Jim Pfaff News Review: Monday, February 27, 2023

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DoE and FBI agree: The “Lab Leak Theory” is correct!

Over the weekend, a Wall Street Journal article opened up the debate on the Wuhan Lab Leak Theory once again. WSJ says the White House and Congress received a classified report in which the U. S. Department of Energy concludes that the COVID-19 virus “likely arose from a laboratory leak” in Wuhan, Hubei Province, China. This lines up with an FBI report in 2021 which supported the lab leak theory with “moderate confidence.”

The implications of this report are profound and sweeping extending into all the radical changes in American and international culture over the last three years: in media, academia, science more broadly, government, and social media.

Considering the Twitter Files revelations and efforts to shut down debate on the issue, many serious commentators and physicians are beginning to feel vindicated over being shut out by government censorship efforts. David Sacks summarizes this best:

David Sacks @DavidSacks

Why is this story so important? It shows: 1) unelected government officials have huge power to pursue dangerous agendas. 2) rather than holding them accountable, corporate media cover for them. 3) tech censorship ends up promoting rather than suppressing “disinformation.”

Dr. Jay Bhattacharya who was privately and publicly assaulted by Francis Collins and Anthony Fauci over the Great Barrington Declaration, responded as well:

Jay Bhattacharya @DrJBhattacharya

Important @thackerpd thread giving good context on the new DOE lab leak assessment. One important takeaway: Fauci and his cadre of #scicomm writers have lost control of the media narrative. How much damage has that crew done to public trust in science?

Paul D. Thacker @thackerpd

1. WSJ's report on Department of Energy conclusion that lab accident started the pandemic, created a lot of Twitter threads that left out critical information. https://t.co/CpSlFKYvbh First, this is really a second set of DOE scientists, from a different lab than in the past.

Needless to say, as more information comes out about government, social media companies, and mainstream media colluding to shut down speech, the corruption is worse that we thought. The behavior of government actors to give China a pass on the horrific crime is gravely concerning.

What we don’t yet know is whether Americans are willing to take down this political and government corruption if they know the full scope of this at all. Most of media are ignoring the story.

There was an extensive discussion on this issue in Twitter Spaces Sunday night. Here is a recording of that conversation which included speakers like the following:

• Dr. Li-Meng Yan, the Chinese virologist who escaped the CCP to bring the information to the West.

• Dr. Drew Pinski

• Justin Hart, author of the book Gone Viral: How Covid Drove the World Insane

• Tom Fitton of Judicial Watch

• And, of course, Yours Truly (that’s me)

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Claim: Americans are “fairly satisfied” with Social Security/Medicare. Is this really true?

Gallup released a survey of satisfaction rates for various policy and life areas. They concluded Americans are “fairly satisfied” with Social Security and Medicare. It’s an odd conclusion since only 45% are satisfied. It’s odd (but I guess expected) Gallup created may be appreciated by some Americans but most are aware these programs are constantly on the verge of bankruptcy. Satisfaction with, for example, “the quality of medical care” which by all accounts is pretty poor these days ranks higher but still below half of the general public. (Interesting result from the survey “the position of women in the nation” has a 62% satisfaction).

Recently, Joe Biden and the Democrats are claiming Republicans plan to eliminate the programs. Of course, this is false. But one wonders if a 45% approval of the programs is enough to maintain their support in the long run. Study after study shows that Americans lose a lot of money in potential retirement savings by putting their Social Security taxes into the system instead of investing those taxes themselves. The Heritage Foundation put out a paper in 2018 which had many shocking statistics. For example:

For average-earner males in Florida (a median-income state), lost investment earnings equal over $600,000 for those born in 1955; over $700,000 for those born in 1975; and over $1.1 million for those born in 1995. For average-earner females living in Florida, Social Security will provide over $190,000 less in lifetime income than personal savings for those born in 1955; over $230,000 less for those born in 1975; and over $420,000 less for those born in 1995.

This is a truly shocking result. And those who have lower life expectancy do even worse. Read the paper with appendices with more detail here.