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Anna Bramwell
Anna Bramwell
1 year ago

The article omits any reference to the US’s outsourcing of research into killer viruses, its funding of foreign labs. This must be part of a wider international practice, witness the French funding and building of the Wuhan lab, also funded by the US. Wasnt this part of Fauci’s portfolio??

j t
j t
1 year ago
Reply to  Anna Bramwell

I find part of this article interesting concerning Fraudci’s connection with the bioweapon-loving neocons and their “defense system.” But much of it sounds more like controlled opposition and attempts to credit Cheney and his fellow psychopathic liar, Bush, for “doing good.” There is neither hint nor even question, for instance, of the possibility that those letters containing anthrax were sent out under the auspices of the same “masterminds” that wanted to expand their military bioweapons/defense system, and for that very purpose.
The author writes, “Bush has been rightly credited with identifying the threat of a global pandemic, as well as providing a serious policy for dealing with the spread of HIV/AIDS in Africa.” “Rightly credited” … !???What?? He and the powerhungry, bloodthirsty neocons that he served (incl NATO’s worst) WANTED that “threat” to further their desired policies and very likely were part and parcel in creating it.
And hasn’t he read RFK, Jr’s massively documented book about Fraudci and the $$$ he created for PigFarma and the slaughter he was responsible for thru his totally created HIV/AIDS disaster in Africa?… “serious policy” …!??? Is he kidding?
And then there’s “Dark Winter, it was designed by the Johns Hopkins Center for Civilian Biodefense Strategies.” No mention of the fact that that Center is totally tied to the Rockefeller Foundation and the “simulation” was part and parcel of a whole slew of “simulations,” including “Event 201” in October, 2019, right before the appearance of the c-1984 plandemic, created and promoted and paid for by various globalist “Great Reset” and depop-supporting groups and foundations?
And I could go on….

Last edited 1 year ago by j t
Peter Bingham
Peter Bingham
1 year ago

It was an intereresting backdrop. But it fizzles out just and leaves you thinking – well what about the alleged abuse of his power, the corruption, the conflcts of interest, the patents and off-shoring gain of function? Not to mention Doctors not being allowed to be well, Doctors with early treatment protocols for C19 patents. I think the “Fauci Effect” might mean something else 10 years from now.

Warren Trees
Warren Trees
1 year ago
Reply to  Peter Bingham

To me, it was an example of how the intoxicating effect of power can cause some people to cause major public policy debacles.

Martini Lyola
Martini Lyola
1 year ago
Reply to  Warren Trees

It’s more likely that Fauxi was already temperamentally the wrong man for the job … he is a totalitarian narcissist by nature as he had already demonstrated during the AIDS “crisis” of the 80s, well before the Bush administration. His management of COVID was just as inept, and just as intransigent.

Rob Mort
Rob Mort
1 year ago
Reply to  Martini Lyola

Fauxi..brilliant…love it..nee how…

greg green
greg green
1 year ago
Reply to  Martini Lyola

I forget where I read it, but an article about the growth of EcoHealth said that Peter Daszak was unsuccessfully trying to get Fauci to speak at his fledgling company’s gatherings. A friend of Fauci told Daszak to get tv networks there and that will help get Fauci there.

So Daszak arranged for a few network cameras to be there and invited Fauci to the televised event. That got Fauci to show up.

Amusingly the same friend of Fauci later said Fauci is all about the science, there’s no ego to him.

Jim R
Jim R
1 year ago
Reply to  Peter Bingham

The author is probably working on a book and decided to publish some of the early work. Not sure why everyone’s being so hard on him for not having a more satisfying conclusion. It’s a very interesting take and I’m glad to have read it. We’ll see where all this goes over time. If you want more polished turds, the mainstream media are always there to oblige.

Andy O'Gorman
Andy O'Gorman
1 year ago

The next time I see Fauci’s name in a headline, I hope it will be the final time – reading his timely obituary.

Billy Bob
Billy Bob
1 year ago

I subscribed to “unherd” because I want to broaden my reading horizons. It has been rather disappointing for the shallowness of the articles. But sometimes one of them tries to stands out.
This one was an interesting read on the history but find it lacking on references. The one link supposed to substantiate the claim of “no oversight structure” goes to apple.com — one hopes it is a typo.
Even forgetting the gratuitous swipe at being the highest paid US civil servant (there has to be one and a similar position in the private sector would pay much more), like all of the unherd articles I read so far, it ends in a rather shallow and unsatisfying way: the author makes a great case on the title, but completely fails to substantiate the claim in the subtitle other than a vague last paragraph that appeals to the already-convinced.
I give it a C+.

