BRANDON J. WEICHERT | THE WEICHERT REPORT
Society is governed by institutions that have increasingly been under siege both from bad actors within their organizations and from misrepresentations in the mainstream press. Since being elected, President Trump has been blamed for being the source of the delegitimizing effect that our once hallowed institutions have suffered.
In fact, these institutions have been delegitimized by the very same “civil servants” who portray Trump and his leaders as being the source of the bad behavior. Whether it be continuing–and expanding–incompetence at the institutional level or outright corruption, these institutions have done a fairly good job of delegitimizing themselves in the eyes of the American people (whom they serve, but people they routinely look down upon on or simply have no attachment to, since they are increasingly aggregated in what usually seems like a foreign city, Washington, D.C.)
That is why so many people, myself included, are increasingly skeptical about even the ability of our well-funded medical organizations to respond adequately to the pandemic-level event (that the World Health Organization refuses to identify as a “pandemic,” even as the disease spreads like wildfire across the globe).
For several weeks, I have been warning readers about the fact that the coronavirus (coded CoVID-19 by medical professionals) is a pandemic and that both our institutions and those of China, where the disease first appeared (possibly, despite what we are told by our elites, from a poorly secured level 4 virology lab in Wuhan), are entirely unprepared for the outbreak. Their only solution is to obfuscate and attempt to control the flow of information about the disease to the public.
This, by the way, explains the source of most of the world’s present woes: there is an attempt to stunt the democratization of information and intelligence because such democratizing impacts would effectively tear down the edifices of control that our hollowed out and bloated elite institutions purport to possess.
Such behavior is especially true of China’s regime, which on a good day is opaque and authoritarian. When it experiences pressure from events, such as political unrest or a pandemic-level event, like the spread of the coronavirus, it becomes outrightly authoritarian.
Xi Jinping, the ruler of China, has had a bad year: his economy has been slowing down–and this trend has only increased under the pressure imposed by President Donald Trump’s “trade war”–while the people of Hong Kong have protested his rule (with problems arising in Maccau); he has gotten bad press for his heinous handling of the Muslim Uighur population of Xinjiang, Xi has also spent the last few years increasingly threatening his Taiwan neighbors, and he has been cracking down on the Falun Gong religious minority as well as the large (and growing) Christian population of China.
In response, Xi has militarized his society and coopted as much power in his own hands as possible. The coronavirus was both a risk and an opportunity: Xi needs to appear to be stomping out unrest and the disease unless Xi loses legitimacy both in the eyes of his people and those of his rival Communist Party members, who might coalesce to challenge his reign. If he can at least appear to be controlling the situation in both Hong Kong and the outbreak in Wuhan, then Xi’s power last. But, time is not on his side.
As this occurs, the Chinese regime has reached out to the West for assistance in finding a cure. Yet, they have manipulated the situation to their advantage; giving only what will help the West find a cure (which will then either be shared with China outrightly or be pilfered by Chinese “scientists” operating in among the Western firms and institutions feverishly working on a cure).
Here is a video of Wuhan-based nurse telling her audience that many more people had died and been infected with coronavirus than the Chinese government was telling the world back in January of this year:
China needs the West but they will only give us information that they think will help without making their ailing regime look bad. Beijing sits atop of the information flow coming out about the coronavirus outbreak. It’s very telling that as soon as the Chinese admitted to the outbreak in mid-January of this year, it almost immediately was leaked by a dying doctor in China, Li Wenliang (whose name should be on the lips of every freedom-loving person in the world) was aware of warning–and trying to warn authorities–of the disease outbreak far earlier than China admitted to being aware of in their dealings with Western scientists.
The World Health Organization, which was created by the West during the Cold War, has been–like so many international organizations–effectively coopted by Chinese personnel, money, and influence over the years. It is, therefore, not that surprising that their medical staff are so “skeptical” about the coronavirus being a pandemic (when it was clearly a pandemic) only after the leader of the WHO met with President Xi Jinping in January and ever since both he and his organization have towed the Chinese Communist Party’s official line. It’s also unsurprising that the WHO would kowtow to Xi, because they need the information to continue coming from China (even if the data sets are compromised by Chinese propagandists).
But, even the partial information China is a sharing with international medical workers is ineffective to stem the outbreak of the disease. Since the outbreak was admitted to by China, the United States’ Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has remained in lock-step with their colleagues in the WHO.
Until today.
