Saturday, December 7, 2024

How Did We Know?

A report came out this week, 557 pages, giving us what we now know, 5 years into this ordeal, about the COVID-19 pandemic, its origins, the response—all the things we were told were conspiracy theories and we weren’t allowed to talk about. They were true. I feel exonerated. But still puzzled.

We knew these things, in pretty close to real time. Or at least we had very good reason to believe we knew them. And all the while the “experts” were feeding the public some very wrong “official narrative” that we could see was not true.

For some reason, some of us could see through the official narrative and many others could not.


cover page of the House Coronavirus Pandemic report

 

What’s In the Report

First, a quick look at the report. It includes a lot of “what happened,” for the sake of history. But its intention is more as a guideline for future pandemics, so we don’t repeat the mistakes. (The conspiracy theorist/observer in me thinks, maybe they weren’t mistakes; maybe they were intentional willingness to harm. But that’s not the focus of the report.) It begins with a letter from the subcommittee chair Brad Wenstrup, a member of Congress who is also a doctor (podiatrist) identifying 5 points of bipartisan agreement and 7 findings. [Also, there’s an official 18-page summary of the recommendations, here.] 

These are the five points of agreement:

1)        The possibility that COVID-19 emerged because of a laboratory or research related accident is not a conspiracy theory.

2)        EcoHealth Alliance, Inc. and Dr. Peter Daszak should never again receive US taxpayer dollars.

3)        Scientific messaging must be clear and concise, backed by evidentiary support, and come from trusted messengers, such as front-line doctors treating patients.

4)        Public health officials must work to regain Americans’ trust; Americans want to be educated, not indoctrinated.

5)        Former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo participated in medical malpractice and publicly covered up the total number of nursing home fatalities in New York.

Besides those five points of agreement, the Select Subcommittee came up with the following seven findings, which I believe will be detailed in the body of the report, but this works well as a summary—and let me note, below, areas where I do not agree (point 3 in particular):

1)        The US National Institutes of Health funded gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

2)        The Chinese government, agencies within the US Government, and some members of the international scientific community sought to cover-up facts concerning the origins of the pandemic.

3)        Operation Warp Speed was a tremendous success and a model to build upon in the future. The vaccines, which are now probably better characterized as therapeutics, undoubtedly saved millions of lives by diminishing likelihood of severe disease and death.

4)        Rampant fraud, waste, and abuse plagued the COVID-19 pandemic response.

5)        Pandemic-era school closures will have enduring impact on generations of America’s children, and these closures were enabled by groups meant to serve those children.

6)        The Constitution cannot be suspended in times of crisis and restrictions on freedoms sow distrust in public health.

7)        The prescription cannot be worse than the disease, such as strict and overly broad lockdowns that led to predictable anguish and avoidable consequences. 

There are some other statements within the report that probably ought to be highlighted as well, for example:

·        The six-foot social distancing requirement was not supported by science.

·        Masks and mask mandates were ineffective at controlling the spread of COVID-19.

·        Unscientific COVID-19 lockdowns caused more harm than good.

·        Vaccine mandates were not supported by science and caused more harm than good.

·        Public health officials disregarded natural immunity, despite its proven effectiveness and durability.


 

CDC image of the COVID-19 virus

I don’t want to go through every point. But I’d like to comment on a few.

Lab Leak. It was either an accidental lab leak or a purposeful lab leak. I go with accidental, but who knows. We might have known, if that line of questioning had been allowed when the evidence was fresh. The Chinese wanted to save face, but it seems less damning to them to have a lab leak—followed by better safety measures—than a purposeful leak. They’re a communist regime, so we may not have gotten clear answers, but that was the time to try, rather than shutting down questioning and insisting on the wet market lie. (And we have added nagging questions about how much was related to Hunter Biden’s corrupt influence peddling in China.)

Messaging. It's not that messaging wasn’t as clear as it needed to be; it’s that the messaging was a lie, and clear truth was not allowed—because it would confuse the public, or rather, because it would cause the public to doubt the official lies.

