Below is my column on Fox.com on yesterday’s “testimony” from Dr. Anthony Fauci. Americans deserve answers to the questions raised by his diary and other remarks. The most likely course to gain such answers would be through an immunity grant. The impact of a pardon on invocations is a bit murky but, as I stated yesterday, the odds favor Fauci in a court finding that he can still invoke the privilege. In any challenge, a court would likely find that there remains a risk of self-incrimination. What is clear is that many in Washington would prefer Fauci to remain silent on the questions raised by his diary.
Here is the column:
“Stick with the science and never veer from that, even when the science turns out to be an inconvenient truth for somebody.” Dr. Anthony Fauci delivered those words to Georgetown students in 2017 as the touchstone of medical ethics. Today, before the Senate Homeland Security Committee, that line was replaced by Fauci in repeating “On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer based upon my rights under the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution.”
The optics could not have been worse, but what you saw depended largely on how you viewed the hearing. For critics, Fauci sounded like Crazy Joe Gallo without the sunglasses. For supporters, Fauci is still a hero who refused to fall into a trap laid out before him. Democratic senators such as Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-NH) actually praised Fauci for refusing to answer questions before Congress.
There is no question that it is Fauci’s right to refuse to invoke his privilege against self-incrimination and many advised him to do so. It could be taken for strategic reasons separate from any criminal culpability. After all, he was given a last-minute pardon by President Joe Biden, and any false statements he made before the Committee could be used to bring criminal charges against him.
However, Fauci is unlike many who have invoked the privilege. While many past witnesses have invoked the privilege in being called to Congress, Fauci has testified for days in countless prior hearings. He also has appeared in countless interviews on these issues. He had reason to fear this hearing after his diary revealed startling contradictions with what he was stating publicly.
The question many will ask is why Fauci could not just “stick with the science” and resolve these contradictions. The fact is that he would have had difficulty in dealing with his own “inconvenient truths.”
Fauci’s opening statement expressed obvious anger over the release of his “unredacted diary.”
The new evidence shows that Fauci connected the Wuhan lab to the emerging crisis before most people had ever heard of the lab. It also shows him repeatedly referencing the lab’s gain-of-function work and discounted the “wet market” as the true origin of the virus as opposed to an “amplifier.”
Some of the most embarrassing areas for Fauci concerned his entries acknowledging that he pushed to close schools, despite public denials that he ever recommended such closures. His entries take credit for convincing figures such as then-New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, the staff of California Gov. Gavin Newsom, and others to close the schools.
In an Oct. 16, 2022, ABC interview, Fauci repeated that denial: “They always come back and say, ‘Fauci was responsible for shutting schools down.’ I had nothing to do [with it]!”
The media has also taken the Fifth on these subjects, declining to publish many of these contradictions. They have the same reason as Fauci: there are no spins that would reconcile their own prior coverage and gushing reviews of Fauci. The diary entries also show disturbing references to private meetings with media figures.
Fauci’s diary refers to CNN anchor Jake Tapper 41 times. In some entries, Fauci suggested that the host was concerned about crafting an interview to better serve Fauci: “Jake wanted to make sure the interview did not cause me any problems.” Fauci also related how he met socially with Tapper in July 2020: “Had dinner over Jake Tapper and Jen Tapper’s home in DC. Terrific couple. Friendship building.” (Notably, on October 14, 2020, CNN published a report repeating the condemnation of the dangers of “small household gatherings.”).
The diary revealed an obsession with his publicity and access to celebrities. The diary is replete with his gushing accounts of himself, such as “It is not hyoperbole [sic] to say that today I am the most famous and talked about person in the country and one of the most recognizable peson [sic] in the world.”
The fact is that diaries tend to be self-obsessed, and no one would want their unvarnished private thoughts made public. Rather, my gripe with these passages is something I have previously written in criticism of Fauci. During this period, dissenting scientists were barred from social media, removed from positions, and vilified for expressing views, despite now being vindicated on subjects ranging from the lab origin of the virus, the efficacy of masks, the six-foot rule, natural immunities, and school closures.
As these courageous scientists were being abused (by academic and media figures who still hold their positions), Fauci said not a word in their defense despite privately acknowledging that they could be right.
Yet, Fauci remained silent as his allies in the media savaged those who voiced the view that the virus was man-made and escaped from the lab.
In 2021, New York Times science and health reporter Apoorva Mandavilli was still calling on reporters not to mention the “racist” lab theory. (Federal agencies found the lab theory to be the most credible despite Fauci claiming publicly that a natural origin was the most likely explanation).
Fauci stayed silent while relishing his celebrity status. Indeed, his diary shows no concerns for these scientists as he breathlessly recounted his bobbleheads and cover shoots.
Once again, Fauci has every right to invoke his constitutional rights, but the public has every right to demand answers to these questions related to the deaths of 1,238,563 Americans. That may result in a grant of immunity to compel him to answer these questions.
If it is any solace for Fauci, he will clearly be able to maintain that he is “the most famous and talked about person in the country.”
Jonathan Turley is a law professor and the New York Times best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”
Prof. Turley while I mostly agree – there is no legitimate strategic basis for taking the fifth
The constitutional right is solely a right to not be forced to testify against yourself, and that has been found to only apply when you face the jeophardy of criminal prosecution.
Those who argue that he has been pardoned, and can not invoke the 5th are correct. Further, even if he was FORCED to testify justified by the pardon, and the pardon was later found invalid – he would still have immunity for that testimony.
This is how the Oliver North Prosecutions failed.
At the same time congress should just grant him immunity for his testimony. The offer costs them nothing – he is already immune and it allows his testimony.
There are very good reasons to get his testimony. We need to understand Everything that was going on to prevent it in the future.
We need to undertand how the funding of research that ultimately cost millions of lives was accomplished circumventing laws.
We need to understand how Govenrment used false public health justifications to deprive people of their liberty.
Covid was bad, but it is increasingly clear that we did everything possible wrong, and that we did not do so inocently with good intentions, but with a variety of bad intentions.
Further While Fauxi is the Dr. Mengele of this story – myriads of others were involved who do NOT have pardons – and all should face conseuences.
John Say, you’re wrong.
That because Dr. Anthony Fauci has a presidential pardon covering past actions (from 2014 to January 2025), he faces zero legal jeopardy today. This is completely false. A pardon cannot immunize a person for crimes they have not yet committed.
If Fauci testifies before Congress today and aggressive lawmakers like Senator Rand Paul claim his answers contradict his past statements or his personal diary, Fauci can be charged with a brand-new count of perjury. Because this perjury would occur in 2026, the 2025 pardon offers absolutely no protection. Avoiding a brand-new perjury charge is the exact “legitimate strategic basis” for taking the Fifth.
Without an official, voted-upon grant of congressional immunity, a witness cannot be “forced” to testify if they invoke the Fifth Amendment. A past presidential pardon does not grant automatic immunity for future congressional hearings.
If Congress grants Fauci immunity for his current testimony, they would be immunizing him against the very thing they are trying to trap him on—perjury. If Congress shields him from future perjury charges just to get him to talk, they lose all legal leverage to punish him if they catch him lying. This is why Congress rarely grants immunity to high-profile political targets.
Sen. Paul wants to punish Fauci. He can’t do that if Congress grants him immunity. This whole charade is about seeking punishment and to force him to commit perjury. That is why his right to invoke the 5th is entirely and absolutely justified.
What is your legal authority for saying that a witness can plead the 5th because he wants to avoid the possibility of being charged for perjury in the testimony he is being asked to give? That would give every witness a basis for refusing to testify. Is there any case that holds this?
Daniel, you need to look at how the law actually works. The Fifth Amendment protects people from self-incrimination, which includes protecting them from being forced into a perjury trap during a hearing. A witness is NOT immune from being prosecuted for perjury if they lie to Congress today. The fear of a manufactured perjury charge is exactly why the Fifth Amendment exists.
You don’t have to take my word for it the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Ohio v. Reiner that the Fifth Amendment’s basic function is to protect people from being ensnared by hostile questioning. Under the landmark precedent Watkins v. United States, the Supreme Court made it clear that Congress must respect a witness’s Fifth Amendment rights just like any criminal court.
“Daniel, you need to look at how the law actually works. The Fifth Amendment protects people from self-incrimination, which includes protecting them from being forced into a perjury trap during a hearing. ”
There is no such thing as a perjury trap. Avoiding perjury is easy – TELL THE TRUTH.
The 5th amendment protects you from being a witness against yourself for your own past conduct.
If you did not commit misconduct – you have nothing to fear.
If you did but are immune – you have nothing to fear.
“A witness is NOT immune from being prosecuted for perjury if they lie to Congress today. T”
Finally something you say that is correct.
“he fear of a manufactured perjury charge is exactly why the Fifth Amendment exists.”
Nop the 5th amendment does not exist to protect you against manufactured perjury charges – Every witness has some risk of that every time they testify.
The 5th amendment solely bars your being a witness against yourself. If you have immunity – then you face no possibility of prosecution – so the 5th amendment priviledge dies.
“You don’t have to take my word for it the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Ohio v. Reiner that the Fifth Amendment’s basic function is to protect people from being ensnared by hostile questioning. ”
False the holding in Ohio v Reiner is that asserting your innocense does NOT preclude asserting the 5th. That is all.
Questioning is court is often hostile – we have an adversarial system. hostility is not a basis for asserting the 5th.
“Under the landmark precedent Watkins v. United States, the Supreme Court made it clear that Congress must respect a witness’s Fifth Amendment rights just like any criminal court.”
Correct, but you seem to miss that with a presidential pardon Fauxi faces no threat of prosecution, and can not raise the 5th.
Not before congress – not in a criminal or civil trial.
Fauxi can renounce the pardon and assert the 5th. Though the law opn whether a pardon can be renounced is not all that clear.
But so long as he is sheilded from prosecution by the pardon, he MUST answer questionres with respect to the acts and the period covered by the pardon.
John Say, you say “with a presidential pardon Fauci faces no threat of prosecution, and cannot raise the 5th.”.
These two statements cannot both be true. Because a past presidential pardon from 2025 cannot immunize a person for a crime they commit in 2026, Fauci does face a real threat of prosecution if he speaks today. The Fifth Amendment applies whenever a witness faces a realistic threat of future prosecution. Since the act of testifying today creates a brand-new threat of a perjury prosecution, the privilege remains entirely intact.