Earlier today, even as the WHO pooh-poohed my theory that this was, in fact, a pandemic–and that it was unlikely that the coming warm weather would slow the pathology of the disease down–the CDC is issuing press releases indicating that they are preparing for a major outbreak. The CDC, WHO, etc. are staffed by smart people. They can see trends as much as the next person. What’s more, it is likely that they are aware that the information they are receiving from China on the disease–while helpful, though not as much as it could be–is insufficient to being able to actually contain the disease and prevent outbreak beyond its original source. Although, these organizations have appealed to their own authority (which is fundamentally compromised) in public.
Here is the CDC:
“We expect we will see community spread in this country,” said Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. “It’s not so much a question of if this will happen anymore, but rather more a question of exactly when this will happen and how many people in this country will have severe illness.”The agency tweeted Tuesday evening that Americans should think about getting ready. “Now is the time for US businesses, hospitals, and communities to begin preparing for the possible spread of #COVID19,” it wrote, referring to the name the World Health Organization has given the novel coronavirus. “CDC continues to work with business, education & healthcare sectors, encouraging employers to be prepared.”
Their concern is to prevent panic.
That is a fair concern and my goal with these posts on the coronavirus is not to fear monger or to incite panic. My hope is that we can force these organizations to be more honest with Americans about what is coming. I live in Florida, the land of the seasonal hurricanes. In these events, the more information authorities share with people in the path of the storm, the more lives are saved and preserved. An overabundance of caution is often preferable rather than keeping mum and hoping for the best. Stoicism is good, but not always.
The coronavirus outbreak is a global pandemic–and it should be publicly labeled as such so that people understand the severity of the crisis and make adjustments to their routines accordingly. The coronavirus is the equivalent of a hurricane: it might not be able to be stopped, but we can move out of its way. In this case, we can stem the flow of people coming into the United States from abroad and work hard to build better containment facilities and prepare our medical infrastructure in the United States for managing an epidemic.
Right now, the American system–whether it be resisting a pandemic or mitigating a cyberattack–exists on a razor’s edge. When there is no serious threat; when everything works as it should, our system is amazing. But, when outside pressure mounts in unconventional or unforeseen ways, such as with a pandemic, our system finds itself strained and near-collapse. Yes, we’ve thus far weathered the storm. But, we are already witnessing how FEMA, Health and Human Services, and CDC are scrambling to prepare for the coming storm…and they are found wanting in most cases.
In such situations as these, organizations, whether it be a company or a political campaign or the CDC attempt to control the information flow and manage perceptions. If the goal is to avoid panic and disruptions to the everyday economy and political system, then they will not share information necessary for Americans to survive until it absolutely must be shared–and it will always be framed in the least truthful ways. They must appear to be in control–even though they are not. This is their appeal to authority and it is this appeal that gives them the monopoly of power these institutions usually need to remain legitimate and in control during crises.
What they don’t understand is that playing keep-away with the people, especially in today’s media-saturated environment, will only lead to their further delegitimization. I suspect that most of these organizations in the West handling the coronavirus understand that the Chinese data is skewed and they are simply managing expectations; releasing press warnings and statements warning of a coming proliferation of the disease to the United States on an as-needed basis. But, delays will only make it harder for the people to weather the storm. This is something these organizations don’t quite seem to understand.
The CDC is distancing itself from the narrative the WHO and the Chinese are spinning. This is because we are going to start seeing the rise of the coronavirus in earnest here in the United States. The CDC probably knows this and is preparing for major disruptions (because our system is not prepared to handle a pandemic).
Over time, the WHO will continue delaying the admittance that coronavirus is a global pandemic until it absolutely cannot. The CDC, being closer to the American people and having their rear-end in the proverbial sling, must be more willing to come clean sooner. Yet, this is not soon enough. They should have been demanding that the White House seal the border and slow trade. They did not. We will suffer now because of political and economic concerns trumping health concerns.
Things will get worse here before they get better. Just look to China: the regime is outrightly lying about what’s really happening there…and the institutions that are supposed to protect us in the West have been simply taking China’s word that all is under control (even as new disease patterns appear outside of China and Asia, and in Italy, Iran, and even in Michigan).
Given that the disease mirrors influenza, there is also no reason to take China’s word (or the Trump administration for that matter) that the disease will simply go away over the summer because of the warm weather. Instead, we can expect a new paradigm for humanity, courtesy of China: Human existence + coronavirus.
Let’s just hope they can find a cure soon.
THE WEICHERT REPORT 