Polarizing Georgia Republican Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene appeared on Sunday’s “MediaBuzz” on Fox News where host Howard Kurtz asked her about past comments that showed her support of QAnon. Greene told Kurtz, “Well, like a lot of people today, I had easily gotten sucked into some things I had seen on the internet. But that was dealt with quickly, early on. I never campaigned on those things. That was not something I believed in. That’s not what I ran for Congress on. So those are so far in the past.”
Kurtz allowed that answer to stand and didn’t push her further.
As a reminder, before running for Congress, Greene called Q a “patriot” on social media. She continued to talk about QAnon after becoming a congresswoman. In testimony for the Jan. 6 committee, former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson said Greene brought up QAnon several times with then-President Donald Trump and his chief of staff Mark Meadows. Hutchinson testified, “Ms. Greene came up and began talking to us about QAnon and QAnon going to the rally, and she had a lot of constituents that are QAnon, and they'll all be there. And she was showing him pictures of them traveling up to Washington, D.C., for the rally on the 6th.”
Last April, Greene spoke with Real America's Voice’s “Prime Time with Dr. Gina Loudon.” Greene echoed QAnon by calling Democrats the “Party of Pedophiles” and said, “The Democrats are the party of elementary school teachers trying to transition their elementary school aged children and convince them they are different gender. This is the party of their identity, and their identity is the most disgusting, evil, horrible thing happening in our country.”
Those are just some examples. The Independent’s John Bowden wrote, “Though there have been too many to mention, a notable example is her past statement suggesting that a California wildfire was started by lasers fired from space by a wealthy family with Jewish heritage, the Rothschilds.”
Depressing headline of the day
This from The Washington Post: “New variant XBB.1.5 is ‘most transmissible’ yet, could fuel covid wave.”
The Post’s Fenit Nirappil and Lauren Weber wrote, “Three years after the novel coronavirus emerged, a new variant, XBB.1.5, is quickly becoming the dominant strain in parts of the United States because of a potent mix of mutations that makes it easier to spread broadly, including among those who have been previously infected or vaccinated.”
The Post reports there is no evidence that the new variant is more severe than its predecessors. And Vaughn Cooper, a professor of evolutionary biology at the University of Pittsburgh, told the Post, “XBB did not evolve because people were vaccinated. The way it evolved, let’s be straight, is because people were infected by multiple viruses at the same time.”
In a column for The Post, Eric Topol, professor of molecular medicine at Scripps Research, wrote, “There’s no sugar-coating it: The world has let its guard down on covid-19. And the virus’s latest dominant form, XBB.1.5, makes clear that we’re doing so just as the virus finds new ways to hurt us.”
Topol added, “The new dominant strain shows that the virus is always evolving to spread more quickly and infect us more efficiently. That should serve as a wake-up call for the country to re-invest in new vaccines, treatments and pandemic monitoring.”
An essay about her husband … and the world
Dr. Celine Gounder — widow of sportswriter Grant Wahl, who died suddenly while covering last year’s World Cup — wrote a guest essay for The New York Times: “Grant Wahl Was a Loving Husband. I Will Always Protect His Legacy.” Gounder is an infectious-disease physician and epidemiologist and host of the podcast “Epidemic.”
Gounder recounted first hearing that her husband had died in Qatar and how the news became public. She wrote, “But soon strangers began blaming Grant’s death on COVID-19 vaccines, a playbook I know all too well and a move I refuse to let stand. I knew that disinformation purveyors would blame Grant’s death on COVID vaccines, and I knew what tactics they would use to do so. I also knew that debunking what these people believe head-on in public risks giving them the attention they crave and invites further trolling.”
She added, “This was my Grant, and I needed to know what had happened to him. And I knew I had to share that information publicly: Pairing facts with empathy is the best way to disempower trolls.”
Preliminary results of the autopsy showed Wahl’s aorta, the large blood vessel carrying blood from his heart, had ruptured. Still, Gounder was attacked on social media and in emails, including one she claimed said, “Now you understand that you killed your poor husband. Karma is a bitch.”
I encourage you to read the rest of the powerful essay, where Gounder writes about the tactics and misinformation used by anti-vaxxers. She concludes by writing, “Grant will be remembered for his kindness, openness and generosity. His legacy is his commitment to seeking truth through reporting, supporting human rights and fighting for equality. I will continue to honor Grant by living by our shared values. I’m channeling my grief into something productive: protecting the public’s health against those who would profit from the suffering of others.”
Remembering a legendary journalist
Bernard Kalb — the longtime journalist and analyst, as well as spokesperson in Ronald Reagan’s White House — died over the weekend at his home in Maryland. He was 100. His brother, journalist Marvin Kalb, reported that Bernard died from complications of a fall.
Kalb is best known for his journalism career covering international affairs at CBS News, NBC News and The New York Times. In 1992, Kalb became the original host and panelist on CNN’s media show “Reliable Sources,” a post he held until 1998.
Bart Barnes wrote in The Washington Post: “In a career spanning six decades, Mr. Kalb became a high-profile journalist who crossed paths with some of the most intriguing personalities of his generation. When he was a young Army journalist during World War II, his editor was the detective story master Dashiell Hammett — ‘a bayonet of a man,’ Mr. Kalb later recalled, and a ‘giant of an author who took a bunch of semiliterate kids and turned them into amateur newsmen.’”
In 1984, Kalb went from covering the State Department to working for it as a spokesperson. But he resigned after two years to protest what he called “the reported disinformation program conducted by the Reagan Administration against the Libyan leader Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.”
Tweet of the day
Horror author (and noted Elon Musk critic) Stephen King on Sunday: “There are persistent rumors that I have left Twitter. I have not. I may do so eventually, there are many things about the Musk iteration of the site that I don't care for, but that day is not today. You don't fix a thing by leaving it.”
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