There is indeed such a thing as a “perjury trap”. In federal law, a perjury trap occurs when a prosecutor or committee calls a witness with the primary purpose of extracting a statement that contradicts an existing piece of evidence, just to secure an indictment.
If Fauci is asked to recall exact details, dates, or phrases from a 2020 pandemic meeting, and his memory deviates even slightly from his personal diary, a hostile prosecutor can frame that memory lapse as a deliberate, willful lie under oath. The Supreme Court has long recognized that the Fifth Amendment is designed to prevent people from being forced into these exact semantic traps.
You claim Ohio v. Reiner only means that asserting innocence doesn’t stop you from taking the Fifth. You completely skip the Supreme Court’s explicit reasoning.
In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court stated that the Fifth Amendment serves to protect “the innocent who otherwise might be ensnared by ambiguous circumstances.” The Court recognized that a completely innocent person can invoke the Fifth if answering truthful questions provides a hostile government with the building blocks to construct a false or misleading criminal case against them.
The claim that “if you did not commit misconduct, you have nothing to fear” is a fundamental rejection of American constitutional law. You know nothing about how the law works.
The Supreme Court explicitly struck down this logic in Grunewald v. United States (1957), ruling that the Fifth Amendment is a safeguard for the innocent, and that treating it as an admission of guilt or a badge of misconduct is completely unconstitutional.
You continue to be wrong even in the face of the facts.
“a past presidential pardon from 2025 cannot immunize a person for a crime they commit in 2026″
Correct – there is absolutely no way at all to gain immunity for a crime that has not yet occured.
Pardon’s and transactional immunity are ONLY protections against prosecutions for PAST acts.
If you are given immuniuty and you lie that is just about the most certain way in existence to get prosecuted for perjury.
You are completelyu toast if you testify falsely while you have immunity.
Faucxi alrready has immunity for the past.
No one cvan give him immunity for the future.
” Fauci does face a real threat of prosecution if he speaks today. ”
ONLY if he lies.
“The Fifth Amendment applies whenever a witness faces a realistic threat of future prosecution”
Nope. The 5th amendment only applies when a truthful answer about a PAST act might reasonably lead to prosecution.
Your idiotic argument would result in no one ever giving immunity for testimony. The ONLY reason for granting immunity is to REQUIRE the witness to tell the truth. If they are free to lie without consequence – there is no reason to give them immunity.
The goal of hearing sis not to get people to testify.
It is to get them to testify TRUTHFLLY
“There is indeed such a thing as a “perjury trap””
Nope.
“In federal law, a perjury trap occurs when a prosecutor or committee calls a witness with the primary purpose of extracting a statement that contradicts an existing piece of evidence, just to secure an indictment.”
That is not a perjury trap. No one is ever obligated to lie.
“If Fauci is asked to recall exact details, dates, or phrases from a 2020 pandemic meeting, and his memory deviates even slightly from his personal diary, a hostile prosecutor can frame that memory lapse as a deliberate, willful lie under oath.”
They can and they will lose. Outside left wing nut lawfare people are not prosecuted for incorrect testimony about facts that are not material
Search Assist
The elements of perjury include that the person made a false statement while under oath in an official proceeding, did so with specific intent/willfulness (knowledge the statement was false, not just confusion or mistake), and that the falsehood was material to the proceeding.
Proving perjury requires proving EACH of 3 elements.
False Statement Under Oath
The person must have knowingly made the false statement It is not sufficient for the statement to be incorrect due to confusion or a mistake; the individual must be aware that the statement is false.
Materiality of the Statement
The false statement must be material, meaning it has a direct impact on the outcome of the proceeding.
Statements that are irrelevant or do not affect the case may not qualify as perjury, even if they are knowingly false
” The Supreme Court has long recognized that the Fifth Amendment is designed to prevent people from being forced into these exact semantic traps.”
Nope,
you keep citing SCOTUS cases that do not hold anything even remotely close to your claim.
“You claim Ohio v. Reiner only means that asserting innocence doesn’t stop you from taking the Fifth.”
Yes, that is the HOLDING of the case.
“In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court stated ….”
You are not citing the decisioon – you are citing someone else.
Read the DECISON – Specifically the HOLDING,
That is the Only part that is binding.
I would note that your source – NOT the supreme court, explictly says things that are not anywhere in the decison.
If you are going to cite the supreme court – cite THE SUPREME COURT
No court in the nation is going to care in the slightest what some random third party claims the supreme court said.
The claim that “if you did not commit misconduct, you have nothing to fear” is a fundamental rejection of American constitutional law. You know nothing about how the law works.
The Supreme Court explicitly struck down this logic in Grunewald v. United States (1957), ruling that the Fifth Amendment is a safeguard for the innocent, and that treating it as an admission of guilt or a badge of misconduct is completely unconstitutional.
Grunewald v. United States
Held: If the main objective of the conspiracy was to obtain the “no prosecution” rulings, petitioners’ prosecution was barred by the three-year statute of limitations, since no agreement to conceal the conspiracy after its accomplishment was shown or can be implied on the record in this case to have been a part of the conspiracy.
Grunewald is not a 5th amendment case – it is a Statue of limitations case.
BTW there is no 5th amendment right after the stature of limitations expires.
“You continue to be wrong even in the face of the facts.”
Check a mirror.
“Daniel, you need to look at how the law actually works. The Fifth Amendment protects people from self-incrimination”
Yes
” which includes protecting them from being forced into a perjury trap during a hearing.”
Nope. You are never forced to perjure yourself.
“A witness is NOT immune from being prosecuted for perjury if they lie to Congress today.”
They are never immune for perjury they have not yet committed.
” The fear of a manufactured perjury charge is exactly why the Fifth Amendment exists.:”
Nope. The 5th amendment almost never protects you against a perjury charge.
If you have perjured yourself in the past, and you do not have immunity – you can be prosecuted – whether you invoke the 5th or not.
zIf you are going to perjure yourself – NOTHING – no0t immunity, not the 5th protects you from prosecution.
“You don’t have to take my word for it the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Ohio v. Reine”
Ohio v. Reine
The Fifth Amendment privilege’s protection extends only to witnesses who have a reasonable cause to apprehend danger from a direct answer. Hoffman v. United States, 341 U. S. 479, 486. That inquiry is for the court; the witness’ assertion does not by itself establish the risk of incrimination. This Court has never held, however, that the privilege is unavailable to those who claim innocence. To the contrary, the Court has emphasized that one of the Fifth Amendment’s basic functions is to protect innocent persons who might otherwise be ensnared by ambiguous circumstances.
“that the Fifth Amendment’s basic function is to protect people from being ensnared by hostile questioning. ”
There is absolutely nothing in Ohio V Reine with regard to “hostile questioning”
Hostile questioning is the NORM,
All Ohio V Reine decided is that a person can claim to be innocent and take the 5th.
That is ALL. I would note that Ohio V. Reine CLEARLY states that the determination as to whether a person may take the 5th rests with THE COURT not the person.
YOu have said that the senate can offer Fauxi immunity for past acts to compell his testimoney.
They can and may yet do that – it costs them nothing. They are offering immunity he already has.
In the alternative they can go to court and a judge can decide whether Fauxi is free to make a 5th amendment claim.
Without finding Biden’s pardon invalid the courts are going to require Fauxi to testify. He has immunity, there is no jeopardy for testifying about past crimes. He must testify. He can not invoke the 5th.
As an example if the statute of limitations has expired – you can not take the 5th.
You may only take the 5th when telling the truth might reasonably get you prosecuted.
And a Judge determines if that is the case – not you or your attorney.
“Under the landmark precedent Watkins v. United States, the Supreme Court made it clear that Congress must respect a witness’s Fifth Amendment rights just like any criminal court.”
Absolutely – congress can not force a person to testify about PAST acts for which they can still be prosecuted.
@George
No, George, you are George. And you project that daily onto every other living being, even though it is just yours. You are sad.
Nothing you said shows anything I stated is wrong.
Gee, just like YOUR responses!
“John Say, you’re wrong.”
ROFL
“That because Dr. Anthony Fauci has a presidential pardon covering past actions (from 2014 to January 2025), he faces zero legal jeopardy today. This is completely false. A pardon cannot immunize a person for crimes they have not yet committed.”
If I can decipher your poorly constructed remarks – you are correct, and we are not in disagreement, and nothing I said is wrong.
No one is asking Fauxi to testify about his future actions – and even if they did – you can not be prosecuted for what you MIGHT do in the future.
Only what you DID in the past.
“If Fauci testifies before Congress today and aggressive lawmakers like Senator Rand Paul claim his answers contradict his past statements or his personal diary, Fauci can be charged with a brand-new count of perjury. ”
Close to correct. If Fauxi testifies TRUTHFULLY today – he can not be charged with Perjury because he contradicts past lies.
He is immune from prosecution for what he said in the past that was FALSE.
But he is not immune in the present if he choses to REPEAT a past lie.
It is not conflicting his past remarks that would get him in trouble it is repeating past remarks that are demonstrably false.
“Because this perjury would occur in 2026, the 2025 pardon offers absolutely no protection. ”
Correct and true of every single person that ever testifies. Contradicting what he said in the past would be embarrassing.
Admitting that he lied and committed crimes would be publicly devastating. But would not subject him to prosecution for past crimes.
Only NEW ones would get him in trouble.
Again same as everyone else. Fauxi has LESS reason to invoke the 5th – not more. He can tell the truth immune from the consequences of past lies.
Very few witnesses have that luxury or protection.
“Avoiding a brand-new perjury charge is the exact “legitimate strategic basis” for taking the Fifth.”
Absolutely not. Like every single witness ever, Fauxi can avoid a perjury charge simply by telling the truth.
UNLIKE most witnesses he has ZERO risk of being charged with perjury for past statements.
He has zero risk of perjury today so long as he tells the truth REGARDLESS of what he has said in the past.
While people will not forget the lies under oath he has told int he past, he is not and can not be held legally culpable for them.
“Without an official, voted-upon grant of congressional immunity, a witness cannot be “forced” to testify if they invoke the Fifth Amendment.”
