QUESTION ASKED: Does the White House Believe Vaccines Work or Not?
Jen Psaki’s response is a lot of things: snide, condescending, arrogant, uniquely irritating in the way that only a lifelong political parasite can be. However, it is not an answer to Peter Doocy’s question.
Either the vaccines work or they don’t. If they work, why do vaccinated people need to wear masks?
Millions of Americans are asking that question today. Millions more are afraid to ask that question because a Democrat will scream at them. And this White House will not tell us.
It’s panic. They’re panicking and they don’t know what to do. “Quick, put on masks! Wear a mask even when you’re in the shower! No, it doesn’t matter if you’re vaccinated! Forget everything we told you just yesterday because WE’RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!!”
Earlier: The Pressure Campaign to Restore Pandemic Restrictions Is Succeeding.
It’s hard to avoid the impression that we’re witnessing a pressure campaign designed to compel the CDC to reimpose COVID mitigation restrictions on the public. There’s more where this came from. The World Health Organization advises all adults to continue masking even if they’re fully vaccinated. Donald Trump’s surgeon general, Dr. Jerome Adams, insists that the CDC was “premature” to abandon its masking guidance. Ubiquitous public health advocate Dr. Leana Wen advises all parents of children under 12 to continue to avoid public indoor settings like restaurants even with a mask. But if you must go inside, masking should be mandatory. “With coronavirus infections climbing throughout the country and the pandemic worsening once more,” she wrote, “the Biden administration needs to strongly urge a return of covid-19 restrictions.” After all, the United States is on a much “different trajectory” than it was in May (when she also opposed the lifting of mask mandates).
To judge from the media landscape, the activists who favor a return of pandemic-related restrictions even despite the nation’s enviable immunization rate are winning the argument. Polling—an industry whose own professionals confess is hopelessly broken—suggests that the public overwhelmingly favors the reimposition of onerous mid-pandemic restrictions on social and economic life. It seems like a safe bet that the Biden administration will eventually agree with the loudest voices in the room—sacrificing its claim to have broken the pandemic and scuttling much of the progress toward a full economic recovery in the process.
It’s not at all clear what effect restoring mask mandates will have on localized rates of COVID infection. If, however, the Biden administration accepts the premise that the pandemic is back in full force despite all the sacrifices the public has already made over the last 18 months, the political consequences are far easier to predict.
As Glenn wrote this morning, “There’s a lot of opportunity in being the anti-Lockdown, anti-Karen party.”