Energy and Commerce Committee Hearing on Covid Origins: Pleas for More Money and a Pretense of US Government Benevolence
Democrats continue to be in denial about origin of pandemic. Republicans ask some relevant questions, but scrutinize China more than the US institutions they have actual control over.
The House Energy and Commerce Committee held a hearing today on Covid origins. Or seemed to. The quality of the witnesses was questionable. Most of the questioning was deluded or lackluster, though there were some exceptions.
It’s hard not to see this as a way to eat up the clock. Like the Iraq WMD story, to bore people with things when they try to pursue it so that when any more truth comes out, this is all seems a matter of ancient history rather than a cause for massive outrage. Concerns I wrote about last September have unfortunately proven to be founded.
I did my best to live tweet it. See my lengthy thread:
But my tweeting got little pickup. I’m clearly being shadowbanned to the max. As folks might recall, my Twitter account was undermined in seemingly unprecedented manner back in December. Today, someone reported that they would RT me and the RT’s would go away, which I’d never heard of before. I’m not writing that to whine, I’m hoping you’ll forward my writing to others. Critical reporting on this issue isn’t likely to get out otherwise.
The US people need to demand a robust investigation and actual transparency here or we are inviting disaster after disaster.
Republican subcommittee chair of Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, Morgan Griffith, made some of the best remarks.
He said: “I believe the substantial circumstantial evidence favors COVID-19 emerging due to a research-related incident.”
But he also said: “Although there’s little we can do to predict the timing of the next outbreak, there’s a lot we can do now to prepare for the next outbreak.” But the point is to prevent the next pandemic. And if it’s lab origin, then focusing on the creation of potential pandemic pathogens, i.e., gain of function, i.e., biowarfare, needs to be at the top of the list.
He also focused on the secrecy of the Chinese Communist party. But as eminent scientist Richard Ebright at Rutgers has stressed: "Many threads of investigation are available in the US and would be accessible to a Congressional inquiry with subpoena power. At EcoHealth. At funding agencies (USAID, DTRA, DARPA, DHS, and NIH). At publishers (Springer-Nature and Lancet). No cooperation from China needed."
Virtually all the Democrats, who stopped any real Congressional action for years, continue to live in denial and downplay lab origins. Here’s Jan Schakowsky via Emily Kopp of US Right to Know who pulled several telling clips:
Rep. Kathy Castor attempted to cast inquiry as being a “witch hunt”. Which is an insult to actual witches since there has clearly been a coverup about at least the possibility of lab origins of the current pandemic, see my overview from 2021:
One theme of the hearing was that the work done by the US government is good, but we have to scrutinize other countries like China. This was “counterbalanced” by occasional pleas for the need to cooperate with other counties, tacitly arguing that we may need to compromise getting at the truth because we need international cooperation to prevent future pandemics.
Another major theme, sometimes subtle, sometimes not, was for more funding. More “capacity” and more surveillance. Stronger biosafety facilities around the world. This will effectively enable more dangerous lab work and may well be putting out the fire with gasoline.
The concept of overly zealous attacks on scientists creating potential pandemic pathogens was frequently raised. But the funding pressures and such have actually hushed scientists who have been critical of such work. And of course scientists have apparently been “suicided” for lifting the veil on biowarfare: Frank Olson and the British scientist David Kelly.
One of the witnesses Michael Imperiale:
Ebright at Rutgers responded:
They were under oath:
Imperiale also continued to cling to the wet market theory:
An actual Department of Justice would examine this.
Imperiale seemed to pretend that no work was done that makes pathogens worse.
One witness argued that the pandemic had two origins and this was evidence of zoonotic origin.
Also noteworthy:
One of the most interesting members was Rep. Jeff Duncan:
Though as Kopp noted, the witness Parker did then throw shade on the project, which the infamous Peter Daszak has been pushing for years. But it’s insane that the bounds of criticism from the witnesses of Daszak is that he shouldn’t get all the millions he is asking for.
Alexis Baden-Mayer from Organic Consumers Association noted Parker was commander at Fort Detrick during the anthrax attacks:
Thus, we’re largely hearing from different sides of the bioweapons establishment of the US. Much of what’s going on is turf wars — which agency gets to endanger humanity when what’s called for is scrutiny of the whole ball of wax.
Ironically, the anthrax attacks did come up a few times, but it was just assumed that the story from the FBI that it was a one man operation was never questioned. Congress has never investigated this bioweapons attack against it which was critical to spawning the “Patriot Act” and the invasion of Afghanistan.
Additionally:
The hearing was — as one of the Democrats complained — called at the last minute. Interesting timing that it happened at 2:00 today — the same time as the Tyre Nichols funeral where VP Harris spoke and which of course got massive coverage:
Not even C-SPAN covered the hearing:
I’ve noted other instances when events were done at a time that would draw limited eyeballs, like DNC debates coinciding with major sporting events so that the public wouldn’t be subjected to a mildly progressive candidate like Bernie Sanders debating a Biden or Hillary Clinton.
Full hearing:
Will post a transcript if it becomes available.
Thank you, Sam. So appreciate your efforts and ethics.
Their Limited Hangout