Last edited 1 year ago by Billy Bob
John Potts
John Potts
1 year ago
Reply to  Billy Bob

I agree with Billy Bob: the article leads us through some events of twenty years ago, which was informative, but then completely fails to show how and where America’s biodefence strategy has “backfired”. The article simply comes to a halt at the point where it should be making the case for the statement in the sub-headline.

Norman Powers
Norman Powers
1 year ago
Reply to  John Potts

I think we’re meant to infer that it backfired from the fact that Fauci (and the public health / disease fighting community in general) has been so destructive. They were meant to save us from dystopian villains, not become them! The author doesn’t really have to spell this out in my view.

Russ W
Russ W
1 year ago
Reply to  John Potts

It seems the author accepts the entire COVID response as self-evident evidence. I’d prefer more references as well. Still, a good article that taught me more about the background.

Norman Powers
Norman Powers
1 year ago
Reply to  Billy Bob

Another link (“NIAID article”) also goes to a generic landing page that isn’t actually an article. Link checking as part of the editorial process would help.
Nonetheless, I give this article an A. Fauci has been in the news constantly for years but I have not yet heard this perspective anywhere else – it is truly an UnHerd essay, which is exactly what this site is about. And the argument it makes is compelling. Many of the other links do support their claims and go to archival material that was otherwise long since forgotten. How Fauci became so powerful is (or was?) indeed a puzzling mystery.
That said I agree the argument as laid out has holes in – so what if Cheney thought the guy was great, how does that stop Trump firing him? It doesn’t. But your response likewise seems to have holes. The fact that Fauci is the best paid US civil servant cannot simply be hand-waved away with a statement like “there has to be one”. That’s nonsense because:

  • Fauci’s pay is not merely the best, it is radically higher than normal.
  • Why is Fauci considered so special? There are tons of people you might expect to earn very high amounts in the government but this one in particular has no obviously unique skills, in fact, his “skills” are clearly fraudulent garbage and there’s no evidence in his career history that the private sector was desperate to hire him.
  • The USG has a law that says civil servants may not earn more than the President, which was apparently waived in this case – why?

Again and again we hit the question of why is this little man specifically so rich and powerful, given the lack of any obvious logical explanation? This article does a fine attempt of trying to explain it, even though I struggle to follow the logic – Bush created a ton of massive security bureaucracies and it’s unclear why this one guy in particular did so much better than e.g. the chief of Homeland Security. But at least it’s a start!

Last edited 1 year ago by Norman Powers
Rob Mort
Rob Mort
1 year ago
Reply to  Norman Powers

I think the general tone of the quantity of his pay reflects all private and public pay remunerations across the western world..it’s the same here in Australia..there are public buearocrats in Canberra on $800,000 per year..this is a deep structural problem caused by easy borrowed money of the last 30 or so years..and doesn’t by necessity reflect the output.

Stephen J
Stephen J
1 year ago
Reply to  Billy Bob

There are also dubious facts. Like the idea that Cheney worked with DOD for decades before becoming VP. Cheney was known as being an energy guy, not a defense guy. His career in Congress was energy focused. Halliburton, the company he led, was an energy company.
The article also ignores NIAID has three mission areas including HIV/AIDS, of which Fauci was the world’s foremost expert. His focus undoubtable remained on that disease which he had already dedicated 20 years of his life to when NIAID was expanded in the early 2000s.
This piece should be titled how d**k Cheney made Anthony Fauci the highest paid federal government worker. Because that’s all this piece proves in the end.

John McKee
John McKee
1 year ago
Reply to  Stephen J

Cheny was the most war loving of all the Neo-Cons in the Bush Cabinet, and, I believe, the most powerful.

