Outgoing Dr. Anthony Fauci was against masking before he was for it.
He calls flip-flops like that the “evolution of the science.” He seems to think that anybody who questions his comments simply must not understand how the scientific theory works — but conservatives aren’t letting him get away with that sleight of hand.
On Monday night, Fauci told MSNBC, “With COVID, I mean, the things that we thought we knew in the beginning turned out, as the months went by, to not be the case, which really forced us to adapt and to change some of our policies and recommendations.”
“That was interpreted by many as flip-flopping, or not really knowing what’s going on,” he added. “When it really was the evolution of the science.”
In response, Buck Sexton, co-host of Clay & Buck tweeted, “No F-ing way, Fauci. Can’t let him pull this bulls***. He lied about his certainty in the ‘the science’ at every phase so he could please his lunatic fan base.”
“His falsehoods were used to fire people- including veterans- from their jobs. He’s the disgusting villain of Covid,” he added.
No F-ing way, Fauci. Can’t let him pull this bullshit. He lied about his certainty in the “the science” at every phase so he could please his lunatic fan base. His falsehoods were used to fire people- including veterans- from their jobs. He’s the disgusting villain of Covid. https://t.co/Ccp9rHJLRU
— Buck Sexton (@BuckSexton) August 23, 2022
Indeed, many businesses, communities, and states locked down and limited businesses based on the advice of Fauci and his colleagues. He was — and still is — the face of the pandemic. Millions of people looked to him for guidance.
In turn, economic ruin plagued America based on his recommendations.
His latest comments also bring about the question of why our elected leaders even listened to Fauci’s advice in the first place.
Commentator Yossi Gestetner rebutted, “This is garbage on multiple levels: A) Why implement never-tried policies based on an evolving thing? B) Some of these things he/CDC could have known months sooner if they were not arrogant. C) People who YELLED about some of these things were suspended from social media!”
This is garbage on multiple levels:
A) Why implement never-tried policies based on an evolving thing?
B) Some of these things he/CDC could have known months sooner if they were not arrogant.
C) People who YELLED about some of these things were suspended from social media!
— Yossi Gestetner (@YossiGestetner) August 23, 2022
Cultural critic Chef Andrew Gruel also argued, “If science is always evolving, every aspect of covid policy should have been treated with an open mind, but instead it was mandate, mandate, mandate; ban those who ask questions.”
“Now that it is all proven wrong it’s ‘just evolution.’ Criminal. Anyone who believes this needs help,” he threw in for good measure.
If science is always evolving, every aspect of covid policy should have been treated with an open mind, but instead it was mandate, mandate, mandate; ban those who ask questions. Now that it is all proven wrong it’s “just evolution”. Criminal. Anyone who believes this needs help.
— Chef Andrew Gruel (@ChefGruel) August 23, 2022
There was one man early on arguing that exact premise.
In April 2020, legendary technology prophet and President Ronald Reagan’s favorite economist George Gilder warned against ceding decision-making to scientists like Fauci.
In The Wall Street Journal, Gilder wrote, “There are not, and never will be, scientific answers to all public problems. Scientific expertise and specialization inform good policy, but they should never be the final word.”
“To navigate successfully between competing interests or competing calamities, between war and peace, and even between deadly pandemics and deadly economic depressions, we need politics—and politicians,” Gilder opined.
Gilder’s prescient words were proven true.
At the federal level, we had to endure Fauci’s manipulation of facts throughout the pandemic. He even admitted to doing so on things like herd immunity based on what he thought the American people could stomach.
“When polls said only about half of all Americans would take a vaccine, I was saying herd immunity would take 70 to 75 percent,” Fauci told The New York Times. “Then, when newer surveys said 60 percent or more would take it, I thought, ‘I can nudge this up a bit,’ so I went to 80, 85.”
As pointed out by Dr. Vinay Prasad, that was an astonishing quotation for multiple reasons.
“… the two undeniable admissions in the Times article are 1) Fauci is, to some degree, basing his statements on what he thinks the public will accept, and to what degree his rhetoric might help vaccination efforts, and 2) this is the absolutely stunning part, he is admitting this openly to a reporter for the New York Times!” Prasad wrote.
Prasad also broke down that Fauci was against recommending masks for the general public, only to later endorse the idea.
The medical establishment’s shift toward being pro-mask “occurred in the absence of any substantive new mask studies,” Prasad claimed.
Fauci later revealed that “his words were chosen to prevent a run on masks — so that healthcare workers would get first priority…” Prasad observed.
Prasad laid out why Fauci’s distortions presented one important question.
“Irrespective of your feelings in these specific cases, the core tension in both examples is whether we want scientific advisors and public health experts to report just the facts, as they see them, or do we want them to make the additional calculation of what the public would do with those facts, and use that to shape their comments, aiming to maximize the greater good?”
For the associate professor of medicine at the University of California San Francisco, the answer is obvious. The malpractice like the kind that “Fauci” engaged in “cannot be” acceptable.
If it occurs, “The public will not trust us, and should not trust us,” he advised his colleagues. “People will put our statements through a reverse translator to try to deduce what we truly think, and it gives an unjustified power to scientists that belongs in the hands of people.”
Fauci never got that message apparently. As of Wednesday, he was denying that he had any involvement in the shutting down of the U.S. economy.
On Fox News, Neil Cavuto asked Fauci if he regretted “the shut down, the sweeping shutdown, that some say made things worse.”
“No, I don’t, Neil. In fact, I think we need to make sure that your listeners understand, I didn’t shut down anything,” a defiant Fauci said.
"Do you regret the sweeping shutdown that some said made things worse?"
FAUCI: "No…I didn't shut down anything." pic.twitter.com/IZqMTZ0hIb
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) August 23, 2022
Sure, he wasn’t the one making the executive decision — but his so-called expertise and position of power led to those kinds of precautions described by Cavuto being implemented by those in power.
Ultimately, the loss of trust in the American medical establishment can never be fully recovered, and that will be Fauci’s greatest legacy — no matter how he rewrites history in real-time.
The views expressed in this piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.