Incorrect. Fauxi can not be charged with anything regarding conduct of testimony from 2014 through early 2025. PERIOD.
He can not be charged today for his truthful remarks – regardless of whether they conflict with the past.
” A past presidential pardon does not grant automatic immunity for future congressional hearings.”
Correct, neither does a congressional grant of immunity. Immunity precludes you from being charged for PAST misconduct.
Immunity NEVER protects you from any conduct after the immunity grant.
“If Congress grants Fauci immunity for his current testimony, they would be immunizing him against the very thing they are trying to trap him on—perjury.”
Nope. Whether congress grants him immunity or not – he can not be charged for past conduct.
Whether congress grants him immunity or not – he can be charged for Current perjury.
“If Congress shields him from future perjury charges just to get him to talk, they lose all legal leverage to punish him if they catch him lying.”
There is no such thing as immunity for future conduct. With or without congressional immunity, Fauxi can not be charged for past conduct.
With or without congressional immunity Fauxi can be charged for any perjury he commits From the point of receiving immunity forward.
“This is why Congress rarely grants immunity to high-profile political targets.”
The first senator to point out to Fauxi that he already had immunity, that he was requirred to testify honestly and fully and thatr he was subject to contempt charges if he failed to do so destroyed the slightest hope of charging Fauxi by claiming that the Biden Pardon was a fraud.
No court was going to rule that even if somehow DOJ established that the autopen pardon was invalid, that the Senate had not extended him immunity by telling him it was valid and that he must testify.
There are other similar cases. Oliver North was granted only very limited immunity in his congressional testimony. He was subsequently tried and convicted based in part of testimony that was outside the scope of his immunity grant. his conviction was later reversed because of the immunity he was granted to testify.
John Say, you contradict yourself so many times it’s embarrassing. This is what you said,
“Avoiding a brand-new perjury charge is the exact ‘legitimate strategic basis’ for taking the Fifth. Absolutely not. Like every single witness ever, Fauxi can avoid a perjury charge simply by telling the truth… He has zero risk of perjury today so long as he tells the truth REGARDLESS of what he has said in the past.”
You reject the idea that avoiding a new perjury charge is a valid reason to plead the Fifth. By claiming Fauci has “zero risk.” That’s not true. He still faces risk.
You said,
“Whether congress grants him immunity or not – he can not be charged for past conduct. Whether congress grants him immunity or not – he can be charged for Current perjury.”
But the moment he swears in on this hearing he’s not protected by the current pardon. Because he faces new questions and a new accusation. That’s why he’s absolutely within his right to invoke the 5th.
Your “yes, but no” shell game is hilarious. You admit that Fauci can be prosecuted for new perjury, but then immediately claim Fauci faces “zero risk” and has “no reason to take the Fifth” if he just tells the truth. What nonsense. You have a weak argument.
John, let’s cut through the tangents about autopens and Oliver North. You admitted that a past pardon does not protect a witness from a brand-new perjury charge if they testify today.
Because you claim that avoiding perjury is as simple as “telling the truth,” you are completely ignoring 18 U.S. Code § 1623(c). Under this federal statute, the government does not have to prove a witness is lying today; they only have to prove that the witness’s current testimony is irreconcilably inconsistent with their past testimony under oath.
If a witness tries to “tell the truth” from memory today, but a hostile committee uses their past statements or diaries to show a clear contradiction, they can be prosecuted for a brand-new count of perjury under § 1623.Stop deflecting and answer this one specific question:
If a witness testifies today based on their honest current memory, but a hostile committee proves that their answer is irreconcilably inconsistent with their past notes, are they or are they not legally vulnerable to a new perjury prosecution under 18 U.S.C. § 1623?
Yes or no?
“No one is asking Fauxi to testify about his future actions – and even if they did – you can not be prosecuted for what you MIGHT do in the future.
Only what you DID in the past.”
Or the present.
“He can not be charged today for his truthful remarks – regardless of whether they conflict with the past.”
Yes he can. Because the pardon explicitly covers a certain time period. It does not cover anything he says now with a new line of questioning.
“ Congress grants Fauci immunity for his current testimony, they would be immunizing him against the very thing they are trying to trap him on—perjury.”
Nope. Whether congress grants him immunity or not – he can not be charged for past conduct.
Whether congress grants him immunity or not – he can be charged for Current perjury.”
You really don’t understand what you’re trying to argue. The whole point of the hearing is to put Fauci in a perjury trap. He’s not immune from perjury charges. If he’s questioned about his dairy. The pardon does not protect him from a brand new line of questioning. That’s why he’s able to invoke the 5th.
You lost the legal argument. You have no idea what you’re talking about. None.
“Sen. Paul wants to punish Fauci. ”
Absolutely – as do many many others.
And Guess what – they have succeeded.
Fauxi reveled in his reputation as a saint. Yesterday was almost the tail end of exposing him as a modern day Mengele.
I do not want to claim to read minds as you do. But my guess is that the entire political theater of yesterday was intentional.
This was Much like Eichman on Trial in Israel. Fauxi was esposed as a petti pathetic impotent person who had once unfortunately been given power beyond his abilities and abused it.
You are correct that the Senate could have granted Fauxi immunity yesterday and didn’t.
They didn’t because the got what they wanted – Fauxi on camera over and over invoking the 5th.
While the rules regarding the 5th required that once invoked he was required to continue to invoke it – even over the color of the carpet.
And I disagree with those rules. A witness who invokes the 5th should be allowed to consult their lawyer and testify about anything that does not implicate them. But that is not the rules.
Regardless most people do not understand or care. The do understand how pathitic and impotent it is to invoke the 5th over the day of the week.
Sen. Paul and other senators PUNISHED Fauxi yesterday. They took from him something he valued most – his claim to be a celebrity angel.
As of today he is just shy of Mengele in the public eye. That is far worse than any punishment that fauxi could actually expect from the courts.
Further I doubt this is over. ONE reason Fauxi was not given immunity yesterday – is because he can be given it in the future.
I expect we will see Fauxi again – and without the 5th to hide behind.
Another is that invoking the 5th when you have immunity is a crime – Contempt, and charges will be forwarded to DOJ.
Absolutely Sen. Paul wants Fauxi’s “head on a pike” -0 and he has gotten that, and he is not through.
Punishing Fauxi does not hurt Sen. Paul. The majority of people are behind him.
People want someone to blame for all the lies, and Fauxi is the judas goat being staked out for public slaughter.
Fauxi brought this on himself.
No I do not think this is near over.
The ONLY real protection Fauxi has is Trump. And that is complicated. Trump is complicit in some of Fauxi’s malfeasance.
Trump took much of Fauxi’s advice and followed it. This is also why there is no serious effort to address the lies about the Vaccine – because both Democrats and Republicans are anchored to the vaccine. Truymp still considers the vaccine =one of his great accomplishments that he does not get credit for. Democrats pretend that Trump had nothing to do with getting the vaccine to the world in record time.
Neither party is giving the vaccine the scrutiny it deserves because both parties are implicated.
While Other republicans participated in eviscerating Fauxi yesterday – the core of this conflict is between Fauxi and Paul – and Paul is NOT letting this go – even though Trump would prefer it disappeared.
Other republican senators do NOT have the links to Fauxi and his disasteroous handling of covid. They do not beleive the harm to Trump will be consequential, and they do not care – THEIR interests are also served in eviscerating Fauxi.
Regardless Trump is the only one who can and might stop this.
I doubt there is any love lost between Trump and Fauxi. But it is highly unlikely Trump will allow DOJ to go after Fauxi.
Trump’s opwn hubris and perception of his own infalability will not allow him to admit or even allow others to repeatedly claim Trump was misled by Fauxi. Fauxi did not go after Trump like Comey of Smith. or James or …atleast not until after Biden was president.
Trump would be happy to see Fauxi in jail – if it could be done without public spectacle that makes Trump one of those deceived by Fauxi.
“He can’t do that if Congress grants him immunity. ”
Of course he can – he just did.
Yesterday was Fauxi in the stocks with Paul and other senators throwing vegatables at him.
It was a very puritan form of punishment.
“This whole charade is about seeking punishment and to force him to commit perjury. ”
You can not “force” someone to commit perjury.
All you have to do to avoid a perjury change is tell the truth.
You claim that because Fauci has a presidential pardon, he already has immunity, and therefore taking the Fifth is “contempt.” This is completely false. A presidential pardon only covers past acts; it does not immunize a witness against a current perjury trap. Because Fauci faces a current risk of prosecution for new testimony, his Fifth Amendment right remains active.
There is no rule in the U.S. Senate or federal courts that says, “If you take the Fifth on question one, you are legally forced to take the Fifth on the color of the carpet.” Fauci’s legal team chose a blanket invocation as a defense strategy to prevent Rand Paul from building a foundation for a perjury charge. It was a strategic choice, not an administrative rule forcing his hand.
Since you abandoned the legal argument to pivot to dramatic analogies, let’s clear up the blatant legal misinformation in your response:
You don’t understand Contempt: You claim that invoking the Fifth while having a pardon is a crime and that “charges will be forwarded to DOJ.” This is legally absurd. A 2025 presidential pardon does not protect a witness from a 2026 perjury trap. Because active legal jeopardy exists, the Fifth Amendment privilege is fully intact. You cannot hold a citizen in contempt of Congress for exercising a valid constitutional right.
You don’t understand the Senate Rules: You claim the rules forced Fauci to invoke the Fifth over the color of the carpet. False. No rule forces a blanket invocation. His legal team chose a blanket invocation as a protective strategy to prevent a hostile committee from weaponizing basic questions into a § 1623 perjury trap.
The Theater Proves the Point: You openly admit “yesterday was political theater” designed to “punish” Fauci on camera rather than find facts. You just accidentally admitted to the exact definition of a weaponized, politically motivated proceeding.
You lost the legal argument the moment you refused to touch the federal statute. If you want to salvage any credibility, stop the storytelling and answer the question you dodged:
Does 18 U.S.C. § 1623(c) allow the government to prosecute a witness for perjury based solely on irreconcilable inconsistencies with past notes, yes or no?
Make up your mind – am I wrong or am I write ?
Regardless, no one can grant you immunity for future crimes.
Nor can anyone compell you to testify about future crimes you might commit.