Johann Strauss
Johann Strauss
1 year ago
Reply to  Billy Bob

The salary issue is not to be taken lightly. It’s not simply that Fauci is/was the most highly paid US civil servant, but his salary exceeds the NIH cap by well over $100,000. And yes, many of the top scientists (not administrators) would be paid much larger salaries on the outside, including in academia, but that is irrelevant, because they choose to stay at the NIH because the research situation is more favorable (e.g. not having to write and apply for grants). Similarly, many of the institute directors (but not all as many are incompetent and wouldn’t see the light of day in the private sector), would get much higher salaries in pharma, for example. But that is neither here nor there. Fauci’s massive salary is a complete outlier. There are quite a number of top scientists (and I mean really superb, internationally recognized scientists who are at the forefront of their respective fields) at the NIH whose salaries exceed those of Justices on the Supreme Court and even the vice president. But all their salaries pale into insignificance compared to Fauci’s. Fauci’s salary is and was a complete anomaly. Incidentally, scientists at the NIH are not allowed to obtain outside remuneration as the Supreme Court Justices do during their summer recess.

M. Gatt
M. Gatt
1 year ago

Read ” The Real Anthony Fauci’ by RFK Jr. (Extremely well referenced)

Steve Elliott
Steve Elliott
1 year ago

Did I miss something? I didn’t get the reason Trump didn’t fire Fauci.

N T
N T
1 year ago
Reply to  Steve Elliott

Or, if they needed him for biodefense, why he was not removed from being in charge of the covid response, in favor of someone or a group of someone’s.
When I read faucci’s early remarks about his fear of a sars-like, more infectious agent, it occurred to me that this guy was too close to the sun to be the person responsible for the reaction to the crisis.

Steve Elliott
Steve Elliott
1 year ago
Reply to  N T

Perhaps he was left in charge of the covid response in order for him to smokescreen the US involvement in the Wuhan laboratory and development of the virus and I know, I’m sounding like a conspiracy theorist.

Alan Hultman
Alan Hultman
1 year ago
Reply to  Steve Elliott

That’s part of it. Fauci was left heading up NAIAD so he could also cover up prior and ongoing NIH funding to EcoHealth Alliance (Peter Daszak) and by extension Ralph Baric, who also collaborated with PLA officer/virologist (aka “batwoman”) at WIV research into SARS Gain of Function “research”. https://twitter.com/TexasRose1776/status/1564245766302040064?s=20&t=N8ZHDzwPoJY6N1iffIKYJw
https://twitter.com/R_H_Ebright/status/1564043456594395136?s=20&t=f1iVVxCsaoDNn8zAmDm5fg
Bioweapon research, outlawed on USA soil.

greg green
greg green
1 year ago
Reply to  Steve Elliott

That wasn’t clear to me either. Though in cases like that I blame the swamp. Probably lots of senators advising Trump not to do the obvious.

Maybe replacing him would’ve brought a new guy who would quickly realize and report Holy Crap! This is what we were funding!

So the secrets needed to be contained. Too many times Trump didn’t fire who and when he needed.

russ king
russ king
1 year ago

So very essence of creating such nodal agency and putting person like Fauci at the top of it has been defeated. Agency motto was to prevent covid like situation but in turns it helped create virus and kill millions of people worldwide, highest from US and west, what a tragedy. Cheney wanted to make sure US remain superpower forever, but it looks like it has failed miserably in that regard and China has now great weapon at her disposal, which US scientist helped to create and fund. Hope US has learned lesson from it and stop tinkering natural virus, but it won’t happen, they are already on hunt for new viruses with new 250m funding, world is doomed except China

greg green
greg green
1 year ago
Reply to  russ king

In 2018 Fauci extols the virtues of an mRNA vaccine but complains it’ll take too long to certify unless some sort of crises comes along. Lo and behold a few years later from a lab in Wuhan he funded, using a gain of function research he favored, a virus suddenly allows him to use the mRNA vaccine he dreamed of. Then he had to smear HCQ, IVM, and ignore healthy living to finish the victory.

He’s like a Bond villain, except real. And working for our government. Reminds me of the line from the sheriff in the Bond film Live and Let Die: Secret agent!!! On who’s side!?!?

Chris Clark
Chris Clark
1 year ago

Agree with the other commenters. This article feels like it hit a word count and just ended…lots of detail early on and then…nothing! How disappointing.

