Hodad

Bullshit. You're just a shameless liar, who won't even quit when caught red handed. A hopeless case. And you know who thinks you're bad at science? Scientists. Johns Hopkins What do we know about what happened at this animal market? Three-quarters of the early cases had some association with the market and none had an association with the laboratory. Even though the market and the laboratory are both in Wuhan, they are in different parts of the city separated by a river. There were also other indicators: There were two lineages—or two separate variants—of SARS-CoV-2 that were circulating in the early days of the pandemic. One of those became the pandemic [as we know it] and the other one died out. But [the existence of two lineages] would mean that there would have to have been two introductions from a laboratory, versus an outbreak going on among animals and then spilling over multiple times to people. The scientists looked for two things: tracking the early cases and evolution of the two lineages. They did a geospatial analysis which tracked cases that we knew about and pinpointed exactly where in Wuhan those cases were. They were even more tied to the market than previous indicators had suggested. The scientists looked at those two strains and [their] lineages to see how they evolved, which also tied it to an animal spillover. They got down to the exact stall of where one of the positive environmental samples had come from. There had been a picture taken a couple of months prior where a raccoon dog had been sitting in said stall. Raccoon dogs are one of the prime suspects for where the virus came from.

"His virus"? "That he helped make transmissable"? You have drunk half the conspiracy fever swamp. Now directing grant money to another organization is the equivalent of cooking up a supervirus in a lab. GTFO.

Don't play dumb. They ARE functionally different. Saying that the scientific evidence supports a natural jump and saying that a lab leak is impossible are two VERY different statements. That's just how the goddamn English language works. And what farking "lost this argument" are you even talking about? Fauci said then what is still the scientific consensus today: the scientific evidence points to the explanation zoonotic origin.

And then you tried to change it, liar. What you initially quoted: April 17, 2020 Rebuffing then-President Donald Trump, Fauci downplays the possibility of a lab leak, saying the virus’ “mutations” are “totally consistent with a jump of a species from an animal to a human.” What you just tried to change it to: "He said it was totally natural. There is no ambiguity in that statement. None." And when called out you deny, deny, deny. It's shameless. Scientists don't deal in impossibilities. They tell you what the evidence indicates. And you are making up your own science. Any time a virus jumps to a new species there is a first point of contact. Evolution happens at the individual level, not across a species simultaneously.

Exactly. Sounds like a great solution to a common problem. Less garbage = more better.

You are a bald faced liar. You are literally changing the words directly in front of us. Fark off. And yes, natural viruses exist in labs. Yes, humans in those labs can become infected with those natural viruses. And there you have a lab leak of a natural virus.

You are such a clown. I didn't cite or "cling" to any clinical trials. I'm talking about what happened in the real world.

Care to quote that? Or you just making shit up again?

Apparently you are. If you can't understand a basic statement and have to invent new (more convenient) meanings for it. If he had meant to say it was impossible, he would have said that. It doesn't even farking contradict the lab leak theory, in which the virus made the jump IN the lab. It simply means that it does not appear to be engineered. Which, again, the science still supports today. Stop making shit up.

Lash out when you get caught lying again. Way to go. Hope that's what you're teaching your kids!

The vaccines didn't prevent transmission as much as hoped, but they did help. And in any case, a 5-7x reduction in hospitalization and death is a massive farking win. That IS slowing down the number of people dying. 1 million+ lives saved, and all you armchair epidemiologists can do is shit on that huge success. Give me a break. I know you're obsessed with terrible math, but as always, the asinine argument you are making applies perfectly to seat belts in cars. Regardless of the "death count" in raw numbers, seat belts are dramatically effective at saving lives on a per-incident basis. Exactly like the vaccines.

Bullshit. "Totally consistent with a jump of a species from an animal to a human" does not mean that a lab leak is impossible. It simply means that the evolutionary steps are plausible if not probable. On other words, there's no reason to jump to another explanation. Which is where the science still is today.

Not hospitalizations, dummy. Infections were waaaay up. It was a pandemic, after all. And no, news coverage is entirely dictated by what the audience wants to see. What gets eyeballs and clicks. These are businesses.

Jesus, man. Get a grip. Read those quotes. Fauci, as in your quotes, NEVER said it was definitive or impossible. Rather, he said simply that it was highly improbable. And, with apologies to the conspiracy theorists, the scientific perspective is STILL, years later, that the origin was most likely natural.

I think it's an incredibly juvenile term, but if anyone is a "vaxtard," it's the people who looked at a 5-7x reduction in hospitalization and a 5-7x reduction in death and said "Nah, I'll pass."

You get that you simply confirmed his point, right?

Nah, in the TV analogy it's more like when Tivo rolled out ad skipping. So you can see content you want without the pointless time wasters you don't. Why clutter your screen with things--or people--that don't have value? Helen Mirren is wise.

Biden inherited a broken economy from Trump. The damage was reversed and Biden handed Trump a robust economy--which Trump seems dead set on breaking in obvious ways. Trump did promise to reverse Biden's accomplishments. The MAGA cultists probably didn't realize that meant aggressively reversing the economic prosperity as well.

As long as Ukrainians have the will to fight for their freedom, they should be supported. We were supposed to protect them in exchange for nuclear disarmament. We've not lived up to that bargain. The least we can do now is to provide the conventional equipment they need to defend themselves. Freedom is not free, but it's not up to Trump to decide how much freedom is worth to another people, what sacrifices they should be willing to make. Let the Ukrainians choose the terms for themselves.

I don't think that's accurate. Political parties have typically coalesced around a political direction and a subset of core objectives--all subject to change over time in response to the priority of memberships. In a two-party system like we have in the US, that has typically meant broad and diverse values even within parties. People are aligned because "this" party better represents their views that "that" party. These are practical, pragmatic alliances. The idea of a "cult" though has heavy connotations around singularity of belief and purpose and often "worship" of a charismatic leader. It's not a pragmatic relationship, but one of "true believers" unified by purity and fervor. You can spot plenty of (typically ugly) examples in world history, but by my estimation the US has only twice been threatened by cultism. The first was the reverence for George Washington, who was offered a kingdom and had the vision to turn it down and re-vest power in the people. The second is this bizarre Trump takeover of the Republican party, which above all things prioritizes loyalty to the individual rather than to any set of values. That's why there's such chaos and whiplash. It's all the fervor of true belief, but belief in the individual (and whatever nonsense he says on a given day) rather than unifying principle. And unfortunately, unlike Washington, they are devoted to a man who will claim as much "kingship" as he can manage to acquire.

Just pull your head out of your ass. Will resolve most of that problem and it's easier to breathe.

They didn't plead nolo. They just didn't show up at all.

And then some people moved from South Africa to the US to spread it here. Hm...

Fun fact: it's not actually called a "pivot," it's called "presenting."

Exactly like I said, if only FDR had been such a brilliant "diplomat" he could have similarly averted much killing: just let them have it. This new "roll over and take it in the name of peace" crowd is truly pitiable. But you'd be well protected in prison. As a sad little shell of a man, perhaps "life" alone is sufficient for you, but the Ukrainians are made of sterner stuff. They believe that their fundamental rights include not just life, but also liberty and the pursuit of happiness. And if they are willing to fight for those things, the rest of the democratic world should be supporting them.