The right is so crazy about the pandemic. Fox News Prime Time host Brian Kilmeade started a segment complaining about Biden’s criticism of Facebook misinformation and his urging everyone to get vaccinated (July 19). Kilmeade says Biden isn’t a public health expert and then goes on to excoriate those who are like Fauci and the Surgeon-General. Kilmeade shows a half-a-dozen misstatements in the past about the pandemic and goes on to say that “lies” keep popping up and scientific advice has been “useless.” How absurd! Scientific views about the pandemic change over time, and 6 honest errors are balanced by hundreds of accurate statements. The right is so crazy about all this that at the CPAC meeting (of conservatives) the week before, the crowd was chanting about Dr. Fauci, “Lock him up!”
It is interesting to note that last week, the right seemed to have a change of heart when major Republican voices like McConnell, DeSantis, Hannity, and others came out with calls for people to get vaccinated (although Hannity walked back his comments some). The left has been speculating on why now, all of a sudden, when they have all been silent or hostile to vaccines for so long? I haven’t heard a convincing reason, but perhaps it is because they are losing voters to Covid?! I am sure a lot more Republicans are dying of Covid than Democrats. I can’t believe no one is reporting on this either!
The other big pandemic bugaboo for the right are masks. Fox headline: “Blue state cities reinstate face covering mandates.” Interviewed on Fox, Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas) is typical of Republicans who view mask mandates as an attack on their “freedom” to “live their life fully.” What nonsense! What about my freedom not to be infected by your germs? Do these people wear seat belts? What about dealing with much more important freedoms like freedom from hunger, eviction, climate disaster, roads and bridges collapsing, etc.? Anti-maskers need to get a grip on reality!
Tucker Carlson
Carlson has the most watched cable TV news show (2 million viewers), and he is one of the most extreme Fox voices. On a recent show (July 22), he continued his misinformation campaign against vaccination by arguing for the need for investigation into deaths actually due to taking the Covid vaccine. More nonsense!
Much of that show was raising questions about the Jan. 6 insurrection (the term in a Fox banner in quotation marks). He was complaining that Nancy Pelosi rejected Reps. Jim Banks (R-Indiana) and Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) as members of the Jan. 6 investigation committee the House is putting together. Carlson argued that Pelosi doesn’t want them because they will ask tough questions about Jan. 6.
Carlson then goes on to delineate what those questions should be. Why was the Capitol police request for more security even before Jan 6 repeatedly turned down? Who shot Ashli Babbitt? Is it OK to shoot unarmed protesters who are trespassing? Shouldn’t this apply to BLM protests? Don’t the lives of those who voted for Donald Trump count? What role did the FBI play on Jan. 6? Carlson goes on to say: “We know for certain that there were FBI informants in the crowd at the Capitol and that many of them made it inside the Capitol and encouraged others to break the law.” Unbelievable! Carlson’s lies and mis-directions are many. He implied that Pelosi knows the answers to all these and is hiding them and we need people like Banks and Jordan to get at the truth when their presence would really just turn the hearing into a circus.
Miscellany
House minority leader Kevin McCarthy (R-California) in an interview on Fox (July 13) acknowledged that Biden is legitimately President. It wasn’t the first time. On May 17, he said: “I don’t think anyone is questioning the legitimacy of the presidential election.” What about Trump and 60% of Republican voters? Why isn’t this plastered all over the press and Fox news to counter the Big Lie that is threatening our democracy?
I and many other Democrats think Trump and his ilk are truly nuts, to use a technical term. But the reverse is true too. Rep Lindsay Graham on Fox (July 21) said: “The people in charge of your government right now are crazy.” The U.S. is in a very dangerous, precarious situation, and there is no clear way out.
Re: two points you’ve raised: (1) “…the right seemed to have a change of heart …and came out with calls for people to get vaccinated.” Many in their base are now showing up in ICUs in disbelief that COVID actually exists, that it could be this bad, and it is too late for a vaccine. Then consider how many immediate and extended family members and friends witness their suffering or death having bought into the same disinformation campaign. I suspect that far right politicians have realized they are literally losing their base due to encouragement to ignore scientific information and precautions. It will be quite a trick to pull that messaging back, though they won’t be bound by a need for consistency or facts.
(2) People “who view mask mandates as an attack on their ‘freedom’ to “live their life fully” should also demand that all traffic signs and lights at intersections be removed immediately. Why should anyone have to wait at a stop sign or red light for someone else’s “right” to drive through ahead of them just because some government official decided that it would be a public health hazard to let drivers work it out among themselves as to who goes ahead of others. Same for those freedom-depriving yellow lines on roads that socially distance cars moving in opposite directions.