The Third Year of the Virus Wars

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​The Third Year of the Virus Wars

By Cliff Kincaid

Nixon Veep Spiro Agnew’s description of journalists as “nattering nabobs of negativism” now applies to the Luddites in the MAGA movement who resist mRNA vaccine technology that saves lives. I hear from them every day. They are mostly religious zealots and QAnon ideologues who have turned on Trump.

In his debate with Candace Owens, Trump faulted them for resisting scientific and medical progress.
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In regard to technology that defeats disease and holds out a cure for cancer, the “nattering nabobs of negativism” claim the vaccines are flawed because they are not 100 percent effective and that there are “breakthrough” cases of COVID from the vaccinated. They ignore the data showing the unvaccinated are the vast majority of those going to the hospital and dying from the disease.

Former President Trump made this point to Candace Owens on her program sponsored by Ben Shapiro’s Daily Wire. In response, Owens called Trump an old man.

I am curious about the Luddite mentality of the opponents of the Trump “Warp Speed” vaccines. Owens lives in Tennessee and just had a baby. Here are the vaccine requirements in that state for children enrolling in kindergarten:

• Hepatitis B (HBV)
• Diphtheria-Tetanus-Pertussis (DTaP, or DT if appropriate)
• Poliomyelitis (IPV or OPV) - final dose on or after the 4th birthday
• Measles, Mumps, Rubella - 2 doses of each, usually given together as MMR
• Varicella - 2 doses or credible history of disease
• Hepatitis A - total of 2 doses, spaced at least 6 - 18 months apart.

Does she object to all of these or some of them? On what basis? I am curious to find out.

By harping on Trump’s vaccines as genocidal weapons of mass death, the anti-vaxxers on the right are playing into the hands of Biden and Company, who should be under fire for failing to mobilize the federal bureaucracy to produce accurate COVID tests available for free.

The Luddites now preach “medical freedom” as their numbers dwindle and their followers drop dead.

In terms of history, which is relevant, Carnegie Mellon University’s new Curator of Special Collections Samuel Lemley has commented on how Edward Jenner’s 1798 book, An Inquiry into the Causes and Effects of the Variolae Vaccinae, a Disease Discovered in Some of the Western Counties of England, was instrumental in developing the modern-day smallpox vaccine. Jenner believed that vaccination “offered a natural, even wholesome intervention that could restore humankind’s preordained immunity.” But that view, which eventually saved millions of lives, was rejected by the Luddites of the time.

Even before Jenner put his findings into print, efforts were being made by various doctors to find a cure.  General George Washington, fighting for American independence, implemented a system of inoculation, considered at the time an “experimental” approach, like the mRNA technology of today. Quinn H. Becker, Surgeon General of the United States Army, notes that the recommendation to Washington was made by Dr. John Morgan, physician-in-chief of the American army, who wrote a treatise in 1776 entitled "Recommendation of Inoculation According to Baron Dimsdale’s Method."

As noted by Mary V. Thompson, research historian of the Mount Vernon Estate and Gardens, soldiers “would contract the milder form of the disease at the same time that they were being outfitted with uniforms and weapons” but would “consequently be completely healed, inoculated, and supplied by the time they left to join the army.”

Bringing this story up to date, the lesson is that patriots should embrace new technology that can be used by humanity to cure disease and enable people to live longer and healthier lives. This new technology can help us win this war against China and its virus.

Instead of embracing President Trump’s approach, I find several so-called “conservatives” accepting the views of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an attorney and environmental activist who wants to free his father’s Marxist assassin, Sirhan Sirhan, from prison. It’s no wonder that Trump’s team, after he was elected in 2016, pulled back on the announcement that Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. would chair a commission on vaccine safety and integrity.

Democrats for the most part have accepted the scientific integrity of the Trump “Warp Speed” vaccines and have gotten vaccinated. But if they were totally honest, they would acknowledge the truth of Rep. Paul Gosar’s short history of Biden’s broken promises regarding COVID testing, as documented by Politico:

• ​Jan. 22: Biden promises “a war footing to aggressively speed up our Covid-19 response, especially on vaccines and testing and reopening our schools.”

• Feb. 17: Biden announces “a series of new actions to expand Covid-19 testing, improve the availability of tests, and better prepare for the threat of variants.”
• March 11: Biden says, “We continue to work on making at-home testing available.”
• July 6: Biden says, “We’re going to deploy things like testing to expand detection of the virus.”
• Sept. 9: In a major speech, Biden says, “From the start, America has failed to do enough Covid-19 testing.” He promises to: 1) “use the Defense Production Act to increase production of rapid tests, including those that you can use at home,” 2) ensure that retailers such as Walmart, Amazon and Kroger “sell at-home rapid test kits at cost for the next three months,” and 3) “purchase nearly 300 million rapid tests for distribution … so that every American, no matter their income, can access free and convenient tests.”
• Dec. 2: In a major speech, Biden says, “This winter, we are going to make free at-home tests more available to Americans than ever before,” principally by mandating that “health insurers must cover the cost of at-home testing.”
• Dec. 6: In a White House press briefing, a reporter asks press secretary JEN PSAKI whether the Biden reimbursement plan is needlessly cumbersome: “Why not just make them free and give them out to — and have them available everywhere?” Psaki mocks the question, responding, “Should we just send one to every American?

Even a pillar of the liberal media, Politico, refers to Biden’s testing failures as a “mess,” explaining, “For a year, he has been promising to fix the lack of testing capacity in the U.S.”

It would seem to me that Trump supporters would join Rep. Gosar in holding Biden accountable for his failures. Instead, they charge Trump with genocide.

Now entering the third year of COVID, with the death toll at 819,000, the “nattering nabobs of negativism” are literally making people sick and getting them killed. Their new-found hatred for Trump is one of the best things Biden has going for him.

*Cliff Kincaid is president of America’s Survival, Inc. www.usasurvival.org  
 
 
 

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