John Pade
John Pade
1 year ago

This article will be an important reference for histories of Covid-2’s origins, if it will be allowed to publish them. Later developments are covered in two “Vanity Fair” articles: ‘ “This Shouldn’t Happen”: Inside the Virus-Hunting Nonprofit at the Center of the Lab- Leak Controversy’ and “The Lab-Leak Theory: Inside the Fight to Uncover COVID-19’s Origins”. Gaps remain, but points along a dangerous path are being revealed.
America’s part in the pandemic may very well be that of unwitting co-conspirator instead of victim. The doubters of globalization and its elites may have been righter than they could have ever known.
And herein, perhaps, are those elites’ darkest, deadliest fears: that they are wrong. As perilous as the status of their project is presently, it will be irretrievable should the evidence pointing to them is firmly connected.
Or, Covid could have occurred purely through natural causes, as unbending efforts will attempt to prove, and all the curious events starting with those described in this article are coincidental.

J Reece
J Reece
1 year ago

This article exemplifies why I feel so ambivalent about Unherd generally. There is a mixture of interesting informative gems of articles (The lab-leak theory isn’t dead e.g.) amidst a slurry of ordure which seems designed to re-enforce the prevailing false narrative. This feels like I’m reading the work of an intelligent, hardworking schoolboy, who has achieved a lot, but doesn’t appreciate the significance of the lacunae in his grasp of the bigger picture.

He starts with the predictable fatuous notion that all opinion lies on a linear spectrum – left to right – as if you are not free to have any opinion you want on any issue. Of course if you live in the U.S. and watch TV then your opinions are likely to be limited by your tribe. But if you do neither of these things (live … watch) and you take an interest in the World, then listening to people hobbled in this way is painful.

Drawing the distinction between Fauci’s role in the bio-defense and public health sounds promising … but then all he says is that he is not in public health. So nobody took any notice of what he had to say in the public health arena? Where have you been for the last two years?

Just how is being put in place by those disgusting neocons “contrary to the notion that he is a Deep State string-puller”?

“Cheney seeking to address the gaping hole in America’s national security” – ha-ha. You don’t have to be a history professor to have noticed that the “Department of Defense” is in fact Offensive (in both senses). (If this has escaped your attention, do a quick search on countries bombed or subverted by the US in the last century or so). Developing biological weapons is illegal, that is why it has to masked as “defensive”. When Obama blocked the proposed research in the US (for whatever reason) it was simply moved offshore to Wuhan.

The Anthrax attacks! Ahah, now he’s going to say something to enlighten people … but no, he seems to have done no research on this incident. What a great opportunity missed.

Dark Winter! … again no.

By now it’s no surprise that he’s recycling the lies about SARS. This is really not hard to inform yourself on.

The amount of money Fauci earns has a little interest for some, but it’s not nearly so significant as the power he gets from the vastly greater billions he allocates, thus choosing what research gets done, and whose career will prosper.

If all this is your genuine belief, rather than deliberate propaganda, Ashley, I suggest you start by working your way through Richard Andrew Cole’s “Peace Revolution” podcast. That will take you a couple of weeks full-time, but you will start to grasp how the World works.

To everybody else I would say pick the journalists you want to spend your time on more carefully. Try Whitney Webb for a start.

Last edited 1 year ago by J Reece
greg green
greg green
1 year ago
Reply to  J Reece

Fauci’s grant funding power is what I suspect kept nearly everyone from speaking against him.

Chuck Pezeshki
Chuck Pezeshki
1 year ago

A great piece. And fills in the details behind what I figured out in this piece. https://empathy.guru/2022/03/15/the-memetics-of-bioweapons-and-why-they-matter/

Rob Mort
Rob Mort
1 year ago
Reply to  Chuck Pezeshki

“If you’re a reader of this blog, the statistics are that you’re a smart person”.
Phwaor I’m blushing now..haha.
In all honesty tho yeah a good assessment of the reality..I called bullshit from day one here from my home in the tropical paradise of the United soviet socialist state of Byron Bay ( most excellent sour dough loaves and almond croissants). The clothing masks sent me into paroxysms, but the strange upside to covid1984, was that after my beautiful wife died in September 2020, a year later I met my beautiful fiance here from the legaszpi city Philippines, and the rest as they say is histoire..irony? Anyway thanks so much Mr Fauxi..your the best..I love you so does jesus..

Last edited 1 year ago by Rob Mort
J Reece
J Reece
1 year ago
Reply to  Chuck Pezeshki

Thanks Chuck: yours is a much better article!

Russ W
Russ W
1 year ago
Reply to  Chuck Pezeshki

Wow. Thank you, Chuck.