Front-line Doctors. It is true that we needed to hear more from front-line doctors, who were treating patients. Those of us who had good information got it from such sources. The official “experts” who were lying to us were not even seeing patients, which means they were not experts at treating the disease and should have deferred to those with experience. Instead, they shut down those with actual clinical experience; some lost their jobs for even speaking about possible treatments. It’s a stretch to call that an error; that was purposeful, harmful tyranny.

School Closures. We knew almost from the very beginning (before schools were shut down) that the disease was not affecting children. Nor was there evidence that children were carriers, as they often are with respiratory infections. Children were at near zero risk, and teachers/staff were at near zero risk of contracting the illness from the children. In other words, the teachers would have been safer being around the children than they would have been in most other environments. The schools were closed, because it was part of the fear campaign. People highly value our children, so if we think they are at risk, we are more likely to worry and follow orders that we’re told will keep them safe. Let’s just be clear that instilling fear in order to gain compliance is not a valid reason for shutting down schools and depriving children of a year’s education—for which we nevertheless paid for with our taxes.

Social Distancing, Masks, and Lockdowns. “Follow the Science” was shouted at us if we so much as questioned these policies. But they were not following actual science. Those who looked at actual science knew this. I complied when required, with the social distancing and mask wearing. But only when required. The facts were available pretty early on about the inefficacy of masks, where the size of the virus were so much smaller than the holes in various fabrics that you could picture trying to keep mosquitoes out of your yard with a chain-link fence.


infographic by Visual Capitalist, found here

And the lockdown explanation, by simple logic, would only work in an absolute situation: total lockdown—without any contact with other humans—for the length of time from exposure to certainty that it didn’t affect the contactee. We could not, and did not, shut down all human interaction for that length of time. We were told it was “two weeks to flatten the curve,” which meant that it would still spread, but would spread more slowly, so our hospitals wouldn’t get overrun. Our hospitals (with maybe a couple of exceptions worldwide) did not get overrun. This was never necessary. And we could all see the lie when the order to stay home continued after the two weeks.

The Vax. Operation Warp Speed continues to be a point of disagreement between Donald Trump and his supporters. We voted for him anyway, because there are so many other reasons. But either he was misinformed, and maybe is still being misinformed, or he pushed the vaccines for another reason—possibly because the tyrants wanted everything shut down for years, to create a vaccine and test it before rolling it out, and he was preventing them from continuing that lockdown tactic indefinitely. Nevertheless, the “vaccine” was not a vaccine; it was a therapeutic drug, which included untested mRNA. They tried changing the definition of vaccine to include what this was, but that was an obvious ploy. They used the terms “safe and effective,” when the data showed that it was neither.

I haven’t read the entire study. This part comes around page 301. They say Operation Warp Speed was a huge success. I beg to differ. We know that the “vaccine” did not prevent the spread of the disease; it did not prevent contracting the disease. It requires proving a negative to say that it made the disease less bad for the individual. (An acquaintance who died of COVID, one of very few that I knew, had taken the vaccine, and was told in the hospital how fortunate that was, because without the vaccine it could have been so much worse.) But there wasn’t testing to show a comparison. There is growing data to show the contrary.

The report does admit that there were adverse reactions, and they should be investigated. You think? There are other reports coming out, showing the various harms from the vax. Not everyone appears to be affected, and that’s good. Most of the people I know got at least one or two doses (two was the minimum to be considered vaccinated).

What we have, going forward, is a long-term control study, comparing people who took the vax (and however many times) and people who did not. We unvaxxed are the control group. You’re welcome. If the long list of symptoms for us does not go up commensurate with those who got the vax, then we can hypothesize (and further test) that the vax caused the rise is myocarditis in young people, exponential rises in cancer rates, blood clots, aneurysms, and more.

Since those who took the vax did so out of some combination of fear of the disease and a willingness to be a good citizen who doesn’t fight the system, I don’t want to add fear that some terrible outcome will be lurking in their body. While I’m glad I don’t have that fear (I have plenty of health issues already that I’m diligently taking care of), if people are two years out from their vax and haven’t noticed anything yet, they might have dodged a bullet there. (Some conspiracy theories involve there being good and bad batches of the vax, and that the “good” ones didn’t actually have any of the bad stuff in them. I note that such theories exist, but I don’t know how to think through someone in a production facility knowingly creating and sending out good and bad batches. There’s enough known evil in the story of COVID-19, that we don’t need to invent even more.)

