2024-04-07 11:00:18
Legal Insurrection recently looked back on the 4th anniversary of “15 days to Slow the Spread,” highlighting the spate of disastrous consequences of the covid lockdowns that extended in some locales for three years.
I have often noted the role of Dr. Anthony Fauci in this fiasco. But a new documentary reminded me about”Scarf Lady” Dr. Deborah Birx.
“It Wasn’t Fauci: How the Deep State Really Played Trump” shows how Birx, a career bureaucrat, seized control of the government from President Donald Trump and created a disaster.
The documentary shows how Birx was invited to join the White House Coronavirus Panel in March 2020 through a connection with former Vice President Mike Pence. Her qualification was being the leader in the Office of the Global Aid Coordinator (OGAC) as part of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) program.
Interestingly, there was an Inspector General report on complaints about her leadership style, which is described as dictatorial and “lacking rationale.” The complaints in the letter should have been heeded.
In addition to concerns about performance targets, country team members cited broader issues related to OGAC’s management approach. Of 68 statements the inspector general’s office received about OGAC’s leadership, 49 — or 72% — were negative. The auditors cited responses that described OGAC’s leadership as “dictatorial,” “directive,” and “autocratic.”
“Sometimes decisions are made without clear rationale other than ‘[the Global AIDS Coordinator] told you to,” one respondent told the auditors.
Another reported that an implementing agency with “high level technical staff” has been “directed to read the [planning] letter and do exactly that.”
“Let’s just obey and move on. This is a worrying trend. Working in fear and a space where nothing is negotiable. It is causing a lot of strain with the government. Also losing gains made in the country. There should be room for negotiation and allow people to air their views,” the same person reported.
The documentary notes that Birx was the covid policy maker on the panel, not Fauci . . . whom the film suggests was merely its “face.” Birx handled covid, caused by an airborne respiratory virus that is readily transmittable, using the exact same approach used for AID—a bloodborne pathogen that is substantially more difficult to contract.
The playbook she used was taken directly from her PERFAR experience.
- Treat the disease as a killer.
- Focus on children.
- Get to zero cases at any cost.
Thus, the “15 days to slow the spread” morphed into the national nightmare from which we are still recovering.
In April 2020, Trump began asking questions about how effective the lockdowns were compared to the harm being done to the nation and its citizens. Scott Atlas, a senior fellow in health policy from the Hoover Institute, was brought in. He began his work to reverse the tide by challenging the high Infection Fatality Rate, indicating the virus was actually low risk for the young and healthy.
Eventually, Atlas brought in a number of scientists who were also challenging the “COV-AIDS” approach Birx was using. In fact, a meeting with Trump was reporedly scheduled in August 2020, so that Birx could be there.
Atlas explained that meeting was almost scrapped when Birx cancelled, then changed to a 5-minute meet-and-greet with Trump. Then Trump began asking the scientists probing questions, and the session was extended to 45 minutes.
Atlas says Birx was attempting to sabotage their efforts.
[Trump] went through and asked point by point all of the five of us these questions and it went on for 45 minutes. And I kept being tapped on the shoulder saying Scott, you know, wrap it up, we have other things. And I said, OK, but meantime, I’m not gonna interrupt the president of the United States. That’s obvious. Secondly, this was important. Third, he was asking great questions and in fact, called in his video maker, and said he was so happy to have what he called “five geniuses” here that he brought in the video, and I narrated a small video and we introduced ourselves on the video.
Of course, that video has been suppressed. There was never a press release. It was viewed as, as harmful that it was held without Birx. But Birx backed out of it and in fact, tried to sabotage it, I believe. But luckily, we were there.
Ultimately, Birx continued to issue lockdown policies using White House stationery and scuttling Trump’s attempts to reopen the country.
The kicker: Pence allowed Birx to use Air Force Two to fly around the country and undermine the efforts of Atlas and the other serious and well-qualified scientists who disagreed with the Birx model.
Perhaps the most chilling aspect of the documentary was the audio of Birx herself bragging about how she subverted Trump and his advisors.
Well, with a little help from Pence.
“I made it very clear to the Vice President, and I said, “You know I’m saying exactly the opposite of what the president is saying, and what Scott Atlas is saying. And the Vice President said, “You do what you need to do.
I just want you to grasp this: The White House with the White House emblem on it is send this report to governors every week. And it says completely the opposite of what the President is saying. Despite the fact Scott Atlas would say, “The President’s policy is…I’m like, “Have the President tell me”.
I went tp the communications leads and I said, “You can’t put Scott Atlas out”. I can’t stop him from talking to the President. But I can stop him being on national news. They said, “OK”.
If Trump wins in November, I hope that he has learned some lessons from Argentina’s new President Javier Milei on how to handle our de facto 4th branch of government—the Administrative State housed in the Executive Branch. And he needs to select pick a much better VP, too.
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