belatedly, tried to sideline Dr. Fauci, Mr. Biden took the opposite approach. He emboldened him.
By the time Mr. Biden took office, the scientific community knew that widely reported case counts, hospitalizations and death counts were fiction. They knew that COVID-19 was not a threat to children or even adults who didn’t have at least three to four other medical conditions.
Most Americans had come to appreciate that social distancing and the ever-changing mask protocols weren’t stopping the spread and “stop the spread” itself was a scientifically unsupported strategy.
Worst of all, it was apparent that the vaunted vaccines would not stop infection or transmission of the virus. Despite that, the Biden administration led the nation in vaccination mandates that led to the firing of teachers, doctors, nurses, police officers, service members and others while forcing millions to take a shot they didn’t need.
There was evidence early on after the rushed approval of these experimental therapeutics that they would have limited effectiveness and that they were only an advanced therapeutic for high-risk patients — at best.
As for Dr. Fauci, he kept on denying all of this. The public health complex, of which he was the face, kept on telling people that there were no therapeutics and that Ivermectin was dangerous.
The public health complex in this country is critically important. But thanks to Dr. Fauci, the misinformation spread by Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention at the time, and the state health officials who either parroted their nonsense or used the crisis for political gain, Americans’ trust in public health has sunk to new lows in recent years.
It has been uncovered that Fauci staffer David Morens at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases may have conspired with other government officials to cover up, delete or otherwise obscure emails related to COVID-19 and Dr. Fauci.
Thousands of pages of emails also show how Dr. Fauci’s forces in the public health complex colluded with the Biden White House and Department of Justice to censor legitimate scientific discussion. One of Mr. Biden’s top aides, Andy Slavitt, even successfully pressured Amazon to change its algorithm to depress the visibility of books about the COVID shots.
Our government sought to eliminate the scientific method, squash dissent and skirt safety protocols. Doctors and scientists were censored and threatened. Lives were destroyed by government misinformation.
COVID-19’s origins are worthy of investigation, as is any associated cover-up. The bigger mission here is to ensure the public understands the depth of the deception and the damage done to this country by the likes of Dr. Fauci and those in government more than willing to shred the Constitution.
When your opposition gives you ammunition, use it. Mr. Biden and Dr. Fauci did that in spades. Nearly every American was financially, physically or psychologically harmed. The Fauci factor in the 2024 election must be given the attention and resources it deserves.
• Tom Basile is the host of “America Right Now” on Newsmax TV and a columnist with The Washington Times.
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