Rand Paul’s Solution to Anthony Fauci: Three More Anthony Faucis

White House Coronavirus Update Briefing, April 16, 2020. Public Domain.
White House Coronavirus Update Briefing, April 16, 2020. Public Domain.

Two years into the COVID-19 pandemic, as the US approaches — according to the official statistics — 80 million confirmed cases and a million deaths, most Americans seem to finally understand that America’s “public health” institutions were the opposite of helpful in combating the disease.

US Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) has a solution: Triple the number of such institutions at the top.

He’s introduced an amendment to Section 401 of the Public Health Service Act which would split the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases into three separate agencies (a National Institute of Allergic Diseases, a National Institute of  Infectious Diseases, and a  National Institute of Immunologic Diseases).

Each of these new technocratic/bureaucratic organizations would get its own director, its own staff, and its own budget in addition to its own, theoretically smaller, bailiwick.

Paul’s focus here seems to be on the baleful influence of one man: NIAID director Anthony Fauci.

While it’s true that Fauci was the most prominent public face of government failure in the pandemic, he was hardly, as Paul’s press release puts it, a “dictator in chief.”

Fauci didn’t have the power to drag his heels on approval of  COVID-19 vaccines (he doesn’t head the Food and Drug Administration).

Nor did he have the power to mandate vaccinations (those mandates were done at the state level and by other federal departments), or implement Soviet-like internal “vaccine passport” requirements (ditto).

He didn’t have the power to mandate the wearing of masks. Again, those mandates were local, state, and other federal agency affairs. In fact, early on — before politics took full hold of pandemic response — he  stood on the science and pointed out that there’s no significant evidence that masking reduces the spread of viral diseases.

He didn’t have the power to mandate or forbid the use of hydroxychloroquine or ivermectin to treat COVID-19. In fact, no agency had the power to forbid those treatments, since they are both FDA-approved drugs which doctors are free to prescribe “off-label” at their discretion.

Fauci really only exercises two types of power.

One is the aforementioned power of the “public face.” He spoke authoritatively from a “top” government position, so people assumed (for a little while, anyway) that he knew what he was talking about.

The other is the power of controlling funding for research. That power comes in handy when you want research that supports your claims, and don’t want research that contradicts them.

In his quest to “get” Fauci, Paul proposes to create three new “public faces” to push whatever policies they happen to support, and three new points of control over research funding to justify those policies.

That’s like trying to subdue a knife-wielding maniac by handing him a machine gun and a baggie full of PCP-laced methamphetamine.

If we want to avoid future stupendous “public health” failures and the authoritarian power grabs that inevitably accompany those failures, we need to eliminate, or at least reduce, the authority of the people and institutions that fail. Tripling the technocracy won’t fix it.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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Biden’s Latest Excuse for Inflationary Monetary Policy: Blame Putin

Inflation data. Compiled by Wikideas1. Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.
Inflation data. Compiled by Wikideas1. Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.

“Today’s inflation report,” US president Joe Biden told us on March 10, “is a reminder that Americans’ budgets are being stretched by price increases and families are starting to feel the impacts of Putin’s price hike.”

It’s the latest in a long line of dodges on the causes of US inflation, which took a dive in early 2020, then began its steady climb toward the current official rate of 7.9%.

The first explanation was that inflation increases were “transitory.” That explanation made sense. Or would have, anyway, if Congress and the Biden administration had brought government borrowing and spending levels back to pre-COVID-19 levels. Instead, they decided to go bigger. When the causes aren’t “transitory,” the effects won’t be either.

Because Biden and Congress were unwilling to rein in borrowing and spending (requiring the Federal Reserve to continue flooding the economy with newly created money), new excuses were required.

Next came “well, if you really think about it, inflation is GOOD — look, higher wages!” And,  the US Labor Department did report an average pay increase 4.7% in 2021. But since prices jumped by at least 7%, those “higher wages” actually amounted to significant pay cuts.

“Corporate greed” looked like the administration’s last pitiful stand. Companies were hiking their prices for no good reason except to line their  pockets, those scoundrels! Their own higher costs for labor and for their supplies and inputs couldn’t possibly have anything to do with it.

It looked like the game was up. “Corporate greed,” the last refuge of the inflationary scoundrel, didn’t pass the smell test either. The administration was fresh out of excuses. There was really nowhere left to go except admitting the truth:

Inflation is caused by increasing the money supply faster than society increases its production of goods and services for sale. Everything else is an effect, not a cause.

If we want lower inflation, the Fed has to stop creating huge numbers of dollars out of thin air, making the dollars in our wallets and bank accounts worth less (even, eventually, worthless).

The bare minimum requirement for THAT to happen is for Congress to stop borrowing all those trillions of those dollars. In fact, the ideal cure for inflation would be a free market in money that sends the fiat dollar to the dustbin of history in favor of competing currencies backed by promises or commodities more substantial than the “full faith and credit” of a government no one should trust at all.

Unfortunately, Vladimir Putin came to Biden’s rescue and gave him yet another lame excuse to draw out pain instead of facing, and acting on, the truth.

Don’t buy that excuse. Even if you can afford to. And with today’s inflation rates, you probably can’t.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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Elizabeth Warren’s Solution to Every Problem: Put Elizabeth Warren in Charge

Bow to your sensei -- BOW TO YOUR SENSEI! Photo by Gage Skidmore. Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.
Bow to your sensei — BOW TO YOUR SENSEI! Photo by Gage Skidmore. Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.

Whenever and wherever too much government power produces bad policy and terrible results, US Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) can be counted upon to pop up with the same proposed solution: More government power and more bad policy. Surely that will fix it.

Current case in point: Oil prices.

“Putin’s war is causing gas prices to rise,” she tweeted on March 8, “but this is no excuse for large oil companies to pad their bottom line with war-fueled profits. Senate Democrats are watching closely — and already working on a windfall profits tax.”

And then, the very next day:  “We need to use every opportunity for economic pressure to hold Putin accountable — and @POTUS’ decision to ban Russian oil in the U.S. is the right thing to do.”

Oh, and by the way: “The President and Senate Democrats will use every tool to bring down costs for families.”

Every tool, that is, except resisting the temptation to  push those costs up with economic sanctions, strangling regulations, and punitive taxes.

It’s not that Warren is economically illiterate. As an entrepreneur of sorts, she flipped houses for a while before managing to parlay her terrible ideas into both political power and a series of sweetheart book deals that made her a multi-millionaire. So she can presumably do basic arithmetic well enough figure out that pushing costs up doesn’t bring costs down.

But if her problem isn’t stupidity, what is it? The most likely candidate seems to be jealousy.

She’s appalled whenever she notices that other people seemingly feel entitled to make their livings without her permission and absent her direction. Why, the nerve!

She can’t get her head around the idea that anyone, anywhere could possibly make anything work without the benefit of Elizabeth Warren’s omniscience and expertise.

She’s enraged when she learns that something, anything got done without a phone call to her office to get her blessing first.

She’s not content to just take a good deal of your money, borrow more money in your name, and spend that money as she pleases. She wants your attention, your allegiance, and your gratitude, too.

Well, why shouldn’t she feel that way, given that you and she have so much in common — you want to run your life, and she wants to run it too.

And if Elizabeth Warren running your life makes your life more difficult and expensive, she’s fine with that.

Are you?

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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