For Dr. Anthony Fauci, liberty apparently ends where his power lust begins.
The director of the U.S. National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and top White House health advisor said Sunday on CNN’s State of the Union that COVID-19 restrictions have “nothing to do” with Americans’ civil liberties. He made the comments following a heated exchange in Congress with Representative Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) about how the response to the virus outbreak has eroded U.S. citizens’ rights.
Speaking on CNN’s State of the Union, Fauci shot down Jordan’s contention that restrictions on businesses and individuals put in place since the lockdown began in March 2020 violate Americans’ constitutionally protected freedoms.
“I don’t enjoy those kinds of confrontations but I mean, it was very, very clear that he was talking about liberties that were being restricted,” Fauci said. “This has nothing to do with liberty…. We’re talking about the fact that 560,000 people in our country have died. We’re talking about [60,000] to 70,000 new infections per day. That’s the issue. This is a public-health issue. It’s not a civil liberties issue,” he added.
On April 15, during a House Coronavirus Crisis Subcommittee hearing, Jordan asserted that Americans’ First Amendment-protected rights had been “completely attacked” during the pandemic. “You don’t think Americans’ liberties have been threatened the last year, Dr. Fauci? They’ve been assaulted!” exclaimed the Ohio lawmaker, who serves as the ranking member on the House Judiciary Committee.
Fauci quipped back that he doesn’t “look at this as a liberty thing,” prompting Jordan to reply, “Well, that’s obvious!”
“You think the Constitution is suspended during a virus, during a pandemic?” Jordan asked. “It’s certainly not!… Over the last year, Americans’ First Amendment rights have been completely attacked. Your right to go to church, your right to assemble, your right to petition your government, freedom of the press, freedom of speech have all been assaulted.”
{modulepos inner_text_ad}
The intense back-and-forth prompted Representative Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) to tell Jordan to “shut your mouth” after the congressman’s time had expired. Joe Scarborough came to Fauci’s defense on MSNBC’s Morning Joe Friday morning, declaring that “No personal liberties were taken away. The Supreme Court has reviewed the cases. The courts have reviewed cases. It’s sheer idiocy playing for the lowest common denominator.” Scarborough added:
They’re trying to attack the messenger … while they’ve been lying through their teeth to the American people, who has been warning that a lot of people could die. A year ago, they kept saying, ‘Open things up, everything’s fine, what is this? No worse than the flu.’ No worse — over 550,000 people are dead. And the lies continue. The scapegoating still continues.
As The New American has reported, global flu cases mysteriously went down by 98 percent amid the COVID-19 pandemic. In Australia, for instance, just 14 positive flu cases were recorded in April 2020, compared to 367 during the same month in 2019 — a drop of 96 percent. And by June of last year, which is typically the peak of the season in Australia, there were zero cases. In Chile, just 12 flu cases were detected in the entire country between April and October 2020. By contrast, the South American nation experienced 7,000 flu cases during the same period in 2019. Meanwhile, surveillance tests in South Africa found just two cases at the start of the season, which became zero by the following month — a 99-percent drop from 2019.
The establishment, however, does not want Americans reaching the obvious conclusion: that COVID-19, produced by the novel coronavirus, is a flu strain that for the high-risk may be slightly, but not significantly, more deadly than the typical strain. Those raising the alarm about COVID-attributed deaths, calling for lockdowns and obligatory mask-wearing, always conveniently ignore that well over half a million people die from the flu every year, according to the WHO. But no one bats an eyelash at these figures (and while the mainstream channels report the worldwide COVID-19 death count is more than a million, there has been extensive evidence of these numbers being padded).
Some observers who favor the mainstream media narrative argue that the drop in flu cases was caused by the coronavirus safety precautions. But the question remains: If social distancing, masks, lockdowns, and other restrictions successfully stopped people from spreading the flu, shouldn’t they have likewise stopped people from spreading COVID-19?
