So Much For That, Part???

The always-ineffectual Rand Paul grilled Fauci over Wuhan lab funding back in May 2021, which was 6 months ago, and what came of it? Absolutely nothing.

Remember a year ago when Ted Cruz ripped into Jack Dorsey. He really showed him, didn’t he. Trump is still suspended for Twitter, and nothing changed.

And at around the same time, Sen. Hawley “demanded” answers from Facebook over censorship of a Hunter Biden article. And in 2019, Hawley introduced legislation to “Amend Section 230 Immunity for Big Tech Companies,” which also went nowhere.

And remember all the media hype in June-July about the Wuhan lab leak hypothesis? Finally the mainstream media was entertaining the possibility of a lab leak and gain-of-function research, and it seemed like we were so close to having a definitive answer about the origins of Covid, but what happened? It’s as if the whole story just died. There are still headlines about a supposed lab leak, but what came of it? Nothing, as I correctly predicted.

Even if there is obvious evidence of a leak or some cover up, Biden will never implicate/blame China and Fauci in the same way George W. Bush, for example, blamed Bin Laden and Afghanistan for 911 (this does not necessarily mean the ‘official’ 911 narrative is correct, but at least Bush laid the blame on something, an actual individual and country, instead of nothing).

The ‘billionaire tax’, student loan debt forgiveness, and ‘medicare for all’ will never happen, so it’s not just the ‘right’ who are feeling empty handed. You can choose between one of 50 or so preferred pronouns and genders and have an abortion up to the 9th month, but make the wealthiest 700 or so Americans pay a little more in taxes, or forgive student loan debt? Not gonna happen. [1]

It’s evident that these people useless. These roles are perfunctory (for example, Buttigieg took a 2-month leave of absence and no one noticed). Individual senators, congressmen, and the media have much less power than people think, at least as far as House Republicans are concerned.

But it’s interesting how on one extreme there is so much activity on social media, such as on Twitter (I have observed that pundits and politicians are getting about 3-5x as much engagement, such as likes, comments, and retweets, compared to year ago, thanks in large part due to Jan 6th, Covid, BLM, the ever-intensifying culture wars, and other catalysts), and so much action in the private sector (such as Tesla stock making new highs everyday, Facebook’s unveiling of the universally-panned ‘Metaverse’), yet on the other extreme so much inaction in Washington. I have argued that inaction and gridlock in Washington, to some extent, is a contributor to rage and division online, because neither side feels like they are being heard.

[1] This is not surprising. It is easier to push social/cultural change than economic change. Raising taxes for example must go through both houses. It is easier to have success with legislation that increases opportunity or expands rights, than policy that takes money from ‘A’ and gives to ‘B’. Raising minimum wage requires that business pay more directly. ‘Increasing diversity’ does not come at such a cost, or the costs are more indirect, whereas medicare for all or student loan debt forgiveness has a real, quantifiable cost. Rather than taking from A and giving to B, as in raising taxes, the govt. instead can just give money to everyone with stimulus, which is politically more palatable for both sides.