Whether it is court or the senate inquiry – speculation about the future is NEVER perjury.
” Dr. Anthony Fauci has a presidential pardon covering past actions (from 2014 to January 2025), he faces zero legal jeopardy today.”
Correct and therefore have can not take the 5th for questions related to actions covered by the pardon.
You can not take the 5th if you can not be prosecuted.
“If Fauci testifies before Congress today and aggressive lawmakers like Senator Rand Paul claim his answers contradict his past statements orONLY if his current statements are lies.
” his personal diary, Fauci can be charged with a brand-new count of perjury.”
Absolutely – if he LIES.
The 5th amendment applies when telling the truth might subject you to prosecution.
It does not cover you when lying would subject you to prosecution – you are NEVER allowed to lie in court.
” Because this perjury would occur in 2026, the 2025 pardon offers absolutely no protection.”
Correct NOTHING protects Fauxi from prosecution for LYING again – EXCEPT telling the truth.
” Avoiding a brand-new perjury charge is the exact “legitimate strategic basis” for taking the Fifth.”
Nope – that Presumes that Fauxi is going to lie. That is his choice.
You can not invoke the 5th because “I might lie” You can only invoke the 5th when truthful testimony about the past might lead to prosecution.
That can not happen – Fauxi is pardoned.
“Without an official, voted-upon grant of congressional immunity, a witness cannot be “forced” to testify if they invoke the Fifth Amendment. A past presidential pardon does not grant automatic immunity for future congressional hearings.”
You have the most absurdly illogial understanding of everything.
The 5th amendment protects you when telling the TRUTH might lead to your prosecution.
Fauxi telling the truth can not lead to prosecution – he has been pardoned.
Fauxi telling new lies under oath can lead to prosecution.
There is no 5th amendment right to not testify because you might lie.
No one would ever have to testify.
“If Congress grants Fauci immunity for his current testimony, they would be immunizing him against the very thing they are trying to trap him on—perjury.”
Not at all. If congress grants Fauxi immunity and he lies – he will be prosecuted.
ALL forms of immunity are protection from prosecution for things you may have done in the past.
Immunity in return for testimony REQUIRES that your testimony is truthful.
No grant of immunity of any kind allows you to lie in the future without consequence.
“If Congress shields him from future perjury charges just to get him to talk, they lose all legal leverage to punish him if they catch him lying. ”
Nope all grants of immunity are for PAST acts not future ones.
“This is why Congress rarely grants immunity to high-profile political targets.”
Nope. Immunity is granted to secure TRUTHFUL testimony from people who might be prosecuted if they tell the truth.
MOST OFTEN immunity is granted to LOW PROFILE targets in order to get testimony to prosecute HIGH PROFILE targets.
“Sen. Paul wants to punish Fauci.”
Absolutely. Making Fauxi tell the truth making Fauxi tell the world of the crimes he has committed is the punishment Paul is seeking most.
Having St. Fauxi expose himself as Dr. Mengele from his own mouth is the punishment Paul and republicans are seeking.
“He can’t do that if Congress grants him immunity.”
Of course he can.
If fauxi tells the truth he confesses to his crimes from his own mouth – He exposes how untreustowrthy he is to all but the most rabid sychophants like yourself.
If Fauxi lies – he goes to jail.
” This whole charade is about seeking punishment and to force him to commit perjury. ”
You can not force someone to commit perjury.
People choose to lie.
John Say, it’s clear you’re an absolute moron. You have no idea why or how the 5th amendment works.
“The 5th amendment protects you when telling the TRUTH might lead to your prosecution.
Fauxi telling the truth can not lead to prosecution – he has been pardoned.”
No, it doesn’t work that way. Because telling the truth in that setting requires that everything he says is absolutely accurate in every detail. Recollecting things you said years ago and comparing it to whatever Sen. Paul claims he said is impossible to state with perfect accurate. This is why it’s called a perjury trap. Anything, ANYTHING Fauci says that doesn’t exactly match the record can be considered perjury under the law. The 5th protects you agains that because the absolute best way to avoid any discrepancy or misunderstanding of what was said in the past is to say nothing at all. Because saying anything INCLUDING THE TRUTH CAN BE DEEMED PERJURY. Because anything you say, even the truth, CAN be used against you. It can be twisted into a false claim or manipulated into an admission of guilt. That’s why the right to remain silent and not answer questions IS better than saying anything at all.
@John
Personally – I think the Mengele comparisons are apt. That we are not having tribunals should illustrate how this is not then, Fauci will walk. That he is likely a sociopath means he will never feel remorse for what he did. We are at the point where this transcends politics altogether.
The behavior of Fauci was revealed publicly but the entire apparatus of the modern left’s leadership is likely the same behind closed doors; Carville, for example, spouts off tyrannical propositions like he’s folding his socks; there is no other explanation for their behavior or mentality. This will not magically get better, and that mentality only gets more aggressive the more marginalized it becomes. Nevertheless: sanity must prevail.
The real news is fauci cannot tell the truth and he cannot lie. He’s cornered like a rat and he knows his own mouth is more controlled by that massive ego and not his ‘smart’ side.
I read an article in the Atlantic (left wing) Magazine yesterday singing the praises of Dr. Fauci. It reiterated how a bunch of renowned scientists agreed that Covid was transferred from an animal. Now years have passed and not one animal has been found to carry the virus. Not one apology? Not even one my bad? There is however one piece of evidence that can’t be ignored. Workers at the Wuhan lab became very ill. Fauci knew from the beginning and could see that the government funding that had fulfilled his fantasy would soon be drifting away if the truth were uncovered.
What would Sherlock Homes say? Elementary my dear Watson, elementary.
All other matters aside, huburus, arrogance, and narcissism are hardly unique personality traits inside the beltway.
Absolutely, and the purpose of the limited government of the constitution was to preclude them from using power to the detriment of the people.
Important fact: Fauci actually ran an effort to publicly ostracize the lab-leak theory. He wasn’t passive and that is documented. My theory (and everybody else’s theory): he did it to change the subject from the NIH funding of gain-of-function research at the Wuhan lab. He knew that was damning because such research was already barred in the USA.
There is a pattern of Democrats and their fellow travelers offshoring dirty deeds to get around U.S. law. Hillary did it when she created the Russian-collusion hoax and Fauci did it with a number of ugly research projects, including gain-of-function.
Since DOGE has dried up federal funding of Democrat-support groups and ActBlue has come under fire for possibly laundering money (dark money from the CCP?), the Democrats have suddenly found themselves near bankruptcy. The foreign money goes away and the Dems suddenly have to hock their headquarters to stay afloat.
All this suggests that foreign entanglements have been a Democrat strategy for years. Now there are rumors that the CCP blackmailed Joe Biden. Naomi Wolf is right: the Democrats are a national security threat.
DOGE was a start – we need MORE, much MORE.
Currently there are investigations of various forms of entitlement fraud. But the big deal is how pervasive that Fraud is.
Nor should we assume that fraud is limited to a few entitlements.
These programs and many more were unconstitutional and a bad idea from the start.
They can not be fixed. They must be ended.
Yesterday you wrote of Mamdani’s grocery stories – these too will prove vehicles for grovernment fraud.
We already know that Mamdani is using his takeover of housing authorities to fund his groups that got him elected.
He is building a political machine that is being Funded by Government.
Never ever should government be funding directly or indirectly the election efforts of those in govenrment.
Power Corrupts- ALWAYS.
I take it you’re clearly against Trump’s corruption as well.
can you name one? one thing? you have TDS so no you cannot.
@John Say
Mayor Mandami has only been a citizen of the US for eight years. I find it outrageous that he and so many others seem to have overlooked the fact that NYC was on the brink of bankruptcy 50 years ago. That’s when the Municipal Assistance Corporation was formed to issue the MAC bonds. With the exodus of so many New Yorkers, we cannot have folks running the state or its largest city who are economically illiterate.
@Diogenes
👏👏👏👏👏
So the lab theory is racist? Let’s move the Wuhan lab to Moscow and see what Mandavilli would say.
All truths that the left does not like are racist. Reality does not care.
Why would the release of someone’s diary ’embarrass” them unless it was full of narcissism? but a narcissist wouldn’t view it that way anyway so where is the source of Fauci’s embarrassment in his diary? What does he have to be embarrassed about? deaths of millions from his monster virus?
It evidences his perjury to Congress. He is a liar, he is responsible for funding the machine that created this mess and lying to Congress about it. He lied about masks, he played politics with Americans lives during a pandemic for monetary gain misusing federal employees for cash.
He is indirectly responsible for the deaths of millions of people, justice will be served at some juncture.
I just realized the incredible similarities between this guy and the character Dr. Frankenstein!
Both scientifically arrogant, dismissed reason, superiority complex, both took various body tissues to create life and that life escaped to wreak havoc on the villagers.
Well said.
BREAKING (satire): New York Times Quietly Relocates Three Bestsellers from Nonfiction to Fiction
In a joint statement, the Times confirmed that Anthony Fauci’s “On Call,” James Comey’s “A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership,” and Hillary Clinton’s “What Happened” have all been moved off the nonfiction list.
“We considered leaving them,” a spokesperson said, “but between one book whose author’s own diary contradicts it, one with the word ‘lies’ right there in the subtitle, and one that still hasn’t actually answered its own title, we felt fiction was the more honest shelf for all three.”
All three remain #1 bestsellers in their new category, shelved together under a new imprint the Times is calling “Government Accountability: A Choose Your Own Narrative.”
@Olly
What a hoot!
The much bigger issue:
Why would the best and brightest young people ever want to serve in government? Why take the risk of being used as political pawns by cowardly, divisive and self-serving politicians?
Government employees generally are lower paid than the private sector employers and when manipulated by petty politicians must hire attorneys to defend themselves for making good faith decisions. Why would anyone want to risk that?
In early 2020, nobody even knew what Covid was or understood it. In that scenario, greater precautions would be the adult responsible reaction to save lives, even if it was wrong in hindsight. Most American parents operate the same way protecting their children when dealing with uncertainty.
Fauci – unlike Trump – worked at a lower paying government job for decades for the goal of saving lives and serving the American people. Fauci didn’t receive free jets, free gifts or make billions of dollars like Trump.