 

My Question: How Did We Know All Along?

On Viva Frei’s response to the report, he began with: “Virtually everything they once called a conspiracy theory they literally now just confirmed as reality.”  Then he says, kidding not kidding, “I told you so.” Indeed. It’s just against decorum to say it. But it’s also against decorum to shut people up for asking questions or spreading actual truths. So, “I told you so,” but from my very obscure platform, you probably only noticed that I told you because you already agree and just wanted more links to data.

I don’t immediately see why I was able to detect the lies and find the truth, which was pretty readily available if you looked for it, instead of listening to legacy media and/or government spokesperson resources. I’m typically conservative, in temperament and personality. I don’t set out to be a disrupter, although I do tend to be stubborn about seeking and speaking the truth. I am college educated but not decorated with multiple degrees or credentials. I’m religious, and look to do what is right in my own family and in the community. All of these things look like I would be most likely to do what people do to go with the prevailing opinions—and yet I did not.

I have known people with much education who fell for the lies (and still do, it seems, maybe even regardless of the report). I have met religious people—people in my own religion, who went along with everything, while others didn’t fall for a bit of it. It seemed to me those who call themselves liberals were more likely to fall for the lies than those who call themselves conservative, but that wasn’t universal either. (Bret Weinstein and his wife, Heather Heying, on their Dark Horse podcast let us watch as they were red-pilled over this issue—as scientists who were looking at the actual data and being cancelled for doing so.)

Back in October of 2021 I heard Mattias Desmet talk about Mass Formation. It was finally an explanation for why some people fell for the lies and others did not. He talks about four conditions that, when met, could lead to the mass believing of a cult-like lie:

1.             a lot of people experiencing a lack of social bonds, a lack of social connectedness.

2.             a lot of people who experience a lack of meaning making.

3.             a lot of people who experience a lot of free-floating anxiety.

4.             a lot of free-floating frustration and aggression.

Until the shutdown, I was not lacking in social bonds, and throughout that time I had family, plus a fair amount of online connection. So maybe that saved me. I also have a fair amount of meaning making in my life; it’s just who I am and what I do. I do have some anxiety, and I’d call it free-floating mostly. It’s a condition where my heart races and my blood pressure drops (POTS), which feels like anxiety attacks when it happens. But I’ve learned to step back, recognize whether there’s an actual cause, or just that sense of anxiety for no reason that I can ignore until it goes away. And I wouldn’t say I have a whole lot of frustration and aggression. But it also isn’t apparent to me that this is the case for those who fell into the Mass Formation. Some of them I would call worriers (I recognize that in myself, though, as well). And some are more emotion-based, while I am probably more logic-based.

Maybe one difference was my long-time practice of reading a lot of different sources and making connections and thinking things through. It’s what I do here in this blog. More information is always better, and I find I rarely go to standard news sources, even Fox, anymore.

At this point, I’ll mention a few ongoing sources.

·        Tom Woods, who kept daily track of data and turned it into the book Diary of a Psychosis: How Public Health Disgraced Itself During COVID Mania.   

·        RFK Jr’s book The Real Anthony Fauci was also eye-opening and remains pretty much unchallenged.

·        I started following Dr. John Campbell’s  podcast on YouTube somewhere along the line, and watched him lose faith in the medical experts in real time. He continues to bring out valuable information. This includes recent reports concerning excess deaths— which didn’t appear to be significant in 2020, but did show up in 2021 after the vaccines were given.

·        Another good data source, particularly on excess deaths, is Edward Dowd. His Substack is here, with links below to previous articles and videos.

·        And of course I continue to trust Dr. Peter McCullough.

·        And Dr. Robert Malone (here’s a recent video).  

Pretty much every one of these reliable sources has been maligned by the medical “experts” and media who were lying to us all along.

