If you want to feel hopeless about the coronavirus pandemic and be convinced President Trump has allowed the virus to wreak havoc, CNN is the place for you. But Thursday night on the Fox News Channel, Tucker Carlson provided a reality check in showing how New York City’s far-left local officials initially dismissed the virus. And thanks to CNN, they’ve been able to absolve themselves of responsibility for the chaos inside their hospitals.
And with efforts on Friday from people like the great Tom Elliott from Grabien and National Review’s Jim Geraghty, there are voluminous examples of how, while CNN has reveled in bashing previous statements by the President suggesting the virus wouldn’t amount to anything, the double standard is glaring.
Carlson started the monologue by noting that “the most obvious answer” for the city’s troubles is that it’s “the densest metro area in the country” and it’s a transient area with droves coming and going.
That said, he then explained the more sinister answer and teed up a February 2 clip of NYC Health Commissioner Oxiris Barbot dismissing the virus (click “expand”):
CARLSON: As this deadly virus that emerged from Eastern China and began to spread inexorably across the globe, clearly headed here, leaders in New York not only failed to shield their citizens from it, they took affirmative and aggressive steps to increase the risk to their population. Why would they do that? Well, because they were worried far more about being called racist than protecting human lives. That’s not an overstatement. That’s not hyperbole. Watch the city’s Health Commissioner, Oxiris Barbot, urge New Yorkers to spend as much time as possible in crowded public places. Keep in mind this video was from February 2nd of this year. That was long after the threat from the Chinese coronavirus was obvious to anyone who was paying attention.
BARBOT [on 02/02/20]: The risk to New Yorkers for coronavirus is low and that our preparedness as a city is very high. [SCREEN WIPE] There is no reason not to take the subway, not to take the bus, not to go out to your favorite restaurant, and certainly not to miss the parade next Sunday. I’m going to be there.
CARLSON: Take the subway. Go to dinner. People cheer. They feel good about themselves.
In the next clip, state Senator John Liu (D-NY) said that “there’s really no need to panic and to avoid activities that we always do as New Yorkers” and “[d]iseases originate from anywhere or from particular places in the world.”
And then in the third clip, Liu’s Senate colleague Brian Kavanaugh insisted New Yorkers take to the streets for Chinese New Year festivities. He also warned “it is very important that we ensure that we don’t have misinformation and many in the media have been covering this issue as if it’s, you know, a terrible plague that people have to avoid.”
Carlson saved perhaps the best (or worst?) for last: Mayor Bill de Blasio (D). Geraghty’s piece laid out a meticulous timeline of his Baghdad Bob-like statements, but Carlson stuck with two great examples. Unfortunately, he didn’t include de Blasio’s infamous YMCA visit (click “expand”):
On March 2nd, this March 2nd, Mayor Bill de Blasio tweeted this: "Since I’m encouraging New Yorkers to go on with your lives + get out on the town, despite Coronavirus, I thought I would offer some suggestions. Here’s the first: thru Thursday, go see "The Traitor"…If "The Wire" was a true story + set in Italy, it would be this film." That’s right, go to a movie theater immediately. You must. A week later, de Blasio was still encouraging New Yorkers to live it up and mingle in large groups. On March 11th, which keep in mind was barely two weeks ago, de Blasio was still insisting that: “If you’re not sick, you should be going about your life." That very same day, the NBA announced it was suspending its whole season. Italy was already several days into a national lockdown, but the mayor of one of the world’s most crowded cities was telling everyone to carry on and so the Chinese coronavirus was just a racist myth.
Soon after that, people in New York inevitably started to get sick, in some cases very sick. In some cases they died and then suddenly de Blasio was on Meet the Press shrieking that Donald Trump had abandoned the city. ‘It was their fault. It’s all their fault.’ That line almost always works, which is why de Blasio did it. The media play along and move on to the next thing and no one remembers what actually happened. Will that happen this time? Maybe not. This time might be different.
Elliott had even more receipts. In the first of four tweets, Elliott featured Barbot from February 7 telling New Yorkers to “go about your lives, take the subway, go out, enjoy life” and that the city’s preparedness was “high.”
She noted that “we’re always learning more,” but CNN sure doesn’t seem keen on giving Trump or their other enemies that benefit.
And then on February 10’s Morning Joe, Elliott’s clip had de Blasio asserting that “if you’re under 50 and you’re health, which is most New Yorkers, there’s very little threat here,” adding that “even if you get it, basically acts like a common cold or flu and transmission is not that easy.”
Yikes.
Two hours prior, The Situation Room was one of countless CNN shows to not only demand Trump not offer scared Americans even a dose of positive rhetoric, but brag about how wrong he was to claim a month ago that the cases would soon hit zero.
With urging from host Wolf Blitzer, CNN medical personality Dr. Sanjay Gupta huffed that “it clearly didn’t go the way that he said” and thus Trump shouldn’t be trusted. Gupta also claimed that “public health officials” and many others knew this pandemic was coming, so the president should be called out for allowing to transpire a scenario that “was predictable.”