Trump for his part ignored the pandemic in 2019, then told American possibly drinking or ingesting industrial bleach cleaning solution might cure Covid. Then Trump thought sunshine in the Summer if 2020 would get rid of Covid. Biden inherited the mess Trump created through inaction and ignoring real medical experts like Fauci.
Maybe Republicans have a cult problem, not a Fauci problem?
“Fauci . . . worked at a lower paying government job . . .”
At a salary of $480,000/year (not including benefits), he was the highest paid federal employee in American history.
The rest of your screed is equally accurate.
Fauci Made over $400,000 per year. Hardly an underpaid position.
That didn’t include the millions he received in grants and awards for his part in helping steal an election.
What is bothersome is that no matter what is written, if there is a comment section the “Trump is worse” crowd is always blathering about something. Fauci was with out a doubt one of the worst things that has happened to us. Yes, Trump’s an idiot and various other things bad, but how can anyone in their right mind apologize for Fauci?
“In early 2020, nobody even knew what Covid was”
Fauci DID!
Fauci DID receive free jets, DID receive free gifts and made millions you uninformed moron.
All of this information is available but you don’t know how to read?
“Government employees generally are lower paid than the private sector employers”
Once that was true – it is not any longer – Government employees are paid way above the mean and above the median incomes in the US. Further they have far better benefits, far better retirmement, and work far less hours.
John Say, got any evidence to back that up?
According to comprehensive data from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), government workers with a professional degree or doctorate are paid 23% to 24% less than their private-sector counterparts.
The inverse is true for low-skilled labor. Workers with a high school diploma or less do earn more in government than in the private sector. But for the highly educated staff managing federal agencies, the government operates at a steep discount.
Government workers as a broad group do have a higher raw average salary than private-sector workers. However, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), this is because the government employs a much higher concentration of white-collar professionals.
The public sector consists heavily of lawyers, scientists, regulators, teachers, and specialized administrators. The private sector, by contrast, includes millions of low-wage, entry-level, and retail service jobs that pull its raw median income down. Comparing the two without adjusting for education is mathematically misleading.
You need to specify exactly which government employees you’re talking about. Bunching all of them together is an easy way to mislead.
You can look up mean and media wages and mean and median govenrment wages.
it is not my job to prove to you things that you can trivially find for yourself.
“According to comprehensive data from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), government workers with a professional degree or doctorate are paid 23% to 24% less than their private-sector counterparts.”
BTW comprehensive and govenrment do not go together – Please quit trying to use spin to make arguments.
Govenrment data is what it is and it is rarely comprehensive of fine grained.
A tiny percent of people have professional degrees or doctorates. though the percent is likely larger for govenrment employees than the private sector. I have a professional degree and a license because it is either a requirement or an advantage in my work.
I do not peruse degrees merely to paper my walls. In the private sector FEW DO.
This is a multiply false comparison.
People with professional degrees in the private sector DO THINGS. that is why they have degrees, and it is why they are in the private sector.
The private sector is where things get done. Absolutely an engineer who takes risks and personal responsibility and builds bridges will be paid more than a government engineer who rubbers stamps the work of private sector engineers. Though the public sector person is more likely to collect advanced degrees for no purpose beyond getting raises and papering walls.
I am an architect. I get building built. I also take those buildings to sometimes very nice people at the state for various approvals.
Not one of them DOES anything – they do not build buildings they do not design them. They are not business owners or project managers.
They rarely have teams of people working for them they must manage. They do not ever take risks.
The primary factor in what I am paid is the risk I take on. My skill level means that those who hire me are taking less risk – and they pay more to get the same thing at lower risk. Regardless I am paid as a architect primarily for taking on the risk associated with getting a building built. If things go wrong – with certainty AI will be sued – and if I made a mistake – I will lose alot. Even if I am not responsible – I am at risk.
There is a giant gulf between a government architect and a private one – at most the similarity ends with the degree.
They do not do anything close to equivalent jobs – and for the most part they do not even have equivalent degrees.
Not only do I have a professional degree, but I passed a stringent test to get a licence to practice architecture.
I am not the equivalent of nearly anyone with an architecture degree in govenrment, further most people with a architecture degree but no license are NOT equivalent. Nor are people with masters or doctorates in architecture but who do not practice.
Further we tend to find those in Govenrment whether teachers or others tend to collect advanced degrees – paid for by govenrment.
I have a architectural degree so that I can practice architecture. The people in govenrment do not have that degrees to practice architecture.
I do not have a masters or doctorate of architecture – because those do not make me more valuable as an architect. I have a license – because that does.
When you compare apples to apples – people in govenrment are paid more for less.
“But for the highly educated staff managing federal agencies, the government operates at a steep discount.”
Short of cabinet positions and under secretaries – mid level management of govenrment agencies is almost meaninless.
BTW most of it is meaningless privately too. Studies of middle management in business have typically found that 60% of middle management is not merely useless but actually reduces revenue and profits.
“Government workers as a broad group do have a higher raw average salary than private-sector workers. However, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), this is because the government employs a much higher concentration of white-collar professionals.”
I am not interested in what BLS says but what the data says.
Regardless. while a high school degree a colleged degree, etc. are useful as filters for entry level jobs. Outside of Government your future is determined by your productivity and success in your prior jobs. Private workers rarely engage in and employers rarely support continued education Except where it clearly will produce results. I tried to take a few college courses long ago after I graduated., But I found that it was not possible to go back to college – everything was so disconnected from the real world. It was far easier and more meaningful to learn whatever I needed outside of academia, and I had no need for certificates to put on my wall – though I do actually have plenty of those.
Government almost never cares about actual productivity, in many cases being productive is a deficit. But they do care about degrees,
Absolutely go to work for the government and get more degrees. It does not actually change your value to a private employer, and though it may change your pay in govenrment it does not change your value there either.
Regardless, While I am not discounting education entirely – as I said it is often a pre qualifier for entry level positions.
I told you I am an architect – I am also an embedded software developer. I have code in the Linux kernel. I do not have a degree in computer science or anythign that would qualify me for the software development work I perform. Unless this is your first job out of college – in which case no one is going to allow you to do what I do, no one cares about your degrees, they care what you have accomplished. They care about the risks you have taken and whether they have worked out.
It is very hard to transition from a govenrment job to a private sector job – because the culture is different, the performance metrics are different.
“The public sector consists heavily of lawyers, scientists, regulators, teachers, and specialized administrators.”
Mostly false. Most lawyers are not public sector and you would not want or expect otherswise.
Scientists should not be public sector – Science is not a legitimate govenment role – regardless most scientists are not in govenrment.
Regulator is an oxymoron. Teachers are obviously primarily government employees – and government works incredibly hard to keep it that way. There is no such thing as a specialized administrator. People rise to middle management from within the field that they were initially workers. regardless you skipped myriads of jobs in govenrment receptionists, secretaries, police.
The STRUCTURE of government employment is no different than private employment. The tiers as you rise from the bottom to the top are no different. The numbers at each level are no different.
A private law firm needs receptionists, secretaries, paralegals, interns, associates, ….
The DA’s office has the same needs in the same proportions.
There are a few verticals in govenrment that do not exist privately – such as police. But the structure and the needs at each level are relatively the same.
The most fundimental difference is that Govenrment does not produce anything and that makes performance metrics harder.
“The private sector, by contrast, includes millions of low-wage, entry-level, and retail service jobs”
So does government.
“Comparing the two without adjusting for education is mathematically misleading.”
Comparing the two using education is definitely misleading.
“You need to specify exactly which government employees you’re talking about.”
No actually I do not.
While the tasks performed by government are different, contra your claim the structure of employment is essentially the same.
I would further note that for the most part the “highly educated” people in govenrment generally work with their less educated by more accomplished peers in the private sector. As I noted – I am an architect. A significant portion of my interactions with people in govenrment have been with people who were also educated to be architects. Unlike most of them – I am licensed. But often they have masters and even docotrates that I don’t. But I have building that I have built and they don’t. They are better educated and less well paid because they chose secutiry rather than risk. Because they produce nothing of value. Because while I am polite in my dealings with them – in the real world they are a cost with no value added. Many of them are knowledgeable and pleasant – but then contribute nothing. I deal with them to tick boxes required to actually build a building – but they are overall a net negative. they are a cost with not value. No amount of government review changes the FACT that I am the architect for a project – if ANYTHING goes wrong – I get sued. In most cases everyone associated with designing and supervising the construction of a building works for me. The mechanical engineers, the landscape architects, the electrical engineers – if they screw up – I get sued first. Even an allegation of failure on their part – goes through me.
My POINT is that education is only a rough proxy for value for entry level positions. Given that most of the people in government do not need to be there at all – their level of education is not relevant.
“Bunching all of them together is an easy way to mislead.”
Absolutely – most of those in government are well paid and unproductive.
@ John Say
Is there a pension forfeiture provision for fraud?
when manipulated by petty politicians”
Fauxi was not manipulated – he was the manipulator.
More actual harm was caused by Fauxi’s policies than by Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Dr. Fauci’s guidance—such as masking, social distancing, and vaccines—did not kill or maim anyone. In fact, peer-reviewed studies published in medical journals like The Lancet estimate that COVID-19 vaccines and early mitigation strategies saved tens of millions of lives globally. Equating temporary lockdowns and medical advice to a literal nuclear holocaust is plain stupid.
Fauci was an advisor. He had no power to pass any policy or mandate it. He could only advise on best practices at the time. All actual mandates and public health policies were enacted by elected officials—including state governors, city mayors, and the Trump and Biden administrations. Fauci could only give advice; he could not force any politician to listen to him. Calling him the sole manipulator ignores how the American government actually works. Which is to say John Say has no idea how government works.
Countries all over the world that never listened to Dr. Fauci—from European nations to Asian democracies—enacted the exact same lockdown and masking policies because they were fighting the same deadly virus. Disruptions caused by a global biological emergency, were not because the advice of a single American scientist.
“In early 2020, nobody even knew what Covid was or understood it.”
That is both false and not relevant. Fauxi is being damned right now because of the many many many things he KNEW from the start and LIED to EVERYONE – politicians, congress and the people.
