By Rod Dreher
March 19, 2020 "Information
Clearing House" -
NPR has a scoop about how
the Republican head of the Senate Intelligence
Committee, Richard Burr, warned a private group of
wealthy constituents about what was coming from
coronavirus, at the same time the government was
withholding that information from the public — and
President Trump was downplaying it. Excerpts:
The chairman of the Senate Intelligence
Committee warned a small group of well-connected
constituents three weeks ago to prepare for dire
economic and societal effects of the coronavirus,
according to a secret recording obtained by NPR.
The remarks from U.S. Sen. Richard Burr were
more stark than any he had delivered in more
public forums.
On Feb. 27, when the United States had 15
confirmed cases of COVID-19, President Trump was
tamping down fears and suggesting the virus
could be seasonal.
“It’s going to disappear. One day, It’s like
a miracle. It will disappear,” the president
said then, before adding, “it could get worse
before it gets better. It could maybe go away.
We’ll see what happens.”
On that same day, Burr attended a luncheon
held at a social club called the Capitol Hill
Club. And he delivered a much more alarming
message.
“There’s one thing that I can tell you about
this: It is much more aggressive in its
transmission than anything that we have seen in
recent history,” he said, according to a secret
recording of the remarks obtained by NPR. “It is
probably more akin to the 1918 pandemic.”
He went on to say we could see the military
deployed to assist in the response.
Read it all. The story has the audio of the
speech.
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Are You Tired Of
The Lies And
Non-Stop Propaganda?
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Look what Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal
tweeted on February 25. Keep in mind that legally
and ethically, he couldn’t reveal what he heard in a
classified briefing, so don’t blame him for not
spilling the beans:
Think about it: Trump certainly knew how bad it
was going to get, but kept on downplaying it, at a
time when being straightforward would have given
people time and impetus to prepare. Trump’s most
loyal backers then were calling it a hoax, and
dunking on people like me for hyping panic, and so
forth. This top Senate Republican (and no doubt
other Senate Republicans) knew that the president
was misleading the public, and said nothing. If he
felt comfortable telling wealthy donors about this,
why didn’t he tell the general public? Because it
would contradict the president’s messaging? Why?
Having senior Republican lawmakers contradicting
the president at that relatively early stage, based
on information they knew, would have been in the
country’s best interest. Sen. Burr told rich,
well-connected supporters what was coming, but not
the people who elected him. He owes them an
explanation. And I would like to know why the Senate
Republicans, all of whom surely had the same
information, did not challenge the president, and
warn the public while we still had time.
Covid-19 obsessives like me saw it coming, but
the US then was full of deniers, especially among
conservatives. On February 25, US senators were told
what was coming. What a difference it would have
made if Republicans had come out and told the
American people the truth, instead of sticking to
the White House line.
Rod Dreher is a senior editor at The American
Conservative. He has written and edited for the New
York Post, The Dallas Morning News, National Review,
the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, the Washington
Times, and the Baton Rouge Advocate. Rod’s
commentary has been published in The Wall Street
Journal, Commentary, the Weekly Standard, Beliefnet,
and Real Simple, among other publications, and he
has appeared on NPR, ABC News, CNN, Fox News, MSNBC,
and the BBC. He lives in Baton Rouge, Louisiana,
with his wife Julie and their three children. He has
also written four books, The Little Way of Ruthie
Leming, Crunchy Cons, How Dante Can Save Your Life,
and The Benedict Option. -
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