But as we saw above, that sure wasn’t the case in New York City.
To see the relevant transcript from FNC’s Tucker Carlson Tonight on March 26, click “expand.”
FNC’s Tucker Carlson Tonight
March 26, 2020
8:08 p.m. EasternTUCKER CARLSON: So you saw what’s happening in New York. The question is why is the outbreak so especially devastating there? New York City is the densest metro area in the country. That’s the most obvious answer. Probably the biggest problem. The city also has an awful lot of people traveling to and from other infected countries, and that’s significant, too. But it’s not the whole story. As this deadly virus that emerged from Eastern China and began to spread inexorably across the globe, clearly headed here, leaders in New York not only failed to shield their citizens from it, they took affirmative and aggressive steps to increase the risk to their population. Why would they do that? Well, because they were worried far more about being called racist than protecting human lives. That’s not an overstatement. That’s not hyperbole. Watch the city’s Health Commissioner, Oxiris Barbot, urge New Yorkers to spend as much time as possible in crowded public places. Keep in mind this video was from February 2nd of this year. That was long after the threat from the Chinese coronavirus was obvious to anyone who was paying attention.
NEW YORK CITY HEALTH COMMISSIONER OXIRIS BARBOT [on 02/02/20]: The risk to New Yorkers for coronavirus is low and that our preparedness as a city is very high. [SCREEN WIPE] There is no reason not to take the subway, not to take the bus, not to go out to your favorite restaurant, and certainly not to miss the parade next Sunday. I’m going to be there.
CARLSON: Take the subway. Go to dinner. People cheer. They feel good about themselves. Future generations, though, are going to watch that video with their jaws open in disbelief. How could someone charged with protecting public health so recklessly endanger it? They’ll watch this performance from State Senator John Liu, too. Liu suggested that people who might be concerned in any way about contracting a deadly disease or who might be interested in where it came from must be -- and you guessed it -- bigots.
STATE SENATOR JOHN LIU (D-NY) [on 02/02/20]: But there’s really no need to panic and to avoid activities that we always do as New Yorkers. We are a hardy people. [SCREEN WIPE] As an Asian-American, I’ve been somewhat disturbed, if not outright appalled at some of the comments or gestures that I have seen. [SCREEN WIPE] Diseases originate from anywhere or from particular places in the world.
CARLSON: In other words, as a member of a protected interest group, I’m ordering you to ignore this threat to your family on moral grounds. Go to the parade, or else. That’s what Liu was saying. Let’s hope that in the wake of this disaster, after John Liu has lost his job, and we can all think clearly again, people will stop talking this way in public for good. It was always the most brutal form of social control masquerading as sensitivity and caring. Now, we know it was infecting the public with disease, but at the time, sentiments like this were universal among big city public officials. State Senator Brian Kavanagh, for example, decided to embark on a crusade against what he called misinformation, a euphemism, as it so often is for accurate information. Kavanagh encourage people to head to Chinatown for a festival.
STATE SENATOR BRIAN KAVANAGH (D-NY) [on 02/02/20]: It’s very important that we recognize that this holiday and this festival is of tremendous significance for many communities in our state and it is very important that we ensure that we don’t have misinformation and many in the media have been covering this issue as if it’s, you know, a terrible plague that people have to avoid.
CARLSON: If you don’t go to a crowded public place immediately, you’re racist. Look at those people telling you that, demanding that you do that. Hectoring you, badgering you, exerting moral blackmail on you to expose yourself. By early March, coronavirus was clearly becoming a major problem in the United States, but for elected officials in New York, the only problem was their constituents’ racist worries about staying alive. On March 2nd, this March 2nd, Mayor Bill de Blasio tweeted this: "Since I’m encouraging New Yorkers to go on with your lives + get out on the town, despite Coronavirus, I thought I would offer some suggestions. Here’s the first: thru Thursday, go see "The Traitor"…If "The Wire" was a true story + set in Italy, it would be this film." That’s right, go to a movie theater immediately. You must. A week later, de Blasio was still encouraging New Yorkers to live it up and mingle in large groups. On March 11th, which keep in mind was barely two weeks ago, de Blasio was still insisting that: “If you’re not sick, you should be going about your life." That very same day, the NBA announced it was suspending its whole season. Italy was already several days into a national lockdown, but the mayor of one of the world’s most crowded cities was telling everyone to carry on and so the Chinese coronavirus was just a racist myth. Soon after that, people in New York inevitably started to get sick, in some cases very sick. In some cases they died and then suddenly de Blasio was on Meet the Press shrieking that Donald Trump had abandoned the city. ‘It was their fault. It’s all their fault.’ That line almost always works, which is why de Blasio did it. The media play along and move on to the next thing and no one remembers what actually happened. Will that happen this time? Maybe not. This time might be different. This pandemic is too horrible. Too many people are getting hurt. Nobody really liked identity politics anyway. All it did was help mediocrities like Bill de Blasio get elected to office, but it was disgusting and cruel and divisive, and now we know it can get people killed. Maybe we can stop.
