Tag: corruption

A Short History Of How Anthony Fauci Has Kept Failing Up Since 1984

In 2003, terrorism was a more immediate national danger than infectious diseases. Dr. Anthony Fauci’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) had just redirected $117 million from infectious diseases to fund a new anthrax vaccine effort in response to the anthrax attacks that happened a week after 9/11.

The millions were just a small part of the $1.8 billion Fauci had poured into defense from bioterrorist attacks over the preceding two years. More than half of those funds were devoted to anthrax and smallpox alone. In 2004, Fauci launched the $5.6 billion “Project Bioshield,” the National Institutes of Health’s biggest outlay for a single research issue until then.

Some microbiology researchers at the time, however, according to the journal Nature, were concerned that Fauci’s actions would ultimately “distort priorities in infectious-disease research, sucking money away from work to understand and counter natural disease outbreaks that ultimately pose a greater threat to public health.” The 2003 Nature article cited a Stanford University microbiologist saying “that diseases such as influenza and other respiratory-tract infections routinely kill far more people than would die in a bioterrorist attack, and therefore deserve a greater share of the NIAID budget.”

The criticism turned out to be warranted. In 2007, after spending billions under the opposite premise, Fauci admitted that “at the end of the day, you’re not going to kill as many people [with an anthrax attack] as you would if you blasted off a couple of car bombs in Times Square.” His anthrax vaccine effort had failed, having been “sunk by lobbying.”

The anthrax vaccine failure followed on the heels of Fauci’s controversial leadership of the nation’s AIDS response in the 1980s and ‘90s. According to “Good Intentions,” a 1990 book by investigative author and innovation expert Bruce Nussbaum, Fauci started his career as “a lackluster scientist,” who “found his true vocation—empire building” when he took the reins at NIAID in 1984.

To ensure that AIDS would be his exclusive demesne within the federal government, Fauci “started the most important bureaucratic battle in the history of the fight against AIDS,” squeezing out more scientifically competent, but less conniving administrators. According to Nussbaum, if Fauci had not won the battle, “many people who died might have lived.”

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10 Examples of Kickbacks & Waste in New ‘COVID’ Bill Showing It’s Not About COVID at All

President Biden has proposed $1.9 trillion in additional COVID-19 spending. He’s asking Congress to authorize another round of checks, more expanded unemployment benefits, a $15 minimum wage, and much, much more. Over the weekend, House Democrats finally released the text of the 600-page bill meant to make Biden’s broad COVID proposals a legislative reality.

Critics and economists have already attacked the proposal on the merits of its main provisions and staggering overall cost, arguing it would break the budget, incentivize unemployment, and fail to stimulate the economy. However, there’s a much simpler objection to this legislative bonanza: it’s full of unrelated pork and political priorities.

Here are 10 crazy examples of waste and partisan kick-backs that have nothing to do with COVID-19 but are in the new bill.

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New Mexico Gov. Grisham under fire for allegedly spending thousands of taxpayer dollars on groceries, alcohol, dry cleaning

New Mexico’s Democratic Governor Lujan Grisham is in hot water for allegedly using taxpayer money to buy herself groceries, liquor, and dry cleaning. Financial documents obtained by local media showed that in the last half of 2020, Grisham spent $13,500 on various expenses, including Wagyu beef, tequila, vodka, gin, and wine.

In addition to extravagant spending on alcohol and personal effects, reports say that individuals close to Grisham received significant raises that ranged between $7,500 and $12,000.

“It’s not what tax dollars ought to be spent for,” said Republican House Minority Leader Jim Townsend. “In the time when people are hurting all over the state, using their tax dollars to buy Wagyu beef has got to be a little bit disenchanting to many people. I think it’s just more of [an] indication of the problem that we have had and the governor has had connecting with people.”

Beyond questionable expenditures on the taxpayer dime, Grisham has also been criticized for issuing family gathering restrictions for private citizens throughout the pandemic while simultaneously holding large events and meetings of people at her mansion.

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White House working with Facebook and Twitter to tackle anti-vaxxers

The White House has been reaching out to social media companies including Facebook, Twitter and Alphabet Inc’s Google about clamping down on COVID misinformation and getting their help to stop it from going viral, a senior administration official said.

President Joe Biden, who has raced to curb the pandemic since taking office, has made inoculating Americans one of his top priorities and called the move “a wartime effort.” But tackling public fear about taking the vaccine has emerged as a major impediment for the administration.

Since the onset of the pandemic, calls from lawmakers asking the companies to tackle the spread of COVID misinformation on their platforms have grown.

The White House’s direct engagement with the companies to mitigate the challenge has not been previously reported. Biden’s chief of staff Ron Klain has previously said the administration will try to work with Silicon Valley on the issue.

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Raytheon Awarded $49 Million DoD Contract Weeks After Former Board Member Lloyd Austin Confirmed as Defense Secretary

Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin stands to profit from a new Department of Defense contract with arms contractor Raytheon, even after he promised to divest from Raytheon holdings he acquired as a civilian.

A new $49 million contract was awarded to Raytheon last week, just weeks after the company’s former board member Lloyd Austin was confirmed as the new Secretary of Defense. The contract is for engines for VTOL (vertical take-off and landing) aircraft.

Austin joined the board of Raytheon Technologies in 2016, the same year he retired from the armed forces. As of 2020, his disclosed Raytheon stock and compensation holdings amount to more than $1.4 million, and it’s likely he’ll sell his Raytheon shares at an inflated price due to the latest contract while in office as Secretary of Defense.

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Report: Epstein Madam Wouldn’t Help Find Tapes Of Bill Clinton Because It Would Hurt Hillary’s 2016 Run

According to a new book, Ghislaine Maxwell, the alleged madam for the late accused child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, refused to help a CBS producer locate videotapes Epstein had made of Bill Clinton because it might hurt Hillary Clinton’s chances of winning the presidency in 2016.

In his new book, “Ticking Clock: Behind The Scenes At 60 Minutes,” former CBS producer Ira Rosen writes of speaking with Maxwell in 2016, saying he asked for footage of Donald Trump that Epstein might have shot, only to have Maxwell respond, “If you get the tapes on Trump you have to do [Bill] Clinton.”

Rosen admits that at his meeting with Maxwell in early 2016, acting on a “hunch” that such tapes existed, he said, “I want the tapes. I know he [Epstein] was videotaping everyone and I want the tapes of Trump with the girls.” He writes that Maxwell replied, “I don’t know where they are,” tacitly confirming the tapes’ existence.

Rosen writes that he told Maxwell to “ask Epstein,” adding the “fate of the country is at stake. … Trump could be elected president and how would you feel if those tapes emerged after he was in office?”

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