While there are SOME things that were not known in early 2020. The POINT of all of this is that Everyone with a brain INCLUDING those like Fauxi who were Telling the world the opposite KNEW in early 2020, that Covid came from a Lab Leak of US Government funded research that was prohibited by law.
Covid was NOT a natural occuring virus it was a bioweapon that was illegally developed and accidentally released.
Those involved – including Fauxi have committed “Crimes against Humanity” Just as Hilter, Mao and Stalin have.
Beyond the origins – these people KNEW that masks did not work, that social distancing did not work, that school closures did not work, that pretty much all there policies did not work
And they FORCED them on all of us anyway – often while ignoring them on their own in private.
Again Fauxi is just the figurehead for massive tryanny.
John Say, as usual, you’re wrong.
U.S. intelligence agencies are not in agreement. While some agencies (like the Department of Energy and the FBI) later assessed with “low” to “moderate” confidence that a lab mishap was possible, several other intelligence agencies and the National Intelligence Council concluded the virus most likely emerged naturally through animal-to-human transmission.
Every single U.S. intelligence agency that investigated the matter explicitly ruled out the idea that SARS-CoV-2 was developed as a biological weapon.
Also, federal oversight committees and independent scientists verified that the specific viral backbones and genetic sequences used in the NIH-funded research were molecularly impossible to turn into SARS-CoV-2. The research was not “prohibited by law,” nor did it create the pandemic virus.
You keep saying things without evidence, just because you say so it does not make it true.
You say officials “knew from the start” that masks and social distancing did not work. That’s false.
In early 2020, officials initially discouraged the public from buying N95 masks to preserve scarce supplies for hospital doctors. Once data proved asymptomatic, airborne transmission was the primary driver of spread, the guidance shifted to recommend masking.
Nobody, not even medical professionals ever stated masks were 100% effective or that they would stop the virus. None. What they did say was masks effective in <reducing transmission not full protection. That’s a distinction you keep missing. It was ignorant pundits and internet influencers who made claims professionals said masks would prevent transmission. YOU believed what they said. That’s on YOU. Not the professionals.
Extensive peer-reviewed global health studies showed that high-quality masks and social distancing significantly reduced transmission rates before vaccines became widely available. Masks were never meant to be used as full protection against transmission. Never. The goal of using masks was to reduce the rate of transmission rather than stop it. Because reducing the rate helped keep more people from going to the already overwhelmed hospitals. That was the point of mask mandates. To REDUCE transmission rates.
“U.S. intelligence agencies are not in agreement. While some agencies (like the Department of Energy and the FBI) later assessed with “low” to “moderate” confidence that a lab mishap was possible, several other intelligence agencies and the National Intelligence Council concluded the virus most likely emerged naturally through animal-to-human transmission.”
I have no idea what the NIC might have said – and I doubt you do either. Nor do I care.
I am glad that intelligence agencies have reached valid conclusions.
But no one needs an intelligence agency to grasp this.
1). Every single time any virus has jumped from animals to humans we have found the animal source – usually withing weeks, but it has never taken more than 9 months. If you do not find a source in nature the odds of an animal to human jump is astronomically SMALL.
The odds of all life on earth being wiped out by an asteroid are today greater than covid coming directly from an animal to a human.
Again this is MATH. I know this is difficult for you but ALL SCIENCE is dependant on math.
If the science is not supported by the math – the science is WRONG.
Separately while Trump and others have fixated on intelligence estimates – this is not a international intelligence issue.
Does the NSA have a satellite that can detect viruses jumping from Pangolins to humans ?
If I want to know where North Korean Nukes are – I will consult the CIA (or increasingly the private services that are proving even better.
If I want to know if a virus came from nature I will wait to see it biologists throughout the world identify that source.
If they do not within short order – the odds become exponentially larger with each day the source was not from nature.
Few things are as certain today as that Covid did not come directly from an animal.
After that – Do you have any credible alternative besides it was man made ?
As Sherlock Holmes says – when you rule out the impossible whatever is left no matter how improbable must be the answer.
Could covid have come from a lab other than the Wuhan Institute of Virology ?
Could it have been introduced deliberately rather than accidentally ?
None of those are ruled out with the degree of certainty an animal source is.
But given that WIV was conducting GOF research on bat corona viruses – with some funding from the US and Fauxi.
And given that the intial outbreak was not only in Wuhan but alon the subway lines that serve the WIV
The degree of certainty is sufficient that proving an alternative is YOUR BURDEN.
And yes this is comparable to nuclear hollocaust.
Engineered lethal viruses are weapons of mass destruction.
“Every single U.S. intelligence agency that investigated the matter explicitly ruled out the idea that SARS-CoV-2 was developed as a biological weapon.”
Might even be true.
Not relevant.
Three mile island Chernoble, Fukashima were accidents. Fortunately only Chernoble had significant global impact.
But TMI did experience a meltdown and came incredibly close to a containment breach and could easily have been as bad a chernoble.
“Also, federal oversight committees and independent scientists verified that the specific viral backbones and genetic sequences used in the NIH-funded research were molecularly impossible to turn into SARS-CoV-2.”
ROFL
That is total garbage – you claim it came from nature. There are two differences between human biological engineering.
The first is the human engineering process is faster. The 2nd is that gene splicing can create things that nature can not.
If as you claim Covid could come from nature – then you can not claim it could not come from bio-engineering.
“The research was not “prohibited by law,””
Of course it is – that is why it was moved to China.
This is all well documents. It was well documented BEFORE Fauxi’s diary.
Sen Paul has been pummeling Fauxi over this for years. Fauxi’s testimony has mostly been YORU kind of word games – he does not deny funding the research he denies it is “Gain of Function” and he does so using word games – but his diaries prove HE called it gain of function.
Regardless the point is you are making an absurd claim. Covid Exists – it was not a figment of our imagination.
Absent your proposing a 3rd alternative – it came from a lab or from animals.
ANYTHING that can evolve in nature can evolve in a lab except faster. But there are things that can evolve in a lab that can nopt evolve in nature.
“You keep saying things without evidence, just because you say so it does not make it true.”
No I expect you to be familiar with ALL the evidence that has accululated over 6 years AND be familiar with all the claims that have actually been falsified.
I am not interested in arguments from you that were debunked years ago.
I do not need to provide you with evidence that has grown in scope and credibility over time to the point that only a few loons like you still try to argue.
“You say officials “knew from the start” that masks and social distancing did not work. That’s false.”
PRIOR to 2020 11 double blind controlled studies of masks were performed over the course of 20 years measuring the effectiveness of masks against airborne viruses like the Flu with HALF the transmission rate of Covid.
ALL Universally found masks do not work – an additiona 3 studies of masks agains Covid from 2020 forward found the same.
Regardless, early in 2020 controlled lab experiments found that an n95 mask caught 76% of covid virus passing through it.
That sounds good – but the effectiveness to stop a virus with a transmission rate of 2.5-3.5 is about 98.5% not 77%.
Anything less and all you do is slow the spread and risk the virus becoming endemic. Which is exactly what happened.
Further the 76% effective rate is is per exposure. The 98.5% required to stop the spread is an aggregate rate sustained globally until the virus dies out.
We have NEVER stopped an airborne virus once it gets a foothold.
Are there specific use cases in which a mask can provide some protection ? Absolutely – but they are entirely useless as a means to stop the spread of the virus.
“In early 2020, officials initially discouraged the public from buying N95 masks to preserve scarce supplies for hospital doctors. Once data proved asymptomatic, airborne transmission was the primary driver of spread, the guidance shifted to recommend masking.”
And that was WRONG.
“Nobody, not even medical professionals ever stated masks were 100% effective or that they would stop the virus. None. What they did say was masks effective in
“Dr. Fauci’s guidance—such as masking, social distancing, and vaccines—did not kill or maim anyone.”
Actually they did – but that is a small part of the harm.
But directly addressing the killed or maimed.
The Trump administration is not persuing the issues with vaccines – because Trump is very proud of Project Warp Speed, and is not desparate to prove how bad vaccinations and our vaccination policies were.
Regardless, much though not all of what we are discovering today was known in 2020.
Vaccinations are hard on the immune system. The major vaccinations that people get are taken once, and provide near life long immunity.
The Flu Vaccine is the only vaccine that people take regularly and the data has shown for a long time its effectiveness is poor.
Every vaccine that “works” is NOT automatically a good idea. All vaccines KILL PEOPLE. Nearly always they kill people who would have lived.
But they also save people who would have died. When you have a disease like Smallpox that is very deadly and that a single vaccination provides lifelong immunity that is a pretty easy choice. The harms of the vaccine are usually vastly outweighed by the benefits.
The covid vaccine has possibly the worst adverse effects numbers of any vaccine ever. In the past it never would have been approved.
If it has any benefits they are short lived. Like ALL vaccines – people die from taking it – though more than most vaccines. Additionally people who do not die are seeing lifelong complications. In the US we are seeing few good studies – Neither Biden nor Trump nor the europeans want to fund research that might fund the covid vaccine was a disaster. But there is excellent research coming from Japan.
It is remotely possible that there is a USE case for the Covid vaccine based ont he data we have now. But even early on with less data – there was enough to clearly assert that a mass vaccination program was a BAD MISTAKE.
Not only did the vaccine harm lots of people directly.
But you should never use mass vaccination as the means of eradicating a disease unless you can vaccinate EVERYONE in a time frame determined by the transmission rate of the disease, and the half life of the vaccine.
You do not EVER use a vaccine to try to eradicate a disease when the disease has a transmission rate of 2.5-3.5 – early covid – much less over 30 – Omicron. You do not ever do so when the half life of the vaccine is measured in months not years.
When you do the above you guaranteed the disease (and vaccination) will be with you always.
The spanish flu killed over 100 milion and is gone forever. we have had other serious flu epidemics that have followed the same pattern.
Every global epidemic ever has come and gone EXCEPT COVID – it is still with us.
The bad news is it is 10 times more contagious than initially. The Good news is that it is far far less fatal.
But the reason that covid is still with us and still infecting and killing people, and that we are still vaccinating people and maiming and killing them is because of ALL of our policies.
Those policies transformed covid from an epidemic that burns out to an endemic disease we have always.
So YES – Fauxi and the rest of the left killed and maimed people.
YOU can be excused – it is unlikely that you understood that our efforts to eradicate covid could instead result in making is permanent.
