My Current Default Position About COVID Booster Vaccines

I received two COVID shots as well as a booster. Then, about six months ago I got COVID, which had me feeling down in the dumps for 3 days, which also left me with a loss of strength and balance for a few weeks after that. I'm hearing a lot about the alleged need for all of us to get more and more boosters lately. Should I? I'm not a scientist. I don't know how to read the medical research with confidence. I thought we would all have clear answers about COVID and boosters by now, but it has never been less clear. And now we have Twitter Files indicating that the U.S. government has been warping the conversation about COVID and vaccines, even having a hand in shutting down well-decorated medical professionals who disagree with the national narrative of "get lots and lots of booster shots." I wish we had dependable information about the following:

1. Whether boosters are meaningfully effective

2. Whether boosters are safe; and

3. Whether the risks of boosters (according to some) outweigh the benefits of booster (according to others).

It doesn't help that public health officials and CDC have been so wrong about so many things over the last few years. The evidence on this includes the internal reversals of CDC policy (e.g., No need for a mask, then you must wear a mask; getting the jab will keep you from getting COVID, then not so much). Every time there is a new pronouncement reversing a prior pronouncement, it is presented with equal confidence. Thus, it is not surprising to see recent statistics showing that ever greater numbers of Americans are refusing to get the newest boosters. But also consider comments by doctors such as "Elizabeth Bennett" on Twitter:

I am one of the many people who are now somewhere between disoriented, distrusting and disgusted with the state of COVID information. I am not alone:

In the absence of reliable information and wide-open vigorous conversation among our medical professionals, the rest of us need to act on assumptions and guesses. I am assuming that I am at more risk if I get yet another new booster than if I refuse it. I'm open to new information, of course, but I'm highly concerned that doctors and researchers with legitimate concerns about the boosters are still being shut out of the conversation. I've seen ample confirmation of this censorship--many doctors and researchers being completely shut down by Twitter for instance.  I also see many serious sounding accusations like these.  I would like to know a lot more information. I would like to have credible answers to these 130 highly specific concerns assembled by Steve Kirsch.

In the meantime, no more boosters for me.

Continue ReadingMy Current Default Position About COVID Booster Vaccines

The Case for Investigating Anthony Fauci

Elon's Musk has announced that his "pronouns" are "Prosecute/Fauci." This is over the top for me, yet Musk has the right to say this and I have the right to criticize Musk that it's over the top. That's how free speech works. We don't yet know enough to prosecute Fauci. Maybe we never will. Maybe Fauci is completely innocent of the things Musk wants to "prosecute."

I don't know all the facts about Fauci, but I know enough of them to be suspicious. There are a LOT of suspicious facts. I want very much to get to the bottom of this because COVID disrupted the lives of billions of people and hurt or killed millions of them. Since when do we ignore calamitous situations just because someone calls them a conspiracy theory, someone like David Frum (who doesn't understand the import of major media coordinating with the U.S. spy state to squelch the story of Hunter Biden's laptop)? Stevemur wrote an excellent response to Frum:

In invite you to walk through stevemur's thread, step by step, then ask yourself whether you too are suspicious.  Note stevemur's conclusions:

Continue ReadingThe Case for Investigating Anthony Fauci

Americans Who Approve of China’s Ghastly Lockdown . . .

Nellie Bowles writes:

China’s obsession with Zero-Covid: Chinese authorities have taken a brutal stance on Covid: They have welded people into their own apartments and locked building exit doors. Last week, an apartment fire killed 10 in China’s Xinjiang province, and many say the dead were locked in their building and fire trucks were slowed by road blocks that were the result of the draconian Covid rules. The result has been unprecedented protests across the country. In Beijing, people chanted “no to Covid tests, yes to freedom.”

Some on the American left were quick to defend the CCP. Being welded into your apartment, having all the exits locked in a fire, these are just the price of safety. One particularly wild example: When the Washington Post ran a news story about the CCP’s flawed Zero-Covid response, the paper’s most famous reporter, Taylor Lorenz, slammed her employer’s phrasing and defended the CCP. “Choosing not to kill off millions of vulnerable people (as the US is doing) isn’t a ‘critical flaw,’” Lorenz wrote.

I do have good news for America’s Pandemic Forever advocates: You’ve won. Yes, a few people still go to the movies, and you can always tweet about how selfish and evil they are. But take a look at this chart . . .

→ Americans’ staggering loneliness: We were already spending more and more time alone each year. Then Covid hit, and our isolation grew much deeper. Our social lives haven’t bounced back.

I got emphatic pushback when I agreed with Glenn Greenwald (in August 2021) that our COVID policies need to be based on sober cost-benefit analyses, the same type of analyses we use when we discuss traffic safety. I think it's clear that Taylor Lorenz has convinced many people that more lockdown is the best policy, but she (and her ilk) are ignoring the exponentially greater damage that lockdowns have caused.

Continue ReadingAmericans Who Approve of China’s Ghastly Lockdown . . .

The “News” Media is the Dying Canary in the Coal Mine

I have lost respect for many institutions over the past few years. Not so much the members, but the leadership (which causes many member to fall silent). Exhibit A is our so-called "news" media. I have been collecting dozens and dozens of examples at my website, Dangerous Intersection.

It often boils down to these organizations failing to be curious about what is going on. Failing to question powerful people. Failing to vigorously cross-examine the leaders of the political parties they obediently serve. Journalists should be out there pissing off ALL of our leaders with probing questions, but they are too often serving as stenographers and megaphones for highly questionable positions. This great danger to our country is invisible as long as you cling to one side or the other (democrat serving or republican serving) "news" media.

I challenge anyone reading this to start reading "the other side" and, better yet, independent journalists, in order to get a much better view of what is going on. You'll find many of those independent journalists have left mainstream news to strike out on their own (e.g., on Substack), disgusted with what has happened to their employers.

Here's a recent example: Why were reporters failing to grill Pfizer executives and our political leaders on whether the vaccinations would stop transmission of COVID? How many dozens of bad policies resulted because our "news" reporters decided to parrot public officials rather than vigorously question them?

Continue ReadingThe “News” Media is the Dying Canary in the Coal Mine