One last word about all this: If they lied, and were willing to have people die to serve their own interests, what else do “they” (experts, government, elites, etc.) lie to us about? I assume there are a great many things that will need similar 500-page reports to come out.


flatten the curve graphic that was meant
to convince us to lockdown for two weeks



 My Pandemic Collection

I don’t think that I’ve ever done a “collection” of my posts on the pandemic, which might, it turns out, to be a subject I’ve covered more than any other. So, for the sake of history, here it is, with heaviest coverage in the first and second year. In reviewing these, there were some details we didn’t know in the very beginning (like the certain knowledge that we should never have trusted Fauci, which we came to know a few months later). But I’m fairly pleased to see that I was asking the right questions and looking for the right information from the beginning, and applying the principles of freedom even in (especially in) a time of crisis. Many of these link to the resources I used, which I hope are still active links. This may not be exhaustive (but it looks pretty exhausting, and I don’t expect anyone to go back and read them all), but in an age in which there was so many lies told, I think it’s important to have a contemporaneous record.

·        From Home, March 16, 2020 

·        Look to Literature, March 19, 2020 

·        Crisis Legislation, March 23, 2020 

·        Innovation, March 26, 2020 

·        The Classic Trio: Emotion, Logic, Action, March 30, 2020 

·        Encouraging Words, April 6, 2020 

·        Worldwide Unity, April 9, 2020 

·        Unrighteous Dominion, April 13, 2020 

·        Tyranny's Body Count Rises, April 16, 2020 

·        Federalism Works—Even in a Crisis, April 20, 2020 

·        Is the Cure Worse Than the Disease? April 23, 2020 

·        Open to Hope, April 27, 2020 

·        Math and More Questions, April 30, 2020 

·        Seeing Miracles, May 4, 2020 

·        Civil Disobedience—Under What Circumstances? May 7, 2020 

·        Coming to Be at Peace, May 11, 2020 

·        Breaking Out, May 21, 2020 

·        Coercive vs. Cautious Response, May 28, 2020 

·        Politics Is Viral, July 9, 2020 

·        What If Conspiracy Isn’t a Theory? July 30, 2020 

·        Time for a COVID Update, October 5, 2020 

·        Just Some Personal Stories, November 19, 2020 

·        Censorship Is Deadlier than the Virus, February 11, 2021 

·        The Two Weeks That Stretched into a Year, Part I, March 8, 2021 

·        The Two Weeks That Stretched into a Year, Part II, March 11, 2021 

·        Go Ahead and Party: or The Two Weeks That Stretched into a Year, Part III, March 16, 2021 

·        That Explains It, April 8, 2021 

·        So Many Reasons—or That Explains It, Part II, April 14, 2021 

·        Hesitancy Might Be a Good Thing This Time, May 11, 2021 

·        Something Is Up—and It’s Worldwide, May 13, 2021 

·        Who Can You Trust? June 4, 2021 

·        Door Approaches, July 12, 2021

·        Nothing Novel about It, Part I: The Proof, July 19, 2021 

·        Nothing Novel about It, Part II: The Significance, July 22, 2021 

·        A Letter of the Law, July 29, 2021 

·        Panel of Experts, August 3, 2021 

·        Have a Plan, August 16, 2021 

·        I Have More Questions, September 3, 2021 

·        Trying to Make Sense of What Makes No Sense, September 27, 2021 

·        So This Is Why People Have Ears That Do Not Hear, October 8, 2021 

·        Three Books and Some Other Research Assignments, November 18, 2021 

·        Holidays—Must Be Time for Another Crisis, November 30, 2021   

·        Coming to a Fortunate End, December 14, 2021 

·        Not Like the Others, December 27, 2021 

·        So Many Things They Know That Aren’t So, January 10, 2022 

·        Charts and Other Info, January 28, 2022 

·        Evil Enough for You? February 3, 2022 

·        Putting the Pieces Together, July 12, 2022 

·        News from the Front Lines, September 8, 2022 

·        It’s Over, December 15, 2022 

·        Don’t Be on That Side, January 9, 2023 

·        Trolling—and How Not to Take the Bait, February 6, 2023 

·        The Answer to Whodunit, April 21, 2023 

·        The Upcoming Sequel, August 26, 2023 

·        At War with the Beast, April 25, 2024 

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