But Fauxi KNEW or should have known.
I KNEW that flattening the curve was a very bad idea when it was first brought up. I knew that masks were useless when I learned that the laboratory test single exposure effectiveness was 76% I knew the vaccine would not work when I learned that it had an initial effectiveness of 97% and a half like of 6-9 months.
KNOWING those numbers are not good enough and create a serious risk of making the disease endemic is MATH – it is not science.
” In fact, peer-reviewed”
Have ZERO interest in PEER REVEIWED – I am only interested in properly conducted studies done following the scientific method or other mathematically valid means of assessing data.
I am not interrested appeals to authority. I am interested in REAL science.
Regardless – it is pretty trivial to FALSIFY these “studies”.
Using only demographic factors you can accurately predict the mortality of Covid in pretty much every country in the world.
Demographic factors ALONE – completely ignoring policy.
What is the age curve of the population, what is the population density, what is the proportion of the population with serious medical problems.
Undeveloped countries with young populations that did absolutely nothing had the lowest mortality rates. Why ? Because in undeveloped countries if you are not healthy you died BEFORE covid came along. In the US with double the proportion fo the population with diabetes of anywhere in the world – Covid killed alot of diabetics.
Generally world wide the countries with the BEST healthcare had the highest mortality rates. Why ? Because Covid kills unhealthy people and really good healthcare allows unhealthy people to live when elsewhere they would die – UNTIL COVID.
I have no idea whether the studies you claim actually exist. YTou are not a trustworthy source – but even if they do – Peer review does NOT change the actual requirements for valid science it is NOT a substitute for mathematical and statistical rigor, nor for reproduce ability.
Peer review would have left us with the sun revolving arround the earth – Galleleos peers overwhelmining said he was wrong.
Please do not cite self serving garbage.
You can always find studies that say anything you want. You can especially always find studies that say Govenrment did not F#$K up – The govenrment spends millions to get those studies.
” studies published in medical journals like The Lancet estimate that COVID-19 vaccines and early mitigation strategies saved tens of millions of lives globally.”
Ignoring the FACT that is an obviously false claim.
Lets pretend it is correct. You left wing nuts have claimed that Trump handled covid WORSE – yet the same data does not show that.
You have claimed that the approach of the swedes was going to lead to disaster – but they did better than most of europe.
The FACT is that all the various different claims you make – both about covid and about most everything else are self contradictory.
That means with certainty some of them are false – i.e you are obviously an untrustworthy reporter.
But it is possible for ALL your claims to be false – and even likely.
“Equating temporary lockdowns and medical advice to a literal nuclear holocaust is plain stupid.”
Just because you do not like something does not make it wrong or stupid.
“Fauci was an advisor. He had no power to pass any policy or mandate it. He could only advise on best practices at the time.”
ROFL
Your doctor has no power to make you do what he advises. But if you follow his advice and you are harmed – HE IS RESPONSIBLE.
People who are paid for their professional judgement are responsible when that judgement is bad – especially when it is predictably bad.
” All actual mandates and public health policies were enacted by elected officials—including state governors, city mayors, and the Trump and Biden administrations.”
Has anyone said they should be let off the hook ?
“Fauci could only give advice; he could not force any politician to listen to him. Calling him the sole manipulator ignores how the American government actually works. Which is to say John Say has no idea how government works.
Countries all over the world that never listened to Dr. Fauci—from European nations to Asian democracies—enacted the exact same lockdown and masking policies because they were fighting the same deadly virus. Disruptions caused by a global biological emergency, were not because the advice of a single American scientist.”
You are completely ignorant of the power Fauxi wielded both within the US and globally.
Fauxi is responsible for approving the Gaion of Function research on Bat Corona Viruses.
He is responsible for funding the early work in the US,
he is responsible for the move to China
and part of the funding for the work in China.
Fauxi controlled a significant portion fo the global purse strings. He controlled careers globally.
Absoluytel he was not alone in all this – but he was the leader. Both in advice and in action.
For years, Fauci was the highest paid federal govt employee, making more than the President of the United States.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamandrzejewski/2021/01/25/dr-anthony-fauci-the-highest-paid-employee-in-the-entire-us-federal-government/
Facts simply don’t matter to the Left.
With qualified vaccines still months off, researchers showed how ordinary household cleaners and, I believe, UV light could kill COVID. Trump wss fascinated, and asked if anything COULD work LIKE that, but in the body, according to all transcripts of his remarks. He thought the light solution might work, but what did he know? He was no scientist.
No mention of bleach consumption or injection was made
Sure. Showing up to a hearing with a preemptive pardon and 12 attorneys and pleading the fifth over the color of the carpet positively screams ‘innocent’.
This was some of the most epic evil in modern history, possibly of all time, in the West. There is simply no other word for the sheer madness of the modern left, they are barely human anymore at this point. The subsequent wagon circling and gaslighting can probably be seen from outer space.
James, remember, even Trump has invoked the 5th after loudly claiming those who invoke it are hiding something or guilty of something. Trump is equally suspect of being guilty after invoking the 5th.
So you’re on the side of pleading the fifth always? what a ridiculous equivocation!
When it’s warranted and legally valid it is. Fauci is perfectly within his right to invoke it.
Letitia James
Trump pleaded the fifth only one time in his life: during a four-hour Letitia James fishing expedition deposition as part of a civil suit alleging the Trump Organization committed fraud when it set valuations for its properties for the purpose of getting loans.
James could not be trusted, bc no one had lost any money, even if they had relied on Trump Organization estimates. So pleading the fifth was merely prudent.
Not like 1.25 million dead Americans because Fauci wanted to play with bat viruses.
@Anonymous
No, actually. And you all need to disavow yourselves of the notion that anyone other than you is that unequivocally stupid or susceptible to suggestion. Whatever money is being pumped into you may as well have been lit on fire. And left to your own devices that is likely precisely what you would do with money.
why is it, EVERY Democrat wants censorship and canceling anyone that challenges them?
Would it be that ALL Democrats are really just FASCISTS seeking TOTAL POWER?
Now do Donnie Von Schitzenpantz. He took the 5th hundreds of times during a court appearance.
Donald did not kill over one million people
Actually he has. And more.
Sally: Check your meds. You’re having delusions.
@Sally
You are a very bad troll. At least try to make sense. Pro tip: nobody believes you.
Try this thought experiment. Imagine finding out the federal government had been quietly funding nuclear research inside Iran, calling it peaceful energy work, all while knowing that same research could be turned into a weapon. Nobody accepts that. Everybody instantly understands why funding dangerous, dual use research in a country we don’t trust is disqualifying on its own, no explanation needed.
Now add the next layer. Imagine the lead scientist behind it wasn’t some anonymous name in a report. Imagine he was a public face, someone an entire generation of young people was told to admire, someone who inspired kids to go into science and medicine because he represented trustworthy expertise. Then imagine he got caught lying about the work, caught contradicting his own private notes, and instead of owning it, an entire political party and half the media class circled the wagons around him. Mocked the people asking honest questions. Treated a straight answer like a concession to the other team.
Now picture the kids who grew up admiring him watching that play out. They’re the ones asking why he won’t just tell the truth. Meanwhile the actual adults, senators, pundits, decades of public life between them, are the ones making excuses for the dodge.
That’s backwards. Gain of function research in Wuhan was the same bet as nuclear research in Iran, dual use, dangerous, handed to a regime with a track record of hiding the truth.
Different visual, same recklessness. And when the man behind it gets protected instead of held accountable, it doesn’t just damage his reputation. It teaches an entire generation exactly how little the truth matters once your team needs you covered.
The Supreme Court has repeatedly affirmed that the Fifth Amendment protects the innocent, not just the guilty. When a public figure is faced with a hostile political committee openly seeking criminal prosecution, invoking the Fifth is a standard defense against targeted perjury traps and politically motivated prosecution. It is a refusal to participate in a political theater, not an admission of lying.
Even Trump has invoked the 5th for the same reason when he is being deposed.
Because he cannot be prosecuted for past actions covered by the pardon, the primary remaining legal danger he faces at a new congressional hearing is perjury—being caught in a semantic trap by aggressive lawmakers. Pleading the Fifth protects him from new, manufactured charges, not past accountability.
Also, almost all advanced virology and medical research is technically “dual-use,” meaning knowledge used to cure a disease could theoretically be weaponized.
The U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) funded research globally to study viruses where they naturally emerge. Funding a localized lab to monitor active bat coronaviruses is standard epidemiological surveillance, not a clandestine geopolitical partnership.
Your sense is too much for MAGA peanut brains.
X: All good points. The problem most have with Fauci was his public position that the lab was not the source of covid as well as his other non scientific pronouncements. The public trusted this man. Now the truth is out and people are angry. Still, as you note, taking the 5th was the wise legal move.
Tryingtoclarify!,
Fauci was managing a global crisis that no expert initially understood, and he did it while fighting political interference. Changing guidance based on new evidence is how science works, yet he was undermined by an anti-intellectual movement that trusted podcasters over actual medical experts. Fauci is being scapegoated for the mistakes of others. Senator Paul didn’t know how to handle the pandemic any better than anyone else. This ongoing attempt to “catch him in a lie” is just a personal grudge that the public has completely moved past. We have much bigger problems to worry about.
Faucio “managed” nothing but his ego and the press. He and his lab conducted NO science – tho they certainly funded dangerous science and madeup messages and fiction along the way. He was never undermined -as his own diary boasts he was lionized everywhere and still is by fools such a yourself. no need to catch him a lie -the diary was sufficient.
The man is culpable for millions of deaths .-
“Fauci was managing a global crisis that no expert initially understood”
False.
One of the huge deals in all this is that the “no expert initially understood” part was for about 2 weeks in early January 2020.
Fauxi is an epidemiologists – they study epidemics and the put together plans for dealing with them in advance. It was his job to be prepared.
The Mathamatical FACTS I have asserts are well known in epidemiology BEFORE Covid.
The transmission rate was known before the first reported case in the US. The Covid virus had its genes completely mapped by Jaunary 14th 2020. The transmission rate plus other factors established to a high degree of certainty Covid was an airborne virus. The size of the virus was know.
Everything related to the idiocy of the policies imposed was KNOWN in very early 2020.
What was NOT known ? Whether the virus could be thwarted by off label use of existing drugs. Whether any effective hospital treatment would exist.
But everything needed to avoid bad and deadly public policy choices was known to people like Fauxi.
” and he did it while fighting political interference.”
ROFL
Trump wanted Covid gone as quickly as possible. Trump did everything in his power to follow Fauxi until it became claer Fauxi was lying to him.
“Changing guidance based on new evidence is how science works,”
What new evidence ? As noted above with few exceptions not only was everything critical to NIH epidemic guidance known in very early January – but none of that ever changed.
” yet he was undermined by an anti-intellectual movement that trusted podcasters over actual medical experts.”
YHes myriads of people turned on experts BECAUSE THE EXPERTS WERE LYING.
“Fauci is being scapegoated for the mistakes of others. ”
There are others besides Fauxi who failed, But Fauxi CHOSE to be the face of the fight against Covid.
He is not being scapegoated – he chose to frame himself as St. Anthony, he should not be surprised to find he is now viewed as Dr. Mengele.
“Senator Paul didn’t know how to handle the pandemic any better than anyone else. ”
In Jan 2020 – no. But it was increasingly obvious to Paul and many many others that Fauxi was lying and that we were doing EXACTLY the wrong thing. There are LOTS of intellectuals – some with credentials superior to Fauxi’s who raised alarms early on and were silenced.
While lots of “experts” like Fauxi undermined their own trust and that of science as a whole.
It is NOT true that there opposition was anti-intellectual. The frequently silenced opposition was either other highly skilled epidemiologists or people reporting on them.
“This ongoing attempt to “catch him in a lie” is just a personal grudge that the public has completely moved past. We have much bigger problems to worry about.”
This is far more than a personal grudge.
YOU rant about the lack of trust in science – and you are correct that people have lost faith in science.
But that is because in myriads of domains – but especially this one too many scientists – particularly public scientists have LIED.
People do not trust liars.
There is absolutely Zero doubt Fauxi is a liar – his own diaries prove he was lying and knew it.
There is no doubt that Fauxi perjured himself repeatedly. While he is protected from criminal prosecution by a pardon – no pardon protects against future crimes.
Fauxi is obligated by the pardon to tell the truth or go to jail.
And that is appropirate.
@Tryingtoclarify!
Mm-hm, new troll. Tell us another as though we didn’t all live through 2020-2022. Go blow.
@George
You replying to yourself is pretty sad, dude. Combined with your AI posts, sh**: are you really this bored? You are the one troll I don’t think is paid, what a sad and vacant place your mind must be every day. There is life outside. Go touch it.
“The Supreme Court has repeatedly affirmed that the Fifth Amendment protects the innocent, not just the guilty. ”
Correct.
“When a public figure is faced with a hostile political committee openly seeking criminal prosecution, invoking the Fifth is a standard defense against targeted perjury traps and politically motivated prosecution. It is a refusal to participate in a political theater, not an admission of lying.”
Incorrect.
There is no such thing as a perjury trap – atleast not in the context of a senate hearing.
The way to avoid a perjury charge is to tell the truth.
You may invoke the 5th amendment when you have good reason to beleive that truthful testimony would lead to prosecution
the 5th amendment only protects disclosures that might lead to criminal prosecution – it is almost never allowed in a civil context.
You may not invoke the 5th to avoid testimony. You may not invoke the 5th to avoid testifying bout things that can not lead to your prosecution.
“Because he cannot be prosecuted for past actions covered by the pardon, the primary remaining legal danger he faces at a new congressional hearing is perjury—being caught in a semantic trap by aggressive lawmakers. ”
There is no such thing as a semantic trap. You keep playing these games.
“Pleading the Fifth protects him from new, manufactured charges, not past accountability.”
More stupid word games.
First Sen. Paul has already stated that he will be refering Fauxi for contempt of congress.
Fauxi is not avoiding charges – he is manufacturing them himself.
While I would agree this is political theater – Good political theater.
I strongly suspect Republicans HOPED Fauxi would do this. They got 3 hours of Senators essentially testifying against Fauxi in the form of questions, and Fauxi taking he 5th. I agree that innocent people sometimes need to take the 5th.
That SCOTUS has repeatedly found that courts can not conclude from invoking the 5th that someone is guilty.
But that is exactly what ordinary people outside of Court do.
Yesterday Fauxi completed his transformation from St. Anthony to Dr. Mengele.
Out side a few left wing nuts like you – that is forever.
But I suspect Republicans will bring him back. They will give him immunity – that eliminates any question of the validity of the pardon.
ANd he will not be able to ivoke the 5th again.
Alternatively they can charge him with contempt and the ONLY defense he has is to claim the pardon is not valid.
When a person has immunity the CAN NOT invoke the 5th. Either he goes to jail for contempt, or he goes to jail for past perjury.
“Also, almost all advanced virology and medical research is technically “dual-use,” meaning knowledge used to cure a disease could theoretically be weaponized.”
False as a generalization – but True with respect to Gain of Function research.
Further not relevant.
“The U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) funded research globally to study viruses where they naturally emerge. Funding a localized lab to monitor active bat coronaviruses is standard epidemiological surveillance, not a clandestine geopolitical partnership.”
Incorrect. with respect to the GOF research in question.
The NIH funding that is related to Covid – was NOT about studying viruses in nature.
It was about taking viruses from nature and altering them in a lab. There are circumstances that can be beneficial – It is not established that WIV was engaged in weapons research. It is possible that was true, it is also possible it was not. But it is absolutely True that WIV was Genetically modifying Bat Corona Viruses and that the NIH was partially funding that.
Nor is there any doubt that Fauxi was legally barred from doing so.
Well said. Thank you
Fauci is a good little fascist of never let a good crisis go to waste!
And Destroy scientific discovery…while promoting yourself!
Hand him over to other countries for Crimes Against Humanity!
what is astound is how the LEFT defend actions that lead to their death
When they tell you they want to reduce the world population believe them.
When they tell you they are going to fundamentally change America, believe them.
When they tell you by any means necessary believe them.
There are no coincidences that could have timed the COVID pandemic so perfectly to subvert Trump’s reelection. What other incident could have completely changed our election laws and processes to allow mail in ballots, and drop boxes etc. just in time to steal an election.
It was on purpose and they are now getting closer to revealing how deep the evil and lies go.
Why would America’s government be running biowarfare labs in China to develop lethal strains of pathogens in synch with the Communist Party?
The “hearing” was nothing more than a rehash of MAGA bs. Ivermectin does not help with Covid. The Covid vaccines are safe and effective. The lab leak theory has been disproved. Those are alll true even if MAGAs don’t like it.
Sally says that “the lab leak theory has been disproved”??? Sally is like the last Japanese WWII soldier stuck on an island of insanity. What she says is sickening, untrue, partisan BS and laughably wrong. Don’t be a Sally.
It hasn’t been disproved, it has not been verified. It still not certain where it originated.
So you think it isn’t certain where the virus originated? As a comedian said, if there was a chocolate disease and the first cases were in Hershey PA, would you claim it came from a bat?
😂 I like that hullbobby. I needed the chuckle.
If it walks, quacks, looks and tastes like a duck, clearly it’s a pine tree.
But the problem is there’s no proof it tastes like a duck. It hasn’t been verified. It may look like a duck, but it cannot be confirmed with certainty that it tastes like one. If that is the case how do we know it does taste like a duck for sure?
HullBobby,
Good one!
Some of us have this thing called common sense.
Anyone really think Fauci’s CCP buddies are just going to fess up to it? Of course not.
Just let those who say “It still not certain where it originated,” lock themselves in their homes, by themselves, while wearing a mask or three.
Hullbobby, can you cite any official finding declaring where exactly the virus originated?
Which Kool-Aid flavor did you choose?
Ivermectin sure worked for our family. It greatly reduced the severity of the illness. We used it and vitamin D, Zinc once we had caught it and then preemptively after later exposure. We were down three days, my wife had no worse than a mild fever and sniffles, this was when people were dropping like flies.
My wife and I had Covid. It lasted 3 days. We DIDN’T take ivermectin, zinc and vitamin D. We got essentially the same result as you did.
Anecdotal conclusions are not useful in medicine. This is why science uses double-blind studies involving thousands of outcomes before publishing any conclusions.
Worked for us, worked for the family and people that we relayed our results to. We will use it again, isn’t America wonderful?!
A Vaccine is effective if it prevents you from getting the disease and prevents transmission to others. The Covid vaccine does neither and is, thus, not effective. It does reduce the severity of the illness. However, it has side-effects that can be quite dangerous and in rare cases lead to death. So, to claim that the vaccine is safe is also removed from reality.
Disproven? Sally – you are not qualified to offer an opinion on lunch.
Remember this.
I only bring this up because in 2022, this man said he had nothing to fear and welcomed any invitation to testify before Congress. What happened, man? I thought you were salt of the earth, willing to talk about anything. Do you have something to hide? Something that could make your blanket pardon from Biden not so bulletproof. If he lied to Congress Wednesday, he wouldn’t be protected by the pardon, something former John Yoo mentioned on Tuesday.
Declining to answer questions from such unhinged MAGA nuts was the right move.
maybe you should read Fauci’s diary and his total hypocrisy.
Amazing how the LEFT love being led to death and failure
Anthony Fauci and John Yoo should be waterboarded unto death and buried in a common grave so we can piss on them both at once.
He is responsible for bringing THE PLAGUE on us, & also for allowing vaccines that do SIGNIFICANTLY more harm than good. Then trying to bury the test results for 50 years. He recommended pregnant women to get shots – trails showed that ~ 48 % had miscarriages. He also pushed for children to get the vaccines when the data showed they would get cold like symptoms. THEN there is no data to show the impact on their development. HE BELONGS IN LEAVENWORTH, with a hoast of others.
Nothing you said is even remotely true.
care to back that up?
His DIARY says otherwise!
Tell that to the poor dogs who were tortured sally.
oh sally, why can’t you put a little effort into it?
This is very typical of your type. Low effort.
This is Sally = who tells us the lab theory was proven untrue. Absolutely ignorant but profoundly biased.
Sally=George=Svelaz=Anonymous
=Gigi=Wally and various other sock puppets.
And those children with colds would have natural immunity.